by Leah Weiss
“There are forty-two marbles in that box, right?” Lydia says, because she’s heard it so many times. Forty-two marbles that are almost a hundred years old—and all flawed but still priceless to us. These were marbles the factory rejected. We hold them up to the light and study them under Mama’s magnifying glass. We look for bubbles, irregular lines, and our great-grandpa’s fingerprints.
We have our own sacks of micas, sulphides, and latticino swirls. We’re proud of our skill, but Mama reminds us we tread close to the sin of pride when it comes to marbles. I don’t think we can help ourselves.
On the Saturday after my birthday, Grady is the lucky one. He gets to watch a showdown between the two best players in the prison camp, one a German and one an army guard from Warren, Michigan.
“Why can’t we all go?” Bert says in her forthright way. “Cause we’re girls?”
“Let Grady and Daddy go first, then we’ll see about y’all going another time. If Byron thinks it’s okay.”
Mama uses this bargaining technique a lot: dangling hope to keep us in line with no real promise attached, and it works. If we throw a hissy fit, she can rescind any smidgeon of hope. Then where would we be? In a pickle, that’s where. Mama is a slick negotiator.
When Grady gets back that marble-playing day, he has wonder etched on his face. His fingertips twitch. “Never seen anything like it,” he starts. “First off, they call their game ringers. Stead of some puny three-foot circle like we use, they play on a circle ten foot wide with thirteen marbles in the crosshairs lined up on the axes. They play on concrete, and the taw flies and does good damage, but it can get away from you easy.” Grady is flushed with admiration and adds, “And that’s using hand-me-down marbles that are nicked. What could they do with good mibs?”
“How big’s ten foot?” Lydia wants to know.
“Stay there,” he says and steps back and back and back. “From you to here.”
“Golly. Are you fooling?”
“Nope. Daddy, Tiny Junior, and I witnessed the whole thing. The guard called Simpson is good, but it’s that German named Didi who won today’s match. He has moves I never witnessed. He puts a backspin on his shooter that keeps it right where he wants it to be. His control is phenomenal.”
Bert says, “I bet you could beat him, Grady,” which shocks me. She shocks Grady, too, from the look on his face. “Don’t you wanna try?” she adds as a challenge.
Grady scratches his head. “I’d have to practice with the bigger circle on concrete to see which moves work and which don’t. Uncle Nigel has that concrete portico. I could chalk a circle on that.” Grady already sees it happening.
“Would you play fair or keepers?” Bert asks the question like she’s interested when she doesn’t even like the game. She came too late to us to be any good at it.
“Let me practice first. I’m a long way from beating the likes of Didi. They’ll play another match next Saturday. I wanna watch again.”
“You want company?” I say to Grady, then look over at Bert, Lydia, and Cora. We’re thinking the same thing: we’re going to finagle us a trip to that camp.
The next evening, while I’m setting the supper table, I say, “Mama, about those camp mibsters.” Her silence sounds amenable, so I go on. “We girls want to watch, too. You could come with us if you thought it was dangerous. Grady didn’t feel scared one bit inside the fence, and you know Byron would make sure we’re safe. Grady says it’s playing the likes he’s never seen.”
And she astounds me when she says, “That might work out.”
It might have been because of the glum of winter days that could use a spark of change. It might have been because Daddy tells her there’s no danger in watching an old game made new, but Mama grants permission. Next Saturday morning, clouds hang heavy and threaten rain, but our attitude is sunny. Bert and I dress with extra care and put on a teeny bit of Patricia’s makeup, but Mama notices and shakes her head. “Put on regular clothes. Wash that stuff off your faces. This isn’t a social call. It’s marbles.” And we acquiesce because we have to.
Daddy and Grady slide in the front seat of the car, and Bert and me sit in back with Cora and Lydia on our laps. Helen wasn’t even asked to come. We grin on the ride to a forbidden place we’ve only passed in the truck. Captain Toots meets us at the gate. Bert and I feel funny walking into a place where nothing feminine abides. The attention we garner is thick like sugar syrup but tickles our skin like spider feet. Somebody whistles, and Byron calls out, “Knock it off.” We remember the power Patricia and her A team bestowed upon us at tobacco market last August, so this feeling isn’t completely new, but it still makes us giddy. The silly thing is I don’t know where to put my arms and look natural. By my sides? Folded over my chest? Behind my back? It’s a problem I struggle with till I forget to.
