The children popped out of their grandparents’ Nash like champagne corks with energy bottled up during the long, arduous ride. Great Aunt Millie stood on the front porch steps in a cotton house dress, her arms folded, clearly displeased as they pulled onto the gravel driveway of her shady bungalow. “I expected you hours ago,” she fumed as Tell and Tandy sprinted past her and toward her newly installed indoor bathroom.
“We ran into some traffic,” Grandma answered as she unfolded herself from the front passenger seat and attempted to press out the wrinkles in her dress.
“Why the hell can’t your highway department fix those antiquated roads?” Grandpa growled as he adjusted a fedora on his bald head.
“Well, I figured you picked up some misfit who robbed you all and left you along the side of the road to die. Thank the Lord, you made it and you’re here now. I’ll get supper going while you and the kids bring in your things.” She paused dramatically. “They do seem riled up. Did something happen?”
“Nothing happened, Millie. They’ve been in the car for five hours. What did you expect? They are just normal, active children,” Grandma defended them.
“With wild imaginations,” Grandpa muttered under his breath.
After the luggage was ported, everyone sat on the front porch to escape the dreadful heat inside the house. Aunt Millie, in her wisdom, had ordered her handy man, Homer, to nail shut all the windows so burglars couldn’t sneak in and, she said, “Kill me in my sleep.”
“Batshit crazy woman,” Grandpa remarked every summer when they visited. The children swooped back and forth in the porch swing, bored beyond measure, as Aunt Millie rambled on about the comings and goings in Burford, which Grandma had abandoned as a teen, taking the train up North where jobs and worthy husbands could be found. Luckily, Grandma had found both and took an overbearing pride in parading her economic security and her beautiful, immaculately groomed grandchildren all around town, cautioning them, “Don’t touch anything. You don’t know where these people’s hands have been.”
Aunt Millie reported the latest gossip to her sister, births and deaths, marriages and divorces, highlighting the various shootings, a drowning in Scotsman Lake, and the gruesome strangling of a young wife by her jealous husband. Just days before, Freddy’s Bait Shop had been robbed at gunpoint of $14.65 and some teenagers had gone on a joyride in a stolen Ford pickup and careened through the county with all three police vehicles giving chase. “Mavis Purcell told me they went right past this very house,” her saggy arms waddled like tent flaps. “And I don’t suppose you heard Arlene Blanchett died?” Aunt Millie’s voice billowed. “Fell off a motorcycle, I heard, while she was runnin’ off with some drifter.” Grandma expressed shock as Aunt Millie added one of her signature phrases: “She was a handsome woman, for an inbred.” Everyone Aunt Millie knew came with a similar disclaimer. “He was a good daddy, for a drunk. She was a nice woman, for a gypsy. He was a good boy, for a colored man. He was a good worker, for a cripple.” She rattled on, “The bank got sold to some outfit in New York. You can bet I pulled all my money out of there. My daddy always said, ‘Can’t trust a Jew any day but Saturday.’” She referred to her late father as if he was hers exclusively, as if he wasn’t also Grandma’s father or their other six siblings’. In her mind, she owned him, or at least his memory. “My daddy didn’t suffer no fools. My daddy never told a lie in his life. My daddy was a real wheeler-dealer.”
Grandma (and everyone else in the family) chose to let slide the truth: that their daddy was a hateful, stubborn, ignorant man despised by everyone in the county. But Aunt Millie was oblivious to this and cavorted around Burford like an heiress, not waiting her turn, neglecting her debts, and subverting the very social protocols she foisted on everyone around her.
Tell and Tandy finally ran out of steam pumping their legs in unison on the porch swing and begged to play in the yard until supper. “Alright but stay away from the neighbors. They’re Methodists. And killers. They tried to poison Sassy because she barked at one of their brats,” Aunt Millie warned.
Tell darted off around the corner of the little cement house and made for the sawmill and lumber yard that butted up to Aunt Millie’s property, a half-acre left to her by her third husband. Among other notorieties, she was the most infamous widow in Lee County. Her first husband had been killed in “The War”, meaning World War II, and received an elaborate military funeral. Only months later, her second husband had perished in a train accident traveling from their wedding reception to “The War”. They had been married five hours. Her last husband, a salesman of some sort, departed from a heart attack, Grandpa said, “To escape her any way he could.” He often joked, “Men were lined up to get at her and then desperate to get away from her.” A corruption in the land survey had forced Aunt Millie to co-exist with the lumber yard, but her tenacity had gained her unrestricted access to their water pump. Thus, every day, Homer wheeled four glass milk jugs to the mill and back to fetch potable water, eight whenever her sister visited.
Tandy followed her brother, and they wove through the lilac bushes, around the giant pine trees, and through thickets of witch-fingers that edged the property on one side, looking for adventure. Grandpa called them T & T because, individually, they were perfectly behaved children, but together, they were what their mother termed “a handful” and could be exhausting.
