The corridor on the seventeenth floor of the Ramsey County Courthouse, City of St. Paul, was lined down one side with a long bench where men and women divorcing or wrangling over custody or suing for protection sat and waited to be called. A woman with her jaw wired shut and a fading bruise all down her neck studied her folded hands. Which of the men—if he was present—was the violent boyfriend or husband or father could not be determined; no one sat together here. Lawyers, social workers, deputies, and clerks cut through, while, along the bench, calm prevailed, the horrid enforced idleness of waiting.
The three MacGregors—Rose, Natalie, and Meggy—had arrived early, Rose just a step behind Natalie, who’d turned and clasped her sister hard to her. Meggy accepted Rose’s hug with a polite, uninhabited smile and they sat down. Guy wasn’t there yet.
How Rose’s days had passed since her return from Seattle, she couldn’t have said. In the mulberries outside her windows, birds sang and sang, but she was sick of music, sick of everything. She’d slept; she’d taken bath after bath, but she still felt Stephen on her skin and his words of judgment were snarled up inside her.
“Mommy?” Meggy shyly uncurled her finger toward the far end of the corridor where, below a small window, an armed deputy sat. “What does he need a gun for?”
“Aw, don’t worry, sweetheart.” The deputy spoke up from ten feet away. “Sometimes the grown-ups in here get upset and I have to calm ’em down.” A nervous shifting along the bench followed, as of birds rising and settling.
Maybe, as Stephen had suggested, lovelessness did show in Rose’s music. How could she tell? She was cold and celibate, as doomed as any miserable soul here on the bench, where shoulders angled stiffly and averted faces spoke of a distance worse than that of strangers: the wish to become unacquainted, to have never met.
Rose bent toward Meggy. “I’ve got something for you.”
In a cloth sack in her briefcase was hidden the small pack of treasures she’d long accumulated for Meggy: the canary feather in a Lucite block, the Afghan coin purse filled with dimes, a jade ring, a tiny black winged horse—Pegasus carved from a piano key—and even the Tiffany egg from Stephen—Rose could see no reason Meggy should forgo the egg just because of its source. Meggy’s eyes glimmered at her, but the whiz of the briefcase zipper drew Natalie’s glance and Rose stopped her hand.
What Rose most wanted to do was to slip down to the floor with Meggy and hand her presents, one by one. But even if Natalie would allow presents, Rose couldn’t get down on the floor in what she was wearing. As if for a wedding or a funeral, she’d dressed in her linen suit: straight skirt and shoulder pads, the single professional woman, chic version of the maiden aunt. Why had she come so armored? Because she was ashamed of the situation? Because she wished to show the judge or anyone else who was watching that not all MacGregors lived like Natalie? A lot of good that would do Meggy.
“Later,” she whispered to Meggy, who nodded agreeably, her eyes flat again, her shoulders held very straight under Natalie’s hands. Her hair, though raggedly cut, was combed and clipped back with a plastic bumblebee barrette. Her T-shirt and shorts were a matching blue. She looked nice;Natalie deserved that much credit. The little girl’s knees were scabby, though, and her rubber flip-flops seemed grievously wrong for court. But Meggy was not on trial—why should she have to impress anyone?
Natalie was the one under scrutiny, but seemed not to know it. Her hair hung lank and unwashed, and she wore an old plaid jumper of Rose’s, which she’d transformed into overalls, the skirt slashed and re-stitched into trouser legs that bunched clownishly at the crotch. What was she thinking? Was she crazy? Well, yes, she was. She seemed to be.
At the appointed hour of their hearing, the escort deputy stepped out and called names, but no Natalie MacGregor and no Guy Robbin. Rose went to confirm that their judge was in court and that they were on the roster. They were—court was running a little behind. Here came Guy, late, and dressed little better than Natalie. He wore a derelict sport coat, jeans, and cracked work boots embedded with cement. He’d grown a beard but left it untrimmed, a bird’s nest, and he’d water-combed his hair straight back. He had a sheaf of papers in his pocket that he couldn’t seem to keep from rattling.
