The Last Days of Dogtown

All Oliver could think about was that Tammy would throw something at him if he returned without the carpenter. “When’s he coming back?”

“Mamma says tomorrow

if we’re lucky. Mamma says

he’s liable to find himself a tavern and forget all about us for a week. That’s why Johnny went, to try to keep him on the straight path. But if he strays, to get him home as quick as he can.

“Mamma says Pa isn’t so bad, that’s just his nature and most of them are far worse, and I’m to give thanks to my Heavenly Father for having such a good provider in my father here on earth.” Elizabeth barely took a breath. This was just the kind of talk that Tammy would love to hear, Oliver thought. Maybe he could postpone her anger with this scrap of gossip.

Then he saw the biscuits, piled like a heap of miniature gold bricks on a pearly white plate, set on the edge of the table to cool.

“Isn’t your ma here?” he asked.

“She’s over to Mrs. Pulcifer’s house to borrow some

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syrup. She said I could stay here on my own ’cause I’m getting to be a big girl, and she says I can keep myself out of trouble long enough for her to have a cup of tea with Mrs.

Pulcifer in peace.”

Oliver took off his hat and started making his way across the room. Elizabeth set her thin lips in a line and didn’t take her eyes off him.

“Think I can take a biscuit?”

“No.”

“Your ma always gives me something.”

Elizabeth thought about this for a moment. “My

mamma says you are a half-starved wild ’un and that Tammy Younger is a skim-flint and a sinner to treat you the way she does. She says it’s a shame and a scandal, too, because you have the air.”

Oliver nodded but he was only half listening. He made it to the table and quick-as-he-could snatched a biscuit and stuffed the whole thing into his mouth.

Elizabeth frowned, but kept on talking. “Mrs. Pulcifer said it wouldn’t be so much longer before they put her in the ground and then you’ll get what’s yours.

“I think Aunt Tam is terrible mean to you, whatever she says. Aren’t you ’feared she’s going to carve you up while you’re sleeping in your bed and eat you for breakfast?”

“What are you going on about?” Oliver said.

Elizabeth grew uneasy. “I never know what Mrs.

Pulcifer means,” she whined. “Mamma says Mrs. Pulcifer likes to hear herself talk, but Mamma likes to hear her talk, too. They talk all the time, my ma and her. Pa says that Mrs. Pulcifer . . .”

“I gotta go,” said Oliver.

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“I’m telling Mamma about the biscuit,” she called after him.