Chapter 23

“Damn all Crocketts,” I scratched out, bent over the ladies’ room sink and washed my face. Rose had been right. I wondered what she would say when she found out I’d been disqualified because I hadn’t even bothered to read the rule book. Here she’d made me this nice dress and toted me all the way up here.

I left the restroom and crossed the big hall over to the plant exhibits. I stood there a long while staring at my tobacco, the Pepsi drum Rainey had shined and filled so carefully, now nicked and dented. Dirt spilled out beside it. Leaves scattered about. Then I spied it, and hot anger crawled up my neck, warming my cheeks. Peeking out from under the drum was Cash’s hankie. I pushed the tobacco over to the trash can and left it to be put out with the garbage.

A minute later, I opened the metal doors and escaped outside, a blast of candy and onion scents almost sending me back.

I huddled inside my thoughts alongside Freddy. After a few minutes, Freddy called out, asking if I was lost. I shook my head and decided to head toward Rose’s booth, stopping to glance at the different wares and listening to the barking pitches. Anything to distract me from my gloom.

I passed the booth of Rose’s Tennessee friends. Bonnie Kate sat perched on a metal stool wearing a glittery tiara on her head, smoking a long filtered cigarette while her husband sold their wares: stiff aluminum crowns with sparkly plastic stones, little boxes of sparklers, and pictures of Elvis Presley. “Be a State Fair Princess—A Crooning King—Get your best sparkle from Zachery’s Novelties and Fireworks,” he barked at the passersby. Bonnie Kate caught my eye and smiled.

I lifted a polite one back and moved on to the next booth. One man in overalls sold spices at his stand. Next to that booth, a gray-haired woman with a lodestone hanging from her neck sold jellies and jams. I lingered at her counter, studying a jar of pawpaw jelly. A small basket holding two rocks cozied up to the stacks of jars. She picked up one of the reddish brown stones and placed it in my hurt hand.

“Here you go, child,” she said, sneaking her old eyes to my scratched hand. “Take you a madstone back home. Cures the fevers, mad bites, stings, and more. Special ’cause it comes from the belly of the ghost deer, it does.”

“Thank you, ma’am, but I don’t have the money.” I held it back up to her.

“Bad luck to sell a madstone.” She pushed my hand away. “Can only be given. Got that special one from down round eastern Kentucky,” she said. “Nameless.”

Surprised, I said, “I’m from Nameless, Kentucky, ma’am. But I ain’t never seen an albino deer before.” I flipped it over. “My uncle said he saw one when he was a boy, though.”

“Well, there you go. The stone knows its way home. And Lord-love-Betsy-and-her-babies, Nameless sure is a pretty place!” She peeled back a toothy grin.

I rubbed the stone, and told her, “Back home, Mr. Turner has a rock he found in a catfish head, and he said it cured sore eyes and got rid of dust gathering in them. Keeps it sitting close to his tobacco paper press. And Oretta, that’s our midwife, always wears a cock-stone around her neck. Says it will protect the babies she delivers.”

“Sure will,” the old woman said.

I examined the madstone, turning it over several times before I thanked her and tucked it into my purse.

Ellen and her mama passed by me, chatting in smile-filled song.

I wondered if there was a stone for the things I’d been afflicted with. I was feverish with the sadness, a longing for my parents, Rainey, and a longing to live here in the city.

I passed a few more booths, stopping beside a smiling couple in front of a covered stand. They pointed and peered at strips of tiny photographs. Curious, I looked up at the Strike a Pose Photomatic! 3 Instant Photographs! booth. Behind the red half curtain, I heard a woman’s giggles and looked down and saw her sitting on a man’s lap. They spilled out laughing, the black man’s shoulder pressed close to the white woman’s arm.

I watched as they strolled away. Except for a few old farmers and their wives, folks hurried past the couple without so much as a blink and nary a stink—and not a soul came forward to give a whipping.

I stood there gawking a good while until an applause jolted me out of my thoughts. I edged toward the noise. In front of a large booth, a group of kids about my age lowered their clapping hands and listened to the pitchman who ran it. Some of the boys in the group wore navy-blue corduroy jackets with a gold eagle emblem on the back.

A FUTURE FARMERS OF AMERICA banner hung across the booth. The man behind the stand also wore the nifty blue jacket. A corn-yellow tie hung neatly over his pressed white shirt. I stood back and watched. Three girls wearing green pinstriped dresses with four-leaf clovers on breast pockets came up behind me. The man talked about agriculture education being important, about being a good citizen, and how important a job it was to feed so many. How to grow better crops and different crops. Then he recited a creed that told what things the farmers’ club believed in.

