A Man of His Word

by Karen Kelly

  “Sounds like your grandparents were used to nor’easters.” Herb dipped the corner of his toast into the almost liquid egg yolk. Annie knew exactly how he preferred his eggs.

  Annie filled two mugs with coffee and handed them to LeeAnn. “I’m sure they were. They must have seen hundreds of them during their years here.” She topped off Herb’s coffee mug before replacing the carafe on the warming plate and sitting down to her breakfast. “Now that I’ve decided on settling here, I suppose I should start keeping track of how many I experience.”

  “We can’t play games all day,” John inserted. “It’s hours and hours!” He raised a mug of hot chocolate to his lips for a long drink, tilting his head back to capture the last drops. “Hey, can we play in the attic, Grandma?”

  Joanna’s eyes lit up at her brother’s suggestion. “Oh, please, Grandma? We promise we won’t break anything!” She carefully picked up her plate and mug, and set them in the large kitchen sink.

  Annie had spent many hours in the attic in anticipation of her grandchildren’s visit, but they had not had time to venture up there. “I think that’s a great idea, John. We’ll go upstairs as soon as your mother and I have eaten and cleaned up the breakfast dishes.”

  Herb pushed his chair back, and stood. “Let’s play a few rounds of Uno while you wait.” After thanking Annie and LeeAnn for breakfast, he herded the twins down the hall, “yeahs” and “awesomes” echoing off the walls.

  LeeAnn’s eyes smiled at her mother over the rim of her mug. She lowered it and said, “You know, I’m actually thankful for this nor’easter. Maine is beautiful to explore, but I’m glad we’ll have time to explore the attic too—the famous attic of mysteries.”

  “Or do you mean infamous?” Annie chuckled as she cut into her eggs.

  LeeAnn waved her fork at her mother. “No more infamous mysteries. Let’s keep it to entertaining and safe ones from now on.”

  “The mysteries don’t usually consult me about their danger levels, sweetheart. They are what they are, and only the Lord knows where each will lead when they show themselves.” Annie spread a thin layer of jelly over her toast and took a bite. The tangy sweetness tasted like sunshine to her on the stormy day.

  “Well, I’ll just have to talk to Him about it,” said LeeAnn. Her eyes roamed around the homey kitchen, filled with the warmth of antique pieces mixed with modern updates. “I hate the thought of any more intruders—” Annie opened her mouth to interrupt. “—whether you’re at home or not,” LeeAnn finished.

  “Maybe there won’t be any more mysteries,” Annie tried to assure her daughter. “I mean, just how many mysteries can one attic hold?” A burst of triumphant cheering and a groan sounded from the family room. “Sounds like John just won a round of something.”

  “We’re still working with him on the concept of being a gracious winner, as well as loser,” LeeAnn said between nibbles on her toast.

  Annie thought back to the days of child training she and her late husband, Wayne, had spent with LeeAnn—the same LeeAnn who was pointing the half-eaten piece of toast at her mother. “Don’t think I’m not noticing that smile on your face, Mom. I’m well aware I’m receiving payback for my childish ways.”

  “That didn’t cross my mind at all,” Annie countered, as she gathered the last bit of yolk onto her fork. “I was smiling at how God took our shaky parenting and created such a dynamic person and mother.”

  Her plate now empty, LeeAnn went to the sink and grabbed a dishcloth to wipe the table, dampening it under warm water from the tap. “And you had not one thought about Kenny Ford’s birthday party?”

  Annie startled at the name of one of their neighbors from the old house in Texas, where they had lived when LeeAnn was young. “Kenny Ford? Wow, it’s been a while.” She paused to think over those years. “Are you referring to his fourth birthday, by any chance?” She stood and carried her plate over to the dishwasher, lowering its door to start loading the breakfast dishes.

  “Of course, I am! I feel embarrassed every time I think about it.” LeeAnn opened the refrigerator door to return the jelly, butter, and coffee cream to their places.

  “It’s been more than twenty years, LeeAnn! And it turned out to be a wonderful teaching moment.” Annie slipped the other plates into the slots of the bottom rack.

