Read Online Hilda and Pearl by Alice Mattison - Free Book Online

one sock?”
    â€œThe other got wet,” she said, “so I took it off.” She hurried into her bedroom.
    The next day, Uncle Mike came to the house to call for Nathan. “Where are you going to look today?” said Frances.
    Mike just looked at her. “Try the Forty-second Street library,” she said, but not in a loud voice, and she was pretty sure he didn’t hear her. Once she had gone to the library on a class trip, and she’d wanted to run away from the class and stay there.
    Her father was shaving. Uncle Mike would not sit down. He barely spoke to her mother. When her father came out of the bathroom, she saw Uncle Mike look at him and she knew how Mike must have looked when he was a little boy.
    It had stopped raining. Her father put on his coat. “Pearl says, if you’d come—” said Mike to her mother.
    â€œOf course,” said her mother, and her cheeks reddened. “Frances can stay here. Frances can answer the phone if it rings.”
    She knew her father was uneasy about leaving her alone. Maybe he thought she would be kidnapped, too. The men left. Her mother was still in her bathrobe, and now she went to get dressed. Frances followed her into the bedroom. Her mother put on her panties under her nightgown and worked her girdle on, but then she took her nightgown off and Frances could see her breasts. “Did you want two children?” she said.
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œTwo children. Did you want two children?”
    Her mother had turned to put on her brassiere, and now she reached behind herself to fasten it. “I love children,” she said, not harshly. Frances was surprised that her mother said that, although she thought it was true that her mother liked children. Her mother was nicer to Lydia than Lydia’s mother was to her.
    â€œYou stopped with me,” said Frances.
    â€œThat’s right,” said her mother. Frances couldn’t think what to say next.
    Her mother put on her slip, and then sat down on the bed. She put on her stockings. She rolled each of them carefully, then unrolled it up her leg, smoothing it, holding her fingernails out of the way just as if Simon were not lost. She pulled up her slip and stood for a moment to fasten the garters in the tops of the stockings. She looked over each shoulder to check the seams. Then she sat down again instead of walking over to put on her blouse. She was wearing only her slip, and Frances looked at her mother’s heavy arms, which looked girlish even though they were fat. The wrists and hands were small.
    â€œFrances, you know there was another baby, don’t you?” her mother said. Her voice was low and Frances thought she should not have asked her mother about children. Frances wanted the conversation to be over.
    â€œYes,” she said, though she didn’t really know. She remembered that her mother had said she’d gotten fat when she was pregnant the first time, so there had to be a second time.
    â€œGirls your age know everything,” said her mother. “I knew you knew.” She was speaking very quietly.
    â€œI don’t know everything,” said Frances.
    â€œIt’s all right,” her mother said. “It’s not a secret.” She stood up and put on her blouse and skirt. Frances was afraid she wasn’t going to speak again. “So,” she said, more brightly, “I once had another baby. She was born a long time before I had you, but she died.”
    Frances wanted to know how the baby had died, but she didn’t think she ought to ask. Maybe she would ask another time. This must be the miscarriage Simon had spoken of. Of course her mother had kept the shoes she’d bought for that baby. Maybe she’d bought clothes, too, not just shoes. People did that—they bought things for a baby before it was born.
    â€œWas she born dead?” Frances said.
    â€œOh, no,” said her mother. She must have died in