Big Stone Gap Part 7

Fred Mulligan, however, had boundaries in all things. He could never make his customers his friends. I think he felt he couldn't make a profit from friends, so he simply never made any. Or maybe n.o.body wanted to be friends with him. Anyway, it feels right and glorious to have Iva Lou and Theodore sitting in my living room, eating chess pie, surrounded by stacks of books, all special orders from Clinch Valley College, a division of the University of Virginia in Wise. Iva Lou was allowed to check out these books because she knows the powers that be at the university library. (They've shared Sanka.) She shoves a book under my nose and shows me a panoramic photograph. "Look, here's Bergamo. It's about the size of Big Stone Gap."

I study the panorama of Mama's hometown. There is a fountain with dancing angels in the middle of the square. Buggies led by donkeys cart people around. There are cobblestone streets. Fig trees. Small stone houses. Children. I picture my mother there as a girl. It seems to fit.

Theodore and Iva Lou leave around midnight. I clean up the dishes and walk through the first floor, turning out the lights. Then I do something I haven't done since my mother died. I go into her room.

My mother's room is simple. There is a double bed with a white cotton coverlet; over the bed hangs a small wooden crucifix. A straight-backed chair and a bureau stand against the wall opposite the window. Her sewing machine is tucked in a small alcove next to the window. The closet is small, its contents neat. I sit on the edge of her bed and look around the room as though I've never been inside of it before. I used to lie in here with her when she was dying. I took my rightful place next to her, as I was all she had. When I was little and I got sick, I would come and get her, but she never took me into her bed with my father. She would always come to my room on the second floor and lie with me there. She used to tell me that she didn't want to disturb him, but now I know she could not disturb him. He knew I wasn't his, and though he could have lovingly claimed me, he did not, and she kept me quiet. That was their understanding. And it was an understanding that lasted both of their lifetimes.

My mother was an avid reader, too. Occasionally, she bought books, but usually she just checked them off the Bookmobile as I did. She loved books about romance. Books that took place in faraway places and times. Stories with costumes. When Mama designed the costumes for the Drama, she studied the period, drew the sketches and everything. She had less theatrical tasks too. Mama has made every cheerleader uniform since anyone can remember. She made elaborate square-dancing skirts. And prom dresses, of course. When a customer wanted fancy, my mother would say in her Italian accent, "Simple is better. Simple. Simple." Sometimes she succeeded, but often I would hear her clucking as she sewed sequins and lace onto dresses that didn't need the fanfare. Many times when folks dropped off their clothes for altering or mending she would convince a lady to line a cloth coat in red satin or a skirt in silk. "No one will see it, but you will know it's there and it will feel wonderful," she'd say. My mother knew the finer things, but she didn't have a life that could celebrate them. I pick up a book off the nightstand. Glamorous Gene Tierney is on the cover. It's a book about costumes from the movies of the Golden Age in Hollywood.

Mama always took me to the movies over at the Trail Theater, right next to Zackie's. I didn't know it at the time, but Jim Roy Honeycutt, who owned the place, showed movies that were ten, fifteen years old. I never bothered to ask my mother why the people on the screen were wearing funny hats and hairdos; I just accepted it. It wasn't until years later that I found out Mr. Honeycutt saved a lot of money renting old prints. That's how I fell in love with the leading men of the 1930s and '40s: Clark Gable, William Powell, Spencer Tracy, Robert Taylor, and especially Joel McCrea. Mama loved the actresses, costumed by the great designers Edith Head, Adrian, and Travis Banton. I remember their names because Mama always pointed them out to me on the screen. We would see the same movies over and over again so Mama could study the clothes. Later she would discuss them with me in great detail. The movies were black and white, but Mama could tell when they used real gold thread on Hedy Lamarr's harem pants or real sable on Rosalind Russell's coat.

My mother was a great beauty. She had black hair so shiny it seemed lacquered; she wore it simply, combed back off of her face in a blunt bob. Her skin was golden-she died without a wrinkle or a line on it. She had deep-set brown eyes with lots of lid, like a Modigliani painting. Her neck was long and so were her fingers. She had full lips and beautiful teeth; she always was faithful about going to the dentist and taking me. Her nose was regal, aquiline. Her high forehead belied a n.o.bility; to me she was a queen. But there was a deep sadness in my mother's eyes always, a longing to be somewhere else. I used to ask her, "Why, Mama, why did you come here?" As though here were worse than a swamp, a place without air. But she loved the mountains. Mountains meant everything to her.