“ ‘. . . I believe in less dependence on begging and more power in bargaining; in the life abundant and enough honest wealth to help make it so—for others as well as myself; in less need for charity and more of it when needed; in being happy myself and playing square with those whose happiness depends upon me . . .’ ”

The Future Farmers of America spokesman told everyone the important creed was written by an author named E. M. Tiffany, ’specially for his club, and then went on to say that for the first time ever, females could have membership. “Including 4-H females,” he pointed and said to the girls behind me. The girls in the neat pinstripes giggled, and he waved his hand at them, and also to me, to come forward.

The boys spread a path, clapping politely. I accepted the spokesman’s pamphlet and a packet of fat sunflower seeds.

Somewhere behind me I heard a baby’s squall trailed by familiar voices.

Turning, I saw them beside a toy booth. Mr. and Mrs. Emery bent over a baby buggy, tending to Eve.

Half-hidden behind fairgoers who were milling around the table, I watched the family.

“There there, sweet Eve,” they prattled to the baby. Mr. Emery’s arms were filled with stuffed toys. The bottom of Eve’s periwinkle-blue buggy burst with more playthings. Mrs. Emery picked up the baby and gently rocked her.

“Is she okay?” Mr. Emery asked. “She’s not sick, is she?”

Alarmed, I took a step toward them.

“She’s fine, darling,” Mrs. Emery assured, lifting the baby higher for a better glimpse. “Just a busy day for our daughter’s first State Fair . . . Come on, little one.” She smiled. “We better get you home. Tomorrow’s another busy day. There’ll be more fairs.”

I breathed a sigh of relief.

Mr. Emery cooed and wiggled a stuffed doll in front of Eve. “Lots more fairs for our fair princess,” he said, kissing the baby’s forehead. “Let’s go home, Eve.” He tickled Eve’s belly. “We’ve got the dressmaker coming bright and early so she can make our girl the most beautiful baptismal gown in the world. Yes, the most beautiful for the most beautiful.”

Eve whimpered a little.

“You’re my princess, and Daddy’s here to protect you,” he comforted.

Eve quieted and smiled at her daddy. I smiled, too.

Mr. Emery babbled on.

I opened my purse and pulled out the madstone. Maybe if Eve had this special stone it would protect her like Oretta’s cock-stone that had been taken from the knee of an old fighting rooster.

I raised my hand, waving. “Mr. and Mrs. Emery,” I called.

Mrs. Emery spied me. Surprise flashed in her eyes. Then just as quick, deep worriment took hold and disgust pinched her mouth.

I waved again. “Ma’am, it’s me, RubyLyn.”

Quickly she turned and tucked the baby back into the carriage. “Time to go, darlings,” she said, skittering away. Mr. Emery followed her, a tied-on balloon tailing behind them.

I waved once more, wanting to see Lena’s baby one last time. To give Eve this madstone for protection. To leave a part of me and Nameless and her family back home with her . . . But Mrs. Emery looked at me like I was dirty. I looked down at my dress. How could she not speak when I was wearing this fine dress with a fine lady’s slip like her . . . ?

Mrs. Emery gave one last nervous look over her shoulder, leaving me to lower my hand, tuck it close to my side. Blinking back the stinging dampness, I turned my gaze and saw Cash push beside the couple, heading straight my way. I meant to grab him and give him a piece of my mind, but he didn’t even notice as he whizzed past me, him so full of his fire to follow a girl in a white blouse, navy skirt, and fast wiggle.

I glared after him until a whistle turned my attention. A balding man in a bright green Paramount Pickle T-shirt with a pickle-shaped whistle around his neck motioned me up to his booth. Grinning, he passed around a plate of free pickles to me and a few others. Hungry and knowing it would be a long time till my next meal, I grabbed one.

I took a small bite. It was crunchy and delicious—and almost as good as Rainey’s. The Paramount Pickle man talked about his company in Louisville and how lots of folks liked pickles. He told us that people with land could work with his company and produce great tasty pickles—the country’s best. He ticked off big numbers—the money that hardworking pickle farmers could make.

Then the friendly pickle man passed out a packet of cucumber seeds and a flyer with his company name and information. I studied the green paper with its border of pickles and line touting, “Be a Sweet Pickle and Grow Paramount” before stuffing it and the seeds into my purse with my other things.

I walked out of the rows of vendors. Leaning against the wall, I munched on the rest of my pickle and watched the fair people.

Everyone laughed or packed a smile. Some talked with hawkers, tried the games, and bought the goodies. Others rushed to the next fun thing with that once-a-year excitement only a fair could bring.

I didn’t belong in this place, but somewhere else, a darker place where troubled folks had no laughter for this day or tomorrow.