Mystery of Drear House Read online

  Pesty awoke at ten minutes past six. Not bad, she thought. The house was cold. She blew her breath; it was like white mist on the air. Wonder how many breaths it take to warm this room? She got up and got dressed. Shivering, she put on boots that were the warmest shoes she had. Remember boots for Mama. And her coat, too. Keep her good and warm.

  In the kitchen she started the fire in the big old cookstove. She washed up in the cold water pumped into the sink from the well and dried her face and hands. By that time there was a roaring fire in the stove. She put the water kettle on to boil. When the flames settled down, she added pieces of wood and soft coal from the bucket next to the stove. Now I wash my hands again! She always did that when she lit the fire.

  She put peanut butter and jelly on the toast, boiled eggs and instant coffee. She had it all on a tray when Macky came in. “Morning. Mama hungry this morning,” she told him, forcing herself to smile.

  “What you been doing?” he asked her. It was his chance to talk to her with no one else around. “You stay over there at that house all the time. What have you been up to?”

  She couldn’t get over how fast he’d got on her trail. “I was over to Mr. Pluto’s, too, yesterday,” she said pleasantly. “And Mr. Thomas and me play with the little guys some, over his house. They go to school, too. We hang out with Great Mother Jeffers. She a lot of fun, and we took her to Mr. Pluto’s.” All the time she spoke, she was moving out of the kitchen, away from him. Macky stood there, rocking on his heels. Looking angry and defeated, he watched her go.

  Pesty ran into her daddy. He was looking in on Mattie. He had closed the door, so Pesty knocked. River Lewis Darrow opened the door. “Morning, Daddy,” she said as softly as she could. He blocked her view, and she couldn’t see if her mama was awake.

  River Lewis eyed her and stepped to one side so she could pass through with the tray. He nodded curtly, but he did not speak to her. It made her feel bad, never to have her daddy say hardly a word to her.

  Mattie was sitting up in bed. River Lewis went back to sit down in the chair. Pesty remembered that Great Mother Jeffers had sat just there.

  Mama seem not to mind Great Mother, Pesty thought. She looking pleasant this morning, too. “Morning, Mama,” she said. “How you feeling today?”

  Mattie laughed suddenly. “I bent my back down the road,” she said happily. “I squirreled the tree and gave a hoot.”

  Pesty sighed. “Okay, Mama, I got some food for you and me. Eggs and toast—how ’bout that?”

  “I treed a squirrel, that was my dream,” Mattie said. “But going down the road backward—I don’t know.”

  Pesty grinned, delighted. When her mama could figure out her own words, she was doing better than ever.

  Pesty took part of the food and put it on the night table. Then she took the tray and handed it over to her daddy.

  River put the cup of coffee in Mattie’s hand. “Now take a good, long drink,” he said. “This room is coolish. I’ll bring in a heater if you want.”

  “No, thank you,” Mattie said. Her voice sounded less disconnected this morning, thought Pesty. She’s doing better, but it won’t last.

  Pesty ate some of the food. River Lewis and Mattie chatted after a fashion, as Mattie ate her breakfast. So did Pesty and her mama chat. But River and Pesty had few words spoken between them. She hoped he would talk to her. All the time she was careful not to mention any of the Smalls.

  Her older brothers came in to speak for a moment to their mother. Big, bungling men. The room seemed crowded with them in it. They shuffled their feet back and forth. They said they would see her later, and they went out. Macky came in, joined his father and Pesty around the bed.

  “Morning, Mama. Daddy,” he said.

  “Ah, Macky,” his mama answered.

  River Lewis said nothing. It wasn’t a minute before he got up and walked out of the room. Some of Mattie’s pleasant mood went with him. She frowned at Macky. Then she seemed to forget there was any change or that River Lewis had gone, had ignored his youngest son for one more day.

  Mattie patted the coverlet, and Macky came over to sit down.

  “It’s chilly today, Mama,” he said. He put his head down on her pillow next to her, with his face facing away from her. She reached around and held his head in the crook of her arm.

  Macky always was her favorite, Pesty thought, watching. She didn’t mind that. He was her mama’s own last child. She was her mama’s own first and last orphan girl. Each has a place. I never got in the way of any child’s place.