I begged her to go to Italy with me after my father died. We had the time, we had the means, and most important, we no longer had him. We were free, but we couldn't adjust to it. After he died, we could play Sergio Franchi as loud as we wanted, but we still kept it muted so we could hear his approaching car in the driveway. He wanted nothing Italian in this house, except food. He ate my mama's cooking with relish; in fact, that's when we could count on him to smile. My mother made everything fresh, from her own garden; olive oil she ordered out of New York. My father even drank espresso. Her cooking was his one concession to my mother's heritage. Though he had studied Italian in college, he refused to speak it. He preferred my mother speak English. She taught me Italian, her regional dialect; we used it as a secret language.

The summer after I graduated high school, we went to Monticello, Thomas Jefferson's home outside Charlottesville, Virginia. It bugged me when my father misp.r.o.nounced Monticello-he made a soft c, like "Monti-sello." I corrected him, and he got so mad he slapped me. But that was the last time he slapped me. From that moment on I stayed out of his way. I gave up. Then Mama did too. For years she tried to make us get along, but it was not to be. When I look back, I realize that she protected me from him. We built our world around keeping him comfortable and not upsetting him. I never showed anger, frustration, or pa.s.sion in front of him. I swallowed everything, and soon it became part of my character. I was there to amuse and entertain, never, ever to challenge or disrupt. When I was alone with my mother, I could have my feelings, but then I would feel guilty-why upset her?

My mother was Roman Catholic. She was allowed to go to ma.s.s and take me, but then we would have to attend the Methodist church with my father as well. The Catholic church here is run by a small missionary order of poor carpenter priests called the Glenmarys. We didn't even have a real church building until five years ago; the priests were so busy building churches in poorer areas, they kept putting ours off. Finally, we built it, and nothing made my mother happier than writing a big fat check to the Catholics after my father died. She gave them so much money, they finished building our church! When the Methodists, who have a grand big church, came for their share, my mother gave them a small token, citing their large congregation and huge donor list. They weren't happy about the slight, but being good Christians, they let it go.

Mama and I tried to be good Italians after Fred Mulligan died. We wanted to reclaim that side of ourselves that we had hidden. We decided to go to Italy. We had great fun planning our trip. We did our research, made all the arrangements, bought the tickets, and then, as the date approached, Mama panicked, complaining of a fear of motion sickness. She became so distraught, I canceled the trip. Then, after a few days, she became herself again. The incident upset her so badly, I never mentioned traveling again. I didn't try to plan another trip. She could not have gone anyway. She got cancer, and that changed our lives forever.

I look around this room and see that she had one of everything: one lamp, one bureau, one chair. She only ever had one winter coat. One pair of good shoes. One pretty hair clip. One child. One of everything, but only one, as if to keep her life quiet. She lived by her own philosophy: Be un.o.btrusive and maybe he'll let us stay. As though that was all she deserved! My mother deserved so much more! The best of everything! No gold, no rubies, no rare diamond would have ever been enough for my mother. She was a woman of great character. My deepest sadness comes because I know she lived a life where she wasn't treated that way.

You would think, after she died, I would have come in here and gone through her things, but I couldn't. And now I am putting too much importance on this room. I want to find clues to her. Figure out what she really wanted. What she desired. What she was secretly interested in. I pull the books off of her nightstand and onto the bed and begin sorting. One on breast cancer. Another on regional Italian cooking. Ingrid Bergman's life story (we both love biographies). And, finally, Lake Maggiore and Its Regions.

I take the book, turn off the light, and leave her room. I am never afraid in this house, but tonight a chill runs through me. An urgency. I have led a life of quiet desperation (as my favorite author, Henry David Th.o.r.eau, described in Walden), just like my mother had, and now I want to change. As I pa.s.s through the living room to go up to bed, I pick up a small book from the large stack Iva Lou left behind. It's called Schilpario: A Life in the Mountains. The checkout card in the back says, "University of Virginia Architecture Library. DO NOT REMOVE." Iva Lou really went to some trouble to get me these books. I may have to break down and buy some Sarah Coventry jewelry from her.

