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  And where, oh, where, was my father? How did he figure in all this? Nothing of his was in the bag. Was it possible she wasn’t certain who my father was? Was he some dancing partner along the way, or musician from an orchestra she met at a theater? Could she not afford to keep me without the support of a husband, and thus deserted me in the hopes someone better able to provide for me would come along?

  Was she famous now? Perhaps even been here to dance at a theater at one time or another? Could I have gone to the ballet and watched her, not knowing who she really was?

  Why could I not remember anything? It was so utterly hopeless trying to piece anything together, knowing nothing. And the things in the bag only worsened it. I stuffed the gown into it. Then my hand caught inside the torn lining and felt the edge of a piece of paper. I tore into it, ripping the brittle lining six inches down.

  There were four things: a musical program dated June 17, 1899, a program from an opera dated December 31, 1890 (both events held in Galveston), a single sheet of paper with a name and two addresses, and a picture. It was the picture, at first, that I stared at intently. A man and a woman, probably a wedding portrait. It was only a half-picture, each party shown to the waist, so there was no way of telling the size of either of them.

  She appeared fair, kind of snobbish. This would fit: I am snobbish, and look it. The man was fair-haired also, but his face was less reserved, his smile full of a kind of inward joy. He wore a coat and a tie. She wore something light-colored with very high ruffled collar. It was impossible to date the picture, for fashion before the turn of the century always looked about the same to me, no matter what the year. And there was nothing written on the back or front. The corners were cut diagonally on all four edges, and I supposed it must have been taken from a frame before being slipped into what was now the torn pocket of the bag.

  I put the photo down and looked at the piece of paper. The information was handwritten in childlike script with heavy lead pencil. Almost surely it was a youngster’s work, I thought, then a new idea came to mind. I looked at both programs for the name James Randolph Byron … it was a small chance, but maybe …

  Yet there was no name resembling Byron in either program, and visions of my mother coupled with a celebrity drifted from my mind. The only eye-catching name was Roman Cruz, an unusual name made more prominent by the boldness with which it was printed.

  Then I thought of the shoes and picked up the opera program again. Fancier than the other, this cover was made of heavy parchment, decorated with gaily colored flowers, and printed in red filigree script, bound to its tissue-thin pages by a gold silken, tassel-hung thread. No dancers were named in the opera itself; yet, in the center between Acts there was a small notation: “Ballet Solo from ‘Swan Lake,’ Performed by Miss Margueretta Sterling.”

  Could this ballet dancer be my mother?

  That would have been around ten years before my birth date in 1900. If Margueretta were a professional dancer, would it not have been strange for her to have been in Galveston again in 1899 (where I now knew I must have been conceived), saving a program from the show of a traveling band? It was possible, to be sure, but somehow did not seem probable.

  My head was full of new questions, and I was more than ever confused. Again, I looked back at the sheet of paper. No doubt about it, a young boy had written it. James Randolph Byron, Number 2 Blackburn Place, Grady; and 707 Avenue L, Galveston. Well, Grady is some distance from here, but Galveston is only fifty miles away, so there was the obvious place to start, even if I were seeking someone who must have known my mother as a youngster, and might not even remember her after all these years.

  I had to go, in spite of wedding plans and Rodney Younger and my father and mother and all their friends. They were of no significance in the face of what I’d found in the bag. It gave me a moment of pause, to realize how utterly detached I felt from all of them at that moment. They might have been nameless faces I’d seen in a crowd.

  There was a moment of hesitation in which I considered taking the carpetbag to my adopted parents, confronting them with the proof they’d lied, then letting them tell me the truth about my past, or as much as they knew of it. It would give me no small amount of satisfaction to be able to show them up and force them to be honest with me. I started for the door.

  Then a frightening thought occurred to me: what if they were keeping my mother somewhere, imprisoned in an institution? Oh, it was too horrible to believe, yet my father certainly had the means to do it, and after all, they’d lied to me from the beginning.

