Lingering Echoes Read online

  “As you’ll notice, these are biographies, and each of you got a different one. Opal, what’s a biography?”

  It was a true story about a person. Everyone knew that. And Bone didn’t like true stories. Bone loved to read and tell stories. About Gypsy curses and ghosts and devil dogs and Jack and Ashpet. Not about real things that happened. Her Gift was all about seeing real things that had happened to objects, or at least to the people who owned them—and she still didn’t like it one little bit.

  Bone placed the book on her desk and crossed her arms again. As she did, her fingers brushed across Mama’s butter-yellow sweater.

  Mama was watching Bone go off to school the first time. Will held her hand tightly while she jabbered on about some story. He was two years older but had been held back on account of not talking. Bone felt Mama’s mix of love, pride, and sadness as the pair plodded up the road. Mama followed them all the way to the schoolhouse without them noticing.

  Her Gift was not entirely useless, Bone conceded. It had given her back pieces of Mama—bits she knew, bits she didn’t know, even how she died.

  Mama being gone was Aunt Mattie’s fault.

  Usually, Bone got an icy cold feeling in her stomach when she thought of Aunt Mattie holding her head under that freezing bathwater. Now an ember of fury warmed her belly.

  Miss Johnson went on about the differences between biography and autobiography, but Bone didn’t hear any of it—until Jake poked her in the back again with a slightly less sharp pencil. He handed her a note. Let’s egg a certain community member’s house come Halloween.

  Miss Johnson cleared her throat.

  Bone hid the note under the book. She tried to listen as Miss Johnson moved on to history and then math. But all she could think about was what the sweater had showed her a few weeks ago. Mama had been nursing Aunt Mattie during the influenza outbreak. This one hadn’t been as bad as the one in 1918 that had killed millions. In 1936, several people hereabouts had died. But when Aunt Mattie nearly died, Willow Reed Phillips laid her hands on her sister and cured her. That was Mama’s Gift. She could see what was wrong with people and heal them. Only healing Mattie took all Mama’s energy, and she couldn’t heal herself. Mama died saving Aunt Mattie. If only Mama hadn’t … Bone took a deep breath and pushed down that thought, screwing the lid on tight, hoping that would snuff out the ember in her gut.

  The lunch bell rang.

  Bone crammed the note inside The Life of Charlotte Brontë and stuffed both in her desk.

  “You owe her for what she done to you,” Clay whispered as they grabbed their sack lunches. Aunt Mattie had tried to baptize the Gift right out of Bone, nearly drowning her in the process.

  Bone nodded, her insides broiling, but then she watched Ruby as they all filed out to the picnic tables. Ruby dragged behind her friends as if her sack lunch weighed a thousand pounds. Bone shook her head. “Ruby don’t deserve that—neither does Uncle Henry.”

  Clay stared at his feet. “Guess you’re right.”

  “Damn, I hadn’t thought about Ruby or the preacher,” Jake said. “Okay, Bone. We’ll think of something else.” He and Clay exchanged a glance.

  The three of them settled down at the picnic table under the sugar maple. Bright orange leaves fluttered onto the pine tabletop. Bone brushed them aside. She laid out an apple and her fried bologna sandwich wrapped neatly in wax paper. The bologna was black and crispy, just how she liked it. Jake unwrapped two pieces of fried chicken and handed one to Clay. He only had two butter biscuits and a small jelly jar in his sack. He slid a biscuit over to Jake.

  “How about a ghost story, then?” Clay asked, tearing his biscuit and slathering it with a huge dollop of apple butter. “A good and scary one.”

  “That would lift my spirits!” Jake laughed at his own joke. “Get it?”

  Clay groaned loudly. “That one about Stingy Jack.”

  Bone grinned. There wasn’t anything she loved better than telling a good story. “Once there was a stingy old man named Jack. He was a blacksmith. And he loved to play tricks on people—”

  “Damn, Bone, I missed these stories,” Jake interrupted.

  Clay nodded, his mouth full of biscuit.

