“Looks to have been broken a long time,” Daniel says, watching Jonathon rummage for another screwdriver. Maybe he isn’t so bad. It’s not his fault he’s always the extra set of hands.
“No telling,” Jonathon says and walks toward the back of the house. “Holler if you find anything worth keeping.”
Evie sits on the edge of Aunt Ruth’s bed, swinging her feet so the bedsprings creak and watching Aunt Ruth try to thread a needle. She is still sleeping in Evie’s room, but once Elaine gets married to Jonathon, Aunt Ruth and her baby will live in Elaine’s old room.
“You know your mother doesn’t like you doing that,” Aunt Ruth says.
Evie glances at Aunt Ruth, offers no response and the bed continues to squeak.
Aunt Ruth misses the needle’s eye with her thread for a second time and smiles. “Light’s not so good today,” she says. “Would you like to try?”
“Daddy says Olivia won’t die all the way until spring.”
Aunt Ruth lowers the needle and thread. “What do you suppose he means by that?”
“He said things don’t all the way die when it’s so cold outside. He said she’ll finishing dying in spring. He said she’ll sink into the ground and come back as a tree or something.”
Aunt Ruth rests both hands in her lap. “I guess I understand that.”
Evie nods. “Yeah, me, too.” She stops swinging her feet. “Was it cold outside when Aunt Eve died?”
Aunt Ruth wraps her thread around the small bolt and lays it and the needle on her bedside table. “It was warm,” she says. “A beautiful time of year.”
“Is she all the way dead now?”
“Yes, she is.”
Evie leans back on both arms and begins to swing her legs again so that her feet bounce off the box frame. “I saw Uncle Ray at church,” she says. “He was visiting a grave.” She stops swinging. “Is Aunt Eve’s grave there? Was he visiting Aunt Eve?”
Aunt Ruth flips on the lamp near her bed, opens the small drawer in her nightstand and lifts out two round stones.
“Perhaps,” she says, holding the stones in the palm of her hand. “I suspect he was.”
Daniel stops at the top of the stairs where a long hallway leads to the far end of the house. While the downstairs felt like a barn because of the wind blowing through the broken window and the leaves and dirt scattered about the wooden floors, the upstairs feels like a home, like he might find Mrs. Brewster living right behind one of the five doors that line the hallway. He takes a step toward the first room, slowly, carefully, leading with his toe and only rolling back onto his heel when the wooden floor doesn’t bow underfoot.
Grabbing the knob on the first door with two fingers, he gently pushes and pulls, testing the hinges. They creak but swing freely. He takes one step closer, testing the floors again with his toe, and inspects each hinge. They are tarnished and black but Jonathon will want them. He’ll scrub them with acid and a toothbrush and by the time he hangs them in Elaine’s and his house, they’ll be like new. Before continuing, he knocks on each of the door’s six panels, happy to be doing something that doesn’t involve Mama’s rubber gloves and a bucket of soapy water. Solid. Yep, Jonathon’ll want this one.
Pushing open the second door, Daniel coughs at the dust kicked up and squints into the light that spills across the hallway. A bathroom. Better paint job on this door. Frame is in good shape. Hinges look the same. The third and fourth are keepers, too, making Daniel wonder how many doors Jonathon needs for his new house. The biggest bedroom, which was behind the first door, was empty, but the smaller two still have furniture in them-dressers, a rocking chair, two single beds-all covered with white sheets.
Daniel steps into the second small bedroom and carefully pulls the sheet from a rocking chair. He coughs and waves away the rising dust. Evie would like the red-checkered seat cushion, even if the rocking chair might be too big for her. Maybe, if Norbert Brewster doesn’t want it anymore, Dad will come back with his truck after the snow melts and take the chair home for Evie. It might make her forget about Olivia rotting away in the back pasture and Aunt Eve being dead and Julianne Robison still missing. Before draping the sheet back over the chair, Daniel looks at the ceiling and hopes it won’t cave in on Evie’s chair before they can come back for it. Black mold seeps out from each corner and a single crack runs the length of the room. He backs away from the rocker, watching the snowfall through a dirty window.
Once outside the room, Daniel looks down the hallway to the last door. All of them are fine, and after Jonathon gets through with them, the hinges will be fine, too. Taking a few steps toward the staircase, Daniel calls down to Jonathon.
“Got five good ones up here,” he shouts. “Hardware looks good, too.”
“Did you say five?” Jonathon calls up. “Five? All in good shape?”
Daniel looks at the last door. “Yeah, five.” He coughs.
“All have good hinges?” Jonathon calls back as he appears at the bottom of the stairs.
Daniel motions for Jonathon to come up and see for himself.
Celia takes two mugs from the cabinet overhead and fills them both with coffee. Reesa, sitting at the head of the kitchen table, stitches the belt back onto the body of a lavender and green plaid apron. The fabric is faded and frayed at the seams.
“I’ve never seen that one before,” Celia says, setting one of the mugs in front of Reesa.
“Haven’t worn it.” Reesa drapes the apron across her lap, demonstrating how little of her it protects. “Covered more of me when I was younger.” She smiles, which makes Celia smile and realize that Reesa, after all these months, is making a joke. “Made from a feed sack,” she says, holding the apron up again.
“From a feed sack?” Celia asks. “But it’s such lovely fabric.”
“Mother always picked the nicest ones for aprons. Different sack, different fabric.”
“Do you have others?” Celia asks, looking at the bag sitting near Reesa’s feet.
“Mmmm,” Reesa says, meaning yes, and she lifts the bag into her lap. “Here’s another.” She holds up a blue calico bib apron with a solid blue ruffle sewn at the waistline. “Mother always liked ruffles. Here,” Reesa says, handing the apron across the table to Celia. “This’ll fit you still.”
Celia frowns at the comment, thinking Reesa means that someday Celia will outgrow it, too.
“I couldn’t, Reesa,” Celia says. “Those are antiques. They’re too special.”
“Mmmm,” Reesa says, again meaning yes.
While Reesa inspects the blue calico apron for torn seams, Celia takes a deep breath, and says, “Will you tell me about Eve?”
Reesa continues to run her fingers over the worn cotton, pulling the thin belt through two fingers and tugging when she gets to the end. “What’s there to know?”
“Well, I’m not sure.”
Behind Celia, her bedroom door is closed. Having been up late fixing the back window and watching for Ray, Arthur is taking a nap.
“Arthur is getting more… well, more angry. Don’t you think? I’m worried about him. And about Ruth. It seems that… there is something else. Something I don’t know.”
“The child is gone. Dead and buried. Not much more matters, does it?”
“No, definitely not. But something is eating away at him. You see that. I know you do. He stayed away from here for so long.”
Celia waits, but Reesa doesn’t respond.
“He thinks he should have saved her, doesn’t he? His father thought that, too. He blamed Arthur. Blamed Arthur for Eve’s death.”
Reesa pulls a spool of blue thread from her sewing case, wets one end by dabbing it on her tongue and, lifting her hands to catch the light coming through the kitchen window, she pokes it through the eye of her needle.