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  My mother gave me a couple of ashtrays for the sale. She and my father both quit smoking, so they have all these ashtrays nobody uses. One says, “Old doctors never die, they just lose their patients.” That’s my favorite.

  I went through my jewelry box and chose a necklace I found last year in the movies. It was tucked down in my seat and I thought at first it might be real diamonds. It turned out not to be real anything. Rowena said her mother said we could have her old fur coat We got all excited and raced over to have a look. After we inspected Rowena’s mother’s coat, we decided to put a price of two dollars on it, so as to leave room for bargaining. People who go to yard sales expect to bargain. It’s no fun if something is marked $1.50 and you pay $1.50 and that’s that. Bargaining’s half the fun. So you should price items accordingly. I learned that from an article I read in a magazine telling you how to go about organizing a yard sale.

  I smell a fight coming up with Betty. So far, she hasn’t contributed anything. She claims the Chum Club was her idea so she thinks that should let her off the hook and that she doesn’t have to contribute anything. Rowena and I are furious.

  I think there’s more than meets the eye with a yard sale. It looks as if some personality conflicts were cropping up. Tact may be required to resolve these conflicts. I think we should take a vote on who has the most tact and let that person handle the matter.

  One thing sure, it won’t be Rowena.

  4

  We’re in luck. A new family moved into the house on the end of our road yesterday. There are a lot of kids, Rowena’s mother says. Five or six, maybe. Rowena’s mother usually knows. When she isn’t being a housewife, she scours the surrounding countryside looking for newcomers. She has appointed herself the official newcomer welcomer. When she sights the moving van on the outskirts of town, Rowena’s mother hotfoots it for home and gets all doozied up in her print dress and her black shoes with heels and stuffs a scented hanky down her bosom and marches out with a loaf of her freshly baked bread tucked under her arm to welcome the newcomers. There can never be enough newcomers for her, she says.

  My father says that bread is enough to head them off at the pass. He says if the newcomers knew what was waiting for them, they’d turn and run. He says that bread would give an orangutan indigestion. He says if Rowena’s mother ever gives us another loaf of her freshly baked bread, he’s going to drop it on her foot. He says he’ll be very interested to see what happens to Rowena’s mother’s foot when her bread falls on it.

  Anyway, this family has a crowd of kids. They range from little to fairly big, Rowena’s mother says. She says she caught a glimpse inside the moving van and counted at least four beds. Maybe more.

  “Where do they hail from?” Mrs. Sykes asked Rowena’s mother. Mrs. Sykes has a little beard, sort of like a goat, and is hard-of-hearing. She lives alone and takes a bath in the spring and in the fall. When she was a girl, her grandmother told her that too much water dries out the complexion. People tend to avoid Mrs. Sykes. She shouts so people will be sure to hear her.

  “I said, ‘Where do they hail from?’” Mrs. Sykes asked again, at the top of her voice, when Rowena’s mother didn’t answer her right off.

  “They’re outa staters!” Rowena’s mother shouted back. In Maine anyone who isn’t born and bred in Maine is an outa stater.

  “‘That so?” Mrs. Sykes shook her head despairingly. “Well, might’s well try to pretend they’re good as you and me. Might’s well close our eyes to the fact they’re different and just smile and say, ‘Howdy.’ God moves in mysterious ways. Maybe He’s testing us, wants to see how charitable we can be. Wants to sit back and watch us love our fellowman.” Mrs. Sykes pulled at her little beard the way she does when she’s puzzled.

  “Can’t say as I see why He wants to push us like that, though. I put a dollar in the plate last Sunday. Didn’t expect any thanks. Didn’t expect a load of foreigners in my front yard, neither!” she said. Then she waddled over to her 1949 Chevvy that has its original tires, and drove home. Everybody in town knows Mrs. Sykes. They try to stay out of her way as much as possible. She drives smack in the middle of the road, to avoid accidents, sounding her horn all the way. Her horn makes a funny little bleating noise that also sounds like a goat. Mrs. Sykes raises goats, which may account for her resembling one. They say people begin to look like their dogs after a while. So that would explain Mrs. Sykes and her beard. Anyway, she was born and raised in Maine.

