Gideon Wolf might have guessed who the father was, since not many men visited the farm and Grace was always at the house, but he never said. He watched her struggle to move about when he came to the Cavetts’ house to tune their piano, sharpen tools and mend roofing. And then again to tune the piano, because Mrs Cavett – who loved to pound away at the thing, often in a hellish duet with Mr Cavett’s whistle – managed to knock the keys about as though she played with iron gloves. Gideon wondered if there was anything the Cavetts treated kindly aside from their wastrel son.
Grace had been happy to let her boy, Ned, squat beside Gideon Wolf while he worked. The boy had been mute from birth, but made it clear from his face and constant presence how curious he was about the man. He pointed at Gideon’s missing finger and Gideon invented a wild story by way of answer, which amused them both.
‘It’s bound to be more exciting if I lost my finger to a cannibal than a plain old axe,’ he said to Grace. And he showed Ned how the stumpy digit was no impediment: he played his fiddle for the boy, taught him noughts and crosses by drawing in the dirt with sticks, and lit up his eyes with card tricks.
‘Never speaks?’ Gideon asked.
‘Not a word,’ Grace said.
After Gideon tuned the piano on his August visit, Harry Cavett told him he could spend the night in the barn. At sunset, Grace and Ned took supper and an extra blanket out to Gideon. Ned ran to the back of the barn to play with the newborn piglets.
Gideon thanked Grace for the food and edged over on the hay bale so she could sit while Ned played. ‘When’s the next one due?’ he asked.
Grace felt the baby roll inside her. ‘Soon, too soon.’
‘Could be I’m having one, too.’ He stretched out his rake-thin legs and patted his medicine-ball stomach.
Ned ran over to them, a squirming piglet in his arms. He showed the animal to Gideon then his mother.
‘Put him back, darling. He wants to be with his family. Be careful.’
Ned carried the piglet back to the pen, cuddling and nuzzling it.
‘What happened there?’ Gideon had noticed the crescent-shaped scar on Ned’s arm.
‘A disagreement with a calf’s hoof. Some animals don’t want to be carried.’
‘You have to admire the spunk in trying to lift something your own size.’
‘He’s never lacked spunk. Scared of dogs, though, for no reason I know of.’
‘Huh.’ The two sat amicably amid the comforting smells of hay and animals.
‘You’ll have your hands full with him, a baby and them.’ Gideon took another spoonful of thick bean soup. ‘You look worn slap out as it is, if you don’t mind me saying.’
‘I’ll make it work.’
Gideon brushed crumbs off his pants. ‘He could come with me for a time, if that’d help you.’
‘Ned? Oh, I don’t think so. He’d run you ragged. You’ve seen how he is.’
‘I’d survive. I’d enjoy showing him the place, and it’d be good for him to be out in the air.’
‘He’s outside plenty, don’t worry about that.’
‘I’d do a loop and be back here in a month. I travel slow and stop a lot, sleep warm at night. I’d take care of him, give you time to recover after –’ He gestured at her belly.
Grace heaved herself up to standing. ‘Thank you, Mr Wolf, but I’ve done fine with Ned on my own so far.’ Gideon seemed a kind man, indulgent with Ned, capable enough. But that didn’t mean he could take care of a child.
‘Maybe so, but I reckon he’d have a better few weeks with me than staying at your bedside.’ He stared out the barn door again. ‘I wouldn’t trust them to look after him while you’re birthing and recovering, or to feed him.’
Grace placed her palms on her aching lower back and rocked on the spot. ‘Perhaps you could stay a while?’
‘After tomorrow my work here is done.’ He placed his empty bowl, bread plate and spoon on the tray and stood up to hand it to Grace.
As she reached forward, Grace felt a twinge in her hip, the pain radiating down her right leg. For a moment she thought the baby might be coming, but she rocked back and forth a while and the pain passed. ‘Let me think about it.’
