My mom was waiting for her. At first, I couldn’t make out what they were saying, but their voices started to rise as they moved into the kitchen.
“You are a woman completely without shame!” my mother yelled.
“I have nothing to be ashamed of, Libby,” said Aunt Shirley.
“How can you say that? It’s indecent! It’s obscene!”
“Don’t get yourself all worked up now, Lib,” said my dad.
“Worked up? I’ll give you worked up! You haven’t seen worked up!”
“This really doesn’t concern you, now does it?” said Aunt Shirley. Her voice was as calm as always, the sound of a cool river breeze on a sweltering day.
“It certainly does concern me, as long as you insist on presenting yourself at my door, expecting to be taken in whenever you darn well feel like it. It concerns me as long as you keep trying to insinuate yourself into the affections of my only daughter!”
My ears were burning for sure now. I held my breath.
“Indians!” my mother yelled, as though a bunch of wild red men were coming in through the back window. “Indians! My God.”
“Not ‘Indians,’ Libby. Indian. His name is Daniel Migwins.”
“More likely the whole tribe on a bargain rate!”
“Libby, keep quiet a minute!” said my Dad. “I suppose you’re going to want to marry this guy?” Even though I couldn’t see him, I could tell by the tone of his voice that he was glowering something awful and was probably pulling at his ear the way he did when he was real mad.
“No, I don’t know whether I do or not. We haven’t decided.”
“That is it!” Mom’s voice rose way up to a squeak. “The last straw. You are not welcome here any longer, Shirley MacDonald. I will not have you around Kathy. You will leave my house.”
“Is that what you want too, Doug?” Aunt Shirley’s voice was so low I could barely hear it.
“It might be for the best. At least for a while.”
“I see.”
“I hope to heaven that you do!” said Mom.
“A fine mess you’ve made Shirley. Jesus! I need some air,” said Dad. His footsteps sounded on the linoleum floor and I dashed around the corner of the house and along the path to the berry patch. My heart pounded like a jackhammer.
I knew I better stay away for a while. So, I filled the pail halfway with berries. But all the time my mind was whirling with the information I’d heard.
When I went back to the house Dad told me I’d better head off for the afternoon. Let things cool down a little.
“Is Aunt Shirley going away?” I said.
“I don’t know, Kitten, I don’t know.” He ran his fingers through his thin hair. “Don’t you worry about it though, all right? Just go play some place for a few hours. Things’ll be better by dinner time. We’ll be all right.”
“What’d she do?”
He turned me round and gave me a gentle push.
“You ask too many questions. Git!”
So I and Ginny, who’s my best friend, went climbing trees near the stream in my orchard. We were sitting up high, peeling the bark off the dead branches and looking for the secret writing left on the smooth wood by worms, the trails and snaky lines we knew meant something mysterious. Secret Indian writing, maybe. Ginny was a branch lower than me. She had trouble climbing because she was chubby and her shorts were always too tight. She said she was afraid they’d split if she had to reach her legs too far. Ginny had long wheaty hair in a thick braid down her back. She said it weighed a ton and she wanted to cut it off but her mother wouldn’t let her because she said it was her best feature. I envied that hair.
Ginny dropped her head back and shrugged her shoulders to get the weight of the braid off her neck. Then she grabbed me by the arm, pinching me.
“Ow!” I yelled. Her eyes were wide behind her thick pink-framed glasses.
“Kathy, look!” she pointed to the other side of the stream. I looked but didn’t see anything.
“Look,” she said again, “there, next to the rocks.”
“What’re you looking at?” I strained to see. “What is that?”
“I think it’s a man.”
I could make out a shape in the long dry grass.
“It’s a dog or a coyote or something.”
“That’s no dog!”
“Yeah, you’re right. Wait a minute! I don’t think he’s got any clothes on.”
“Not a stitch,” she whispered. “We should get out of here.”
“He should get out of here,” I said. It made me mad, seeing him there. How did he even find his way here? This wasn’t a place most people even knew about. My blood was boiling to think of this man, this naked man in my special place. “He’s got no business here.”
“It’s not your orchard.”
“I claimed it. I’m the only one who comes here. You only come here because I bring you.”
“I’m going.” She started to climb down the tree.
“Go then, if you want.” I broke a piece of dead branch off and chucked it across the stream. It landed with a soft flop on the far bank.
“Kathy! Don’t!”
“Hey, you! Get out of here! You’re trespassing!” I yelled.
The man sat up and looked in our direction. My heart started to beat fast, but I held on tight to the wood even though my palms were slippery. He looked hard at the tree. He had a big head, full of black hair and his eyes were small.
“Now you’ve done it,” said Ginny, “he’s seen us sure.”
“So?” I said, trying to sound brave.
For a second I could have sworn he was looking straight in my eyes. He held his hand up to keep the sun out. He wore a thick silver chain bracelet around his wrist. He was smiling and his teeth were very white. I scrambled down as fast as I could put hand over hand. I scratched my ankle on a patch of rough bark and skinned my shin. The blood soaked through my cotton socks in a bright round spot.
Ginny and I huddled at the base of the tree.
“You think he’ll just leave?” I said.
“I don’t know.”
“Maybe we should go, too.”
“Look
