Ellen hastily brushed the loose strands back. “Reckon I did.” She could sense Mom’s piercing eyes.
The men went out; Adele and the children drove to church. Ellen was working in the kitchen. She was preparing peach cobblers for dinner that night. Mason jars of peach halves glistened bright orange in the sun-shot window. While she was mixing the dough with her fingers, Mom came in, carrying a heavy book. “Have you ever seen a Polish Bible, Ellen?” Mom laid it on the table and turned to the record of family dates on the first page.
Ellen knew the woman had brought it in for a purpose. “I’ve heard that some keep their Bibles like that, Mom. Though our family ne’er did with ours.” She put her hand swiftly to her hair leaving a drift of flour.
Mom pointed to the list. “Pop’s mother brought it over from Poland. We can’t any of us read Polish, but it’s been in his family so we write everything in it.”
There were different hands, some with foreign characters, hard to decipher. The latest entry read, “Hannah Wasilewski. July 6, 1932.” Higher on the list Ellen could see in faded green ink, “Daniel Matthew Wasilewski. May 10, 1895.”
“See, there’s Sudduth’s wedding to Adele.” Mom was putting a broad finger on it. “That was clean before the depression. Now Star and Dan’ll be setting their date. It’ll say, Daniel Wasilewski took Star Webster in marriage. October first, maybe. This year.”
“That’s a fine book there.” Ellen said it coolly. I was born in 1909. That makes him fourteen years older. He’s forty-one. She felt languid because of her love. She was smiling at Mom, gray eyes narrow, hiding the secret anger.
“We know Dan’s making a good marriage, Ellen.” Mom’s cheeks were red.
“That Mr. Webster’s a rich man.”
“Look, Star suits Dan.” Mom spoke crisp. “My son loves her.”
“Reckon two cobblers’ll be enough for tonight, Mom? With company coming?”
“Better make three.” The older woman was going to put the Bible back on its shelf; her heavy body moved stolid, with decision. Ellen watched her go.
When she and Dan had come back last night from Penny’s, Dan had changed his clothes and gone directly to the barn. After supper he hurried out again with Sudduth to set up a pen for the new sheep. The two men returned at dusk, stood in the kitchen awhile talking before they went to bed. Dan paid no heed to Ellen. The yellow cat purred and mewled now about her feet while she rolled the dough deftly, fitted it into the pie tins. She thought how she disliked Mom. The woman’s hostility was palpable. She was calling out as her steps were heard descending, “I’ll be in the fruit cellar, Ellen. When you finish, come and help. We’ve got to get this straightening done if it is Sunday.”
“I will.” In a swift flood Ellen was homesick for the old kitchen in the yellow house. For Frankie and Maria nearby, the boiler steaming on the range, Jack waiting in the bushes by the porch. The goats in fresh straw in the woodshed. And her in the garden rows, singing “Down in the Valley.” Here the customs were foreign, even their manners and speech differed from what she had known. The old people had been born in a land across the water, brought their alien habits with them. They bathed in a separate room where a white tub stood on ornate legs. Everyone had his own towel, and when he bathed he would hang it on the line in the sun, even Hannah. Ellen would see Dan pinning his in the evenings, casually, pausing to light a cigarette before returning to the house. It would seem to her as if he performed a woman’s task, as if it were too clean. When she first came to this household and rolled pie crusts, Mom had showed her how the edges of the dough must be crimped by twisting the thumbs in a particular way. And when they went to kill a chicken, they laid a broomstick across its neck and yanked the legs sharply so the head was pulled off. She poured the fragrant peach halves into the pans. At first I couldn’t get over their merry ways. But there’s Adele who tried to keep from having her baby. Sudduth’s jealous of his brother. And Mom’s bent on managing them all. Dan will bring Star Webster here just like she says. They’ll write it in that Bible. Wish I could be away tonight. I don’t want to see that girl. Ellen was crimping the edges of the pies skillfully and sliding them into the oven. The yellow cat bounded after, and she caught it in her arms as she went down the cellar steps.
* * * * *
The lilacs on the north side of the house, outside the dining room windows, were opening their buds in the afternoon. The perfume was drifting through the house. Ellen fried the chickens while Mom helped Adele dress the girls and straighten the rooms. Ellen was setting the table, spreading first the linen cloth, cream-colored with age. She took out crystal that stood in the sideboard and heavy-plated silver, placed it as Mom had directed, the knife and spoon on the right side with blade turned to the plate, the fork on the left. Simon came in. “Who’s Star Webster?”
