Earthly Possessions - Anne Tyler [40]
Wednesday morning I made my decision: Alberta’s bureau. I waited till Saul had gone to the radio shop, and then I lugged it down the stairs—first the drawers, one by one, and then the frame. The frame was hard to handle and it clumped quite a bit. My mother called from the kitchen: “Charlotte? Is that you?” I had to stop and rest the bureau on a step and steady my voice and say, “Yes, Mama.”
“What’s happening up there?”
“Nothing, Mama.”
I took it out the front, so she wouldn’t see. Dragged it around to the alley, slid all the drawers in and left it by the trashcan. Then I went to the grocery store, and on to Photo Supply for some bromide paper. So it was noon before I got home again. I stepped in the door, set down my packages, and came face to face with Alberta’s bureau.
Well, it was like meeting up with a corpse that I’d already buried. I was truly startled. And it didn’t help to have Saul looming behind it with his arms folded across his chest. “Why,” I said. “What is this doing here?”
“I found it by the trashcan,” he said.
“You did?”
“Luckily, it’s Columbus Day and nobody picked it up.”
“Oh. Columbus Day,” I said.
“How many other things have you thrown away?”
“Well …”
“It’s not yours to dispose of, Charlotte. What would make you chuck it out like that?”
“Well, I ought to have some say what’s in this house,” I told him. “And when I spoke to you about it you were too busy, oh, you couldn’t be bothered with earthly things.”
“I was working,” said Saul. “I’m falling asleep on my books every night. I can’t stop to rearrange the furniture at the drop of a hat.”
“Drop of a hat! I asked you in August. But no, you had to wait for the proper moment. And then went off muttering scripture somewhere, practicing handshakes or whatever it is you do in that place, I wouldn’t know.”
“Naturally you wouldn’t,” he said, “since you didn’t come to Opening Day at Hamden, where they explained it all.”
“But I don’t like Hamden,” I told him. “I hate the whole idea, and I would try to make you quit if I were sure that I had any right to change people.” ’
“Well, I don’t understand you,” he said.
“No, I know you don’t. Preachers never ask themselves that question, that’s what’s wrong with them.”
“What question? What are we talking about? Listen, all I want is for you to leave my things alone. Don’t touch them. I’ll tend to them sometime later.”
“Even if they’re breaking my neck?” I asked.
He brushed a hand across his forehead, like someone exhausted. “I never thought you’d turn out to be this kind of person, Charlotte,” he said. “That furniture is mine, and I’ll decide what to do with it. Meanwhile, I’m late for class. Goodbye.”
He left, closing the door too quietly. I heard the pickup start. I gathered my packages and took them to the kitchen, where I found my mother sitting rigid in her lawn chair. These days she had packed down somewhat; she was merely a very stout, sagging woman, and could have sat anywhere she chose but returned to the lawn chair during moments of stress. She wore her old scared look and clutched the splintery arms with white-tipped fingers. I said, “Never mind, Mama. It’s all right.”
“You treat him so badly,” she said, “and he’s so fine and mannerly.”
She liked Saul a lot more than she’d ever liked me.
I said, “Mama, I have to defend myself.”
“But you don’t want to drive him off,” she said.
“Drive him off?” I said. “Ha!” It was exactly what I did want. I could see myself chasing him with a stick, like the girl on the Old Dutch Cleanser can: “Back away! Back away! Give me air!” This hopeless, powerless feeling would vanish like a fog, if I could just drive him off. I would be free then of his judging gaze that noted all my faults and sins, that widened at learning who I really was. I would be rid of his fine and mannerly presence,