It struck now. Then after a pause the others began: ten o’clock. And here she was with nothing to do, no one to talk to, alone in a sealed house with the last of her supports sent away. She rose from the table, touching a hand to her hair, and went to the front hall. On the bureau was a vase of marigolds which she spent minutes rearranging, changing nothing. She smoothed the linen runner beneath the vase. Then she opened the front door, intending to stir the dim, dust-flecked air. She was about to close it again when she caught sight of the outdoor furniture, which spilled in an uneven line down the veranda and on around the corner of the house. It would stay there year-round; it always had. No wonder this house was so depressing. She remembered how dismal the wicker loveseats looked in winter, the seams of their soggy cushions harboring wisps of snow; how the aluminum chairs dripped icicles and the rattan ones darkened and split and overturned in the wind. The picture came to her like an answer: everything would change for the better, if she moved the furniture before fall set in.
She rushed out with her skirt swirling around her, picked up the round metal tea-table and clicked down the front steps with it. Then around to the back yard — more forest than yard, slanting downward as steeply as a mountainside all the way to the garage, which was out of view. She passed two empty trellises, a toolshed, a rotting gazebo, a stone bench, countless frayed, cut-off, cruel-looking ropes her children had once climbed and swung by. Spongy moss gave way beneath her heels, and brambles snagged her stockings. Birds started up from bushes as if she had no right to come this way. When she reached the garage she found that the side door was stuck. She gave it a kick with the pointed toe of her shoe. Then she heaved the table inside and started back up the hill. Already she was out of breath.
Next came a loveseat, bulky and awkward. She flung the sleeves of her sweater behind her and bent to tug at one wicker arm, but the legs kept catching on the floorboards. When she had pulled it to the steps she stopped to rest. Then someone on the street said, “Need a hand?”
She turned. A tall girl in dungarees was watching her. “I could take the other end,” she was saying.
“Oh, would you?” said Mrs. Emerson.
She stepped to the side, and the girl moved past her to scoop up one end of the loveseat. “It’s not heavy but it’s clumsy,” Mrs. Emerson told her. The girl nodded, and followed her down around the house with the base of the loveseat resting easily in her hands. She certainly didn’t believe in wasting words. Every time Mrs. Emerson looked back at her to smile apologetically (she really should have warned her about the distance they had to cover), all she saw was the top of a bent head — dark yellow hair hanging straight to her shoulders, a style Mrs. Emerson considered drab. The girl didn’t comment on the steepness, or the brambles, or the fact that it seemed ludicrous to cart furniture through an apparently endless forest. When they reached the garage she disappeared inside, righted the tea-table, and reached out for the loveseat. “Any more going in?” she asked.
“Yes,” Mrs. Emerson said.
“Well, then,” said the girl, and she moved the two pieces of furniture down to the far end, opposite the car, making more space. Mrs. Emerson waited outside with her arms folded. She could use this breathing spell. Now, should she offer a tip? But that might be an insult. And there was always the question of how much to offer. Oh, where was her husband, with his desk-size checkbook and his bills on a spindle and his wallet that unfolded so smartly whenever she was sad, offering her money for a new outfit or a trip to Washington?
The girl emerged from the garage, wiping her hands on the seat of her dungarees. “I certainly do appreciate this,” Mrs. Emerson told her. “I hope I haven’t held you up too much.”
“Didn’t you say there was more?”
“Oh, yes, all that’s left on the veranda.”
“I’ll stay and help you finish, then.”
“Well, goodness,” said Mrs. Emerson. She was glad of the help, but she wondered what kind of person would let herself get so sidetracked. Weren’t there any fixed destinations in her life? As they climbed back up the slope she kept glancing sideways at the girl’s face, which was pretty enough but Mrs. Emerson thought it would take a good eye like her own to notice. Not a trace of make-up. What a nice bright lipstick could have done! She wore brown moccasins, shapeless and soft-soled. Ruining her arches. Her white shirt was painstakingly ironed, the creases knife-sharp across the shoulders and down the sleeves. A mother’s work, for certain — some poor mother wondering right this minute where her daughter had got to. But she hadn’t the strength of character to send her on her way. The girl looked so capable, hoisting up two chairs at once when they reached the veranda and swinging through the side yard with them. “Any time you get tired, now,” said Mrs. Emerson, compromising, “or have to be somewhere, or meet someone—” The girl was already too far down the path to hear her.
When they were climbing the slope again Mrs. Emerson said, “I used to have a handyman. Did until this morning. He would have made short work of this. Then I caught him mistaking the nearest rosebush for the men’s room.” The girl laughed — a single, low note that made Mrs. Emerson look up at her, startled. “Well, I fired him,” she said. “I can’t have that.”
The girl said nothing. They rounded the house, climbed the front steps side by side. There seemed to be more furniture now than before; they hadn’t made a dent in it. “Where did they all come from?” Mrs. Emerson said, poking a chair with her foot. “I can’t remember ever buying any of this.”
“Outdoor furniture is capable of reproducing,” said the girl. Which made Mrs. Emerson pause for a moment before she went on with her own train of thought.