Keeper, Page 3

  Keeper had forgotten about Dogie. The last thing she ever wanted to do was hurt Dogie’s feelings.

  The crabs shuffled around a little. Keeper sighed.

  Just yesterday, Mr. Beauchamp had told her, “All the stars are lining up.” Keeper knew that that meant that something significant was about to happen, and she knew that the gumbo was an important ingredient.

  Gumbo. Ukulele. Night-blooming cyrus.

  Stars in a line.

  All on a blue moon night.

  She watched Signe lift the cutting board and scrape a mound of chopped green peppers into the pot. “Plus,” said Signe, “we always have crab gumbo on the blue moon. It’s our family tradition.”

  Keeper put her elbows on the table and rested her head on her hands. The steam from the pot settled on her arms. She felt clammy all over.

  Suddenly, as if to remind her of their plight, the crabs began to raise a ruckus again. She tried not to look at them. But she couldn’t help it.

  One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten.

  She didn’t even notice BD until he rubbed his wet nose against her leg. It was so cold, it made her bare toes curl. She patted the dog. Did he feel bad for the crabs too?

  Then, out of the blue, Keeper caught a lucky break.

  “Oh no,” said Signe. She held a small empty jar in the air. “How could this happen?” Signe shook the empty jar, as if by shaking it, she could make the missing ingredient somehow appear.

  “What is it?” asked Keeper.

  “Pepper sauce,” said Signe. “I don’t have any pepper sauce!”

  “Does it matter?” asked Keeper.

  “Petite Tartine Red Pepper Sauce,” replied Signe. “I need it.” Then she pointed to the recipe in the old cookbook and stated, “Finest pepper sauce in the country.”

  Keeper knew it was the only pepper sauce that Signe ever used, and she only used it in gumbo. Now she was out. The jar was empty.

  The pot bubbled on the burner. Signe turned down the flame so that it would simmer, and then she scratched her forehead. Then, to Keeper’s great surprise, she asked, “Keeper, can you keep an eye on this while I run to town?”

  Keeper couldn’t believe her ears. For the last several weeks she had been working hard to prove that she was responsible enough to stay home alone, at least for short periods.

  She had taken care of all her chores without being asked (twice)… she had kept her clothes up off the floor… she had washed the dog every week. And also, after all, didn’t she have her own job at the Bus? Wasn’t she the official waxwing? Hadn’t she made $42.00? And wasn’t she going to make at least $2.00 more that very day?

  Wasn’t all of that “responsible”?

  Usually, no matter how small the errand, Signe made Keeper ride along with her. Either that, or she made her stay with Mr. Beauchamp, or she sent her down to Dogie’s Bus to wait for her. In fact, the Bus or Mr. Beauchamp’s place was where she went while Signe worked her shifts at the Prince Oyster Bar and Bar. But today was not a workday for Signe. Today was a gumbo day.

  Now with the empty pepper sauce jar in the air, a golden opportunity rose in front of Keeper.

  “I’ll only be gone for a few moments,” said Signe. “I’ll be right back.” As Signe walked through the door, she turned around and added, “Keeper, if the gumbo starts to boil again, turn down the flame and stir it, or else we’ll have gumbo everywhere.”

  Keeper nodded and waved, a small little wave. Her heart thumped inside her rib cage. She watched the door close.

  Alone!

  She was all by herself.

  With the crabs.

  She did a quick calculation.

  A drive to Tater and back, added to a quick trip into the store. Thirty minutes. At the most, Signe would be gone thirty minutes.

  At the most.

  The ten crabs looked more beautiful than ever, their backs shaped like wide hearts.

  Keeper pointed at BD. “We’ve got a job to do.”

  “Woof,” he replied, “woof!” Then he ducked under the table and kept his distance.

  Keeper felt a happy rush of gladness skitter down her legs and over her toes. But she had to hurry. Signe would be back in thirty minutes, not a minute more.

  10

  In the driveway Signe turned the key in the ignition of the Dodge station wagon. She waited a moment for the engine to warm up, and while it did, she said her customary blessing of gratitude that the old V8 had started.