Once I'm in bed, I turn on my bedside lamp and look through the pictures in the book about Schilpario. The Italian Alps are pointed and snowcapped. They seem three times as high as the Blue Ridge Mountains, and more dangerous, not as soft and maternal. The roads look new but narrow. There is a picture of a race car taking the dangerous curves, showing deep, jagged valley plummets to the sides of the road. No guardrails. Just like Powell Valley! I turn the page, and there is the town. This is a long-shot vista photo, probably taken from another mountain. The houses are close together and painted in muted shades of terra-cotta, gold, and soft brown. The main street leads to a waterwheel. On the next page, a picture of the waterwheel, a point of interest for tourists. In another time, before electricity, the waterwheel provided fresh water and power to the town. Now it is a museum.

I turn the next page, and there are some dignitaries from the town. They stand in a row-all men, puffed up and proud of their little village. I glance down at the names listed under the picture. As I'm reading, I look up at the row and study one man in particular who catches my eye. It's the expression on his face. I have seen it somewhere-in my own mirror. My heart begins to pound as it did the night at the Fold. I look down. My pajama b.u.t.tons are moving, but this time I can hear the attack and the whoosh, beat, whoosh, beat of my blood as it chugs through my heart with force and fear. I breathe deeply, but I can't inhale very well, so I suck in the air in small gulps. I think of Lew, who tells me not to worry, that it's nothing. I steady my fingers against the book. They are sweating and leave small circles on the book jacket. I rub the book on my bedspread. Then I pull the light as close as a microscope and prop the book open on my knees to steady it. I count over four names; the fourth man is the man I think I know. I scoot my finger across the faces and down to the matching name: Mario Barbari, Mayor, Schilpario, 1961present. I flip to the front of the book and check the copyright date: 1962. That's a long time ago. I pull the small lacy picture of my father out of its envelope-I keep it with me at all times-and compare the faces. Mario Barbari is small in the picture, but I can see the shape of the face, the eyes, the eyebrows-all look similar to the young man in the picture Mama left behind for me. Is he my father?

I can hardly wait for Friday because it means Iva Lou is coming through with the Bookmobile. I wanted to call her at home, but I didn't because I wanted to tell her about Mario da Schilpario's picture in person. I can't wait for her to come to town, I'm too nervous and excited, so I drive down to her first stop in the Cadet section, just south of town, where she is parked by the side of the road. Iva Lou is sitting in the driver's seat of the Bookmobile, eating a sausage biscuit. I holler from my car window, "Are you alone?"

"n.o.body showed up yet. It's slow as Christmas."

I park my car next to the Bookmobile and join her. "I think I found him. Mario."

"Lordy mercy!" she shouts, and jumps up and down. The Bookmobile rocks back and forth like a boat.

"Careful, Iva. We'll flip over."

"Honey-o, don't worry. This old thing doesn't have to last much longer."

"Why? Is the county springing for a new one?"

"No. But old Liz Taylor is gonna have a fried-chicken dinner over to the Coach House when she's here to raise money for our very own library. This could be it, Ave. The Big Time."

I sit down on my snap stool. Why does this upset me? Am I that attached to this truck full of books?

"I know you love this unit, but a library! Imagine all the books we can git if we git a whole big building!"

"You're absolutely right. I am being selfish."

"The state said they'd match whatever she came up with. Can I put you down for a couple of tickets to the dinner?"

"Sure, sure."

"It'll be fun. We'll get Theodore for you, and I'll sc.r.a.pe up a date. Lyle Makin has been chasing me of late, and I just might let him catch me. He's nice and he's got a good suit. But, Lord, forget all that. Tell me about this man you think might be your daddy."

I show Iva Lou the book; she scribbles down some notes.

"Sanka?"

This time I accept her offer. She pulls a sack out from a shelf and offers me a pink coconut s...o...b..ll from the dry-bread store. I take it, tearing off one small piece at a time as I tell Iva Lou about the night I found my father in the book. She listens intently, following my every word.

