Tommy approached McCrady’s. He pressed his hand against his pocket to keep the silver from clanging. A girl in a wagon-wheel-sized straw hat sat on the stairs that led to McCrady’s porch, face buried in her knees, arms latched around her legs.
Tommy jogged up a couple stairs, eager to unload his silver haul and distance himself from the thieving. The girl let out a funny noise, making him stop.
Tommy looked back but then moved on. Another noise. A sob came from the girl, plucking at something in him, trussing the girl’s pain right to him, reminding him of his own deep, heavy desperation. “You lost?” Tommy asked.
She shook her head, not looking up.
Move on.
He couldn’t. “Your mama in the store?” He went down a step. “Want me to get her?”
“I’m by myself.”
Tommy would’ve preferred her to be lost so he could return her to grateful parents who might want to reward him for his effort. The silver poked into his thigh, reminding him why he was there. But seeing her, this delicate soul, curled into herself, made it impossible to just walk by. “Everyone’s alone in some way. You hurt?”
The girl lifted her head. He drew back, surprised he hadn’t recognized her. Her red hair was tucked under the wide-brimmed hat.
Tears trailed down her dusty cheeks, her green eyes glistening. “Pearl?”
She gave a little shrug. Her vulnerability, seeing her delicate and exposed, frightened him. He turned away wanting to run.
No.
His breath stuttered. He gripped his chest, pain swirling there. What was happening? His thoughts ran wild, the secrets she knew about him, how she’d helped him with the deer . . . Love. That word kept forming behinds his ribs, then springing to mind.
She stared past him and he visualized how she’d chased him down to warn him about the reverend the other day. Pearl looked out for him. And in that moment, the fear disintegrated and all he wanted was to protect her, to take away whatever caused this pain.
He sat beside her and put his hand on her back, drew it away, then laid it there again, her wiry body quivering under his palm. She cried hard. Her crumpled face and watery eyes made him move closer, his leg against hers. She sniffled and pulled away slightly. He became nervous and pulled his hand away, stuffing it in his lap.
Her tears cut trails through the filth, revealing pink skin. His heart clunked, paining him. He grasped at his chest. He wanted to shield her from whatever this was but didn’t know how to get her to confide.
Pearl readjusted her arms around her knees, her skirt pulling up, exposing dirt-covered, bare legs. He started to ask what happened to her stockings but couldn’t get the words out. She stared out past the street in front of them.
He patted her back again. “What happened, Pearl?”
She jerked her body so her back was to him. If it had been another girl, he would’ve gotten up and walked away. Maybe she needed something different than his help.
“Can you do me a favor, Pearl? I need to go inside for a minute, and when I come out you can tell me all about it. But I need a favor.”
She sniffled.
Tommy pulled Frank from his pocket and petted the bird’s back. “How about you watch my bird, Frank, while I’m in the store? He likes you and I know he’ll stay put with you.”
She remained quiet.
“Here.” He brushed her arm.
She turned toward him, her knees against his, staring at Frank. Her eyes were swollen, the spring-green irises practically swallowing the whites. She turned her palms up and cupped them to accept the bird. Frank settled into her grasp. She wouldn’t look at Tommy, and he knew she’d be there when he came back out. He waited for Frank to say something as usual, but he was silent.
Tommy shrugged. “Well. I’ve got business inside.”
She didn’t respond but she’d stopped crying. Tommy hopped to his feet. Inside the dark store, musty, dusty, grimy scents—the odors of unloved things—made him choke then breathe through his mouth. Whatever acquisitions had recently been made, the aroma carried the innate filth of a home built right into the side of a hill—the type of home the Arthurs had lived in on the prairie. He scratched his belly, sickened.
“Whatchu need, boy?” A voice from behind a stack of newspapers startled Tommy. He moved around them and saw Mr. McCrady sitting on a stool, legs spread, a piece of wood in his lap as he carved it.
Tommy wiped his palm and then the back of his hand on his pants and stuck it out. “Tommy Arthur. We spoke about silver a while back. For if I ever decided to sell some.”
Mr. McCrady grunted.
Agitated, Tommy struggled to steady his voice. “Said you’d take a look. I think this is rare, what I have. Not that ordinary stuff you’ve seen over the years.”
Mr. McCrady grunted again and nicked his knuckle with the knife. He sucked at the cut and stood towering over Tommy, talking around his finger. “Damn it, look at that.”
Tommy stepped back. His mind went to other people he might sell the silver to or gift it to for equity in favors. He was interested in easy money, not this hassle. “Well, okay. Thank you.” Tommy began to leave the store.
“Now wait a cotton-pickin’ minute. Shuffle back here and give me a gander.” He gestured with his unharmed hand, looking over the spectacles that slid down his nose. “Grab me that silver book off the counter there.”
Tommy felt a surge of glee that his leaving may have evoked the very response he’d been trying for. He handed McCrady the book and pulled the fish fork, knives and teaspoons from his pocket. The silver shone in the dark room like it might have if lodged inside the earth before being freed.
McCrady stopped sucking on his knuckle and paged through the book. “Lay it all out so I can see.”
Tommy splayed it in front of McCrady. The man held the fork into a channel of sunlight streaming through a side window. He whistled as he turned the serving fork back and forth. “A beaut all right.” He licked his finger and turned pages. “I think I saw this in . . . Yes, here it is.” He tapped the name on a page. Old Orange Blossom.
