The Little Friend

The library looked empty. Mrs. Fawcett was alone at the front desk going through the night’s returns and drinking a cup of coffee. She was a tiny, bird-boned woman, with short pepper-and-salt hair, veiny white arms (she wore copper bracelets, for her arthritis) and eyes that were a little too sharp and closely set, especially since her nose was on the beaky side. Most kids were afraid of her: not Harriet, who loved the library and everything about it.

“Hi, Harriet!” said Mrs. Fawcett. “Have you come in to sign up for the reading program?” She reached under her desk for a poster. “You know how this works, right?”

She handed Harriet a map of the United States, which Harriet studied more intently than she needed to. I must not be all that upset really, she told herself, if Mrs. Fawcett can’t tell. Harriet’s feelings were not easily hurt—not by Edie, anyway, who was always flying off the handle about something—but the silent treatment in the car had unnerved her.

“They’re doing it with an American map this year,” Mrs. Fawcett said. “For every four books you check out, you get a sticker shaped like a state to paste on your map. Would you like me to tack this up for you?”

“Thank you, I can do it myself,” said Harriet.

She went to the bulletin board on the back wall. The reading program had started Saturday, only day before yesterday. Seven or eight maps were up already; most were blank but one of the maps had three stamps. How could someone have read twelve books since Saturday?

“Who,” she asked Mrs. Fawcett, returning to the desk with the four books she’d selected, “is Lasharon Odum?”

Mrs. Fawcett leaned out from the desk and—pointing silently to the children’s room—nodded at a tiny figure with matted hair, dressed in a grubby T-shirt and pants that were too small for her. She was scrunched up in a chair, reading, her eyes wide and her breath rasping through her parched lips.

“There she sits,” whispered Mrs. Fawcett. “Poor little thing. Every morning for the past week, she’s been waiting on the front steps when I come to open up, and she stays there quiet as a mouse until I close at six. If she’s really reading those books, and not just sitting there pretending, she reads right well for her age group.”

“Mrs. Fawcett,” said Harriet, “will you let me back in the newspaper stacks today?”

Mrs. Fawcett looked startled. “You can’t take those out of the library.”

“I know. I’m doing some research.”

Mrs. Fawcett looked at Harriet over the tops of her glasses, pleased by this adult-sounding request. “Do you know which ones you want?” she said.

“Oh, just the local papers. Maybe the Memphis and Jackson ones, too. For—” She hesitated; she was afraid of tipping off Mrs. Fawcett by mentioning the date of Robin’s death.

“Well,” said Mrs. Fawcett, “I’m really not supposed to let you back there, but if you’re careful I’m sure it’ll be fine.”

————

Harriet—going the long way, so she wouldn’t have to walk by Hely’s house; he’d asked her to go fishing with him—stopped at home to drop off the books she’d checked out. It was twelve-thirty. Allison—sleepy and flushed looking, still in pyjamas—sat alone at the dining-room table moodily eating a tomato sandwich.

“You want tomato, Harriet?” called Ida Rhew from the kitchen. “Or you wants chicken instead?”

“Tomato, please,” said Harriet. She sat down by her sister.

“I’m going to the Country Club to sign up for swimming this afternoon,” she said. “Do you want to come?”

Allison shook her head.

“Do you want me to sign you up, too?”

“I don’t care.”

“Weenie wouldn’t want you to act like this,” said Harriet. “He would want you to be happy, and get on with life.”

“I’ll never be happy again,” said Allison, putting down her sandwich. Tears began to brim at the rims of her melancholy, chocolate-brown eyes. “I wish I was dead.”

“Allison?” said Harriet.

She didn’t answer.

“Do you know who killed Robin?”

Allison began to pick at the crust of her sandwich. She peeled off a strip; she rolled it into a ball between thumb and forefinger.

“You were in the yard when it happened,” said Harriet, watching her sister closely. “I read it in the newspaper down at the library. They said you were out there the whole time.”

“You were there, too.”

“Yes, but I was a baby. You were four.”

Allison peeled off another layer of crust and ate it carefully, without looking at Harriet.

“Four is pretty old. I remember practically everything that happened to me when I was four.”

At this point, Ida Rhew appeared with Harriet’s plate. Both girls were silent. After she went back into the kitchen, Allison said: “Please leave me alone, Harriet.”

“You must remember something,” said Harriet, her eyes still fixed on Allison. “It’s important. Think.”

Allison speared a tomato slice with her fork and ate it, nibbling delicately around the edges.

“Listen. I had a dream last night.”

Allison looked up at her, startled.