needed it. Beds and chairs and tables and rugs, of course, but also plates and glasses and sets of silverware, even good old sheets and mixing bowls and egg beaters and wooden spoons. A great find was an old pine blanket chest that turned out to have eight good quilts inside it.
People, some people, were already tired of the country, tired of living with the same stuff that had been in the house for generations. After the war, they wanted a clean sweep. There was a longing for the new, the modern, and a disregard, just beginning, for lives that had been lived in faithful seclusion, fathers and sons working the same land, climbing up and down the steep stairs their great-grandfathers had climbed, had sometimes even built by hand.
A whole hotel, Alum Springs, went out of business because people just didn’t believe any more in the curative powers of the waters, and Alma got for Charlie a whole set of heavy hotel silver, knives and forks and spoons for twelve, even if Charlie didn’t know twelve people in the whole town. She bought him a porch rocker for a dollar, and heavy maroon velvet curtains, everything he could need for setting up a kitchen, and rugs that ladies had walked on when their skirts still swept the floor.
There was even a grand piano, and Alma raised her hand to bid, but Charlie and Will begged her to stop—nobody played, no matter how beautiful it might be or even how cheap, so she stopped at thirty-four dollars. It went for forty-eight, and Alma settled instead for twelve huge bath towels with ALUM SPRINGS written on them, two dollars for the lot.
She had a vision for Charlie’s house that mystified the amused men. She wanted it not simply to house, but to attract, although who or what wasn’t quite clear. It was as though she already had a vision of who Charlie would become, and was outfitting his rooms so that a woman would feel at home when she arrived.
He moved in on the last Friday in September. Most of the furniture was already there, but Will and Charlie worked all day, putting the pieces where Alma told them to. They opened all the tall windows, and the warm Indian summer air blew through the house, the men with dark sweat rings under their arms as they lugged sofas and armoires from one room to another.
Charlie picked out a bedroom, not the biggest one, but facing east, so he might still wake at the first light of dawn and smell the first breeze of the day. Alma laid out the linen sheets on the bed, tucking the corners tightly so the sheets wouldn’t get all tangled up in the night. She put on the bed one of the strongest and brightest of the quilts, a pattern called Crown of Thomas, even though Charlie wouldn’t need it for weeks and weeks, just to add some color to the room.
As he worked, Will smiled and sang the verses of one of the mournful old songs over and over:
Oh, I wish I had someone to love me
Someone to call me their own
Oh, I wish I had someone to live with
’Cause I’m tired of living alone.
Finally Charlie told him to quit it, and Will did. But Alma still hummed it, forgetting, maybe, that however cheerful the melody, it was about going off to jail and dying, that song.
Now I have a grand ship on the ocean
All mounted in silver and gold
And before my poor darling would suffer,
Oh, that ship would be anchored and sold.
Mac Wiseman sang that song on the radio. It was a beautiful thing to hear.
Neighbors dropped by, bringing things, saying how glad they were that the house wasn’t empty any more. They brought lunch, egg salad sandwiches on rich, fluffy rolls, and potato chips, and Mason jars full of sweet tea with mint and lemon.
Betty Fowler from next door brought a potted chrysanthemum, russet gold, a massive plant that spoke of fall and last bright fadings. She even picked out where to put it on the porch so it would catch the most light, telling Charlie to be sure to pinch the dead flowers every day, so more flowers would come in abundance. In the late afternoon
People, some people, were already tired of the country, tired of living with the same stuff that had been in the house for generations. After the war, they wanted a clean sweep. There was a longing for the new, the modern, and a disregard, just beginning, for lives that had been lived in faithful seclusion, fathers and sons working the same land, climbing up and down the steep stairs their great-grandfathers had climbed, had sometimes even built by hand.
A whole hotel, Alum Springs, went out of business because people just didn’t believe any more in the curative powers of the waters, and Alma got for Charlie a whole set of heavy hotel silver, knives and forks and spoons for twelve, even if Charlie didn’t know twelve people in the whole town. She bought him a porch rocker for a dollar, and heavy maroon velvet curtains, everything he could need for setting up a kitchen, and rugs that ladies had walked on when their skirts still swept the floor.
There was even a grand piano, and Alma raised her hand to bid, but Charlie and Will begged her to stop—nobody played, no matter how beautiful it might be or even how cheap, so she stopped at thirty-four dollars. It went for forty-eight, and Alma settled instead for twelve huge bath towels with ALUM SPRINGS written on them, two dollars for the lot.
She had a vision for Charlie’s house that mystified the amused men. She wanted it not simply to house, but to attract, although who or what wasn’t quite clear. It was as though she already had a vision of who Charlie would become, and was outfitting his rooms so that a woman would feel at home when she arrived.
He moved in on the last Friday in September. Most of the furniture was already there, but Will and Charlie worked all day, putting the pieces where Alma told them to. They opened all the tall windows, and the warm Indian summer air blew through the house, the men with dark sweat rings under their arms as they lugged sofas and armoires from one room to another.
Charlie picked out a bedroom, not the biggest one, but facing east, so he might still wake at the first light of dawn and smell the first breeze of the day. Alma laid out the linen sheets on the bed, tucking the corners tightly so the sheets wouldn’t get all tangled up in the night. She put on the bed one of the strongest and brightest of the quilts, a pattern called Crown of Thomas, even though Charlie wouldn’t need it for weeks and weeks, just to add some color to the room.
As he worked, Will smiled and sang the verses of one of the mournful old songs over and over:
Oh, I wish I had someone to love me
Someone to call me their own
Oh, I wish I had someone to live with
’Cause I’m tired of living alone.
Finally Charlie told him to quit it, and Will did. But Alma still hummed it, forgetting, maybe, that however cheerful the melody, it was about going off to jail and dying, that song.
Now I have a grand ship on the ocean
All mounted in silver and gold
And before my poor darling would suffer,
Oh, that ship would be anchored and sold.
Mac Wiseman sang that song on the radio. It was a beautiful thing to hear.
Neighbors dropped by, bringing things, saying how glad they were that the house wasn’t empty any more. They brought lunch, egg salad sandwiches on rich, fluffy rolls, and potato chips, and Mason jars full of sweet tea with mint and lemon.
Betty Fowler from next door brought a potted chrysanthemum, russet gold, a massive plant that spoke of fall and last bright fadings. She even picked out where to put it on the porch so it would catch the most light, telling Charlie to be sure to pinch the dead flowers every day, so more flowers would come in abundance. In the late afternoon
Similar Books