  “Never been outa state but the once,” she brags. “Didn’t want to go then, but it was our honeymoon and my husband had relatives over in New Hampshire owed him money. So we went. Didn’t stay but the one night, though. Left right after they paid up. He charged ’em interest too. Oh, you shoulda heard ’em when he charged ’em interest.” Then she’d shake her head, and her little beard would tremble with admiration at her husband’s cunning.

  Rowena couldn’t wait to fill Betty and me in on the details of the newcomers.

  “There’s a girl about our age,” Rowena said. “Got this real cute figure, from what I could see, and she’s got curly hair. Permed, most likely.” Rowena rolled her eyes around in her head so vigorously I was fearful they might fly out of their sockets and land in the road.

  “Maybe this new girl would be good for our club,” I suggested. “Lord knows we got room.”

  Betty said, “She’s from outa state,” as if that disqualified the new girl from joining.

  “So what?” I said. “I think we should go over there and say hi. How would you feel if you were new in town and nobody even came over and said hi? Wouldn’t you feel rotten?”

  “I guess,” Rowena said doubtfully. We don’t get too many strangers moving in around here, and most folks get clutched at the very idea.

  “Well,” I said, “I don’t know about you two, but I’m going.” So we went. The moving van was just pulling out as we arrived. It was a move-yourself type. A big, burly red-faced man was driving. He waved to us and we waved back. Rowena’s mother was just pulling in, her loaf of freshly baked bread tucked under her arm, her black shoes with the heels carrying her swiftly down the driveway, past the shed where the previous tenants kept their chickens, past the little heaps of car parts scattered here and there, as if for decoration, and onto the front porch, right up to the door.

  The yard was deserted. There was an old blue truck out in back and piles of empty boxes and cartons sitting on the porch. Just as Rowena’s mother lifted her fist to bang on the door, a dog came around the side of the house, walking slowly on stiff legs, growling a little deep in his throat to show who was boss.

  “Oh, oh,” Betty said. We watched. The dog stood still. So did Rowena’s mother. A boy who looked like he had adenoids came to the door.

  “My ma’s not home,” he said, pushing his face against the screening, which billowed out like a sail filled with wind. “She said not to let nobody in.” He stared out at Rowena’s mother and us. The dog sighed and flopped down and fell immediately asleep.

  “I’m your new neighbor,” Rowena’s mother said in her sweet company voice. She held out the bread. “Welcome,” she said. “I baked this fresh this morning. For you all. Welcome.”

  He stared at her some more. His dark little eyes were full of hostility. “We can’t take stuff from strangers,” he said at last. “My ma said you never know what might be inside. Razor blades. Pizen.” That’s what he said: “Pizen.” We figured he meant poison. We could see Rowen’s mother’s back stiffen. She has been known to fly off the handle.

  “Besides,” the boy said, “we’re vegetarians,” almost like other folks say, “We’re Presbyterians.”

  For once, Rowena’s mother was speechless. “Let’s go,” Betty whispered. That seemed like a good idea. We turned on our heels.

  “Where’s the dump?” a loud voice demanded.

  “What?” I said, looking around. A girl about our age, with plenty of bouncy curls, stood on the steps. “Where’s the dump?” she repeated crossly
. “Where’s it at? First thing we always do, we find where the dump’s at. You’d be surprised what you find laying around a dump. Why, once we fixed ourselves up with a bed and a davenport and a chiffonier. All three. Plus”—she dragged out her voice to get our attention—“plus a whole roll of Christmas wrapping paper. Silver and clean as a whisker.” She smiled. “Was that at Bradford Falls, where we found that?” she asked the boy with adenoids. He said something we couldn’t catch.

  “Anyways,” the girl said impatiently, “where’s it at?”

  I made my voice as loud as hers as I said, “Turn left at the top of the hill, go along till you come to Cross Road, take another left, follow that to the end. You can’t miss it.”

