Death In The Family, A - James Agee [97]
“Is Daddy dead?” Rufus asked. Her glance at him was as startled as if he had slapped her, and again her mouth and then her whole face began to work, uncontrollably this time, and she did not speak, but only nodded her head once, and then again, and then several times rapidly, while one small squeaky “yes” came out of her as if it had been sneezed out; then suddenly sweeping both of them close against her breasts, she tucked her chin down tightly between the crowns of their heads and they felt her whole body shaken as if by a wind, but she did not cry. Catherine began to sniffle quietly because everything seemed very serious and very sad. Rufus listened to his mother’s shattered breathing and gazed sidelong past her fair shoulder at the sheet, rumpled, and at a rubbed place in the rose-patterned carpet and then at something queer, that he had never seen before, on the bedside table, a tangle of brown beads and a little cross; through her breathing he began once more to hear the quarreling sparrows; he said to himself: dead, dead, but all he could do was see and hear; the streetcar raised and quieted its grim, iron cry; he became aware that his cap was pushed crooked against her and he felt that he ought to take it off but that he ought not to move just now to take it off, and he knew why his Aunt Hannah had been so mad at him. He could no longer hear even a rumor of the streetcar, and his mother’s breathing had become quiet again. With one hand she held Catherine still more closely against her, and Catherine sniffled a little more comfortably; with the other hand she put Rufus quietly away, so that she could look clearly into his eyes; tenderly she took off his cap and laid it beside her, and pushed the hair back from his forehead. “Neither of you will quite understand for a while,” she said. “It’s—very hard to understand. But you will,” she said (I do, he said to himself; he’s dead. That’s what) and she repeated rather dreamily, as if to herself, though she continued to look into his eyes, “You will”; then she was silent, and some kind of energy intensified in her eyes and she said: “When you want to know more—about it” (and her eyes became still more vibrant) “just, just ask me and I’ll tell you because you ought to know.” How did he get hurt, Rufus wanted to ask, but he knew by her eyes that she did not mean at all what she said, not now anyway, not this minute, he must not ask; and now he did not want to ask because he too was afraid; he nodded to let her know he understood her. “Just ask,” she said again, and he nodded again; a strange, cold excitement was rising in him; and in a cold intuition that it would be kind, and gratefully received, he kissed her. “God bless you,” she groaned, and held them passionately against herself; “both of you!” She loosened her arms. “And now you be a good boy,” she said in almost her ordinary voice, wiping Catherine’s nose. “Get little Catherine dressed, can you do that?” He nodded proudly; “and wash and dress yourself, and by then Aunt Hannah will have breakfast ready.”
“Aren’t you getting up, Mama?” he asked, much impressed that he had been deputized to dress his sister.
“Not for a while,” she said, and by her way of saying it, he knew that she wanted them to go out of the room right away.
“Come on, Catherine,” he said, and found, with surprise, that he had taken her hand. Catherine looked up at him, equally surprised, and shook her head.
“Go with Rufus, dear,” her mother said, “he’s going to help you get dressed, and eat your breakfast. Mother will see you soon.”
And Catherine, feeling that for some reason to do with her father, who was not where he ought to be, and her mother too, she must try to be a very good girl, came away with him without further protest. As they turned through the door to go down, Rufus saw that his mother had taken the beads and cross from the bedside table (they were like a regular necklace) and the beads ran among her fingers and twined and drooped from her hands and one wrist while she looked