Family Secrets

by Judith Henry Wall

  Hattie was a late bloomer but finally began to fill out. And some of the men who visited her mother began asking about her. She could hear such conversations just the other side of the curtain. Mama would laugh as if they were making a joke. “Why, she’s just a child,” she would say.

  Then one evening while they ate the last of a pot of watery stew in the shabby kitchen with the linoleum worn clear though and soot on the wall behind the cookstove, Mama took only a few bites, then put down her spoon and stared past Hattie’s shoulder at the corner of the room and told her that a man had offered a lot of money to be the very first to have “sexual intercourse” with her.

  Hattie had never heard the term before, but she realized what it meant. “How much is ‘a lot of money’?” she asked.

  At first Mama looked shocked by her question, then her eyes filled with tears. “I shouldn’t have told you about him.”

  “How much is ‘a lot of money’?” Hattie repeated.

  “He said he would pay fifty dollars if he really was the first,” Mama said, looking down at her lap.

  “How would he know?”

  “The first time a woman bleeds.”

  “Why?”

  “Because the man uses his thing to poke open a hole in her.”

  “And men like that?”

  “Yes, I guess they do,” Mama said with a sigh. “The first time a girl doesn’t know anything about pleasing a man, but I guess it gives him something to brag about.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is there a lot of blood?”

  “Can be.”

  “Did Papa do it to you the first time or did some other man?”

  “He was the first,” Mama said, toying with her spoon. “It was our wedding night, and I never had sexual intercourse with another man until after your father passed away. But even before that, men had been asking, and sometimes they would slip me money and say they would settle with me later, meaning after your poor father was dead. The undertaker was one of those men. He knew I wouldn’t have any money to bury your father when the time came.”

  Mama put her hand on Hattie’s. “We are dirt-poor, Hattie. You might not like what I do, but we still have a roof over our heads and a car that gets us where we’re going and so far we haven’t starved.”

  Hattie pulled her hand away. “Why didn’t you go to work in a store or clean houses?”

  “I tried to find work,” Mama said, rubbing her forehead the why she did when she was getting a headache, “but I was tired after taking care of a sick husband and peddling eggs and vegetables and keeping his poor dying body clean and washing all that soiled bedding. My hands have been raw for years from all that washing and wringing and hanging laundry no matter what the weather. I just didn’t have the energy for cleaning up after other people or standing on my feet all day in a store. After I paid my ‘debt’ to the undertaker with coffins all around and his wife upstairs in the apartment cooking his dinner, the only man I did it with was Mr. Hadley, so he wouldn’t kick us out of the house. He said his wife was real sick and couldn’t do it anymore and he sure missed it and he thought I was a pretty lady and the money he gave me seemed more like a gift than a payment. I was sort of hoping that when his wife died, he would marry me, and our troubles would be over. But she didn’t die, and other men started coming. I tried to be discreet and not let the word get around town. I tried to make each man think he was the only one. But before I knew it, I was the town whore and no man is ever going to marry me.”

  “This man who wants to be the first, how was he dressed?” Hattie asked. “Was he a farmer or a miner?”

  “Neither. He works at the front office at the mine and was wearing a suit and tie.”

  “What about his shoes?”

  “What about them?”

  “Were they shiny and new or ratty and old?”

  “He was wearing shiny black shoes that looked brand-new.”

  “Has he been in your bed?”

  “No. He came here to ask about you.”

  “How does he know about me?”

  “He said that he’s seen you waiting for the school bus.”

  “How did he know that I’m your daughter?”

  Mama’s shoulders sagged. “I don’t know, Hattie. I just opened the door and he asked if I had a daughter named Hattie. Then he wanted to know if you were a virgin.” Hattie frowned. “What’s that?”

  “Oh, God,” Mama moaned and began shaking her head. “Just forget the whole thing.”

  “What is a virgin?” Hattie demanded.

  “It’s a girl who has never had sex with a man.”

