Читать книгу The Future Homemakers of America - Laurie Graham - Страница 18

We found a back road with tarmac for Kath’s first lesson.

I said, ‘Now. Hold the gas pedal right there and listen to the engine. Bring your shift pedal up real slow, and keep listening, till you hear the sound changing, then just hold it there. You feel how it’s ready to move? Y’understand what I mean? Okay, let’s roll. Gently now. Just give the gas pedal a gentle squeeze.’

I gave her an hour and she was away.

Kath Pharaoh was a natural-born driver. I’d taught a few. My big sister, Connie, didn’t know her right from her left; and a girl on the base at Carswell, a New York City girl, never used anything but the subway, suddenly found herself with the whole of Texas outside her door. But I never seen anybody take to it like Kath. I just hoped she wouldn’t ask me to teach John too. There was something about that smile of his gave me the creeps. Sometimes when I went to pick her up he’d be round the side, skinning a rabbit or fixing up his traps. He’d smile and smile, like he was real excited to see visitors, specially if Gayle had come along for the ride. She was a pretty little thing and he’d keep sneaking a look at her.

All through the spring of ‘52 I saw Kath twice a week at least and she’d drive me around. She was so thrilled, specially when any of those Jexes and Gotobeds’d seen her. She’d give them some regal kinda wave, and then she’d turn and give me her new Pepsodent grin. One time, when it came on to rain, we stopped and picked up a woman trudging along with heavy bags.

‘Look at poor old Annie gitting drenched,’ Kath said. ‘Can we give her a ride?’

It was a proud moment for her, leaning out of her window, shouting, ‘Jump in the back, Annie, and I’ll drop you near your door.’

She climbed in and perched there, steaming, like a wet dog.

Kath said, ‘You all right there, Annie? Soon have you home. Once you can drive a motor, you wonder how you ever went on without it.’

Not that our passenger had asked. She didn’t say a word, and when Kath stopped, outside one of those crouched-down houses, she just got out and went. Never a goodbye or a thank-you.

I said, ‘Who’d you say she was?’

‘Annie,’ she said. ‘She was Annie Jex, then she married Harold Howgego. Their boy Colin was took prisoner in the last lot; Japs got him. You should have seen him when they sent him home. I’ve seen more flesh on a sparrow. Now, he married a girl from Lynn, and her mother was a Jex, only not the same lot, of course. Annie was one of the Waplode Jexes, and her mother was a Pargeter.’

She killed me, reeling them off. I said, ‘I think you just invent these names.’

‘Why?’ she said. ‘Don’t your lot have Howgegos? I didn’t think there was anything you didn’t have.’

‘Howgegos!’ I said ‘What kind of name is that, anyway? I think you lie in bed at night and dream them up.’

She laughed. ‘No I don’t,’ she said. ‘But I have thought up what name I’d have if I was to be a film star. I’d be Loretta. Loretta Jayne-with-a-Y Pharaoh.’

Kath always put me in a good mood. Didn’t matter how much it blew or rained or if I couldn’t make it, after I’d promised we’d go driving, I never heard a word of discontent from her. It was like having a puppy-dog around, always wagging its tail. She was just as happy to come out to play or curl up in her basket and wait.

I said, ‘Okay, Loretta Jayne, are you gonna turn this car round nice and neat? Can you do it in three?’

‘Piece of cake.’

I said, ‘You think you’ll ever get your own wheels?’

‘When we come up on the Treble Chance,’ she said. ‘First thing I’d do is get the electric light brought in. If we had the electric light, I could see to do a bit of sewing. Then I’d buy a motor and a new wringer. And I’d pay you back, for all your juice I’ve been using up. I’d come to America and take you out for a slap-up tea.’