Drowning Ruth

by Christina Schwarz

  “No,” Ruth said quickly.

  “Yes,” Imogene said. “Ruth met someone interesting.”

  “You don't say. What was he like, Ruth?” Lillian leaned so eagerly over the table that some of the egg salad dropped out of her sandwich.

  Ruth was trying to finish her homework for that afternoon, two pages of shorthand she'd neglected over the weekend. “He wasn't anything special, Lillian. He liked the way Genie danced, but who doesn't?”

  “When are you going to let me do something with your hair, Ruth?” Myrtle asked, offering cigarettes around before lighting her own. “Men would like the way you danced, too, if you didn't look like an old-fashioned schoolmarm.”

  “Myrtle can do hair, Ruth,” Lillian said. “She does mine, you know, the cut and the wave.” She turned to show off the back.

  “And the color,” Myrtle added. “Under that henna, Lillian's got hair like a mouse.”

  “It's true. I do.”

  There was something of the little girl with the black tooth in the way Ruth looked at the sisters then, as if they were the oddities and not she, but now she smiled, as she would never have done before. After all, they were only trying to help.

  “My aunt likes it this way,” she said. “It doesn't bother me.”

  The office door at the back of the room opened and young Mr. Brown, the typing teacher, stepped out and strolled slowly through the classroom with his hands in the pockets of his smartly cut trousers. He was known as “young” Mr. Brown to distinguish him from his father, the school's founder, but he was hardly young by Imogene and Ruth's standards. He'd had ambitions once and pursued them to Milwaukee, but had been somehow disappointed. He combed his hair back to show its curl to advantage and kept his nails manicured. While other teachers rolled up their shirtsleeves and smudged chalk on their ties, no one could imagine young Mr.Brown shedding his jacket during the school day. Imogene said that was because he couldn't bear to be separated from the flask in the pocket.

  “How're my girls?” he asked, resting one hand on Imogene's shoulder, the other on Ruth's, and leaning between them to put his face next to theirs. He took a paternal stance toward his female students as an excuse to touch them and to stroke their hair. Ruth twitched almost involuntarily like a horse with a fly on its neck. She closed her notebook and studied its cover, waiting for him to move on.

  Imogene, though, looked him full in the face and nodded briskly. “Ruth needs to finish her work,” she said. “Was there something you wanted?”

  Mr. Brown straightened his back. “No, no,” he said, “I'm off for my coffee break.” He removed his hand from Imogene's shoulder and to compensate gave Ruth's a little squeeze.

  Imogene rolled her eyes at his retreating back. “Coffee, I'll bet.” She turned her attention back to the table. “I wonder if Arthur Owens will be at the dance this week. Did he say anything about it to you, Ruth?”

  “I already told you everything he said to me,” Ruth answered without looking up. She slid her notebook in front of Imogene. “Show me how to do ‘ough' again. I can never remember.”

  “You could remember if you tried,” Imogene said impatiently but she took the pencil Ruth held out to her.

  The woman who stepped into the room just then wore a cinnamon-colored suit and a hat that wasn't the usual cloche, but a new style with a feather, angled to half hide her face. “Would you please tell me where I could find Mr. Brown?”

  “Young Mr. Brown or old Mr. Brown?” Lillian piped up.

  The woman hesitated. “I don't know. I want to hire a secretary.”

  “Then you'll want to see old Mr. Brown,” Imogene said. She was already on her feet. “I'd be happy to show you to his office.”

  “Did you see her shoes?” Imogene whispered as she slid back into her seat.

  When the woman emerged from the office, she glanced toward the table and raised her hand to Imogene, who waved back.

  “What did you say to her?” Ruth asked.

  “Oh, I don't know.” Imogene shrugged. “Just something about how much I've learned here.”

  “But you're only in Level Two!” Lillian protested.

  “I type faster than most of the people in Level Four. Besides, she wants someone gracious and sensible to answer her telephone and make appointments and keep her schedule in order. I'd be good at that. Wouldn't I, Ruth?”

  Gracious and sensible, Ruth thought, those weren't Imogene's words. But they did describe her, part of her anyway.

