Ruffling Society Page 8

  Nancy shook her head. “Don’t be botherin’ Miz Christine ’bout that.” She ducked her head and stared at the wide boards of the porch floor. “Coloreds be too scared to come in the house anyway.”

  “Spirits?” Sarah demanded.

  “No, ma’am. White mens.”

  A wave of shame washed over Sarah. She abruptly turned away and stared out at Christine’s flowerbeds. How can those roses be blooming on a day like this? Don’t they understand that Richard Boyd is dead, but men with evil in their hearts are alive? Whether you like it or not, Sarah Novak, Josie is right. Without turning back to the servants, she made the only judgment she could. “Everyone but the coloreds must be allowed into the house. I don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings, but—but—”

  “Night gonna come.” Nancy finished Sarah’s sentence. “And when it get dark, ain’t no colored man gonna be safe if’n he been in this house.”

  “Lawd, help us,” Josie moaned. “Ain’t no tellin’ what gonna happen in this house today ...”

  Sarah’s temper flared, and she whirled around. “Nothing upsetting to Miss Christine will happen in this house today! We will not allow it! Do you understand me?” She stepped briskly toward the open door, paused to calm her voice, and added, “Whatever happens, God will help us. We just need to keep control of our thoughts and tongues. Now get about your business.”

  As she entered the main hall, Sarah heard the two servants whispering behind her.

  “You think that Miz Sarah know what she talkin’ ’bout?” Josie asked.

  “Course she do. Ain’t she just graduated teacher school and won a prize too?”

  “But that be book learnin’,” Josie protested.

  “You’s right. Ain’t the same thing. That’s why we gotta help her.”

  Sarah moved on and knocked softly on the tall pocket doors that closed off the front parlor, slid one open, and slipped into the room. In the face of death, all the room’s former elegance had fallen away; Sarah noticed nothing but the open coffin raised on a table in the middle of the room and the woman dressed in black kneeling next to it. As quietly as possible, she crossed to Christine’s side and knelt next to her. Christine held a simple gold cross, its chain draping down her black silk skirt. Sarah put her arm around her beloved friend’s waist.

  “I’m so glad you have come, Sarah,” Christine whispered. “I need your strength today.”

  “I won’t leave you, and Victoria will be here soon.” Sarah debated whether to mention the sharecroppers gathering at the back of the house and finally relented to the necessity of reality. “People are gathering—the sharecroppers have come early before they go out to the fields.”

  Christine nodded, and with trembling hands, she brought the cross to her lips, kissed it, and struggled to rise.

  Sarah leapt to her feet to help her. “I could tell them to go on home—”

  “No, my dear. They loved Richard.” She leaned over the casket and stroked her husband’s still face. “He would want them here.” She seemed to gain resolve from touching the man she loved and turned to face Sarah. “Promise me that you will see to it that everyone who wants to come in is allowed to do so. Some of the townspeople will not welcome everyone.”

  Sarah heard the pocket doors slide open, and Nancy whispered across the room. “Miz Sarah, you better come. That Miz Bellows and another lady comin’ up the steps.”

  “I’ll take care of it,” Sarah said.

  “No.” Christine drew herself up to her customary elegant posture and folded her hands at her waist. “We might as well settle this issue now. Send the ladies in, Nancy.”

  Almost immediately, Edith Bellows pushed Nancy aside and bustled through the doors. “I have come early, my dear Christine, and I shall not leave your side—” She stopped in her tracks and scanned the room. “Oh, Christine, there’s far too much light in this room. The windows are uncovered! And what are these empty vases doing here?” She hurried to Christine’s side and threw her arms around her. “Of course, you are too bereft to think of such things, but the servants should have— Don’t worry. I’ll take care of everything. Nancy, come here this minute!”

  Christine withdrew herself from Mrs. Bellows’ embrace. “Thank you, Edith, but things are exactly as I have ordered them to be.”

  Edith Bellows’ mouth fell open, and she turned to Fanny Sharp for support.

  “Oh no, Christine. No, no, my dear,” Fanny Sharp clucked as she gravely shook her head. “There are proprieties, traditions that must be observed. Oh! I can see that your poor mind has been overwhelmed by your grief.”

