To Sail Beyond the Sunset (8 page)

I listened and found myself humiliated by these arrangements. I was never one of those women demanding the vote…but fair is fair! Somebody was going to inseminate me…then, when I groaned and moaned the way Mother does and gave birth to a baby, he got paid. I fumed to myself.

“It still sounds like whoring, Father, from where I sit. What’s the going rate? How much does my hypocritical, hypothetical husband get paid for each set of my labor pains and one smelly baby?”

“No set price.”

“What?
Mon papa
, that is a hell of a way to run a business. I lie down and spread my legs, by contract. Nine months later my husband is paid…five dollars? Fifty cents? This is not a good bet. I think I would be better off to move to Kansas City and walk the streets.”

“Maureen. Behave yourself.”

I took a deep breath, and held it. Then I lowered my voice an octave, the way I had been practicing lately. (I had promised myself never to let my voice get shrill.) “I’m sorry, sir. I guess I’m just another vaporish ex-virgin—I had thought I was more grown up.” I sighed. “But it does seem crass.”

“Yes, perhaps ‘crass’ is
le mot juste
. But let me tell you how it works. No one will ask you to marry anyone. If you consent, your mother and I will submit your name to the Foundation, along with a questionnaire that I will help you fill out. In return they will send you a list of young men. Each man on that list will be what is called an ‘eligible bachelor’—eligible quite aside from the Foundation and its money.

“He will be young, not more than ten years older than you are, but more likely about your age—”

“Fifteen?” I was amazed. Shocked.

“Simmer down, flame top. Your name is not yet on the list. I’m telling you this now because it is not fair not to let you know about the Howard Foundation option once you have graduated to functioning woman. But you’re still too young to marry.”

“In this state I can marry at twelve. With your permission.”

“You have my permission to marry at twelve. If you can manage it.”

“Father, you’re impossible.”

“No, merely improbable. He’ll be young but older than fifteen. He will be of good health and of good reputation. He will be of adequate education—”

“He had better be able to speak French, or he won’t fit into this family.” The Thebes school system offered French and German; Edward had-picked French, then Audrey also, because both Father and Mother had studied French, and made a habit of shifting to French when they wanted to talk privately in front of us. Audrey and Edward established a precedent; we all followed. I started on French before I could take it in school; I did not like having words talked in front of me that I did not understand.

This precedent affected my whole life—but, again, that’s another story.

“You can teach him French—including that French kissing you asked me about. Now this faceless stranger who ruined our Nell—Can he kiss?”

“Gorgeously!”

“Good. Was he sweet to you, Maureen?”

“Quite sweet. A bit timid but he’ll get over that, I think. Uh, Father, it wasn’t as much fun as I think it could be. And will be, next time.”

“Or maybe the time after that. What you’re saying is that today’s trial run was not as satisfying as masturbation. Correct?”

“Well, yes, that is what I meant. It was over too fast. He—Goodness, you know who drove me to Butler. Chuck. Charles Perkins. He’s sweet,
cher papa
, but…he knows less about it than I do.”

“So I would expect. I taught you, and you were an apt student.”

“Did you teach Audrey…before she got married?”

“Your mother taught her.”

“So? I suspect that you taught me more. Uh, was Audrey’s marriage sponsored by the Howard Foundation? Is that how she met Jerome?”

“That is a question never asked, Maureen. It would be polite not even to speculate.”

“Well, excuse my bare face!”

“I won’t excuse your naked manners. I never discuss your private affairs with your siblings; you should not ask me about theirs.”

I suddenly felt the curb bit. “I’m sorry, sir. This is all new to me.”

“Yes. This young man—these young men—will all be acceptable prospects…or, if I don’t approve of one, I’ll tell you why and not permit him in my house. But in addition to everything else, each one will have four living grandparents.”

“What’s special about that? I not only have four living grandparents but also eight living great-grandparents. Have I not?”

“Yes. Although Grampaw McFee is a waste of space. If he had died at ninety-five he would have been better off. But that is what this is all about, dear daughter; Ira Howard wanted his fortune used to extend human life. The Foundation trustees have chosen to treat it as if it were a stock breeding problem. Do you recall the papers on Loafer, and the reason I paid a high price for him? Or the papers on Clytemnestra? You have long life in your ancestry, Maureen, all branches. If you marry a young man on the list, your children will have long life in all their branches.”

