Plainsong (Plainsong #1)(67)

It’s me, she said. I’ve come back.

They looked at her. We can see that, one of them said.

She looked up at them. I’ve come back to ask you, she said . . . I wanted to ask if you’d let me come back here to live with you.

They watched her, the two old brothers in their work clothes, their iron gray hair short and stiff on their uncombed heads, the knees of their pants baggy. They said nothing.

She looked around. It all looks the same, she said. I’m glad of that. She turned back toward them once more. She waited, then went on: Anyway I wanted to thank you. For what you did for me. And I wanted to say I’m sorry for the trouble I caused. You were good to me.

The old brothers stood regarding her without speaking, without moving. It was as though they didn’t know her or didn’t want to remember what they knew about her. She couldn’t say what they were thinking. I hope you’re both well, she said. I won’t be bothering you anymore. She turned to go back to the car.

She was halfway to the gate when Harold spoke. We couldn’t have you leaving like that again, he said.

She stopped. She turned around to face them. I know, she said. I wouldn’t.

We wouldn’t want that again. Not ever.

No.

That has to be understood.

Yes, I understand. She stood and waited. The wind blew her coat.

Are you all right? Raymond said. Did they hurt you?

No. I’m all right.

Who’s that out in the car?

Mrs. Jones.

Is it?

Yes.

I thought it would be.

You better come in, Harold said. It’s cold out here, outside here in this weather.

Let me get my box, she said.

You come in, Harold said. We’ll get the box.

She approached the house and climbed up the steps and Raymond went out past her to the car. Maggie Jones got out and removed the box from the backseat and handed it over to him while Harold and the girl stood waiting on the porch.

Do you think she’s okay? Raymond said softly to Maggie.

I think so, she said. So far as I can tell. But are you sure you want to try this again?

That girl needs a place.

I know, but . . .

Raymond turned abruptly, peering out into the dark where the night was collecting beyond the horse barn and the holding pens. That girl never meant us no harm, he said. That girl made a difference out here for us and we missed her when she was gone. Anyhow, what was we suppose to do with that baby crib of hers?

He turned back and looked once directly at Maggie Jones and carried the girl’s box of clothes up to the house. Maggie called, I’ll be in touch, and then got back in the car and drove away.

Inside the old house, the two brothers and the pregnant girl sat at the kitchen table. Looking around, she could see that the room had fallen into disorder again. The McPheron brothers had let it go. There were heel-bolts and clevises and screweddown Vise-Grips and blackened springs loaded onto the extra chairs and stacks of magazines and newspapers piled against the back wall. The counters held days of dirty dishes.

Harold got up to make her some coffee and canned soup at the gas stove. You want to tell us about it? he said.

Could I wait till tomorrow? she asked.

Yes. We’d like to hear it when you’re ready.

Thank you, she said.

The old house was quiet, just the wind and the sound of the food beginning to heat on the stove.

You had us worried, Raymond said. He was looking at her, sitting beside her at the table. We got worried about it. We didn’t know where you was. We didn’t know what we might of done to cause you to want to leave here like that.

But you didn’t do anything, the girl said. It wasn’t you.

Well. We didn’t know what it was.

It wasn’t you at all, she said. Oh, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. She began to cry then. The tears ran down her cheeks and she tried to wipe them away, but she couldn’t keep up. She didn’t make any sound at all while she was crying.

The two old brothers watched her uncomfortably. Here now, Raymond said. It’s all right. We won’t have any of that now. We’re glad if you come back.

I didn’t mean to cause you any trouble, she said.

Well no, he said. We know. That’s all right. Don’t you mind it now. It’s all right now. He reached across the table and tapped the back of her hand. It was a clumsy act. He didn’t know how to manage it. Don’t you mind it, he said to her. If you come back here we’re glad. Don’t you mind it now anymore.





Ike and Bobby.

They sat down front in the first row at the movie theater with the other boys, watching up at the faces turned three-quarters to each other, their outsized mouths talking back and forth while the patrol car was taking the third one away, the red lights rotating flickering light across the faces as the car passed, and behind it all the country gliding past on the screen like it was some manner of dream country that was being blown away by an unaccountable wind. Then the music came up and the house-lights came on and they came back up the aisle into the lobby among the movie crowd and emptied with it out onto the sidewalk in the night. Above the streetlamps the sky was filled with bright hard stars like a scatter of white stones in a river. Cars were waiting double-parked at the curb to pick up kids, fathers waiting and mothers with younger children, while the high school boys and girls broke away and got into their own loud cars and began immediately to drive up and down Main Street, honking at one another as they passed as if they hadn’t seen the passengers in the other cars for weeks and months.