The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate

Chapter 20 THE BIG BIRTHDAY

THE YEAR GROUND ON, and there was still no word about the Plant. My days consisted of a cycle of schoolwork, piano practice, and cooking lessons with Viola. I learned, against my will, how to make Beef Wellington and Lamb Parsifal. I learned how to fry chicken, catfish, and okra. I made white bread, brown bread, corn bread, and spoon bread.

None of this seemed to wear well on Viola. It didn’t wear all that well on me, either. In the shrinking scraps of free time I had left, I traipsed after Granddaddy as often as I could.

We made it to October. Ah, October. That time of ecstasy for me and three of my brothers, each of us with a birthday that month, plus Halloween to look forward to. It was almost too much excitement to bear. And that year it did in fact prove to be too much, at least for Mother, who called me, Lamar, Sul Ross, and Sam Houston in for a talk.

“Children,” she said, “this year we are going to have a birthday party for all of you to share. One big group birthday, instead of four ordinary ones. Won’t that be nice? We’ll invite all your friends and have a real celebration.”

“What?”

“Hey, that’s not fair!”

“Wait a minute.”

“Motherrrrr.”

Did she expect general joy about this arrangement? There was none. The chorus of grizzling was so loud and long that I was surprised she didn’t relent and go back on her plan. But she stuck it out.

“Enough!” she commanded. “It’s all too much. For me and for Viola, both. If she has to make four birthday feasts in one month again, she’ll quit us, I swear she will. And I’ll not have you complaining to her about it, either. It wasn’t she who suggested it.”

“Callie Vee could help her cook,” Lamar said loftily. “She’s learning how. Let her help. I want my own birthday party.”

I threw him such a venomous look that he took a step back.

Mother prevailed, and so began an entire week of preparations, during which she and Viola and SanJuanna went full-steam ahead (since it was my birthday too, I was excused from cooking, despite my rotten brother’s comment). We four children stayed out of their way and continued to vent our group spleen amongst ourselves, muttering about the unfairness of it all. Then the first Saturday of October came, and we were herded together for our communal birthday, in a peculiar mood both celebratory and sullen.

Viola’s job was to cook the mountains of food; SanJuanna’s was to keep it coming. Alberto’s job was to erect the pavilion tent in case of rain and lead Sunshine, a bitter, elderly Shetland pony, around on a tight rein, making sure she didn’t perform her favorite trick of whipping around like a snake and taking a chunk out of her rider’s leg.

Our initial collective pique melted away as the party began, and why not? It was the biggest party Fentress had ever seen. All of the children in town were invited, and many of their parents came too. There were pony rides, sparklers, bottle rockets, croquet, horseshoes, taffy pulls, and apple bobbing. There were favors and crepe-paper hats and streamers.

There were mounds of dainty sandwiches and sausage rolls; there were cool aspics and hot ham served with apricot preserves; cold roast beef sliced thin and served with fiery horseradish, which the children assiduously avoided; all the jelly roll and ice cream you could possibly eat; pecan pies and lemon meringue pies; there was a towering four-layer dark chocolate cake with the name of each birthday child written in fancy white icing on the sides, with candles on the top for all of us, a total of forty-nine, covering the top layer. (Twelve for me, fourteen for Lamar, fifteen for Sam Houston, and eight for Sul Ross. It was a veritable sheet of flame, and I could see that if we kept up the communal birthday, we’d soon have to convert to some other candle system, or else get a much larger cake.)

Things started out decorously enough but deteriorated into unprecedented pandemonium. Ajax swiped a sausage roll and managed to gulp down his prize while running at top speed, a mob of gleeful children pounding in pursuit.

My one responsibility for the day was to chaperone Sul Ross and make sure he didn’t stuff himself on birthday cake to the point of getting sick. A futile undertaking. Sul Ross always got sick on cake, whether watched by me or not.

Father and Mother played the gracious host and hostess. Granddaddy stood with the adults and had a convivial glass of beer. He announced that there was a birthday present for all of us coming from Austin but that it had been unexpectedly delayed and would arrive later in the week. This caused all sorts of speculation, but he wouldn’t tell us any details. Then he retreated to the library to take a refreshing nap.

Travis and Lamar and Sam Houston circulated in Lula Gates’s vicinity like planets around the sun, pestering her with constant questions: “More ice cream, Lula?” “Can I get you more cake, Lula?” “Are you having a good time, Lula?”

Nobody asked me if I wanted anything. But then, I was perfectly capable of getting my own cake. I surely was. A good, sturdy girl like me.

Lula stood talking with her mother, the tiniest beads of sweat on her nose, her loose hair a silver-and-gold cataract in the sun.

Mrs. Gates smiled at Travis and then Lamar. So, I thought, she is hoping to land a Tate boy for Lula, and it doesn’t look like she cares which one, either.