Ringers begins, and it’s simple enough but challenging. We watch the shooters, but the prisoners watch us. Daddy sees the glances and the grins from the prisoners that don’t require knowing German to understand. Didi wins the match, and Grady’s got work to do, but I regret leaving the electricity of the compound. Hundreds of eyes watch us walk away.
We don’t ask Mama if we can go back next Saturday. We act like it’s no big deal.
Grady practices. He studies on Didi.
We bide our time.
Chapter 44
Bert: All’s Fair
Today Grady is gonna beat the Nazi. Mama’s gonna come watch, too. Nobody wants to miss the fun cept Helen. Mama says we can bring the sunshine right to Helen’s door, but only she can open up and let it in.
Tiny Junior’s got on an army jacket from Captain Toots cause he’s the camp mascot. He’s a friend to everybody, but today he’s on Grady’s side. His uncle Terrell’s empty lawn chair sits at the tree line, turning to rust. It’s the only thing to remember him by. Terrell Stucky’s name was on everybody’s lips after the murders last fall, then me and Lu never stumbled over another clue after Tiny Junior said he saw his uncle that last morning. I mostly forget him. I mostly forget Larry Crumbie, too. It’s only Frankie Tender I don’t forget.
Today, we come through the gate on Mama’s heels. Lydia and Cora got dropped off at Aunt Fanniebelle’s to play with new paper dolls. Irene stands beside Captain Toots like she belongs. The Germans are polite with Mama here. Nobody whistles at me and Lu, but we feel the buzz.
Grady’s buddies are outside the gate. Ricky, Jamie, Donnie, and Russell—they want Grady to make us proud. Whiz Mayhew is there looking lots better than he did at his homecoming party. Sugar, too, and more children. Word has spread round the county that today Grady goes knuckle to knuckle against the German. This is the first time a townie faces off with a prisoner. Grady might become champion of the world.
Inside the gate, me and the Browns stand in front of the Germans to see good. Grady and Didi shoot to a line to see who goes first, and Grady wins, and a strange pride fills my heart. He drops to his knee. He rolls his shoulders. He blows on his favorite Clambroth shooter for luck, the one with red and white stripes like the barber pole on Main Street. He sets his sight and sends his taw sailing, and it strikes one of the marbles on the line, but it don’t go outside the ring like it has to. Grady nods to Didi like a gentleman and steps back. Grady lost his lucky lead.
The German kneels and fires his shooter like Grady said he could. Didi hits a marble out while his shooter spins inside the circle. He makes it look easy. Grady chews on his bottom lip. The German shoots another one out. And another. My heart sinks when mibs number four and five go flying, because the first one to knock out seven marbles wins.
Then Didi’s shooter barely crosses the line, and Grady gets another chance. Lord’a mercy, Lord’a mercy, I pray hard with my eyes closed, waiting to hear the clack of Grady’s marble on marble. When I do, I open one eye. A marble is outside the ring, and the shooter is inside. He shoots again—and again—until he tie
s with Didi, five to five. Didi don’t look so proud. He thinks he’s playing a farm boy, but Grady ain’t no ordinary farm boy. Byron shouts the tied score so friends outside the fence know, and they chant, “Gra-dy, Gra-dy…” He shoots and misses, and Mama turns away.
Didi smiles all cocky while Grady cusses under his breath. Marble number six for Didi flies outta the circle and bumps my shoe. Didi’s eyes travel over the wide ring to my feet and slowly up my legs, my soft hips, and my full chest till our eyes meet. I wink and pout my lips the way the college girl Patricia taught me to.
Didi clears his throat and rubs his hands on his trousers. He only needs to knock out one. It’s a wall of prisoners behind us. Everybody’s watching. We stand like stone and listen to the chant, “Gra-dy, Gra-dy.”
Didi lines up his shot, then stops, stands up quick, breathes in deep, and rolls his neck.
“Gra-dy, Gra-dy.”
