Read Online The Cape Ann by Faith Sullivan - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Faith Sullivan
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the habit. For that reason it was twice as important to him that I be made to quit the filthy practice.
Mama had painted my nails with pink polish, and when that didn’t discourage me from biting them, she’d dipped them in some foul-tasting stuff, just as she had done to her own. It was no more successful with me than it had been with her.
I did try to stop. I was still trying. Every night when I went to bed, I asked God to help me, but so far He’d kept out of it. Each night I swore that I would not put my fingers near my mouth the next day. It was a mystery to me how I kept doing it after all my praying and swearing. I must truly be incorrigible.
I was also an incorrigible dawdler, and as Mama dragged me into the kitchen, she remarked to Hilly, “This child is an incorrigible dawdler. I’m always thinking she’s been kidnapped, like the Lindbergh baby, although I don’t know who would want a dawdlerwho takes an hour to walk five short blocks home from school. Sometimes longer.” She let go of my hand and held the screen door for Hilly. “Your mother’s going to worry, too, Hilly. I’ll give her a ring.” She started for the living room. “Would you like to stay for supper?”
Hilly nodded vigorously. “Supper.”
It was seven-thirty when we sat down to hamburger patties, skillet-fried potatoes, canned peas, bread and butter, and the spice cake with penuche frosting. Papa had not come home. If Papa had been home, Mama would not have invited Hilly to stay. Papa thought Hilly was a “damned nuisance,” always getting under foot when you were coming out of the post office and holding you up, hanging around the Oldsmobile or the pickup with his damned old rag, wiping the fenders and hood. Papa didn’t like it when Hilly came to wash our windows. How did it look to passengers getting off at Harvester to be greeted by an idiot? Someone might complain to the railroad, and then Papa would get the blame. “Magdalen Haggerty says they put a stop to him coming in the Loon Cafe.” Magdalen was one of the two waitresses there and had probably served Papa his supper tonight. Magdalen Haggerty or Dora Noonan. “Shanty Irish,” Mama called them to irritate Papa.
“They’re good Catholic women who’re at the communion rail every Sunday.” Mama only took communion at Christmas and Easter, one time more than the law demanded, as she pointed out. Papa only took communion at Christmas, Easter, and when we went to visit Grandma and Grandpa Erhardt.
“Another piece of cake, Hilly?” Mama cut a big square and lifted it onto Hilly’s plate, then she refilled their coffee cups. Seated again, holding her cup in both hands, Mama told Hilly, “Lark has First Communion classes every Saturday morning at the Catholic church. Eight o’clock in the morning she has to be there. That’s pretty early for a six-year-old. Next year she’ll take her first communion. This year she was an angel.” Mama touched me lightly with the offhand, proprietary glance mothers use when discussing a child who is present, the same glance they use while sitting on the davenport and observing that the thing has held up well, but probably needs a new slipcover.
“The angels,” she went on, “are the ones who escort the First Communion children up to the altar and back to their pews again. They wear white organdy dresses and white organdy wings andsilver halos. The wings are separate from the dress. They tie on with white satin ribbon. Well, you can’t send away to Monkey Ward for an outfit like that, the way you can for a party dress. The mothers of the angels had to sew the dresses and the wings, and make the halos. I ended up making two, because Stella Wheeler doesn’t sew, and Sally needed an angel dress. You know the Wheelers, they live a block east of the school in the new cottage. He travels for an office supply company. Stella has bad nerves, but she’s a good soul, always nice to Lark.”
This was Mama entertaining Hilly. He
Mama had painted my nails with pink polish, and when that didn’t discourage me from biting them, she’d dipped them in some foul-tasting stuff, just as she had done to her own. It was no more successful with me than it had been with her.
I did try to stop. I was still trying. Every night when I went to bed, I asked God to help me, but so far He’d kept out of it. Each night I swore that I would not put my fingers near my mouth the next day. It was a mystery to me how I kept doing it after all my praying and swearing. I must truly be incorrigible.
I was also an incorrigible dawdler, and as Mama dragged me into the kitchen, she remarked to Hilly, “This child is an incorrigible dawdler. I’m always thinking she’s been kidnapped, like the Lindbergh baby, although I don’t know who would want a dawdlerwho takes an hour to walk five short blocks home from school. Sometimes longer.” She let go of my hand and held the screen door for Hilly. “Your mother’s going to worry, too, Hilly. I’ll give her a ring.” She started for the living room. “Would you like to stay for supper?”
Hilly nodded vigorously. “Supper.”
It was seven-thirty when we sat down to hamburger patties, skillet-fried potatoes, canned peas, bread and butter, and the spice cake with penuche frosting. Papa had not come home. If Papa had been home, Mama would not have invited Hilly to stay. Papa thought Hilly was a “damned nuisance,” always getting under foot when you were coming out of the post office and holding you up, hanging around the Oldsmobile or the pickup with his damned old rag, wiping the fenders and hood. Papa didn’t like it when Hilly came to wash our windows. How did it look to passengers getting off at Harvester to be greeted by an idiot? Someone might complain to the railroad, and then Papa would get the blame. “Magdalen Haggerty says they put a stop to him coming in the Loon Cafe.” Magdalen was one of the two waitresses there and had probably served Papa his supper tonight. Magdalen Haggerty or Dora Noonan. “Shanty Irish,” Mama called them to irritate Papa.
“They’re good Catholic women who’re at the communion rail every Sunday.” Mama only took communion at Christmas and Easter, one time more than the law demanded, as she pointed out. Papa only took communion at Christmas, Easter, and when we went to visit Grandma and Grandpa Erhardt.
“Another piece of cake, Hilly?” Mama cut a big square and lifted it onto Hilly’s plate, then she refilled their coffee cups. Seated again, holding her cup in both hands, Mama told Hilly, “Lark has First Communion classes every Saturday morning at the Catholic church. Eight o’clock in the morning she has to be there. That’s pretty early for a six-year-old. Next year she’ll take her first communion. This year she was an angel.” Mama touched me lightly with the offhand, proprietary glance mothers use when discussing a child who is present, the same glance they use while sitting on the davenport and observing that the thing has held up well, but probably needs a new slipcover.
“The angels,” she went on, “are the ones who escort the First Communion children up to the altar and back to their pews again. They wear white organdy dresses and white organdy wings andsilver halos. The wings are separate from the dress. They tie on with white satin ribbon. Well, you can’t send away to Monkey Ward for an outfit like that, the way you can for a party dress. The mothers of the angels had to sew the dresses and the wings, and make the halos. I ended up making two, because Stella Wheeler doesn’t sew, and Sally needed an angel dress. You know the Wheelers, they live a block east of the school in the new cottage. He travels for an office supply company. Stella has bad nerves, but she’s a good soul, always nice to Lark.”
This was Mama entertaining Hilly. He
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