Winter Birds (36 page)

“Sometimes men change after they’re married,” I say. Rachel looks at me, puzzled. “My sisters’ husbands took their money, too,” I add. My mind suddenly fills with pictures of old boots, coat pockets, tin cans, cardboard boxes behind coal buckets. I see men’s hands dispensing small bills as charity, but grudgingly. And then I see my bankbook and the large sum showing my wealth.

There is a song in
Cymbeline
, sung in a forest by one of the king’s sons. This one is a short song with a theme: All men come to dust. After the sunshine of youth and the raging winds of old age, “golden lads” and “chimney-sweepers” all come to the same end. Shakespeare employs a job metaphor. After your work is done, he says, you get paid for it. “Home art gone and taken thy wages.” This is not necessarily a comforting thought. Where is this home, and what are these wages? I recall a verse from the red Bible, one in which the subject and verb do not agree: “For the wages of sin is death.”

“I read once that it is common for women to hide money from their husbands,” I say, “but I believe husbands are just as likely to hide money from their wives.” Perhaps Rachel thinks I am suffering from the early stages of dementia. If so, my next words surely give her more cause to think so. “Fidelity and cuckoldry may be found on either side of the marriage bed.” Rachel appears to be thinking this over. She takes another bite of cheesecake and nods solemnly.

“I had a cousin who took in a baby and raised him as her own,” she says. “Her husband told her it was a friend’s baby, but a long time later she found out it was her husband’s own baby. He had been seeing this other woman all along.” If this is Rachel’s stab at a relevant response, it is a lucky one.

“The European cuckoo is thought to be a foolish bird,” I say. “It makes no nest of its own but lays an egg in the nest of some other unsuspecting bird.”

Rachel takes only the smallest of bites. I wonder if life has taught her this: What pleasure there is to be had, take it slowly.

“And then the other bird feeds the little cuckoo when it hatches?” she asks.

I nod. “Yes, some think this is where the word
cuckold
has its origin. Infidelity must be prepared to dispose of the offspring it produces.”

If she is not familiar with the word
cuckold
, she does not show it. She puts her head to one side and looks at me. “A person could sure learn a lot from you, Aunt Sophie.”

We both turn again to look at the television. Barney is busy disqualifying women right and left from his list of candidates for Andy’s wife. He crosses them off for things such as not liking housework or not being able to cook.

“I only knew how to make pancakes when we were married,” Rachel says. Like A. E. Housman, she has misplaced her modifier. “Did you know how to cook when you got married?”

I tell her I was forty-two when I married, and though I wasn’t a very good cook, I knew my way around in the kitchen.

“Patrick sure ate a lot of pancakes those first few months,” she says. “But he never did say a cross word about it.” She runs the tip of her fork back and forth through her cherry sauce, then lifts it to her mouth. “I’ll never forget how excited he was the day he came home and found out we were having hot dogs for supper.”

I glance through the doorway into the kitchen. It comes to me that Rachel and Patrick would have eaten those pancakes and hot dogs within sight of where I now sit. I try to imagine the two of them as newlyweds.

“Where did Patrick take you for a honeymoon?” I ask.

“New Orleans,” she says. “He got us a hotel right on the river, and we spent three nights there.”

I take note that she speaks of the nights they spent there but not the days. I think of all the collected desire and hope in the word
honeymoon
. I think of the disappointment, also. Often it is disappointment one will not admit. On the television Barney has invited a new group of women to Andy’s house, having judged everyone in the first round ineligible.

My cheesecake is disappearing fast. I try to slow down. “There were no honeymoons in Elizabethan times,” I say. I tell her what little I know about the wedding celebrations in Shakespeare’s day. I tell her of the feast at the bridegroom’s house, of the all-day merrymaking, of the bridesmaids leading the bride to the wedding chamber, of their undressing her and putting her into the bed. I tell her of the groom’s friends bringing him to the chamber. I tell of their sewing the sheets together with the bride and groom inside and then leaving them alone in the bridal chamber while they went back to finish their party in the adjacent rooms.

