The Night Watchman(75)
“Call you?” Thomas knew there wasn’t a telephone for miles.
“In her dreams, remember? In our dreams.”
“Of course. I’m just tired. What’s she doing now?” asked Thomas.
“I don’t know,” said Zhaanat. “For a while she was wearing green high heels. Then she was wearing men’s clothes. She was walking along a road. But my dreams have quit.”
“Mine too,” said Patrice. “Last night I dreamed . . .”
She mumbled something, looked away. Last night she had actually dreamed about being kissed by a man from a magazine ad. He had stepped off the page, put down his cigarette, leaned across, and . . .
“How much money did you raise?” she quickly asked.
“More than halfway. Almost there if we find a person who can put us up in Washington. The hotels there are heap big expensive.”
“Heap big,” said Patrice. She laughed.
Thomas had carefully explained the bill to Zhaanat, and she was worried because if it meant she would have to pay taxes on her land she would have to let it go. They would have nowhere to live. Just like Juggie said, they’d be walking the road looking for a place to light. Although of course, thought Patrice, with her job she could probably afford to rent a place for them to live, somewhere. They’d have a better place if Valentine hadn’t stolen her promotion. She had jokingly accused her friend of just that on the way home and Valentine just said, “All purple with envy, you!” But now Thomas was trying to outline his strategy.
“I have an ace card now. Louie Pipestone’s daughter with that girl he never married. Well, it was the other way around. Her parents weren’t happy that she was engaged to Louie. Said he was too much of an Indian. They squashed things.”
“That’s sad!”
“Yes, Louie was so blue over it. Way back when. Now that girl’s grown up and got herself to college. She’s working on a higher degree, even. We’re going to see if we can use all she found out. The Congress thinks we are so advanced, rolling in cash, but we know we aren’t. We don’t have a way to prove it. We can’t just go complain. We need the hard facts. We need a study.”
“A study!”
It sounded so professional to Patrice. A woman from her own tribe doing a study. It sounded like something that she herself would like to do. Go to college. Do a study. She was smart enough, good at math, and her writing was always best in class. But she thought of herself as that little hide tent, stretched so thin. Without her, the family would collapse. You could not send money home when you were off in school. The baby needed a rug to play on. The floor was freezing cold. But even this floor, this small patch of ground, would be gone if they had to sell their land. They wouldn’t make it. They would be like before. You don’t forget.
Patrice went behind the blanket, into her room. She didn’t dare raid her stash under the linoleum, but she did open up the spice tin. There was five dollars inside, all in change. She counted four of the dollars out onto the bed and brought the money to her mother. Put the coins in her hands. Zhaanat put the money on the table.
“That’s for Washington,” she said.
Thomas, visibly moved, said, “Thank you, cousin.”
The next day, it happened. Mr. Vold sent Betty Pye to the workstation next to Patrice. He gave the direction at lunch, and Betty brought her things there right after. Such a relief. For a while they worked quietly. Patrice had promised herself that she wouldn’t talk unless Betty talked. She didn’t want to risk getting Betty in trouble, in case Betty wanted to stay clear of Mr. Vold. But within the hour, Betty asked what she was doing that weekend and Patrice murmured that she didn’t know. Then she asked Betty what Betty would be doing that weekend and Betty said that she would leave the place and time up to Norbert, but after that she had a pretty good idea of what would happen.
“Say, Betty,” said Patrice in a tiny quiet voice, “I only know in a general way what happens. I wish somebody would tell me the details.”
“You mean you’ve never done it?”
Betty’s voice was too loud, but fortunately Curly Jay had a sneezing fit at the same time, covering her.
“Shhhhh.”
“Sorry, I just couldn’t believe it.”
“I’m scared to because, you know. For the reason you said you might elope.”
“Let’s go out and have a cup of coffee somewhere and I’ll explain it all.”
“Would you?”
“My god, somebody has to.”
On Saturday, Patrice walked into town with Pokey. He went to the center to punch on the speed bag. She went to Henry’s to meet Betty. There she was, already drinking her cup of coffee. Betty was wearing a beige felt hat like a plump cake, with a cute feather. It perched on her dark permed curls. Her coat was rose colored with white rabbit-fur trim. Eye-catching. Her wide, round, merry face was avid and her lips puckered over her cup. She blew daintily to cool the coffee. Patrice asked for tea. She didn’t drink coffee on the weekends. If possible, she napped in the afternoons.
“So,” said Betty. “Nobody’s never told you?”
“No,” said Patrice.
That wasn’t exactly true. Actually she’d always known what happened. She lived around animals wild and tame. Once, she’d watched minks mate in the rushes by a slough. She’d seen all sorts of things. She’d been trapped in the car with Bucky and his friends and knew what they were trying to do. Her mother had talked to her about these matters, but all in Chippewa, so she had a good idea of what happened, in Chippewa. But she wanted to know how it happened in English, because she needed to know the words for what might happen in case it happened with somebody who didn’t speak Indian. She understood there were several ways it could happen, but not how that would be negotiated. It seemed strange, her having been a waterjack, that she didn’t know. But she understood the fact that she didn’t know might have been obvious to Jack Malloy. It might have been the reason he hired her. Sometimes she suspected it might have been Jack’s job to mess with her, but he’d flinched when she smashed his arm. She was too strong.