  It was in this very car, behind this same steering wheel, that Meggie Marie had driven onto the shoulder of the highway and picked Signe up all those years ago.

  There Signe had stood, all alone on the side of the road, with only a large wooden bowl, her only possession in the world, held tightly against her chest, just a few dollar bills stuffed into her shoe, no luggage, no nothing, except a large wooden bowl and a huge desire to escape from the closed-in terrain of central Iowa.

  This very same green Dodge station wagon had swept Signe up and brought her here to this remote strip of beach along the Texas coast. No mile upon mile of cornfields here. No grain silos marching along the horizon. No wintry snow piled up in heaps. No rooms full of memories; memories of her parents, who had been killed in a car accident when she was only eleven.

  Only sand and palm trees and water. In Iowa, Signe had felt as locked in as the landscape. But not here, not on Oyster Ridge Road, world unto itself.

  From the moment that she rode up to the old house with Meggie Marie, Signe had felt at home.

  Today, as she drove past the gate of the state park that bordered Oyster Ridge Road, still clutching the empty bottle of Petite Tartine Red Pepper Sauce in her hand, she glanced in the rearview mirror. In it, she saw the haint blue house and caught her breath.

  “Am I crazy?!” she suddenly asked herself. “I just left Keeper alone!” She pressed the brakes. The wheels squealed in response, and the car fishtailed back and forth on the road. Signe pulled over. What was she thinking? She started to turn around… but then… then… she thought about Dogie.

  Usually, it wouldn’t matter if she didn’t have any Petite Tartine Red Pepper Sauce. It wouldn’t have made a bit of difference. But tonight she needed the gumbo to be perfect. She needed every single ingredient to be just right. The moon would not be blue again for months, and by then she might lose her courage altogether. She needed Petite Tartine Red Pepper Sauce.

  She stepped on the gas pedal and drove toward town, at least ten miles an hour faster than she usually drove. Thirty minutes. She shouldn’t be gone longer than thirty minutes. If she hurried, maybe she could make it in twenty or twenty-five. She knew the exact spot on the shelves where the jars of sauces stood at the Tater Grocery " Market. Thirty minutes.

  Max.

  That was all.

  11

  As soon as Keeper heard the door slam and the car drive off, she grabbed the handle of the tub. A fifteen-gallon tub, filled partway with water and crabs, is not light. Dogie had carried it in earlier like it weighed five pounds, but when Keeper tried to lift it, she could hardly get it to budge. Even with her brand-new muscles from her job as waxwing, the tub was way too heavy for her to lift.

  She’d just have to get some of that water out of there. The crabs were quiet now, but she still felt them urging her on. “I’m hurrying,” she told them. One of the bigger ones reached above the water and snipped at her. She stepped back and let go of the handles. The water sloshed, splashing over the rim and onto the kitchen floor. “Rats!” Keeper muttered.

  Now she’d have to mop it up before Signe got back. She opened the cabinet and found a measuring cup to scoop out the water.

  Then she paused. All ten crabs had their pinchers up in the air. She wasn’t about to lower her hand down into those pinchers. What to do? What to do? She looked at the clock on the stove. She had not checked it when Signe left, but she guessed that at least five minutes had passed.

  The crabs seemed to be clacking the
ir pinchers in time to the advancing clock.

  Keeper lifted one end of the tub again, but it was no use. It probably weighed as much as she did— maybe more, actually, if she thought about it—but there wasn’t time to compare her weight to the weight of the tub, not with that clock tick-tocking away!

  She heard the brew on the stove begin to boil. She dashed over and gave it a good stir. She tapped the spoon on the side of the pot and then set it on the counter. That’s when she noticed the big bowl. Signe’s wooden bowl.

  Keeper called it the “spinning bowl” because Signe had told her, “When I was a little girl, my mother would put the bowl on the kitchen floor and then set me in it and spin me around and around and around.” It had been Signe’s mother’s bowl, and Signe had brought it all the way from Iowa.

  There was a song too, a spinning song:

  Spin, my little spinneroo,

  Spin around the room.