“She’s a friend of theirs, Simon.”
“Dennie says she’s Dan’s sweetheart.”
Ellen was laying small butter knives in front of the plates. “Well.”
“That’s fancy there, Ma. The way you’re doing.” Simon was grown so his head came above Ellen’s shoulder. He was over ten now.
She put goblets at the knife tips and turned to him. “You eat proper. No swooshing your food with a biscuit. Mind, now. And the fork goes in the right hand.”
“I’ll most likely fall o’er backwards in my chair.”
“Watch Dennie and do like he does. You’re twice his size and half as mannerly. And be quiet too.”
“I don’t care for all this.”
“Put on that new shirt I made.” She went to the kitchen. “Now go on. The queen’ll be here before we know it.”
The clock read seven when they drove up. Ellen paused to look out the window. Dan had changed into his brown suit, wore a bright striped tie. He was taking Star’s hand as she stepped down from the truck cab. Star Webster was just nineteen. Her small form was sheathed in a white dress, she wore white shoes and gloves and a wide-brimmed white hat. Her hair fluffed out, her arms were untanned. Adele said Star put stockings on her arms when she went to pick berries to keep the sun from them, and a sunbonnet to protect her face and neck. She was laughing up at Dan. He had said she was exciting. She was afraid of the dark. He liked that. Maybe she leans on him, helpless. A man doesn’t like a woman strong.
The potatoes steamed as they boiled over, and Ellen turned hastily to them. Mom and Adele came in, fastening on starched print aprons. Mom wore her new black rayon dress, a cameo gold brooch at the neckline. Adele’s dark green suit made her round face sallow. The little girls followed. “Thay, Ellen. Look at us.” They twirled pink and blue dresses before her.
“You sure sew pretty, Adele,” Ellen said.
“A little starch will do wonders with that cheap voile.” Adele was modest. “Now you girls go say hello to Star.” They ran, whispering and nudging.
The women beat potatoes with a wood masher, lifted browned chicken onto the huge white platter, and broke ice cubes into a water pitcher. The family was coming in from the living room, Star holding to Dan’s arm. Sudduth was complaining, “Sunday’s a workday like every other around here, Star. When my house is built, I’m going to church with Adele and the girls. That’ll give me a day off.”
Pop shuffled after them, pulling his beard. “Hee. That’s one way to do it.”
“This is our girl, Ellen,” Mom said to the guest, “and that’s Simon.”
“Hello there,” said Star. “Oh Mom, what a lovely table. You always set it so pretty.”
“You sit over here, Dan,” Mom said.
“I’ll sit where I usually do.” He was smiling stiffly.
“Well, Star, you take the chair by him.”
Dennie said grace. “God is great, God is good, bless us for our daily food.”
Grace shouted, “Zaccheus he. Did climb a tree. Our Lord to thee.”
“That’s enough,” threatened Sudduth.
They were pressing extra morsels on the girl in white. “Have some watermelon pickles,” Mom said. “Land o’ Goshen, it was two years ago we put them up.”
“I got thick on them,” Hannah lisped, “on my new thpring coat.”
“Hannah,” Pop shouted.
“You’re always saying speak up,” Dan reminded him, “so you ought to let her alone.”
“That’s right.” Pop clattered his knife. “Speak up.”
“And it won’t come out of the coat, neither,” Grace said shyly.
“Girls,” Mom cried.
“Jesus, my back hurts.” Sudduth fidgeted in his chair.
Dan and Star were sitting near Mom at one end of the table. Star would turn her face sidewise, appealing, “Don’t you agree, Dannie?”
Sudduth was saying, “I’m trying to buy a piece of our neighbor’s land, Star. Near where my house’ll be. If I get it, this farm’ll total a hundred and ten acres.”
“That’s a lot,” Star’s fork was poised, “don’t you think, Dannie?”
“It’s Sudduth’s twenty acres,” Dan said, without looking at her.
“Oh.” Her mouth was round and pink. She set the fork down, the food untouched, put her napkin to her lips. “Did you fry the chicken, miss?” she asked Ellen. “It’s delicious. Isn’t it, Dannie?” The lilac scent was floating through the open window behind her.