The Tin Can Tree

'Well, is that what you've been getting ready to say?' Mrs Hall asked irritably.

'Oh no,' Missouri said. 'It was something entirely different. I was working up to something.'

'You were talking about Aunt Lou,' Joan reminded her.

'Well, I know I was. If you all would just let me -'

'Personally,' said Mrs Hall, 'I think this is a lot of fuss for nothing. You think it's something wrong if Mrs Pike sticks to herself a few days. Well, something is wrong. Somebody died. And that's all I'm going to say.'

'It's just as well,' said Missouri. 'You keep distracting my mind.'

'Why, Missouri-'

'You said,' Missouri reminded her, 'you said that was all you was going to -'

Mrs Hall sighed and turned her back, muttering something but not attempting to argue any more, and Missouri nodded to herself several times. There now,' she said. 'Now, what was I -?' But when Lucy clicked her tongue in exasperation, exactly like her mother, Missouri waved her free hand at her to tell her not to speak. 'Now I remember,' she said. 'Growing old surely do – Well. Anyway. Now, of course we're not saying anything's wrong with Mrs Pike. Sure she's sad. Going to go right on being that way, always a little sad to the end of her days. But that don't stop us from trying to make her feel better; that's just natural. We all got reasons. Maybe we want to stop remembering the dead ourselves. Or a host of other reasons.'

She bent down and slapped a fly on her leg. 'Oh, you,' she said to the fly, and then reached out for Joan's leaves. Joan was holding the leaves too high and far away, and Missouri had to snap her fingers at her. 'Come on,' she said. Joan came to life and handed the leaves over.

'Anyhow,' said Missouri. 'Now I've lost my place again. Where was I?'

'Mrs Pike,' Joan said.

'Mrs Pike? Oh, her. Well, no, I was passing on to someone else. What's-his-name. What's his name?'

'Mr Pike?' Lily suggested.

'Just hush. Though he's in this too, of course. No, just hush -Simon. That boy of theirs. You know him, Joan?'

'He's my cousin,' said Joan.

'Oh, yes. Yes. Simon. Going to go to pieces if things go on this way. Do you see now what I'm getting at?'

'Well, no.'

'It's as plain as the nose on – Boy? Come on, now, quit that poking. I'm saying it's Simon should be in her beauty shop with her.'

'In her-?'

'I mean in her sewing shop. Look what you done now, got me all confused. Well, that's who you want.'

'You mean he should entertain the customers,' Joan said.

'That was my point.'

'Well-'

'He's the only one can help now. Not hot tea, not people circling round. Not even her own husband. Just her little boy.'

'I don't see how,' said Joan.

Missouri made an exasperated face. "You don't know,' she told her. 'You don't know how it would work out. Bravest thing about people, Miss Joan, is how they go on loving mortal beings after finding out there's such a thing as dying. Do I have to tell you that?'

She snapped her twine tight and held it there while she watched Joan scrape up the last of the leaves. 'I despise finishing the day on half a stick,' she said.

'Well, I'll be,' said Charleen. She leaned back against the table, shaking her head and watching Mrs Hall tie the end of her stick. 'I never. Was that what you did all this talking to say?'

'It was,' said Missouri.

At the other end of the table, Mrs Hall suddenly looked up. 'That's true,' she said slowly, but when they turned toward her she only shook her head. 'That's true,' she said again, and lifted her tobacco rod gently from its notches and handed it to the waiting boy.

6

James was halfway through his second beer before he saw Joan coming toward him. He was sitting on Mr Terry's porch, leaning back against the side of the house in a folding chair and lazily listening to the other men talking, and the beer can was making a cold wet ring on his knee. There were four other men there, all sitting just like he was in a line against the house. Maybe if Joan hadn't come he would have sat with them till supper, just to rest up from the long day's work and let the breeze dry his damp shirt. But then Mr Terry said, 'If you'll look out yonder -' and James raised his eyes toward the fields and saw Joan padding down the dirt driveway in tare feet with a sandal swinging from each hand. 'Out yonder to the east is what I mean to cultivate year after next,' Mr Terry went on. He had been saying that for as long as James had known him. 'I aim to extend the alfalfa a bit. No sense in letting good land grow wild, I say.' James only nodded, not really listening. He squinted his eyes so as to see better -Joan was still far away – and watched how she picked her way so quickly and gently along the dusty wheel-tracks. Her head was bent, so that her hair fell forward and nearly hid her face. Way behind her were the other women, going in the opposite direction toward town, and once they turned back and waved at Joan but she didn't see them. The women bobbed on, farther and farther, until all that showed of them was their bright dresses between the tobacco rows and two huge black umbrellas shading Lily and Missouri from the sun.

'I also been thinking about the eight acres out back,' said Mr Terry. 'They're Paul Hammond's, but he's not using them.'

'No,' James said.

'You listening?'

Joan had reached the edge of the Terry's front yard. She crossed onto the grass, sliding her feet a little as if she liked the coolness of it, and Mr Terry stopped talking and the others sat forward and took their hats off.

'Hey, Joan,' said Mr Terry.

'Hey.' She stopped at the bottom of the steps and smiled up at them. 'Lem,' she said, 'Missouri sent you a message. She said to come right on home.'

Lem tipped back again in his chair, shaking his head. 'Must be a mistake somewheres,' he said. His eyes were faraway and dreamy, and the others laughed softly.

'Well, anyway,' said Joan. 'I came to see if you're ready to go yet, James. Or do you want to stay on a while.'

'No, I'm ready.'

He finished his beer in one gulp and stood up. Down at the end of the porch, Howell Blake looked up from cleaning his fingernails with a pocket knife and said, 'You coming tomorrow?'

'Depends on Roy Pike, I guess. Looks like he'll be sitting with his wife a while.'

'Well, just so's one of you makes it,' said Mr Terry. 'You tell Roy I know how it is. You tell him, Joan.'

'I will.'

James went down the steps toward Joan, and she switched one sandal to the other hand so that he could take her free hand in his. Both of them were coated with tobacco gum. The gum had lost its stickiness by now but it still clung to their skin in heavy layers, so that it was like holding hands with rubber gloves on. He kept hold of her anyway, and turned partway back to nod at the others. 'See you tomorrow, I guess,' he said. 'I or Roy, one.'

'Okay. So long.'

'So long.

They crossed the yard together and then they were on the dirt driveway again, heading toward the gravel road. When James looked down, he could see the dust rising in little puffs around Joan's toes every time she took a step. Her toes were gum-covered too, and the dust had stuck to them like a layer of sugar frosting.

'I have to have a bath,' Joan said, as if she had been following his eyes.'

'No. I like you this way.'

'I'm serious. You have to have one too, and then we can sit outside and cool off.'

'Okay,' James said. He pulled her along faster, because he liked the idea of just the two of them sitting out on the porch a while. But Joan slowed him down again.

'I have to put on my sandals to walk fast,' she said. 'Do you want me to?'

'No, that's all right.'