  Mr. Brown came out of his office with a notice and tacked it to the board.

  HELP WANTED:

  Personal secretary. Typing, filing, some dictation.

  Must have good telephone manners.

  No experience necessary.

  Theresa Owens (Mrs. Clement), W290 N3040 Lakeside Road.

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Ruth, I've got to get you in that house!” Imogene had stopped to see Ruth and Amanda on her way home from her first day at work at the Owenses'.

  “Are you riding your bicycle tonight?” Amanda asked. “It'll be raining in an hour.”

  “Oh, no, my parents let me take the Ford. I thought it would make a better impression. But let me tell you about this place.” She pulled Ruth down beside her at the kitchen table and described the rooms Mrs. Owens had shown her that afternoon, sketching their positions with her finger on the oilcloth, and recalling as well as she could the colors and fabrics and furnishings.

  “Two fireplaces, what a waste!” Amanda said. “What's the use of two fireplaces?”

  “Well, it's a big room. There's one at either end, you see, so you can use just half the room for an intimate evening or the whole thing for a grand party. And she calls it the living room. Don't you think that's a much better term? So much more … I don't know … lively than front room. Of course, the whole house is quite rustic compared with their house in town.”

  “Of course,” Amanda said dryly. “Imogene, Ruth tells me you've quit Brown's to do this job. I thought you girls were working toward something better than typing some woman's letters. I thought you were going to be advertisers.” She held a plate of coffeecake in front of each of them in turn.

  Ruth started to take a piece, but Imogene stopped her with a hand on her wrist. “Wait, Ruth. Try this.” From her pocketbook she pulled a smashed triangle of layer cake wrapped in her hankie. “I smuggled it out for you. Isn't it scrumptious? Mocha.” She pronounced the word carefully. “The Owenses' cook is from Austria. Did you know Austrians make the best pastry? I'm learning so much from Mrs. Owens. She's the president of all sorts of committees. She's even on the board at that hospital you used to work at, Miss Starkey.

  “Ruth, you'll never guess what we had for dinner—lunch, I mean—cucumber sandwiches with the crusts cut off and iced tea with a sprig of mint in it. It tasted so fresh that way. Mrs. Owens says you must grow a patch of mint near your house for iced tea. And you know what she put on the plate—just for decoration, although you could eat them? Wild strawberries—you know those adorable tiny ones? Garnish makes the plate, that's what Mrs. Owens says.”

  “What's the point of putting something on your plate that you're not going to eat?” Ruth asked.

  Amanda breathed deeply to steady her voice. “So where was Mr. Owens while you were touring his house?”

  “Oh, he's up in Door County, doing something with ships,I believe. Arthur went with him,” Imogene added for Ruth's benefit.

  The Rebecca Rae, Amanda recalled with relief, was headed for Duluth, nowhere near Door County. “Well, Imogene,” she said, “it all sounds very exciting, but hadn't you better be running along?” She forced herself to smile. “We don't want your mother to think we've kidnapped you.”

  It went on like this, week after week, Imogene modeling a hand-me-down cashmere sweater Mrs. Owens had given her, choosing new stockings to match her employer's shade, and speaking with an inflection she'd never used before. Once, when Ruth wasn't at home, Imogene left a note for her. The me
ssage was not written in her usual compact, slanted script; instead the words were up and down, full of curves and loops and fat round letters. The girl is possessed, Amanda thought, holding the page to the light. But she knew that what gnawed at her was only jealousy.

  Amanda

  The baby was strong now, stronger than I was. It had made me into its creature, with swollen breasts and massive belly, over which the skin stretched slick and tight, like the peel around a currant. It demanded all of my body's attention, all of my food, all of my sleep. It exhausted me.

  I heaped quilts and pillows on the davenport in the front room, and it was all I could do to lumber from my bed in the morning to that spot where I spent most of the day, looking through the glass at the undulating lake, a clean blue space between my tangled nest and the brown, yellow and red patchwork of the shore. Swimming was out of the question now. Propped uncomfortably in my cocoon against the cold wall, I could see that the deep blue of the water was unnaturally gorgeous. It was slippery and unstable. It was not to be trusted.