Big Stone Gap has never been so atwitter. Theodore is in constant rehearsal for the halftime show; Nellie Goodloe has taken over the organization of the library fund-raiser chicken dinner; and I'm writing letters to government agencies in Italy, gathering information about Mario Barbari. It's as though the Blue Ridge Mountains around us have been peeled back and we're being discovered by a larger universe. This is equally thrilling and troubling. There is something comfortable about life the way it has been; who am I to upset the cart?

With all that's happening to me in my private life, the responsibilities of the Pharmacy still need tending to. I'm inspecting a new shipment from Dow, Fleeta is manning the cash register, and Pearl is doing inventory on our medical supplies when the familiar mine whistle blows. The coal mines are closing for the day; soon town will be filled with truckloads of men returning home for supper. I look out over my little staff as I fill prescriptions, and I feel very secure. Then the whistle blares three times in quick succession. It's not the whistle of the day being done; it's an emergency whistle. Something bad has happened up at the mine. We kick into automatic mode. Fleeta helps me out of my white jacket and into my Rescue Squad vest, and I grab my first-aid kit. I hear a horn-it's Spec-and I jump into the ambulance. The whistle blares three more times. Spec cannot drive fast enough.

We speed up the mountainside to the mine. The road is not paved, it's pure gravel; we kick up dust and are pitched to and fro in the grooves carved out by coal trucks. The smoke on the entrance road is thick and gray, which confirms my suspicions that there has been an accident inside.

The first thing we do is pull up to the check-in hut, which is close to the mouth of the mine. Here each miner, before he starts his shift, leaves a silver tag bearing his name. He wears an identical tag on his belt, so his whereabouts are known to the company at all times. In an emergency we rely on these tags for a head count. There are three tags left on the board; only they remain inside the mine: A. Johnson, R. Harmon, and J. MacChesney. I take a breath. "Come on, Ave. We ain't got all day," Spec says as we move to join the other Rescue Squad staffs.

There are four "holes," or entrances drilled into the side of the mountain. One entrance leads the miners to their work areas; one is for the conveyor belt, which transports the coal out; and the other two are for ventilation. There is a high level of methane gas underground, and the slightest disturbance can ignite it. There is no smoking allowed inside, but pockets of deadly gas can ignite without warning. Inspectors check the methane levels throughout the workdays and nights, but the miners travel as far as five miles into the mountain; there is always the threat of danger. As we get closer the smoke becomes deadly black, so the explosion must be deep. Rescue squads from the surrounding towns pull in around us. I see station wagons from Appalachia, Stonega, Norton, Coeburn, and Wise.

Spec and I await orders from the mining supervisor, who is on the radio to survivors in the mine. The stretchers are filling up fast. Most of the injuries appear to be from smoke inhalation. Hopefully, the situation inside is not too bad. In our favor: This is a new mining site, so the construction within is modern.

Spec and I are told to join the unit from Stonega. I can't see because of the smoke, but it wouldn't do much good anyway. The supervisor shows us a map of where the explosion took place: at the third level, about five miles into the mountain.

When I trained for the Rescue Squad along with volunteers from across the county, we toured a coal mine. I remember looking forward to it, like a field trip. We dressed like the miners: one-piece coveralls; rubber knee boots; the hard hat and light; and the belt to which we attached a power pack for the hat light, an ID tag, and a mask to convert carbon monoxide to carbon dioxide in case of an explosion. Miners are required to wear safety goggles; everyone does. It is also recommended that the miners wear a protective cloth mask while they work to decrease the inhalation of deadly coal dust, but most find it difficult to communicate and work while wearing a mask, and since they are not convinced that a mask prevents black lung anyway, they usually skip that step.

I had romanticized the underground, thinking it would be cryptlike and eerily beautiful. Instead, it felt ominous from the moment we climbed into the transport car. The cars are shallow, tin canoes that hold about ten people. The entrance ceilings are low, so you lie down most of the trip; on a deep excursion it is nerve-racking and uncomfortable. The only person who is allowed to sit up is the driver; he operates the car on the tracks with a wooden pole connected to the electrical lines rigged on the ceiling. There is not much conversation during the ride, but there is a lot of chewing and spitting. The men chew tobacco to keep their mouths wet, as the air is very dry within the mine. The temperature remains about fifty-five degrees year-round.

I thought the interior of the mine would be black, like dirt, and well lit. Instead, the main source of light is our hats, and the walls are white. After the coal is extracted, the miners spray the walls with a white rock dust that is nonflammable, so in case of fire the mine won't turn into an oven, roasting its own coal.