  Even as I asked myself whether they were capable of sinister deeds, I knew I could not afford the risk. The only sure way to get at the truth was to find it for myself. They might not guess I’d found the carpetbag at first, and even if they did, it was as good a chance as any they knew nothing of the clues my mother left me in its pocket.

  I sat down at the davenport and penned a note: “Dear Mother and Dad, Please forgive me, but I know now I can’t go through with this wedding. Don’t try to find me, for I am off in search of myself. How can I know where I want to go with my life if I have no idea where I’ve been? Tell Rodney I’m truly sorry. Willa.”

  Chapter 7

  I propped the note against the bed pillow and repacked my real mother’s carpetbag, just as she’d left it. Then I packed the alligator bag for myself, and waited until I was sure everyone in the house was asleep. I took a good warm suit from the closet, pulled out my heavy coat and a warm pair of walking boots. My eyes traveled over the going-away suit hanging there with Fashion tags still attached, and the chemise wedding gown hanging on the closet door like a child’s angel costume for a Christmas pageant, and I thought what a waste it all was, what a mistake to think I could pull it off and play happily ever after married lady.

  Shortly after midnight, I walked carefully down the stairs and left the house, surprised at how easy it was to sneak out. It was deadly cold, yet clear, and I had no choice but to walk to a corner for a cab. There was always the streetcar, probably soon to be making its way down the cable, but I always loathed streetcars for they stink and are inordinately cold in winter.

  I waited ten minutes before a taxicab passed, and at twelve forty-five walked into Union Station, one of the few people around the stark, high-ceilinged hall. I bought a ticket on the GH&H, looking every few minutes over my shoulder, unable to believe it had been so easy. Then the simple possibility occurred to me that James Byron might even live right here in Houston, and as I rushed toward the telephone directory I realized that in my haste to get away, there might have been any number of solutions to the puzzle I hadn’t thought of.

  So many people had moved to Houston from Galveston over the years, especially after the terrible storm of 1900. Was it not possible James Byron was one? I flipped through the B’s and found several Byrons, including one with the initial J, and one with R. My fingers shook as I wrote down the numbers, and thought of the glorious chance that I might come face to face with my past without ever stepping into a train car.

  It did not cross my mind that anyone would resent being disturbed from sleep at one o’clock in the morning until I reached the first number, asked for James R. Byron, and was told by a sleepy-voiced woman, “Never heard of him. My name’s Jenny Byron, and I ain’t never been married.” She slammed down the receiver in my ear.

  Undaunted, I tried the other number, and was met by a similar reaction. R proved to stand for Richard, and where he came from—southern Louisiana—strangers who called on the telephone in the middle of the night were taking their lives into their own hands.

  Disappointed, I told myself I should have never expected it to be that easy. I found a place to sit down, lit up a cigarette, and prepared for the long wait until eight o’clock, when the next train pulled out.

  I haven’t been to Galveston more than a half-dozen times in my life. I don’t care for the feel of salt water and sand on my body, and after reading and hearing eyewitness accounts of that horr
ible storm, I never quite trusted the weather enough to enjoy an outing on the beach there.

  The train pulled in at nine-fifteen, and I was able to get a cab right away. I gave the driver the address on Avenue L, and he said, “Well, miss, I can take you to Avenue L, sure ’nough, but I ain’t sure about seven-oh-seven. How old is this information?”

  “Over twenty years, I think.”

  “That expains it, then. Everything’s changed here since the big storm. There may not even be a seven-oh-seven anymore. But I c’n take you on to L if you like.”

  “That will be fine. Just let me out anywhere you like. I can walk the rest of the way.”

  We drove along the geometric streets, passing palms and grand houses raised off the ground like ladies’ skirts lifted to ensure not getting them muddy. I had never really noticed anything of Galveston except the beaches and main streets, and was surprised to find the town rather quaint, kind of peaceful after the hustle-bustle of Houston.

