The Truth According to Us

  He put his hand on the steering wheel. “Is the house on fire?”

  “Not last time I was there,” she answered.

  “Well, then,” he said, still holding the wheel, “what’s your rush? See America first. Let’s go out for supper.”

  She laughed and shook her head at him. “I thought you needed your car.”

  “I do. But not this minute.” He glanced over his shoulder at Bird and me. We assumed our most pleading expressions. Bird even put her hand on her stomach to show how famished she was.

  “Please, Jottie,” I whispered.

  “Hm,” she said, not quite ready to say yes. “We’ve got perfectly good food at home.”

  “They’ve got perfectly good food at the Bavarian Restaurant, and you don’t have to cook it and wash up afterward,” said Father.

  “The Bavarian Restaurant? Kind of fancy, isn’t it?” She looked over her shoulder at Bird and me.

  “I’m rich,” he said. He took out his wallet and waved it at her. “I’m a tycoon.”

  Then she said, “Can you girls behave yourselves?” and we knew that meant yes, so we said Yes ma’am, yes ma’am and didn’t bounce in the seat, to show her how perfectly behaved we could be.

  The Bavarian Restaurant was dim and cool, with fans in the ceiling and white tablecloths and two different kinds of glasses at each place. Father said we could get anything we wanted, and of course Bird tried to get nothing but pie, but I ordered Roast Beef Lafontaine Style, which Father said was a famous Bavarian dish made out of old Frenchmen. I said I knew better than that, and he told Jottie that I was getting too smart and she shouldn’t let me read any more books. He was joking.

  We had soup first. It was white as cream and delicious, and there were rolls with little curls of cold butter, too. My Roast Beef Lafontaine Style was all rolled up with mushrooms on top and it was wonderful, but I couldn’t finish it. I was too happy. Father and Jottie were laughing and talking as if they went to the Bavarian Restaurant every single day of their lives, and then Father looked around and said that all the other people in the restaurant probably thought that Bird was an heiress.

  Bird was minding her manners so hard that she swallowed a bite of Veal Escallope without hardly chewing so she could speak. “Why?” Her eyes watered.

  “Because,” he said, “anyone can see that the three of us”—he circled his finger to include me and Jottie—“are related. But you? Big blue eyes and yellow curls? They’re going to figure we kidnapped you. And why would we kidnap you unless you were an heiress?” He leaned over to wipe a tear off her cheek. “Not to mention your table manners. You’d have me fooled if I didn’t know better.” Bird smiled and sat up straight in her chair. She liked being an heiress. It was fine with me; I didn’t mind being a kidnapper, if Jottie and Father were, too.

  After dessert, which was Boston Cream Pie and which I got even though I didn’t finish my dinner, Father and Jottie pushed back their chairs and drank coffee and talked about the farms and Mr. Roosevelt and Swiss neutrality. It was the most boring conversation imaginable, but I tried to look alert and interested so they’d know they could take me to restaurants anytime. Bird folded her napkin into shapes.

  Father paid grandly, not even looking at the money, just laying it down on the little silver tray that the waitress had put on the table. And when we left, the folks at the other tables nodded slightly to Father and Jottie, as if they were saying, We’ll see you at the next restaurant.

  The sun was setting through the trees on Route 45. I watched the sky turn orange and pink and blue and bluer. Starlings zigzagged through the colored light; I blinked and they were bats. In Martinsburg, Father left us and got into his car, but he kept just ahead of us instead of speeding away, and when we got home, he came to Jottie’s car to get Bird, because she’d fallen asleep. He carried her against his shoulder, and I went right behind him to pull back the bedspread before he put her down. Miss Beck’s door opened a crack, and I saw her watching but Father didn’t, because he was holding Bird so carefully. So there, I thought. I didn’t think it meanly, though. I was too happy.

  27

  I was still happy the next morning. For a little while, anyway. We were at the breakfast table, Miss Beck and I, when Father steamed into the kitchen, kicking up a ruckus about where was his hat, he was late, he couldn’t find his hat.

  Jottie found it, of course, but as Father was leaving, Miss Beck asked, “Where are you off to, in such a hurry?”

  “Got to see a man about a horse,” he said, and laughed. Then he rushed off, happy and kind of fizzing, the way he got sometimes when he was going out on business.

  Miss Beck watched him go. Then she turned to me. “What do you suppose that means?”