  “O.K.” She nodded and didn’t say, “Thanks.”

  “My name’s Schuyler Sweet,” I said. I would’ve shaken hands, but she had the look about her of turning people down so I didn’t. Her dress was real short, and her legs were bare and purplish from the cold. She was eleven, twelve, thereabouts and she already had a figure. None of the rest of us did, although Rowena liked to think she did.

  “What kind of a name’s that? I never heard of a person named that before,” she said.

  “Best kind.” I put her in her place. “What’s yours?”

  “Nell Foster,” she said with a practiced toss of her curls. “These here …” Her arm swept behind her, taking in the crowd of kids who had gathered behind her. There were only three of them, it turned out, but they seemed like a crowd.

  “They’re my kin.”

  Behind me I could hear Betty and Rowena breathing heavily. Take them out of their own backyard and they’re all thumbs, if you get my meaning.

  “That’s a lot of kin,” I said. Nell Foster didn’t answer. She stepped smartly back inside the house and shut the door in my face. Rowena’s mother snatched up her loaf of bread and marched back down the driveway, head high, shaking with rage.

  After a minute we followed. At the end of the property I stole a backward look. The place looked deserted. Even the dog was gone. It was almost as if I’d imagined the lot of them.

  “Come on,” Betty called. “We better get out of here. They’re outa staters. What can you expect?” I followed them down the narrow dirt road, but I kept my distance so that if anyone happened to look out of the window of the house they wouldn’t think we were together.

  5

  “Mama, I don’t want you to go,” Sidney said. The boys and I were watching my mother pack her suitcase. She’s leaving tomorrow. My father is driving her to Portland to get a plane to Boston, where she’ll catch her flight to Africa.

  “I’ll only be gone two weeks, Sidney. I’ll be back before you know I’m gone.” She swept him up in a big hug. “And I’ll bring you back something special. What would you like?” She put Sidney down and held up a flowered skirt. “I hate this skirt,” she said. “Never should have bought it. What would you like, Sidney?”

  Sidney concentrated on what he’d like her to bring him. “How about a little alligator?” he said at last. “One I could fit in my pocket. Then I could take him to kindergarten for show-and-tell. I bet it would be the only alligator in school that ever came from Africa. I would like that.” His big eyes never left her face. I knew Sidney would have a bad time the first couple of days my mother was gone. He always did. I never told her how much Sidney missed her because I knew it would make her feel bad. This was the first trip she’d taken since she and Dad had gotten divorced.

  My father said from the doorway, “Don’t forget to tell your mother to leave us her itinerary. I want to know how to reach her at all times. Just in case.”

  “Dad,” I said. “There she is. You tell her.” My father had been shut up in his studio all morning working on Plotsie. I could tell by his hair. It stood up in peaks, like well-whipped cream. Before they got divorced, my mother and father told us that didn’t mean they didn’t still care about each other. They did, they said. My mother told me when she got back from her trip she might move into a small house and take us kids with her. “What about Dad?” I said.

  “He’ll manage,” she said, avoiding my eye. “He’ll get along fine. Your father doesn’t really need people. You’ll see.”

  I didn’t believe her then, and I don’t believe her now.

  “I’m hoping Angus will come back with me,” my mother said directly to my father. Angus is the great white hunter she told me she was in love with. He’s from Australia, only she met him the last time she went to Africa. “I want him to meet the children and see Maine. I want you to meet him too,” she said. “I want to know what you think of him.”

  “Don’t be too determinedly modern about this, Mary,” my father said, patting his pockets for a pack of cigarettes, forgetting for the moment he’d given them up. “I’m not sure I want to meet Angus.”

  My mother got red in the face. “I want the children to meet him and tell me what they think of him. Tad, you haven’t said what you want me to bring you.” She cupped Tad’s chin in her hand. “What is your heart’s desire, darling?” she asked him.