  “It’s awful boring sorting coal with nobody but this lunk for company.” Jake elbowed Clay. “Y’all come listen. Bone’s telling a good ’un.” He waved over the rest of the seventh grade with his drumstick.

  “Ha, ha,” Clay said, his mouth slightly less full. “Shut up, and let her tell the blame story.”

  Pearl and Opal eagerly slid in beside Jake, and Ruby sat by Bone. Robbie leaned against the tree munching an apple. They were all that was left of the seventh grade. A few sixth graders turned around in their seats to listen.

  “One fine day, the devil called on Jack. He’d disguised himself as an old man, but Jack was no fool. He knew the devil had come to collect his soul. But ole Jack tricked him.” Bone took a bite of her bologna sandwich and chewed as she considered which version of the story to tell. Stingy Jack had vexed the devil with his sheer orneriness in a number of ways. She settled on the simplest one. “Stingy Jack agreed to go if the devil bought him a drink first. The devil turned himself into a nickel to pay for the drink, but Jack stuffed that coin in his pocket next to a little silver cross he carried. The devil was stuck, right there in Jack’s pocket as a plug nickel, until Old Scratch agreed to leave without Jack’s soul and not come back for ten years.”

  “That was right smart,” Clay said. Others nodded.

  “The devil kept his word and didn’t come back for a whole decade,” Bone continued. She told them all about how Jack tricked the devil again and again—until he was a very old man. By the time Bone got to the best part of the story, all of the sixth and fifth grade had gathered around. “When it came time for Jack to die, though, neither Saint Peter nor the devil wanted him.”

  Ruby was wide-eyed. “What’d he do?”

  “Well, that’s what Jack asked the devil. What was he supposed to do? It was so dark and cold out in the world.” Bone paused for effect. Everyone leaned in. “The devil fetched Jack an ember from the fires of eternal damnation itself. He told old Jack to go make his own hell on earth.” Bone whispered hell so the teacher couldn’t hear her swear.

  Ruby and the Little Jewels gasped—and then tittered.

  “So Jack carved out a pumpkin and stuck that ember in it. He carried it like a lantern, roaming the night between heaven and hell. And folks say you can see him still, especially on Halloween night, wandering the deep, dark woods.”

  “Oh, that’s where we get the Jack o’lantern!” one of the fifth graders cried out in delight.

  Bone breathed in the crisp, fall air. Sunlight streamed through the orange and red leaves of the sugar maple overhead. A single gold leaf drifted down and landed on the picnic table in front of her.

  2

  IN THE BOARDINGHOUSE parlor, President Roosevelt’s voice crackled over the radio: “There are millions of Americans in army camps, in naval stations, in factories, and in shipyards …” Uncle Ash’s fox terrier, Corolla, wiggled into Bone’s lap as she sat cross-legged by the hearth. Uncle Junior leaned forward in Daddy’s chair. Bone missed the smell of Daddy’s cherry tobacco, the smoke curling up to the ceiling. Mamaw, Mrs. Price, and Miss Johnson were perched on the settee. Mrs. Price’s knitting needles clicked away as Uncle Ash paced and smoked behind them all.

  Mr. Roosevelt had been having these fireside chats on the radio for as long as Bone could remember. Of course, he’d been president for as long as she could remember. Tonight he was talking about the home front. His voice always sounded so smart yet reassuring. It was like he had everything figured out and was letting the country in on it—one person at a time.

  Bone didn’t always understand what he was saying, like when he was talking about the war of nerves and propaganda. Miss Johnson nodded her head, though, as he spoke. She’d no doubt cover the speech in class tomorrow.

  Uncle Junior sat u
p straight in his chair when the president said folks were fighting in planes over Europe—and deep down in the mines of Pennsylvania. Each of us was playing our part to save democracy, the president explained, and we were going to win.

  That made Bone feel good. But she’d never thought about them not winning. Could that happen? America had stepped into the last war to whup the kaiser. In less than a year, Daddy had told her. He’d only seen one battle back then before it was all over. Bone had a bad feeling he’d be gone a lot longer this time.

  Then Mr. Roosevelt said there was a manpower problem at home.