Our guide explained that each car carries a work crew to a particular area. Advances in technology introduced a machine called the Continuous Miner, which actually extracts the coal from the wall. The work crew is there to load the coal onto a conveyor belt, once it has been extracted by the machine. After an area is mined, a crew places timbers on the sides and walls to create channels and sh.o.r.e up the walls so they don't collapse; then the roof-bolt operator and his team come in to bolt the ceiling with giant screws so the men can dig more deeply into the mine and extract more coal. The roof-bolt operator has one of the most dangerous jobs; more miners are killed by rock slides than by explosions. The guide explained that these men have superior hearing, and the slightest cracking sound is a signal to move his men out immediately. There isn't much to be done in a serious rock slide, except try to excavate the men. In an explosion, you hope they can crawl out the shafts to safety, if they can see their way through the smoke. The other threat to the miner is flooding. A man called the pumper travels through the mine during the shift and pumps out water, as there is no way of predicting underground water sources.

I remember feeling I would suffocate as the car plunged deeper into the mine, and I became more fearful as the tunnel behind us became a black river with no end. The dimensions of the mine kept changing, too. Sometimes it seemed almost large, like a cavern, and then the car would push through to a s.p.a.ce so tiny, my arms could reach from one wall of the tunnel to the other. I never felt that I could hold my head up without getting whacked by a beam or a crossbar.

There were constant reminders of impending doom: gas meters that would sound when noxious fumes were emitted from the earth; machinery programmed for automatic use that could go off without warning and cause injury; and then, of course, the dust. You can taste it, and when you breathe it into your nose, it is a little like trying your first cigarette. At first it seems foreign and you resist it. But eventually you forget about it. Coal dust penetrates the skin and fills the lungs, causing all sorts of diseases-the least of them cancer, the worst of them black lung, all of them painful, protracted illnesses that cause slow death. The thing that surprised me the most was the sound inside the mine. It was deadly quiet. This was a feeling of being buried alive. I wondered how the men do it each day. I couldn't.

Coal miners in general are practical men. I get to know them long after they quit the mines and are on black lung benefits. That's when they need their meds, and believe me, they need a lot of them. If it isn't the lungs that go, it's repet.i.tive injury to the joints from the picking, the loading, the hauling, and the lifting. In the same way that the mountains are depleted of coal, the men are spent by taking it from the earth.

Mining is a family tradition; usually sons follow fathers into the mines, and their sons will follow them. There are amazing stories of bravery, and I think of them as I stand and await instructions. In the 1930s, Wesley Abingdon was a local hero because he refused to give up during an accident-he took the train car, threw the men into it, pedaled out, threw the men out, and went back for more. He saved about thirty men that day, and those thirty men told their thirty families, and so on. Wesley gained saint status in these parts.

A couple of years ago there was an incident that upon repeating sounds like a folktale, but I witnessed it, so I can tell you it is absolutely true. It was late spring, and the mountains were just coming into their green. The whistle sounded, and we a.s.sembled, just as we have today, to a.s.sist in the rescue. The supervisor had determined that all the men were out but one: Basil Tate, a young miner, was still unaccounted for. The problem with explosions is that it is very hard to determine the cause until after they happen, so they are very hard to prevent. Fire and smoke are wily as well, and a good miner figures this out and works with it. The mine rescue team was deciding how to proceed, how to find Basil, when a rumbling was heard from deep in the mine. It started out softly, but it sounded like it was coming toward the exit. I will never forget what happened next. The rumble became a blast. Dirt and black smoke poured out of the entrance, and then we heard a pop. We looked up, and there was Basil Tate, flying through the air like a human cannonball. The explosion had created a vacuum, with Basil in it. Then fire propelled the fumes-and Basil-like stoking a cannon to fire. The crowd watched the spectacle in awe. Was he alive? We followed the body up over the hill and down the mountainside. Basil landed by the creek, on soft mud. We were certain he was dead. When we got to him, he was unconscious, his body contorted in an S shape. We could tell from his position that he had broken his neck and his legs. But there was still a pulse, so we wrapped him up carefully and called for a chopper from the University of Virginia to fly him out for emergency surgery. Basil was in a body cast for close to two years, and now he works the box office at the Drama. We call him the Miracle Man.

