Heaven (Casteel 1)

"Yeah, I guess yer right," agreed Tom, sinking into dialect when he was discouraged and hungry. "Back to t'fishin lines, t'traps, so keep yer fingers crossed." And with briefly warmed hands and feet, he again left the cabin to search for food. Never could we keep our laying hens when our cooking pot called them to early deaths.

Life not only grew a thousand times more difficult after Sarah left, it also grew impossibly complicated. Pa didn't come home. That meant no money to buy what we needed to keep us going. Our kerosene was so low we had to use candles.

Hours passed that seemed like bits of eternity, waiting for life to begin when Tom came home with Fanny and Keith, and sometimes Our Jane. I wanted to convince myself that Grandpa didn't matter, and I could go to school when Our Jane recovered, and he'd take care of himself just fine. But all I had to do was look at him a-rid see how lost he was without Granny. "Go on," said Grandpa one day when I had the cabin tidy but was wondering what we'd eat tonight. It was almost Thanksgiving. "I don't need ya. Kin do fer myself."

Maybe he could, but the next day Our Jane came down with another cold. "Hongry . . ." she wailed, running to tug on my shiftlike garment. "Wanna eat."

"Sure, honey. You just go back to bed and rest, and in no time at all, supper will be ready." How easily I said that, how lightly, when there wasn't anything in the house to eat but some stale biscuits left over from breakfast, and a half-cupful of flour. Oh, why hadn't I rationed the food we'd had when Sarah left? Why was it I thought Pa would always show up, as if by magic, just when our supplies ran out? Where was he anyway?

"Tom, is it possible to fish after dark?" I asked.

He looked up from his reading, startled. "You want me to go out in the dark and fish?"

"You could also check your rabbit traps."

"I already checked them before I came home from school. Nothing. And at night, how could I find what I hide so well?"

"That's why you've got to fish now," I said in a whisper near his ear, "or there's nothing to eat but two biscuits, and I'll be lucky if I can scrape enough lard out of the can to make the gravy." I was whispering, for if Our Jane heard, or Keith did, there'd be such a clamor none of us could stand it. Our Jane's stomach had to be fed on time or it hurt. Hurting tummy made her wail, and when she was wailing, it was impossible to do anything.

Tom got up and took a rifle down from the wall. He checked it for buckshot. "Deer season just opened, so maybe I kin draw a bead on somethin . . doe or not."

"Ya mean we ain't got nothin t'eat if ya don't shoot a deer?" shouted Fanny. "Jesus Christ, we'll starve t'death iffen we have t'depend on yer shootin!"

Tom stalked to the door, threw Fanny a hard, long look of disgust, then smiled at me. "Go on, get your gravy ready--and in half an hour I'll be back with meat--if I'm lucky."

"What if you're not?"

"I won't come home until I can bring

something."

"Well," said Fanny, rolling over on her back and staring into a small cheap mirror, "guess we won't eva see Tom agin."

Tom slammed the door and left.

Fishing and hunting were both part of our daily routine now. Part of my time during the day was spent outdoors, setting traps, baiting fish lines. Tom made the snares to catch rabbits or squirrels. We had already hunted for mushrooms that Granny had taught us how to distinguish from deadly toadstools. We had picked berries until our hands turned bloody from the briars, searched for wild bean and pea pods in the woods, dug for turnips that could be found near the edge of Winnerrow. We stole spinach, lettuce, collards, and other things from Winnerrow backyard gardens. When real cold winter came, the berry bushes stopped producing. The peas and beans dried up. The rabbits and squirrels disappeared in their hidden hibernation places, and weren't attracted to our snares and boxes now that we didn't have decent bait. And mushrooms didn't favor freezing cold nights any more than we did. And that was why our larder of food had been reduced to almost nil.

"Heaven," complained Fanny, "cook what ya got. We kin't sit around an wait all night fer Tom t'come back with nothin. Ya got beans an peas hidden somewhere, I jus know ya have."

"Fanny, if just once in a while you'd do more to help, maybe I would have a hidden store of beans and peas . . but I don't have anything but lard scrapings and two dry and biscuits." All this said in a low voice that the keen ears of Our Jane and Keith couldn't hear.

For once Grandpa's ears perked up. He craned his neck and peered my way. "Taters planted in t'smokehouse floor."

"Used all those last week, Grandpa."

Our Jane let out a terrible shriek. "Gotta eat!" she howled. "Hurts! Tummy hurts so bad . . . Hey-lee, when we gonna eat?"

"Now," I said, running to pick her up and sit her at the table on a chair raised by two blocks of wood placed on the seat. I kissed the sweet place on the back of her slender neck and ruffled her soft hair. "Come, Keith. You and Our Jane can eat first tonight."

"What ya mean, they kin eat first? What about me?" cried Fanny. "I'm a member of this family much as they are!"

"Fanny, you can wait until Tom comes back."

"If he's gotta shoot somethin first, I'll be old an in my grave fore he doesr,

"0 you of little faith," said I, busy heating up the little lard I had, putting water and a little flour in a small bowl and mixing it until the lumps disappeared, before I added it to the hot lard, shaking into it salt and pepper, stirring and stirring so it wouldn't go lumpy. I tasted, sprinkled in more salt, stirred some mo

re, actually feeling the hungry eyes of Our Jane and Keith devouring it while it still heated in the pan. Grandpa rocked on and on, eyes glazed, thin hands clutched on the chair arms, not expecting to eat again today. If Our Jane and Keith suffered most, second most had to be Grandpa, who was losing weight so rapidly I could have cried for him.