The Help / Прислуга. Книга для чтения на английском языке

After I’m done with the bear, I dust the fancy books nobody reads, the Confederate coat buttons, the silver pistol. On a table is a gold picture frame of Miss Celia and Mister Johnny at the altar and I look close to see what kind of man he is. I’m hoping he’s fat and short-legged in case it comes to running, but he’s not anywhere close. He’s strong, tall, thick. And he’s no stranger either. Lord. He’s the one who went steady with Miss Hilly all those years when I first worked for Miss Walters. I never met him, but I saw him enough times to be sure.

I shiver, my fears tripling. Because that alone says more about that man than anything.

At one o’clock, Miss Celia comes in the kitchen and says she’s ready for her first cooking lesson. She settles on a stool. She’s wearing a tight red sweater and a red skirt and enough makeup to scare a hooker[32 - enough makeup to scare a hooker – (разг.) столько косметики, что и проститутка бы испугалась].

“What you know how to cook already?” I ask.

She thinks this over, wrinkling her forehead. “Maybe we could just start at the beginning.”

“Must be something you know. What your mama teach you growing up?”

She looks down at the webby feet of her stockings, says, “I can cook corn pone.”

I can’t help but laugh. “What else you know how to do sides corn pone?”

“I can boil potatoes.” Her voice drops even quieter. “And I can do grits. We didn’t have electric current out where I lived.

But I’m ready to learn right. On a real stovetop.”

Lord. I’ve never met a white person worse off than me except for crazy Mister Wally, lives behind the Canton feed store and eats the cat food.

“You been feeding your husband grits and corn pone ever day?”

Miss Celia nods. “But you’ll teach me to cook right, won’t you?”

“I’ll try,” I say, even though I’ve never told a white woman what to do and I don’t really know how to start.

I pull up my stockings, think about it. Finally, I point to the can on the counter.

“I reckon if there’s anything you ought a know about cooking, it’s this.”

“That’s just lard, ain’t it?”

“No, it ain’t just lard,” I say. “It’s the most important invention in the kitchen since jarred mayonnaise.”

“What’s so special about” – she wrinkles her nose at it – “pig fat?”

“Ain’t pig, it’s vegetable.