To put things in order--that was the thought in his mind. He bundled up Alice’s clothes and personal possessions to give to Lucile. He thoroughly cleaned and straightened the bureau drawers. He even rearranged the shelves of the kitchen downstairs and removed the gaily colored crepe streamers from the electric fans. Then when this was done he sat in the tub and bathed himself all over. And the morning was done.
Biff bit the thread and smoothed the black band on the sleeve of his coat. By now Lucile would be waiting for him. He and she and Baby would ride in the funeral car together. He put away the work basket and fitted the coat with the mourning band very carefully on his shoulders. He glanced swiftly around the room to see that all was well before going out again. An hour later he was in Lucile’s kitchenette. He sat with his legs crossed, a napkin over his thigh, drinking a cup of tea. Lucile and Alice had been so different in all ways that it was not easy to realize they were sisters. Lucile was thin and dark, and today she had dressed completely in black. She was fixing Baby’s hair. The kid waited patiently on the kitchen table with her hands folded in her lap while her mother worked on her. The sunlight was quiet and mellow in the room. ‘Bartholomew--’ said Lucile. .What?’
‘Don’t you ever start thinking backward?’
‘I don’t,’said Biff.
‘You know it’s like I got to wear blinders all the time so I won’t think sideways or in the past. All I can let myself think about is going to work every day and fixing meals and Baby’s future.’
That’s the right attitude.’
‘I been giving Baby finger waves down at the shop. But they come out so quick I been thinking about letting her have a permanent. I don’t want to give it to her myself--I think maybe take her up to Atlanta when I go to the cosmetologist convention and let her get it there.’
‘Motherogod! She’s not but four. It’s liable to scare her. And besides, permanents tend to coarsen the hair.’
Lucile dipped the comb in a glass of water and mashed the curls over Baby’s ears. ‘No, they don’t. And she wants one.
Young as Baby is, she already has as much ambition as I got.
And that’s saying plenty.’
Biff polished his nails on the palm of his hand and shook his head.
‘Every time Baby and I go to the movies and see those kids in all the good roles she feels the same way I do. I swear she does, Bartholomew. I can’t even get her to eat her supper afterward.’
‘For goodness’ sake,’ Biff said.
‘She’s getting along so fine with her dancing and expression lessons. Next year I want her to start with the piano because I think it’ll be a help for her to play some.
Her dancing teacher is going to give her a solo in the soiree. I feel like I got to push Baby all I can. Because the sooner she gets started on her career the better it’ll be for both of us.’
‘Motherogod!’
‘You don’t understand. A child with talent can’t be treated like ordinary kids. That’s one reason I want to get Baby out of this common neighborhood. I can’t let her start to talk vulgar like these brats around her or run wild like they do.’
‘I know the kids on this block,’ Biff said. ‘They’re all right.’
Those Kelly kids across the street--the Crane boy--.
‘You know good and well that none of them are up to Baby’s level.’
Lucile set the last wave in Baby’s hair. She pinched the kid’s little cheeks to put more color in them. Then she lifted her down from the table. For the funeral Baby had on a little white dress with white shoes and white socks and even small white gloves. There was a certain way Baby always held her head when people looked at her, and it was turned that way now.
They sat for a while in the small, hot kitchenette without saying anything. Then Lucile began to cry. ‘It’s not like we was ever very close as sisters. We had our differences and we didn’t see much of each other. Maybe it was because I was so much younger. But there’s something about your own blood kin, and when anything like this happens--’ Biff clucked soothingly.
‘I know how you two were,’ she said. It wasn’t all just roses with you and she. But maybe that sort of makes it worse for you now.’
Biff caught Baby under the arms and swung her up to his shoulder. The kid was getting heavier. He held her carefully as he stepped into the living-room. Baby felt warm and close on his shoulder, and her little silk skirt was white against the dark cloth of his coat. She grasped one of his ears very tight with her little hand.
‘Unca Biff! Watch me do the split.’
Gently he set Baby on her feet again. She curved both arms above her head and her feet slid slowly in opposite directions on the yellow waxed floor. In a moment she was seated with one leg stretched straight in front of her and one behind. She posed with her arms held at a fancy angle, looking sideways at the wall with a sad expression.
She scrambled up again. ‘Watch me do a handspring. Watch me do a--’
‘Honey, be a little quieter,’ Lucile said. She sat down beside Biff on the plush sofa. ‘Don’t she remind you a little of him--something about her eyes and face?’
‘Hell, no. I can’t see the slightest resemblance between Baby and Leroy Wilson.’
Lucile looked too thin and worn out for her age. Maybe it was the black dress and because she had been crying. ‘After all, we got to admit he’s Baby’s father,’ she said.
‘Can’t you ever forget about that man?’
‘I don’t know. I guess I always been a fool about two things. And that’s Leroy and Baby.’
Bill’s new growth of beard was blue against the pale skin of his face and his voice sounded tired. ‘Don’t you ever just think a thing through and find out what’s happened and what ought to come from that? Don’t you ever use logic--if these are the given facts this ought to be the result?’
‘Not about him, I guess.’
Biff spoke in a weary manner and his eyes were almost closed.
‘You married this certain party when you were seventeen, and afterward there was just one racket between you after another.
You divorced him. Then two years later you married him a second time. And now he’s gone off again and you don’t know where he is. It seems like those facts would show you one thing--you two are not suited to each other. And that’s aside from the more personal side--the sort of man this certain party happens to be anyway.’
‘God knows I been realizing all along he’s a heel. I just hope he won’t ever knock on that door again.’
‘Look, Baby,’ Biff said quickly. He laced his fingers and held up his hands. ‘This is the church and this is the steeple. Open the door and here are God’s people.’
Lucile shook her head. ‘You don’t have to bother about Baby. I tell her everything. She knows about the whole mess from A to Z.’
‘Then if he comes back you’ll let him stay here and sponge on you just as long as he pleases--like it was before?’
‘Yeah. I guess I would. Every time the doorbell or the phone rings, every time anybody steps up on the porch, something in the back of my mind thinks about that man.’ Biff spread out the palms of his hands. ‘There you are.’ The clock struck two.
The room was very close and hot. Baby turned another handspring and made a split again on the waxed floor. Then Biff took her up into his lap. Her little legs dangled against his shin. She unbuttoned his vest and burrowed her face into him.
‘Listen,’ Lucile said. ‘If I ask you a question will you promise to answer me the truth?’
‘Sure.’
‘No matter what it is?’
Biff touched Baby’s soft gold hair and laid his hand gently on the side of her little head. ‘Of course.’
‘It was about seven years ago. Soon after we was married the first time. And he came in one night from your place with big knots all over his head and told me you caught him by the neck and banged his head against the side of the wall. He made up some tale about why you did it, but I want to know the real reason.’
Biff turned the wedding ring on his finger. I just never did like Leroy, and we had a fight In those days I was different from now.’