A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

by Betty Smith

  Thus Katie figured out everything in the moments it took them to climb the stairs. People looking up at her--at her smooth pretty vivacious face--had no way of knowing about the painfully articulated resolves formulating in her mind.

  They set the tree up in the front room after spreading a sheet to protect the carpet of pink roses from falling pine needles. The tree stood in a big tin bucket with broken bricks to hold it upright. When the rope was cut away, the branches spread out to fill the whole room. They draped over the piano and it was so that some of the chairs stood among the branches. There was no money to buy tree decorations or lights. But the great tree standing there was enough. The room was cold. It was a poor year, that one--too poor for them to buy the extra coal for the front room stove. The room smelled cold and clean and aromatic. Every day, during the week the tree stood there, Francie put on her sweater and zitful cap and went in and sat under the tree. She sat there and enjoyed the smell and the dark greenness of it.

  Oh, the mystery of a great tree, a prisoner in a tin wash bucket in a tenement front room!

  Poor as they were that year, it was a very nice Christmas and the children did not lack for gifts. Mama gave each of them a pair of long woolen drawers, drop-seat style, and a woolen shirt with long sleeves and itchy insides. Aunt Evy gave them a joint present: a box of dominoes. Papa showed them how to play. Neeley didn't like the game so Papa and Francie played together and he pretended to be disgusted when he lost.

  Granma Mary Rommely brought over something very nice that she had made herself. She brought each a scapular. To make it, she cut out two small ovals of bright red wool. On one, she embroidered a cross of bright blue yarn and on the other, a golden heart crowned with brown thorns. A black dagger went through the heart and two drops of deep red blood dripped from the dagger point. The cross and heart were very tiny and made with microscopic stitches. The two ovals were stitched together and attached to a piece of corset string. Mary Rommely had taken the scapulars to be blessed by the priest before she brought them over. As she slipped the scapular over Francie's head, she said "Heiliges Weihnachten." Then she added, "May you walk with the angels always."

  Aunt Sissy gave Francie a tiny package. She opened it and found a tiny matchbox. It was very fragile and covered with crinkly paper with a miniature spray of purple wisteria painted on the top. Francie pushed the box open. It held ten discs individually wrapped in pink tissue. The discs turned out to be bright golden pennies. Sissy explained that she had bought a bit of gold paint powder, mixed it with a few drops of banana oil and had gilded each penny. Francie loved Sissy's present the best of all. A dozen times within the hour of receiving it, she slid open the box slowly, gaining great pleasure from holding the box and looking at it and watching the cobalt blue paper and the clean wafer-thin wood of the inside of the box appear. The golden pennies wrapped in the dreamlike tissue were a never-tiring miracle. Everyone agreed that the pennies were too beautiful to be spent. During the day, Francie lost two of her pennies somewhere. Mama suggested they'd be safest in the tin-can bank. She promised that Francie could have them back when the bank was opened. Francie was sure that Mama was right about the pennies being safest in the bank, yet it was a wrench to let those golden pennies drop down into the darkness.

  Papa had a special present for Francie. It was a postcard with a church on it. Powdered isinglass was pasted on the roof and it glistened more brightly than real snow. The church window panes were made of tiny squares of shiny orange paper. The magic in this card was that when Francie held it up, light streamed through the paper panes and threw golden shadows on the glistening snow. It was a beautiful thing. Mama said that since it wasn't written on, Francie could save it for next year and mail it to someone.

  "Oh no," said Francie. She put both hands over the card and held it to her chest.

  Mama laughed. "You must learn to take a joke, Francie, otherwise life will be pretty hard on you."

  "Christmas is no day for lessons," said Papa.

  "But it is a day for getting drunk, isn't it," she flared up.

  "Two drinks is all I had, Katie," Johnny pleaded. "I was treated for Christmas."

  Francie went into the bedroom and shut the door. She couldn't bear to hear Mama scolding Papa.

  Just before supper, Francie distributed the gifts she had for them. She had a hatpin holder for Mama. She had made it with a penny test tube bought at Knipe's Drug Store. She had covered it with a sheath of blue satin ribbon ruffled at the sides. A length of baby ribbon was sewn to the top. It was meant to hang on the side of the dresser and hold hatpins.

  She had a watch fob for Papa. She had made it on a spool which had four nails driven into the top. It took two shoe laces. These were worked over and around the nails and a thick braided fob kept growing out of the bottom of the spool as she worked it. Johnny had no watch but he took an iron faucet washer, attached the fob to it and wore it in his vest pocket all day pretending it was a watch. Francie had a very fine present for Neeley: a five-cent shooter which looked like an oversize opal rather than a marble. Neeley had a boxful of "miggies," small brown and blue speckled marbles made of clay which cost a penny for twenty. But he had no good shooter and couldn't get into any important games. Francie watched him as he crooked his forefinger and cradled the marble in it with his thumb behind it. It looked nice and natural that way and she was glad she had got it for him rather than the nickel pop-gun she had first thought of buying.