In truth, they simply had glorious imaginations and both the energy and chutzpah to live out their fantasies. One might pass by and hear them say, “I’m tired of milking this ostrich. You do it,” and minutes later, “What makes you think the zodar will take a transistor radio as ransom for the Tickle Queen?” They might at any time be on a pioneer wagon train, in a diamond mine, or on a distant planet signaling Earth with a “telesponder” made from a broken baton and bicycle spokes. Another day they might pull out their mother’s entire wardrobe and create a department store or incorporate all the bedspreads and blankets into a clothesline tent where they treated wounded soldiers with contraband Band-Aids and Kool Aid in Dixie cups.
The pair, only eighteen months apart in age, followed the dirt road to the mill and inspected the lengths of vertical lumber in tall stalls along the back of the barn. A circular saw sat in the middle of the ramshackle complex; its serrated teeth poised to chew anything if the dust-covered red button were to be flipped on. What adventures the children could advent here! What tales this exotic place could spin! “Help me with this,” Tell enjoined his younger sister as he attempted to topple a ten-foot two by four. “If we lean it against this tractor tire, we can climb up and then walk the gangplank.”
“How fun!” Tandy squealed as she moved to help her brother. After a while the gangplank morphed into a tightrope, and they became a circus act. Then the slat of wood became a horse, and they rode it into battle, fending off the enemy with oak sticks they had found at the other end of the barn.
“What the hell are you yahoos doing?” Grandpa hollered at them, and they jumped like June bugs. “I’ve been calling you to supper at the top of my lungs,” he cupped a freshly lit Pall Mall in his hand. He stood in the amber sunlight that slanted through the trees, an imposing man, a regal man in perfectly pleated slacks and a stripped short-sleeved knit shirt, his official vacation attire.
“You shouldn’t be here. This is private property. You know, your great aunt thinks the owner will shoot you with the slightest provocation” he chuckled, pleased with his own wit. “Now, move it!” he called, and they scampered back to the house.
Supper was always an event: sliced ham, mashed potatoes, green beans from Aunt Millie’s garden, pickled beets, cucumber and onions, and homemade biscuits with butter and honey. Aunt Millie had conjured a sugar cream pie, which they ate on the front porch on blue and white Delft china, or Piggly Wiggly’s version of it. T & T had made accordion fans out of notebook paper to cool themselves while they gulped sweet iced tea. As the night fell upon them, Aunt Millie tuned her radio to the Grand Ole Opry and turned up the sound so that it drifted like undetectable smoke through the wide-open front door and out onto the porch. The Carter Family, Little Jimmy Dickens, and Loretta Lynn floated out into the yard, recounting their pain and losses, their faith and devotion to God, fireflies flitting about, the crickets joining in, Sassy panting from the top step. Minnie Pearl shouted “Howdy” at them like a neighbor visiting from far away. Tell and Tandy played War with a deck of cards with birds printed on the backs. Grandpa smoked, Grandma sang along, and Aunt Millie grumbled about the clerk at the grocery. “You know, the more I think about it, the more I believe that shifty girl shorted me a nickel. Flour was on special this week.” No one answered her. “Lordy, it’s so hot I think I’ll die before mornin’”.
“Too bad there aren’t any windows in this house to open,” Grandpa mumbled.
“Oh, Ezra, hush up! What’s done is done,” Grandma chastised him.
“I’m just saying, what kind a nut job nails their windows closed in the American South?” The music concluded and Grandma announced bedtime.
“Yes,” Aunt Millie agreed. “I’ve got to look over my funeral clothes before bed.”
“Who died, “Grandma asked?
“Lordy, I won’t know until I hear it on the radio Monday morning. Elmer Ainsley announces all the services at 6:00 and I’ve got to be ready.”
“You mean you go to random funerals?” Grandpa inquired, organizing his laughter already.
“I listen for the best one. You know, who was the most important person to die over the weekend, whose family will put out the best spread. I go and represent the Tipton family. As one of the most prominent names in this valley, I think someone should, you know, pay our respects.” She pursed her lips and titled her head in annoyance.
“But you don’t know yet who you’re paying these respects to?”
“Let it go, dear,” Grandma grabbed his shirt sleeve.
Tell and Tandy washed their necks and faces in a metal bowl, brushed their teeth, and slid into their matching cotton pajamas, another gambit in their grandmother’s constant campaign to show Lee County that she had left Burford a poor farm girl and returned a proper wife, mother, and grandmother and was, in every way, better than them.
The children always slept in the screened in back porch, which they called a breezeway, the only part of the house with any hope of fresh air. Two cots were erected, one down the side and one across the back, with the heads touching so the children could feel the night breeze, gaze at the stars, and listen to the glorious nocturnal concert that did not exist at their home in the city. They padded across the cool linoleum floor, past Aunt Millie’s garden supplies, her potato and onion bins, and a load of laundry to be washed and hung out to dry. Grandma kissed them goodnight, requesting they “give me some sugar,” and disappeared into the kitchen where Aunt Millie was already prepping for breakfast.
Tell pulled out a contraband flashlight from under his cot and Tandy removed a surreptitious teen magazine from under her pillow. Tell shined the torch her way as she flipped through pages of young celebrities revealing their innermost secrets to the world, such as their favorite color and the particulars of their first kiss. Tell produced an Archie comic book from his suitcase and the two settled in, stealing a shaft of light from the kitchen. As the moon moved over them and the katydids pulsed, the pair began to doze off. The house fell silent as a crypt. Tell thought he heard a noise, or a movement, or a stirring. Then he heard it again.
