It was easy enough for Kim to believe in those fairy tales that had to do with kindly sprites who worked miracles overnight. A whole staff of such good creatures seemed pretty regularly occupied with the Ravenal affairs.
Once a month there came a letter from Mrs. Hawks. No more and no less. That indomitable woman was making a great success of her business. Her letters bristled with complaint, but between the lines Magnolia could read satisfaction and even a certain grim happiness. She was boss of her world, such as it was. Her word was final. The modern business woman had not yet begun her almost universal battle against the male in his own field. She was considered unique. Tales of her prowess became river lore. Parthy Ann Hawks, owner and manager of the Cotton Blossom Floating Palace Theatre, strong, erect, massive, her eyebrows black above her keen cold eyes, her abundant hair scarcely touched with gray, was now a well-known and important figure on the rivers. She ran her boat like a pirate captain. He who displeased her walked the plank. It was said that the more religious rivermen who hailed from the Louisiana parishes always crossed themselves fearfully at her approach and considered a meeting with the Cotton Blossom a bad omen. The towering black-garbed form standing like a ship’s figurehead, grim and portentous, as the boat swept downstream, had been known to give a really devout Catholic captain a severe and instantaneous case of chills and fever.
Her letters to Magnolia were characteristic:
Well, Maggie, I hope you and the child are in good health. Often and often I think land knows what kind of a bringing up she is getting with the life you are leading. I can imagine. Well, you made your own bed and now you can lie in it. I have no doubt that he has run through every penny of your money that your poor father worked so hard to get as I predicted he would. I suppose you heard all about French’s New Sensation. French has the worst luck it does seem. She sank six weeks ago at Medley’s just above New Madrid. The fault of the pilot it was. Carelessness if ever I heard it. He got caught in the down draft of a gravel bar and snagged her they say. I think of your poor pa and how he met his end. It took two weeks to raise her though she was only in six feet of water. On top of that his other boat the Golden Rod you remember went down about four weeks ago in the Illinois near Hardin. A total loss. Did you ever hear of such luck. Business is pretty good. I can’t complain. But I have to be right on hand every minute or they would steal me blind and that’s the truth. I have got a new heavy. No great shakes as an actor but handy enough and a pretty good black face in the concert and they seem to like him. We had a pretty rough audience all through the coal country but whenever it looked like a fight starting I’d come out in front and stand there a minute and say if anybody started anything I would have the boat run out into the middle of the river and sink her. That I’d never had a fight on my boat and wasn’t going to begin any such low life shenanigans now.
(Magnolia got a swift mental picture of this menacing, black-garbed figure standing before the gay crude curtain, the footlights throwing grim shadows on her stern face. That implacable woman was capable of cowering even a tough coal-belt audience bent on a fight.)
Crops are pretty good so business is according. I put up grape jelly last week. A terrible job but I can’t abide this store stuff made of gelatine or something and no real grapes in it. Well I suppose you are too stylish for the Cotton Blossom by now and Kim never hears of it. I got the picture you sent. I think she looks kind of peaked. Up all hours of the night I suppose and no proper food. What kind of an education is she getting? You wrote about how you were going to send her to a convent school. I never heard of such a thing. Well I will close as goodness knows I have enough to do besides writing letters where they are probably not wanted. Still I like to know how you and the child are doing and all.
Your mother,
Parthenia Ann Hawks.
These epistles always filled Magnolia with an emotion that was a poisonous mixture of rage and tenderness and nostalgia. She knew that her mother, in her harsh way, loved her, loved her grandchild, often longed to see both of them. Parthy’s perverse and inhibited nature would not permit her to confess this. She would help them with money, Magnolia knew, if they needed help. But first she must know the grisly satisfaction of having them say so. This Magnolia would not do, though there were many times when her need was great. There was Kim, no longer a baby. This feverish and irregular life could not go on for her. Magnolia’s letters to her mother, especially in lean times, were triumphs of lying pride. Sentimental Tommy’s mother, writing boastfully home about her black silks and her gold chain, was never more stiff-necked than she.
Gay is more than good to me. . . . I have only to wish for a thing . . . Everyone says Kim is unusually tall and bright for her age. . . . He speaks of a trip to Europe next year . . . new fur coat . . . never an unkind word . . . very happy . . .