  Neeley shoved the marble in his pocket and announced that he had presents, too. He ran into the bedroom, crawled under his cot and came out with a sticky bag. He thrust it at Mama, saying "You share them out." He stood in a corner. Mama opened the bag. There was a striped candy cane for each one. Mama went into ecstasies. She said it was the prettiest present she had ever had. She kissed Neeley three times. Francie tried very hard not to be jealous because Mama made more fuss over Neeley's present than hers.

  It was in that same week that Francie told another great lie. Aunt Evy brought over two tickets. Some Protestant organization was giving a celebration for the poor of all faiths. There would be a decorated Christmas tree on the stage, a Christmas play, carol singing and a gift for each child. Katie couldn't see it--Catholic children at a Protestant party. Evy urged tolerance. Mama finally gave in and Francie and Neeley went to the party.

  It was in a large auditorium. The boys sat on one side and the girls on the other. The celebration was fine except that the play was religious and dull. After the play, church ladies went down the aisle and gave each child a gift. All the girls got checker boards and all the boys got lotto games. After a little more singing, a lady came out on the stage and announced a special surprise.

  The surprise was a lovely little girl, exquisitely dressed, who came from the wings carrying a beautiful doll. The doll was a foot high, had real yellow hair and blue eyes that opened and shut, with real eyelashes. The lady led the child forward and made a speech.

  "This little girl is named Mary." Little Mary smiled and bowed. The little girls in the audience smiled up at her and some of the boys who were approaching adolescence whistled shrilly. "Mary's mother bought this doll and had clothes made for it just like the clothes little Mary is wearing."

  Little Mary stepped forward and held the doll high in the air. Then she let the lady hold it while she spread her skirt and made a curtsey. It was true, saw Francie. The doll's lace-trimmed blue silk dress, pink hair bow, black patent leather slippers and white silk socks duplicated exactly the clothes of the beautiful Mary.

  "Now," said the lady, "this doll is named Mary after the kind little girl who is giving her away." Again the little girl smiled graciously. "Mary wants to give the doll to some poor little girl in the audience who is named Mary." Like wind on growing corn, a rippling murmur came from all the little girls in the audience. "Is there any poor little girl in the audience named Mary?"

  There was a great hush. There were at least a hundred Marys in that audience. It was that adjective
"poor" that struck them dumb. No Mary would stand up, no matter how much she wanted the doll, and be a symbol of all the poor little girls in the audience. They began whispering to each other that they weren't poor and had better dolls home and better clothes than that girl, too, only they didn't feel like wearing them. Francie sat numb, longing for that doll with all her soul.

  "What?" said the lady. "No Marys?" She waited and made her announcement again. No response. She spoke regretfully. "Too bad there are no Marys. Little Mary will have to take the doll home again." The little girl smiled and bowed and turned to leave the stage with the doll.

  Francie couldn't stand it, she couldn't stand it. It was like when the teacher was going to throw the pumpkin pie in the wastebasket. She stood up and held her hand high in the air. The lady saw it and stopped the little girl from leaving the stage.

  "Ah! We do have a Mary, a very bashful Mary but a Mary just the same. Come right up on the stage, Mary."

  Feverish with embarrassment, Francie walked up the long aisle and on to the stage. She stumbled on the steps and all the girls snickered and the boys guffawed.

  "What is your name?" asked the lady.

  "Mary Frances Nolan," whispered Francie.

  "Louder. And look at the audience."

  Miserably, Francie faced the audience and said loudly, "Mary Frances Nolan." All the faces looked like bloated balloons on thick strings. She thought that if she kept on looking, the faces would float away up to the ceiling.

  The beautiful girl came forward and put the doll in Francie's arms. Francie's arms took a natural curve around it. It was as if her arms had waited and grown so just for that doll. The beautiful Mary extended her hand for Francie to shake. In spite of embarrassment and confusion, Francie noticed the delicate white hand with the tracery of pale blue veins and the oval nails that glowed like delicate pink seashells.

  The lady talked as Francie backed awkwardly to her seat. She said: "You have all seen an example of the true Christmas spirit. Little Mary is a very rich little girl and received many beautiful dolls for Christmas. But she was not selfish. She wanted to make some poor little Mary, who is not as fortunate as herself, happy. So she gave the doll to that poor little girl who is named Mary, too."

  Francie's eyes smarted with hot tears. "Why can't they," she thought bitterly, "just give the doll away without saying I am poor and she is rich? Why couldn't they just give it away without all the talking about it?"

  That was not all of Francie's shame. As she walked down the aisle, the girls leaned towards her and whispered hissingly, "Beggar, beggar, beggar."

  It was beggar, beggar, beggar, all the way down the aisle. Those girls felt richer than Francie. They were as poor as she but they had something she lacked--pride. And Francie knew it. She had no compunctions about the lie and getting the doll under false pretenses. She was paying for the lie and for the doll by giving up her pride.

