Free The Promise by Ann Weisgarber Page B

at the side. It occurred to me that she did not wear a corset. Her gaze skimmed over the daisies on my hat, dropped to the rows of lace on my collar and shirtwaist and then, finally, moved on to Oscar, lingering there.
    ‘I’ve got something for you,’ he said to Andre.
    ‘You do?’ Andre said.
    ‘Yep.’ Oscar pulled out a small paper sack from the pocket in his trousers. He crouched down so that he and Andre were eye level. Andre put his hands behind his back and grinned with excitement. He bent his knees a little and peered into the sack that Oscar held open. Astonished, Andre sucked in his cheeks and rounded his mouth. His eyes sparkled as he looked at his father and then up at Nan. ‘Candy,’ he said.
    ‘Lemon drops,’ Oscar said. ‘Your favorite.’
    I’d made a terrible faux pas, I realized. I should have brought Andre a book, a spinning top, or a ball. A gift would have smoothed the way for both of us but it had never entered my mind.
    ‘One piece,’ Nan said to him. ‘Or you’ll spoil your dinner.’
    There must be something I could give Andre. I opened my cloth purse. My mirror. My comb. The torn halves of train tickets. I fumbled with the purse, trying to find something suitable without anyone noticing.
    ‘Give you a bellyache, too,’ Nan was saying, a thread of sternness beneath her lazy drawl. ‘One piece. You hear me?’
    ‘Yes, Miss Nan.’ Andre held up a yellow drop of hardened sugar between two fingers, twisting his wrist as he studied the candy. I found my coin purse inside of my bag.
    Oscar said to Nan, ‘Did Frank T. and Wiley get off on time this morning? Everything all right around here?’
    ‘Maisie’s leg’s still swelled up. Frank T. couldn’t get much milk out of her, her not taking her feed.’
    ‘Can’t say I’m overly surprised,’ Oscar said, his attention on the barnyard. ‘Course I’d hoped otherwise.’
    Andre might like a penny, I thought. The coin purse still deep inside of my bag, I opened it. Andre was studying my face now as he popped the candy into his mouth. His gaze dropped to my purse, my hand inside of it. His eyebrows drawn, he squinted as if pondering. He knew, I thought. This five-year-old child understood that I was desperately trying to find something that might pass as a gift. Still studying me, Andre picked at a brown crusty scab on his right knee, the skin around the sore a tender pink. A small shudder crawled down my spine.
    Oscar took off his hat and used it to point toward the front door. ‘I’ll show you the house,’ he said. ‘Let you get situated. Then I’ll see about Maisie.’
    ‘I’d like that very much,’ I replied. I closed the coin purse. Timing was vital in music, and the same was true about the giving of a gift. I’d find another opportunity to give Andre a penny.
    The floor shook as we walked, and the thought of the thin stilts that held up the house unnerved me all the more. Andre came in with us but Nan stayed outside. The front room served two functions. A small parlor was on the left side and the kitchen was on the right. There was a coffeepot and a skillet on the stove, and the house smelled of onions cooked in butter. Pots and pans hung from the kitchen wall. A nail tacked a calendar to the wall by the icebox. A long table with two benches filled much of the kitchen, and on the cooking table, flies crawled over the red and white checkered dishcloths that covered dishes and platters.
    Oscar said, ‘It’s nothing fancy.’
    ‘But it’s pleasant with all the windows. It’s bright and cheerful.’
    He tilted his head toward the parlor end of the room. ‘Some of the keys stick,’ he said. ‘I’ve noticed that.’
    I followed his gaze. An upright piano was up against the wall by the fireplace.
    Oscar said, ‘It’s all this salt in the air. Some days are better than others.’
    An upright, scorned by my professors. I walked over to it. The floorboards trembled beneath my feet, but the blue and green braided rug