  “Tell this man I’ll do it if he gives me two hundred dollars up front, and I want the money the day before so I have time to hide it away someplace where he won’t find it and take it back.”

  Mama shook her head. “No man is ever going to pay that much for sex—not in a hundred years. And besides, that’s not how it’s done.”

  “I know how it’s done. After they pull on their pants, they’re supposed to leave money on the bureau before they leave. But sometimes they don’t leave as much as they promised, do they? And sometimes they just walk out the door without leaving a dime.”

  Wordlessly Mama picked up the two soup bowls and carried them to the sink. Her shoulders were hunched over. Hattie realized that her mother wasn’t pretty anymore. The skin under her chin was starting to sag, and dark circles were under her eyes. She looked gaunt and haggard and just plain worn-out.

  “I want the money first,” Hattie repeated.

  For the next two days, Hattie felt as though she were holding her breath. With two hundred dollars she could ride the train to West Virginia and maybe even have some left over in case Aunt Vera wouldn’t take her in. On the third afternoon, when she got home from school, her mother had been crying and her lip was split open. “I shouldn’t have told you about him,” she said. “You don’t have to do this, Hattie. I don’t want you to do this. I forbid you to.”

  “Is he going to pay two hundred dollars?”

  Mama sank into a chair. “He’ll bring it by this evening and then leave for thirty minutes so you can hide the money away.”

  Hattie was too nervous to eat dinner. She put on the only halfway decent dress she owned and put her hair up. When the knock on the door came, she remained in the front room.

  Mama opened the door.

  He was a tall, well-built man in his midtwenties and looked vaguely familiar. He was wearing a brown suit, and his fingernails were clean. He looked Hattie up and down. She could see the desire in his face, and it made her feel powerful.

  She held out her hand for the money that he was supposed to put there.

  “You little bitch!” he said. “For two hundred dollars I could buy this shack and burn it to the ground.”

  Then suddenly Hattie knew exactly who this man was. She’d seen him years ago standing beside his father in front of the bank. He was Mr. Sedgwick’s son, who had gone to a fancy college back East and was now back in Coal Town with his new wife to learn how to run the family business.

  Her mother had been watching this exchange with a look that was half fear, half bewilderment. Hattie understood. She had always been such a meek, quiet girl. Her mother didn’t know the girl who had stood up to someone as high-and-mighty as Mr. Sedgwick’s son.

  Mr. Sedgwick’s son threw a wad of bills on the floor. “I’ll be back in thirty minutes, and I want you alone in this house and buck naked.”

  He slammed the door so hard the entire house shook.

  Hattie realized that she had overplayed her hand. Mama was crying and waving her hands around like a crazy woman. “He’s real mad, Hattie. He’s going to hurt you.”

  Hattie stared at the bills scattered on the floor. Tens and twenties. She had planned to the take the money and run. Under her bed was a freshly laundered feed sack filled with her clothes. But if she wasn’t here when he returned, Mr. Sedgwick’s son would take his an
ger out on her mother. She didn’t love her mother anymore, but she didn’t want anything bad to happen to her.

  Using her mother’s gesture, Hattie rubbed her forehead. Harder and harder she rubbed it. She had to plan. Had to think.

  First the money.

  She picked it up and put it in the feed sack with her clothes. Then she went to the kitchen and grabbed a butcher knife.

  When her mother saw the knife, she started to scream, “No, Hattie. No!”

  “Shut up!” Hattie yelled. “Just shut up. I want you to go out to the shed and stay there until I come get you.”

  When the car pulled up into the yard, Hattie stood by the door, her back pressed against the wall, the butcher knife in her hand.

  The door burst open:

  Mr. Sedgwick’s son took one step, then stopped, looking around the seemingly empty room.

  Hattie plunged the knife into the side of his neck. Then she pulled out the knife and slid it across his throat.

  Mr. Sedgwick’s son fell to his knees, blood gushing from both wounds.

  Hattie stabbed him in the back, the blade scraping against bone.