  Spin again and spin some more

  Spin around the moon.

  Whenever Signe finished the spinning song, she always smiled. And then she’d rub the bowl with her hand. Keeper could picture a miniature Signe sitting in it.

  Such a large bowl.

  Large enough for a little girl.

  Large enough for a crab or two.

  Bingo!

  She lifted the bowl and set it on the floor next to the tub. Then she crossed her fingers and chanted, “Let there be bacon, let there be bacon, let there be bacon.” Dogie had shown her how to catch a crab from the pier; all she needed was a piece of string and some bacon. She had watched him do it. She could do it now.

  She found the string in the drawer next to the knives and forks. Then she closed her eyes and pulled open the refrigerator door.

  “Let there be bacon, let there be bacon, oh please, let there be bacon.”

  She opened her eyes.

  Bacon!

  There was bacon.

  “Bingo bingo bingo!” she cried.

  She peeled off a strip of it and tied it to the string. Then she lowered it into the tub, right in front of a waiting crab. Sure enough, the crab latched on. Slowly, slowly, slowly, she lifted it out of the tub and right into the wooden bowl. She could see that there was plenty of room in the bowl for at least one more crab.

  She cut another piece of string from the roll and tied another morsel of bacon onto it. Crab Number Two climbed aboard. Now she had two crabs munching bits of bacon in Signe’s wooden bowl. Should she try to fit a third in there? She lifted the bowl and decided to leave it at two. Quickly, she slipped out the door and down the ten porch steps. She had to hurry.

  At the bottom of the steps she paused. If she ran all the way to the beach, it would take too long. Signe would be back before then. Plus, she still had eight more crabs to rescue. She turned around. She would take them to the Cut. It didn’t have much water in it this early in the day because of the low tide, but it would have to do. After all, crabs didn’t need much water.

  Keeper ran across the yard and down to the pond. She was right, there wasn’t a lot of water in it, but soon enough, the tide would rise and fill it. Until then, there was enough for ten angry crabs.

  She tilted the bowl on its side in the grass and watched as Numbers One and Two scuttled out. She stood there as they disappeared beneath the water. Dogie’s boat, The Scamper, tied to the pier, bumped against the wooden railings like a welcoming committee for the crustacean crew.

  “Woof, woof!”

  From outside the house, she could hear BD bark in the kitchen. His voice reminded her that she still had eight crabs to go. She had to hurry.

  Up the stairs she ran.

  String.

  Bacon.

  Slowly, slowly, slowly.

  Plop! Into the bowl.

  String.

  Bacon.

  Slowly, slowly, slowly.

  Plop! Into the bowl.

  Then out the door, down the steps, across the yard, and down to the Cut. Hurry, hurry, hurry. Signe would be back any minute.

  12

  From his perch on Mr. Beauchamp’s porch, the cat Sinbad watched the girl across the way. He saw her carry the large bowl back and forth to the edge of the pond and then release some crabs.

  Crabs! Sinbad had no use for crabs. In fact, Sinbad had no use for anyone except Mr. Beauchamp. They had been together for years and years, too many to count. They had an understanding, he and the old sailor. Mr. Beauchamp tended the house, and Sinbad did as he pleased, which meant he prowled the beach, teased BD, hissed at the very annoying seagull that rode on BD’s back. Sinbad came and went with the tides, always arriving in time for dinner and a good rub behind his ears.

  But lately, Mr. Beauchamp had been sleeping more and more, sleeping too much. It worried the cat, all this sleeping. As he watched the girl scurry to and fro with the bowl and the crabs, he wondered if he should go inside and wake Mr. Beauchamp up. He looked at the morning surrounding him. It was still early.

  No, he would let Mr. Beauchamp sleep a little longer. Then Sinbad fluffed his fur and moved into a new sunbeam and let the warmth of it soak into his skin. There, next to the clay pot that held the night-blooming cyrus, its heavy buds just on the cusp of bursting open, the cat yawned and licked his paws. He blinked. Then he drifted off into an early nap. He needed all of his energy for taunting the dog.

  His favorite pastime.