The mining supervisor, a b.u.t.toned-down city type, not from these parts, shoots me a look that says, "What are you doing here?" Spec picks up on this and tells him, "She's with me." I ask an intelligent question about the explosion, and the foreman's brow relaxes like he's decided I'm okay and can stay and be of some help. He is a foreigner, too, but that's where the similarity between us ends. His demeanor and condescension are a perfect example of why locals don't like these company men. They come in with an att.i.tude.

As explosions go, this does not appear to be a bad one. There is no fire yet; the smoke is from a power gash near the mouth of the mine. The mining foreman is trying to explain the location of Level Three to the company man when I look up and see Jack Mac crawling out of the air vent with Amos Johnson. I hear a scream as one of the wives runs toward her husband. She is held back as the rescue team from Coeburn tends to him. I run toward Jack Mac as he turns to go back into the mine. The foreman shouts at me to stop him. Jack Mac turns and looks at me. I tell him, "Rick is still inside." Two of the company engineers try to stop him, but he throws their hands off of him and goes back into the mine. The foreman chews me out for releasing information and tells me to stay behind the line and wait for the injured.

The worst thing about these accidents is the lag time between men going in and men coming out. The waiting periods are filled with silence and some m.u.f.fled weeping. For the most part, folks don't cry; accidents are an occupational hazard, and there is no sense worrying until something actually happens.

Spec is miffed at me because he's been rendered impotent by my big mouth. Spec likes to get in the middle of things, and now he is a sideliner. Twenty minutes go by. Still no Jack Mac. I feel horrible guilt about this. Why did I tell him about Rick? Couldn't I have left it up to the company men to come up with a rescue solution? Didn't I know that Jack Mac would never sit and wait for them to do something? A hand is placed on my shoulder. I turn and see Sweet Sue with a look of total terror on her face.

"Is he in there, Ava?"

"He's getting Rick out. Don't worry." I comfort Sweet Sue as best I can, and she goes to join the rest of the women behind the line. I look over at them. Their expressions range from utter desperation and fear to pure fury. They are tired of this, and they have a right to be angry. They have sharp eyes-nothing gets past them-but there is also a weariness that comes from disappointment.

Spec shouts at me to follow him as most of the other rescue squads have already departed with injured. The foreman is still furious with me for telling Jack Mac about Rick. His job is to save as many men as he can, and now it looks as though he will lose two. Spec is starting to referee our argument when we hear a woman scream, "Help them! Help them!"

The crowd hushes to still quiet as smoke pours out of the mine. Then, almost as if in a dream, Jack MacChesney emerges from the mine carrying a man. I hear someone yell, "Jack Mac's got Rick! He's got Rick!" Rick Harmon's body is lifeless. We move in to resuscitate.

Spec is terrific with CPR and oxygen, so he takes charge and I a.s.sist. Jack Mac collapses and a doctor tends to him immediately. I look over at him and see that he is out cold. Rick's wife, Sherry, runs to us with her kids. They clamor to touch Rick, believing they can bring him around with familiarity and love and kisses. But the supervisor pulls them away and we continue to pump, pump, pump. Spec looks up at me. "He's coming to."

The doctor joins us and takes over. He tells us to move Rick away from the residual smoke, so Spec and I lift him carefully onto a stretcher and carry him a few feet to a clearing. Rick opens his eyes and says, "My foot. G.o.ddammit, my foot." I smile at Rick with a look that says, I don't think this is a good time to be cursing G.o.d; and he looks back at me apologetically.

"Let me take a look at it." I hadn't noticed his foot. It is mangled and b.l.o.o.d.y. I smile again and tell Rick not to worry. But I am worried; there is a deep cut across the top of his foot, and I cannot make out his toes. I fear he may lose it. "How is it, Ave?" he asks, suspecting the worst.

"It's not too bad." Rick looks relieved and closes his eyes. He pa.s.ses out. I wrap the foot and ice it.

The Norton crew places oxygen on Rick and hoists him into the ambulance. The doors slam shut and they speed away. I turn to find Jack Mac, but he is gone. The unit from Appalachia has taken him to the hospital.