“Callie,” said Mrs. Gates, “we were talking about the fair. How is your handiwork coming along? If I may be permitted to toot my own daughter’s horn, I must say that Lula is surprising me with her skill these days.”

“Ah,” I said.

“We’re hoping she takes a ribbon in cutwork, although her lace making is progressing as well.”

“Well,” I said, and then realized I could think of not one single word about the subject. The gap in the conversation yawned wider until Travis chimed in.

“Callie Vee is making me some socks for Christmas, Mrs. Gates. Aren’t you, Callie?”

“Yes. That’s right. Socks.”

Travis said, “It will be nice to have wool socks when it’s cold, don’t you think? I hope they’ll be done in time.”

“Oh, Travis,” said Mrs. Gates, smiling, “I’m sure they’ll be done in time for Christmas, won’t they, Callie? Why, socks don’t take any time at all.”

I felt like saying, Don’t bet on it.

“Lula can make a pair of socks in an afternoon,” Mrs. Gates went on.

“Really?” said Travis, digesting this information and then looking at me with puzzlement.

I didn’t like the way this conversation was going. “Lula,” I interrupted, “do you want a ride on Sunshine? It’s okay, Alberto’s got her, she won’t bite. But if you’re worried, I’ll go first if you want.”

“Okay, Callie, that would be nice,” Lula said, and we excused ourselves.

Travis, again showing admirable social skills for his age, followed Lula with his eyes but cannily stayed behind to woo Mrs. Gates with his attentions. That boy was growing up fast.

As we passed the groaning trestle tables of food, I saw Sul Ross head for the trees with two mounded plates of cake. I had forgotten that I was supposed to shield him from his own excesses. I felt guilty, but in truth an eight-year-old should know better, shouldn’t he? Besides, it was my birthday party too.

We passed the horseshoe game, which Harry was supervising. He kept one eye on Sam Houston, who was known for his wild pitches, and the other on Lula’s older cousin, Fern Spitty, who swanned about nearby, twirling her white lace-trimmed parasol.

“Callie,” Lula said tentatively, “it seems like you’ve been in such a bad mood. Are you sick?”

I was torn about explaining it to her. Could she, the budding princess of bobbins and lace, understand what I was going through? We’d been friends for years, yet lately it seemed that we didn’t speak the same language. But the thought of not being able to tell my best friend that my paw was caught in the trap was too sad. So I screwed up my courage and said, faltering, “I . . . I don’t like all that sewing and knitting stuff, not like you, and besides, I’m not any good at it. I want to do something else with my life.”

“Like what?”

“I’m not sure.”

“You mean you want to be a schoolteacher? Like Miss Harbottle? But then you wouldn’t get to have a family of your own. Don’t you want a family of your own?”

“I’m not sure,” I said.

She looked confused. “Everybody has a family. Don’t they?” She thought for a moment and said, “Oh, you mean you want to be like the Telephone Operator, like Maggie Medlin. She doesn’t have a family.” Lula thought some more and said, “She does get paid real money of her own. That would be nice, real money of your own. . . .”

“I don’t know what I want to do, Lula.” And then it came to me, like the first shocking glimpse of the sun’s disk rising over the horizon, what it was I did want to do. It was so obvious that I wondered why I hadn’t seen it before. I only had to say it aloud. Did I have the courage to do that? To reveal it in the open air? Maybe I should try it out in front of Lula to see how it sounded.

“I think,” I said, then stopped. “I think maybe I want to go to the university.”

“Really?” Lula was either impressed or appalled, I wasn’t sure which. She said, “I don’t know anyone who has gone to the university. Wait, did Miss Harbottle go?”

“No, she went to the Normal School. She’s only got a certificate.”

“What do you do at the university?” said Lula.

“You study things.”

“What kinds of things?”

“All kinds of things,” I said, a trifle pompously. I had no real idea what you did at the university—I was making it up as I went along—but I didn’t want her to know that. “Science and things,” I said. “They give you a special diploma that shows you’ve been there.” I was afraid she would ask me what you did with your special diploma once you got it, and the truth was I had absolutely no idea. The sudden, ridiculous superstition seized me that if she asked the question and I couldn’t answer it, I would never get to go. “Come on, Lula,” I said, grabbing her hand, “let’s go for a ride!”

She smiled with pleasure and swiped at the sweat beads scattered on her nose like freckles, and we ran off to find the cranky pony. As we passed the horseshoe pit, I saw Harry talking to Fern Spitty, and there was something about his attentive attitude that made me think we were in for the mating dance again.

After riding Sunshine, a group of us played at Civil War games, enacting the battles of Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville, skirmishing with wooden swords and firing log cannons. All my brothers except for Sam Houston lamented that they had missed the heroics and the romantic glory. (Sam Houston was the one who had seen Mathew Brady’s gruesome photographs in the library and hadn’t found them any too glorious.) We had to maintain a strict rota to determine whose turn it was to play the Federals, as no one wanted to enact their part. We tried playing a few times without the North, but this turned out to be so boring that we abandoned the game altogether.

