282
PAUL SMIT H
our crib out all year round brought ours out only at Christmas so
that the pleasure was always new.
And she had other rituaIs too; and as Annie picked up a
scallion and bit into the head, 1 remembered the drink my mother
made from hops every June, and the head and face she carved out
of a turnip at Halloween, and the paper chains she made and gar–
landed the ceiling with on Christmas Eve. Also, unlike Ellen Simms
who lived and liked Iiving with bare walls with the bricks showing,
my mother fresh-papered the walls and whitewashed the ceilings
of our two rooms every spring, and it was from things like this that
the year for me gained shape and the rhythm 1 wanted my life
to have.
"Of course, it's not taking the unexpected into account that's
my trouble," Annie said; and she watched Ellen Simms twist off
a ragged fringe of tobacco from the blackened bowl of her pipe,
and then, with her left hand which had been stiffened by a winter
rheumatism, stuff it back down again.
"I
mean," Annie said, "it's
like when 1 come here and see that crib. 1 know I'll see it, but just
the same, every time 1 do 1 get a shock. It's like that pack of
beggars stripping Tucker of that hat and coat," she said, as Ellen
Simms struck a match, and without shifting her somber gaze off
Annie, held the match close over the bowl of her pipe and sucked.
"Now that was unexpected and had never happened to us before,"
Annie said into the blue spiral of smoke that rose and hung in
folding and unfolding layers over us and the table. "And for God's
sake who'd've thought there was one among that pack with the
courage to do such a thing?" she asked, and looking through the
smoke at Ellen Simms, added, "And it was unexpected the way
you said nothing about it.
"I
was sure you'd give us a hard time over that, and so was
Tucker. He even thought you might change your mind about giving
us your cart on account of it." Annie paused, and 1 glanced at
Ellen Simms and tried to read her, but she remained impassive,
thoughtfully silent.
"Then last night," Annie said, "my Ma grabbing that money
from us before my hand could even feel the strength of it. What
I'm really trying to say is 1 just never allowed for none of them
things taking place when 1 threw up the milk route and talked
Tucker into quitting Mr. Cribbins. Even though 1 know that man
-
I
t
,
.'