“Guess what?” Meggy whispered to him. “Our bathroom doesn’t work, so we took a bath in the dishpan, like in Mexico.”
“Really?” said Guy pointedly. Rose tried not to look at Natalie’s hair.
“And we peed outside and pooped at the gas station,” said Meggy, for-getting to whisper.
“Shh, Meggy,” hissed Natalie.
Guy added a note to his sheaf of papers and Rose found herself annoyed. So they’d peed outside? Up north, Guy used an outhouse, same as at the Goat Pasture. So Natalie and Meggy were a little dirty? Hadn’t Rose herself, just days before, stumbled off the train, grubby and sour-smelling? They were all travelers of a sort. They’d get through this and move on. There’d be a decision, peace, and eventually better or at least different days, a change of luck, maybe, though Rose was not keen just then on the subject of luck.
But she could be an instrument of peace. She’d made lunch reservations at the museum a block away. She spoke up to tell them so. Her treat. The museum restaurant had a nice buffet. There’d be chicken and shrimp salad, hot rolls and local strawberries, the fresh, soft kind that won’t travel. After court, they’d break bread together; they’d talk things over and make arrangements. Alan, Frances, and Max were going to join them for dessert, for a sense of a wider community—Frances’s idea. The museum restaurant overlooked the river. Meggy and Max could watch the barges and boats.
Guy stared at Rose without expression. She realized she was gibbering.
“The matter of Robbin versus MacGregor,” announced the escort deputy.
They were led into a tiny courtroom with a platform at the end, just room enough to seat a judge and a court recorder, and, below the judge, a table and chairs. The judge sat close, almost on top of them. His platform placed him just a few inches above them and he may as well have been somebody’s uncle in a choir robe—Guy’s uncle, in fact. Though clean-shaven, his resemblance to Guy was uncanny: long nose, sharp jaw, bold gaze. Rose felt a surge of sympathy for her sister now taking her place before Guy and the judge, men who were about to confer over her, men handing out rights to each other. The judge’s hair was combed straight back. Had Guy done the same deliberately?
He motioned Rose to his side of the table. Natalie hustled Meggy to the seats opposite him. Rose hesitated.
“I see that Mr. Robbin has brought counsel,” said the judge, and the court recorder, a woman with brown hair hooked over her ears and a pair of hands joined to a machine, clicked into action, a sort of staccato accompanist.
The judge’s voice, at least, was nothing like Guy’s, but a big, deep voice, pitched softly to whisk over the surface things, a voice which, if singing, would boom and roar.
“I’ll be speaking for myself. I’m prepared,” said Guy.
“So am I,” put in Natalie. “Don’t think I’m not.” Her tone was high and mean. Rose was surprised. She’d expected a show of meekness.
“So this is your counsel?” the judge asked Natalie, pointing to Rose, who still stood. Counsel? He’d mistaken her for a lawyer.
“The aunt,” said Guy.
“My sister,” said Natalie.
“Rose MacGregor.” She went and shook the judge’s hand. His palm was dry and neutral. Why was she shaking his hand? Because he’d mis-taken her for a fellow professional, instead of recognizing that she might be related to Natalie—Natalie’s sister and Meggy’s aunt? Ashamed, Rose sat down beside Meggy.
“Ms. MacGregor,” said the judge, addressing Natalie pleasantly, “as I said last time, it is improper for a child to be present at these proceedings.”
“Where else should she be?” Natalie retorted.
“With a baby-sitter,” he answered. “Perhaps the aunt?” He turned to Rose. “Would you take the little girl back to the waiting area?”
Rose stood quickly. There was suddenly nothing she’d rather do.
Natalie clamped a hand on Meggy. “My daughter doesn’t leave my sight.”
Did Natalie mean to misbehave? Did she not see that she was under judgment? Did she not understand the weight of everything she said or did there?
“Anyway,” said Guy, “I need the aunt. I need her for corroboration.”
The aunt. Rose was the aunt. Yes, Meggy’s aunt, and glad of it.
“Don’t we have an affidavit from you?” the judge asked Rose.
“Jesus,” Rose blurted. “I forgot.”
