As I waited on the sidewalk for the cab that would take me downtown, a police car drove past at a snail’s pace. Before I even saw the policeman’s face, I knew he would be the same one who’d driven past me repeatedly the day I walked to the post office. He’d been the high bidder on Lucy’s box supper. Teddy Wright. When he was close enough for me to see his face, I waved. He turned away from me abruptly and sped up, looking straight ahead, as if he hadn’t noticed me at all. A strange young man, I thought.
The cab delivered me downtown where there were several small clothing shops I might have gone into, but I decided to try the Belk-Broome department store instead. I thought I might be more anonymous in a big store. I doubted it would have a maternity department, or if it did, it would be tucked away in some hidden corner and I wouldn’t dare ask for it. After all, I’d only been married a little over a month and wasn’t about to give myself away.
I hoped to get three or four loose-fitting dresses and something smart—a suit, perhaps, if I could find one roomy enough to accommodate my expanding figure. I wanted to wear it when I traveled to Winston-Salem to take the exam, now only two weeks away. I hadn’t brought the subject up with Henry again because, frankly, I didn’t want to hear him say I couldn’t go. I was going to do this on my own, whether he approved or not.
I found the dress department easily and an auburn-haired salesgirl in her late twenties approached me, a green floral dress over her arm.
“You’re Hank Kraft’s wife, aren’t you?” she asked.
So much for being anonymous. I smiled my most winning smile. “Yes,” I said. “Do you know Henry?”
“Of course,” she said. “Who doesn’t? But I recognized you from the box supper when Violet Dare’s daddy took quite a shine to you.”
It had hardly been a “shine,” I thought, but I managed to hold on to my smile. “That was a fun night, wasn’t it?” I asked.
“Sure was.” She smoothed the skirt of the dress she held in her arms. “And how can I help you today?”
“I’d like to buy a few dresses,” I said. “And perhaps a suit.”
Her gaze dropped instantly to the center of my body. Somehow she knew. How? Did all of Hickory know the truth about Henry and me?
“Well, bless your heart,” she said, and I knew better than to think the words were spoken from kindness. She hung up the dress on a nearby rack, then turned back to me. “Let’s see what we can find,” she said, pulling a tape measure from the pocket of her skirt. “What’s your usual size?” she asked. “Or do we need to go up one?” She raised her eyebrows, looking innocent.
My waist had been twenty-three inches since I was a teenager. I knew that wasn’t what it measured now. I took a step away from her and her tape measure. “I think I’ll know the right size when I see it,” I said. A ridiculous statement, I thought, but I would have to live with it.
“Well, let’s find you something darling that’s also nice and loose,” she said, and I gritted my teeth. What could I say? This had been a mistake. I should have traveled to another town for this shopping spree, and I wished Henry had thought to suggest it. I felt like leaving, but I’d only create more rumors if I fled. Instead, I would try to win the salesgirl over.
“Your hair is the most beautiful color,” I said as I followed her through the racks of dresses. Her short, rich auburn bob really was attractive on her.
“Thank you,” she said, smoothing her hair with her palm.
“Have you lived in Hickory all your life?” I asked, as she looked through the dresses for one that might fit.
“Now, how about this one?” she asked, as if I hadn’t spoken. She pulled a yellow housedress from the rack, and I knew I wasn’t going to be able to engage her. She already had her mind made up about me. She was probably one of Violet’s friends.
I tried on two dresses. They fit well and neither the salesgirl nor I mentioned that they each had extra room at the waist. But they were both an inch or so too long.
“I’ll have these taken up for you and delivered to your house in two or three days,” she said.
“Wonderful,” I said, ushering her out of the dressing room. I didn’t want her to see me in my slip. I knew I was finished with this shopping trip. I would have to do without a suit.
I stewed over the experience quietly as I rode in the cab home. I would tell Henry about the salesgirl and ask him if there was another town nearby where I might have some anonymity.
And I would have asked him, if he’d ever come home that night.
36
A few mornings later, I was sitting at my dressing table in my slip when I heard the doorbell ring. I was studying the knitting pattern I’d bought for my baby’s sweater, and when the bell rang a second time, I remembered that Hattie was at the market. I had no idea where Ruth or Lucy were. I quickly threw on a housedress and headed for the stairs.
In the foyer, I found Ruth closing the front door. She was holding the mail, and she looked in my direction.
“That was a delivery boy from Belk’s,” she said. Her white chin-length hair, rigid with hair spray, sat on her head like a helmet.
I looked at the table by the front door where we left packages and mail for one another. “Did he have a package for me?” I asked.
“He did,” she said, not looking up as she sifted through the stack of mail in her hands. “But I told him to take it back.”
“You sent it back?” I asked in disbelief, remembering the ordeal I’d endured as I tried on the dresses, the salesgirl hovering over me.
Ruth plucked a catalog from the stack of mail and held it in the air. “I guess you didn’t recall our conversation where I told you to order clothing from the Lane Bryant catalog,” she said. “There was no reason for you to trouble yourself with a trip into town.”
“It was no trouble.” I tried to keep my voice even, but I was seething inside. Was there some way to get those dresses back?
“I’m so curious to understand why you’d tell Mary Sue Lamb you’re expecting.” Ruth wore a puzzled smile, and her question knocked me momentarily off balance. I guessed Mary Sue Lamb was the salesgirl at Belk’s and that Ruth somehow knew every detail about my visit to the store.
“Is that the salesgirl?” I asked. “I didn’t tell her or anyone else that I was expecting. She already knew. Is she a friend of Lucy’s? Maybe Lucy said something to her.”
There was an almost visible crack in Ruth’s false smile. “Let’s not pass the blame on to Lucy, shall we?” She handed me the catalog. “It will be much simpler for you to find the appropriate clothing in here,” she said.
“Ruth,” I said, “I want that package back. I’m an adult. It took me a long time to find the right dresses. I purchased them on my own with my own money. I don’t think—”
“With whose money?” she asked.
I might have continued defending myself if I hadn’t noticed the small pink envelope in the remaining stack of mail she was holding. Gina’s stationery. That envelope was my connection to the one person I knew loved me.
“Is that letter for me?” I asked, walking toward her, my hand outstretched.
She looked at the envelope and for a moment I thought she was going to taunt me with it, holding it out of my reach, but after a few charged seconds, she handed it to me.
“You won’t go into town again,” she said.
I ignored her, turning away and heading for the stairs. I was too busy tearing open the envelope to care what Ruth wanted.