  “I’m going to stay with you, Mama,” Macky said. “Stay here the whole day.”

  “No!” Pesty hollered inside. Often Macky said he would stay the whole day. You know he’s not staying, she thought. Don’t let anything go wrong. What time it is? Is it time? Couldn’t be more than seven o’clock. Time left, but I got to get her up and going.

  Mattie Darrow had been watching Pesty over Macky’s head. She cradled her youngest son. Big old boy, Pesty thought.

  Macky had his eyes closed and did not see Pesty’s expression. But Mattie did. She stared at her orphan child, whom she kept safe in her house and hoped never to send along the underground road.

  “Mama, didn’t you say you wanted some wild meat?” Pesty said. “Didn’t you, Mama?” She dared give her mama a clue that wouldn’t hurt anything, to say something that would help get rid of Macky. Her mama did love wild meat so.

  “Squirrel? Squirrel?” her mama murmured.

  Macky lifted his head. “Mama, you want me to hunt you squirrel? Haven’t had some squirrel in a long kind of time,” he said. “Been eating too much house meat anyhow.” Meat bought in the stores was called house meat.

  “Cut it up and parboil it. Squirrel,” Mattie said into Macky’s hair.

  “You got to shoot him first,” he said. “Then you ring his hind legs at his feet. You have to cut around that tail base. Put him on his back.”

  “Put your foot on his tail,” Mattie said, and cackled loudly.

  “Grab him by his back legs,” Pesty added.

  Macky gave her a dirty look. “This between my mama and me,” he said.

  “Soak him,” Mattie said. “We always soak him.”

  “Who, we?” Macky asked. But she was silent on the subject.

  “She means when she was a girl,” Pesty said.

  “How you know she means that?”

  “I always know what she means,” Pesty said. “She’s my mama, too.”

  “No, she’s not.” He had his eyes closed again.

  Mattie’s chin rested in his hair. She stared at Pesty.

  Pesty felt sick at heart. Things change, she thought, and swallowed away the lump in her throat.

  “I got to go,” Macky said to Mattie. He got up.

  “Bushy tail,” Mattie said, smiling. She shielded her eyes, as if looking into the sun.

  “I’ll get you maybe some squirrel,” he said. “I’ll go see what I can find in the woods today. You want this?” He held up the toast she hadn’t touched. She took it, took two bites, gave it back to him. He wolfed it down, going out the door.

  Nobody saying goodbye, Pesty thought. She felt so bad today. Living in this house with nobody to talk to most of the time. Now Macky didn’t want her around.

  Her papa drank his coffee in the kitchen. So did her older brothers. Macky waited in his room. When they were gone, he went in and had some milk and cookies. He got his gun from the high gun shelf in the pantry. And he left.

  Everybody hates me, Pesty thought. She stood just inside her mama’s bedroom at the doorway, looking out. She saw everybody leave. Then she closed the door and turned the skeleton key in the lock.

  “Mama, get your clothes on! We got to get going in the tunnel.”

  Mattie Darrow was out of bed, suddenly rushing, tearing up the room.

  “Mama, shhhh. Slow down! Here. Sit. I’ll get your clothes and your coat, and your boots, too. You want to go to the bathroom? Okay, Mama. And you wi
sh to wash up, too. I’ll comb your hair when you are finished. It was seven-fifteen when Daddy left. Now it’s some later, so please, Mama, hurry! Oh, it’s going to be a big day, I bet!”

  It was just after eight when Mattie and Pesty swung around into the bedroom upstairs in the house of Dies Drear. Thomas and Mr. Small and Great-grandmother Jeffers were there waiting. “We’ll go downstairs to the kitchen,” Great-grandmother said, after greeting Pesty and her mama. She took Mattie Darrow ever so gently by her arm. Mattie made no resistance.

  They all went downstairs. Pesty hung back with Mr. Small and Thomas.

  “They all of them are out the house,” she told them.

  “Can you get them on time?” asked Mr. Small.

  “Sure. They’re just out doing chores.”

  “Macky, too?” asked Thomas.

  “No. He’s hunting. Squirrel, ’cause Mama wants it. But I can get him.”