  I gave her my blankest look. “Maybe he likes horses.”

  She nodded and went on chewing her toast, but her face fell into thoughtfulness. I didn’t like it a bit. I was beginning to think that Miss Beck might be just as much of a natural-born sneak as I was.

  Later, I went to gather up the mail. I was generally the one who brought the mail in and set it on the hall table. I saw this as an opportunity for a little mild snooping. I didn’t read anyone’s letters, of course. I just saw who got what. Not that there was much to see. Jottie got plenty of bills and some letters, mostly from cousins and her friend Raylene, who was a missionary in darkest China. Father got almost nothing, except letters from my mother asking to see me and Bird. Miss Beck got the most—letters from Washington, D.C.; from Delaware; from the Department of Chemistry, Princeton University; from Cape May, New Jersey; from the West Virginia Writers’ Project in Charleston; and from Mr. Tare Russell.

  Mr. Russell’s envelope was elegant, all creamy and thick. I stared at it, thinking of my father, stepping so quick and sure around Mr. Russell’s boxwood hedges to let himself in the little black door. I was almost sure that was where he kept his bottles. I had gotten used to the idea of him being a bootlegger. I even sort of enjoyed it, especially when I thought of it running in the family and us being an outlaw band. But now, looking at that creamy envelope, I thought to myself that I didn’t truly know why my father went there. I didn’t truly know very much atall.

  I knocked on her door. “Here’s your mail, Miss Beck.”

  She opened it looking distracted, with a pencil behind her ear. “What?”

  I smiled with all the teeth I could muster. “Your mail. I brought it.”

  “Well! Thanks.” She was a little surprised, I guess. “Thanks.”

  She was turning away when I stopped her. “I see you got a letter from Mr. Russell.” I wedged myself in the door. “You going to visit him?”

  “Oh, good.” She riffled through the envelopes until she found his. “Yes,” she said, as she slit it with a hairpin. “I’ve heard that his house is full of wonderful artifacts, practically a museum…” She trailed off, reading.

  “He’s going to show you his house?” I asked. “The whole thing?”

  “Uh-huh,” she said, kind of absent. “At least, I hope so.” Then she looked up, a lot sharper. “Why do you ask?”

  She thought she had a right to know Father better than I did, because she was a grown-up. She thought I was just a silly child, but she was wrong. I knew his secrets, more than she did, more than anyone did, probably, and I’d guard them. I’d guard him. Honor among thieves, I said to myself, though of course we weren’t thieves. All for one, one for all was a better saying. I decided to go see for myself just what was there, behind Mr. Russell’s black door.

  I practically cracked my head in two, smiling. “Oh, no reason.”

  —

  I got through the creek pretty fast, considering the mud, and when I came up at the back wall of the Tare Estate, I peered around carefully. There wasn’t a soul there, not in all that garden that stretched out as far as I could see, but I couldn’t conjure up the nerve to stride through the paths like Father had. I edged my way around with the wall at my back. It just took longer, that’s
all. I still got to the house and the small black door. I stood in front of it with my heart thumping—I couldn’t help but think of Bluebeard’s wife. I’d always thought she must be a ninny, to barge in where she’d been told not to go, but I had more sympathy now. The door had a few steps in front of it, not leading up, but down into the ground. It was a basement door. Breathing fast, I went down and turned the handle, just like Father had done. And, just as easy, it opened. A gust of deep, cool air came up to greet me. I went in and closed the door quietly, though I needn’t have. There was nobody there. The pounding in my heart began to subside a little. I was in a basement, all right, brick and dirt and cement, with shelves and long high tables—maybe workbenches—all around. I turned slowly, not looking for evidence, not yet, just getting used to the dim, greenish light and the rich, damp smell of dirt. If I had a place this cool and quiet in my house, I’d have spent every minute there. But Mr. Tare Russell didn’t come there much, I could tell. There was a layer of dust on all the shelves and benches and tables, and not just a layer of dust, but a layer of dustiness, of left-behind-ness, that covered everything. A couple of trunks were stacked in a corner, and some cans of paint were lined up on a shelf. There was a broken-down velvet chaise propped up against a wall beside a cobwebby doorway. I began to look for bottles straightaway, but I soon stopped. Father was cleverer than that. He wouldn’t leave them right out for people to see. He’d put them in something.