The German gets back on his knee, blows on his shooter, takes aim, and shoots. The marble rolls straight and steady and clicks and goes outside the circle. But his shooter goes out, too.
Grady’s belly must hurt something terrible. Like the time I got the gall to read The Velveteen Rabbit to thirty-one folks and thought I’d puke. This is way bigger. When Grady strikes number six, I sink to my knees, and my ears don’t work right, and I suck in air and hold it till I get dizzy.
Grady wins.
Chapter 45
Lucy: Gold Star
Mama and Daddy drive from the camp to Main Street, but the crowd of Grady’s peers walks River Road to the soda fountain to celebrate with our international champion. Ricky Miller and Donnie Gibson lift Grady onto their shoulders, and the chant of his name grows. He is a hero of an unparalleled distinction I don’t recollect ever seeing. The crowd fills up the soda fountain, and Uncle Nigel’s there because he watched Grady win, too, and he shouts, “Ice cream on the house,” and he rolls up his sleeves and goes behind the counter to help Judy, the overwhelmed soda clerk. He asks me to carry out cones for Whiz and Sugar and the others outside on the sidewalk looking in. Lydia, Cora, and Aunt Fanniebelle squeeze through the crowd up to our world champion, and the very air sparkles around my brother. For a moment, I don’t recognize us. Or maybe I recognize us from another lifetime. This amazing moment gives me hope that levity hasn’t been destroyed by war.
Grady and Irene stay in town, but our carload of happiness heads home to tell Helen what she missed. When we pull up our lane, we see a green army car with a crisp white star. A man gets out, straightens his uniform, puts on his cap. He is not disheveled like John T. Booker, who brought beeswax news two years back. This man is a honed professional as somber as an undertaker.
A strange sound from somewhere deep comes out of Mama’s chest. She struggles to open the car door and tumbles out in the yard, barely able to stand. Helen is on the porch, wrapped in Wade’s old sweater and his wool cap she wears most days. The lot of us stumble across the yard to Helen, but the soldier reaches her first.
“Miz Wade Sully?” he says, likely guessing by Helen’s age and demeanor that she’s the one he’s looking for. She nods with a quick jerk, and he hands her a telegram. It’s heavier than the first piece of paper she received with Wade’s name on it.
Mama and Daddy have reached her side. Daddy opens the telegram and reads, “Dear Madam, we regret to inform you…”
Daddy takes out the gold star that will replace a blue one in our window.
My sense of sight is heightened. Each family member is propped up like Lydia and Cora’s paper dolls, two-dimensional, lifeless. An easy wind could blow us over. This is what it feels like to have death come to your door.
The government car leaves as Trula Freed comes up the drive, wrapped in a muted coat the color of sorrow, a pale scarf fluttering behind like a thin flag. I don’t see Uncle Nigel’s car, so how did she get here? She walks up to Helen, who smiles an empty smile like she’s forgotten where she is or who she is or what has happened.
“She’s in shock. I have tea,” Trula says.
We limp into the house with little Lydia walking in front of me. Does the girl remember her own premonition a year ago? The smell of Oma’s Dentyne chewing gum. Her question about Wade looking for Oma in heaven. How did Lydia know? Weeks back, I asked my little sister if she still had night visits from Oma, and she said, “Sometimes.” When I asked if Oma gave her another question to ponder, she nodded. Oma asked her to watch over Tiny Junior. Now what in the world kind of foreboding is that for a little girl? Today, I look at Lydia with more than a pinch of wonder.
For a body of people trying to be quiet in the wake of bad news, we make a lot of noise. A sniffle, the creaking floor, the slide of the bench, water in the kettle, muffled wool coats on pegs, standing bodies bending to sit.
Helen starts. “Betty Gail is a good enough name, I guess, now that we’re used to it.” Her voice is empty.
The tea steeps in the pot. Trula’s blend holds golden root, ginseng, St. John’s wort, and valerian. She brought it in a mason jar. The herbs are listed on the side. She rubs lavender oil on Helen’s wrists and her limp hands, and Helen lets her.
