Twilight's Child (Cutler 3)

"Lillian? Grandmother Cutler? What do you mean?" I asked. Jimmy appeared in the doorway but didn't come forward. He didn't want to interrupt.

"She's the one give birth to Charlotte," he said. "Lived in that little room, just like you did."

"Gave birth to Charlotte? You mean Charlotte wasn't really her and Emily's sister?" I asked. His smile widened.

"Oh, I guess you could say she was, sort of."

"I don't understand," I said, now turning to Jimmy, who had overheard it all. He started toward the desk.

"Her pappy," Luther began, and then he stopped.

"Fathered Charlotte?" I said, finishing the horrible sentence.

"It's what my momma told me," Luther said, and he looked up at Jimmy. "And my momma," he added, turning back to me, "she never told no lies about the rich people. Not never. They were the only ones who told lies about themselves.

"They made Mrs. Booth look and act pregnant to cover the shame, and then, after Charlotte was born, they treated her like some dumb animal," he said, showing anger for the first time. "She used to come to me to show me where they whipped her, and when they starved her, I would get her food," he added with vehemence.

And suddenly I realized that in his way Luther had loved Charlotte and probably still did.

But what a dreadful tale, I thought. This was truly a house of horror. Considering the age difference between Grandmother Cutler and Charlotte, I realized she couldn't have been much more than fourteen when this beastly thing had happened to her. I sat back, dazed. Jimmy and I gazed at each other, both thinking the same thing.

No wonder she had been the way she was.

Neither Jimmy nor I saw any reason to prolong Emily's burial. We knew no other people to inform, and from what I remembered and what Luther told us, she had no real friends. Luther gave me the name of the minister, and I had Jimmy drive me to Upland Station so I could phone him. His name was Carter, and he knew of Emily Booth. I explained our situation, and he said he would come right out to perform a service at the grave site.

When we returned I told Luther the arrangements were complete. He hurried to bring the coffin upstairs and placed Emily's body within it. He pounded it shut, the clank of his hammer reverberating throughout the house as he hit the nails extra hard. Then he and Jimmy carried the coffin downstairs and put it on the back of Luther's truck.

I looked after Charlotte, now feeling sorrier for her than ever. She didn't have anything proper to keep her warm outside, and the sky was dismal gray. There were flurries, too, so I went into Miss Emily's room and found a dark blue wool coat. At first she was afraid to accept it.

"Everything that was Emily's is now yours, Charlotte," I explained. "She left it to you," I lied. Gingerly she took it from me and put it on.

Reverend Carter arrived with his wife, a small, birdlike woman. They were both dressed in black. His wife looked like a professional mourner. She never smiled,

and her eyes were glassy and swollen, as if she had been crying for days.

Luther led us out to the family burial plot where the Booths lay side by side, going back as far as the beginning of the nineteenth century. When I looked at the fresh grave dug for Emily I thought Luther had gone far deeper than necessary. It was as if he wanted to be sure she would have pounds and pounds of dirt over her to keep her securely within.

As the minister read from the Bible Luther and Jimmy lowered the casket into the grave. I stood beside Charlotte and wondered if she really understood what was happening. She had a fine angelic smile on her lips.

The minister said a few words about Emily being happy now that she was where she deserved to be, and then we started away, leaving Luther to fill in the grave. He insisted he would do it all himself. When I turned back and saw how he shoveled the dirt, I thought he looked gleeful. He worked with a youthful vigor that seemed to straighten his back and rejuvenate him as he dropped the soil into the grave and heard it rumble onto Emily Booth's coffin. I was sure a lifetime of pain and suffering was being buried along with Emily.

I paid the minister something for his trouble, and then Jimmy and Charlotte and I did finally have that mint tea. Charlotte actually prepared it for us. As she moved about the kitchen I realized she was more capable than Emily had made her out to be. Free now of the chains and restrictions Emily had put on her, Charlotte seemed to take on more and more responsibility eagerly.

"Where do you want to go now, Charlotte?" I asked her.

"Go?" she said, looking up from her cup. She gazed around the kitchen. "No place. I gotta do some cleaning today," she said, "and work on my needlepoint."

"She does beautiful work," I told Jimmy. We heard the front door open and close.

"I put the marker up," Luther said, coming into the kitchen.

"What about a gravestone?" Jimmy asked.

"Almost got it done," Luther replied, sitting down at the table. "I've been working on it for years," he added. Jimmy flashed a smile at me.

"What do you want to do now, Luther?" I asked him.

"Do now?"