  Are you serious?” LeeAnn asked, shaking her head as she returned to the table and picked up the napkin holder to wipe underneath it. “Here I go to the Ford’s party and win game after game with a stack of prizes. And what do I do when, finally, someone else wins the last one? I cry! And Mrs. Ford was so nice, but I still came home upset.” LeeAnn shook her head again. “I was being so silly, and you thought it was a wonderful time?”

  Annie slipped a mug in a gap between two glasses in the dishwasher. “Do you remember crying at any parties after that?”

  “Hmmmm, I guess not,” LeeAnn said after a pause.

  “See? You grew from that experience. That makes it wonderful in my book. And John will grow too, as you and Herb keep doing the hard work of parenting.” Annie shut the door of the dishwasher. “Do you think we should take the twins upstairs now or give John time to lose a game first?”

  Annie’s cat, Boots, padded into the kitchen and over to her food and water bowls. After checking the level in each, the cat cast a glance at Annie and sat down, staring at her.

  “It looks like we need to restock Boots’s supplies before we do anything else,” LeeAnn countered. The tip of the cat’s tail flicked up and down, up and down.

  Annie restored the cat’s dish to a more acceptable level and chucked Boots under the chin. “We’ll let you eat in peace now, Boots.” Turning to LeeAnn she whispered, “She can’t seem to figure out if she wants to be left alone or not. She’s either acting put out or neglected. Sometimes simultaneously!”

  “Good thing I gave you all that practice in parenting.” LeeAnn and Annie laughed as they left Boots to eat and went to round up the twins from the family room.

  They poked their heads through the doorway. “Anyone ready for an attic adventure?” LeeAnn asked in her best imitation of the classic horror-film actor, Bella Lugosi.

  John leaped up, scattering his Uno hand. “I am! I am!”

  “Me too!” Joanna started to replace her cards on the stack but paused. “Is that OK, Daddy?”

  Herb nodded. “Of course, it’s OK. We can always play more later, if you want.” Joanna jumped up and threw her arms around her father’s neck. “Thanks, Daddy! Are you coming with us?”

  “Maybe later. I need to check the news and weather first.” Herb met his wife’s smiling eyes. LeeAnn gave a slight nod. “I might even make you a surprise lunch.”

  John moaned. “Aw, Dad, it’s not a surprise if we know ’bout it.”

  “Maybe that’s not the surprise part,” his sister retorted.

  “Can we quit talkin’ and get on with the ’venturing?” John responded. “Please?”

  “Let’s go!” Annie led the way up the stairs to the second floor and down the hall to the attic stairs. When they reached the top of the stairs, Annie flipped on the track lighting she had added after she grew tired of stumbling her way around the cavernous room jumbled with decades of accumulation. The eyebrow window set in the wall opposite the door usually provided most of the light needed during daytime visits to the attic. Not today, Annie thought. The nor’easter has swallowed the sunlight.

  Joanna pulled on Annie’s sleeve. “Grandma, can we use that lamp over there too? It’s awesome.” Annie and LeeAnn followed Joanna’s pointing finger to a lamp teetering on top of a pile of items perched on an old chest of drawers. The base of the lamp was crafted from a piece of driftwood and topped with a shade made of fabric that resembled sail material.

  “It probably hasn’t been used in years, Joanna,” said her mother. “It may be broken.”

  “Can we just try it?” John asked. “It’s a super-cool lamp.”

  “Grandma would probably need to go downstai
rs for a lightbulb anyway, John. Why bother when there’s enough light?” The excitement on the twins’ face disappeared.

  Annie walked over to a wall cabinet hung beside the stairs. “Actually, I still have some extra bulbs in here.” She opened the cabinet door and pulled a bulb from a box inside. Her head cocked to one side as she considered the lamp’s position on its perch. “I think we’re going to need help reaching it.”

  “Let me try.” LeeAnn made her way to the chest of drawers and reached up as high as she could. “It doesn’t look that high, but this trunk and the boxes get in the way of my reach.” She looked around for something to boost her height.

  “What about that, Mom?” John pointed to a bench under a well-used vanity table with peeling white paint.

  Annie clapped her hands together. “Good job, John!” she exclaimed. “You take one end, and I’ll take the other.” John jumped to the nearest end. On Annie’s signal of “One, two, lift!” he raised his end.