The supervisor grumbles at Spec and me as we pa.s.s. I stop and ask if everybody is for sure out of the mine. He a.s.sures me that they are. He smiles, not a smile of relief for the men who survived, but a selfish one. Saving lives for him is all about numbers; he has had a good day, and he knows his job is secure.

The women rush away from the roadside and get into their cars. They speed down the mountain to follow the ambulances to the hospital. Rick's wife comes toward me and I give her a hug. All I can think is how much she must love him, and how happy she and Rick were dancing the other night at the Fold.

Spec drops me off at the Pharmacy, and I tell the girls I'm going to make a run to the hospital to see how the men are doing. Fleeta and Pearl need no details; they got the rundown from the police radio. Fleeta stops me as I'm leaving and wipes dirt off my face with a tissue.

Saint Agnes Hospital was founded by Irish Catholic nuns who migrated here in the 1930s. The common wisdom around here is, "When you're sick, let the sisters take care of you." Even though the locals don't particularly care for Catholics, they make an exception when it comes to health care. The nuns built their hospital in Norton, the closest city and the location most central to the coal camps. I love the hospital because there are statues of saints and angels tucked in every corner. One time Eulala Clarkston was in for a blood clot and she swore that she saw the Virgin Mary wave at her. Sister Julia told me that, as much as they would love for the Blessed Mother to make an appearance in Norton, they were pretty sure Eulala didn't actually see her. She was on Darvon at the time and was seeing things.

Most of the miners have been released. I ask one of the nurses if there is any word on Rick Harmon, and she tells me that he is undergoing surgery at UVA Hospital in Charlottesville, and that as soon as there is word, she'll let me know. I see Spec in the hallway and compliment him on his CPR; he thanks me for helping. As I turn the corner to go, I run right into Jack MacChesney. I give him a quick hug that catches him off guard.

"Are you all right?"

"Yes, ma'am."

Jack Mac is looking at my face funny, so I a.s.sume Fleeta didn't get all the soot off of me. I wipe my face with my sleeve. Then he says quietly, "Thank you for telling me about Rick-"

I interrupt him. "The supervisor really let me have it. That guy is a real jacka.s.s." Why am I talking so loud? I'm obnoxious. Then I blurt, "Do you need a ride home?"

Jack Mac looks like he would love one and is about to answer me when we hear a familiar voice.

"Jack!" his mother cries. "Let me see you!"

Mrs. Mac is on the arm of Sweet Sue. Jack looks at me, confused for a moment. Then Sue runs to him and covers him in kisses. Mrs. Mac then takes her turn and keeps touching his face like he's five. All of a sudden I feel all the sad things I felt as a girl: I'm an outsider. Sweet Sue and Mrs. Mac embrace Jack, and rightly so, for he is the town hero now. He didn't save thirty men, but he did save one; in the eyes of folks around here, that is just as important.

I'm happy Mrs. Mac and Sweet Sue are fussing over him. He deserves it. To be loved like that! To have somebody to worry about you. To have your mother hold your face in her hands like delicate china! I am watching something perfect and beautiful, and I am not a part of it. They are a family. I walk back around the corner and out the door to the parking lot.

All I want is a hot bath, a gla.s.s of wine, and a long phone call with Theodore, but as I round the driveway to the back of the house, I see that I have company. Aunt Alice and Uncle Wayne's Oldsmobile Cutla.s.s Supreme is parked near my back porch. The two of them are walking in the yard surveying the trees.

"You ought to get the forestry division over here to check that poplar. It has root rot."

I want to say, And how are you, Aunt Alice? but instead, I shrug.

"We'd like to talk to ye, Ava," my uncle says.

I invite them in and offer them iced tea, which they decline. As we pa.s.s through the dining room to get to the living room, Aunt Alice takes into account every piece of furniture, dish, and gla.s.s. It's as if her neck were on a wire, craning this way and that, to record each item and its placement in her memory.

I can't imagine why they're here. They never visit, call, or invite me to their home. After Dad died, out of respect, Mama and I would call them on holidays, but they were always so curt, we stopped trying. Aunt Alice has not aged well. She is around sixty now but looks far older. Her short hair is permed into dry, blue, tight curls. Her small face, wrinkled from a lifetime of grimaces, squints, and frowns, has an overall sour expression. She could use some Queen Helene. Her eyegla.s.ses are too large for her face, and she has false teeth now-I can hear air whistle through them when she talks. Life has settled in on her, and the results aren't pretty.