  He fell on his side. His eyes were wide and bulging, his mouth opened as though to scream, but no sound came. Only blood.

  She pushed him onto his back and began stabbing his belly again and again. Stabbing the son of the man who had killed her father. The son of the man who denied her mother money that was rightfully hers and turned her into a whore. It was hard work, all that stabbing. And so bloody. So much blood. The man’s eyes were still open, but she could tell that he was dead.

  She sat back on her haunches, put down the knife, and regarded the mutilated body.

  Then she went to fetch her mother.

  Mama took one look at her bloody dress and began to scream. Hattie put a hand over her mouth. They had no close neighbors, but she didn’t know how far a scream could travel.

  Hattie told her mother to drive the man’s car around back. Then they rolled his body onto a blanket and dragged it out to the car and somehow wrestled it into the trunk of the man’s shiny black Oldsmobile sedan. Hattie siphoned some of the gas from the Oldsmobile to put in the Ford’s almost empty tank.

  Then they went inside to change out of their bloodstained clothing, and Mama filled a jar with water and made two sandwiches with stale bread and sliced tomatoes. “What do we do now?” she asked her daughter.

  “Remember the quarry lake we went to one Sunday afternoon?” Hattie asked. “You and Papa and Patrick and me.”

  “I remember the lake but I don’t remember where it was, Hattie. That was a long time ago.”

  “Think, Mama. Close your eyes and think. You fixed a picnic lunch. We stopped for gas at a service station that had an old Model T Ford sitting on the roof. Papa gave me a nickel to buy a Coke from a machine. I shared it with Patrick. We went through a town where the signs on the storefronts were written in German.”

  Hattie’s only experience driving a car consisted of driving into town with Mama at her side. But it was night and there was little traffic. She focused on the taillights of the Oldsmobile. Mama drove slowly heading east. Hattie never saw the service station with the Model T on the roof, but she followed the Oldsmobile’s taillights through the town with signs on the storefronts written in German. It was almost dawn when the headlights of the Oldsmobile illuminated a wooden sign that said QUARRY LAKE with an arrow pointing down a rutted country lane that disappeared into a thick growth of pine trees. The lane sloped downward, and when they emerged from the trees, it continued to the edge of the quarry, then began a gentle circling descent down the steep walls to the water’s edge. Mama went in the other direction heading for the far side of the huge man-made crater where there was a sheer drop to the water below. Hattie followed.

  Mama pulled the Oldsmobile close to the edge and got out.

  Side by side, mother and daughter stood looking down at the water. Calm, black water reflecting the moonlight. “Let’s get this over with,” Hattie said.

  Mama released the brake, and together they pushed the car over the edge. It hit the water front-first, then slowly and gracefully slipped from view.

  Mama drove the Ford on the way home. It was daylight when they arrived.

  They worked throughout the day cleaning the house. There was only one scrub brush so they took turns scrubbing the blood-soaked wooden floor, with the other emptying the bucket then refilling it. Again and again. Hattie burned their blood-soaked clothing in the potbellied stove. When they were finally finished, Hattie washed herself, put on clean clothes, and pulled the feed sack from under her bed.

  Her mama had fallen asleep in the rocking chair, her head lolling to one side. Hattie wished it was Mr. Sedgwick himself that she had killed. Because of him, her parents became paupers, and her mother had lost herself.

  Hattie opened the sack and pulled out the roll of bills. She peeled off a twenty and placed the rest in her mother’s lap.

  She would get more money, Hattie vowed. And not by spreading her legs for men. She would rob a bank if she needed to and ride the train to Pikesville, West Virginia.

  Twenty-Three

  GEORGIANA realized she had been holding her breath and slowly exhaled while she watched the white-haired woman lean back in her chair, focusing once again on the present and her three visitors. “I never made it to West Virginia and I never met Vera Wentworth,” Hattie said.

  Georgiana glanced at her sisters to see how they were dealing with the woman’s grisly story, which seemed too far-fetched to be true.

  Could Hattie have made it all up?