  Annie shuffled backward, keeping an eye on the path behind her with quick glances over her shoulder. In spite of the numerous hours she had spent sorting in the attic, it was still a labyrinth, thanks to her grandmother’s penchant for collecting curiosities.

  Joanna gasped, “Watch out, John! You almost knocked over that old ski thingy.” John grunted his response, a scowl of concentration on his face.

  When the bench neared LeeAnn, she put out a hand to position it where she needed it. “Right here. You can put it down, John.” John set his end down with an effort reminiscent of a grand-piano mover. He wiped the dust from his hands onto his jeans.

  LeeAnn climbed onto the bench, stretching for the lamp. “Ahhh, just what I needed. Got it.” She grasped the lamp in one hand and steadied it with the other. As Annie watched her daughter’s movement, her curiosity peaked.

  “LeeAnn, what is that black thing right under the lamp?” A long leather trunk sat directly on top of the chest and two large boxes, one rectangular and one square, on top of that. Sitting on the rectangular box was a black item about a foot long, but it didn’t look like a box of cardboard or wood.

  “I think it’s a book, Mom.” LeeAnn handed the lamp down to her mother.

  “A book?” Annie frowned as she examined the lamp for damage. “That’s odd. Why wouldn’t it be in the library?”

  LeeAnn bent closer to the book. “It’s a Bible! And it looks pretty old.” She carefully lifted it off the box and wiped the dust off the cover. “Authorized King James Version,” she read. Stepping down from the bench, she brought the Bible with her.

  Annie was reaching for it when Joanna tapped her shoulder. “Grandma, will the lamp work?”

  “The wires look all right.” Annie inserted the new bulb and turned it until it was secure. “Now for the final test.” She carried the lamp over to a washstand near one of the electrical outlets her grandfather had installed and plugged it in. Light poured from the lamp.

  “It works! It works!” Joanna cheered. The sail-fabric shade of the lamp diffused a friendly bright light, like a beacon in fog. Joanna turned to her brother. “Come on, John. We already found one treasure; let’s find more! I hope I find a hoop skirt.”

  John snorted. “A hoop skirt? I hope I find a sword. Wouldn’t you rather be a pirate than a sissy girl?”

  Joanna drew herself up to her full height of three feet and six inches. “I’m not a sissy girl. I can be a pirate princess, if I want to.”

  “Just don’t try to boss me around, or I’ll make you walk the plank,” John growled back in his best man-of-danger voice.

  LeeAnn whispered to her mother, “Is it possible they could find a sword?”

  Annie raised an eyebrow. “In this attic? I wouldn’t rule out anything!”

  “Gotcha.” LeeAnn handed the Bible to Annie and put an arm around each child. “OK, here are the rules of the treasure hunt: One, do no damage. Two, no fighting over anything. Three, any sharp items or weapons of any kind must be examined by an adult as soon as they’re found and before touching.” She gazed steadily into John’s eyes. “Understood, Pirate?”

  John returned his mother’s gaze and muttered, “Understood.”

  LeeAnn moved her eyes to Joanna’s. “Understood, Pirate Princess?”

  Joanna grinned, knowing hoop skirts weren’t considered weapons, and she was pretty sure they weren’t sharp. “Understood, Pirate Mama.”

  3

  As soon as her small pirates began rummaging through the first pile of potential booty, LeeAnn turned her attention back to the Bible in her mother’s hands. “Is there a name in it?”

  Annie sat down on the bench, patting the space beside her. Mother and daughter bent over the old book. Annie turned the pages slowly, one after the other, until the Presentation page appeared. In a fine hand of calligraphy the words “Presented to William Frederick Holden on this day, the fourth of January, in the year of our Lord 1915, upon his taking the bench as Justice of the Superior Judicial Court, Cumberland County, Maine” were written.

  “William Frederick Holden … I think that’s Grandpa’s Uncle Will,” said Annie. “He told me his uncle was a judge for many years. How in the world did something this special wind up stacked in the attic? It should be in the library with the family Bible.”

  LeeAnn nodded. “It does seem an odd place for it. Good thing it’s not hot and humid for long periods of time here, or it might have been ruined.” She ran a finger over the smooth page.

  “It’s also a blessing Grandpa was always meticulous about keeping the roof in good repair,” added Annie. “One leak in the wrong place would have completely destroyed this.” She leaned closer to the pages, marveling at the beautiful handwriting.