Ned was never far from Grace’s side. He followed her as she worked through her chores, joining in when he could: gathering eggs from the chicken coop, feeding the new chicks bread-crumbs soaked in milk and dusting them with insect powder, fetching Grace the food or drink Mrs Cavett requested from the cellar, and watching as Grace dug weeds from the vegetable patch and milked the cow. Sometimes, without prompting, Ned would hug Grace’s leg through a scrunch of skirting until she tickled him off. They played hide-and-seek behind freshly hung sheets.
In the evenings, Grace sang Ned the alphabet and showed him how to hold a pencil, enveloping his hand in hers and making swirling motions on the butcher’s paper she’d taken from the kitchen. If Ned didn’t learn to speak he’d have to write, and he’d have to learn younger than most. She taught him the few words she knew and decided they’d both learn to write by copying words from her Bible.
But as the baby continued to grow, Grace found it hard to walk. She worried the birth was going to be difficult; the baby sat at an odd angle inside her. If the worst happened, Ned would be left alone with the Cavetts; it might be the safer option to ask Gideon Wolf to keep Ned away from the farm until Grace had come to the other side of this birth.
Lying in bed the night before Gideon was due to leave, with Ned curled on his side next to her, Grace listened as the first drops of rain hit dusty dirt. Soon, cool air pushed under her door, water pattered on her window and Ned’s breathing grew slow and deep. But the top note to these gentle sounds was Mr and Mrs Cavett bellowing at one another, then a crash as something heavy hit the floor. Grace let the tears drip off her face.
On the evening of 15 August, seated together in the barn, Grace and Gideon made a verbal agreement: Wolf would take Ned travelling for no more than five weeks, would feed him, keep him warm, and make sure he had a place to sleep at night. He’d keep him away from dogs. And if Grace didn’t survive the birth, he would find Ned a new home.
Grace wept when she said goodbye to her boy, hugged him to her bulbous stomach and smoothed his hair down with her wetted palm. She handed Wolf a calico bag containing Ned’s few clothes and watched the pair walk down the dirt road until Mrs Cavett hollered for her from the porch.
As the five-week mark came and went, there was no sign of Gideon Wolf or her son. Grace, cradling her newborn daughter, Lily, stood outside looking for them as often as the Cavetts’ distractedness permitted. When Mrs Cavett did catch Grace slacking off, she told her to quit moping.
Grace missed Ned fiercely. Some days she couldn’t stop crying, even in front of the Cavetts. At any time, terror that Gideon Wolf would not return came upon her, like a fist gripping her heart. But she couldn’t go out on the road and search for them; she had no idea where they were, had little money, no companion to keep her safe, and she had a baby and reduced strength.
So Grace stayed at the Cavetts’ farm, worked, slept with her daughter on their straw-stuffed bed, and prayed for Ned to come back.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
On 23 September 1915, Mrs Leonard Potter entered the Mobile sheriff’s office to say a tramp and child had been on her porch asking for work, and this time she was certain the boy was Sonny Davenport.
‘This time?’ Sheriff Bird said. Still, he hollered over his shoulder for his deputy on duty, Al, and the two stepped outside, not expecting anything other than a walk to Mrs Potter’s house. (Minus Mrs Potter, who continued on to the market.)
Along the way Sheriff Bird checked for signs that people were preparing themselves for the coming storm. Another hurricane was headed towards the Gulf Coast, but so far the clouds were wispy, the wind mild. As the sheriff and Al turned into Franklin Street, he noted the birds were still chirping and his arthritis hadn’t flared up. Air pressure couldn’t be too low, then. He was ab
out to make these very observations aloud when Al pointed at a man and boy sitting on the steps of the Catholic church, right at the top in the shade of the portico.
Sheriff Bird moved closer, staring at the boy. He had the same build and hair as the child in the photograph, looked about six, but the sheriff wouldn’t know until he could see the face. The boy sat side-on to the man, listening – sceptically, it seemed – as the man waved his arms about, likely telling some shaggy-dog story. The man wore a crumpled jacket fastened by a single button over a faded waistcoat. His pants were patched at one knee, his boots scuffed. A tramp, without doubt.
‘Morning,’ the sheriff called out. The tramp stopped talking, hands fixed mid-air, until he saw the star-shaped badge and rearranged himself into a more dignified posture.