“Language,” muttered Natalie.
Rose had meant to give Guy his affidavit. Where on earth had she been? All wrapped up in her work. And then, in Seattle. In Seattle, get-ting fucked, literally.
“But you’re prepared to speak here?” the judge asked her.
“I need corroboration,” Guy said, spreading his papers on the table. Did he have to be so formal? It seemed suddenly strange that he should get custody. Would he know how to talk to a little girl? What kind of father would he be? Grim and remote as now?
Rose nodded to the judge. She’d speak. But what would she say?
The judge cast his glance around the table and frowned. “As I’ve stated, I question the appropriateness of deliberating with the child present.”
“Then call the thing off. Postpone,” said Natalie in a tone so unruly, Rose turned and stared. Natalie sat heavily in her chair, large-eyed and pale, deathly afraid.
“Your Honor,” said Guy. “Please. Since we’ve gotten this far.” It was Guy who was meek now. Rose couldn’t understand it. The facts were on his side, it seemed to her.
The judge cleared his throat. “These are adult matters.”
“Meggy knows he’s not her father,” sneered Natalie.
“Ms. MacGregor,” said the judge.
“She knows everything,” Guy shot back, “the way you raised her.”
“She’d better know. I want her to see what you people are trying to do to her.”
“Ms. MacGregor,” enunciated the judge. “Mr. Robbin.” His voice, though no louder than before, exerted its force, and they all went still. “This is a formal proceeding. There will be no quarreling.” The court recorder paused in her clicking. The judge looked up out the window, a tiny lapse in demeanor, and Rose thought she saw grief. Then he snapped his jaw tight. She could almost hear his teeth crash together.
“All right,” he said. “You’re raising a fine young girl here.” Easy and warm as a friendly coach—a referee, as his title plate read—he turned to Meggy.
He was good, Rose realized; they were lucky. They might be lucky in him.
He explained custody, that the people present all cared about Meggy and what was best for her, and that more than one person wanted her to live with them. As he spoke, Meggy carefully laid on the table a small, grubby, nail-bitten hand.
“Do you have any questions about this?” he asked her, and Meggy drew a breath. “Any thoughts at all about where you would live? We’re not asking you to decide.”
Natalie leaned back from her daughter and closed her eyes.
“With my mama?” asked Meggy and Natalie exhaled noisily. But the girl’s words had been a question, not a statement.
Invited by the judge, Guy then began reading from his papers. As quietly as she could, Rose unzipped her briefcase and fished out and placed the little yellow feather in its clear plastic block onto the table where Meggy had laid her hand. The girl glanced at her mother and gingerly closed her fingers around it. Natalie looked over and rolled her eyes.
He’d known Meggy from birth, Guy was saying. Meggy had known him all her life. He’d changed her diapers; he’d been up with her when she was sick in the night. She’d known no other father, and, until forbidden to do so, she had, of her own accord, called him Daddy. He’d been the one she came to first when she hurt herself and cried.
“I don’t think so,” Natalie growled. The judge fixed her with a swift glance.
“Diapers,” Meggy muttered.
“That was a long time ago, when you were in diapers,” said the judge. “We know you’re a big girl now.” They exchanged a nod, grave, collegial— two judges who might, between them, straighten things out. Rose choked on the thought. How could they? How could any of this ever be set straight?
Guy started in again, started over, it seemed. Now he was saying all the same things but in legal language. He spoke of the need for stability and continuity of relationship, he spoke of the need for a father figure. The language was bland, almost hateful. Rose took out the jade ring in its felt box and offered it to Meggy. Uncertainly, the girl handed back the feather floating in its block.
“All yours,” Rose whispered, “all these things are yours.”
Her eyes on Rose, Meggy tucked the block into her pocket and put the ring on. Guy was speaking of Easter and of Natalie’s defiance of the visitation order. Without even knowing if the aunt was home, the mother had abandoned the child on the aunt’s doorstep, on a city street.
