The Personal History of Rachel DuPree_ A Novel - Ann Weisgarber [108]
At the store, I put a penny on the wooden counter. “A stamp, please,” I said. It had been years since I’d seen Charlie Johnston, a friendly enough man even if Isaac thought he had gouged ranchers during the drought.
“Cold enough for you?” he said, giving a small smile as he pulled out a drawer from his side of the counter. There were rough patches of flaky skin on his cheeks and the end of his nose was red like he had a head cold. He found a stamp and put it on the counter.
“Yes,” I said.
“Folks say it’s going to be a bad winter.”
A shiver ran through me. Charlie Johnston rang up the one-cent key on his cash register and put the penny in the drawer. I loosened the drawstrings that held my cloth handbag shut. I pulled out a letter. My hands fumbling some, I licked the stamp and put it on the right-hand corner of the envelope. I pressed the stamp into place and then slid the envelope across the counter to Charlie Johnston.
He looked at the address. “I’d heard about this, how Isaac’s working the mine in Lead.”
“Yes.”
“A letter from home. A man always appreciates that.”
“I expect so.” But not this one, I thought. I had written it the night before after the children were in bed. It had taken all evening, each word harder to write than the one before, but I had to do it. It was only right that Isaac knew I’d done what I said I would do. I pictured him opening the letter as he sat in a miner’s tent late at night, holding it close to a lantern, squinting, wishing for his magnifying glass.
Dear Husband,
Me and the Children are going to my Mother’s. In Chicago. I hired on a second Hand. Pete Klegberg. I am Sorry for this. We will be Back in the Spring.
Your Wife
A sudden clutch of fear seized my heart. Get it back, I thought. I put out my hand, but by then Charlie Johnston had dropped the letter into a small canvas bag that hung from a peg. There was black lettering on it—U.S. MAIL—the print a little faded around the edges. I let my hand drop. Isaac left us, I told myself. You had to do this thing.
Charlie Johnston turned to the open cabinet that hung on the back wall behind him. It had narrow rows of pigeonholes, some with mail in them. He said, “It’s the oddest thing about letter writing. Something I’ve noticed. Folks go months, even years sometimes, without getting one. Or writing one, for that matter. Then the letters start flying back and forth. Like with you and Isaac.” I looked at him; I didn’t know his meaning. He pulled out a letter from one of the pigeonholes. “Here’s another one for you folks. Came Monday, I believe it was. Or maybe Tuesday.”
All at once the store was too hot, like the stove along the side wall had fired up a blaze too big for the room. I pulled at my neck scarf, but loosening it didn’t help. When I had written my mother in September, I told her she didn’t have to write back if she agreed to take me and the children. Since then, I’d been uneasy every time Isaac went to town, worried sick there’d be word from her.
Charlie Johnston put the letter on the counter. I couldn’t bring myself to look at it; I fixed my eyes on the cabinet behind him. The letter, I knew, carried bad news. It was from my mother, saying it was wrong to leave the ranch. She was warning me about race riots; she was telling me she didn’t have room for five children and me. Or maybe it was from Sue, my sister, telling me that something had happened to Mama. But it was too late. I’d sold my wedding band. We had to come; my children needed to. It was only for a few months.
“You all right?” Charlie Johnston said.
Not wanting to, I glanced at the letter. It was to Isaac, not me.
“Mrs. DuPree?”
Relieved, I put the letter in my handbag. “Yes,