Acre Under a Green Sky

I don't know why we weren't allowed to go to the funeral, but we heard all about it. They dropped us off up the street at the Sisters McConnell's house like always.

The Sisters McConnell had white hair and a garden everywhere; front yard, back yard, hanging in baskets from the porch, everywhere. There were mice in the garden in spite of their cat, Fats. Fats was as big as a cocker spaniel and hissed viciously at anything that moved. Everyone hated him except the Sisters McConnell. Irene was short and fat, and Janet was tall and thin. Imagine Abbott and Costello in house dresses and you've got the Sisters McConnell. But they were very, very nice.

For a very long time, there was nothing especially distinctive about the Sisters McConnell except the mice in their garden. No one could explain the infestation, nor apparently could anyone do anything about it; least of all Fats. Then something bizarre happened, and all those mice had to take a back seat.

For as long as anyone could remember, Irene stayed at home and Janet was the librarian at the Waterstop Library. When Janet retired from the library, her picture appeared in the Daily News, and for some reason, it got picked up by the Pittsburgh Press. Sometime later, a man showed up at Mrs. Moskowitz' house across the street looking for his long lost mother. He was carrying that Pittsburgh Press clipping.

Now, everyone knew that Janet McConnell was an old maid like her sister, but here was this man asking Mrs. Moskowitz to go across the street and smooth the way for some mother-son reunion. But there's more. He claimed her name wasn't Janet McConnell at all but was Janet Banner, and that Irene McConnell wasn't her sister but her lover who some thirty-five years earlier had come and broken up his happy home back in Lima, Ohio.

As ill-luck would have it, Mrs. Jett was there that day and heard everything, so the word was out. The Sisters McConnell were ... well, you know ... homely-sexuals. It would be years before I got that word right.

If I appear to make light of it, it's because the storm that followed is long passed and forgotten. There were, nonetheless, black threatening clouds over the Sisters McConnell's house and hearts for some time. My mother, of course, embraced the Sisters McConnell and campaigned vigorously for them. In fact, their new standing in the community endeared them to her as never before. Prior to this, she had thought them "mouse-happy bores".

Gwen Luka happily joined my mother in favor of the Sisters McConnell probably for no other reason than to spite her mother, Estelle, who thought the Sisters were "an abomination". She seriously suggested they be run out of town. She was white with rage that this sort of thing might be tolerated in decent society.

This was, after all, another time; another perspective. Why else would the Sisters live such an elaborate lie? But then, lies were the order of the day back then. Appearances were everything. Everyone lied to maintain the appearance of propriety; of normalcy. And some of us came to believe the lies we told. The most ruinous lies are the lies we tell ourselves. Public exposure was a terrifying prospect, and so everyone cloaked themselves in lies and everyone was afraid –– whether they knew it or not. And so the Sisters McConnell became pariah, except at our house.

While all the other kids were being warned off, we were suddenly being dropped off at their doorstep at every turn; sometimes overnight. When I asked my mother to explain their relationship, she said, "They're in love with each other, dummy!" Meant less than nothing to me. All I knew was my mother had become their best friend. That was obvious to everyone.

Ultimately, the scandal liberated the Sisters McConnell. Janet and her son worked out their differences, and the month of August brought two granddaughters and a grandson to stay with Janet and Irene. They were nearly grown, so we kids had little to do with them except when the Sisters baby-sat us. Like the day of the funeral.

I was in a torment about the knife that day, and Janet McConnell sensed it. She sat me down on the front porch swing away from everyone.

"Is it about the murders, then?" she asked. Her years in the library had created a kind of permanent whisper that was both soothing and conspiratorial. She was stooped from years of half bending over books.

"What if you know something," I said, "but if you tell, you'll get in trouble?"

"What is it you think you know?" she asked, with that air of confidentiality she had.

"I'm just asking. I don't know anything."

"I think we may have the same problem. You see, I may know something, too. It's a frightful weight to carry, isn't it?"

"Yes."

"Especially if you're wrong. Are you absolutely sure about what you know?"

"Oh yes, I heard it plain as day."

"Well then, perhaps we both should talk to your father about what we know?"

"He'd really give it to me then!"

"Is it so bad; what you did?"

"Oh yeah."

"I understand perfectly. We do have the same problem."

"What did you hear?"

"Just talk. Vicious talk that could get a lot of people in trouble if it's true. And hurt a lot of people if it's not. The point is I know of someone . . . There's someone very angry, and I believe, capable . . ."

She stood up unable to finish her thought. She shook out the apron she was wearing, and added offhandedly, "I guess everyone's got ideas about this thing. Probably all nonsense."

"Why don't you tell my mother . . .?"

"Oh no!" she said, turning on me with a fearful look on her face. "No, I couldn't do that. You see, your mother is not very good with secrets. Especially when they make her angry. You understand?"

"I guess."

"She'd go off like a roman candle. No. If I were to tell anyone, it would be your father. He'd know how to handle it. Your father's a good man."

"Yeah."

"Probably all nonsense anyway."

Before I could say another word, the screen door slammed on her backside and she was in the house. I gave the swing a good kick, and swung my legs up onto the swing to ride it out. Between the hanging plants all around the porch and the flower boxes attached to the porch railings, I could barely see the deserted street beyond the foliage. Everyone was at the funeral, except us. Fats joined me on the porch, and together we watched a mouse jump from one hanging plant to another. Fats stretched and yawned. I might have, too, were it not for my problem.

If my father knew we had broken into Luka's house, he would kill me. But I should tell him they found the knife that first day. No. If my father doesn't know already, I'm sure someone will tell him. There's no need for me to incriminate myself yet. And what the hell was Janet talking about? Maybe she knows who did it, after all. God, I wish I was at the funeral. We never get to go anywhere good.