  “Why, you don’t even have your veil over your face!” Edith exclaimed.

  “I don’t intend to cover my face, Edith. I want to greet my callers without a black veil dividing me from them.”

  “But a widow always—” Fanny Sharp switched to a tone appropriate for addressing small children. “I’m sure you’ve just been so distressed—” She glanced scornfully at Sarah. “And no doubt you’ve received bad advice from those who are not true members of society.”

  “I’ll lower my veil when I go to the funeral tomorrow, but not today. And the windows will be left undraped so we can enjoy fresh air. As for the vases, they will be filled with the flowers the people bring.”

  “But you’ll have a hodgepodge of sizes and colors,” Mrs. Bellows protested.

  “It will be ugly and unseemly and—well, entirely unfit,” Mrs. Sharp added.

  “It will be most loving.” Christine cut off their comments, then turned to Sarah. “Please usher in the sharecroppers, Sarah, so they can get on about their day’s work.”

  “Sharecroppers,” Mrs. Bellows exclaimed. “You’re going to allow sharecroppers in the parlor?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  “That can’t be,” Mrs. Sharp snapped. “Why the townspeople don’t want to—they will absolutely refuse to mix with them.”

  “Then that will be their loss. These people have risen earlier than usual and made the journey to town to pay their respects to my husband.”

  “Really, Christine.” Mrs. Sharp snorted. “You can’t be that naive. They are only here because they’re afraid you’ll throw them off your land or call in their bank notes. They couldn’t care less about Richard Boyd or you.”

  Sarah watched in amazement as anger blazed across Christine’s face. In all the years she had known the lady, Sarah had never seen Christine show anger. The frosty tone of Christine’s answer provided further surprise. “How dare you suggest that my husband was not beloved in this town. This discussion is over.” She turned her back on the ladies in an obvious dismissal.

  “Now, Christine, I’m sure that Mrs. Sharp didn’t mean—”

  Christine acted as if the two ladies had gone. “Sarah, kindly invite the sharecroppers in.”

  “Through the kitchen, Miz Sarah,” Nancy added.

  “Certainly not.” Christine turned and remanded Nancy’s decree. “Everyone is welcome to come through the front door. Everyone.”

  “But, Christine!” Mrs. Bellows exploded. “The quality people are gathering in the front garden even as we speak. You can hardly expect them to mingle with sharecroppers!”

  Christine looked straight through her and addressed Nancy. “All people are quality people in my home. Surely in the face of death we can recognize our common humanity and love each other. Sarah, bring the sharecroppers to the front door and usher them into the parlor. I shall greet them here.”

  “Well!” Mrs. Sharp drew herself up. “You leave us no choice. Come, Edith. We must leave immediately. It is our duty to warn our friends outside that they are about to be invaded.”

  “Please go now, Sarah,” Christine insisted. “The workers need to get to the fields before it gets any hotter.”

  Sarah waited until the ladies bustled out the door, then asked Christine, “Are you sure this is worth the pain it’s going to cause you?”

  Christine turned back to look at her husband’s still face a
nd smiled sadly. “I’m sure. He would have wanted everyone to be welcomed properly.”

  Hesitant muttering and nervous shifting in the crowd met Sarah’s invitation for the sharecroppers to come to the front door. Then, to her surprise and delight, Jana Novak stepped forward, a huge bouquet of blue hydrangeas in her hands, and stood by her daughter. “I am here for two reasons,” she announced. “To pay tribute to the man who made it possible for my family to have a good farm, and to offer comfort to his widow. I will gladly go through any door Mrs. Boyd has chosen for me.”

  Sarah smiled at her mother. “Then you—and others who want to lighten Mrs. Boyd’s grief—will follow me to the front door.” She turned and, with her mother, led the way as the crowd of farm workers fell in line. When they reached the front porch, they found it cleared of mourners; the townspeople, dressed in their fine silk dresses and their black suits, had moved away from the house and waited in the garden.

