31.
THE WARDEN’S PARTY
Friday, September 13, 1935
It’s tense this week on the island. No one knows what’s happening with Piper’s mom, and the warden spends all of his time at the hospital. With Warden Williams gone, Associate Warden Chudley is in charge. But the warden has never left his post before, so Chudley has no idea how to handle the island without him. In the kitchen, I hear my dad and mom discussing this. “Can’t make a decision which shoe to put on first,” my dad tells my mom. “He shouldn’t be in charge. Let’s just hope nothing happens . . . ”
Luckily on Friday, when Jimmy and I get back from school, the warden is down at the dock. “A boy! It’s a boy!” he crows, handing out cigars to every man getting off the boat, no matter his rank. “I have a son! Walter, his name is Walter William Williams.” His voice full of joy, his big face beaming with delight, he looks like another person entirely.
“What happened with Piper’s mom?” Jimmy whispers.
“Beats me,” I say.
It’s not until Jimmy and I get to the Mattamans’ apartment that we find out the full story.
“It was touch and go, but it looks like Mrs. Williams is gonna make it,” Mrs. Mattaman tells us from the kitchen, where she is cleaning celery. “That got lost in the warden’s report, did it?” Mrs. Mattaman lays the celery out and works her knife across it with a rising vengeance.
“Was Piper at school, Moose?” Mrs. Mattaman asks without looking up from her work. “Because I didn’t see her with the warden.”
I nod. “She was, but she didn’t come home with us.”
“Course it’s none of my business . . . but why the warden felt the need to bring his son home last night with his wife still in the hospital”—chop, chop, chop—“I will never understand. You’d think he gave birth to that baby by himself.”
“Where’s the baby now?” Jimmy asks.
“Mrs. Caconi is watching him. But all this morning the warden was parading him up one side of the island and down the other.” Mrs. Mattaman shakes her head. “And now he’s throwing a party. Why he couldn’t wait until June got home I will never understand.” Mrs. Mattaman points her knife at us. “You didn’t hear that . . . either one of you.”
“Yes, ma’am,” we tell her as she dumps the celery into a giant burbling pot that smells like garlic and tomato sauce.
Outside we see Bea Trixle hauling out cartons of beer for the grown-ups and root beer for the kids. Mrs. Chudley has her accordion and begins to play.
Soon, Mr. and Mrs. Bomini are dancing on the balcony of 64 building and even my mom goes up to the Officers’ Club and plays requests for the warden, who is giddy with happiness. His son in his arms, he waltzes around the Officers’ Club, until Mrs. Caconi snatches the newborn back, insisting he needs a bottle and a diaper change.
It’s Mrs. Mattaman who notices Piper is nowhere to be found.
“Maybe she’s still in the city,” I suggest as Annie, Theresa, Natalie, and I sweep through the food line filling our napkins with cannolis, cookies, brownies, and cake.
“Go up to her house. All of you,” Mrs. Mattaman insists, pushing us out into the foggy afternoon. “Make sure she’s not holed up there all by her lonesome. Go on, you’ve got your marching orders, you hear?”
I’m not wild about this idea. Dealing with Piper these days is like picking up black widow spiders with my bare hands. But there’s nothing else to do. Mrs. Mattaman is at the Officers’ Club door, herding us up the hill. And Natalie is already ahead of us. I hurry and catch up.
The warden’s house is dark and silent. It’s as if the good news hasn’t reached the top tier of the island yet. Not even Buddy and Willy One Arm are visible, though I can hear them working in the kitchen. The front door is partly open.
“Piper!” we call as Annie and I, Theresa and Natalie climb the stairs to Piper’s room. Piper doesn’t answer. The door to her room is closed. Annie knocks.
“What?” Piper barks.
“We brought you cookies,” Annie tells her.
“I’m not hungry,” Piper declares, opening the door. As we troop in, she snatches a cannoli out of my hand. For a second, I think she’s going to toss it in the trash. Throwing away a Mattaman cannoli is like burning the American flag as far as I’m concerned. But no, she stuffs it in her mouth, squishing the cream out the back side.
“I’m not hungry,” she mumbles, her mouth full of cream.