  “Darn right,” Uncle Junior grumbled. He was looking awful tired.

  The president said we needed everybody—including women and black folks—to help out where maybe they weren’t welcome before. “We can no longer afford to indulge such prejudices …,” Mr. Roosevelt said. He also said young and old alike were needed for the war effort at home.

  As soon as the broadcast was over, Uncle Ash whistled and Corolla shot out of Bone’s lap after her master. They were both out the back door before Bone even could turn around.

  “Is Uncle Ash okay?” Bone asked, turning to her grandmother.

  “The war talk gets to him sometimes,” Mamaw said. “It brings back bad memories. And I think he feels like he can’t do his part anymore.”

  In the last war, Uncle Ash ran off when he was a teenager to join up in Canada—even before America was in the Great War. He spent three years in the trenches and was wounded in action. Some folks said he hadn’t been right since.

  Uncle Junior stretched his long wiry legs out in front of the fireplace and yawned deeply. “He’s served far more than most already. More than I ever could,” he added. Uncle Junior had been deemed unfit for duty on account of his flat feet during the last war, and now he was too old. Neither his feet nor his age stopped him from coal mining.

  “The war is running on the coal you’re mining, son,” Mamaw reassured him.

  Bone hugged her knees as she sat in front of the fireplace.

  Mrs. Price’s knitting needles clicked in the silence.

  Bone wondered if Mr. Roosevelt had seen Daddy when he visited the army camps.

  The clicking stopped. “I hear the powder plant is hiring women.” Mrs. Price exchanged a look with Mamaw.

  Bone wasn’t sure if she meant one of them might go work there. The army had just built a big factory to make ammunition over in Radford. Almost everyone called it the powder plant on account of it making gunpowder and explosives.

  “Bone, honey, I stuck some preacher cookies in the icebox for you and Will,” Mamaw said. “He should be on his way by now.”

  Bone knew when she was being got rid of. Plus she was right. Will would be here soon. He’d wanted to listen to the president with his mama. “Yes, ma’am.” Bone pulled herself to her feet.

  As Bone went into the kitchen, Mamaw answered Mrs. Price, “I’ll tell her that.”

  The familiar rap on the back door came as Bone opened the icebox.

  She slipped on her sweater and joined Will on the back porch, two cool chocolate oatmeal cookies in her hand. The crisp air outside was like the tart taste of green apples. Airish, folks would call it.

  Hester Prynne, Miss Johnson’s tabby cat, wound her way through Will’s legs as he sat on the step. Animals loved silent Will Kincaid. If Uncle Ash were still here, his dogs would be lying at Will’s feet, too. Bone pressed a cookie into his hand and plopped down beside him.

  She bit into hers. It wasn’t as sweet as usual. More oatmeal than cocoa, but still good. She asked him how work was. He knew what she meant. He always did.

  He scribbled out something on his little notebook. She’d given it to him—four of them, actually, each with a stub of pencil tied to it—when he started down in the mines.

  Beat. Five cars today. Army upped the quota.

  “I bet Junior is already snoring away in Daddy’s chair,” Bone said. Uncle Junior was now Will’s boss, the day shift supervisor, since Daddy was off to war. Just for the duration, Junior always added. He’d moved into the boardinghouse just for the duration, too. Bone had a feeling the duration might be longer than she’d thought.

  Will wrote something else. Don’t mind. More money.

  Bone nodded. The men got paid per carload. And war needed coal. Loads and loads of coal. For the duration.

  He handed her another cocoa-smudged page. Something odd happened today.

  “Nobody got hurt, did they?” She licked the cocoa off her fingers.

  Will shook his head as he wrote. No, it were during lunch.

  Bone took the slip and watched him as he wrote out a bunch more in his pocket-sized notebook.

  I sat down in the cut like usual. Pulled out my pie and biscuits—and this.

  He reached into his coat pocket and revealed an empty jelly jar. He set it between them.

  She could imagine him sitting on the dirt floor of the mine, his mining light on, spreading out his dinner on a kerchief. Pecan pie. Ham biscuits. Slaw. His mother was a good cook.