  I tried to read an old newspaper, but my mind wouldn't take in the words. I let the pages slide to the floor in a slovenly heap. Without my energy, the whole place was falling apart. The garden had gone to seed. The squash and potatoes and onions were buried in weeds. The little room where Ruth slept was strewn with sticks, colored leaves, rocks, and even seaweed, as if the outside had moved in. With the advent of cold weather, spiders had crept in, too, and Ruth seemed always to be crouched in some corner poking at a daddy-long-legs with her fingertip.

  “Ruth, stop that!” I said, seeing she was at it now. “Here, let's wash your face.”

  I hefted myself off the davenport and tromped heavily into the kitchen. Ruth pitter-pattered behind. I picked up the dishtowel, meaning to wet it at the sink, but it was already damp and crusted with flour in patches. “Oh, Ruth,” I sighed, sinking into a chair. “What have we come to?”

  “Outside,” she said. “Wanna go outside.”

  “All right. Let me button your sweater.” I kissed her forehead and opened the back door for her. “Be careful. Don't go near the water.”

  I kept an eye on her from the window and moved desultorily around the kitchen, trying to make sense of the mess we'd let accumulate there.

  “Mattie!” I called once, just looking for company. But then I remembered she'd gone to the farm.

  I picked up a pile of books and papers she'd let drift into a heap on the counter. Really, reading material did not belong in the kitchen. I carried it into the front room, but all the surfaces there were already covered, so I took my load to Mathilda's room and dumped it on her unmade bed. This way, at least, she would have to take care of it before she went to sleep.

  I glanced out the window, then, for Ruth. I didn't see her in the back. I looked out the side window, searching the garden up and down for her red sweater. Nothing. I hurried to the front. There she was, standing on some rocks and leaning over the water.

  I opened the door and yelled, “Ruth! Come back here!” But she didn't budge, didn't even seem to hear me. Despite my unwieldy body, I was down at the shore before I was even aware that I'd left the porch. If she'd been falling in, I'd probably have caught her before she hit the water, but she wasn't falling in. She was just stirring the lake, making whirlpools with a long stick.

  The rocks were pleasantly warm in the sun, although the air was chilly, and I sat down next to her, every so often wrapping one hand around her leg to steady my nerves. The water rose and fell between the rocks. I couldn't take my eyes off the ebb and flow. Until I noticed the bit of white.

  It was stuck between two rocks and had not yet slipped far enough for the water to drag it away. I reached for it, but my fingers wouldn't fit.

  “Here, Ruth. Let me borrow your stick a moment.”

  Wedging the stick between the rocks, I managed to work the white paper out far enough to pinch it up. It was an envelope addressed to Carl. Mathilda must have dropped it when she was getting into the boat.

  Of course, I knew what I ought to do, and seven months ago I would have given it, unopened, to Mattie upon her return. But now I was different. Now I was tempted. Now I had to know what Mattie had written about me. Why should I give it back to her? If I hadn't happened to find it, it would have been lost forever. Maybe I was meant to find it, I told myself—that's the way I thought in those months—maybe it was waiting here for me.

  In a way, I'd made myself forget about Carl. After all, far away as he was and likely to be killed, he had very little to do with us. What I'd imagined when I thought of Mattie raising my baby was something very much like what we were doing now, except with four instead of three. My baby would be both mine and Mattie's, just as Ruth was now Mattie's and mine. In the family I'd envisioned, there was no place for Carl, for squeaking bedsprings, for private smiles, for suppers with applesauce instead of rhubarb to please a man who had to have everything sweet.

  But Mattie, clearly, did not feel as I did. In the letter she told him everything, everything I'd done, everything we'd planned. I was shocked. I saw myself there on the page, the facts of my foolishness and my shame in Mattie's sloppy, black letters. I couldn't stand to look at it. And I couldn't stand for him to see it, Carl with his talk of horses and his smooth dance steps and his birdhouse. I didn't want him to have any part of it.

