What Mom Left in the Cedar Box

“Kyle, honey, you did right to tell me and I never told on you until now, and I’m dead, so nobody can fuss at you.

“That same week I opened the county paper and there was the list they print of the people behind on their property taxes. I always read it. It’s a sin and I read it anyway. And there was my own son’s name and his wife’s name, two years behind, for everybody at the Food Giant to see. Randy, your hours had been cut on the river since before Thanksgiving. I knew that much. I did not know it had gotten to that. You didn’t tell me, and I expect you didn’t tell me because you were ashamed, and I want you to hear your mother say there was not one thing in it to be ashamed of.”

My brother made a noise I had not heard out of him since we were children. Tina did not turn her head to look at him.

“I did not have five thousand dollars. I didn’t have five hundred. I had the house and my teacher’s pension and a diamond your daddy bought with a tobacco check. So on the Thursday I got Brenda to drive me to Paducah, and I told her it was the foot doctor, and I walked two blocks down Broadway to the jeweler and I sold him the stone. He gave me nine thousand one hundred dollars for it. I thought that was fair. He was nice about it.

“I had him set a piece of glass in the old mounting, so nobody would ask me where my ring went. Forty dollars. It looked very nice. I’ll tell you something. I wore glass for two winters and I never once felt poorer for it. Your daddy would have done the same thing and he’d have done it faster.”

“Then I called Jeff at the heating and air, and I said I wanted to pay for the furnace on Randy’s house, the whole thing, and I’d bring him cash, and if he ever told a soul where it came from I’d tell his mother about the time he put a frog in my desk. He put the furnace in the next Monday. I understand he told them it had been taken care of.

“And I went to the courthouse and I paid the taxes, both years and the penalty. Four thousand one hundred and twelve dollars. Kim at the clerk’s window is one of mine too, class of 1994, and she didn’t say a word then and I’d thank her not to be asked about it now.

“There was a little left over. I put it in the collection plate a twenty at a time so Mike wouldn’t notice a lump.”

“I noticed,” Pastor Mike said quietly, to the recorder. “I thought you’d sold some quilts.”

“So that’s where the diamond is,” my mother said. “It’s in the basement of the house on Poplar Street keeping my grandson warm, and it’s in a drawer at the courthouse marked paid. I think that’s a fine place for it. I think it’s the best thing that stone ever did, and that includes the forty-some years it sat on my hand looking pretty.”

The clock ticked on the tape and the clock ticked on the wall. They were a little out of step with each other.

“Now you’re wondering why I never said. Tina, especially, I expect you’re wondering.”

Tina’s arms had come unfolded. Her hands were in her lap.