by Andre Norton
Grandpa sloshed some of its contents into all three basins and beckoned. “Wash up it is, ’fore we git to Mercy’s table.”
Crock followed him over. Judy looked dubious, but obediently started for the bench. This was so different from running upstairs to the bathroom to wash at Mom’s bidding. Holly again felt that need to be safely home where all was ordered and—right! She unfastened the zipper of her jacket and took it off slowly. As she did so the small pillow bumped out and fell, almost right in front of Grandma as she came with her quick steps to put a platter of sliced bread on the table.
Holly picked the cushion up. The scent from it was now almost too strong. And it did not feel like a regular pillow, rather as if it had been stuffed tight with bits of leaves, or grass.
“It fell out of a little old trunk when we were loading,” Holly said quickly. “It’s a pillow—I think—” Now, seeing it in the light, she almost doubted her first impression. It was too small for a bed pillow, surely, and not pretty enough to lie out on a divan or couch.
The material which covered it was coarse and yellow. And the embroidered lines on both sides ran around and around in circles which were broken here and there, as if some of the stitches had unraveled. Even if those lines had still been firm and complete, it would not have been a pretty design, not like the crewel-stitch pillows with ferns and flowers Mom had made last year.
Mom had made—Holly’s hands tightened on the ugly little pillow. Her throat closed up and hurt again. Mom—who was gone with all the rest of that life which was safe and happy.
Grandma set the bread down on the table. Now she held out her hands, and Holly surrendered the pillow. She was glad to be rid of the dirty old thing. Grandma turned it around, looked carefully at the broken circles on either side, took her fingernail and pushed a little at the old stitches by one of those broken places in the circle. Then she raised it up to her face to take a long, long sniff.
“Lemon balm, costmary.” She sniffed again. “Rose petals, mint—an’ cloves an’—something else I can’t rightly set name to.” She favored the pillow with three more long sniffs. “No, me, I can’t figure out that there last one. But with the rest—why, this here is an herb pillow, Holly, one made for them as can’t sleep good at nights. Miss Elvery—now she had one she used when she had one of her headaches—showed me how to make ’em. For them you put in mints, an’ bee balm, an’ some orris root. But this is a sight more interestin’. That linen’s real old, wouldn’t surprise me none if it were hand wove, has th’ look o’ it. An’ just about as good as th’ day ’twas made, too.” She squeezed the pillow energetically. “Insides might be gone all to powder. But this here”—she started tracing the design on the upper side with her finger and then stopped—“that do remind me of some-thin’. Only I can’t think jus’ what at the minute. Laws, them beans is coolin’ off. Go set this up with th’ fixin’s in the china stall, Holly. I’d like to think a bit more about this here—puts me in mind—only I can’t remember what it puts me in mind of now.”
Holly plumped the pillow down on a vacant portion of one of the shelves holding the broken china and washed in the basin. The soap, for all its strange appearance, smelled good—spicy. When she came to the table, Judy was pointing to an unusual thing made all of metal tubes cut off at one end but fastened to each other, open ends up, in a block. “What’s that, Grandma?”
“That there’s what earns me a bit of pin money, Judy. Mr. Correy, he lets me put out some things in his shop. An’ I make herb candles in that. People like th’ smell of them, it seems. That there mold, I’ll wager it’s nigh as old as this town. Now, Luther, will you say grace?”
Holly dutifully closed her eyes and listened to Grandpa’s words about the food the good Lord had given them. He added something about Mom, and then about Daddy. She tried to shut her ears then, for fear she would be babyish enough to cry.
She took a big mouthful of the beans as quickly as she could. They were good, as good as the stew last night. Holly found she was hungry, after all.
“Grandma”—Judy spooned up the last mouthful of something Grandma called hasty pudding and served with maple syrup poured over it—“why don’t you have any real lights, like we have at home?”