  13

  Each time Keeper repeated the crab rescue process— string, bacon, crab, and so on—she got a little quicker. And with each foray, splish, splash, more and more salty water sloshed onto the slippery floor. Three more times, she caught a pair of crabs, lowered them into Signe’s bowl, and carried them down to the Cut.

  And in between, she stopped to stir the roux that grew thicker and thicker in its pot on the stove. The house was full of its spicy aroma. Keeper paused for just a moment and took a deep breath, then lowered the spoon. Her crab rescue operation was working.

  Keeper pulled her shoulders back. “We’re almost done,” she told BD.

  “Woof,” he barked.

  After the last trip, with all ten crabs safely set free in the shallow water of the pond, she stood by the bank. A wave of relief washed over her. She looked at the bottom of the bowl. There was only a tiny scrap of bacon stuck to it. She lifted it out and dropped it in the grass. She rubbed her fingers together; they were greasy from the bacon. The sides of the bowl were greasy too. She’d have to wash it before Signe returned.

  For a brief moment she considered dipping it into the water of the pond, to rinse it off, but straight-away she thought, What if it got away from me?

  That wouldn’t be good. With those crabs in the water, she did not want to wade into the pond to retrieve the wooden bowl. No way, no how, no sirree!

  She started back for the house, and when she did, she noticed Sinbad napping on the porch rail at Mr. Beauchamp’s house. This bowl would be a perfect boat for a cat, she thought. She turned and looked back at the water. It would be a perfect boat for a little girl, too, wouldn’t it?

  All at once, a cloud passed overhead. She thought about Signe sitting on her mother’s kitchen floor, spinning in the bowl. Spinning and spinning and spinning. A wave of dizziness spun over her.

  She needed to get the bowl back to its spot on the table. She checked once more to make sure the crabs were still in the water and not, for some reason, following her. All she saw was the silvery water, the shallow waves blinking at her in the morning sun.

  For one wonderful moment she felt a bit like what a hero might feel like, even if she was a hero to only the resident crab population.

  That’s when she heard the familiar crunch-crunch-pop of oyster shells beneath car tires, along with the unmistakable chugging of an automobile engine. She’d recognize that sound anywhere.

  “Oh no!” said Keeper.

  “Woof!” barked BD. Then he barked again, “Woof!”

  “Run!” she called to him.

  Keeper gripped the bowl as
hard as she could and ran up the stairs. The roux bubbled.

  Hurry, hurry, hurry.

  The sound of the station wagon on the crushed oyster shells grew louder. She shifted the heavy bowl into one hand and pulled open the door.

  The clock ticked.

  The roux boiled.

  The door slammed behind her.

  Everything was fine except for the watery floor. As soon as she stepped inside the door, whoosh!

  Keeper slid into the side of the cabinet and managed to grab the edge of the counter without falling. But as she slid, the bowl, Signe’s beautiful bowl, the one Signe’s mother had set her in and spun her around and around, that bowl, the one that Signe had carried with her all the way from Iowa, the one that Keeper had just used to rescue the crabs, flipped into the air and landed, hard, on the ceramic tiles of the kitchen floor.

  Ccccrrrrraaaaaaccckkkk!

  The splitting of wood sounded like a firecracker. And at that very moment, in that exact second, at the precise instant that the bowl hit the floor, Signe walked in, and just like that, Keeper felt the heat in the room skyrocket.

  BD shot down the hall and underneath Keeper’s bed. Signe stood in the doorway, her white hair ablaze. Then, what did Keeper hear, all at the same time?

  1. The hiss of the roux as it slid down the outside of the pot and met the flame of the burner.

  2. The thump of the jar of Petite Tartine Red Pepper Sauce as it fell out of Signe’s hand and onto the floor.

  3. Signe’s voice shouting, “KEEPER!” so loud that BD whined and pushed his head between his paws.

  Keeper knew this last part without even seeing it because that’s what BD always did when Signe yelled.

  Only one word seemed reasonable: Retreat!

  And that’s what Keeper did. She raced after BD to her bedroom and shut the door.