Adam Canfield of the Slash (10 page)

“I guess,” said Phoebe. “It’s just harder to say that if you’ve met them face-to-face. I mean Dr. Cooper and Phyllis, they weren’t trying to be stupid. This Phyllis, she wanted to give me an award.”

“Were they the ones standing in front of the smilers on News 12?” said Adam. “They looked awfully ready to take credit for the event.”

Phoebe nodded.

“How come News 12 didn’t have the candy?” asked Adam.

“They stayed a minute and left,” said Phoebe. “They had some big four-hundred-pound story to go to.”

“They’re a disaster,” said Adam.

“I don’t know,” said Phoebe. “Maybe that’s what people want. Happy news.”

“No,” said Adam. “It’s not your job to write what Phyllis wants. If that’s what we did, we could have Phyllis do the story and call it ‘Phyllis’s World.’ Our job as reporters is to tell the truth as we see it. It has to be backed by facts, but that’s what good newspapers do. That’s why people read newspapers. They trust reporters to be honest about what they see. They trust reporters to ask questions that everyone else is too embarrassed to ask or too afraid. Phoebe, you are the public’s eyes and ears. You, Phoebe, take your best shot at telling them the truth about what’s going on in their town.”

Phoebe didn’t look like the public’s eyes and ears. She looked shrunken. “Maybe we could do the story without their names,” Phoebe said weakly. “So Phyllis and her husband wouldn’t be embarrassed. Couldn’t we just say ‘dental officials’?”

“Oh no,” said Adam. “No way. We have to use names. That’s good journalism. Using real names holds us to a higher standard. It means we have to be telling the truth about people. If we make up the names, how can the reader be sure we’re not making up facts, too?”

Phoebe didn’t say a word.

“Come on, Front-Page Phoebe,” said Adam. “I’m not used to you being so quiet. You OK?”

“I guess,” said Phoebe. “I just keep thinking, When Phyllis reads it — I’m dead.”

By the time Adam set out for 48 Grand Street to see what he could learn about Miss Minnie Bloch and her gift to the school, he knew a lot more about the Willows. As promised, Danny had dropped off the old newspaper with the historical articles. “Look it over,” Danny said. “It’s good background.”

There was one black-and-white photo, in particular, that Adam could not stop staring at. Dated “circa 1900,” it was taken in front of the train station and showed a woman with a dress that went from the top of her neck to her ankles, sitting in a horse-drawn wagon with a sign painted on the sideboard that read,
TREMBLE RIVER TAXI & LIVERY.
In the wagon were four smiling children, three girls in long dresses with big bows in their hair, and a boy, about Adam’s age, in a white shirt, tie, pressed shorts, and high stockings. The woman and her children were white. In front of the carriage, beside several large trunks, stood several men and women, staring seriously into the camera, half of them white, the rest black.

The photo caption said,
Early Tremble River Summer Residents with Servants.

Adam read the articles describing Tremble’s progress from a sleepy summer community to a prosperous year-round suburb full of adults taking the train into the city for work. But it was the photo that he kept thinking about on this October afternoon, as he biked up Grand toward Minnie Bloch’s house. The woman and children in the taxi, waiting to be driven to their new summer cottage — they lived by the river, where Adam lived. And the servants who carried the trunks — they were the ancestors of people who now lived in the Willows.

He was pretty sure this was what Danny had wanted him to understand.

Adam had never been up these streets, never had a play date or carpooled with anyone from this neighborhood. As he biked, he noticed a few kids who looked familiar from school or sports, but he didn’t know their names.

The houses were just as Danny had described, small and rectangular, going back deeper than they were wide. Adam could see why they were called shotgun houses. Maybe half looked good, with flower boxes and potted plants, but a lot needed a paint job and raking. Riding into the wind, Adam could smell the sewage plant.

Number 48 Grand was boarded up. A sheet of plywood was nailed over each window. Adam was disappointed. He’d been hoping someone would be living there who would know about Miss Bloch. In the small front yard, there was a real estate sign that said
SOLD.
On the way over, Adam had noticed four or five of those same
SOLD
signs in front of boarded-up homes. He pulled out a notebook and began writing a description of the house.

