by Richard Peck
Her voice floated above me as we stared out across the empty street. “If you had three wishes, Blossom, what would you wish for?”
Without thinking, I said at once, “Plenty to eat, at least enough.” Her long fingers gripped my shoulder as she seemed to wince. Miss Dabney had never known hunger or how near her it lurked.
“And a chance to put my Second Sight to some use.”
“Yes,” she murmured, and her grip relaxed.
“And a chance to see the world,” I went on, “for there is not a great deal going for me in Bluff City.”
“Yes,” she said again, “and what else?”
“I’ve used up my three wishes,” I reminded her, wondering if she could count.
“So you have,” she sighed. “I wonder why in storybooks only three wishes are offered, when in real life they are never enough.” Then she came out of her reverie and handed over my napkin full of tea cakes. “Well, then, Blossom,” she said in a commanding voice, “you are expected here again tomorrow at four. By then I shall have gathered my thoughts. After all, we must do something about poor Minerva.”
And I headed off for home, wondering how a person would tackle the problem of poor Minerva.
7
WHEN I GOT HOME that night, there was not much around in the way of supper. My mama had her feet propped up on the stove and was snapping a pan of frost-blighted runner beans that were not from our garden. After dark, Mama sometimes did her harvesting farther afield.
The grandeur of Miss Dabney’s parlor was still on my mind. And the tea party on her Rockingham china lingered with me. There was nothing but bare rafters and unswept floors in our place, instead of Miss Dabney’s heavy gold frames around Royalty, and tin mugs instead of Miss Dabney’s silver and china. Still, I was under the spell of my first tea party and decided to re-create it with the napkin of cakes.
There was a spoonful of black tea in a can on the shelf. I shook that into a pot and put the kettle on the fire. When I began to fuss over the plank table, I felt my mama’s dark eyes dart my way. When I glanced back, she was busy with her beans.
I turned up the coal-oil lamp. The table looked like a squirrel’s nest. It was acrumble with broken shells where Mama had picked out walnut meats some days back. I swept them off and looked around for a tablecloth. There was nothing but a feed sack all washed for cutting up and making over, which I spread out on the table. Then I unwrapped the cakes, putting two on each side and the last one in the middle as a centerpiece. The pink rosebuds on the cakes made an odd match with their surroundings.
When the water boiled, I poured it into the pot. Then I peered in as Miss Dabney had done, though I only saw black leaves swirling in brown water. When they sank, I poured out the tea into a couple of tin mugs. “Well, come on, Mama,” I said. “We’re going to have us a regular tea party.”
With only three teeth in her head, Mama does not speak distinct without effort. She muttered darkly. Her eyes fixed on the cakes, and she made for the table. I thought of asking her how she took her tea. But I did not want to be slapped silly for being uppity, and we had no sugar or lemon on the place anyhow.
It’s unrewarding to serve tea to one who only wants to get to the bottom of the mug to read the leaves. But Mama made a meal out of the cakes. Her hands resemble claws, seamed with the topsoil off the runner beans. They snaked out twice, and she hastily gummed her cakes. Then she reached for the centerpiece and wolfed that down too.
I reflected on how fast a tea party will go when there is no conversation. The crosses in Mama’s ears swung forward as she stared down into her empty mug to read her own tea leaves. She gave a disgusted grunt and flung the dregs out on the floor. Then she crooked a finger, which meant I was to hand over my mug.
She couldn’t have seen to the bottom of it in that light, but she sloshed the tea around and squinted. She is a fearsome spectacle at her work. “Humph,” she remarked, running her tongue around inside her collapsed cheeks. “Journeys over water.”
How often had I heard her predicting journeys over water to her customers? It was one of her favorite prophecies, though few of her clients ever crossed much water except on the Mississippi bridge at Cape Girardeau.
“Two trips over water still in the future,” she went on, “and one voyage already past, but interrupted . . . by death.”
Then she gave me a squinting look, and her eyes bored a hole in me. She meant business, or seemed to. I listened against my will. “Two young folks,” she rasped, “a boy and a young chit of a gal—you.”
