The Daughter's Walk - Jane Kirkpatrick [110]
“I needed time alone, and now I see that Louise is in need of more care. I can do that for her, and that’s best done without the distraction of business … or someone less familiar.”
“Less familiar? We’ve been together now for over six years, looking after each other.”
“We’ll still be neighbors.” She looked at the dog. “Lucky can visit between us. He’ll get good exercise that way.”
“There’s nothing going on between Franklin and me,” I said, thinking that’s what this was all about. “He’s loyal to you, as he’s always been. More, really. He adores you both.”
“Hmm. Irrelevant,” she said. “You’re free to do what you wish. Work out an arrangement with him, or let him go. But Louise and I are making a change. And sadly, that requires that you make a change too.”
She said no more, returned to looking out the window at some unseen bird of flight. I stood; Lucky waited, expectant, his eyes on me. I’d allowed myself to become entangled with them, learned from them, had my dreams wrapped up with them. I’d invested in this friendship, this family. God gives the desolate a family, the Scripture promised. Maybe I wasn’t desolate enough to deserve one. It would be all business between us from now on. Nothing more.
“We should finish up details,” I said. “Did you need to sign any papers while I was gone?”
“Just the one that completed the Alta Vista sale. That’s all settled.”
“Thank you. It was good I signed the power of attorney.”
She smiled then, a twinkle of the old Olea in her eye. “There was one more item. It was such a good investment I knew you’d want me to make the purchase on your behalf.”
“Real estate?”
“No. Transportation. That Ford F Touring Car in the driveway is yours.”
I heard the dog’s toenails click-click along the boardwalk as I fast-walked back. I’d have to learn how to drive the thing. I shouldn’t even keep it. It was a luxury purchased without any urging from me that I’d want one. Well, maybe I’d mentioned an auto a time or two, but still. She had no right.
Olea’s decisions were based on Franklin, not about Louise’s health. There was a jealousy present. I’d invaded a relationship they’d had for years, and though she acted as if it was fine, clearly it wasn’t. I’d assumed Olea and Louise would be there to offer moral support for my new venture, that their enthusiasm was genuine. But Olea was independent, had her own resources, and she’d changed her mind because she could. I had let myself forget that, and now I’d pay the price.
“Well, I’m not leaving,” Louise said when I returned and encouraged her to do what Olea had suggested. “I like this house and my room in it. It’s perfect. It’s more than two hundred fifty steps to her outhouse. Why should I leave just because Olea wants me to? We have a ranch to take care of. I help by caring for the boarders. Don’t you remember?” She crossed her arms over her chest, tapped her foot.
“It is a lot of work to keep up,” I said. Lucky sat now and licked at his hinterland, then yawned and flopped down on the linoleum with a long sigh of contentment. Share the dog. How can we?
“I haven’t been as good about that as before,” Louise said. “I’ll do better, Clara.” She reminded me of Ida as a child when she’d pulled up a carrot instead of a weed. “We can do this together. Olea will see that we’re doing fine, and she’ll come back home.” She patted my hand, then an adult again, said, “I’d better get breakfast going for the boarders. They surely are quiet this morning. Must be sleeping in.”
FORTY
In Service
Like the coloring of the leaves, slowly but inevitably, life began to change. I contacted Franklin and told him how things were here. I couldn’t see a way to keep him in my employ as the women no longer required my service as a bookkeeper either. He wrote back, said he’d fill his schedule and now was the time to reach for something more. Would I reconsider his proposal? He included a book of poems by Tagore with his request. In it I found this: “I slept and dreamt that life was joy. I awoke and saw