“Why, that’s amazing,” says Rachel. “I didn’t know any of that. But I’m glad we have honeymoons today.” She smiles. “Patrick told me later that we could’ve stayed longer in New Orleans but he couldn’t wait for me to see the house he’d bought and fixed up.” Her eyes make a slow circle around the room. I wonder if this piece of prime real estate was the house she had always dreamed of.

I have no trouble at all imagining Patrick swinging open the front door of 629 Edison Street, announcing joyfully, “Well, here it is!” It is more difficult to conjure up a picture of his carrying her over the threshold, though, knowing Patrick, he surely must have tried. But I can see him leading her by the hand through each room of the mansion, singing out its many charms.

I think of the female cuckoo, which has no nest in which to lay her eggs. I also think of certain orioles of which I have read in my bird book. The female is treated to a showy display by the male: Here it is! See my orchard! See my tree! See my nest! Come, live with me here! Carried away by his ardor, the male often flutters upward off his perch in the rapture of his singing.

Chapter 28

To Feed on Such Sweet Honey, and Kill the Bees

After a winter diet of fruits and berries in the tropics, the summer tanager is ready for a change. Braving the risk of stings, the bird will plunder the nests of bees and wasps for their larvae and pupae, its preferred food. Known by its nickname, “red beebird,” the summer tanager can overtake insects for a quick meal in flight
.

Do not ask how it comes to pass that Rachel carries a large porcelain basin of water into my apartment, that she slowly stoops and places it on the floor beside the sofa. She returns with something she calls a loofah in one hand, a bottle in the other, and a white towel over her shoulder. She lays the towel and the loofah, which is a small fibrous sponge, on the table next to the sofa. To the water she adds a capful of solution from the bottle and stirs it in with her fingers. It is a miracle solution Patrick has bought at the health food store. She squints at the printing on the back of the bottle before recapping it, then slowly stirs the water again.

Patrick has become a frequent customer of the health food store, for he believes that the physical difficulties Rachel is undergoing can be eliminated with the right combination of natural herbs and vitamins. These he avidly researches and brings home for the speedy healing of her body. Patrick’s idea of a proper malady is one that spikes and is promptly conquered with medication, not an affliction like Rachel’s that comes and goes. “And she said this will help all the swings in body temperature,” he said to Rachel after his first visit to the store. “And this is supposed to make you sleep better.” I heard the rustle of a paper bag as he extracted his purchases. There were other things in the bag—another pill, a cream, and then a bottle.

“I got this for Aunt Sophie,” he said. “The woman said her mother uses it and can’t say enough good things about it. She said she used to limp when she walked but now she doesn’t.” Apparently Patrick believes the woman’s story. Imagine, something in a bottle to cure a limp. “She said it’s excellent for improving circulation,” he added.

“The directions say to soak for thirty minutes, then massage for at least ten,” Rachel says now, looking up at me briefly. She touches the loofah. “Five minutes with this and five with the towel. We’ll be done before Mindy comes. And I won’t be rough, I promise.” As if I am worried about Rachel being rough.

I nod and take the bottle from her hand. It is a product called Feet First, the label of which claims that it is “approved by podiatrists nationwide” and that it will “restore vitality to aching feet.” A tag around the neck of the bottle reads, “Going dancing? Pamper your FEET FIRST with a luxuriant foot bath for all-night comfort and ease of movement. Staying in for a quiet, romantic evening? Prepare for restful sleep by immersing your FEET FIRST in our wondrously fragrant liquid indulgence. Friends for life, your feet deserve the royal treatment only FEET FIRST can give.”

I am not going dancing, nor am I preparing for a romantic evening. Had a foot bath been demanded by Patrick, I would have refused. But Rachel has asked, using the word
please
, as if requesting a special honor, and I have submitted. I sit on the sofa, magazines at hand. Carol Burnett is on the television across the room. Carol Burnett is playing the role of an incompetent secretary, smacking gum and polishing her fingernails while Tim Conway, the boss, tries to get her attention over the intercom.

Rachel removes my slippers and socks. Then she gently lifts my friends for life, slides the basin beneath them, and lowers them into the wondrously fragrant liquid indulgence.