Oh, well, I thought, she’s somehow figured out that Alexander and I went to Miss Dabney’s.
“No,” she said, more distinct, “you, but not that kid from the house. Another kid—dead now and tow-headed. His pore corpse trapped under a mountain of ice.”
This rang a bell in my head. For this towhead sounded very like my ghost boy out by the tracks. He was never far from my mind. I gave Mama a hard look then, wondering if she’d seen him too and was building a tale around him. But she took my hard look for disbelief. Her hand whipped out and boxed one of my ears. This was like lightning striking, though it did not set off my Second Sight. Mama’s was working in high gear.
“A beautiful woman, now living, of high degree:—who’s committed a wicked sin and a crime agin her own kid, the flesh of her flesh. And only you to bring her to justice, puny though yore powers be.”
Even while one of my ears was ringing, I attended my mama. She’d never favored me with a reading. Prophecy is no parlor game to her. “Foreign parts,” she concluded, upending the mug and dumping my future onto the floor. Soon after, she was sound asleep and snoring on her pallet. Any reading wears her out. She’ll often sleep around the clock afterwards.
But I was kept wakeful by her message. Taking up my post out on the porch steps, I pondered in the dark. True or false, Mama’s prophecies lack imagination as a rule. There is hardly ever any “pore corpse trapped under a mountain of ice” about her visions. Generally she sticks to future wealth and romance, with the occasional warning against dark men who limp. (My paw was once shot in the kneecap and staggers somewhat.)
As to the “beautiful woman, now living, of high degree—who’s committed a wicked sin and a crime against her own kid,” I was stumped. Miss Dabney is of high degree enough, as these things go in Bluff City. She is now living, though it would take more than imagination to call her beautiful. As to her ever having a kid she’d committed a sin against—that was completely out.
The “foreign parts” didn’t signify at all. Still, Mama’s been known to throw in a little something extra at the end to make her customers think they’re getting a bargain.
No, I couldn’t work it out and like to never get to sleep that night. The tow-headed boy I’d seen who was dead as a mackerel and yet straining at the bonds tying him down on a bed of ice had me worried.
There is nothing like a parent’s words to rile you up.
When I reported to Miss Dabney’s house the next afternoon, she looked to have put in a restless night herself. She led me down the freezing hall to the parlor where the tea was laid out. There were cloths over the plates, and the cozy was on the pot. It was to be business first, a thing I can appreciate.
We were no sooner settled than there came the sound of a push-broom being worked over the kitchen floor. It thumped roughly against chair legs. Then followed the sound of a dustpan being knocked against the rim of a trash can. Minerva was working away in a fine old sweat. Since all this violent tidying seemed to leave the kitchen still dusty and ill kept, I thought it was a waste of Minerva’s ghostly energy. But then I supposed she had nothing but time.
“She has been noisier than usual all day,” Miss Dabney remarked. “I made haste to prepare this tea and thought the water would never boil. Of course I see nothing in the kitchen.”
“Seeing isn’t the same as doing anything about the situation,” I pointed out, figuring Miss Dabney wanted me to rid her of Minerva. Most people w
ould. But as I have mentioned, Miss Dabney is nothing like most people.
“Things cannot continue as they are,” she said, worrying her back hair.
“Well, Alexander Armsworth might know how to get Minerva away to a quiet grave, but I don’t see how I’ll get him back in this house, even with threats.”
“Minerva into a quiet grave?” said Miss Dabney, quite startled. “Oh, I doubt if she would like that. That would surely mean she had passed completely over to the Other Side, would it not?”
I said I figured it would.
“But how terrible for poor Minerva that would be!” Miss Dabney quivered on her cushions, and her nervous hands played all over her neck. “Don’t you see, Papa is on the Other Side. He rejected her in this world and would surely do the same in the next. Papa was never known to change his mind. It is more than a girl like Minerva could be expected to endure. And besides, I’d be quite lost without her, particularly now that I know who she is. We’ve been together for so many years. Oh no, I’d hate to think of Minerva in a quiet grave. It gives me gooseflesh.”
