by C. Ruth Daly
“Hi guys. How’s it going? I just had peanut butter and jelly at school.” I tried to be nonchalant as if I had no idea something was going on.
Irish set her sandwich down and looked Anna straight in the eyes. “You told her, didn’t you?”
“No Irish. I didn’t. Donna found out on her own. Seems like the whole town knows except for Mom, Dad, and Tim.” Anna didn’t bat an eye and continued to devour her sandwich.
I sat at the table with them and watched them eat. Irish seemed ravenous and Anna had her usual appetite. We were silent for the longest time. I didn’t want to ask any questions because Anna had told me everything I needed to know. A thought came into my mind and I wanted to know the answer right away.
“When’s the wedding, Irish?”
She set her sandwich down and moved the food to the side of her mouth to answer. “It’s in September. Hopefully before the baby is born.” Irish continued eating with deliberation.
“Hey! My birthday is in September. Maybe you’ll get married on my birthday.” It was an exciting thought as I was slowly beginning to adjust to the idea that I would be related to Stewart Rolf. A lot of kids at school had siblings who were married to siblings or cousins of classmates. I really wouldn’t be any different than anyone else. After all, Irish would be the first one to break the McNally mold and stay in Burgenton. And on the other hand, she would be the first one to follow the pattern of many Burgenton residents and marry a local boy, get pregnant and raise a family in Burgenton. Except Irish was slightly out of step in her order of operation. She was pregnant first and then getting married.
The front door slammed shut and in walked Tim and Mom followed right behind him.
“You’re going to wreck dinner eating that food now.” Mom yelled. “I had planned to have it with some ham and roast beef tonight before your commencement ceremony. You’ve invited Gil and his family, right?”
My stomach dropped. It didn’t occur to me the Rolfs would be at our house exchanging family festivities with us. The thought also popped into my head that Irish would be spending holidays with the Rolfs and Gil Rolf would be spending holidays with us. Life was definitely taking a sharp turn. I wasn’t sure if it was for the better or worst.
When the girls had finished in the kitchen we retreated to the bedroom upstairs. Anna and Irish bathed and dressed for the night while I laid down on the bed and read one of Anna’s magazines. Before we knew it, Mom was yelling upstairs that Dad would be home soon and we needed to clean up the downstairs and help set the food out for the Rolfs’ arrival.
After the dining and living room were dusted and made presentable and the luncheon meats, salads, punch bowl and graduation cake were set out, we all took the last minutes to ready ourselves for tonight. I ran upstairs to change my clothes and heard Dad come in followed by Eva and Toni who had hitchhiked from college in Southern Indiana. Dad was fuming over the fact they had hitched rides when they could have been picked up by a derelict stranger and brutally murdered.
“Why look at the murders we’ve seen just around here.” Dad exclaimed. “Two young girls strangled and left to die in ditches. What are you girls thinking? What is college teaching you?” And he continued to rant until Rene showed up and calmly told him she had just given a young college student a ride, too. Rene continued to explain that she was a nice girl, drawing specific attention to the gender of the hitchhiker.
Then the moment I had been dreading came. The Rolfs pulled up in their nice blue sedan and Gil parked behind them in his pickup. I looked over at Irish, who I thought would be stiff with terror. She wasn’t. Irish looked calmer and more relaxed than I had ever seen her. I brushed my sweaty palms on the sides of my flowered dress and realized I was the one stiff with terror.
The Rolfs filed in: Mr. Rolf, Mrs. Rolf, and Stewart. The older brother and his family couldn’t make it, but would be at the commencement ceremony. Gil followed behind them and took his place by Irish’s side.
Mom and Dad offered the Rolfs chairs to sit on and then took seats next to them. I stood positioned by Anna while Rene, Toni, Eva, and Tim stood on Anna’s other side.
I looked across the dining room at Stewart Rolf and he gave me a stiff-lipped smile. Anna noticed him and gave me a pinch on the arm. “Go and offer him some punch.” She said through teeth clenched so tightly I could hear them grind against each other. I wondered when she had become the know-it-all on proper etiquette and manners.
“The only punch I want to offer him is one in the stomach.” I muttered back to her. Anna gave me a nudge and I walked over to Stewart. “So do you want some punch or not?” I asked as I rolled my eyes at him.
Stewart looked somewhat confused and I felt bad. After all, it wasn’t his fault his brother knocked up my sister. I wondered if he also knew Irish was pregnant.
“I’m sorry Stewart. I uh, um guess the waistband of these stupid panty hose is pinching me and I didn’t mean to sound uh, mean.”
Stewart looked at me with a snotty smile and said, “Yeah. I’ll let you go ahead and get some punch for me.”
I hated myself for feeling sorry for him and made my way to the punch bowl where Gil and Irish were standing. Lifting the ladle from the bowl, I played with the fruit and ice cubes on top for awhile before slopping some punch into a cup for Stewart Rolf.
Still angry with myself for being nice to him, I let some punch trickle on the handle of the cup so when Stewart picked it up his hand would get all sticky.