  As Sarah looked out at their disapproving eyes, she became aware of a commotion by the street. Victoria and Hayden, accompanied by Reverend Wright, Lavinia, and Mrs. Logan, were coming up the walk. When they reached the steps, they stopped, looked at the shabbily dressed people on the porch, and turned back to those who had distanced themselves.

  “What is going on here?” Hayden, his face dark with anger, demanded.

  No one answered him.

  “Let me handle this, Hayden,” Reverend Wright insisted. “You and the ladies go on inside.”

  “Come, Victoria.” Hayden held out his arm to her, and they entered the house with Mrs. Logan and Lavinia following them.

  Sarah and the sharecroppers listened as Reverend Wright stopped on the porch and addressed the townspeople. “I am grieved, dear friends, to see your behavior this morning. I am grieved to think I have preached for over twenty years in this town and still not convinced you of Jesus’ love for the poor. If I have failed you, I am confident Holy Scripture will not. Kindly remember the words of our Lord, ‘Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.’” Reverend Wright paused and beckoned to the townspeople. “Now, come, let us remember who we are: we are followers of Jesus Christ.”

  Tears sprang to Sarah’s eyes as she watched several couples step out of the crowd and walk toward the porch.

  Reverend Wright turned to her. “Miss Novak, if you will kindly start the flow of mourners, I’m sure that we will all come together to comfort our dear Mrs. Boyd and her family.”

  Sarah motioned the sharecroppers forward and was relieved to see a few townsfolk slowly weave their way into the line. Thank you, dear God, for Reverend Wright. Please, let this loss of Richard Boyd be a new beginning for the town. Help us come together. Life is a difficult enough journey for everyone without adding bigotry.

  As the morning progressed, the visits from sharecroppers stopped as they returned to their fields, and those attending the wake became townspeople only. Sarah worried about both Victoria and Christine as neither one looked well, and she agonized about the wisdom of her plan to leave town. How can I leave them? After all they’ve done for me, how can I desert them now?

  By noon, heat shimmered in the air outside, and the stream of visitors dwindled. When General Gibbes returned for dinner, he convinced Christine to go upstairs to lie down. Hayden forced Victoria to return home to the relative coolness of the north verandah’s electric fan, but Sarah insisted on remaining.

  “There is nothing you can do here,” General Gibbes told Sarah. “We should all do our best to nap before the visitors begin again at dusk.”

  “But you will feel freer to rest if I am here downstairs in case someone does come. Besides, I must do something. I cannot just leave Christine.”

  General Gibbes patted her on the shoulder. “To tell you the truth, my dear, I am going to return to the bank as soon as Christine is settled. I have left Lee Logan carrying the entire burden, and that will not do.”

  “I’m sure he doesn’t mind, and I wouldn’t think many people are fretting about their bank accounts today.”

  “You are wrong, my dear. That is exactly what they are fretting about. The true foundation of a bank is the integrity of the owner. And now Richard is gone—well, people are worried that we might abandon them.”

  The notion shocked Sarah. “Abandon them?”

  “Sell the bank to an outsider.”

  “To Lee? Do they consider him an outsider?”

  “He did not grow up here. This is his mother’s childhood home, but not his. The Boyd family must be quite visible in the bank for a while. Frankly, I cannot do the job without young Logan.”

  “Lee’s new position is a wonderful opportunity for him, of course, but—oh, why must we lose Richard Boyd? Why must Christine lose her beloved?”

  “Only God can answer that. Only God.”

  CHAPTER 10

  Sarah heard the gnat-like buzzing of whispers behind her as she watched Christine Boyd and her daughters approach Richard Boyd’s casket for a final farewell. She forced herself to concentrate on the loving, but painful, gesture being enacted before her. Heavily veiled in black, Christine led her white-clad daughters to the coffin. Hayden Hodges held out to Christine a large spray of flowers which Victoria had created from the floral tributes brought to the Boyd house. Christine took two small bouquets from the spray and handed them to Ceci and Juli. Then she carried the spray to the casket and placed it on top. Christine lifted her black veil, leaned over, and kissed the shiny wood. She paused, her lips and hands seemingly frozen on the casket, as she struggled to find the will to leave Richard. As sobs sounded throughout the crowd, Sarah’s chest felt so tight she could scarcely draw a breath. When the little girls raced forward and tugged at their mother’s black skirt, grief shook Sarah so hard, she felt her heart had tattered. She could not hold back her own sob.