“But what—”
“Why you must simply have a word with her, child. She’s far more likely to listen to you. I doubt she could even hear me. You will think of something to tell her that will calm her down and make her satisfied with her lot.”
“But—”
“But of course you will. I have every faith in you. And there is no time like the present. Skip along to the kitchen. I will be right behind you.”
What could I do but obey? Miss Dabney was already looming over me. She gathered up the skirts of her gray taffeta at-home gown to shoo me along like a chicken. I headed for the door to the back hall, but my heart wasn’t in it. “I’d just as soon Minerva wouldn’t be hanging by the neck in the pantry,” I murmured.
“Oh, that’s just showing off,” Miss Dabney said. “Tell her to be sensible. Be firm. One must be with servants.”
“Maybe she’s stepped out for a moment,” I mentioned halfway along the hall. But as quick as I said that, there came the sound of a dipper crashing from a great height onto the drainboard.
The kitchen was as before, with the afternoon light falling in rays around the drawn shades. Dust in the air told of a recent sweeping, but the floor was gritty with old dirt.
I paused at the door. The only presence I felt at first was Miss Dabney on my heels. Then there was a ringing in my head, and the light went black for a moment. When I could focus on the room again, a shape stood in the far corner by the sink.
One large hand rested on a pump handle. There was a sense of expectation about the figure. Her outline was clear, and the details of her coarse features were lightly sketched in. But where the eyes should be there was only darkness. Her sleeves were turned back over large elbows, and I pitied her for spending eternity in such drudgery. Her vibrations seemed to tell me to state my business and be quick about it.
I cleared my throat and tried to look her in the eye, but it was like looking into the sun. Fuzzy darkness veiled her expression. The dipper turned over on the drainboard of its own accord. “Minerva?” I said, trembling somewhat.
She was motionless as a graven image, but the whole kitchen listened.
“Minerva, I’ve come to tell you something to your advantage.” She waited. I was reminded of how a cat will freeze on a fence with one paw drawn up, to see if you are friend or foe. I was exploring new territory. The words welled up in me. “Minerva,” I said, quite loud, “you will not be sent away in disgrace. This here is your home, and you are welcome to stay. Nobody wants to turn you out, and there is nothing shameful about you.”
The ghost moved. One rough hand drew up to clutch the grooves on her rope-burned neck. My voice quivered, but I spoke on, high and clear like Miss Spaulding. “Mr. Dabney, he won’t send you packing. He died . . . here a while back.”
“In 1892,” Miss Dabney whispered behind me.
“In 1892,” I said aloud. Minerva’s head turned slowly toward a wall calendar. It was last year’s, but still late enough in history to give her something to think about. “And so you’re to settle down and quit your fretting. Mr. Dabney’s little girl—”
“Gertrude,” Miss Dabney muttered.
“—Gertrude is all grown up now, and she would consider it a privilege to share her home with you.”
“But tell her to be quieter, for Heaven’s sake,” Miss Dabney murmured.
“Say, listen, Minerva,” I added, “if you could hold down the noise a tad, it would be much appreciated.”
She stirred then, and I thought maybe I’d hurt her feelings, since she was clearly the sensitive type. But I saw that instead of grasping her ghastly neck, she was pointing to the rope marks on it. And now there were pinpoints of light where her eyes should be. They were looking into mine like a pair of beacons on a dark night. I nearly took fright.
“Oh, well, that hanging business,” I said in some confusion. “You was . . . ah . . . overwrought at the time and did not know what you was doing. Let’s just call that case closed. It was wrong, but you’ve reproached yourself enough. Besides, yesterday you scared Alexander Armsworth out of a year’s growth with that stunt.”
I didn’t like to wind up negotiations on that note. And Minerva appeared hungry to hear more. After all, nobody had said a word to the poor soul in years. “Minerva,” I said, “you were a good and faithful servant in your earthly life. You’ve earned some peace of mind.”
