Heaven (Casteel 1)

"Don't know yet what I want to be," he said in his most careful diction, nervous as he always was around someone as educated and pretty as Miss Marianne Deale. "Get all kinds of notions about being a pilot; then next day I want to be a lawyer so I can get to be president one day."

"President of our country, or of a corporation?"

He blushed and looked down at his large feet that kept shuffling about. How awful his shoes looked. They were too big, too old and worn. "I guess President Casteel would sound kinda stupid, wouldn't it?"

"No," she said seriously, "I think it sounds fine. You just set your mind on what you want to be, and take your time about it. If you work to obtain your goal, and realize from the very beginning that nothing valuable comes easily, and still forge ahead, without a doubt you'll reach your goal, whatever it is."

Because of Miss Marianne Deale's generosity (we learned later she put down her own money as deposit so we could take those books home), in books we had the chance to look at pictures of the ancient world, and in books we traveled together to Egypt and India. In books we lived in palaces and strode the narrow crooked lanes in London. Why, we both felt that when we got there eventually, we wouldn't even feel strange in a foreign land, because we'd been there before.

I loved historical novels that brought the past to life much better than history books did. Until I read a novel about George Washington I thought him a dull, stodgy sort of president . . . and to think he'd once been young and handsome enough to cause girls to think he was charming and sexy.

We read books by Victor Hugo, by Alexandre Dumas, and thrilled to know adventures like that were possible, even if they were horrible. We read classics, and we read junk; we read everything, anything that would take us out of that godforsaken cabin in the hills. Maybe if we'd had movies, our own TV set, and other forms of entertainment, we wouldn't have grown so fond of those books Miss Deale allowed us to take home. Or maybe it was only Miss Deale, being clever when she "allowed" only us to take home precious, expensive books that she said others wouldn't respect as much as we did.

And that was true enough. We read our books only after we washed our hands.

.

I suspected that Miss Marianne Deale liked our pa more than a little. God knows she should have had better taste. According to Granny, his "angel" had taught Pa to speak proper English, and with his natural good looks, many an aristocratic woman fell for the charms of Luke Casteel, when he cared enough to be charming.

Every Sunday Pa went with us to church, sat in the midst of his large family, next to Sarah. Petite and dainty Miss Deale sat primly across the aisle and stared at Pa. I could guess she was marveling at Pa's dark good looks, but surely she should consider his lack of knowledge. From all I'd heard from Granny, Pa had quit school before he was finished with the fifth grade.

Sundays rolled around so fast when you didn't have the kind of good clothes you needed, and I was always thinking I'd have a pretty new dress before another showed up; but new garments of any kind were difficult to come by, when Sarah had so much to do. So there we were again, in the very last pew, all in our best rags that others would throw out for trash. We'd stand, and we'd sing along with the best and richest in Winnerrow, along with all the other hillbillies dressed no better or worse than we were, who reveled in coming to church.

In God you had to trust, and in God you had to believe or feel a fool.

On this particular Sunday after church services were over, I tried to keep Our Jane neat while she licked the ice cream just outside the pharmacy, not so far from where Pa had parked his truck. Miss Deale had bought cones for all five of the Casteel children. She stood about ten yards away, staring at where Ma and Pa were having a tiff about something, which meant any moment Pa might whack her, or Sarah would belt him one. I swallowed nervously, wishing Miss Deale would move on, or look elsewhere, but she stood watching, listening, almost transfixed.

It made me wonder what she was thinking, though I never found out.

Not a week passed without her writing at least one note to Pa concerning Tom or me. He was seldom home, and when he was, he couldn't read her neat, small handwriting; even if he could, he wouldn't have responded. Last week she had written:

.

Dear Mr. Casteel,

Surely you must be very proud of Tom and Heaven, my two best students. I would like very much, at a time convenient for both of us, to meet you to discuss the possibilities of seeing that they both win scholarships.

Yours sincerely, Marianne Deale

. The very next day she'd asked me, "Didn't you give it to him, Heaven? Surely he wouldn't be so rude as not to respond. He's such a handsome man. You must adore him."

"Sure do adore him," I said cynically. "Sure could chisel him into a fine museum piece. Put him in a cave with a club in his hand, and a red-haired woman at his feet. Yep, that's where Pa belongs, in the Smithsonian."

Miss Deale narrowed her sky-blue eyes, stared at me with the oddest expression. "Why, I'm shocked, really shocked. Don't you love your father, Heaven?"

"I just adore him, Miss Deale, I really do. Specially when he's visiting Shirley's Place." "Heaven! You shouldn't say things like that.

What can you possibly know about a house of ill-rep-

" She broke off and looked embarrassed. Her eyes

lowered before she asked, "Does he really go there?" "Every chance he gets, according to Ma." The next Sunday Miss Deale didn't look at Pa

with admiration; in-fact, she didn't cast her eyes his

way one time.

But even if Pa had fallen from Miss Deale's