Thirty minutes pass, during which I read my magazine and watch Carol Burnett turn into Eunice, whose mother lives with her and her husband, Ed. They play a board game called Sorry, and Mama, Eunice, and Ed end up shouting at one another.

Rachel returns after thirty minutes and begins the massaging phase. She works as if she has long experience in handling the feet of others. While she rubs the sole of one foot with the loofah, she softly and rhythmically kneads the top of the same foot with her other hand.

“Does that hurt?” she says at one point. She lifts my foot to look at the sole. “How long have you had this?” I tell her I don’t know, that it hurts more some days than others.

“It looks like a plantar wart to me,” she says. “We’ll have to get something for that.” She moves the loofah between my toes, taking care with the ones that overlap. She gives special attention to my heels. She splashes a little water on the hem of my dress and apologizes, wiping it off quickly. She does not watch the clock, but I do. I am too embarrassed to speak.

The five minutes with the loofah stretches to ten. She moves the basin and sits before me, placing my feet on the towel in her lap. I look down at them as if they are strangers, not friends for life. How is it that such unlovely things have come to be taken into someone’s hands and treated gently? I look at the top of Rachel’s hair. It is growing longer, losing its crested MacGyver look. I wonder if she is working toward a different style or has simply let it go.

She finishes toweling one of my feet and begins the other. After this the treatment will be finished. Vitality will be restored to my aching feet. I will walk without a limp. Rachel is humming something now, a tune I have heard Patrick singing in the living room of late. Believing that others admire his voice as much as he does, Patrick has volunteered to sing a solo at church. Rachel plays the piano so he can practice it. The two of them give a shaky performance. It is a perfect song for Patrick the Shepherd to sing, for it tells of ninety-nine sheep that are safe in the fold. One shy of an even hundred. But there’s one more sheep that has wandered away into the mountains. I recognize the story from one of the parables I have read in the red Bible. Patrick’s reedy voice throbs with emotion as he sings, and he labors through many verses before the shepherd finally locates the lost sheep.

Carol Burnett has ended, and Judge Jack is now on the television. A white woman is suing a black woman for emotional distress and two hundred dollars in damages. The white woman has stringy yellow hair and is missing a front tooth. The two women clamor at each other simultaneously, and Judge Jack pounds his gavel. The dispute concerns a hole in a backyard fence, a dog, and the black woman’s boyfriend. It is a confusing story, and I do not try hard to follow it.

Rachel cradles my foot in one hand as if it were a small lamb and briskly rubs it with the towel. Perhaps she is thinking of the lost sheep on the mountainside, cold and wet. When she finishes with both feet, she stops humming and looks up at me. “One more thing.” She leaves and returns with a pair of nail clippers. Without ado she lifts each foot and trims my toenails. I do not watch her, but I hear the
snick-snick
of the clippers. “There, I’m done,” she says at last. A little pile of thick yellowish slivers lies scattered on the tabletop beside the bottle of Feet First.

She reaches for one of my socks and begins folding back the top to slip it onto my foot. Though I could do it myself, I do not stop her. I wonder if the act of putting socks on someone else’s feet brings back memories of her babies. “I hope this wasn’t a waste of your time,” she says. “I hope it does some good.”

“All-night comfort, ease of movement, and restful sleep,” I say. “Isn’t that what the label promises to deliver?”

She gives a half laugh. “The people who write those ads always make things sound so great.”

I look down at the magazine in my lap. “Thurl Ravenscroft got a lot of mileage out of that word,” I say.

She gives me a quizzical look. “What word is that?”

“Great,”
I say. “You know, Tony the Tiger.”

She glances at the magazine. “Oh. Don’t tell me Tony the Tiger died, too,” she says.

“In a sense, yes.” I hold up the Milestones page and point to the entry.

Rachel reads it aloud. “‘DIED. THURL RAVENSCROFT, 91, versatile voice-over specialist whose booming “Gr-r-eat!” made Tony the Tiger, mascot of Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes, one of TV’s most recognized commercial pitchmen.’” She smiles when she comes to the last sentence, where
Time
magazine reports Thurl Ravenscroft’s droll commentary on his fame: “I’ve made a career out of one word.”

I think of how little one generally knows about the person behind a voice.