The Tin Horse A Novel - By Janice Steinberg Page 0,125
I prepared to look for Barbara in Los Angeles, though, I couldn’t help finding a crazy logic in Mama’s theory. Not that I thought she’d left with Danny, that the two of them had planned it—it was one thing for him to succumb to the temptation of the moment, but not even the Danny I currently reviled would run away with my sister scant hours after asking me to marry him. But Barbara must have panicked after I walked in on them, afraid of my anger and even more terrified I was going to tell Mama and Papa and she’d catch hell the minute she walked in the door. Desperate to get away, what if the first thing that popped into her mind was the one train she knew left the next morning? It was a rash act—an infuriating one—and just the kind of thing I could see my sister doing.
When I went to bed that night, I discovered that in addition to the note she’d left for Mama and Papa, there was a second note under my pillow.
Lainie, I’m sorry. I love you.
I had an urge to rip the note into shreds in rage. Instead something made me slip it into the treasure box I’d gotten from Aunt Pearl as a child. Did I have some premonition that the note would be the last thing I heard from Barbara? What I remember feeling toward her was still-fresh anger and rage, along with a hint of worry—but no more than a hint. I was able to sleep that night. And the next day at school, I found I could focus on my studies. I even held my own with my economics professor, who quizzed us with the bloodlust of a tiger tearing apart prey. Not even my anguish over Danny dimmed the glow I felt after I answered a tough question and the professor nodded as if he were making a mental note of me; it was the kind of recognition I experienced at the start of every school year, the moment when a new teacher identified Elaine Greenstein as one of the smart students—only this time it was happening not in the Boyle Heights public schools but at the University of Southern California.
Nevertheless, Barbara’s absence afflicted me with a need to do something. After my last class, I called home to see if there’d been any word from her. Not a thing, Audrey reported. So I went to Barbara’s dance school in Hollywood. I found four of her friends there. I told them she’d gone to stay with a friend but forgot to leave us the name, and did they know who it was? They said no but gave me the names and telephone numbers of a few other people to try.
I planned to make the calls as soon as I got home, but Mama wouldn’t hear of it. I’d blabbed about Barbara too much already, she fumed.
“Mama, none of those girls lives anywhere near Boyle Heights!”
“How do you know they don’t have relatives here?”
“We aren’t living in Jane Austen’s time. It’s not going to ruin our whole family if people know—”
“There’s no reason to go stir up trouble,” Mama grumbled. “We know where she is—on that train.”
The train was due to reach Portland at seven-forty, and that evening after dinner, Mama’s anticipation became so palpable that just sitting in the same room with her, I wanted to jump out of my skin. I retreated to my bedroom and opened Beowulf, which I had to read in Old English as well as in translation. But though I forced myself to stare at the book, all I could see was the train speeding closer and closer to Portland. At seven-thirty I gave up on studying and joined the rest of the family in the kitchen. They were gathered around the table, within grabbing distance of the wall-mounted telephone. Papa was playing a game of fish with Audrey and Harriet, and Mama was aimlessly straightening things in the cupboards.
At seven-forty we started stealing glances at the phone and the clock, and by eight we simply sat and stared at them. When the phone finally rang, at eight-fifteen, Papa lunged for it. “Barbara!” Mama exclaimed, hovering at his elbow. We all hovered, listening to his end of the conversation.
“Sol, how are you?” Papa said.
It was an ordinary call, and I started back toward the table. Then I heard Papa say, “Burt called you long-distance from the train station in Portland? That’s good.”