By April she knew without doubt that the baby was on the way. Bert took the news stolidly, no least sign of happiness at the prospect of a little child of their own.
Mrs. Loveland shook her head. “You’re going to be sorry you didn’t wait,” she said. Katherine very nearly retorted, Tell that to Bert, but turned away and went to go feed the black chicken.
She gave up any attempt to be a good farm wife, and nobody seemed to care. She luxuriated in her freedom; took long walks alone, now that spring had come and the dogwoods were flowering. Where the red clay road cut across the hills she imagined she’d walked into a Thomas Hart Benton painting. This was the only part of the South that was the way she’d dreamed it would be.
One afternoon she was passing a house set close to the road, and heard music: Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto no. 1, to her astonishment, sounding scratched and tinny as though it were coming out of the horn of an old Victrola but still flowing magnificently on. She leaned against the split rail fence, listening, rapt. Someone was moving inside the house, through the window she saw someone dancing. Wild, free-form, arms flung out. A second later the woman pirouetted close to the window and saw her. She stopped dancing immediately.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” said Katherine, blushing. “I just—the music was so beautiful. I love Tchaikovsky, but there aren’t any classical radio stations here—”
“I know,” said the woman, pushing up the window the rest of the way and leaning out. Her face was pale and sharp, her gaze fixed. “It is an absolute purgatory for anyone of any culture. Or decent breeding. Tell me, are you a devotee of Beethoven?”
“Well, yes—”
“Please, come in. Will you come in?” said the woman. She ducked inside and slammed the window. By the time Katherine had come reluctantly up the path, the woman was standing at the open door.
“I am Amelia DuPlessis Hickey,” she said, inclining in a queenly sort of way. “I would introduce my dear husband, but he is currently traveling abroad on necessary business. Please, do come in! And you would be?”
“Katherine MacQuarrie,” she replied, and then added, “Loveland.”
“I see,” said the woman, as the music behind her wound down to hissing silence. “Would that be of the Greenville MacQuarries? With the DeLafayette MacQuarrie who perished at Gettysburg?”
“I don’t think so,” said Katherine, stepping across the threshold. “I’m afraid I don’t know a lot about my father’s people—”
“Ah! Well, things happen,” said Mrs. Hickey graciously. “Won’t you stay for tea?”
“Why, thank you,” said Katherine, and recoiled as something sprang up out of a packing box beside her and screamed.
“Now, Peaseblossom, that won’t do!” said Mrs. Hickey. “I really must apologize, Mrs. Loveland. Pray allow me to introduce my beautiful little geniuses: Peaseblossom, Cobweb, Moth and the baby, Mustardseed!”
She was referring to the pale and sullen children who crouched together in the corner. The two boys wore only overalls, rolled up thickly at the ankles; the girl wore a flour-sack dress. They had retreated behind what appeared to be a wooden model of the Brooklyn Bridge. From the pieces scattered on the bare floor, it seemed that they themselves had been constructing it. They were fox-faced, emaciated, staring with enormous dark eyes. A whimper from the floor drew her attention to an ashen baby waving its skinny arms from an apple box.
After a moment of appalled silence Katherine said:
“How clever. You named them after the fairies in Midsummer Night’s Dream, I guess?”
“I adore Shakespeare. Another passion of mine. My grandfather, Zadoc DuPlessis (for we are of the Chaney County DuPlessises, you see) had the good fortune to see the immortal Junius Booth in Charleston where, I believe, he was portraying Hamlet,” said Mrs. Hickey, stoking up the stove. She put a saucepan of water on the burner. Katherine looked around. The room was as filthy as a bare room can be. There were ancient books stacked everywhere, piled against the walls, and three crates of phonograph records. In the corner by the window was, yes, a Victrola with its morning-glory trumpet.
“Gosh, how lucky,” said Katherine. There were no chairs, so she wandered over to the children. “How are you all today?”
They shrank back. The little girl bared her teeth.
“I do beg your pardon,” said Mrs. Hickey, coming swiftly to her side. “They are terribly shy with strangers. We have, alas, nearly no social life. Now, you come out here and be ladies and gentlemen for our caller! Perhaps then we’ll go out for a Co-colee.”
The children blinked and scrambled out, lining up awkwardly against the wall.
“They do love Coca-Cola,” said Mrs. Hickey.
It was two hours before Katherine could get away. Mrs. Hickey told her life story: her family had once owned most of three counties, but of course The War had altered their circumstances, though not so grievously she hadn’t been raised with the best of everything and taught to appreciate all that was exquisite in the arts.
And she’d given it all up for love; so now she rusticated here, teaching her brilliant offspring herself. The boys were clearly destined to be engineers. Why, they’d made that bridge themselves from nothing more than slatwood, all you had to do was show them a picture and they’d build anything! And little Peaseblossom had inherited a love of great literature, she just devoured books. The children listened to all this silent and expressionless.
Later, back at the Lovelands’, Katherine went out to feed the chickens. She picked up the little black hen and buried her face in its feathers, feeling her hot tears spilling, and prayed that she wouldn’t turn out like Mrs. DuPlessis-Hickey.
Summer came and went, and autumn arrived with cornshocks and pumpkins. In the early hours of October 30, Katherine went into labor. Bert joked about the baby being a little Halloween goblin as he drove her to the hospital in town. She wasn’t laughing by the time they got to the hospital. The pains were terrible.
The nurses got her into a room and Bert told her he had to get back, that he’d come see her that evening. She begged him to tell the nurses to give her something for the pain. The head nurse came in and told her they were having difficulty locating Dr. Jackson; as soon as they heard from him they’d give her something.
All the interminable morning and afternoon, they were unable to find him, had no idea where he might be, and at last they gave Katherine drugs anyway. The relief was blissful, unbelievable, and she received with floaty equanimity the news that the baby was turned wrong. “Well, just turn it around,” she told them, smiling.
The bright window darkened and it was night. She floated in and out of a dream about Halloween, big yellow pumpkins on gateposts, little children scurrying in the dark with papier-mache faces. But that wouldn’t be until tomorrow night, would it? They gave her more drugs. Trick or treat!
Suddenly there was a nurse screaming and crying, praying to Jesus. Her sister had called from New Jersey. She’d been listening to Charlie McCarthy and when Nelson Eddy came on she’d switched away. (Katherine felt mildly outraged. How could anyone switch off Nelson Eddy?) The man on the radio had said Earth was being invaded by Martians! They’d come in a big cylinder and were burning people up! State troopers too! It was the end of the world!
The baby was turned around now but the head was too big. The head was stuck. There was a colored lady talking to her soothingly, wiping her face with a cold cloth. You have to work, honey, she kept saying. Nobody could find news of the invasion on the little radio in the cafeteria, but a man ran in and said he’d heard strange lights had begun to appear in the sky, were swooping and circling the town, had they landed yet? There was one. It was right outside the hospital. It looked like a soup plate on fire. The colored lady was crying now too but she stayed right there.