  Soon we were on Broadway, a street which I did recognize, with its esplanaded center planted with tall palms and oleanders, and the two-way trolley tracks marching down. “Our finest street,” said the driver with pride, “greatest houses on it. Yonder’s the Moody house and further down, the Gresham res’dence. I hear tell some two hundred people found refuge in the Gresham house during the storm. He was a lawyer and a congressman, you know, just died last month. Great loss to the city, yes, sir, great loss.

  “Not a whole lot left in Galveston anymore,” he continued, as though he were driving a touring car full of passengers. “Place kind of died a gradual death after the storm. Oh, I mean there’s a town and banks and the port and all the other, but, you know, people began movin’ away right after the hurricane, shore did, and many never came back. Course, some would argue that Galveston is now greater than ever as a city, but when you drive a cab for fifteen years, you develop a kind of instinct …”

  “Were you here during the storm?”

  “No’m. My parents were, but I was visiting an aunt in Albuquerque when it blew in. Always kinda wished I’d been around to see it. Must’ve been a gruesome sight. Thank goodness, none of my family was hurt.”

  “That’s good.”

  “Six thousand people killed, you know, worst storm ever.”

  “So I heard.”

  “Course, you’d have been too young. You grow up around here?”

  “Houston. But I was far away, in Ohio, when the storm came,” I said. Something occurred to me just then and I looked down at the carpetbag. Why was it water-stained only on the bottom?

  “Lemme see now,” said the driver, interrupting my thoughts, “Avenue L runs right down to the beach. One end is practically on the shore. Doubt if you’ll ever find what you’re looking for, considerin’ its location and all.”

  “I never thought of that.”

  “We’ll be there directly, though.”

  We rode the rest of the way silently. It was a lovely morning, defying the late December heading on the calendar page. Shops were opening here and there; men were walking down the street clutching their newspapers; women were hanging out wash; children were playing games. We interrupted one game of ball as we passed down Twenty-fifth Street. The little boys participating looked irritated, and I thought to myself, Just another morning for most people, calm and carefree. In the afternoon the kids would go to a theater and see a show. Fathers would return from their jobs and dinner would be on the table. Everyone would be discussing the approach of the Christmas season, with bellies still smarting a little from their overindulgence on Thanksgiving Day.

  And I was apart from it, just as I had always been apart from everything, a person not doing what everyone else was doing: riding a cab instead, looking for her past, and what if she found it? Would it be what she had longed a lifetime for?

  I stifled a yawn, only then realizing how tired I was. I’d slept some, in a lounge chair in the ladies’ room at the Houston station, but I hadn’t slept much, afraid someone would discover me there, or that I would miss the train. I’d awakened stiff in the neck and with a backache, wondering if anyone had yet noticed my absence and come looking for me, or had they shrugged their shoulders as so many times before, and told themselves they might have expected it?

  Was Rodney even now trying on his tuxedo? Had the coat arrived from Sakowitz? Were the florists at the church adding white poinsettias and lilies of the valley to the profusion of red flowers already decorating the sanctuary? Were workers at the Rice Hotel busily polishing silver and arranging tables? Was the caterer putting sugar roses on the five-tiered wedding cake?

  I ought to have been ashamed of myself and I knew it, but at the time I was too anxious about what was ahead to worry about anyone else, and afraid that if I dwelled on it too much I would lose my nerve and go back …

  “Here’s the seven hundred block. Lemme see, 742, 738, 7—”

  “It’s all right. I think I’ll walk from here. I need to stretch anyway, and even if there is no 707, I can knock on a few doors and ask some questions.”

  “Okay, miss. I dunno what or who you’re looking for, but I wish you luck. Here, I’ll get them bags for you.” He pulled each of them out, obviously puzzled by the paradox of a genuine alligator bag standing next to a ragged carpetbag. He waited for his fare, to which I added a fifty-cent tip, and thanked me, giving me a look that said women would forever befuddle him.

