“Are you a doctor now too?” the man asked. “Ain’t one lady doctor enough for this town, now we got to have two?”
“Of course I’m not a doctor,” Grace said, “I considered it once upon a time, to tell the truth, but I never got the schooling.”
“You’d make a fine doctor, Grace,” Trissie said.
“All right, ladies, get out of my way now, and let me take a look at Miss Chumley.” He pulled a chair up to the divan and took the cloth from Trissie. “Ida Mae, will you take these ladies away and give me some privacy with my patient?”
Ida Mae shooed both of the women into the dining room. I finally felt enough in control of my voice to ask, “Where is Dr. Keating?”
“You’re looking at him,” the man said, fingering my cut. “Oh, I expect you mean my niece. She’s busy with other patients. Used to be her backing up me when I was busy, now it’s the other way around. You will need a stitch or two here. How did this happen?”
“Snowballs,” I said.
“Eh?”
“Ice balls. Someone threw ice balls at me. It made me slip on the ice.”
“Mm. Students of yours? Don’t be surprised. Hillyard’s a small town. Even I heard about the new school teacher. You were lucky, here. Any lower and you could have lost an eye.”
“Lucky,” I said.
“Hah,” Dr. Keating said. “I have to say things like that. I’m a doctor.” He rummaged in a black leather bag much larger than the one Adelaide carried on her belt. I tried to find a resemblance to Adelaide in his looks. He was tall and so was she, and they both had large teeth, though his were stained brown from tobacco. He was quite old, seventy or more, and gaunt, though he used to be a larger man, judging by the loose hang of his clothes. He pulled black thread and a long thin needle from the bag and made a whistle with his tongue as he threaded it. “You may have a scar, but I’ll make it as small as I can. This’ll sting a bit, so brace yourself.”
It stung more than a bit, but I concentrated on the pain in my arm to distract myself.
“How many stitches?” I asked.
“I think three will do it.” He pulled out his scissors to snip a thread.
“Can you leave the threads a bit long?”
“Eh?” He pulled back, scissors in hand, and peered into my eyes, first one, then the other, as if trying to see whether the blow to my head had knocked me loonie. Apparently satisfied that I was in my right mind, he shrugged and said, “You’re the customer. Half an inch long enough?”
“Make it an inch.”
He handed me a mirror when he was finished. It looked horrible, a gruesome mass of black threads knotted in a rough line above my right eyebrow.
“Thank you,” I said. “It’s lovely.”
“Addie told me you were something out of the ordinary, and I see she was right. You may want to wrap a bandage around it when you go out and about so you don’t scare the good people of the town, but I’ll leave it uncovered for now. Keep it dry and exposed to the air as much as you can. Now let’s have a look at this arm of yours. Addie wrap it like this?”
“Yes.” For some reason my voice wobbled. “She thought it was sprained or maybe broken, but I think it’s worse now.”
He nodded and examined it closely. He was gentle, but it still hurt like the dickens, and I had to lie back at one point and close my eyes. “My guess is you had a crack in the bone. It wouldn’t have been out of place, but when you fell on it or it was pulled, it wasn’t strong enough to take it. That’s when it snapped. I’m going to have to set it for you, I’m afraid. You won’t like it.”
I nodded. It was what I’d expected.
“I’ll make you a plaster cast when I’m finished. I have some gypsum in my bag, and Ida Mae will have some cotton cloth she can cut into strips for me. Look the other way now, you don’t want to watch this.”
I had barely turned my head when I felt a terrible wrenching of my poor arm. I let out a squeak and could not stop the tears that dripped from my eyes, but aside from the horrible throbbing, it was over in an instant.
“Don’t move now,” Dr. Keating said. “I’ll be back with the plaster.”
An hour later I had a neat plaster cast wrapped around my thumb and all my fingers but the tips, and it extended nearly to my elbow. I could not move my wrist at all. It was a relief to have my arm so protected, but a fierce ache still thrummed beneath its surface.