“Can I help you?” asked a woman standing on the front steps of the house next door. Adam startled. He hadn’t noticed anyone when he rode up.

“Lordy,” said the woman, “you’re not one of those real estate agents buying up the Willows, are you?” She had a big wad of something in her mouth and spit a glob of dark-colored, menacing-looking liquid from her cheek into a white Styrofoam cup.

“Oh no, ma’am,” said Adam. “I’m definitely not a real estate anything.”

“Didn’t think so,” she said. “Didn’t think they were starting them that young, although you never know when it comes to those snakes. If I see one more house bought and boarded up on this street, I’m going to get out my bazooka.” She spit more dark juice into the cup. “How come you’re scribbling all them words in that notebook?” she asked.

When Adam explained he was a reporter, her eyes bulged. “You’re not from that Bolandvision News 12 are you?” she yelled. “I hate that news almost as much as I hate that Sumner J. Boland. They never tell the real truth. All news all the time, my ass. That is the sorriest news I ever seen.”

“I know what you mean,” said Adam. “It’s pretty bad.” He told her he was from the
Slash
and was trying to write about a Miss Bloch who used to live there.

The woman’s expression seemed to soften. “Why on earth would you want to do a story on Minnie?” she asked. “She’s dead. Won’t be much of a story.”

“She left money to our school,” said Adam. “I was just trying to find out more about her. No one seems to know much.”

“You go to Harris?” said the woman. “Why didn’t you say so, son? I guess I could tell you a thing or two about Minnie. There’s things to tell.” She held out her hand. “Want some?”

“I don’t know,” said Adam. “What is it?”

The woman took a fistful of brown fibery material from a pouch, packed it into a neat, small pile, and stuck it in her cheek. “Chewing tobacco,” she said.

Adam said he’d better not.

“Oh, you’re one of those good little boys,” said the woman, winking at him. “That’s all right. Some good boys turn out fine, too. Well, go ahead, fire away, Gridley. What you want to know?”

Adam wasn’t prepared for her directness. What he wanted to know was how Miss Bloch had lived in a house like 48 Grand yet had all that money to give away. But he was afraid if he asked, this woman would feel insulted, like she lived in a crappy house, too. So he just looked at her, a little stupidly he feared, trying to think of some way to get the conversation going and lead up to the big idea slowly. Where was Jennifer when he needed her? She’d know what to say.

The woman waited, but the boy appeared to have turned mute, so she started rubbing her forehead, making circular motions with her hands. “Ooba, ooba, wha, wha, moe, moe,” she chanted, her eyes closed now. “Let me see. It’s coming to me.” She opened her eyes. “Now I’m not a professionally trained journalist like yourself, son. But I think if I was, what I’d like to know is how someone could live in a dump like the Willows and have all that money to give away.”

“Yes!” said Adam. “I mean, no. It’s not a dump; it’s just . . . I didn’t mean for you to think, that I think . . .”

“Calm down, child,” said the woman. “It’s about time someone asked. I been wondering when somebody would be smart enough to come around. Been waiting a few years now. And who’s the wise man comes knocking? Little boy, all skin and bones. What’s your name, anyway?”

He told her. “Adam,” she repeated. “That fits. The first man. Lot of pressure, going first. The Bible Adam — one wrong bite and he was exhaled from Paradise. Always felt that was a little rough. Just natural the first would make a few mistakes. How are you about making mistakes?”

“We try to fact-check all our stories,” said Adam.

“Then we should be fine,” said the woman. “Now, Adam, I know you aren’t the kind of boy who chews tobacco. Would you be the kind of boy who likes cocoa and marshmallows?” Then Mrs. Betty Willard invited Adam Canfield into her house and walked him straight down the center hallway to her kitchen table.

