The Steep and Thorny Way(42)

“Joe Adder didn’t take away my virginity, Mama. I grew up around farm animals, for heaven’s sake. I know what you’re talking about, and Joe doesn’t want to do that sort of thing with me.”

“Then why did he try to elope with you?”

“Because no one else understands an outsider better than I.”

She closed her mouth and swallowed. “You’re not . . . you’re not going to run back into the woods and try to find him?”

“No! I keep telling everyone, he’s heading up to Washington.” I’d told the fib so often, I began to believe the lie myself. I even stared my mother straight in the eye when I said it.

Mama blinked, and her hazel eyes moistened again.

I switched my attention to the oak wardrobe that housed Uncle Clyde’s suits and dress shirts. “Will you help me look through Uncle Clyde’s belongings?”

She recoiled. “For what?”

“Klan regalia. A membership card.”

“Uncle Clyde is not a part of that organization. Even if he were, the Klan isn’t concerned about Negroes here in Oregon. For the most part they’re improving schools and roads.”

“Are you afraid to look?”

She raised her right hand to slap me again, and I closed my eyes and hunched my shoulders, bracing for pain.

Nothing struck me.

I peeled one eye open and found Mama’s outstretched palm frozen in midair. Her chin twitched.

“If I look”—she lowered her hand to her chest—“will you swear to never again speak of your stepfather this way?”

I rubbed the tender skin of my face and sorted out a suitable response.

“Hanalee?”

“All right. I’ll stop wanting to raid his belongings if I see for certain he’s not hiding anything that links him to that group.”

Mama trod to the closed bedroom door and put her ear to the wood.

“I last saw him outside,” I said, “speaking to Deputy Fortaine.”

“Deputy Fortaine?”

I nodded. “He pulled into our driveway shortly after the sheriff and the Adders left.”

She turned the lock with a solid click that seemed to echo through the house. “Stay right here”—she let go of the brass knob—“and let me know if you hear him.”

My chest warmed with gratitude over my mother’s helpfulness. I felt like a child again, when she and I were two peas in a pod. Daddy’s girls.

She snuck up to the wardrobe and, after inhaling a deep breath, opened the mighty oak doors with both hands. I stood upon restless legs and watched her rifle through dark trousers and white shirtsleeves with silent movements.

“May I help?” I asked.

“No.” She slid open his bottom drawer, filled with socks and undergarments folded in neat piles, which she lifted with the care of a person trying not to wake a sleeping baby.

“What about that hatbox?” I pointed to a black-and-white box sitting on the flat surface on top of the wardrobe.

Mama lifted her face upward. “I honestly don’t think he could fit anything so large in that small of a container.”

“The box sits high enough that neither of us can reach it, though. What if he’s at least storing the hood in there? Or paperwork?”

“I’d need a stepladder, Hanalee.”

“How about the chair from your dressing table?” I jogged over to the padded ivory stool tucked beneath the vanity, where she powdered her face and arranged her hair every morning.

She came over to help me, and together we scooted the small piece of furniture below the wardrobe. The cabinet smelled like the doc—Mennen Shaving Cream combined with Lysol.

With cautious movements, Mama held the side of the cabinet for support, climbed atop the stool, and grabbed the hatbox. After both her feet landed safely back on the floor, I lifted the lid and peeked inside.

A hat sat within. A Pendleton wool cap, suitable for wintertime.

I sifted through the protective paper surrounding the plaid fabric.

“What are you looking for?” asked Mama.

“I don’t know—a membership card, a list of names, anything.”

A knock on the door startled the box out of our hands. The hat dropped onto my toes, and the paper flitted to the ground like an autumn leaf.

“Greta?” Uncle Clyde rattled the knob and shook the door. “Why is this door locked?”

“I’m . . .” Mama blanched. “Hanalee’s in here. We’re talking. Just . . . wait downstairs for a few minutes.”

She picked up the box from the floor, and I grabbed the overturned cap, finding nothing but a receipt from the Meier & Frank department store in downtown Portland.

“What’s that?” whispered Mama.

“Just a receipt.”

“See? There’s nothing here.”

“Is everything all right in there?” called Uncle Clyde.

Mama shoved the cap into the box and covered the lid. “We’re just talking, Clyde. Go downstairs.”

We both held our breath. Beyond the door, Uncle Clyde’s feet descended the staircase, the steps groaning.

“Does anything strike you as dangerous about the Dry Dock?” I asked in the quietest voice I could muster.

Mama straightened her neck. “The Dock?”