For the next day or so, Mama mostly kept to our room. Pacing up and down, chain-smoking, she cursed Mrs. Mank’s infuriating coolness, cursed Mrs. Mank’s friend the woman lawyer, cursed Merry Verlow and her sister, Fennie, and all the Dakins and all their relations by blood or marriage, but most vehemently Mama cursed Mamadee, alive or dead, for all the trouble she had caused.
Since it was the place in the house Mama was least likely to go, I spent a great deal of time in the kitchen. There I learned from Cleonie and Perdita that Mrs. Mank was an occasional guest, that she always had the same rooms, took most of her meals in her suite, and that Miz Verlow treated her like the Queen of England.
“Miz Mank onced done Miz Verlow a favor,” Cleonie explained.
“And she likes Perdita’s sausages,” I said, adding sincerely, “probably almost as much as I do.”
Perdita didn’t say anything to that but that afternoon my iced tea was mysteriously warmed with a dash of bourbon.
Perdita did give me a warning. “You look out, you hear? Miz Mank caint bide churn.”
Thirty-five
OVER the next few days, in the rare moments when no one else was within sight, I tried Miz Verlow’s office door, in hope of finding Fennie’s telephone number. It was always locked. Every time I tried to sneak down that particular hallway to Miz Verlow’s room on the same mission, something happened to deter me: She herself appeared, or Cleonie did, or Mama did.
It was Thursday morning when Mama informed me that she and Miz Verlow were driving into Pensacola to shop, to pay the current installments on Cleonie’s and Perdita’s various layaway plans, and to pick up some important letters that Mrs. Mank was expecting.
I went so far as to ask permission to go with them.
“Calley, no, and that’s final. I think you can find something to do here this afternoon.”
I sulked. “No, I caint.”
“One more word—” Mama threatened, almost absently.
I rocked sullenly in the verandah swing when Mama and Miz Verlow came out the front door.
“What time you coming back?”
“About four,” Miz Verlow answered.
“Why are you asking?” Mama wanted to know.
“I was hoping you’d bring me something.”
Mama sniffed. “Four-thirty. Maybe even five, depending on how long the lines are. And I don’t think we’re going anywhere that has presents for children, so don’t waste the afternoon hoping, because I don’t want to see you spend the evening moping.” She gave Miz Verlow an arch look, at her own wit.
They got into Miz Verlow’s Country Squire and drove off. I stayed in the swing, pretending to study on a bird guide, in case they came back for anything.
Mrs. Mank was in the house—I would have heard or seen her had she gone out. I checked both parlors and the dining room and listened at strategic points all over the first floor.
At Miz Verlow’s office door, I looked every which way, listened intently, and then tried the knob. It did not move. Then, before I could take my hand away, the knob moved without any effort from me. I snatched my hand away behind my back, even as I took a step backward and started to turn on my heel to run away. Mrs. Mank reached through the opening door and caught me by one shoulder.
I felt like a handkerchief snatched back from the wind by a huge and powerful hand. The door closed and I was on the inside.
Petrified as I was, I could hardly breathe, let alone speak. I had not heard Mrs. Mank on the other side of the door. And now I was her prisoner.
She let go of me and my bare feet found safe contact with the floor.
I still felt frail. She was close enough to force me to tip my head to see her face. As she moved away, she began to resume normal proportions. I was hot and miserable with humiliation, but beginning to feel the instinct for survival. A thousand lies buzzed like wasps in my head.
Mrs. Mank dropped into Miz Verlow’s chair behind the small desk. She was wearing little half-moon glasses framed in silver.
“Sit down and hold your tongue.”
I did as I was told, sitting directly on the floor with my legs crossed. I had to look up at her again. The tiny windowless room seemed smaller than it ever had before, and I realized that I had never been inside it when the door was closed.
She tapped Miz Verlow’s address book on the desk. “You won’t find Fennie Verlow’s number in this. Merry hardly needs to keep her sister’s telephone number in a book, any more than Fennie needs to write down Merry’s number.”
I felt stupid. Of course two sisters would know each other’s telephone numbers by heart. There was no surprise in Mrs. Mank knowing what I was up to and what I was looking for. I felt her reading me as easily as I could hear a ghost crab skedaddle across the sand.
I tried a feint. “You don’t like Mama very much, do you?”
“Your mother?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Why shouldn’t I like your mother?”
“Because you know what she’s like. You do, don’t you?”
She smiled her chilly smile at me. “Does that mean you know what Roberta Carroll Dakin is like as well?
I nodded.
“But it seems to me that you love her very much, and that you love her despite whatever reservations you may entertain of her character and conduct.”
“She’s my mama. I’m supposed to love her.”
“‘Supposed to’? Whose rule is that?”
“Mama’s.”
“I don’t for one minute believe you do things just because your mother tells you to.”
Before I could tell any lies contrary to her assertion, Mrs. Mank continued, “Of course, God also tells you to love your mother—in the Bible, in Sunday school classes, and through the mouths of Christians. Of course, I think it’s fair to say that the god of the Jews and the Christ who suffered and died on the cross never had to deal with Roberta Carroll Dakin day in and day out.”
Mrs. Mank’s observation stunned me, as being both sacrilege and truth.
With bland indifference, Mrs. Mank asked, “Oh, do you believe in God? And the Bible? And Jesus and Heaven and Hell and the Communion of Saints and the Forgiveness of Sins?”
“Yes.” I was not lying. It had never occurred to me that any of those things might not be true.
“Yes, of course you do. You’re only seven. You should profess belief in the accepted wisdom of your elders. I’m asking, ‘Do you believe in all those things—God, the Bible, Jesus, Heaven and Hell, the Forgiveness of Sins, and the Resurrection of the Corrupted Body?’”
“No.” The word was out of my mouth without hesitation. If those things were true, I grasped instantly, Mrs. Mank would not have asked me if I believed them.
“Do you believe in them the way that you believe in yourself—in what you think, and what you feel?”
“No.” I thought for a moment, before adding something that was not entirely true. “I believe in you too.”
“You have no reason to.” Mrs. Mank went on, “Society also tells you that you should love your mother. In general, society is a better voice to listen to than either God or Roberta Carroll Dakin, but society isn’t always right. At least not for you.”
“But I do love Mama.” I was frustrated and confused. I had questions to ask Mrs. Mank but her interrogation of me had put them right out of my mind.
“And you should.”
“Why?”
“Why should you love Roberta Carroll Dakin? And why do you love her?” Before I could answer, Mrs. Mank provided it. “You love her because she is your mama. Because you are a child and you believe as a child. You believe that you need your mama to survive. But think about it—you must know otherwise. Did you ever give a thought to the idea that your father might die before he did? He did die, and you are still alive.”