‘Nice spot to take in the day,’ the sheriff said.
‘Giving the boy a rest.’
‘Rest from what?’ Al asked.
Sheriff Bird hoicked up his pants. ‘You live around here? You and –?’
‘We’re passing through.’ The tramp stood up and beckoned for the boy to do the same. ‘Forgive me if I’ve caused offence by using your church steps. We’ll be on our way. No harm intended.’
‘None done. Though I do have a couple of questions. How about you walk with Al and me to the stationhouse. Won’t take more than a minute.’ He walked up a few steps, wanting to get near enough to see if the child had a scar on his arm.
Gideon had been questioned by the law plenty of times, though how it was a crime to be homeless and poor he didn’t know. He weighed his options: run, and hope he and the boy could outpace the men; go with them; or try to talk his way out of their interest and scoot to the next town. The first option was out given the sheriff and deputy now stood on the church’s steps, blocking access to the street, and the doors behind him were locked. Gideon watched the younger officer fingering the handcuffs that dangled from his belt. It wouldn’t take much provocation for him to use them, and Gideon didn’t want the boy to see that. And he wasn’t sure he could call on his quick wit today: they were outdoors, aimless, because he’d failed to talk anybody into giving him a day’s work.
‘We’d be delighted to walk with you gentlemen. Come along, boy. Let’s show you a sheriff’s office.’
Although Gideon had co-operated, Al pushed him, without warning, into the sheriff’s single cell. Gideon shouted his rage, madder than a wet hen, and the boy cried.
As Sheriff Bird waited for the operator to place his call to Sheriff Sherman, the boy sat in front of his desk on a wooden chair, dangling his skinny legs and sniffling. ‘Won’t say a word,’ Sheriff Bird said, once he was put through. ‘But I’ve stared at him long and hard, and I’m about as certain as I’ve been of anything – this is the same child as in the photograph.’
‘If that’s the case, it’s the best news I’ve heard in years,’ Sheriff Sherman said. ‘But I don’t want to drag the Davenports interstate again if there’s any doubt.’
Sheriff Sherman relayed questions to John Henry throughout that day and the next, asking him for such detailed information about Sonny that John Henry thought he should consult with Mary. He didn’t, though, for fear of raising her hopes. At one point, the sheriff asked, ‘Is there anything unique in the shape of his feet, nose, ears? The scar you described has lightened but that happens – two years …’
Two years indeed, John Henry thought. Sonny would be taller, possibly with new marks and injuries.
‘What does the child say?’ John Henry asked.
‘He hasn’t spoken. Give him time. We don’t know what he’s lived through or how much he remembers.’
Sheriff Bird, having rubbed a washcloth across the boy’s face, arranged for a photograph to be taken and sent by train.
When it arrived in Opelousas, John Henry studied the picture. The boy was older than his memory of Sonny, of course, and his hair seemed lighter, his eyes tired, but there was something familiar about him. John Henry agreed with the sheriffs that the only way to know for certain would be for him and Mary to see the boy in person.
The meeting presented a risk to his wife’s stability. In the past year, she’d regained her physical and mental health, even had new friends through her Ladies Aid charitable work. To pull the scab off such a gaping wound, to encourage her to meet a boy who might be another disappointment, would be cruel. But if it was Sonny, life could go back to the way it had been before …
Because it couldn’t continue as it was. Mary still careened from simmering anger at John Henry’s failure to protect Sonny to numb inanities, sometimes speaking to him as though he was one of the servants, not her husband. And while apology would be the smart response, John Henry became annoyed and defensive, then cold. He missed the time when they’d been tender with one another, effortless and light, when they’d each known their role. Their encounters had grown increasingly fraught, a jumble of attempts at normalcy: arguments out of the blue; drawn-out, teary meals – and, sometimes, reconciliation. But no matter how their interaction fell apart, and sooner or later each encounter did, neither of them seemed able to conceive of an end to the sadness. To have lost their son was devastating, and impossible to absorb.
This opportunity in Mobile, though, was possible salvation.
