After the War Read Free Page A

“I can’t stand this professional Southerner stuff. And what on earth do you mean, ‘too Vermont’?”
    Deirdre interrupted all this to say, “And if our little baby SallyJane had’ve been a boy, we would’ve named her Derek. I mean him. I always said that, didn’t I, Russ? And I was thinking of Derek McFall, the very same one. Russ, didn’t I always say?”
    “You sure did, darling,” said Russ, in his softest, meanest voice.
    Oh God! to be away from all these people, these grownupswith their preening, knowing Southern voices, their drinks and their silly quarrels. Their secret kissing, their necking behind everyone’s back, thinking nobody knew. God, how she hated them all, but soon she would be away, far away. In Boston. In Cambridge, Mass. Melanctha thrilled to those names.
    “… home for Thanksgiving?” Archer Bigelow, beside her, was anxiously asking.
    Thanksgiving? In a blind way, she looked at Archer. “I really don’t know,” she told him, untruthfully; she had already promised Russ and Deirdre that she would. Pullman tickets were bought, hard to come by these days.
    Suddenly, into another heavy heated silence, no one talking, no breeze to stir the leaves, from up at the house came the sound of the telephone. Very loud, everyone could hear it.
    Cynthia and Odessa reacted instantly; simultaneously they both rushed toward the house.
    Cynthia was going too fast, though, in her flimsy green sandals. She skidded on the gravel path and slid to her knees. Looking up, unhurt, for a second she saw Odessa’s terrified face, and she knew that the terror was not for her, but it had to do with the phone, whoever, whatever. But why? It must be, must be Derek, for her . Or just conceivably Harry, somehow wangling a cable call. Can Odessa possibly be that worried about Mr. Harry, as she calls him?
    Getting to her feet, not hurt except for a little stinging on the palms of her hands, Cynthia followed Odessa, who had turned again and was racing for the still loudly ringing phone.
    And then Cynthia heard Odessa’s voice, very clear. “Yes’m.Yes’m.” And then a pause during which Cynthia just stood there, outside the kitchen door. Unable not to listen, although by now she knew that the call was not for her.
    “Unh-hunh. It you . I might’ve knowed. You think call from California free ?” (A longer pause.) “That so? That true? You telling me award ? Well now, that just mighty fine. Mighty fine. Horace, you done me proud. And yourself too. You a fine man, you know that? You all right now, you tell me true? You not hurt? Yeah, we do that.” She laughed, a small rich intimate laugh. “You get on home, you hear?”
    By the time Cynthia walked into the kitchen Odessa had hung up the phone and was just standing there, brown and radiant, shiningly happy. She seemed to feel some explanation due, or maybe she simply wanted to tell her news. “That Horace, he in the Navy, San Diego, in California. Say there been an accident, and he pull some mens out the water. Horace always did swim real good. And they give him some kind of a prize. Some medal. The Navy do—”
    “Odessa, that’s wonderful! How terrific—oh, I’m so pleased—”
    Cynthia took both Odessa’s hands in hers, saw tears on Odessa’s face, and then moved to her, gave Odessa a tight warm hug. But then she had no idea what to do, and she had in that instant to abandon a momentary impulse, which was to lead Odessa back down to the pool to announce the news, to celebrate, to make toasts. But Odessa would hate that, what a totally bad idea. Instead she said, “Odessa, wouldn’t you just like to go rest for a while, in your room? Please, I can handle the party. Abigail can help me, and Melanctha.”
    “Oh, no’m, I jus’ keep on—”
    “No, Odessa, please—isn’t there something you’d like to do? I mean—”
    For a moment they stared at each other, helplessly, lacking a common vocabulary or common habits.
    But Odessa seemed to read at