The Daughters of Erietown

by Connie Schultz

  Brick’s father was a horrible man by any measure. Ada knew Angie McGinty to be a kind and long-suffering woman. What had Brick learned from growing up in that family, that marriage? It was something you couldn’t know about a husband until it was too late.

  In recent weeks, Ada and Wayne had been quietly hopeful. Wayne spent many evenings in the barn, a single lantern glowing overhead as he built a hope chest for Ellie, carving a web of curly vines into the lid before staining and polishing the wood. While Wayne built, Ada sewed. She bought a bolt of pale blue linen to make sheets and matching pillowcases, a tablecloth and six napkins. It was the first time they’d ever put such effort into a gift for Ellie, and both of them were caught off guard by their own tears the morning Ellie came downstairs to the sight of her own hope chest sitting next to her chair in the kitchen.

  Ada had taken quiet pleasure in watching Ellie add her own bits and pieces to the trove. The apron she’d worn as a little girl, made by Ada with scraps left over from a church dress; a set of cotton table coasters Ellie had stitched in Home Ec, and four place settings of the Harvest pattern of Lenox china, a gift from Widow Evans next door. “It was our wedding china,” she told Ellie the day she brought the box over and set it on the kitchen table. “I have no children. Your grandma told me about your hope chest. It would do my heart good to see those dishes come to life again.” Ellie gently unwrapped each shiny piece of china, thanking her neighbor each time. “I can’t wait until I’m setting my own table.”

  Ada went to bed that evening with plans to call Bea Wilkins the next morning. “Just to let her know she should encourage her boy Keith to stop by soon,” Ada whispered to Wayne. “He’s always had a crush on Ellie.”

  Ada unsnapped her pocketbook and pulled out a hankie to dab at her eyes. “Who’s going to want our Ellie now?”

  Ellie would never give up any child of hers for adoption. Ada knew that without asking. She and Wayne had raised her as their own daughter, as best they could, but Ada always knew Ellie was haunted by questions with no good answers. How do you explain to a child why both of her parents had been willing to give her away? How could Ada answer that, when she never understood how her son was capable of such a thing?

  Ada looked up again at Jesus. How could he have let this happen to Ellie? With all that suffering so early in her life, had she not earned his intervention? She tried to imagine telling her husband that Ellie was pregnant, and the anger bled out of her. Ada bowed her head, whispered again, “Dear God…”

  She heard the sound of a man clearing his throat from the back of the room and turned around. “Pastor Woodruff.”

  “Hello, Ada.” Peter Woodruff smiled as he stood at the far end of the pew and pointed to the spot next to her on the bench. “Mind if I join you?” Ada straightened her spine and patted her hair. “Of course not,” she said, pulling her purse onto her lap. “Please.”

  Peter Woodruff was thirty years her junior, and looked even younger; a soft-spoken man, and a graceful one. His smile always made it to his eyes, and Ada trusted that in a person. He was in his mid-forties, and still single. Every young woman in Clayton Valley came to the church’s annual Strawberry Festival, including some of the Catholic girls, to their mothers’ horror.

  He pointed to his Levi’s as he sat down. “Sorry for the getup. It’s snowing like crazy out there, and I wasn’t sure I’d make it to the church and back home without having to push my car out of a snowdrift. Can you believe it? In April?”

  “Wayne wouldn’t let me walk. Dropped me off in the truck. Thought I was crazy for coming here today.” She offered a weak smile. “This weather should be no surprise to you, Pastor. You’ve lived here how many years? How many white Easters have you preached?”

  He grinned and shook his head. “Some things you never get used to, I guess. This will be my fourteenth Easter here. Half of them full of daffodils and tulips, the other half looking like Christmas.”

  “Right down to the packed pews,” Ada said.

  “Indeed.”

  She looked down at her lap and pressed her pocketbook against her stomach.

  “What brings you upstairs, Ada?”

  “Oh, I don’t know, Pastor. Lot on my mind, I guess.”

  “Ellie, I’d imagine.”

  “What do you know about Ellie?”

  “You’ve always worried about Ellie. Looks like you’ve been crying.”

  She shook her head. “I can’t talk about it. I’ve got to keep myself together.”

  She pulled off her glasses and wiped her eyes. “Pastor, what do you say to a girl when she’s…when she’s not married and you’ve done everything you can to help her stay pure and…”

  “Gus Campbell called me a little while ago,” he said.

