Walk Two Moons

6 BLACKBERRIES

“What was the diabolic thing that happened to Mr. Cadaver?” Gramps asked. “You didn’t tell us that yet.”

I explained that just as Phoebe was going to divulge the purely awful thing that had happened to Mr. Cadaver, her father came home from work and we all sat down to dinner: me, Phoebe, Mr. and Mrs. Winterbottom, and Phoebe’s sister, Prudence.

Phoebe’s parents reminded me a lot of my other grandparents—the Pickfords. Like the Pickfords, Mr. and Mrs. Winterbottom spoke quietly, in short sentences, and sat straight up as they ate their food. They were extremely polite to each other, saying “Yes, Norma,” and “Yes, George,” and “Would you please pass the potatoes, Phoebe?” and “Wouldn’t your guest like another helping?”

They were picky about their food. Everything they ate was what my father would call “side dishes”: potatoes, zucchini, bean salad, and a mystery casserole that I could not identify. They didn’t eat meat, and they didn’t use butter. They were very much concerned with cholesterol.

From what I could gather, Mr. Winterbottom worked in an office, creating road maps. Mrs. Winterbottom baked and cleaned and did laundry and grocery shopping. I had a funny feeling that Mrs. Winterbottom did not actually like all this baking and cleaning and laundry and shopping, and I’m not quite sure why I had that feeling because if you just listened to the words she said, it sounded as if she was Mrs. Supreme Housewife.

For example, at one point Mrs. Winterbottom said, “I believe I’ve made more pies in the past week than I can count.” She said this in a cheery voice, but afterward, in the small silence, when no one commented on her pies, she gave a soft sigh and looked down at her plate. I thought it was odd that she baked all those pies when she seemed so concerned about cholesterol.

A little later, she said, “I couldn’t find exactly that brand of muesli you like so much, George, but I bought something similar.” Mr. Winterbottom kept eating, and again, in that silence, Mrs. Winterbottom sighed and examined her plate.

I was happy for her when she announced that since Phoebe and Prudence were back in school, she thought she would return to work. Apparently, during the school terms she worked part-time at Rocky’s Rubber as a receptionist. When no one commented on her going back to work, she sighed again and poked her potatoes.

A few times, Mrs. Winterbottom called her husband “sweetie pie” and “honey bun.” She said, “Would you like more zucchini, sweetie pie?” and “Did I make enough potatoes, honey bun?”

For some reason that surprised me, those little names she used. She was dressed in a plain brown skirt and white blouse. On her feet were sensible, wide, flat shoes. She did not wear makeup. Even though she had a pleasant, round face and long, curly yellow hair, the main impression I got was that she was used to being plain and ordinary, that she was not supposed to do anything too shocking.

And Mr. Winterbottom was playing the role of Father, with a capital F. He sat at the head of the table with his white shirt cuffs rolled back neatly. He still wore his red-and-blue–striped tie. His expression was serious, his voice was deep, and his words were clear. “Yes, Norma,” he said, deeply and clearly. “No, Norma.” He looked more like fifty-two than thirty-eight, but this was not something I would ever call to his—or Phoebe’s—attention.

Phoebe’s sister, Prudence, was seventeen years old, but she acted like her mother. She ate primly, she nodded politely, she smiled after everything she said.

It all seemed peculiar. They acted so thumpingly tidy and respectable.

After dinner, Phoebe walked me home. She said, “You wouldn’t think it to look at her, but Mrs. Cadaver is as strong as an ox.” Phoebe looked behind her, as if she expected someone to be following us. “I have seen her chop down trees and lug the remains clear across her backyard. Do you know what I think? I think maybe she killed Mr. Cadaver and chopped him up and buried him in the backyard.”

“Phoebe!” I said.

“Well, I’m just telling you what I think, that’s all.”

That night, as I lay in bed, I thought about Mrs. Cadaver, and I wanted to believe that she was capable of killing her husband and chopping him into pieces and burying him in the backyard.

And then I started thinking about the blackberries, and I remembered a time my mother and I walked around the rims of the fields and pastures in Bybanks, picking blackberries. We did not pick from the bottom of the vine or from the top. The ones at the bottom were for the rabbits, my mother said, and the ones at the top were for the birds. The ones at people-height were for people.

Lying in bed, remembering those blackberries, made me think of something else too. It was something that happened a couple years ago, on a morning when my mother slept late. It was that time she was pregnant. My father had already eaten breakfast, and he was out in the fields. On the table, my father had left a single flower in each of two juice glasses—a black-eyed susan in front of my place, and a white petunia in front of my mother’s.

When my mother came into the kitchen that day, she said, “Glory!” She bent her face toward each flower. “Let’s go find him.”

We climbed the hill to the barn, crawled between the fence wires, and crossed the field. My father was standing at the far end of the field, his back to us, hands on his hips, looking at a section of fence.

My mother slowed down when she saw him. I was right behind her. It looked as if she wanted to creep up and surprise him, so I was quiet too and cautious in my steps. I could hardly keep from giggling. It seemed so daring to be sneaking up on my father, and I was sure my mother was going to throw her arms around him and kiss him and hug him and tell him how much she loved the flower on the kitchen table. My mother always loved anything that normally grows or lives out of doors—anything—lizards, trees, cows, caterpillars, birds, flowers, crickets, toads, ants, pigs.

Just before we reached my father, he turned around. This startled my mother and threw her off guard. She stopped.

“Sugar—” he said.

My mother opened her mouth, and I was thinking, “Come on! Throw your arms around him! Tell him!” But before she could speak, my father pointed to the fence and said, “Look at that. A morning’s work.” He indicated a new length of wire strung between two new posts. There was sweat on his face and arms.

And then I saw that my mother was crying. My father saw it too. “What—” he said.

“Oh, you’re too good, John,” she said. “You’re too good. All you Hiddles are too good. I’ll never be so good. I’ll never be able to think of all the things—”

My father looked down at me. “The flowers,” I said.

“Oh.” He put his sweaty arms around her, but she was still crying and it wasn’t what I had imagined it would be. It was all sad instead of happy.

The next morning when I went into the kitchen, my father was standing beside the table looking at two small dishes of blackberries—still shiny and wet with dew—one dish at his place and one at mine. “Thanks,” I said.

“No, it wasn’t me,” he said. “It was your mother.”

Just then, she came in from the back porch. My father put his arms around her and they smooched and it was all tremendously romantic, and I started to turn away, but my mother caught my arm. She pulled me to her and said to me—though it was meant for my father, I think—“See? I’m almost as good as your father!” She said it in a shy way, laughing a little. I felt betrayed, but I didn’t know why.

It is surprising all the things you remember just by eating a blackberry pie.