Theresa squints at her. “You should be happy now. Your mom is okay.”
“What do you know about it?” she snaps, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.
“My mom said she was better.”
Piper nods. “She is better. I wish she’d come home,” she admits as we hear Jimmy outside.
“Go get the door. It’s Jimmy,” Theresa commands.
“Why don’t you get it?” Annie asks.
Theresa makes a face. “I don’t like going down there by myself.”
“Buddy Boy! Could you let Jimmy in!” Piper calls down.
Jimmy knocks another time.
“Buddy Boy!” Piper calls again.
Theresa jumps up and heads for the open hall window and pokes her head out. “That’s not Jimmy. It’s Mrs. Caconi.”
“Sounded like Jimmy,” Piper mutters.
Mrs. Caconi is inside now, climbing the stairs. “This is your own little house, Walter Williams. Not so little, either. Twenty-two rooms it is. Best one on the Rock.” Mrs. Caconi is huffing and puffing harder than usual. She chuffs and hisses when she breathes, like a freight train.
Annie pokes me. “C’mon! We got to help her. She has trouble with stairs.”
Mrs. Caconi is on the landing, leaning her heavy body against the banister and dabbing at her forehead. Her foot rocks the blue-ribboned basket with the tiny blanketed bundle, all wrinkly and red, no bigger than a banana bread. Hard to believe a person could ever be that small.
“Need some help, Mrs. Caconi?” I ask.
“Well, I wouldn’t say no to a strapping young man like you carrying this baby up these stairs . . .”
“Yes, ma’am.” I lift the basket, which is surprisingly light. Baby Rocky must weigh five times more than this little turnip. Annie stays with Mrs. Caconi as she slowly makes her way up the stairs.
“I’m not used to taking care of a newborn,” Mrs. Caconi explains. “It’s been umpteen years since my Donny was that small,” she tells us as I plunk the basket on Piper’s bed.
We all stare at the tiny baby, his eyes closed tight like a brand-new puppy’s, a blue knitted beanie on his head.
“Been rocking him the last hour. I’m not as young as I once was, you know.” Mrs. Caconi sighs. “He’s sleeping now, though. They’re sweet as pie when they’re sleeping, aren’t they?”
“Baby,” Nat mutters, her eyes whipping past the baby and past again as if they can’t settle down for a full look. “Walter,” Natalie whispers.
“It,” Piper grunts. “His name is It.”
“Oh now dear child, don’t you start with that rubbish. I won’t hear of it. No, I won’t. He’ll grow on you, yes he will.” Mrs. Caconi straightens the baby’s beanie. “Your mama’ll be home soon. And she won’t tolerate that kind of talk.”
Piper’s eyes glaze over. “Thing,” she whispers.
Mrs. Caconi ignores her. “Oh yes, indeedy. He had a big bottle and a nice clean diaper with me. Now you watch him while I catch forty winks, you hear me, little miss?” Mrs. Caconi points her handkerchief at Piper. “Fog’s comin’ in and it’s dark as night. I’m gonna take a catnap before night shift. Little dickens woke up six times last night.” She squints at Piper. “And don’t you tell me no. Watching him while he’s sleeping is not too tall an order for you. I should think not. You got a whole roomful of folks to help you here.” She wags her finger at Piper and stumbles bleary-eyed into the next room.
No one says a word as she groans and grunts her way up on the big bed. In seconds she’s snoring so loud it sounds like the foghorn next door.
Piper stares at the teeny-tiny baby in his blue beanie cap. “Get It out of here,” she whispers.
“Now you listen up.” Theresa mimics Mrs. Caconi and wags her finger at Piper. “Taking care of babies is something I know all about.” She taps her chest. “I’m going to teach you.”
“Theresa!” Annie warns in a husky whisper.
Piper looks like she may hawk up a big one and spit it right at Theresa.
Theresa puts her hands on her hips. “Her mom’s okay now. Do I still have to be nice to her?”
Piper gulps, then crumples into an exhausted heap.
“Uh-oh,” Annie whispers. Her lips pucker up and her forehead wrinkles. She strokes Piper’s hair. “We’ll help, okay?” Annie nods to us and we all pipe in.