Then we had a watermelon-seed-spitting contest, which Lamar won, naturally, as the biggest gas-bag in attendance. Next we opened gifts, and I received a tiny brown bag of licorice from the three youngest boys, who had pooled their resources to buy it. Sam Houston gave me a buttonhook, and Lamar gave me a pincushion shaped like a fat red tomato. Harry gave me a book of music for the piano, Jolly Songs for Family Fun. From my parents, I got a dress of the finest white lace-trimmed lawn and a new pair of winter slippers made of rabbit fur to replace the ones I’d outgrown. I gave each of my brothers a bookmark of a waving Texas flag that I’d inked and colored myself.

By the time the fireworks were set off, all of us were worn out. There was much laughter. There were tears and snits and several small bruises and scrapes, all the hallmarks of a grand party. Dovie got a black eye from running smack into another child’s fist. (It could easily have been my fist but it wasn’t, I swear.) This earned her much approval. Since she was generally esteemed an unbearable Miss Priss, this did her a world of good and earned her much approval.

That evening Mother took to her room with a large bottle of her tonic. Viola went to lie down with a cold cloth and a headache powder and was given an unprecedented two whole days off to recover. SanJuanna and Alberto shouldered the thankless burden of cleaning up. Alberto reported that when he led Sunshine back to her stall at the end of the day, she was too exhausted to try and bite him even once.

And Granddaddy’s gift did arrive at the end of the week, although we all came to wish soon enough that it had not. It came in a large crate with ventilation holes, always a promising sign in a gift. We assembled on the front porch and watched as Harry pried it open. It contained a scrolled wire cage, in which sat a gorgeous parrot. How on earth had Granddaddy known?

And it wasn’t just any parrot. It was an enormous, full-grown Amazon, three feet (excuse me—one meter) long from crest to tail feathers, with a brilliant golden breast, azure back, and wings of shocking crimson. We all stared at it in awe. Granddaddy had read about it in the Austin papers and had bought it from an estate sale, the bird having outlived its previous owner. It was the most beautiful thing we’d ever seen. And it looked like it could take your eye out without the slightest effort.

As we gaped at it, it reached through the bars with its great scaling beak and delicately opened the latch, then swung itself onto the top of the cage in a practiced move, despite the impediment of a thin silver chain that ran from one ankle to its gnawed perch. It preened a long iridescent feather, shook its head, raised and lowered its crest in a gesture that was somehow threatening, and turned to gaze at us with a perfectly round, yellow eye.

We were stupefied. None of us had ever seen anything like it. Mother looked at the creature with some alarm, but then, as if realizing its future was at stake, the bird broke into an amazing whistling rendition of “When You and I Were Young, Maggie,” complete with trills and cadenzas. Was this pure chance? Or had the bird somehow divined that my mother’s name was Margaret and that this was her favorite song? There was some cruel intelligence in its jaundiced eye that made me ponder this and made me grateful for the chain. His name was Polly, of course, and he was our birthday gift. What could my mother do?

So he stayed, at least for a while. He turned out to be as tetchy and irritable as he looked. With his huge beak and tremendous black claws, no one dared think of unchaining him from his perch. He intimidated all of us: parents, children, dogs, cats. Everyone gave his corner a wide berth except to feed and water him and change his paper. He had his own cuttlebone that he rubbed the sides of his beak against like a knife grinder honing his blade. I wanted to examine it up close but didn’t have the nerve. Polly didn’t seem to care that he was a friendless bird. He spent his days muttering dyspeptically to himself and singing naughty sea chanteys, with the occasional random earsplitting screech thrown in just to make you jump.

We took to covering his cage more and more often so that we could have some peace. I suspect everyone wanted to get rid of him, but no one had the nerve to come out and say it; we were waiting for some decent excuse to present itself because he was, after all, the Birthday Bird.

The decent excuse came during one of Mother’s afternoon teas when he cheerily greeted her guest, Mrs. Purtle, with the suggestion to “go bugger yerself.” I didn’t know what that meant, but it appeared that both Mother and Mrs. Purtle did. Within the hour, Polly was carried by Alberto down to the gin and given to Mr. O’Flanagan.

Mr. O’Flanagan was the assistant manager of the gin and a former merchant sailor, and he loved having a bird around. He had once kept an ancient raven, which he’d dubbed Edgar Allan Crow, and he’d labored for years to get the bird to speak the word nevermore. It remained mute until the day it squawked once and then fell off its perch from old age. Mr. O’Flanagan, on hearing that we had a real parrot that talked, was thrilled to take possession of Polly. Being an old salt himself, he took no offense in rough company. It turned out that he and the bird knew many of the same indecent songs, and they would pass the time when he wasn’t busy with customers by singing together, with the door shut, of course.

Polly was missed by no one in our house, including, I suspect, Granddaddy.