“Well, Miss Elvery—she didn’t have no money to pay for ’em runnin’ a line in when they brought the ’lectricity out this way. An’ after she died an’ the town took over Dimsdale, th’ folks there weren’t gonna pay for it. Selectmen, they don’t pay out not a dime more’n they have to. Me an’ Luther, we’d always used lamps an’ such. It just come natural to us. Just like using well water an’ some other things folks in town think is strange nowadays. My mammy, she was real poor, Judy. Only she was wishful for all of us to do better, an’ we did. My brother, Jas, he went on the railroad an’ did right well for hisself. Missy an’ Ellie May, they went to th’ big city, got themselves smart jobs workin’ for families as ’preciated all they done.
“Me an’ Luther, we done well, too. We ain’t livin’ off’n no relief an’ we got us our own home place. Luther has hisself a good business here. Your daddy, he was always one as wanted to get ahead, too. He went clean through high school. Then he joined the army—said as how he was going to learn a lot there. ’Cause the recruitin’ man told him as how there was chances to learn a trade, even if you did it while you were soljerin’. He got right good at what he was doin’—th’ radio thing. Did so good”—Grandma stopped a moment in her stacking of their pudding bowls—“done so good that th’ Colonel hisself wanted him with him in Vietnam, said he knew he could depend on Joel. I guess Joel, he was kinda pleased to be goin’, too—in some ways. He always had a hankerin’ to see ’round th’ world. Lawsy, how he used to get out all them old National Geographic magazines we fetched in when people came dumpin’ an’ jus’ read and read. Got me an’ Luther to readin’ along with him.
“We never had much schoolin’, you see. ’Cause we had work to do. Luther, his pappy died when he was jus’ about Holly’s age here, so he went to work then over to th’ sawmill at Riverton. His mammy sure was able to use what he brought home. But he could read, an’ figger, an’ write—an’ you can keep on learnin’ if you’re not lazy-minded. You come an’ look here—”
She turned away from the table abruptly, beckoning so urgently that not only Judy, but Crock and Holly followed her away from the warmth of the fire-stove portion of the barn toward the more chilly space at the far end. Here were more shelves nailed to the portion of the last stall on the outer side. And these were crowded with books. Some looked badly battered, had even lost one cover or two. But they stood straight, and Grandma touched her fingers to the backs of the nearest ones gently.
“Library—we’ve got a library to our ownselves. Me an’ Luther, we’ve read nigh every single one of these here. ’Course th’ library truck comes around twice a month, down to th’ Forks. But it ain’t always easy to get down there, not in winter. Th’ country men, they cleans off th’ main road, but in winter th’ lane’s sometimes too snowed up to make it. But we ain’t without books, even if we can’t git down to the truck.”
Crock inspected the shelves. “They’re real old, some of them, aren’t they?”
“Guess so. Miss Sarah, she takes those the library can use, but there’s a lot left over. Magazines, too. So we got ourselves a library an’ it’s a good thing to pass th’ time when it’s winter an’ we ain’t got much business with th’ junk. I found me a parcel o’ books about herbs. Them I keep right to hand ’cause I try things they tell about—they being old an’ sorta forgot in these days. There’s some books for young’uns, too. But mind you, treat ’em right. Books should be real treasures, I always think. A lotta thinkin’ an’ hard work must go into writin’ a book.
“Now then.” She returned to the table. “Mrs. Dale is bringin’ out those Cubs of hers after school, so we have to git everything smartened up a bit. Luther, you an’ Crockett here, why don’t you go an’ see as how things back in the t
oy stall are loosened up a mite so as they can crawl around an’ look at ’em good. We’ll just clear way these here dishes—”
A little to her own surprise, Holly found herself with a dish towel made from an old sack in one hand, using it on the warm plates, mugs, and bowls that emerged from the big tin pan in which Grandma vigorously plunged them, while Judy took them when dry to stack on the proper shelf.
“Many hands make light work,” Grandma said. “That’s an old sayin’ an’ it is a true one. I’m glad Mrs. Dale is comin’, gives you young’uns a chance to meet her. She teaches fifth grade at th’ big school—”
“I’m in fifth grade,” Judy broke in eagerly. “Will she be my teacher?”
