“I had to get them back. Don’t you see that?”
“Yes,” the old woman said. “Yes.” She sat bolt upright in the wheel chair. “Well, my Lord. Us poor, fool women — Johnny!” Her voice was sharp, peremptory.
“What?” the young woman said. “Do you want something?”
“No,” the other said. “Call Johnny. I want my hat.” The young woman rose. “I’ll get it.”
“No. I want Johnny to do it.”
The young woman stood looking down at the other, the old woman erect in the wheel chair beneath the fading silver crown of her hair. Then she left the room. The old woman did not move. She sat there in the dusk until the boy entered, carrying a small black bonnet of an ancient shape.
Now and then, when the old woman became upset, they would fetch her the hat and she would place it on the exact top of her head and sit there by the window. He brought the bonnet to her. His mother was with him. It was full dusk now; the old woman was invisible save for her hair. “Do you want the light now?” the young woman said.
“No,” the old woman said. She set the bonnet on the top of her head. “You all go on to supper and let me rest awhile. Go on, all of you.” They obeyed, leaving her sitting there: a slender, erect figure indicated only by the single gleam of her hair, in the wheel chair beside the window framed by the sparse and defunctive Carolina glass.
IV
Since the boy’s eighth birthday, he had had his dead grandfather’s place at the end of the table. Tonight however his mother rearranged things. “With just the two of us,” she said. “You come and sit by me.” The boy hesitated. “Please. Won’t you? I got so lonesome for you last night in Memphis. Weren’t you lonesome for me?”
“I slept with Aunt Jenny,” the boy said. “We had a good time.”
“Please.”
“All right,” he said. He took the chair beside hers.
“Closer,” she said. She drew the chair closer. “But we won’t ever again, ever. Will we?” She leaned toward him, taking his hand.
“What? Sit in the creek?”
“Not ever leave one another again.”
“I didn’t get lonesome. We had a good time.”
“Promise. Promise, Bory.” His name was Benhow, her family name.
“All right.”
Isom, in a duck jacket, served them and returned to the kitchen.
“She ain’t coming to supper?” Elnora said.
“Nome,” Isom said. “Setting yonder by the window, in the dark. She say she don’t want no supper.”
Elnora looked at Saddie. “What was they doing last time you went to the library?”
“Her and Miss Narcissa talking.”
“They was still talking when I went to ‘nounce supper,” Isom said. “I tole you that.”
“I know,” Elnora said. Her voice was not sharp. Neither was it gentle. It was just peremptory, soft, cold. “What were they talking about?”
“I don’t know’m,” Isom said. “You the one taught me not to listen to white folks.”
“What were they talking about, Isom?” Elnora said. She was looking at him, grave, intent, commanding.
“‘Bout somebody getting married. Miss Jenny say ‘I tole you long time ago I ain’t blame you. A young woman like you. I want you to marry. Not do like I done,’ what she say.”
“I bet she fixing to marry, too,” Saddie said.
“Who marry?” Elnora said. “Her marry? What for? Give up what she got here? That ain’t what it is. I wished I knowed what been going on here this last week. . . .” Her voice ceased; she turned her head toward the door as though she were listening for something. From the dining-room came the sound of the young woman’s voice.
But Elnora appeared to listen to something beyond this. Then she left the room. She did not go hurriedly, yet her long silent stride carried her from sight with an abruptness like that of an inanimate figure drawn on wheels, off a stage.
She went quietly up the dark hall, passing the dining-room door unremarked by the two people at the table. They sat close. The woman was talking, leaning toward the boy. Elnora went on without a sound: a converging of shadows upon which her lighter face seemed to float without body, her eyeballs faintly white. Then she stopped suddenly.
She had not reached the library door, yet she stopped, invisible, soundless, her eyes suddenly quite luminous in her almost-vanished face, and she began to chant in faint sing-song: “Oh, Lawd; oh, Lawd,” not loud.
Then she moved, went swiftly on to the library door and looked into the room where beside the dead window the old woman sat motionless, indicated only by that faint single gleam of white hair, as though for ninety years life had died slowly up her spare, erect frame, to linger for a twilit instant about her head before going out, though life itself had ceased.
Elnora looked for only an instant into the room. Then she turned and retraced her swift and silent steps to the dining-room door. The woman still leaned toward the boy, talking. They did not remark Elnora at once. She stood in the doorway, tall, not touching the jamb on either side. Her face was blank; she did not appear to be looking at, speaking to, any one.
“You better come quick, I reckon,” she said in that soft, cold, peremptory voice.
The end