When John Henry arrived at the bedroom door he realised it was a week out from Mary’s birthday. What a gift it would be to have her son back. The morning was warm and bright, blue jays peeped, and George and Paul played outside. He’d heard Cook humming that morning on his way to speak with Esmeralda. The signs were in John Henry’s favour. Still, when his fingers hovered an inch from the doorknob he pulled back, paused to consider whether he needed to burden Mary with a journey, then decided that yes, it was imperative.
Mary stood at the open window staring down at the garden. John Henry walked to her side. He wanted to stroke the pale nape of her neck, but touching his wife had become an unfamiliar act.
‘It’s beautiful, isn’t it?’ she said. ‘The autumn leaves sprinkled on the lawn. I know they’ll be swept away, but I find the shedding before winter so –’ She turned away from the view and saw the expression on John Henry’s face. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘I have news. Sheriff Bird in Alabama might have found our boy. We need to go to him.’
Mary reached out to hold on to the windowsill, then crumpled to the floor.
Once Gideon Wolf was behind bars in Mobile, other people came forward with claims they’d seen him whipping the boy; that he’d told them the child belonged to his cousin, his neighbour, an acquaintance; that he’d told them to mind their own Ps and Qs; that they’d had suspicions.
Wolf told Sheriff Bird he’d never laid a finger on the boy, and might have said any of those things to get people to leave him be. ‘Hauled off to the hoosegow for no reason. What was I supposed to say?’ God’s truth was the boy belonged to Grace Mill, who’d been more than happy for him to travel with Wolf for a few months, had asked for that, to give her time to birth her next baby.
‘She works on a farm,’ Wolf said, but in his troubled state he couldn’t remember the name of the farmer. ‘You go find it. Closer to Magnolia than Osyka on the same road as gets you to Newberry place. Near the Picaninny farm.’
The sheriff had no idea which of the Picaninny farms he meant or who Newberry was, and with each added detail that met with a blank stare, Wolf grew more frustrated.
‘Settle down,’ Sheriff Bird said. ‘None of this sounds likely to me, but if there’s a farm and a Grace we’ll find them.’
Wolf scratched at the rough stubble on his chin as he paced the length of his draughty cell, only a few steps to either wall for his lanky lope, muttering, spitting onto the bare boards. ‘They knowed I was taking the boy and no question she needed the help. Fit to burst and still they’re screaming at her to fetch water and feed the mare.’ The deputy on duty told Wolf to quiet down. But the tramp kept talking. ‘Pretending they didn’t know, while that rope of a man and
his mean-lipped wife kept her – Grace. You find Grace Mill, she’ll tell you.’
When interrogated by Sheriff Bird in a quieter moment, Wolf seemed confused by questions about the boy from Opelousas. ‘Louisiana? What’re we talking about Louisiana for?’ And he was even more confused at questions about his travels with the boy during the past two years. ‘Grace gave her boy over to me the day I left the farm – middle of August, as sure as anything. No more than six weeks ago. Or seven. Tell me the date again.’
The sheriff groaned.
‘Listen, when you stopped me I was going back her way. I’d gone further east than I’d planned to, hadn’t told her I’d leave the state. She’ll be worried … But two years? That makes no sense.’
‘Leaving the state? Where’d you start out?’
‘Magnolia, I told you that. Liberty.’
‘Liberty, Mississippi?’ The sheriff sat forward on his chair. ‘You’re telling me now you met this boy on a farm in Mississippi, not Alabama or Louisiana?’
‘Louisiana! Why y’all keep thinking I’ve been in Louisiana?’
Gideon seemed so bamboozled that Sheriff Bird did worry he’d arrested the wrong man. But the Davenports were coming to Mobile, so there was nothing to do now but let them lay eyes on the boy.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Gideon Wolf had been locked up for six days when the hurricane made landfall, hitting Grand Isle, Louisiana, early on the morning of 29 September. John Henry had hoped news of the oncoming storm had been exaggerated, and that they’d be able to travel to Mobile to see the boy as planned. But there were sixty-mile winds in New Orleans at sun-up, and when the hurricane passed through Opelousas, at seven o’clock that night, he was relieved they’d stayed put.
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