“That she will. Now you, Holly, you’ll probably have Mrs. Finch. She’s a lot older’n Mrs. Dale. Some folks think she’s strict. But she’s fair an’ she treats you right. Only she’ll expect you to try hard—”
“Holly got an honor report card last time,” Judy supplied. “Mom let her choose a prize and she chose going to the movies—all of us. We saw a Walt Disney, about Bambi. It was an old picture, but we’d never seen it before, only a little bit of it on the TV. It was good, all about a baby deer.”
“Was it now? Well, come a little later you’ll maybe get to see a real deer. Luther, he takes kindly to animals. He puts out hay when th’ weather turns bad. Th’ deer come in last year—”
“Grandma—” Judy turned to look at the hearth—“the kitten, what happened to the kitten?”
“He dried hisself off after he’d had a good feed. Then he went explorin’, likely to turn up most anywheres about. Cats is like that, they is curious, want to know all about a place ’fore they settle in. There now—he might have known we was talkin’ about him.”
The gray cat appeared, as if he were a shadow able to detach himself from the other shadows, to sit before his very empty, well-polished plate on the hearth. When he saw that they were watching him, he opened his mouth as if he were mewing, only Holly could not hear a sound. Certainly he did not look as bedraggled as when Grandpa had brought him in. However, he was still so thin his bones stood out visibly under his fur.
“Eatin’ time again?” Grandma shook her head, but she poured milk into his bowl and added crumbled dark bread. “Seems he has a likin’ for bread—some cats have queer tastes that way.”
“Are you going to keep him?” Holly wanted to know. The cat did not bear much resemblance to those in the pictures of the cat books she had brought home from the library. She had always hoped that someday they could own a Siamese or a Persian. This cat looked like one of the half-starved prowlers they sometimes caught a glimpse of in the city.
“If he chooses to stay, he’s welcome,” Grandma said. “A cat chooses a home mostly, won’t stay with folks he don’t like nor in a place he don’t take a fancy to. We’ll see what he decides.”
“What will you call him?” Judy wanted to know.
“Tomkit!” Holly was surprised at her own prompt answer. Tomkit—such a silly name! She couldn’t remember ever having heard it before! Why had she said that?
“Tomkit,” repeated Judy. “Oh, you mean like Tom Kitten, Mom used to read about—the one in the Roly-Poly Pudding story. I’d almost forgotten about him. ’Cause that was a book we had when we were very little.”
“Tomkit,” repeated Grandma thoughtfully. “All right, Tomkit he is.”
The gray cat stopped gobbling down the contents of the bowl and looked up—straight at Holly, she was certain. Just as if he knew that name. Perhaps she had had it in mind from that long-ago storybook. Only somehow she doubted that. However, it seemed just right for this stray.
She and Judy helped Grandma, to “straighten up” the barn-house, as she put it. Then they went to see the things Grandpa and Crock were dragging out of the end stall. There were two bicycles, both pretty much wrecks; a wagon without a wheel, some stuffed toys, part of a train set. Most were so broken that Holly could not see much use for them. And she did not like getting into the mess. Finally she went and told Grandma she would write a letter to Mom, then climbed the stairs to find her paper and ballpoint pen.
She had them in hand, and was ready to go down into the warmer section of the barn-house, when she heard noise below and guessed that Mrs. Dale and her Cub Scouts had arrived. They sounded as if they were all talking at once—about a hundred of them, or at least ten. Holly sat down on her bed. She did not want to go down, to meet all those strangers. Junkyard—what would they think of the Wades living in a junkyard, even helping to collect dirty old rubbish as they had this morning? This was a junkyard and they lived in an old barn full of junk—and—and—
She threw herself face down on the bed and bit hard at the quilt where it covered her pillow. No, she was not going to cry! But Mom! Now she did not want to write to Mom, she wanted to see her right here in this room—Mom coming to say it was all a mistake, they were going home and all would be just what it had been before.
“Holly?”
That was Judy. She did not even want to look at her. But if she didn’t, then maybe Judy would go back and tell Grandma Holly was crying or something like that.
“What do you want?” she demanded fiercely.