  But why would anyone lie about something like that? And why would she tell three people she’d only just met that she had once killed a man? Not a dying man like Hattie’s father. Not an accidental killing either. She had deliberately killed the son of the man who owned the Coal Town mine. The man probably meant her harm, but Hattie and her mother should have left the house after he dropped off the two hundred dollars. They could have driven to town and sworn out a complaint against the man. After all, the man had been soliciting sex with a minor.

  Of course, the man Hattie killed was the son of the most powerful man in the community, and maybe the sheriff took his orders from his father—from Mr. Sedgwick, who would have hired detectives to look for his son and the black Oldsmobile sedan. His son probably was as terrible a man as Hattie indicated. But his father would have loved him. Mr. Sedgwick probably spent the rest of his life trying to find his son. He would have grieved greatly. And his wife, too. Georgiana wondered if they had other children. If the bride that their son had brought from back East was pregnant and provided them with a grandchild who helped assuage their grief.

  “Was that man’s body ever found?” Ellie asked from across the table.

  “No,” Hattie said, rising. “As far as I know, he and that car are still down there on the bottom of that quarry.”

  “So that wasn’t why you were sent to prison?” Vanessa asked.

  “No, it was not.”

  “Then why did you tell us about it?” Georgiana asked, puzzled. “I’d think something like that would be the sort of secret one carried to the grave.”

  “Yes, that would be the most prudent thing to do, wouldn’t it?” Hattie locked her fingers at the back of her neck and stretched a bit.

  “It sounded like you planned all along to take his money,” Vanessa commented. “Which given your situation, I can understand. But did you also plan to kill him?”

  “I don’t know that I planned anything,” Hattie said, irritation in her voice. “I was just improvising. Killing him seemed like the best way out of a bad situation. Can you girls honestly tell me that you would have done otherwise?”

  “When you put it like that, I suppose not,” Ellie said from her side of the table.

  Georgiana was tired. Exhausted really. And disturbed by the story she had just heard. She wondered how long Hattie’s tale would continue. Hopefully they had already heard t
he worst, and the rest would be clear sailing. “I’m going to take a break,” she announced, and rose from her chair.

  She used the bathroom, then stepped out on the moonlit deck. It was cold, and her arms were bare, but Georgiana stood next to the railing for a time feeling as if she were on a ship at sea. Such a house. Like something out of a movie. Not real life.

  Georgiana wished she had never left her real life. Wished she were back home in her cluttered apartment with Freddy on his way over. Her darling Freddy. She needed to hear the voice of that sweet, uncomplicated boy. She would remind Willy about bringing them a phone and call him tonight when their session with Hattie concluded.

  What a disappointment the woman had been. Their long-lost grandmother was not likable. And maybe she was a liar. The more Georgiana thought about it, the more she found Hattie’s story about stabbing that man and dumping him in a lake hard to believe. It was like something out of a movie and not from real life.

  Georgiana inhaled deeply in an attempt to invigorate herself with the crisp, cold, clean air, then went back into the room. A lamp on the credenza had been turned on and cast long shadows across the room.

  Hattie and her sisters were seated at the table, waiting in silence. Georgiana slipped into her place.

  “Why were you sent to prison?” Vanessa demanded of Hattie.

  Hattie held up her hand. “We’ll get that in due time.” Then she became very still.

  For a long time she said nothing. When finally she began to speak, her gaze had once again grown distant.

  Myrna recalled how, with no sleep the night before, she had been exhausted as she left her mother sleeping in the rocking chair and walked away from the only home she’d ever known.

  She wanted to put some distance between herself and Coal Town as quickly as possible but didn’t dare hitchhike for fear someone she knew might offer her a ride. Whenever a vehicle approached, she would duck into the tall grass that grew alongside the road. She walked all night to get to the highway, where she got plenty of offers for rides but always from men. She ignored them and kept walking. East. Finally she was so exhausted she curled up behind a tree and used the feed sack that held her possessions for a pillow and slept for a time.