“Tandy, did you hear that?” he whispered.
“I know,” she agreed and flipped over on her stomach. “It’s outside toward the mill,” she surmised.
“Look!” Tell tried to keep his voice low. A small light glowed in the dark before the lumber yard. It swung back and forth like a railroad lantern but was much smaller.
“Someone’s back there,” Tandy said.
“That’s the tip of a cigarette,” Tell determined.
The light moved across the lumber yard toward the saw, its jagged teeth poised for destruction, and close to the security light on the other end. In the combined illumination with the moon, the children could make out the figure of a man, in a hat, his face hidden by the shadows.
“What’s he doing back there?” Tandy worried.
They watched in stunned silence as the man roamed around the facility.
“I betcha he’s robbing the place,” Tell surmised.
“How’s he’s gonna steal lumber without a truck, dummy?” Tandy charged. “Maybe it’s parked on the other side.”
“He would need other men to help load it.”
“Well, he’s up to something,” Tell was defensive. “I’ll bet it’s the owner and he saw us playing there today.”
“Oh, my God, he’s coming this way,” Tandy squealed as the figure turned and began to move through the yard, past the pine tree line, the lilac bushes, and the witch-fingers. Suddenly the glow of the cigarette was extinguished. But they could see in the moonlight that he held an object in his right hand. “He’s got a gun!” Tell shout-whispered! Its silver barrel reflected in the ghostly light. He moved slowly but steadily toward the breezeway. Tell and Tandy rose and grabbed each other’s shoulders.
“Does he see us?’ Tandy whispered.
“Be quiet.” Tell stilled his breath. “Lie down. Play like you’re asleep.”
The man wove himself through the yard until he came up to the corner of the house and walked directly past the breezeway, so close the children could hear him breathing. They heard the swoosh of his khakis, the shuffle of his shoes in the dirt and grass. Tandy closed her eyes as tightly as possible. She did not wish to look upon her own death. They lay, arms at their sides, fingers clutching the bedsheets in terror. Tell’s world froze on its axis, his mind escalating like a movie in fast forward mode, all his wrongs churning before him. He caught snatches of the times he had disobeyed his parents, secreted his peas to the dog, cheated his sister, lied, exaggerated, and equivocated like the sinner he was, and he was awash with the kind of guilt one cannot overcome in the mere moments before one’s demise. Then he lifted his eyes to face his fate and froze at the glint of a gun. They heard the trigger cock, although it sounded more like a twig snapping in half. Then, silence, except for the chorus of chiggers. They lay very still for a full minute before Tell surmised, “I think he’s gone.”
“I thought we were gonna die,” Tandy confessed.
“Me too.”
They realized they were holding hands so tightly their fingers were pink and white, nails digging into each other’s skin. They lay speechless on their cots, bathed in sweat and dried tears. A mass of clouds obscured the moon, and they slept.
As the sun spilled into the breezeway the next morning, the aroma of sausage gravy and biscuits and fried potatoes awakened them.
“About time you sleepyheads got up,” Aunt Millie grumbled.
“Good morning, angels,” Grandma chanted. She wore her bright floral A-line dress with a belt to accentuate her trim waist and new shoes from Marshall Fields. “After breakfast, you’ll find your church clothes laid out on my bed. I want you to look your best today.”
“Amen,” Aunt Millie added. “We want everyone to see how pretty you are.”
“I, for one, plan to thank God today for our safe journey here and home,” Grandma announced.
Aunt Millie chimed in, “I will pray that heathen Edna Hareton doesn’t sit in my pew. Otherwise, God will have a bloody mess on his hands.” She did not smile, her jowls hanging down, her eyes peeping through the top of her wire rimmed spectacles like a scold.
“How about you two? What will you pray for at the big to-do?” Grandpa, who would not be attending church, asked.
“I just want to thank God I’m still alive,” Tell replied.
“Yes, that we weren’t murdered in our beds,” Tandy added.
“That’s oddly specific and morose,” Grandpa commented.
T & T conveyed their night of terror, omitting no detail, and found that simply retelling the story agitated them all over again.
“Oh, don’t fret,” Aunt Millie directed them. “It was probably just Marvin Henderson. He’s a crazy man who’s feuding with the man who owns the lumber yard. They had a scuffle, and he isn’t allowed on the property, so, when he gets riled up on Saturday nights, he wanders over waving his pistol just to spite them. He’s perfectly harmless.”
Grandpa fought an urge to contain himself but lost. “So, you are worried the milkman, the mailman, and door-to-door salesmen might slaughter you on sight, that people cheat you regularly, that the people at church are heathens, that the world is full of evil lurking around every corner, that we are surrounded by death and violence, but a crazy, onery drunk with a gun who wanders around in your backyard on Saturday nights is not a concern?”
Aunt Millie poured a cup of coffee, unfolded her napkin, placed it on her lap, and replied, “Ezra, don’t be so suspicious of everyone.”