  Finally Christine found the strength to stand, to take her hands off the coffin. She lowered her veil and gathered the girls to her sides as she waited while General Gibbes saluted her husband’s remains. All through the crowd, Sarah saw older men, men who had fought for the Confederacy long before her own birth, stand as rigid as they were able and raise their hands in solemn salutes.

  When General Gibbes brought his hand down to his side, Christine turned her back on the coffin, and holding her daughters to her sides, walked away. Sarah watched as the crying crowd parted and made a path for her, the girls, and General Gibbes. As long as I live, I will never forget this sight … men bowing to the black-draped widow and the white-draped children of Richard Boyd. A man who fought a war and lost, but rather than despairing, built a family and rescued countless people who were newcomers to this country.

  Sarah stood still as the crowd began to thin. Once again, she became aware of whispers behind her, whispers that became louder.

  “That ungrateful girl is leaving in two weeks. Can you imagine? Leaving Mrs. Boyd after all she’s done for her!”

  Other voices magnified the swarm. “I guess you saw how her own father wouldn’t even speak to her before the service.”

  “Can you blame him? The way she’s put on airs and refused to marry that farmer he chose for her!”

  “I don’t care what anybody says. Sarah Novak’s still just a dirt-poor farm girl, and all the education in the world won’t change that one bit.”

  Anger seared through Sarah, momentarily overwhelming her grief for Christine. She turned and glared at Edith Bellows and her friends before walking away. How do my dreams take away one iota of life from them?

  Sarah saw her mother and brothers, Norbert and Josef, at the edge of the crowd and forced her anger back into its dark cave. Equally certain of her mother’s welcome and her brothers’ hatefulness, she proceeded toward them.

  “Sally.” Her mother, still clutching her tear-dampened, crumpled handkerchief, called her by her nickname. “Oh, honey, I’m so sorry. Mr. Boyd was such a fine man, and he did so much for us. Poor Mrs. Boyd, how will she go on?”
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  Sarah wrapped her mother in her arms. “Miss Christine is strong.”

  “She better be,” Norbert Novak snapped. “She sure ain’t gonna get any help from the likes of you.” He turned to his wife. “Well, don’t just stand there. Pa’s waiting in the wagon, and we got work to do. Come on, Mama.”

  “Shhh, son! Here comes Mrs. Hodges.”

  “Even better reason to leave. Let’s go!”

  “No,” Sarah’s mother answered. “I want to speak to Mrs. Hodges.”

  “Good day, Mrs. Novak.” Victoria smiled at Sarah’s mother and nodded to the other family members.

  “A sad day—”

  “A work day! Let’s go,” Norbert grabbed his mother’s arm and pulled her away.

  “Don’t treat her like that!” Sarah lunged at her brother’s arm and tried to stop him.

  “Mind your own business, Sally,” Norbert snapped. “You ain’t one of us anymore. We all got real work to do. We gotta put food on the table; we ain’t being taken care of by no rich woman who ain’t got a daughter of her own.”

  “Norbert!” Sarah’s mother snatched her arm away from him. “I taught you to have more respect for ladies than that.”

  “Ladies!” Josef snorted. “Sally ain’t no lady, and she never will be. She’s just gonna spend her life standing up in front of a class of runny-nosed brats making a fool of herself, showing the world that she couldn’t get no man to marry her. And Mrs. Hodges ain’t nothing but a troublemaker.” He turned and stomped toward the wagon.

  Sarah’s mother gasped. “Oh, Mrs. Hodges, I apologize for my son’s behavior. He had no right to—”

  Victoria hurried forward and took Mrs. Novak’s hands in her own. “Don’t give his words another thought. I assure you, I won’t. You know better than anyone why we—you and I and Mrs. Boyd—have worked to give Sarah more opportunity in life.”

  “I’ll never be able to thank you enough.”

  “By helping Sarah, I have gained much more than I have given,” Victoria answered. “We both know that.”