  Tad is not very talkative. Some days you can count the number of words he says on the fingers of both hands. My mother and father worried about him when he was little. He didn’t start to talk until he was almost four. That’s very late to start talking. When he finally broke down, he said, “No, thank you. I don’t want any.” Then he shut up for another week or ten days until he had something else worth saying.

  Now he said, “I want an elephant tusk, Mama. Not a big one. A medium-size one. Please.” Then he clamped his lips tight shut, a sign he was signing off until further notice.

  My mother made out a list: Sidney, one small alligator. Tad, one medium-size elephant tusk.

  “How about you, Sky?” she asked me. I felt like saying, “Leave Angus where he’s at,” but I knew that would hurt her feelings. So I said, “Oh, I don’t know, Mom. How about a warthog? They’re kind of cute.” I liked the idea of having my own warthog.

  “If I had a warthog, we could make him the mascot of our club,” I said.

  “What club’s that?” my mother said, checking the camera she was planning to take with her.

  “This club we’ve started. It’s called the Chum Club. It’s me and Rowena and Betty and maybe the new girl. We didn’t ask her yet.”

  “I heard there was a new family down the road.” My mother rolled up a pair of chinos and tucked them in a corner of her suitcase. She’s an expert packer. A good thing. She does a lot of packing. “That’s nice there are some new children around. What time should we leave in the morning?” she asked my father, who lounged in the doorway, propped against the doorframe, regarding her quizzically.

  “About nine. I want to get home to get some work done. Sidney can stay with Mrs. Edwards. I’ll pick him up there.” Mrs. Edwards lives not far from us. Her children have grown. She loves having Sidney stay with her. She says it’s like having her own grandchild. Her children are reluctant to commit themselves to parenthood, she told my mother.

  “There’s a lot of hogwash going on these days,” Mrs. Edwards said when she told my mother she doubted she’d ever be a grandmother. “If you ask me,” she said, “there’s more hogwash going on than previously. If you ask me, there’s too much talk and too little action going around these days.” Mrs. Edwards was fond of saying, “If you ask me,” although nobody ever got a chance to ask her anything because she was inclined to answer questions before they were asked.

  That night we all ate together. My father was unusually quiet. My mother chatted and smiled and kept patting us. Except my father, of course. We had roast chicken and mashed potatoes and green beans. And apple pie for dessert.

  “I’m going to miss you all,” my mother said. Sidney got down from his chair and went off to his room. My mother and father exchanged looks, like in the days before they got their divorce.

  “I could kick myself,” my mother said. “How could I be so stupid?”

  We h
eard Sidney keening away in his bed. “What’s his problem?” Tad demanded in an angry voice. “She’s only going to be gone two weeks.” Then he left the table too, and when I found him, he was lying in the empty, dry bathtub playing with his plastic dinosaurs.

  I put my hand on the hot water faucet, pretending I was going to turn it on, trying to make him smile.

  “I don’t care if she’s going,” he whispered, closing his eyes. “She’ll be back. Won’t she? She said she’d be back. She always comes back.” Here I was, halfway to twelve, and I felt like crying too. But I wasn’t going to be a baby about my mother’s going. I had to set an example for the boys.

  Besides, it wasn’t as if my father didn’t take good care of us. He always does. I’m glad he works at home. Also, he’s quite a good cook. His specialty is fried potatoes. Once in a while we pig out on his fried potatoes. He cooks us a meal and that’s all we eat: fried potatoes. We can have all we can hold, he says. We eat until we’re full, then he opens a jar of apple sauce or canned peaches for dessert. Once, in the summer, when my mother was away, he took us down to the dock to the Lobster Shack for a lobster dinner. It was so beautiful that night. The moon was full, and there weren’t any bugs, and we sat on the deck and tied lobster bibs around our necks so we wouldn’t get melted butter on ourselves. Eating lobsters is very messy. People came from miles around to eat at the Lobster Shack. When my father finishes eating a lobster, all that’s left is a pile of shells. Being a Maine native, he knows how. It takes years of practice to really eat a lobster, he says.