  In the letter, too, I could see that with him she was not herself. That was almost the worst of it. On the pages she'd meant for him, her voice seemed different from the one I knew, not only in the things she'd meant to keep private—that I wouldn't have minded so much—but in her everyday observations as well. I could hardly catch a hint of my Mattie in that letter. And when she and he were together—I could see it clearly now—my Mattie would be gone, and there would be no place for me.

  For the moment, though, I could still keep him out of it. And then, well, the longer he was away, the better chance that he'd never come back.

  “Ruthie, find me a nice rock, about this big,” I said, balling her little hand into a fist.

  When she brought me the rock, I crumpled the letter around it and heaved it as far as I could. The water gulped, and it was gone.

  “That was a good one,” Ruthie said. “Do it again!”

  “It's time for your nap.”

  That night at supper Ruth announced to her mother, “Aunt Mandy threw a letter and it went plop.”

  “A letter? You mean a rock, don't you, Ruthie?” Mattie said.

  Ruth looked at me.

  “Yes, Ruthie,” I said. “Remember, it was a rock like this.” And I wrapped my hand around her fist and squeezed, not too hard, but hard enough to show her that I meant it.

  Amanda's pulse was racing by 5:30 A.M., and the air, emerging shivery and wet from its bath in the early autumn night, made her hurry still faster. Quickly, she milked the five cows and fed the few other animals she and Ruth still kept. With Carl so often away and Rudy aging and prices the way they were, the fields lay fallow, except for the two she'd rented to Joe Tully. She'd pass him somewhere along the way, if she went up the road toward town, but she wasn't going into town. Instead, she slipped a piece of coffeecake into her pocket and took the path into the woods.

  Ever since she'd discovered that Imogene was working for Theresa Owens, Amanda had begun to watch the Owenses' house as often as she could. Each morning, so far, she'd seen the same thing: Clement in a French-blue robe, presumably terry cloth, angling down the slope of his green lawn toward his charming boathouse, a chalet with gingerbread hanging from the roofline and pink ivy geraniums spilling from the windowboxes. He was handsome still, if anything, more so, at least through the binoculars. His walk was confident but less swaggering; his movements, more tentative than they'd once been, appeared thoughtful.

  Languorously, he walked across the sand under the chalet's porch and onto the pier, jouncing a bit to test its firmness, making sure nothing had slipped or warped during the night. Three quarters of the way to the end, he sh
ucked off his robe and let it drop in a heap at his feet. He didn't dive, as Amanda expected, but sat on the edge of the pier, first dangling his feet in the water and then easing his body in, as if lowering himself into a bath. His strokes were sinuous but weary, his arms lifting in slow arcs and then seeming almost to drop into the water again. For twenty yards he pushed forward and then disappeared beneath the water. When he emerged, he was turned to crawl back. He swam this length twice and then stopped, holding onto the edge of the pier. After a minute or two he hauled himself out.

  He shrugged back into his robe without drying himself, and she saw him take from the pocket a little box, open it, and transfer something from it to his tongue, before he stretched out flat under the warming sun, his hands crossed on his chest, so that he looked like a man in his coffin.

  At nine, Imogene appeared, picking her way down the drive, which was so steep she had to set her feet from toe to heel, and then taking the stairs to the porch with a running step that made her skirt bounce. She lingered a moment at the top, turning to face the lake and standing with one hand on the nearest pillar, as if planting a flag to claim the view for herself. Then she crossed the porch, stood in front of the towering door, and finally disappeared into the great white pillared maw that was the Owenses' house.

  But today, after a minute or two, the door reopened, and Imo-gene was once again on the porch. She trotted back down the stairs and continued down the hill toward the lake. Amanda slid onto the floor of her rowboat, ducking her head below the gunwale, praying she was too far away for Imogene to recognize, but the girl paid no attention to the water or anything on it. Instead, she sat neatly on her heels beside a stand of tiger lilies and began to cut them.

  “Doesn't that woman know they won't keep?” Amanda thought indignantly, but the picking of wildflowers disturbed her far less than what happened next.