  You’ll never guess what was in it.

  “Apple butter.” Fall was when everyone churned and canned dark, delicious apple butter. Bone could almost taste it slathered onto a hot biscuit.

  Will shook his head.

  Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy

  Bone stared at the words. They made no sense at all. “What in the Sam Hill are you talking about?” she asked finally. How could a radio show be in a jelly jar?

  Will carefully opened the jar just a smidge and held it between them. Sure enough, Bone heard a funny voice say something and then an audience laughed before Will screwed the lid on tight.

  “Wait! Was that the dummy?” Bone felt herself going wide-eyed. Charlie McCarthy was Edgar Bergen’s ventriloquist dummy. “Do you mean the jar …”

  Will nodded.

  He set the jar back down between them—and inched it toward her.

  Bone knew what he wanted. She held her hand over the jar. She could feel warmth radiating off it, like there was an ember or even a coal fire banked down deep inside it. And it was pulling at her. She had a strange feeling, too, one she couldn’t put a finger on. This was like nothing she’d ever felt, Gift or not. She snatched her hand away. “I am not touching that thing.”

  Will put his hand over the jar, protectively. Bone wasn’t sure if he was protecting her or it.

  “Was that in your daddy’s dinner bucket?” She’d gone with Will to get his mining gear at the store. Mr. Scott had saved William Kincaid Sr.’s pail for Will. The bucket had been his granddaddy’s, too. And she’d accidently touched it. Bone shivered. She’d seen darkness and black earth and timbers falling on Will’s father—before Will snatched the tin bucket out of her hands. That’s what his daddy’s gear had witnessed in the moments before his death. But this jar was different. It wasn’t just a witness. It was something more. And it scared her.

  Will was writing something out—on several slips of paper.

  “I need to get you a bigger pad,” Bone joked uneasily.

  He ignored her, handing her the first slip.

  Yes, the jar was in Daddy’s bucket.

  He handed her another slip.

  The first time I opened it, I swear I heard his voice.

  Bone looked up at Will. He nodded.

  “Why didn’t you say something then? That was nearly two months ago.” Bone was peeved that he’d kept this to himself.

  Will shrugged and handed her several slips.

  Thought I was hearing things. And the jar hasn’t made a peep since then. It’s always had something in it. Jam. Pudding. Apple butter. Today, the jar was empty.

  Bone allowed how he might think he’d imagined a voice. “Why Bergen and McCarthy?”

  He handed her the next slip.

  Mama listens to it when she makes my lunch on Sunday.

  He let that sink in.

  “So you’re saying this jelly jar catches sounds?” This was wilder tha
n any story she could think up.

  Like lightning bugs in a mason jar.

  Will had caught her one of the last lightning bugs of the season. Summer in a jar, she’d thought. She’d put it by her bed, but its light was gone by morning.

  “You know that’s as crazy as I don’t know what.”

  About as crazy as you reading stories in objects. Will grinned. He’d known exactly what she’d say.

  He had her there. Anybody else might call the Reed Gifts crazy. Mamaw could tell with a touch how a plant could be used as medicine. Uncle Ash could feel exactly what was wrong with an animal. And Mama, Bone had learned, could do the same with people—and heal them.

  “You want me to read this thing, don’t you?”

  Will shrugged, but his face said yes. His eyes longed to know.

  Bone inched her hand toward the jar again. She could feel its pull. It had a power, a Gift maybe, all its own. Without even touching it, Bone could see little flickers of images. Will Sr. and a very young Will were fishing. The jar was between them, filled with worms. Young Will turned to his daddy and said, “Knock, knock!”

  Bone snatched her hand away again—and tucked it under her leg.

  Will could speak!

  She peered at him in the darkness. Bone couldn’t recall him ever talking. Some folks said he spoke before his daddy died. Bone was barely walking back then. “Do you remember when you stopped talking?” she asked.

  Will stared back at her, his eyes searching her face for a clue. Finally, he shook his head.

  “I’m not touching that thing. Not yet anyways.”