  Avenue L was like something out of a history book. Its width wouldn’t make half of Montrose Boulevard across, and given the same amount of land on either side of the street, there were probably three times the number of houses, all perched together as though being thus situated would offer better protection against high winds and water. I remembered the pictures I had seen, taken after the storm, of houses stacked one against the other and even practically on top of each other, or reduced to a rubble of loose wood, bricks and latticework, not even fully appearing until the water had finally receded. It was lucky they had their seawall built when they did, to protect them from an almost equal whipping by nature in 1915. Was I busy building my own seawall now, to protect me from all the ghosts who had hounded me for a lifetime? Would mine be as effective as the crushed granite wall within blocks of where I now walked?

  The bags were heavy, and I was soon sorry I’d told the driver to go, yet I couldn’t have him driving me around all day as I proceeded up staircase after staircase, inquiring after James Byron. I crossed to the side of the street with the odd-numbered houses, and walked further and further down, the breeze more brisk the nearer to the beach end that I walked.

  When I saw 711 my heart leapt, then there it was: 707 Avenue L, as though it had spent the past twenty years waiting for me to come. It was a pleasant, usual-looking red brick house with gray roof. There was a low red brick fence around the tiny lot on which it sat, so low one might have wondered why bother with it at all. The house was trimmed in light green, and green pots, bereft of plants, were lined along the brick rail spanning its verandah, green chairs and rockers were stationed across either side of the door, as though waiting for people to issue from the house and sit on them. (Was it a boardinghouse?)

  The back part of the house extended over the driveway, forming an arch in front of the garage, and I had my first misgivings when I noticed the windows of the room above the arch were boarded up.

  I left my bags against a huge oak close to the fence, and walked to the door. I rang twice, yet heard no stirring from inside, and I thought, Well, wouldn’t it be just my luck James Byron isn’t home, even if he does live here, even if he is still alive.

  Just then the front door opened slightly, and a small Mexican woman with anxious black eyes looked out at me through the screen.

  “Yes, what you want?”

  “Excuse me, madam, but I’m inquiring about a James Byron. I believe he may live here, or may once have. Could you tell me—?”

  “Zhames Byron? I know no Zhames Byron. You have wrong house,” she said curt
ly, and pushed the door.

  “Just a moment, please. I’ve come from Houston looking for him. Do you know who the former owners were? If I can just get some idea—”

  “I live here five years now. My husband buy house before he die. I know no one live here before. You go away, all right?”

  “Yes, all right. Thanks anyway,” I told her. I could have said a lot more, but it was no use. The woman obviously understood little of what was going on around her, and was afraid of me besides. I went back down the stairs, thinking that you would never catch me living where you had to climb a dozen stairs just to get to your front door. At the fence I picked up the bags again, which now seemed heavier than before, and looked up and down Avenue L.

  Should I inquire at other houses, or go somewhere and check the phone directory for a listing under James Byron, as I probably should have done first thing? There was no activity on this street, no children playing, only the sounds of distant traffic. The houses were quiet to the point of seeming uninhabited, with most of the shutters drawn. I seemed to be as far away from finding anything as I had been last night, sitting at the head table with Rodney during the rehearsal dinner, before I even knew about the carpetbag which now dug red ridges across my hand.

  Then I heard a voice: a woman one house down and across the avenue was calling to me, and when I looked her way, she motioned with one hand for me to come. She was snow-headed, seated in a rocking chair on her front verandah with one hand wrapped around the end of a black wooden cane.

  “You there, girl, you lookin’ fer someone, are you? Maybe I know ’em. I been around for a spell.”

  Hope rushed up inside me again. I left the bags at her gate and walked up to her. “I couldn’t hear what you was sayin’ of course,” she continued, “but with your grips and all, I figgered you must be a’lookin’ fer somebody. That’s old Janie Rodriguez lives yonder. She don’t know nothin’ and don’t care neither. Now, who is it you was huntin’?”