  Ada looked at him and frowned. “I’m sorry?”

  “Gus Campbell, over at the pharmacy?”

  Ada sighed. Was there a man alive capable of talking about what’s really on a woman’s mind? “I know who Gus is, Pastor. I’ve been going to his store for all of my married life.”

  Pastor Woodruff nodded. “Of course, Ada. Didn’t mean to offend you. I just wasn’t sure you heard me, is all.”

  “What’s Gus Campbell got to do with anything?”

  “He called me. He saw Ellie this morning. Running in the snow, crying.”

  “What?” Ada said, her eyes wide. “That’s impossible. Ellie’s in school. She’s never missed a day of school since she was eight years old. So, I’m sure it wasn’t Ellie.”

  “Did she leave without her boots this morning?”

  “Well, she…” Ada looked at her lap. “She was in a hurry.”

  “Gus heard a scream—‘a wail,’ is what he called it—and looked out the window. Ellie was lying on the ground, not even trying to get up. By the time he’d pulled on his boots and coat, she was getting into a truck. The McGinty boy’s, he thought.”

  Ada’s shoulders sagged. “Oh, Pastor, our girl is in so much trouble. As bad as you can imagine.”

  “Well,” he said, “death is as bad as I can imagine, so I’m hopeful it’s something less than that.”

  “But, Pastor, she’s—” Ada started to cry.

  “I’m sorry, Ada,” he said. “But she’s not the first girl, you know. She’s a sweet, lonely girl who fell in love with the first boy who wanted her.”

  Ada looked up in horror. “She was never alone, Pastor. We have always been there for her. Wayne loves her as much as I do.”

  “I didn’t say she was alone, Ada. I said she was lonely, through no fault of yours. She’s always felt set apart, you know that. Never felt she really belonged anywhere. To anyone.”

  “Did she tell you that?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t tell your secrets, Ada, and I’m not about to share Ellie’s. And I’m not telling you anything you don’t know. She’s never gotten over being abandoned by her parents.”

  “Her mother, yes,” Ada said. “What a troubled woman.”

  “And her father, too,” he said. “I’m sorry, Ada, but you know your son let her down, too. He let all of you down. I don’t need to remind you about our long talks after Ellie first came to live with you.” Ada said nothing, her face burning.

  The pastor looked up at the ceiling. “Remember when you fell in love with Wayne? How different you felt, just because he loved you?”

  “It’s been a long time, Pastor. And I resisted temptation. Always.”

  He ran his fingers through his hair. “It was a different time. These kids have so many outside influences now. Fast cars. Hollywood. Take Peyton Place. Have you read that book? Main character is an unwed mother.”

  “Ellie has that library book on her bedside table,” Ada said. “I never knew what it was about.”

  “The old days are gone, even here in Clayton Valley,” he said. “All we can do is
our best and hope their character grows strong.”

  “Pastor, my Ellie has plenty of character. She’s the kindest child I know. I’ve never known a more generous soul. Everybody loves her.”

  Pastor Woodruff smiled again. “There you go. That’s the Ada I know. Proud of her girl, and ready to let me know it, too. That’s what she’s going to need from you. That loyalty, that faith in all that’s good in her. All that’s still in her. She’s a wonderful girl, and she’s got a rough road ahead of her.”

  “I can’t even imagine it.”

  “Yes you can, Ada,” he said. “That’s why you’re here praying.”

  “Trying to pray, Pastor. So far, I can’t find the words.”

  “Shall we pray together?”

  Ada shook her head. “No, I appreciate the offer, but this one’s between me and God.”

  He slapped his palms against his thighs. “I understand.” He stood up. “Well, let me know how I can help. What are Ellie’s plans?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I haven’t talked to her. She doesn’t even know I know.”

  “How’d you—”

  She looked up at him, and this time she was the one smiling. “I wasn’t always an old woman, Pastor. There are some things a woman knows.”

  “Ada,” he said. “I deserved that.”

  Ada folded her hands on her lap. “I’m not saying anything to Ellie until she’s ready to talk.”

  He started to turn away, but then hesitated. “God loves all his children, Ada. Every last one of us, no matter how we come about or how we end up. He doesn’t care if we’re popular, doesn’t even care if we’re like everyone else. All he cares about is the content of our hearts.”