Dr. Keating waved a hypodermic needle at me. “I can offer you an injection of morphine, if you like. It will make the pain go away, I assure you, and it will help you sleep.”
“Thank you, but no. I have to teach tomorrow morning.” I had heard too many horror stories of heroin addiction to risk it.
“Suit yourself.” He dropped the needle back into the bag and closed it up. “The cast may become loose in a day or so when the swelling goes down. I can inject a bit more plaster in there to hold your arm still, or Addie can. We’re on the telephone line, or you can tell her next time you see her.”
It was a pleasant reminder that I would see her in two days, for I had not forgotten that Grace and Trissie would bring me to the salon at Dr. Keating’s house on Friday evening.
Chapter Fourteen
“MANDY, HOW MANY kegs, of nine gallons each, can be filled from a hogshead containing sixty-three gallons of vinegar?”
“Seven.”
“That is correct. John, if a man travels four miles an hour, how long will it take him to travel forty-eight miles?”
“Uh, five?”
“That is incorrect. Please sit down.”
I wasn’t the martinet sending John to his seat. I’d borrowed Ethel, an eighth grader with a desire to teach, from upstairs. In addition to administering the practice of oral arithmetic, Ethel had also led the morning prayer, orchestrated the reading aloud of an ode to a skylark, and directed a spelling bee. She had sent two students to the corner and one to the principal’s office, and she’d coerced the remaining students into good behavior with the promise of letting them use real ink instead of pencils when it was time to practice their handwriting.
I sat in the back of the room, rested my poor arm and head, and learned a few lessons about teaching. I had been doing it all wrong. Within minutes of entering the classroom, Ethel had the students rising to answer questions, arms at their sides, with no fidgeting whatsoever. It was something in the tone of her voice, I decided, and her firm discipline. Whatever it was, I was grateful to her. I’d slept poorly the night before, the pain in my arm and the questions in my head both keeping me awake. I could have asked Mrs. Dunn to teach my classes that day. She wouldn’t have liked it, but she could hardly have refused, not with my banged up appearance. But I had only taught for three days. I didn’t want anyone to think I was looking for an excuse to stay home already. Besides, I was eager to confront two young miscreants in the seventh grade.
Out of consideration for the third graders, I had taped a small piece of gauze over my stitches that morning. Before entering the seventh grade classroom at the end of the day, I removed the gauze, fluffed the black threads, and wrapped a wide strip of cotton cloth around my forehead, tucking the end in to keep it secure. I carried a small mirror in my purse. I pulled it out and examined myself. I looked like I’d been in a war. Perfect.
I pushed up the sleeve of my right arm, the better to show off the cast, and entered the classroom.
“Miss Chumley, what happened to you?”
“You look terrible, miss.”
“Perhaps we shouldn’t have class today. You don’t look up to it.”
“You should go to the hospital!”
I had not wasted my time in the back of the third grade classroom that day.
“Silence,” I pronounced with the firmness of Ethel. “Everyone sit down. Hands clasped on your desks. Eyes forward.”
They looked shocked but complied with a quickness that proved they had known proper classroom behavior all along. Within half a minute the classroom was silent and st
ill, and all eyes were straight ahead. Or nearly all.
The only two students who had remained silent and avoided looking at me, after their first quick glance upon my entrance, still refused to look forward. Carrie sat obediently with her hands clasped on her desk, but her eyes were cast downward and her lips clenched. Her face was pale. Guy ignored my instructions completely. He slumped in his seat, and his hands covered his face. I had suspected as much, but this evidence that Guy and Carrie were behind the ice ball attack of the day before made my chest burn.
I gave the class the same explanation I’d given the third graders, an ice ball gone astray, and followed with a stern lecture about the hazards of careless play. My anger at the two culprits lent an edge to my voice that the students were unfamiliar with, and they listened meekly, though with some bewilderment. Finally we turned to our lesson. I required the students to stand when they spoke, arms to their sides, and they performed like soldiers. Sad, meek little soldiers, to be sure, and I regretted my harshness almost immediately. I had set the course, though, and had no energy to change it that day. We soldiered on, but I did not call on Guy or Carrie until the bell rang, when I called out, “Guy, Carrie, please remain after class.”