"What can I do for y'all?" I ask and sit. Aunt Alice sits, but Uncle Wayne remains standing. He looks awkward, as though he's uncomfortable around his own wife. He is tall and lean, with the face of a wizened marionette; its creases are deep, as have been his compromises.

Aunt Alice answers, "We come down here 'cause I ain't gonna chase you all over h.e.l.l to discuss business with you. So you just set there and listen to me because I got something I need to say. Now, I know your mama done came clean with you." She used the word clean, implying that what came before it was dirty.

"Inez Eisenberg needs to look up client confidentiality in the dictionary."

"Now, Ava, you listen here," offers Uncle Wayne. "We don't want no trouble."

"What kind of trouble?" Then I look at Aunt Alice. "And what kind of business?"

Then Aunt Alice explodes. "You look here, youngun, I have stood by all my life and watched my brother, who I loved very much, give all he had to you and your ungrateful mother, and I kept silent because he wished it so, but now, now that the truth is out, you need to know that rest.i.tution must be made to me as I am my brother's only living blood relative. Blood. You know what I mean."

I nod.

"You are not blood. You will never be blood. It almost killed my mama when Fred came home with a wop. A pregnant one! Jesus help us! He shows up back here, on this here porch with a sullied feriner! She moved in here with her high-and-mighty att.i.tude, looking down her nose at us, and took him for all he was worth. He done educated you, clothed you. You ate well and lived like a princess with trips here and yon and up to Monti-sello and so forth, and I done never even got as far as Roanoke. You done took all you're gonna take from me. And I mean that, missy."

I sit quietly and look at my hands. There are three small cuts on my right index finger. I don't remember getting them, but now they pulse a little and hurt. I must have gotten them removing Rick's gear as the Norton crew lifted him into the ambulance. There is a little bit of dried blood around the first cut. I rub it off on my pant leg. Aunt Alice continues.

"After all, that business of his made you rich. That was my pappy's building, and this was the Mulligan family homestead, and I got nothing from all of this. Do you know what it does to me to think I can't live in the house I grew up in? That some stranger is living in my mama and daddy's house, instead of me? I'm treated like this, and I am his true relative?"

"His blood relative," I say quietly.

"d.a.m.n right! And here we are! Struggling! We're on Social Security, but that ain't enough. And you're over here, rich as all get-out, and you have never lifted one finger to help us." Aunt Alice turns to look up at Uncle Wayne. His mouth moves but no words come out, just like the mechanical Santa I put in the window at Mutual's every Christmas. She stares at him to command him to speak, but he cannot. The vein in her neck is a tight, dark blue cord. Her head snaps wildly about in anger. She looks directly at me, which she has never done. I look into her eyes. Behind the bifocals, they are light brown, googly, off center, and surrounded by whites. (In face-reading, irises that float, surrounded by white, belong to folks with criminal pathologies. I'd say she's angry enough to kill right now.) "I wish somebody had thought about me for once. Looked out for me. n.o.body never done looked out for me!"

This is true. Other than those few times after Fred Mulligan died, I never looked in on them, or brought them a gift, or stopped by. But I didn't because they were the nastiest people I ever knew. Small and clannish, gossipy and mean, they didn't deserve a loving niece. Besides, they had committed the worst of sins in my mind: They were hateful to my mother. Aunt Alice never showed me any affection whatsoever. Nor could I remember a birthday gift, a card, or an Easter egg for me, ever. Really, I had no attachment to them. That is why it is so easy for me to say: "How much do you want?"

My question catches them both completely off guard. They look at each other. Uncle Wayne is practically salivating, like I could cut them a check right now. Aunt Alice is dizzy with greed, looking around, wanting everything in this simple house, including the house itself. Uncle Wayne shifts his posture to stand up straight.

"Your aunt and I haven't actually come up with the specifics yet."

"Well, I think you should."

Aunt Alice looks at me. She doesn't trust me. Her eyes narrow. "We've been talking to a lawyer down in Pennington, and he is advising us."

"Have him call me."

They look at me blankly. They didn't expect me to respond this way.