In August, Jeannie first began to notice the smell. No one had ever said Jeannie was slovenly; the one thing she truly prided herself on was cleanliness. She hated the feel of Clara's flesh when she bathed her-that white, loose skin over obscene softness-but she would keep her great-aunt clean until her dying day. The smell of age she found unpleasant, but not as bad as in a nursing home. No, the smell she noticed was another smell, a sharper, acrid smell, which her great-aunt tried to tell her was from the bachelor's buttons under the window.
Jeannie did not argue. If she argued, if someone heard her arguing with her great-aunt, it would be hard to present herself as the angel of mercy she knew she was. She did say she thought bachelor's buttons had no smell, but with a wistful questioning intonation that let her aunt explain that those bachelor's buttons smelled like that every summer, and she liked the smell because it reminded her of Snowball.
Of course, Jeannie thought, it's a cat. A tomcat smell, the smell of marked territory. Odd that it came through a closed window, in spite of air-conditioning, but smells would do things like that. Since Clara said she liked it, Jeannie tried to endure it, but it was stronger in her bedroom, as if the miserable cat had marked the bed itself. She looked, finding no evidence, and vacuumed vigorously.
Outside, on the white clapboard skirting of the old house, she found the marks she sought. Hot sun baked the bachelor's buttons, the cracked soil around them (she had not watered for more than a week), and the streaked places on the skirting that gave off that memorable smell. On the pretext of watering the flowers (they did need watering, and she picked some to arrange inside) she hosed down the offending streaks. And a few days later, dragging the hose around to water another of the flowerbeds (when she had this house, she would forget the flowerbeds), she saw a white blurred shape up near the house, and splashed water at it. A furious streak sped away, yowling. Gotcha, thought Jeannie, that'll teach you, and forgot about it.
Clara had another small stroke in September, that left her with one drooping eyelid and halting speech, now as ragged as soft. Jeannie had driven her (in Clara's old car) to the hospital in the county seat, and Jeannie drove her home, with a list of instructions for diet and care. In between those two trips, in the hours when the hospital discouraged visitors, she explored Clara's little town. The square with its bandstand had been paved, parking for the stores around it. She remembered, with an unexpected pang of nostalgia, climbing into the empty bandstand and pretending to be, a singer. A hardware store had vanished, replaced by a supermarket which had already swallowed a small grocery store the last time she'd visited. The farm supply and implement company had moved out of town, as had the lumberyard; a used car dealer had one lot, and the other was covered with rows of tiny boxlike rental storage units. A few people recognized her; she hurried past the door that opened onto a narrow stair-upstairs was the lawyer's office, with its view over the town square and out back across a vacant lot to the rest of town.
It was stiflingly hot. Jeannie got back in Clara's car and drove out of town toward the county seat and its hospital, well aware of watching eyes. But the county seat had more than a hospital, and it was larger, and she was less known, Clara's car less noticeable. She parked in the big courthouse lot, walked a block to a sign she'd noticed, and glanced around. Midafternoon: the lawyer would be in his office, or in court.
She came out two hours later. Not drunk at all-no one could say she was drunk. A lady, worried to death about her old great-aunt, needing a cool place to spend a few hours before the hospital would let her back in… that's all. She knew her limits well, and she knew exactly what she wanted. She had the name and number she had expected to find, and would not need to visit the Blue Suite again.
That night, alone in the house (Clara would be in the hospital another two days, the doctor had said), she lounged in the parlor as she never did when Clara was there. She had remembered to call Pearl, had said she didn't need any help with anything, and now she relaxed, safe, wearing the short lacy nightshirt she'd bought in the county seat, enjoying the first cold beer she'd ever had in this house. She smirked up at the shelves of figurines. Clara's monthly allowance wouldn't exactly cover what she wanted, but she knew there were places to sell some of this trash, and if Clara were bedfast she'd never know.
Clara came home more fragile than before. She never left the bedroom now, and rarely managed to sit up in the armchair; Jeannie had to learn to make the bed with her in it. She had to learn other, more intimate services when Clara could not get out of bed at all. But she persisted, through the rest of September and October, until even thorny Pearl admitted (to the supermarket clerk, from whom Jeannie heard it) that she seemed to be genuinely fond of Clara, and taking excellent care of her. When the first November storm slashed the town with cold rain and wind, Pearl called to apologize for not visiting that day. Jeannie answered the phone in the hall.
"It's all right," she told Pearl. "Do you want me to wake her, so you can talk?"
"Not if she's sleeping," said Pearl. "Just tell her."
"She sleeps a lot more now," said Jeannie, in a voice that she hoped conveyed delicate sadness.
Clara was not asleep, but her voice no longer had the resonance to carry from room to room… and certainly not enough to be overheard on the phone. "Who was it, dear?" she asked when Jeannie came back to her.
"Nothing," said Jeannie. She knew Clara's hearing was going. "Some salesman about aluminum siding." She felt a rising excitement; it had taken months, but here was her chance. A day or so without Pearl, another inevitable stroke-it would work. It would be easy. "Do you think Pearl will try to come out in this storm?"
Clara moved her head a little on the pillow. "I hope not… but she'll call. Tell me if she calls, dear, won't you?"
"Of course."
Two days later, it was possible to tell Pearl that Clara had forgotten being told-of course she had told her about the calls, but since this latest stroke, and with the new medications… Jeannie delivered this information in a low voice, just inside the front door. Pearl herself looked sick, her wisps of white hair standing out in disarray, her deep voice more hoarse than musical. If Jeannie had been capable of it, she would have felt pity for Pearl then-she knew she ought to, an old woman whose oldest friend was fading into senility-but what she felt was coarse triumphant glee. Old cow, she thought, I should try you next. Pearl was nodding, showing no suspicion; perhaps she was too tired. '.
She left them alone, and went to fix them tea; she could just hear Pearl 's deep voice, and a wisp of plaintive trembling treble that must be Clara. When she came in with the tray, Clara's hands were shaking so that she could not hold the cup.
"Are you sure you told me, dear?" she asked Jeannie. "You couldn't have forgotten?"
"I'm sure, Aunt Clara. I'm sorry-maybe you were still sleepy, or maybe the medicine…" She held the cup to Clara's lips, waited for her to slurp a little-no longer so ladylike in her sips-and set it down.
Pearl, leaning back in her chair, suddenly sniffed. Jeannie stiffened; she had bathed Clara carefully (that duty she would always perform) and instantly suspected Pearl of trying to make her feel inferior. But Pearl merely looked puzzled.