  “It would be good if you did,” Mr. Small said. “But get your father and the others. You know what to do. I’m counting on you.”

  “I know it,” she murmured. She smiled shyly at Thomas.

  He smiled back at her. “It’s going to come out great,” Thomas said.

  “I know it,” she said. But she was thinking: Am I right to do this?

  They stood at the bottom of the stairs. “Mama won’t be any trouble, long as Great Mother Jeffers is there,” she told Mr. Small. “She likes Great Mother Jeffers. She likes Thomas, too.” She and Thomas grinned at each other. “Have the little fellows gone off to school yet?”

  “Not yet,” said Thomas.

  “Well, she’ll sure like seeing them best of all.”

  “Pesty, I want you to know that we all think you are just wonderful,” Mr. Small told her.

  “You do?” she said.

  “Uh-huh,” he said. “You are smart and very brave, and we thank you now for everything. I promise you, everything is going to work out, you’ll see.” But he hated seeing the sadness in her eyes.

  “I’m going then,” she said.

  “We’ll see you in a short while,” he said. “Remember, the timing is everything. Don’t tell before nine o’clock. Then get them moving.”

  “I know,” she said. “See you.” And she left, wanting only to be in the Drear kitchen, where it was warm and smelled so good. She went out the door and jumped off the front porch. She started her trot home.

  20

  PESTY STOPPED TROTTING TO study the wooded hilltop. She gave a yell, “Mah-Kay! Mah-Kay!,” calling her brother. She could hear her voice a long way around, coming back to her. There, she thought, Macky better hear that! But for good measure she called out again: “Mah-kay! Mah-kay!”

  She could trot forever. But it wasn’t far now. She jogged on along the bottom of the rise on Drear lands clear to the east toward her own family land. It was her mama’s father’s land. They had twelve acres sandwiched between Drear and Carr lands. Her daddy grew low-grade corn for silage. Now it was winter and not much to do. Her daddy did a lot of walking the countryside.

  Still looking for treasure, and it’s right under his nose. Why does he have to have riches? she wondered. He’d kill me if he knew that all this time—She dared not think about it.

  Pesty slammed inside the house just to make noise. There was no one there. She made her mama’s bed. She never bothered to make her own or anyone else’s. The clock said seven minutes to nine. Not long now. She went into her mama’s bedroom and lay on the bed, closed her eyes. All was silence around her.

  “I’m just a kid,” she whispered into the pillow, feeling sorry for herself. Am I wrong to help Mr. Thomas’s papa? What is going to happen?

  She heard a gun go off a long ways off. Her eyes flew open; she saw it was nearly time. She got up, giving herself a minute to leave the house, to trot around to the fields. Her daddy would be nearby. What if he’s not? What if he’s gone off to town? She had a moment of panic and screamed at the top of her lungs. “Daddy! Daddy! Daddy, hurry, something’s happened!” she hollered. She knew it must be nine o’clock. “Dad-dy!”

  Where there had been no one, River Lewis Darrow was suddenly there. He was climbing over a fence near Pesty. “Daddy!” she yelled, running to him.

  He looked slightly to one side of her when he spoke. “Mattie all right?” he said, alarmed by her hollering.

  “Daddy! Come quick. Everybody over Mr. Pluto’s. Say there’s been a great discovery.” Pesty stood there panting.

  River Lewis stopped still. He didn’t move a muscle, and he looked as if he had been struck dumb. His boys, Wilbur and Russell and River Ross, came up.

  “What is it, Daddy?” River Ross asked. River Lewis waved him quiet.

  “Say again? Slowly,” he finally said to Pesty.

  Pesty took a deep breath and started over. “Daddy, all them Smalls, over to Mr. Pluto’s. Everybody yelling. Mr. Small says to Mr. Thomas, ‘Thomas, this is a great discovery.’ Mr. Thomas, jumping up and down. Mr. Pluto, he had a handful of gold. Just lumps and lumps of gold. He given it to Mama!”

  “Wh-what?” River Lewis stammered. “Mattie, over there? Gold?”

  “She like to walk, so I walk her on over to Mr. Pluto’s ’cause she’s his friend,” Pesty said, “and she’s right in the middle of some great discovery.”

