The Four Winds(29)

Loreda heard music wafting through the open doors and the sound of stomping feet. She launched herself out of the wagon and hurried to the schoolhouse.

Inside, the party was on. A makeshift band played in the corner and a few couples were dancing.

Off to the right were the food tables. There wasn’t a lot of food out, but after the years of drought, Loreda knew it was a feast the women had worried and slaved over.

“Loreda!”

Loreda saw Stella moving toward her. As usual, Stella and her younger sister, Sophia, were the only girls in the room in pretty new party dresses.

Loreda felt a pinch of jealousy and put it aside. Stella was her best friend. Who cared about dresses?

Loreda and Stella came together as they always did, grasping hands, heads tilted together.

“Say, what’s the story, morning glory?” Loreda said, trying to sound in the know.

“I’m behind the grind, don’tcha know?” Stella answered.

Stella’s parents came up behind the girls, stopped to talk to the Martinellis.

Loreda heard Mr. Devereaux say, “I got another postcard from my brother-in-law. There’s railroad work in Oregon. You should think about it, Tony. Rafe.”

Like women had no opinions.

And her grandfather’s reply: “I don’t blame nobody for leaving, Ralph, but it ain’t for us. This land . . .”

Not that again. The land.

Loreda pulled Stella away from the grown-ups.

Ant ran past them, wearing a gas mask that made him look like an insect. He bumped into Loreda and giggled and ran away again, arms outstretched as if he were flying.

“The Red Cross donated a big box of gas masks to the bank—for the kids to wear during dust storms. My mom is handing ’em out tonight.”

“Gas masks,” Loreda said, shaking her head. “Jeepers.”

“It’s getting worse, my dad says.”

“We are not talking about gas masks. This is a party, for gosh sakes,” Loreda said. She reached out, took hold of Stella’s hands. “My mom said you can spend the night tonight. I got some magazines from the library. There’s a picture of Clark Gable that will make you swoon.”

Stella pulled back, looked away.

“What’s wrong?”

“The bank is closing,” Stella said.

“Oh.”

“My uncle Jimmy—the one in Portland, Oregon? He sent my dad a postcard. He reckons the railroad is hiring, and there’s no dust storms out there.”

Loreda took a step back. She didn’t want to hear what was coming.

“We’re leaving.”





NINE





Loreda leaned out her bedroom window and screamed in frustration. Below her, the chickens squawked in response. “Fly away, you idiot birds. Can’t you tell we’re dying here?”

Stella was leaving.

Loreda’s best—and only—friend in Lonesome Tree was leaving.

The room seemed to close in on her, becoming so small she couldn’t breathe. She went downstairs. The house was still, no wind poking at the cracks, no wood settling onto its foundations.

She moved easily in the dark. In the past month they’d turned off the party-line phone—no money to pay for it—and now they were really out here all alone. She found the front door and went outside. A bright moon shone out, glazing the barn’s roof with silvered light.

She smelled the sunbaked dirt and a hint of chicken manure and . . . cigarette smoke? Following the smell of it, she walked around the side of the farmhouse.

Beneath the windmill, she saw the red glow of a cigarette tip rise and fall and rise again. Daddy. So he couldn’t sleep, either.

As she approached him, she saw his red eyes and the tear streaks on his cheeks. He’d been out here in the dark, all alone, smoking and crying. “Daddy?”

“Hey, doll. You caught me.”

He tried to sound casual, but the obvious pretense made her feel even worse. If there was one person she trusted to tell her the truth, it was her father. But now it was so bad he was crying.

“You heard the Devereauxs are leaving?”

“I’m sorry, Lolo.”

“I’m tired of I’m sorrys,” Loreda said. “We could leave, too. Like the Devereauxs and the Moungers and the Mulls. Just go.”

“They were all talking about leaving at the shindig tonight. Most folks are like your grandparents. They’d rather die here than leave.”

“Do they know we might actually die here?”

“Oh. They know, believe me. Tonight, your grandfather said—and I quote: Bury me here, boys. I ain’t leaving.” He exhaled smoke. “They say they’re doing it for our future. As if this patch of dirt is all we could ever want.”

“Maybe we could convince them to leave.”

Her father laughed. “And maybe Milo will sprout wings and fly away.”

“Could we leave without them? Lots of folks are leaving. You always say this is America, where anything is possible. We could go to California. Or you could get a railroad job in Oregon.”

Loreda heard footsteps. Moments later, Mom appeared, dressed in her ratty old robe and work boots, her fine hair all whichaway.

“Rafe,” Mom said, sounding relieved, as if she thought he might have run off. It was pathetic how close an eye Mom kept on Daddy. On all of them. She was more of a cop than a parent, and she took the fun out of everything. “I missed you when I woke. I thought . . .”