  Before LeeAnn could respond, Joanna’s voice came from somewhere in the maze of paraphernalia. “Mama, Grandma! Come see what I found! It’s almost better than a hoop skirt, but it’s too long. Can you help me?”

  Annie closed the Bible. Her love of family spanned generations, but time with her grandchildren came first. “I want to make sure I bring this downstairs,” she told LeeAnn. She set the Bible by the attic door, and then followed her daughter to where Joanna stood in front of a cracked mirror. She held in front of her an emerald green dress adorned with an intricate pattern embroidered in gold silk thread.

  “Isn’t it beautiful? Did you make it, Grandma?” Joanna asked Annie, her voice now quiet with awe. Annie fingered the soft yet sturdy material and examined the pattern that filled the entire front of the dress from the neckline to the hem.

  “I would love to have such a fine touch with embroidery, Joanna, but I don’t.” Annie traced the gold thread with a finger. “This looks like it might be from an Asian country. I wonder if your great-great-grandfather Charles brought it home from his travels during World War II.”

  Annie carefully grasped the material on either side of Joanna’s legs, raising the hem to a length more suitable for a small girl. “LeeAnn, do you see anything we can use for a belt to hold the folds of material?”

  Joanna swayed sideways, watching the swing of the dress. “Make sure it’s a pretty belt, Mama.”

  “I will do my best, mademoiselle,” said LeeAnn with a flourish of her hands. She disappeared, picking her way toward the window and looking into any trunk, box, or drawer she encountered.

  Joanna looked down where her feet peeped out from the bottom of the dress. “Grandma, do you think I could be a pirate princess in this dress? You have to be able to run and swing on ropes and stuff.”

  “Well, it’s not a full skirt like a hoop skirt would be,” said Annie, “but it does have these slits partway up the sides. They would make it easier to move than some other kinds of dresses. Try this.” She lunged forward with her left leg and swished an imaginary sword. “Off my boat, you scalawag!”

  Joanna stuck a leg out like her grandmother and lunged, thrusting with her right hand. “Swish! Swish! You scal’wag!” Annie leaned forward with her granddaughter, still holding the dress up so Joanna wou
ldn’t trip. The pirate princess brought her leg back and bounced with glee. “It worked! This is the perfect dress, even if it doesn’t have a hoop skirt.”

  The sound of an old drawer opening reluctantly, squeaking in protest, was followed by a triumphant yelp. “Found it!” LeeAnn reappeared with a length of gold cord with tassels at both ends. “What do you think, Joanna?” she asked, holding the cord up to the green dress.

  “It’s pretty, Mama!” her daughter exclaimed. “Grandma, will it work?”

  “Lift your arms, and we’ll see.” Annie held out her hand, and LeeAnn placed the cord in it. After a minute or two of wrapping, tying, and making adjustments, Annie stepped back to examine her work. “You can lower your arms now, Joanna. Try a gentle twirl to see how it’ll hold up.”

  Joanna did as her grandmother asked and finished with a quick lunge for good measure. “It works!” She twirled again, in the opposite direction.

  “You look beautiful and fierce,” LeeAnn told her. “Just as a pirate princess should.”

  John’s voice yelled from across the attic, “Mom, does an old cane with a pointy thing that sticks out when you press a button count as a weapon?”

  “Pointy thing?” LeeAnn shouted back, trying to figure out exactly which direction to head. “Yes! Don’t do anything until I take a closer look!” She disappeared into the attic maze.

  Joanna tugged Annie’s sleeve. “Grandma, I think we made my pirate princess dress just in time.”

  ****

  “Good night, Mom,” said LeeAnn, reaching out to hug Annie. “Thanks for making the stormy day so much fun for the kids.”

  Annie took her time returning her daughter’s hug; she had less than twenty-four hours left to re-stock her supply of hugs before her family flew back to Texas. “This kid had fun too. It’s not every day I get to be a pirate queen.” She gave one last squeeze. “Rest well tonight. Tomorrow might be a long day.”

  “I don’t think sleep will be slow in arriving.” LeeAnn walked down the hall to the larger guest room, pausing a moment to put her ear to the twins’ room.