At that the pinpoints of light swam and flickered with tears. Minerva’s big head fell forward into her hands, and she wept soundlessly. But it was unlike her weeping and carrying on before. All the anger and misery seemed to seep out of her. She was still weeping with relief when she faded from my view. The dipper lay rocking on the drainboard, and the kitchen was silent.
Miss Dabney and I stood in the dark hallway for a time, hung up between two worlds. She said nothing to me, but her hand fell on my shoulder as it would often do in the future when she meant to show approval. After a while we made our way back to the parlor. Miss Dabney let out a startled cry before she’d taken a step into the room. The cloths were off the cakes. The cozy was off the pot. And the tea had already been thoughtfully poured out by an unseen hand. Minerva was settling down.
8
THERE ARE very few people who’ll do you a good turn, so don’t expect anything. That’s my motto, and I live by it. But here again, Miss Dabney was the exception. Name a rule, and she is the exception. It was her good intention to repay me for settling things in her kitchen. In my next visits to her place, I could just about see wheels turning in her mind.
She harks back to a time when well-to-do people felt like they should do something for the poor. But I was more independent than your average pauper. It also crossed her mind that she might make a young lady out of me. But here again I wasn’t a likely candidate. My manners were not bad enough for correction, especially around her. Besides, to turn me ladylike might have rendered me useless and possibly ornamental. Then I would not be able to fend for myself.
As to giving me advice about the opposite sex, Miss Dabney was short on experience. She was in a muddle for several days before she got a bright idea for me.
I took to going to tea every afternoon at her house, and she made a square meal of it for me. I’d never eaten so good in my life, which was obvious. On my first visit after I’d had my chat with Minerva, there was sliced ham and pea salad prepared by Miss Dabney personally. We had fruit cake studded with sugar almonds, fresh baked, for dessert.
The smell of it hot from the oven greeted me at the door. “I am responsible for most of the tea,” Miss Dabney whispered in the front hall, “but I found the cake done to a turn in the oven, though there had been no fire in the stove since morning. This is Minerva’s little offering, as I see it, and I suppose it’s fit to eat. Where she could have got the ingredients I do not like to think. But we had better sample it.”
It was one of the better cakes I ever tasted. Mi
ss Dabney and me were loud in our praise of it, in case Minerva might be floating behind the door, eavesdropping.
Later that week there were hot blueberry muffins and at a later date, English scones. Minerva was not as steady a worker as a mortal. Still, she would do a little ghostly baking now and then, and she was rarely noisy. “I really ought to pay her a wage, if I knew how,” Miss Dabney would often say in a vague way.
Then one day Miss Dabney greeted me at the door with triumph in her eyes, and I knew she’d settled on something to do with me. In her hand was an advertising leaflet which she shook numerous times in the air. “You have wanted a way to put your powers to work, Blossom,” she crowed, “and I have discovered the very thing!” She handed over the leaflet at last, which read as follows:
World Renowned
PROFESSOR REGIS
Spiritualist Medium Scientist
An announcement of extraordinary interest to the good people of Bluff City. Any persons bereft of loved ones and wishing to make contact with the
SPIRIT WORLD
are invited to attend a series of seances
DAILY SESSIONS
at the Odd Fellows Hall above Nirider’s Notions Store. Professor Regis, who has astonished the Crowned Heads of Europe, favors Bluff City with scientific explorations into
THE WORLD BEYOND
All up-to-date techniques used, including table-rapping, actual manifestations, and words from the GREAT UNKNOWN spoken in English by a Control, who is an actual dead spirit in regular contact with Professor Regis.
* HEAR —Authentic messages from your Dear Departed
* SEE —THE ACTUAL MESSAGE-BRINGER, lovely as dawn and trustworthy as the telephone
* FEEL —Her ghostly presence
which will banish all hints of trickery in your mind.
Now at last break down the age-old barrier between this life and the Next Crowned Heads of Europe and New York City persons alike swear by Professor Regis. Do not let this strictly scientific opportunity pass you by.
