They were of children. The first showed four little boys alike as twins—looking a bit like Will, but with Varia’s tilty eyes. The next was of five little girls, like twins again, and there wasn’t any question who the mother was: Varia. In fact there was five—litters, I guess you could call them, the youngest of them looking about two years old. And written under each child, real small, was what might have been a name.
I didn’t have any doubt at all that they were Will’s and Varia’s kids. Twenty-three little Macurdies, except I doubted they thought of themselves that way. Five litters. But Varia’d gone off pregnant probably eight or nine different times—more than five, anyway. So all told, it seemed to me she’d given birth to some forty. Having litters and a short term explained why she’d started to swell so early, but even so, they couldn’t have been much bigger than squirrels when they were born. I was amazed they’d lived. Seemed like with Varia, Will was more fertile than all the Macurdy men since God knew when.
And if all that wasn’t enough, they were dressed strange, in little coveralls about half snug, like they were tailor-made. Tucked into little black, pull-on boots coming not much above the ankles. Looked like they were dressed for Sunday, but not at the Oak Creek Presbyterian Church. The little girls had Varia’s long hair, fastened like hers in twin horse tails that hung down over the front of their shoulders. The boys’ heads were just about shaved, and they stood there at attention like grinning little soldiers. All of them, boys and girls alike, would have their mamma’s green eyes, I had no doubt, and they looked to be standing in front of a low building with white stone pillars. Didn’t look like any studio backdrop, either. Looked real. Those pictures—kids and building—gave me chill bumps like a plucked turkey.
And there was one other picture, which I took one glance at and covered up quick as I could. Then I put them all back in the envelope in the same order they’d been in, and put the envelope back in the chest the way I’d found it. Closed the lid, and went back downstairs, all of a sudden scared to death that Varia might come back before I got out of there. Because she had a big big secret, and I’d found it out.
I went right back to spreading manure; didn’t have the nerve to stay and eat any pie. When I heard the eleven-forty train whistling for the Ramsey Road crossing, I unhitched the team and drove them home. Halfway there, Varia passed me in the Model A. I didn’t even wave; I was afraid she’d stop to talk. When she drove by, I could feel those bright green eyes right on me, and it seemed to me she knew what I’d done, what I’d found out. My mouth was drier’n dust. I didn’t know how I could ever face her again.
That night I dreamt about Varia. I dreamt I was over to plow her garden patch and couldn’t get the plow in the ground, which was all paved over with brick. Then she came out to me wearing only a shirt, one of Will’s, the tails scarcely halfway to her knees, and unbuttoned down far enough at the top, I could see the roundness of her titties. I was sure she wasn’t wearing anything underneath it. She invited me in for pie. Her tilty green eyes were bigger than ever, and smiling, she asked me what the trouble was. I said I couldn’t get it in, that it was too hard, meaning the plow and the ground. She laughed and put her fingers on my cheek, and said it couldn’t ever be too hard. My face got hot as a depot stove, and somehow we weren’t in her garden patch anymore, but in my bedroom. And I wasn’t asleep anymore, it seemed like. Nor was Varia there, really, but only her ghost, so to speak. I could see right through her. But I could still feel where her fingers had touched my cheek.
“Haven’t you ever wanted to be a daddy, Curtis?” she asked. Her voice was soft when she said it, not at all like a witch.