Then Gil cleared his throat and said he and Irish had something to tell us. I thought Gil would be doing all the telling for Irish and I looked at the group of people in the room and realized all eyes were on Gil, Irish, and me playing with Stewart’s punch cup. I quickly ducked out of sight and hurried over to Stewart, forcing the punch cup into his hand while unintentionally slopping the pink beverage on his good dress pants; then I quickly returned to the safety of Anna’s side.
“Irish and I have an announcement to make.” Gil declared to everyone.
I looked over at Dad who sat there with a smile on his face. So far so good.
Gil continued. “Mr. McNally.” And he looked at Dad. “I have something to ask you.” And Gil reached into the pocket of his tight denim pants and pulled out a little box. A few gasps were heard in the room.
Gil turned back to Irish and picked up her hand. Then he turned back to Dad and then back to Irish and placed the medium sized diamond on her left finger. “Mr. McNally, I am asking for your daughter’s hand in marriage.”
I looked over at Dad again who looked relaxed and was smiling. Suddenly Irish started crying amid all the excitement in the room. “And another thing. I’m PREGNANT!” Irish blurted through her tears.
Gil reached to put his arm around her. I studied Dad’s face to see what he would do next. He sat staring at Gil and Irish with that same, tight-lipped smile. Mrs. Rolf and Mom grabbed each other’s hands and whispered to each other. Mr. Rolf continued to eat his cake and acted like nothing had happened, then looked over at Dad to reassure him that there was a house on his land for Gil and his new bride to move into.
Dad seemed to relax and by that time Irish had stopped crying.
“You are getting married in the Church, aren’t you?” Dad spoke directly to Gil.
“Of course, Mr. McNally! There was no question in my mind.” Gil answered correctly. It was as if Gil was a game show contestant and my dad was the host of the show, “Marry a McNally.”
“Great, Gil!” Dad exclaimed. And that was that. There wasn’t an explosion from Dad. I did notice, however, that Stewart didn’t seem to respond one way or the other. Once I thought about it, I realized Stewart’s other brother Robert had to get married, too. Maybe that’s how it was done in the Rolf family.
Both families sat down around the big dining room table and ate sandwiches, salad, and polished off the cake before heading to Irish’s commencement.
Looking around the table at all of the McNallys and the few Rolfs, it struck me ho
w happy Irish looked sitting beside Gil. The realization came to me. Irish would soon be leaving home just like everyone else. And I would finally have a bed to myself with just Anna and I left to occupy the two double beds in the big blue room. Maybe Gil Rolf wasn’t so bad after all.
EIGHTEEN
Summer was off to a full swing. Brian Reynold’s trial was held in the Round County Courthouse. Gil Rolf testified in the defense of Brian Reynolds and divulged he and Brian were on the country road that night in January to check out the land where they had been cultivating marijuana. Brian Reynolds gave the account of New Year’s Eve and how he slept it off in front of Ned Hollis’s house, and then drove to Gil Rolf’s. It was early morning then and Linda had never left the Hollis house as far as he knew because he did not recall having seen Linda Miles after he left Hollis’s party.
Thelma Carson was called to testify along with Ned Hollis, who reminded the court of his mayoral candidacy and that he believed the poor girl had left the party with the angry and drunken Brian Reynolds. Thelma, who Gil reported, was not very convincing and became flustered, tried to reiterate Hollis’s story. .
The trial ended with insufficient evidence partially due to the fact that a similar murder took place in a neighboring county while Brian Reynolds was sitting tight in jail, and because none of the stories could be corroborated except for Gil and Brian’s report of a marijuana crop. The crop area was investigated and plant remnants were found along with a few seeds. Another court date was set for Brian and Gil. This time for cultivation of an illegal substance, and the murder of Linda Miles was turned over to the state’s bureau of investigation.
NINETEEN
It had been two weeks since school let out and the boredom was setting in. LBJ was stuck out on the farm and rarely got into town. Glynda seemed to be chained to her house where she rode herd on her brothers while her mother worked part-time at the Laundromat. I found myself immersed in stories and gossip from Mrs. Randall while I tended her garden and flowerbeds every day. It was better to be with Mrs. Randall these days as Irish was moody and throwing up all of the time. Mom had become somewhat disenchanted with Irish’s condition and kept asking Irish when the wedding would be.
Mom would say, “You’ve got a diamond on your finger and a baby in your belly, but where’s the groom, where’s the priest?”
It was no secret Mom was beginning to worry that Gil had backed out of his duty to marry her impregnated daughter. But really everyone else knew it was early summer and Gil was busy with the farm. Besides that, Gil, like the rest of us, knew it was just best to stay away from Irish when she was either crying up a storm or puking all of the time.
So it was I engaged my time with Mrs. Randall. One morning in the middle of June, I once again found myself on my hands and knees crawling between rows of newly sprouted green beans. Mrs. Randall kept a close eye on me from the lawn chair positioned at one end of the garden.
“There’s a weed to your right, Donna. Make sure you don’t miss it.” Mrs. Randall called out to me.
Trying not to sound exasperated with her comment, I gave the same response as I had given the last time I had weeded her garden. “Thank you, Mrs. Randall, but remember I’ll finish this row before I move to the next row.”
