Pay the Piper by Joan Williams Page A

of a swimmer holding on to something for dear life. Her eyes briefly met Laurel’s. Her sleeplessness was because of Mr. Woodsum, she meant. Laurel looked away.
    William called, “Hello, old dear. I’ll be right back. Got to go indoors and poo.”
    â€œDad.” Rick laughed. “Tell the neighborhood.”
    â€œHere’s a little money, Rick.”
    â€œGran, thanks.” He reached across the front seat. “It’ll help with my twenty-two.”
    â€œBah. You don’t need another gun.”
    â€œHe only has a BB gun, Mother.”
    â€œBah. He doesn’t need that. He’s not supposed to shoot it in Soundport. That’s why he’s always in trouble with the police.”
    â€œThat’s why he likes Mississippi,” Laurel said. “To be able to use the gun.”
    If she says Bah again, I’ll kill her, she thought. “Bah, he doesn’t need to shoot anything,” Mrs. Wynn said. She meant to remind them she grew up in Mississippi with a passel of brothers clomping mud into the house and bringing in bloody, stinky birds and animals she had to see plucked and gutted and had to smell cooking and finally had to eat. “I brought William my little extra fan. He says the apartment he subleases is so hot every summer.”
    â€œHe’s taking the air conditioner out of my office,” Laurel said.
    â€œGoing to be comfortable.” Mrs. Wynn tried to smile and make eye contact again, but Laurel refused. If her mother attempted to malign William, she would champion him, because it had always been her nature to take up for any underdog.
    Mrs. Wynn looked away toward the neighborhood. “A lot of long days while you’re gone. Sundays are the worst.”
    â€œWhy don’t you start going to church, Mother?”
    â€œWhy? What for?” Her eyes lost their sadness.
    Where had her mother’s feisty nature come from, so unlike her own? Laurel wondered. From having so many siblings? She could remind her mother she could wear her new clothes: people did not particularly go to church for Christian reasons. Between piousness and Christianity there is a fine line, it’s been said.
    â€œIf I go to church, all they’d do would be to start asking me for money, or to be on some committee. They’re always building something.” Her mother’s voice wavered. “Maybe you won’t stay so long.”
    â€œHow can I not stay, Mother? The house is rented.”
    â€œDo you have Jewish tenants again?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œThat’s good. They’re the best. Always leave the house better-looking than the way you left it.”
    â€œThanks,” Laurel said.
    â€œI’m not going to any church. When I was little, I had to go to church twice every Sunday and to prayer meeting on Wednesday nights. And then every night for two weeks during protracted meeting.”
    â€œYou mean revival?”
    â€œWhatever they call it now.”
    Amused, Laurel would not laugh. But she watched her mother walk away with a different sense, noting her short legs, her round ankles, which gave her a peasant girl’s look despite her fashionable clothes.
    â€œThe house looks fine, Mom.”
    Laurel smiled, but the little barb had hurt, with a familiar feeling. As she edged the car slowly backward, fir trees beyond the house receded and grew more slim. Well, it was her fault all that work had to be done, cleaning out drawers and closets for other people to use, fluffing down cobwebs she had paid no attention to before. The slim New Yorker who came to rent the house had brought a child who seemed a minor appendage to her life as an executive. How did women acquire such acumen? How did they know how to command offices and make important decisions? Being a writer and staying at home, she was considered by other mothers not to be doing anything. They were running around Soundport on committees. It was therefore logical