  Before Pesty had finished, River Lewis was moving by her; the older sons were right with him. Then River Lewis was nearly running, and his sons were still with him. Pesty trotted at the rear. Wasn’t any use talking more about it. She had done her part.

  They were nearly at Pluto’s. They had skirted Carr property and were passing by the woods when Macky walked out of the trees. He had his gun over his arm and pointing toward the ground. There was something still in a burlap sack slung over his shoulder. “What’s going on?” he called, trotting down to catch up with Pesty. “Were you yelling my name?

  “Well, sure,” Pesty said. “You catch anything?”

  “Sure, some squirrel,” he said. “But what did you want? Where’s everybody going?”

  River Lewis and the older sons hadn’t stopped. They paid no attention to Macky as usual. “Just come on,” Pesty said, trotting again. “We have to get over to Mr. Pluto’s for the great discovery.”

  “The what?” he said, carefully setting his gun and the sack down. He would pick them up later.

  “Mr. Small says to his son, Mr. Thomas, ‘Thomas, this is a great discovery,’ ” Pesty explained. “And Mr. Thomas, a jumping bean. His mama there, too. She already taken the twins to school and come back. And Great Mother Jeffers say, ‘Praise heaven and earth!’ And Mr. Pluto, he have a handful of gold. He give it to Mama!”

  “He what?”Macky said.

  “Just come on, Macky, and you’ll see!” Pesty said.

  She and Macky went, following River Lewis and the older brothers, who were truly hurrying now. When they reached the clearing before the cave, the men stopped in their tracks.

  “Careful,” River Lewis whispered. He was remembering the last time they thought to enter Pluto’s cave. Then the Smalls with Pluto and his son, Mayhew, had played the awful trick on them, scaring River Lewis and his boys to death. He half suspected that little Pesty had been in on it, although he was never able to prove it. Pretending slave ghosts and Dies Drear ghost had come back to haunt the place and everything. Made him look like a fool when folks found out his boys had run in fear. He’d barely lived it down. Now here he and his sons were back again. And were they to be made fools of twice?

  “Daddy, them doors to the cave is open,” said River Ross.

  “I can see that,” River Lewis said. “Do you think I’m blind?”

  “No, Daddy,” River Ross said.

  River Lewis skirted the clearing. He intended to turn and swagger off at the slightest movement inside. But there was nothing, no sound or anything. The doors to the cave were open partway, but not enough so they could see inside.

  Pesty held her breath as River Lewis reached the door. He st
ood for a second. Then he roughly pushed the plank doors all the way open. Not bothering to knock, he walked on in. After all, his wife must still be inside. His older sons came on behind him. Then Pesty and Macky came in.

  Within, Pluto’s cave was the way it always was after breakfast. The bed was neatly made. But the forge and firepot, the bellows and anvil were cold and still today. The wood roof doors in the rock ceiling were open to the cold and light. Pesty could see a piece of sky surrounded by bare limbs of trees.

  The secret wall across the cave from them had been made to slide away.

  “Look!” whispered River Lewis. “Didn’t know that opening was there!”

  “Daddy …” Wilbur said.

  “Shut up!” River Lewis whispered loudly. Wilbur clamped his mouth shut.

  Cautiously River Lewis moved up to the wall opening.

  When he stands right in front of it, he will see, Pesty thought. Her heart leaped in her chest. Glad I won’t have to keep it a secret no more.

  River Lewis stood at the opening, as still and dark as shadow. He was looking down. They all came up behind him, stood on either side. The opening was that wide. They had to look down into the underground cavern. Darrow men stood there, thoughts rushing so. Pesty, seeing Thomas inside looking up, could almost hear her daddy thinking: This wealth, right underfoot. Forever here. All this time.

  They all were down there: Smalls and Pluto, Pluto’s son, Mayhew Skinner. He was an actor. See, Pesty? Thomas was thinking. We got hold of Mayhew, too, so Mr. Pluto would feel better about it all.

  Mayhew stood coolly, smiling up at the Darrows. Pesty was glad to see him. He was her friend and always nice to her. She’d seen him on television in a commercial once. She didn’t get to see him in real life so often.