I got through the back door just as Viola pulled the roast from the oven. SanJuanna stood ready to take it into the dining room.
“You late,” Viola said. “Warsh up in here.”
“Sorry,” I said. “Is Mother mad?”
“Plenty.”
I pumped water at the kitchen sink and attacked my hands with the nail brush.
“Sorry.”
“You said that already.”
I looked down at my torn, dirt-stained pinafore.
“Take that off,” Viola said. “Nothing you can do. Go get in there.”
I took it off and hung it on the hook by the sink and hobbled into the dining room hiding behind SanJuanna and the roast. I may have exaggerated my lameness a tad. Conversation stopped. I ducked my head and murmured “pardon me” as I took my place. My brothers looked expectantly back and forth between me and our mother.
“Calpurnia,” said Mother, “you are late. And why are you walking like that?”
“I stepped in the world’s biggest badger hole, and I think I hurt myself. I’m sorry I’m so late, Mother, I truly am. It took me ages to get back, what with being so injured and all.”
“See me after dinner, please,” said Mother.
The older boys went back to eating, disappointed by the lack of a public scourging, but the baby, Jim Bowie, said, “Hi, Callie. I missed you. Where have you been?”
“I’ve been collecting plants, J.B.,” I said in a loud, exuberant voice. Both my mother and my grandfather looked up. “And then I stepped in the badger hole,” I added. “Maybe my ankle’s broken.”
“Really?” said J.B. “Can I see? I never saw a broke ankle.”
“Later,” I muttered.
Mother turned her attention back to her plate, but Granddaddy continued staring at me. I was about to bust a gut.
I turned to Jim Bowie and said, “J.B., I might have found something special, a special plant. Yes, indeedy. I left it out in the laboratory. I’ll show it to you later, if you want. Best not to play with your peas like that.”
I peeked at Granddaddy, He was still staring at me with intense concentration. We started the meat course. The port bottle was still a good thirty minutes away, but then Granddaddy did something unprecedented in the entire History of Dinner: He left before the port. Rising from the table, he patted his beard with his napkin, bowed to my mother, and said, “Another fine dinner as usual, Margaret. Kindly excuse me.” He walked out through the kitchen, leaving us all gaping in his wake. I heard the back door close behind him and his boots on the steps. None of us had ever seen anything like it. My mother collected her wits and glared at me.
“Do you have anything to do with this?” she said.
“Not I.” I kept my eyes on my plate.
“Alfred,” Mother said, turning to Father for information, “is Grandfather Walter feeling all right?”
“I believe so,” Father said, looking perplexed.
Seeing an opportunity, Jim Bowie, still playing with his peas instead of facing up to the ordeal of eating them, said, “Please, Mother, may I be ex—”
“No, you may not. Don’t be ridiculous.”
“But Grandfather is ex—”
“Stop it right now, J.B.”
The rest of dinner passed in silence. I was made to sit at the table for a whole hour after they left and SanJuanna cleared up, and I missed the firefly competition. Who cared about that? But not being out in the laboratory was killing me. I caught myself wringing my hands, something I’d only read about in overwrought sentimental stories. I was out of my chair and limping through the kitchen before the clock stopped bonging. Viola was feeding Idabelle the Inside Cat while SanJuanna washed the dishes.
“Listen, you—” said Viola as I crashed out the back door and came to a screeching halt. There, sitting on the back steps in the dark, stroking one of the Outside Cats, sat Granddaddy, smoking a cigar and staring at the sky. From the kitchen behind us came the homey noises of the crockery being put away. From the darkness came the chitter of some night-flying bird. I stood there a moment, my whole world hanging in the balance.
“Calpurnia,” he said, “it’s such a lovely evening. Won’t you join me?”
Chapter 12
A SCIENTIFIC STUDY
There are not many men who will laboriously examine internal and important organs, and compare them in many specimens of the same species.
THE FOLLOWING SATURDAY, Granddaddy and I left for Lockhart in the gig. The excuse I gave my parents was that I wanted to visit the library. Granddaddy didn’t give any excuse; he asked Alberto to hitch up a horse. Even though he had removed himself from domestic matters, everyone still paid him enormous deference. Invoking his name was like turning a golden key to open doors that might otherwise have remained closed to me.
I held the precious specimen in a cardboard box on my lap while he drove. Even though the day was overcast, I had one of Mother’s old parasols shading both me and the Plant, which was snugly ensconced in a small clay flowerpot. I had watched Granddaddy poke a hole in the dirt with a pencil before tenderly easing the fragile green stalk into its new home. We watered it with fresh well water. I felt honored to be entrusted with it.
To my horror, the Plant began to look a tad wilted on our journey.
“Granddaddy, the Plant looks a little . . . tired.”
He glanced at it but didn’t appear concerned. “That’s not unusual, considering we ripped it out of the ground not so long ago. Give it some water from the canteen. Isn’t it a grand day for a drive?”
I agreed that it was and relaxed a fraction. He whistled some Mozart for a while and then broke into song, something rude about a drunken sailor and what should be done about him. To pass the time, he taught me the words.
In Lockhart, we pulled the gig up in front of Hofacket’s Portrait Parlor—Fine Photographs for Fine Occasions. Once inside, Granddaddy had trouble making Mr. Hofacket understand what we needed.
“You want me to take a picture of a plant?” he kept saying. He may have been able to work a camera, but he was slow to catch on to our request. Granddaddy explained again what he wanted. The reluctant Mr. Hofacket said, “Well, I’ll have to charge you my usual rate. That’s one dollar for each portrait.”
“Done,” said Granddaddy without hesitating. Mr. Hofacket looked chagrined, like maybe he was kicking himself for not charging a special plant premium.
“All right,” he said. “Come on back into my studio. Little girl, you wait out here.”
“No, sir,” said Granddaddy. “She’s part of this expedition.” Mr. Hofacket looked at him and then led us through the curtains without saying another word.
In the back were various chairs and chaises and wicker stands. Everything looked familiar, which was disconcerting until I realized I had seen all this stuff before in different family portraits scattered throughout the whole county, the same props used over and over again. Mr. Hofacket fumbled in a drawer and produced a sheet of plain white paper. Then he opened another drawer and found an empty photo album, undid the binding, and pulled out a sheet of rough black paper.
“Like this?” he said to Granddaddy. “You want a black one and a white one both?”
“That will be fine.”
“Okay,” said Mr. Hofacket, still having trouble with the concept. “It’s your money.”