“Holly, aren’t you coming down? Grandma’s giving us all doughnuts, and Mrs. Dale’s so nice. Come on, Holly—”
She supposed she would have to go. But didn’t Judy remember Mom at all? Didn’t she want to be home again? Holly swung around on the bed.
If Judy had cleaned herself up before lunch, she was not very clean now. There was dust and something which looked like oil on the front of her shirt. One of her braids had come loose and flopped over her eyes. As she pushed the hair back impatiently, she left a very dark streak on her brown forehead.
“All right.” Holly wanted to stay where she was. Only fear of what might happen with Grandma (who she was now sure missed seeing very little) got her to her feet, down the stairs, and brought her behind Judy, who was bubbling over with descriptions of what they had found and what could be done with it.
Mrs. Dale was pleasant, Holly had to admit, though she begrudged even that much of a surrender. The boys burrowing into the junk Grandpa and Crock had brought out said “Hello” in an offhand way, as if they did not really see her. But boys always acted like that. Holly was more noticing of one thing—they were all white.
What if there were no blacks in the new school? Would that make a difference? Who could Judy and she be friends with? She wasn’t going to push in where she wasn’t wanted. And she must see that Judy didn’t either. All the time that she talked politely to Mrs. Dale, as Mom had taught her, Holly wondered and worried. She couldn’t come right out and ask, somehow. Only how she wished there were some way of knowing.
The thought of the new school and what it might mean was in Holly’s mind all during the weekend. On Sunday they went to church with Grandma and Grandpa, but that was not to a town church. They took a longer drive, over the river, to what had once been an old one-room schoolhouse. There were all Grandma and Grandpa’s old friends, and most of them were old, also. There weren’t too many of them, and the minister they called Brother Williams, he was really an old man. No children except some who weren’t more than babies or others who were grown up—or thought they were. It seemed to Holly a very queer kind of church, and without Mom there—
In the afternoon, for want of something better to do, they explored Grandma’s library. Sure enough, there were some old books supposed to be for children. Judy fastened on a Nancy Drew mystery that had lost one cover and had a lot of pages mended with Scotch tape. Crock found a pile of National Geographics. But Holly, feeling very dull and unhappy, pulled out books listlessly, glanced at them, and shoved them back on the shelves again. She finally discovered a very battered copy of what seemed to be six magazines bound together. The title on the stained red cover could hardly be read, but she made out the words “St. Nicholas.” Inside, the pages were stained and mended, and the pictures
were very queer. But it was very old because the date also appearing inside was 1895. She turned over the pages, trying not to tear them any more, until it was suppertime.
Monday morning they were up when it was still dark and had a chilly walk down to the lane’s end, to wait there for the school bus. They waited so long that Holly began to hope the driver had forgotten their stop and they would have another day’s reprieve.
But the bus came at last and they got in. The seats were crowded, there was nothing to do but push toward the back, facing all the strangers, who stared at them as they went. Crock saw one of the Cub Scouts, who hailed him, and he sat down there. But Judy and Holly had to go to the very end. Holly was sure her worst fears were proven true. There was not a single black child there.
“Judy.” She caught at her sister’s elbow, gave it a hard squeeze to ensure Judy was listening. “You be careful—”
“Careful about what, Holly?”
“Don’t you see? These are all whites, they may not like us. Don’t push, Judy, don’t you look as if you want to be friends unless they’re friendly first. You be good and careful. They—they may say things—”
“What kind of things?”
“Well, that we live in a dump, and we’re different, things like that.”
Some of the brightness faded from Judy’s face. She looked anxious. “But that boy—he called to Crock to sit with him.”
“It’s different with boys,” Holly told her. “Don’t you give these white girls any reason to think they’re better than we are—to laugh at us. Just be careful until you see how they’re going to act.”
“Holly, are you scared?”
That was one thing Holly was not going to admit to Judy, who was a whole year younger and sometimes quite childish.
“No. I just want to be careful. And you be careful, too.”
“All right, Holly.” Judy’s voice was very low. She sat looking down at her school bag where it rested on her knees, Grandma’s lunch making a big bump in the middle.