“Minnie left school at thirteen,” began Mrs. Willard, bringing over a mug with a couple dozen of those little bobbing marshmallows at the top that Adam loved. “Must have been fifty years she worked as a jewelry polisher, took every lick of overtime she could get. Wasn’t easy for her, neither. She left home before dawn to catch three buses to the factory, and by the time I seen her walking back up the street, it was dark.

“In her ninety-two years, that woman never traveled outside Tremble County,” Mrs. Willard continued. As far as Mrs. Willard knew, Miss Bloch took just a single pleasure trip in her life, to East Tremble, to see the mall when it was new. “Afterward, Minnie told me she was offended by all the ways people wasted money. That Minnie was mighty tight with a dollar.”

Miss Bloch lived her first forty-five years with her mother, who, according to Mrs. Willard, was a German immigrant and very conceited about having been the head household servant for one of the richest, oldest Tremble families. The mother dominated Minnie’s life, Mrs. Willard explained, and after her death, Minnie lived the next twenty-five years with her brother, who also dominated. After his death, she lived alone.

Mrs. Willard stood and looked out the sliding door to her backyard. “Tell me this, Adam,” she said. “You embarrassed by any silly little things that scare you?”

He stopped taking notes. “Yeah,” he said. He felt funny talking about it, but since a reporter asked so many personal questions, it seemed like he should answer a few. “Sometimes I get scared our house is going to burn down,” he said softly. “At night I’ll see a car’s headlights on the street from my upstairs window and think it’s fire.”

“Well, that’s how Minnie was,” said Mrs. Willard. “Except she couldn’t control it good as you. Everything scared her. Bugs, thunder, animals, men.”

“Kids, too?” asked Adam. “She must have liked kids. She gave money to our school.”

“Not really,” said Mrs. Willard. “When my kids was little, she used to holler if they ran into her yard to fetch a ball. But she was a funny bird. You know, she’d plan weeks ahead for Halloween, was the only one I knew in the Willows who gave out full-size candy bars.”

“After she retired,” Mrs. Willard continued, “her only regular contact with the outside world was yours truly. Every morning she’d call me at nine-thirty: ‘Hello, Betty. I made it through another night.’ The older that lady got, the cheaper she got. She watched television in the dark to save on electricity, said she could see fine from the streetlight. She dusted with a mop made from old underclothes and a coat hanger, caught water that dripped from the kitchen faucet and used it to wash dishes.”

“Geez,” said Adam. “Sounds like
Little House on the Prairie.
She doesn’t seem like a rich lady.”

“That’s what I thought,” said Mrs. Willard. “You wait here. I need to get something.” She disappeared down the hall into a bedroom. Adam looked at her backyard. Mrs. Willard had several bird feeders in a tree, and on one a squirrel was hanging upside down, stealing food.

When Mrs. Willard returned, she had a stack of browned papers tied with a silk ribbon.

“Before I forget,” said Adam, “got a photo of her in there? I’d like it for the paper.”

“Never let me take her picture,” said Mrs. Willard. “Said she was too ugly — her face would break the camera. A few times I asked about family photo albums, but she claimed they was destroyed in a flood.”

“Check these out,” she said, handing Adam a pile of receipts.

“Are they from her funeral?” Adam asked.

“They are,” said Mrs. Willard. “For five years, the first Sunday of every month, she rode two buses to Longwood Memorial to pay off her cemetery plot on the installment plan. When she died, she did not owe a cent to a soul. She’d even had her name and birth date carved on the tombstone. All the cemetery had to do was add the expiration date.”

“Did you go to the funeral?” asked Adam.

“The hearse driver, a minister, and me — that’s all,” said Mrs. Willard. “From the minister’s speech, I could tell he didn’t know her. There was no write-up in the paper, neither. And that would’ve been the end of the story, except about a year later I get a call from a lawyer, says a Miss Minnie Bloch had named me as executor of her will, asked if I’d come to his office downtown to sign papers.”

“You saw the will?” asked Adam.

Mrs. Willard nodded. “You know that woman had five savings accounts and never touched any of them? Lived off the four hundred and fifty dollars she got from Social Security each month.”