“You have more than these pieces?”
Tommy pulled his hat from his back pocket and settled it onto his head. “Well, I have more of a lot of stuff. But you know, I come by these treasures in upstanding, law-abiding ways, so I can’t just snap my fingers and—”
“You have more, boy?”
“This is it. For now,” Tommy said before he had a chance to play this whole thing to its natural conclusion.
“Well then, I’ll give you six bucks for the fancy fork. For the rest, another five. And if you git more of this pattern, I’ll give a bonus.”
Tommy looked at the page that outlined the pricing for Old Orange Blossom. “That fork alone’s worth nearly twenty-two dollars. That one fork.”
McCrady sat forward on his stool. “Bring me a place setting. No, two. The wife would love some of this here shiny decadence. Even the slop she peddles will be tasty if delivered on these here utensils. And I’ll give you a fat bonus.”
Tommy wasn’t pleased with this plan, but it was more money than he’d had in some time. This amount would allow him to give extra to Mama. “Thank you, sir,” he said, considering if he could find his way back into the Calder home to steal more.
Outside the store he stuffed the money into his pocket.
Pearl.
Tommy clomped down the stairs and plopped down next to her. He drew a deep breath. He wasn’t comfortable with people watering the landscape with their tears.
We’re not crying people. Mama’s voice came to mind.
Tommy sighed. He’d come to see that everyone, including Mama, was indeed a crying person if the pain struck deep enough. Pearl’s lips quivered again. Tommy took Frank from her and set the bird on his shoulder.
“Can I walk you home?”
She shook her head.
“That boardinghouse on Rose Lane. What’s it called again?”
“Rupert’s.” She wrapped her arms around her shoulders, pulling the neckline of her dress downward, exposing her collarbone. The way it jutted out of her skin, Tommy was sure the girl hadn’t much to eat in recent times and probably not much hardy food when she did eat. He never thought of her as needing to secure food after seeing her slice up a deer faster than any man. He never saw her as needing anything.
“Not going back,” she said.
He was afraid to ask. “Why?”
“Things happened. Think I found another place. But well, it’s that . . .”
“You need money?” he asked.
“Been a day since I last filled my belly.”
He thought of Mama’s garden, the way she worked tirelessly throughout summer, fussing over her plants like they were children. It had meant they had a steady flow of food even into late fall. Tommy considered the silver he’d just traded, how the money would help his family. Mama was doing well with her extra sewing, gardening, and with Katherine’s money when she baked extra for Miss Violet added in, they were doing well. The bills were wadded hard against his leg.
He considered the manhandling he’d suffered when he’d been boarded out, before his luck turned and he got to board with the Babcock family for a time. The sun peeked its head through the clouds and revealed bruising on her exposed collarbone. He studied her, the way she wrapped her arms tight around her naked legs, her shoulders hunched but chin lifted, eyes scanning for . . . threats? Her lips were parted slightly, and it softened her face as he’d never seen it. It was as though his heart were an envelope and her sad face tore it open.
He touched her arm. She shrank away.
Her reaction brought back his own fears. Seeing her frightened made him want to be brave. “Tell me what happened. I can help if you tell me more.”
Her throat constricted as she swallowed a lump. She stared straight ahead, tears spilling over her lower lids. He understood her not running her mouth about it, but he was her friend. He’d trusted her. He held out his pinkie. “I won’t tell anyone. But you have to tell me.”
She kept silent. He was due back home but couldn’t let her go on without means. Now that he had no idea if his father was halfway to the bottom of the ocean plucking pearls from oyster bellies or halfway back to Des Moines, he could spare something for his friend.
He pulled the money he’d just been given from his pocket and pushed it toward her. “Go to that women’s hotel. On Main. Mama stayed there with Katherine and Yale for a time. It’s safe.”
She didn’t move.
He unlatched one of her hands from her body and pried open her fingers. He smashed the money in her palm and closed her fingers back around it.
“Do not go back to Rupert’s.”
She shifted toward Tommy, meeting his gaze with tangible force, jarring him. “I gotta get my book. My bag and my things. Gotta go back at some point,” she said against his ear, sending quivers through his body.
Tommy wanted to hold her, but couldn’t do it, not there. “The fairy tales?”
“Only book I got.”
“Well,” Tommy said. “Don’t fret about that. You go on to the women’s hotel. Your safety is most important.” He knew what it was like to lose things, but things could be rebought.
“Why’re ya doing this?”
He swallowed hard, the words already formed in his mouth, but he wasn’t sure he could get them out. She kept his gaze, and he knew he could say them to her and she wouldn’t make fun of him. “Because I like you.”
Her eyes widened.
“I do.”
She tilted her head, tears brimming again. But then she roped her arms around his neck and kissed his cheek. Her lips brushed his ear. “You’re like a knight in the book. The one who—the hero.” She stopped talking, her breath was warm on his skin. “Thank you, Tommy. Thank you.”
She gripped him hard, and he let her hold tight as long as she wanted, this time memorizing exactly how she felt against him. He’d never been anyone’s hero before. The thought that he might fail her knocked the wind out of his body.
No. Don’t think that way. This is your new story, he told himself.