“Sure, we’ll help,” I say.
“Help. We’ll help. Baby,” Nat adds.
Annie smiles. “That’s right, even Natalie will help.”
Tears spill out of Piper’s closed eyes. She pushes them away from her face in quick jerky motions. “I don’t want a brother.”
Natalie gets a tissue and wraps Piper’s fingers around it, which only makes her cry harder.
We all stare at Piper. No one knows what to say. “Brothers aren’t that bad,” Theresa declares. “They squirt pee at you when you change their diapies, though, you gotta watch that.” Theresa puts her finger down by her personal parts like it’s a water hose. “They have their own private squirt gun.”
“We have nothing of the kind,” I insist.
“How would you know?”
“Because I know my own equipment. I’m pretty much an authority on it, okay?”
“Not when you were a baby.”
“Moose! Piper!” Jimmy’s voice again. This really is Jimmy.
“Buddy!” Piper calls again. “The door!”
Theresa pops up and checks the window. The fog is heavy and dark like a coat pulled tight around us. What time is it? “Don’t the passmen have to go back to the cell house now?” Theresa asks.
“They go back at four thirty,” Piper tells us. She has that fuzzy look, like someone who needs to sleep for two days straight.
Annie glances at her watch.
“I’ll get him,” I offer. Natalie stands up. She has been amusing herself by tucking the baby’s covers all around, then all around again. She is gentle with the baby. So gentle.
“Stay here, Nat. I’ll be right back,” I tell her softly.
Natalie chews at her lip. And Piper snaps to. “Wait, Moose. Moose! I’m coming down too.”
Theresa shakes her finger at Piper. “You can’t. You have to watch the baby.”
“Theresa,” Annie warns.
“You have to take them everywhere with you, Piper. You can’t just leave them.” Theresa’s chin juts out with the force of her words.
“You’re going to be here. You watch him,” Piper says in a small voice.
“Well, what if I wasn’t?” Theresa’s hands are planted firmly on her hips. Her voice is full of authority. “This is training. I am training you. Remember what happened with me and Rocky? Do you want that to happen to It?”
“Theresa,” Annie scolds. “Let Piper alone, okay?”
Piper stares hard at Theresa and then suddenly her face caves in. “Fine,” she whispers, peering in at the baby. The baby’s eyes are still closed. Piper glances anxiously at Annie. “The blanket too?” she whispers.
“Yep, you carry him in it,” Annie explains.
Piper takes a deep breath, then wiggles her hands underneath the blanket, scooping the baby out of the basket. “I did it,” she whispers, smiling a little. She carries him out the door, holding him away from her chest like a football.
“See, see what I did.” Theresa pats herself proudly as I head for the door.
“Nat, really, you can stay.”
“Nat home. I want to go home,” Natalie says, stubbing her toe against the floor.
“Natalie, c’mon. Just stay here,” I tell her.
“Nat home,” she repeats.
“Okay,” I concede. Natalie has been pretty cooperative today. I don’t want to push it. “I’ll send Jimmy up, then I’ll take Nat home,” I call back to Annie and Theresa.
“Why doesn’t he just come in himself? Jimmy, c’mon,”“ Theresa belts from Piper’s room.
“Hey Jimmy!” I open the door into the now near blackness of the darkest September afternoon I’ve ever seen. Piper is right behind me, carrying her teeny-tiny brother, followed by Natalie.
“Light on, light on,” Nat mutters. She snaps the switch at the front door back and forth, back and forth, but no light illuminates the gloomy outside.
“It’s broken, Nat,” I tell her.
The fog is blowing through like smoke. I can’t even see the cell house, which is ten feet across the narrow Alcatraz road. The wind blows a tin can down the steep switchback. “Jimmy!” I shout. “They need my dad up here to fix these lights. Jim meeeeee!”
Natalie walks behind me. She isn’t touching me but her presence is close, too close. That’s Natalie for you. She’s always too close or too far away.
“He’s not here. You go back. I’m going to take Nat home,” I tell Piper, changing course under Piper’s window, when suddenly something clammy and cold closes around my neck, crushing my throat.
“Shut it,” a voice whispers in my ear, “or you die.”