Guy had kept his face hidden during the entire class, and at my words he slumped even further. Carrie did not move except to finally raise her gaze from her hands to stare straight ahead.
Their desks were two rows apart. Carrie sat in the front of the classroom and Guy in the middle. I moved to Guy’s row and perched myself on the top of the first desk so that I faced both of them.
“I wondered if you’d like to see my stitches,” I said.
“What?” Guy croaked.
“No thank you, Miss Chumley,” Carrie said.
“No? Oh, I was certain you would want to see your handiwork.” I unwrapped the bandage from my head, using the fingertips of my right hand as much as possible to show off the cast. “There. I think you must have been the pitcher, Guy. Is that the right word? Pitcher? You have a strong throw. Look at me.”
Guy slid his hands down his face, stretching his cheeks like they were melting, and looked at my stitches. His eyes flooded with tears. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry, Miss Chumley.”
“Look at my stitches, Carrie.”
She didn’t want to, but she was too obedient a child to refuse outright. She glanced to the left and looked at me. Her eyes flicked up at the stitches and she flinched.
“Dr. Keating says I’m lucky,” I said. “A little lower, and I could have lost the eye.”
Carrie swallowed.
“There will be a scar, of course,” I continued. “It’s too bad. I was never a beauty, but I’ve been told I have a nice complexion.”
She bit her lip and turned away.
“We’re sorry, Miss Chumley,” Guy said again. His face was blotched and wet. “We didn’t mean to hurt you. They were just snowballs. We only wanted to scare you.”
“Why?” I asked. “Why did you want to scare me?”
Guy chewed his lip and looked at Carrie.
“Carrie?” I asked.
I didn’t think she would answer, but after a long moment she turned to face me. Two steady streams trickled from her eyes, but aside from the tears, she didn’t look sorry.
“It’s your own fault,” she said. “You shouldn’t nose around in other people’s business. Why don’t you mind your own damn business?”
“Carrie!” Guy seemed shocked out of his tears. “Don’t talk like that.”
She turned on him. “Oh, you shut your mouth, Guy Dunn. If you weren’t such a blabber, this never would have happened. It’s all your fault.”
“It seems it’s everyone’s fault but yours,” I said.
“It was Carrie’s idea,” Guy said.
“Why, Carrie?”
Her shoulders slumped. “I just don’t want you to bother my mother.”
“Your mother? Does she know about this?”
Carrie’s eyes widened. “No! Don’t tell her, Miss Chumley. It’s just—I heard you call her by her old name. Nobody here knows it, except for Guy’s family, and they never tell.”
“I don’t know it,” Guy said.
“Good,” Carrie said. “You can’t blab it that way.”
“So you pelted me with ice balls so I wouldn’t blab it either?” I asked.
“No,” Carrie said. “I don’t know. I was angry. Mother was so scared after you left, and Guy told me what he said to you after school that day. You know too much about us now, and nobody’s supposed to know.”
“Your warning was unnecessary,” I said. “I wouldn’t have told. Your mother and I have already talked about that. Besides, I wasn’t the only one who knew your mother’s name. Mr. Stanfield knew it.”
“I know,” Carrie said. “But he’s dead.”
I knew Carrie was an intelligent girl before I even met her. I could almost see the thoughts process in her mind, and could see by the expression in her eyes when she understood the implication of her words.
“My mother didn’t kill Mr. Stanfield,” she said.
“No.” I nodded in agreement, though I wasn’t convinced. “But what about your father?”
“He’s not my father,” she said. “And he didn’t know anything about Mr. Stanfield.”
“He could have overheard him in the store that day.”
“He didn’t,” Carrie said. “My mother made sure of that. She didn’t want Glenn to know anything, so she brought Mr. Stanfield back into the kitchen. They only whispered, and Glenn was still upstairs sleeping. He didn’t hear a thing.”
I wished I could be as certain of that as Carrie was.