Father turned in his seat and looked me in the eye. “But nobody—nobody!—is asking you to do anything. If you authorize me to submit your name—not today but let’s say next year—it simply means that you will have six or eight or ten or more additional suitors to choose from, instead of being effectively limited to the few young men near your age in Lyle County. If you decide to marry Charles Perkins, I won’t say a word. He’s healthy, he’s well behaved. And he’s not my cup of tea. But he may be yours.”

(He was not my cup of tea, either, Papa. I guess I was just using him. But I’d promised him a return match…so I would have to.)

“Father, suppose we hold off until next year?”

“I think that is sound judgment, Maureen. In the meantime, don’t get pregnant and try not to get caught. Oh, by the way—If you submit your name and a young man on the list comes along, if you wish, you can try him out on the parlor sofa.” He smiled. “More convenient and safer than the judges’ stand.”

“Mother would have heart failure!”

“No, she would not. Because that is exactly the arrangement her mother provided for her…and that is why Edward was officially a premature baby. Because it is stupid to go the Howard route, then find out after you’re committed by marriage vows that the two of you are infertile with each other.”

I had no answer. Mother…my mother who thought “breast” was a dirty word and that “belly” was outright profanity… Mother with her bloomers off, bouncing her bawdy buttocks on Grandma Pfeiffer’s sofa, making a baby out of wedlock, while Grandma and Grandpa pretended not to know what was going on! It was easier to believe in virgin birth and transubstantiation and resurrection and Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny. We are strangers, all of us, family most of all.

Shortly we pulled into the Jackson Igo place, eighty acres, mostly rocks and hills, a shack and a sorry barn. Mr. Igo cropped it a bit but it didn’t seem possible that the place supported him and his thin, tired wife and his swarm of dirty children. Mostly Jackson Igo cleaned cesspools and built privies.

Some of those children and half a dozen dogs gathered round our buggy; one boy ran shouting into the house. Presently Mr. Igo came out. Father called out, “Jackson!”

“Yeah, Doc.”

“Get these dogs away from my rig.”

“They ain’t no harm.”

“Do it. I won’t have them jumping up on me.”

“Jest as you say, Doc. Cleveland! Jefferson! Get them hounds! Take ’em around back.”

The order was carried out; Father got down with a quiet word over his shoulder, “Stay in the buggy.”

Father was inside their shack only a short time, which suited me, as the oldest boy, Caleb, my age or near it, was pestering me to get down and come see a new litter of pigs. I knew him from school, where he had attended fifth grade for some years. He was, in my opinion, a likely candidate for lynching if some father did not kill him first. I had to tell him to get away from Daisy and quit bothering her; he was causing her to toss her head and back away from him. I took the whip out of its socket to point up my words.

I was glad to see Father reappear.

He climbed into the buggy without a word. I clucked to Daisy and we got out of there. Father was frowning like a thunder cloud, so I kept quiet.

A quarter of a mile down the road he said, “Please pull over onto the grass,” so I did, and said to Daisy, “Whoa, girl,” and waited.

“Thank you, Maureen. Will you help me wash, please?”

“Certainly, sir.” This buggy, used for his country calls and specially built by the carriage wrights who built his racing sulkies, had a larger baggage space in back, with a rain cover. In it were carried a number of items that Father might need on a call but which did not belong in his black bag. One was a coal oil can with a spout, filled with water, and a tin basin, and soap and toweling.

This time he wanted me to pour water over his hands. Then he soaped them; I rinsed them by pouring. He shook them dry; then washed them all over again in the basin and dried them after shaking, on clean toweling.

He sighed. “That’s better. I did not sit down in there, I did not touch anything I could avoid touching. Maureen, remember that bathtub we used in Chicago?”

“I certainly do!” The World’s Fair had been an endless wonder and I’ll never forget my first view of the Lake and my first ride on a railroad train up high in the air…but I dreamed about that tub, all white enamel, and hot water up to my chin. I could be seduced for a hot bath. They say every woman has her price. That’s mine.