Asked for corroboration, Rose nodded. That was what had happened, and, of course, it was wrong, but she recalled the wonder of finding Meggy there at her door, the girl grown up from the baby she had cherished— her niece who could now sit to eat at her table and cuddle up with her at night.
“When,” said Natalie hoarsely, abruptly, “are we going to talk about the law?”
“Ms. MacGregor, you will get your turn.”
Guy set forth his worthiness as a father. Meggy meant the world to him. And he possessed the means. Unlike the child’s mother, he earned a living—various odd jobs, but steady—and he owned property.
“A shack,” said Natalie.
“Forty acres of woods on a lake. Compared to a room in a flophouse.”
The judge rapped his gavel. Meggy jumped. “There will be no interrupting,” the judge told Natalie, his voice barely more than a whisper.
“I’ve built a stone house,” Guy continued fiercely. “The roof ’s raised— a grass roof, sealed inside. Sod is laid and the grass is growing. The windows are in. She has her own bedroom and her own bed.” He’d show the girl the woods. She’d hunt and fish with him. They’d grow a garden. The court recorder sped along, her hands lively. Rose now understood Guy’s neglected appearance. He’d been working day and night to make ready. She could see Meggy safe asleep within the stone walls or out on the grass roof, learning the stars, or running loose in the day among the striped birches, jerking her first fish from the water, growing strong and free and confident. Surely the judge could see it too. Guy had built his house; he should have his child. He’d be a fine father. Meggy should be allowed to receive what Guy was so eager and able to give.
The girl had been kept truant, Guy was saying. Despite his best efforts and those of her teachers, the mother had kept her out the last month of school. The judge had affidavits from the social worker and the principal. Guy paused as though out of breath.
“Send her to school? How am I to let her out of my sight when he could kidnap her at any time?”Natalie cried, her voice as ragged as if she’d been talking all the while.
Fine—let the judge see how crazy she was, thought Rose, and reached into her briefcase and brought out the Afghani coin purse for Meggy.
“Kidnap her?” said Guy. “I would never kidnap anyone.”
“You heard me,” said Natalie.
The judge rapped his gavel and lifted his voice and then dropped it. He was not, he said, the sort of referee who chased players up and down the field. This was not a squabble fest. What example, really, did they wish to set for a youngster? If they couldn’t comport themselves, he would decide the case with no further testimony from anyone. Really, how could Ms. MacGregor answer Mr. Robbin if she didn’t first hear what he had to say? Whatever her reason, if she spoke again before being called on, he’d have her escorted from the room.
Rose reached and tugged at the top of the coin purse, which emitted a sour whiff. Meggy sniffed and, fingering the dimes inside, gave the tiniest hint of a smile.
Guy’s hands had begun to shake. The child had been kept truant. Instead of going to school, she was kept up all night praying. Was she properly fed? He didn’t know—the mother lacked an income. She refused his money, though who knows how she might spend it? On religious tracts? On contributions to a lunatic church? And meanwhile, the living conditions! That very day, he’d learned that they lacked even a working toilet, he said, and he let his papers fall and turned to Rose.
“Right,” she told the judge. “What he says is true.”
Natalie jerked Meggy’s chair closer. “Do us a favor,” she muttered to Rose. “Go over and sit on his side.”
Ignoring her, Rose rummaged in her briefcase and slipped Meggy the tiny black horse. Only Stephen’s blue china egg remained to be handed over to Meggy.
“Aunt Rose,” said Meggy softly, “we weren’t supposed to tell about the toilet.”
Rose nodded but kept her chair. Natalie had it coming. Natalie wasn’t a bad person, just a bad mother, a frightful mother, fit for nothing but to follow her own crazy whims. She could follow her whims without Meggy. She’d be fine. She’d have visitation—Guy said so. He was saying that, if granted custody, he’d abide by visitation.
Under the tabletop, Rose handed Meggy the china egg. But before Meggy could close her fingers around it, it fell and shattered. Guy flinched in his chair. Rose asked the judge’s pardon and bent to the floor to pick up the shards, but she was glad of the explosion.
It was the noise of breaking—Stephen’s egg breaking. It was the end of bad things.