Guy sat with his arms crossed on his desk, his head resting on them but turned sideways so he could watch us. His face was flushed and still damp from crying, but slack with exhaustion. Carrie’s face split into a tremendous yawn. They had both been under a terrible strain, and their bodies were taking the toll. I sent them both home.
I found a pair of scissors in the teacher’s desk and pulled my mirror from my bag. I trimmed the threads on the stitches until they were barely noticeable, then donned my coat and went home as well, where I went immediately to bed and slept through the night. They weren’t the only ones whose body was exacting revenge.
Chapter Fifteen
FOR A BRIEF time, I went to college, Barnard, the women’s annex at Columbia. I was twenty years old at the time. I asked Papa if I could go, and he didn’t seem to care one way or the other, so I went, and I had a glorious time. I lived in a house with eight other freshman girls and a house mother, who saw to it that we got in no trouble. The classes and lectures were challenging and sometimes grueling, but the fun we had more than made up for it. We had teas and dances and parties and plays. I belonged to the German Club, and I played on the freshman class basketball team. I was not athletic enough to play for the college team, but we were good enough to beat the sophomores. I had been there five months and had just started working for the college newspaper, “The Barnard Bulletin,” when Papa wrote and asked me to come home.
He missed me, I thought, so I dropped it all and went home. Perhaps he did miss me, but the only welcome I received when I got home was a list of everything that had fallen into disrepair while I’d been gone and an article clipped from the newspaper about how college made women unhealthy, unwholesome, and unwomanly. I pretended, even to myself, that I was grateful to be rescued from such a fate. I certainly did not want to be unwomanly.
I spent the next three years being Papa’s housekeeper, growing more dissatisfied every day. This was my reward for being womanly? I did not like it. So when I received my first and only proposal of marriage, I married Robert. Papa warned me not to, but I suspected Papa of ulterior motives. After all, when I married, he would have to hire a housekeeper. In the end, of course, Papa was right. Marriage to Robert was far worse than living with Papa, and neither could hold a candle to the glorious life I’d lived for those five short m
onths at Barnard.
It had been nearly eight years, I calculated, since I had attended a social gathering composed solely of women, and Friday evening I was so excited I could hardly sit still on the buggy seat next to Grace. Fortunately we were wedged in too tightly to allow much fidgeting. Grace sat between Trissie and me and handled the reins of Ida Mae’s old horse, Tim. It was a short trip, less than a mile, so we didn’t have time to get cold or uncomfortable.
Dr. Keating’s house was three stories tall, sided in clapboard and painted white, and well-lit with outdoor electric lights on poles, two in the front and one in the back. A white picket fence surrounded the yard. Grace pulled the buggy alongside it to the stable in back, where she unhitched Tim and stabled him alongside two other horses. There was a fourth stall, but instead of a horse, it held Adelaide’s bicycle.
We entered the house through the back door without knocking. “We’re expected to let ourselves in,” Trissie said softly.
“This way,” Grace said. We passed through a darkened kitchen to steep stairs leading up the back of the house. A single electric bulb lit the staircase. It was narrow enough I could touch the walls on both sides as we ascended. We reached a landing that led to a carpeted hall with several doors on each side.
“Quiet,” Grace whispered, though we hadn’t made a peep. We did not stop on the landing, but turned and climbed on to the third floor. It was the strangest entry to a salon I had ever known, and if I hadn’t been assured that Adelaide would be at the top, I might have run back home.
We reached the third floor. Grace opened the door into a large room, brightly lit and welcoming, with music and conversation and a fire crackling in the fireplace. I smiled with relief at seeing the comfortable room, but my relief soon turned to disappointment. There were six people in the room, not counting us, but half of them were men, and I did not see Adelaide.
A woman played “So Long Mary” on the piano, and a young man sat beside her to turn the pages. Another woman lounged on a divan leaning back against the chest of a man who draped his arm around her shoulders, his hand nearly on her breast. Both of them held smoking cigarettes in their fingers. A third couple stood beside the window with drinks in their hands.
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