And between Mrs. Randall’s nit-picking and my weary answers I decided to ask about some people in Burgenton who had captured my interest during the past months. One of course was Ned Hollis, but Mrs. Randall couldn’t tell me much more about him. Another one though was Thelma Carson and Mrs. Randall was able to tell me quite a bit about her.
“Of course I know Thelma Carson.” Mrs. Randall began. “Thelma was just a girl when she came to my house with her mother. She was a quiet child and didn’t say much. She sort of kept to herself, I remember. Thelma didn’t want to play with any of the other children in the neighborhood. She’d just choose to sit in the corner and rock her baby doll. Then of course, as she grew older she didn’t come with her mother when her mother came to pay me a visit and bring me fresh eggs to buy from their farm.”
Mrs. Randall went on. “Why I can remember during the war Thelma was in high school and then she had to leave Burgenton and go to Indianapolis to take care of a widowed great-aunt, I remember it was. It seemed strange to me she was gone for about half a year and then returned. I guess when she did come back she was a different girl. She was no longer quiet, but just such an angry young girl. Always seemed to have a chip on her shoulder. Don’t know why. Of course she grew into womanhood and stayed in Burgenton and lived on the family farm. I always thought it was sad she didn’t marry. And you say, Donna, that Thelma drives your school bus now?”
“That’s right Mrs. Randall. She does. I was just curious about her because she’s always so nasty with us. I really don’t like her very much, Mrs. Randall. But from what you’ve said, it sounds like she sort of had a hard childhood.” I tried to sound empathetic toward Thelma but I couldn’t help think about the period of time during the war when Thelma left for Indianapolis for about six months.
“Mrs. Randall? What year did she leave for Indianapolis?” I was starting to make connections between another story Mrs. Randall had told me, when Ned Hollis arrived in town.
“Oh Donna, that was a long time ago. Let’s see. I believe the war had almost ended. Let me see. Could it have been 1944 or 1945? Why is it important, Donna?” Mrs. Randall questioned my curiosity.
“Oh. I’m just wondering. I uh ... like to think about people’s lives whenever I see them each day like I do Thelma Carson. That’s all. I guess if I really wanted to know what year she graduated I could go to the library and look at the old high school yearbooks to see.”
The idea excited me. Didn’t Mrs. Randall tell me Ned Hollis was born in Indianapolis in 1944?
“Mrs. Randall?” I had to find out. “Mrs. Randall, can you tell me about that new man who’s running for mayor. You know, the one who lives by Ethel Becker?” Luckily for me, Mrs. Randall was sharp-minded and long-winded for her eighty-some years.
“What do you want to know, Donna? Yes he came here from Florida after his mother died. Of course she was his adopted mother and she passed away suddenly.” Mrs. Randall recounted the tale of Ned Hollis.
“Gee, Mrs. Randall. Um ... when did you say Ned Hollis was born?” I was trying to be casual about the whole thing and not show my excitement about the prospective theory churning in my brain.
“Oh Donna, I believe Mr. Hollis had said the 1940s. Why let’s see. Yes. It was 1944. That’s right 1944!” Mrs. Randall was proud of her recollection and fortunately she did not make the connection I had made. Ned Hollis was born in Indianapolis in 1944 and Thelma Carson moved to Indianapolis in 1944 for a short time. I thought of Irish’s pregnancy and realized she was not showing yet and it had been almost three months since she found out she was pregnant.
“Mrs. Randall? Did Thelma Carson have any boyfriends you’d remember?”
My question was a long shot, but I had to see if she knew.
“Donna. Such a long time ago for my old brain to remember these things. Why I do remember her mother talking about Thelma and a boy, but that poor young man, his family was new to the community, that boy went overseas and was killed. The family didn’t stay in Burgenton, but moved back to where they came from. It was someplace in Ohio. I believe the boy’s body was shipped back to Ohio and he was buried there.”
“Do you know what this boy looked like, Mrs. Randall?” I knew Ned Hollis looked nothing like Thelma Carson.
“No I don’t. His family was here for less than one year and the boy was drafted. Such sad stories that cross these paths of our lives, aren’t they, Donna?”
I couldn’t help but agree with Mrs. Randall. She was right. There were so many sad stories and they all involved people in Burgenton. “Yes, you’re right, Mrs. Randall. That is a sad story.”
I couldn’t wait to get to the library and examine the yearbooks from the 1940s. I hoped they were still on the shelves from that
long ago.
“Do you know the name of the boy, Mrs. Randall?” Having the boy’s name would be helpful in finding out if he was the real father of Ned Hollis and if Thelma Carson was truly the mother of Hollis and not his first cousin as everyone was led to believe.
“No, Donna. I don’t recall. Maybe it was a Mc-something. I can’t remember.”
After ripping the last weed from the garden, I quickly asked Mrs. Randall if she needed anything else, then hurried home to get on the phone with LBJ. I had to let her know what I had found out. Maybe Glynda would be free to go to the library with me this afternoon.
“Hi Mr. Todd, is Lori Bell home?” I tried to hide the urgency in my voice.
“Why hold on, honey. Lori Bell. It’s one of your little friends calling.”