But now Natalie had her turn. Let her speak, thought Rose. Things ended so things could start over. Guy would get Meggy, and Rose would visit. She’d visit all the time.
“Mr. Robbin says he abides by law.” Natalie, too, was prepared. She spoke word after careful word. Guy had never married her through six-plus years of cohabitation. He had never adopted Meggy. “If I understand the law, he has no parental rights,” she said.
The judge cleared his throat. “Is that all you have to say?”
“It is,” said Natalie. “I believe it’s all I need to say.”
It seemed to Rose a weak defense. She grinned at Meggy goofily, gawkily.
“School attendance is also a matter of law,” observed the judge.
“I’ll be getting her back in school,” said Natalie.
“Oh?” said the judge. “Have you got her registered? Have you deter-mined whether she can be tutored this summer or whether she must repeat the first grade?”
“I said I will get her back in school. She will be in school in September.”
Weak, thought Rose.
“Very well,” said the judge. “May I ask how you are living? Paying the rent?”
“We are not to be tempted by money,” said Natalie and took the coin purse from Meggy’s hands and pushed it over to Rose. “We will not worship mammon.”
Another Christian paid their rent, she said, a friend of her father, a dis-interested person, and Rose recalled the chinless man in the photo.
“May I ask,” said the judge, “how you and the girl are eating?”
“Food shelf,” declared Natalie, “if it’s anyone’s business. And clothes from Goodwill. Blessed are the poor,” she said and joined her palms together.
Good, thought Rose. Let the judge see this too.
“Dear Jesus, enlighten our minds,” intoned Natalie.
“All right,” said the judge. “I believe I’ve got the picture.” He continued to speak as Natalie continued to pray. “What we’ve got here is an eccentric situation,” he said.
No kidding, thought Rose, on the edge of jubilation. Natalie lapsed into silence.
“We’ve got a mother who thinks prayer comes before earning a living or providing a nice place to live,” said the judge. “We’ve got a father who has a more usual view, except he isn’t actually the father. And we have a little girl who is at least adequately fed and clothed.”
Rose felt her heart drop. Something was going wrong.
“Some of us may not like this,” he went on. “Some of us may really dis-approve of the up-all-night praying.”
Rose bobbed her head like an idiot.
“I am constrained, however, to rule according to law,” he said and flashed Guy a look of what had to be sympathy. But then the look was gone and the judge was stone. “For a legal stranger to get custody, conditions must exist which don’t exist here.”
Rose choked. Guy was on his feet. “A stranger?”
“Mr. Robbin, weeks ago, when you set this matter in motion, my clerk advised you of the difficulties,” said the judge. The court recorder rattled on. Guy staggered down into his seat again. “You were told you could petition for custody. Anyone can do that. You were also advised that the rights of the natural parent were likely to prevail. Unless related by blood, by marriage, or by adoption, you have only as much legal right to the girl as a stranger walking by on the street.”
“A blood relative,” said Rose. “What about me?”
The judge frowned.
“Anyone can petition for custody,” she persisted. “Could I?” She sud-denly saw how it should be. She felt what she had to give. If the judge sighed, she didn’t hear it. If he shook his head, she didn’t see. Nor did she see Meggy looking up at her, dismayed. Instead, she remembered what the little girl had said at the rooming house in Frogtown. Rose again felt the little hand on the back of her knee and heard the suggestion that she, Rose, be the mother and Natalie be the aunt. Meggy had spoken, hadn’t she?
“I’ll take her. Let me take Meggy. I petition for custody.”
Natalie stared. “You bitch,” she said. “Have your own damned baby.”
But the words were mere noise to Rose, a sneeze, a scratching on the table. Rose saw Meggy with her, breakfasts and suppers, the little girl’s quiet breathing beside her in the night, the clothes she’d get her, after-school conversations, piano lessons, college. Rose’s career might be wrecked. She might fail to win tenure. All of that could be faced, how-ever. She’d have Meggy and she would cope. She’d wait tables, if need be. Nothing would prevent her from seeing that Meggy got everything—not a feather here and a ring there—but peace and plenty every single day and safety every single night.