“I think Wade would like that name. Do we know a Betty Gail, Mama? Don’t we have an Aunt Betty Gail over Winterville way?” My widowed sister looks around the room at each of us, her eyes large and confused, her voice calm and detached after all the emotion we’ve witnessed since Wade went MIA. We hear Betty Gail in the next room stir from her nap, crawl out of her crib, and pad into the kitchen, dragging the rabbit Vetee by his ear. She’s fifteen months old tomorrow and is the easiest child this household ever raised. She sleeps when she’s tired, eats when she’s hungry, and rarely complains. She’s funny and sweet.
Today, she crawls into her mama’s lap and puts her hand on Helen’s cheek. “Hey,” she says and giggles, all dumplin pudgy cute.
“Hello, sweet Betty Gail, my precious girl.”
Daddy goes to town to find Grady and Irene and take the joy out of their day. He talks to Byron, too, and asks him to help piece together what happened so we know more. Next day, he brings us news. Helen listens, too.
“Army rangers raided the prison in the Pacific where Wade had been held. They won’t say where, so I won’t speculate. It was a gutsy assignment that carried great risk for the rangers and the prisoners. The POWs didn’t know help was coming, of course, but the rangers freed a hundred and nine American soldiers that day. But sadly,” he says as he looks at Helen, “by the time they got there, Wade was too weak to survive. He died on the way out, but he died a free man, surrounded by Americans, hearing English spoken, knowing he was headed to safety. Maybe that counted for something.”
Lydia and Cora hardly remember Wade. Bert has only seen a picture of him. The rest of us spit out our grief in snippets instead of letting it flow. Wade was Helen’s one and only sweetheart, and he was reliable and tenderhearted. Now we take our cues from Helen. We listen when she talks. We hold her when she cries. We shed our tears in private. I never told anyone what Lydia said about Oma looking for Wade Sully in heaven. I didn’t even tell Bert. The timing is off by months, but I’m not sure heaven time and Riverton time are the same, so maybe it happened when Lydia said.
Five days later, the government casket holding Wade’s fragile remains is delivered to Baylor’s Funeral Home. Helen is told it arrived, but she’s still frightfully detached. “Daddy, you go sign papers for me. I’ll go to the funeral, so let me know when it is,” are her strange words, spoken without weight.
The day of the funeral dawns crisp and clear. I don’t like hard funerals on clear days. I like funerals on rainy, stormy days when the world cries with you and you don’t have to pretend. Today, the weather makes fun of the months leading Wade Sully to his death. Or maybe it celebrates his release.
In church, the Brown family surrounds frail Helen. The Sully family sits behind us with Wade’s mama leaning o
n Wade’s daddy, both of them so spent from grief they can’t see. Betty Gail sits on her mama’s lap. The top of Wade’s casket is blanketed with the starched American flag. His military burial is formal. I see Whiz Mayhew wearing his army uniform in the last pew in back of the crowd, needing only a single walking stick now. It’s a handsome stick with a lion’s head carved on top. I think it’s one of Trula Freed’s walking sticks. The eyepatch he wears gives Whiz a rakish look that suits him. Sugar’s got on her eyepatch, too, and holds her brother’s hand. For all the world, it looks like Whiz Mayhew is moving back into himself.
At home, with friends filling every corner of the house, Whiz sits alone in the chilly sunshine on our back porch on the top step. I go out to sit beside him and Sugar comes, too. She sits on one side of her brother, and I’m on the other.
“Hey, girls,” he says and clears his throat because it’s heavy with emotion. “We buried a good one today. That was some fancy coffin.”
I nod and try to think of something notable to say about the finality of death when Whiz asks the big question. “I can’t help but wonder why I’m alive and Wade’s dead.” He studies his open palms for answers. “By all accounts, I should be the dead man, but I’m not, and there’s gotta be a reason, don’t you think? A reason I’m here and Wade’s dead…”
The hum of voices is steady behind us. Spoons rattle and pots and platters clatter on tabletops. It’s as busy as a beehive inside our house, but out here under a cloudless blue sky, the big question floats on the air.
He goes on. “I don’t know much about destiny. Maybe it’s real. Maybe it isn’t. Ma tells me God anointed me with life for a mighty reason, but then I wonder why wouldn’t he anoint Wade, too? What makes me worth saving? Do I really have a destiny? A reason to be here?”