  She remembered the teacher who had told her to write her lies instead of speaking them. Maybe she shouldn't have gone up for the doll but should have written a story about it instead. But no! No! Having the doll was better than any story about having a doll. When they stood to sing the "Star-Spangled Banner" in closing, Francie put her face down close to the doll's face. There was the cool delicate smell of painted china, the wonderful unforgettable smell of a doll's hair, the heavenly feel of new-gauze doll's clothes. The doll's real eyelashes touched her cheek and she trembled in ecstasy. The children were singing:

  O'er the land of the free,

  And the home of the brave.

  Francie held one of the doll's tiny hands tightly. A nerve in her thumb throbbed and she thought the doll's hand twitched. She almost believed the doll was real.

  She told Mama the doll had been given to her as a prize. She dared not tell the truth. Mama hated anything that smacked of charity and if she knew, she'd throw the doll away. Neeley didn't snitch on her. Francie now owned the doll but had yet another lie on her soul. That afternoon she wrote a story about a little girl who wanted a doll so much that she was willing to give over her immortal soul to Purgatory for eternity if she could have the doll. It was a strong story but when Francie read it over, she thought, "That's all right for the girl in the story but it doesn't make me feel any better."

  She thought of the confession she would have to make the next Saturday. She resolved that no matter what penance Father gave her, she would triple it voluntarily. Still she felt no better.

  Then she remembered something! Maybe she could make the lie a truth! She knew that when Catholic children received Confirmation, they were expected to take some saint's name for a middle name. What a simple solution! She would take the name of Mary when she was confirmed.

  That night, after the page from the Bible and the page from Shakespeare had been read, Francie consulted Mama.

  "Mama, when I make my Confirmation, can I take Mary for a middle name?"

  "No."

  Francie's heart sunk. "Why?"

  "Because when you were christened, you were named Francie after Andy's girl."

  "I know."

  "But you were also named Mary after my mother. Your real name is Mary Frances Nolan."

  Francie took the doll to bed with her. She lay very still so as not to disturb it. She woke up from time to time in the night and whispered "Mary" and touched the doll's infinitesimal slipper with a light finger. She trembled at feeling the thin soft bit of smooth leather.

  It was to be her first and her last doll.

  28

  THE FUTURE WAS A NEAR THING TO KATIE. SHE HAD A WAY OF SAYING, "Christmas will be here before you know it." Or, at the beginning of vacation, "School will be starting up before you know it." In the spring when Francie discarded her long drawers and joyously flung them away, Mama made her pick them up again saying, "You'll need them soon enough again. Winter will be here before you know it." What was Mama talking about? Spring had just started. The winter would never come again.

  A small child has little idea of the future. Next week is as far ahead as his future stretches and the year between Christmas and Christmas again is an eternity. So time was with Francie up until her eleventh year.

  Between her eleventh and twelfth birthday, things changed. The future came along quicker; the days seemed shorter and the weeks seemed to have less days in them. Henny Gaddis died and this had something to do with it. She had always heard that Henny was going to die. She heard about it so much that she finally got to believe he would die. But that would be a long, long time away. Now the long time had come. The something which had been a future was now a present and would become a past. Francie wondered whether someone had to die to make that clear to a child. But no, Grandfather Rommely had died when she was nine, a week after she made her first Communion and, as she remembered, Christmas still had seemed far away at that time.

  Things were changing so fast for Francie now, that she got mixed up. Neeley, who was a year younger than she, grew suddenly and got to be a head taller. Maudie Donavan moved away. When she returned on a visit three months later, Francie found her different. Maudie had developed in a womanly way during those three months.

  Francie, who knew Mama was always right, found out that she was wrong once in a while. She discovered that some of the things she loved so much in her father were considered very comical to other people. The scales at the tea store did not shine so brightly any more and she found the bins were chipped and shabby-looking.

  She stopped watching for Mr. Tomony to come home on Saturday nights from his New York jaunts. All of a sudden she thought it was silly that he lived so and went to New York and came home longing for where he had been. He had money. Why didn't he just go over to New York and live there if he liked it so much?

  Everything was changing. Francie was in a panic. Her world was slipping away from her and what would take its place? Still, what was different anyhow? She read a page from the Bible and Shakespeare every night the same as always. She practiced the piano every day
for an hour. She put pennies in the tin-can bank. The junk shop was still there; the stores were all the same. Nothing was changing. She was the one who was changing.

  She told Papa about it. He made her stick out her tongue and he felt her wrist. He shook his head sadly and said,

  "You have a bad case, a very bad case."

  "Of what?"

  "Growing up."

  Growing up spoiled a lot of things. It spoiled the nice game they had when there was nothing to eat in the house. When money gave out and food ran low, Katie and the children pretended they were explorers discovering the North Pole and had been trapped by a blizzard in a cave with just a little food. They had to make it last till help came. Mama divided up what food there was in the cupboard and called it rations and when the children were still hungry after a meal, she'd say, "Courage, my men, help will come soon." When some money came in and Mama bought a lot of groceries, she bought a little cake as celebration, and she'd stick a penny flag in it and say, "We made it, men. We got to the North Pole."