  The trunks were disappointing—empty, and balky besides. I had to practically rip the lock off one, and it made a bad squeak when I opened it. That set my heart galloping again, and I looked up, above my head, hoping there wasn’t anyone listening. After all that effort, I found only a bedspread, old and faded. Honestly. I inspected the few boxes on the shelves and looked behind the velvet chair. I even crawled around like a rat under the workbenches, but I found nothing. It was irritating work.

  Ferocity and devotion, I reminded myself. So I swept the cobwebs away from a doorway and peered into another basement room. This one was smaller. Just as cool, just as dim. A few more trunks—this time with ladies’ clothes in them—and lots of empty frames. The shelves in the next room were full—of boxes! For a moment, I thought I’d hit the jackpot, but every single one of those boxes held a pair of shoes. Men’s shoes. There must have been forty boxes of men’s shoes. I didn’t have time to stop and ponder this mystery, because there was another doorway and yet another room. Considering the size of Mr. Tare Russell’s house, I calculated that he could have a dozen rooms in his basement.

  By the time I got to the seventh room, I wasn’t nervous anymore. I still jumped a little when I heard a sound, but that’s because I figured it was probably mice or worse, not because I thought someone was going to catch me. Above my head, the house was still as a tomb.

  So I strolled into the seventh of the basement rooms and glanced around with what they call a practiced eye. Couple of trunks, again, and a row of terrible-looking jars of fruit on a splintering shelf. They must have been there for years to look as they did. There was a rag tucked into the corner next to the last jar. Nothing, I thought, and turned to the next door. But then I turned back. The rag. It was nothing, just a bit left by mistake, but it was the first sign of a presence I’d seen since I’d come in. I went to the shelf and picked it up. It was a handkerchief, yellowed with time.

  I dropped down, squatting on my haunches to peer into the bottom shelf. Nothing. Nothing until I lost my balance, tipping over slowly but surely, and landing plump on my back. Cobwebs in my hair, I thought regretfully. I was on the verge of hoisting myself up when I saw what I had come for. They had been shoved under a workbench, three of them. Three black leather cases, identical to the one in Father’s car. Scrabbling to my knees, I reached into the darkness and dragged them out, one by one. And there it was, F. H. R., stamped in gold beside the handle—on two of them, anyway. The third was plain, with no initials, and it was shabbier than the others. Older.

  They were surprisingly easy to drag, and I soon discovered why. The first F. H. R. was empty. Not a thing in it. I suppose that was good news, but it made me grim. I was going to a lot of trouble to protect Father, and the least he could do was need protecting. The second F. H. R. case was even worse—ten glass bottles stood in a sort of harness, but they weren’t whiskey bottles. They were small and carefully labeled: Bromine, Potassium chloride, Ammonium…Tucked in alongside them were some papers. I took one out. “DuPont Company: Better Things for Better Living…Through Chemistry!” Beneath that were descriptions of how wonderful and useful their chemicals were. I shoved the paper back beside the bottles and snapped the case closed. Suppose I’d got it wrong, and Father’s job really was selling chemicals? But if his job was selling chemicals, what were the chemicals doing in Mr. Russell’s basement? I didn’t know what to think.

  Discouraged, I reached for the third case, the old one. It was heavier than the others but not so heavy I couldn’t drag it close to me. And it was locked. Locked. I twisted the button clasp back and forth and yanked on the strap that connected the two parts, but it was locked. Suddenly, something came over me. I was as angry as I’d ever been, and for the first time in my life I knew what people meant when they said they saw red. I was furious. I pounded on the case with all my strength; I bashed at the lock until my hand hurt. And then I rustled around in that damn basement until I found a piece of pipe and shoved it underneath the strap that held the lock. I stood up and stamped down on it as hard as I could. The strap popped up, quivering in the air.

  I’d done it.