“Mrs. Malloy charged us two bits for each bath. This minute I would happily pay her two dollars. Maureen, I need glycerine and rose water. In my bag. Please.”

Father compounded this lotion himself and it was intended primarily for chapped hands. Right now he needed it to soothe his hands against the strong lye soap he had just used.

Once back on the road he said, “Maureen, that baby was dead long before Jackson Igo sent for me. Since last night, I estimate.”

I tried to feel sorry about that baby. But growing up in that household was no fate to wish on anyone. “Then why did he send for you?”

“To bless the death. To get me to write a death certificate, to keep him from trouble with the law when he buries it…which he is probably doing this very minute. Primarily to cause me—and you—to make a six-mile round trip to save himself the trouble of harnessing his mule and coming into town.” Father laughed without mirth. “He kept pointing out that I couldn’t charge him for a call since I didn’t get there before the baby died. I finally said, ‘Shut up, Jackson. You haven’t paid me a cent since Cleveland beat Harrison.’ He said something about hard times and how this administration never does anything for the farmer.”

Father sighed. “I didn’t argue with him; he had a point. Maureen, you’ve been keeping my books this past year; would you say these were hard times?”

That brought me up sharp. I had been thinking about the Howard Foundation and Chuck’s pretty penis. “I don’t know, Father. But I know that you have far more on the books than you ever get paid. I’ve noticed something else, too: the worst of the deadbeats would rather owe you a dollar for a house call than fifty cents for an office visit. Like Jackson Igo.”

“Yes. He could have fetched that little cadaver in—never saw a child so dehydrated!—but I’m relieved that he did not; I don’t want him in my clean clinic…or Adele’s clean house. You’ve seen the books; do you estimate that collections are enough to support our family? Food, clothing, shelter, oats and hay, and a nickel for Sunday School?”

I thought about it. I knew my multiplication tables through twenty times twenty, same as everybody, and in high school I had been learning the delights of more advanced ciphering. But I had never applied any of it to our household affairs. Now I drew a blackboard in my mind and did some hard calculating.

“Father…if they all paid you what they owe you, we would be quite comfortable. But they don’t pay you, not enough of them.” I thought. “Nevertheless we are comfortable.”

“Maureen, if you don’t want the Howard option, better marry a rich man. Not a country doctor.”

Presently he shrugged and smiled. “Don’t worry about it. We’ll keep food on the table even if I have to slide over into Kansas and rustle cattle. Shall we sing? ‘Pop Goes the Weasel’ would be appropriate today. How is your weasel by now, dear? Sore?”

“Father, you are a dirty old man and you will come to a bad end.”

“I’ve always hoped so, but I’ve been too busy raising
Kinder
to raise Cain. Meant to tell you: Someone else is interested in your welfare. Old lady Altschuler.”

“So I know.” I told him about her remark. “She thinks I’m Audrey.”

“That unspeakable old cow. But she may not really think you are Audrey. She asked me what you were doing in the grandstand at the fairgrounds.”

“Well! What did you tell her?”

“I told her nit. Silence is all a snoopy question deserves…just fail to hear it. But the insult direct is still better. Which I handed that snapping turtle by ignoring her question and telling her next time to bathe before she comes to see me, as I found her personal hygiene to be less than adequate. She was not pleased.” He smiled. “She may be so angry that she will switch to Dr. Chadwick. One may hope.”

“One may. So somebody saw us go up. Well, sir, they did not actually see us doing it.” I told Father about the box heavy with weights. “Spectators would have to have been in a balloon.”

“I would say so. Safe enough if not very comfortable. I wish I could extend to you the courtesy of the sofa…but I can’t until you take up the Howard option. If you do. In the meantime let’s think about it. Safe places.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you. What I can’t figure out is this: We trimmed the trip to Butler short, in order to conceal the time used up in unscheduled activity. I’ve been figuring times and distances in my head.
Cher papa
, unless my arithmetic is wrong—”

“It never is.”

“Whoever spotted us climbing up into my hideaway must then have proceeded at a fast trot to the Altschuler place, reported my sins, then the Ugly Duchess must have been already dressed, with her buggy hitched and ready, to hurry over to see you. When did she show up?”