  It was hard to stop being angry so suddenly. For a moment I just looked at what I’d done, panting. Then, gingerly, I reached down and pulled the sides of the case wide. At first I couldn’t understand what I was seeing. Cloth. White cloth gone yellow with age. I lifted it out and discovered that it was a package. I unwrapped it and I found more cloth. Brown, this time. I stared at it, frowning, trying to figure out what it was. I didn’t know until I held it up—it was a jacket, a man’s suit jacket. Kind of old-fashioned. I checked the back, the front. Why would Father keep an old jacket tucked away here? I shrugged and was about to put the thing down when I looked at it again. It was too big, too long. Father wasn’t that tall, I was pretty sure. Maybe it wasn’t his. I checked the pockets. In a side pocket, I found a buffalo nickel, but I couldn’t read the date on it. In the breast pocket, a handkerchief, yellowed like the other one, but neat and flat, like it had just been ironed. I flopped the jacket over. The other side pocket held a folded paper. I unfolded it—and there was Father’s writing, straight up and down like always. “V,” I read, “Talked him down to $200, but it’ll need a new tire, so $250. F.” V. Vause Hamilton? I touched the paper, glad to find a bit of long-ago Father, and put it back, refolded just as I’d found it. A little distracted, I reached into the inner pocket, the one that’s hidden inside men’s coats, and felt a small piece of heavy paper. A photograph?

  Yes.

  I stared.

  It was Jottie. A long-ago Jottie, with her hair coiled up on the back of her head. Her face was tilted up and she was smiling sideways, almost laughing, so shining and beautiful and hopeful. I’d always thought Jottie was pretty, with her thick dark hair pulled into a neat knot at her neck and her smooth skin and her eyes so round and deep and bright—but this was Jottie more beautiful than I’d ever seen. She looked like Father, just exactly like Father, but lighter, more delicate, like she was floating.

  I spent a long time looking at that picture. I wanted it. I wanted it with all my heart. But it was too precious, I could see that. I put it back, very carefully, in the pocket where I’d found it. There were so many things I didn’t understand—why Father had kept the jacket, why it was inside the shabby case, and why the photograph of Jottie was in its pocket—but I understood that my father held it dear and no damage could come to it. I folded the jacket perfectly, so that every crease was exactly as it had been, and wrapped it back in its yellowed cloth just as tende
r as I could manage. It seemed wrong to set that bundle on the dirty floor, though I couldn’t have said why. I blew dust off a shelf and set it there before I turned back to the case. What I saw wasn’t very exciting, just envelopes, the big brown kind. Five of them, lined up. I drew one out. Printed along the top, in faded black ink, was American Everlasting Hosiery Company, and then below, in spidery handwriting—I twisted my head to read it—September 2, 1920. Old. I lifted up the flap to peek inside—and almost shed my skin: In that envelope there was a pile of money, a stack of bills thicker than I’d ever seen. I gasped, and the sound scared me worse than anything that had happened that afternoon. My heart commenced to thumping, and I quick dropped the envelope back in the case and slammed it shut. For a second, I sat still and frozen, and then my hand crept out and pulled the two sides open again. Very, very slowly, I drew out the envelope again and looked inside. It took my breath away. I reached to pull out a few bills. Ten-dollar bills. A thick bundle of them, more than I could count. Some of them looked funny—old, I guessed, and brown with age. The words “wages of sin” popped into my head, but I pushed them away. I swallowed hard and stretched over the case to pull out another envelope. Twenty-dollar bills, divided into three packets. The next one held five-dollar bills, a mess of them. Then one-dollar bills, jammed and stuffed into their envelope any which way. I dug in and plucked out a handful, just to see what it would feel like. The last envelope was the thinnest. Fifty-dollar bills, eight of them. I’d never seen even one before.

  All of a sudden I stopped, appalled, and looked at the money lying on the floor around me. Father would know. If the money was mixed up, if the stacks weren’t right, Father would know I’d been here. He could be here any minute. He’d gone out on business, hadn’t he? He was probably going to come right over with the money he’d got. I felt sick. I had to put it back, quick, just like it was before. I was shaking as I put the money in the envelopes, shaking so hard I couldn’t get the bills straight and then shaking harder because I couldn’t. It was real. It was real. My father was a bootlegger, a real one. I hadn’t made it up. Somehow I got it all in, the bills in the right envelopes the way they had been before, or close enough, I hoped. I was panting as I set the envelopes in order on the bottom of the case and put the yellowed cloth bundle on top. Then I closed up the sides of the case and tucked the clasp back into the lock. It wasn’t fast, but it stayed. I rubbed it a little with the old rag. If you didn’t look close, you couldn’t see the scuff mark I’d made. Father would never know. No one would ever know. I pushed the cases deep under the workbench and walked out of that basement fast.