  She looked up at him. “Your predecessor, Pastor Quinn, would have dragged me up to that altar, pulled me down onto these rickety knees of mine, and prayed for Ellie’s soul.”

  “Ah, Martin A. Quinn. He was quite the mighty avenger, I hear. Not my style. Not my story, either. You don’t know this, but I was raised by a grandmother who loved me to death, too. Maybe that’s why I can’t do the fire-and-brimstone thing. My own beginnings are shrouded in second chances.”

  He smiled at Ada’s look of surprise. “Sin was around long before Ellie met Brick McGinty,” he said. “No one is a discard in God’s eyes.”

  Ada stared at the back of the pastor’s flannel shirt as he walked out toward the main hall. The things you don’t know about a person. She turned to face the altar, bowed her head, and closed her eyes against the sound of footsteps climbing the basement stairs.

  “Ada?”

  Ada sighed.

  “Ada, lunch is ready. You coming down?”

  Ada pretended to push a few bobby pins into her hair. “I’ll be right there, Lois,” she said over her shoulder. “You girls start without me.”

  “Don’t be silly, Ada. We’re waiting to say grace until you get down here. Hurry, though. You know how dry Esther’s tuna noodle gets if it sits too long in the oven.”

  Ada waited for the sound of Lois’s footsteps on the stairs, and bowed her head to try one last time.

  “Dear God…”

  She squeezed her hankie and looked up.

  “Help us. Please.”

  Women’s laughter greeted her at the top of the stairs. She paused and took a deep breath before slowly descending. They didn’t know anything yet. For one more day, at least, Ellie was the last thing on anybody else’s mind.

  The heater in Brick’s truck was on the brink of giving up, but it didn’t matter. Every few minutes he felt another bead of sweat slide down the side of his face. He jammed his knees against the steering wheel to keep the truck on the road as he pulled off his sweatshirt and threw it on top of his jacket. He wrapped his fingers around the wheel again and started to gag. He pulled off the road and slammed on the brakes, kicking open the door just in time. Flakes of snow pricked the back of his neck as he leaned over the side of the truck and retched until there was nothing left in him.

  He shut the door, collapsed against the back of the seat, and pulled his handkerchief out of the back pocket of his jeans to mop his face. “Jesus. Jesus, Pint.”

  After Ellie had finally calmed down, and after they both had stopped crying, they agreed to return to school and act like nothing was wrong. “I just need time to think,” he said, pulling her into a hug. “I don’t mean because I don’t know what to do. I just have to figure out the best way for us to do it.”

  She pushed away from him, her face stunned. “I’m not doing anything illegal, Brick. If you don’t want this baby—”

  He grabbed her shoulders and shook her. “Of course I do, El. I want you”—he put his palm on her stomach—“and I want our baby. I want to marry you. Just give me a little time.”

  She wrapped her arms around his neck. “You said our baby,” she whispered into his ear. “Our.”

  He drove her to the same door where, two hours earlier, she’d dropped her books in the snow and started running. Thank God for those books. How else would he have known she was in trouble? After first period, Becca Gilley had made a rare stop at Brick’s locker to tell him that Ellie had never showed up for homeroom. “She never does that,” Becca said. “Thought you might know where she is.”

  “How would I know?” he said, reopening his locker and squatting to pretend he was searching for something.

  “Okay, then you probably don’t want to know that Jerry Finkle saw her standing in front of your truck after the morning bell.” He continued rummaging until Becca finally gave up and walked away. He pulled on his jacket and headed for the exit. As soon as he opened the door he saw the pile of Ellie’s soggy books on the ground. He picked them up and headed for the truck.

  The early-morning snow flurries had turned into a squall. It was like pushing through giant balls of cotton, his truck crawling because he couldn’t see more than a few inches in front of him. He leaned over the wheel as he drove, squinting as his eyes darted from one side of the road to the other in search of Ellie. His head was pounding by the time he found her.

  God. The sight of her there, a tiny heap on the left side of the road. He jerked the truck to the opposite lane and slammed on the brakes, kicked open the door and ran to her, yelling her name.

  She didn’t seem to recognize him as he scooped her into his arms. “I’m sorry,” she whispered, staring straight ahead. “I’m so sorry.”

  Her teeth chattered as he peeled off her wet coat and her soggy shoes and socks. He draped his jacket over her, wedged her bare feet between his thighs, and rubbed her hands and legs to get the blood flowing. It took nearly an hour before the blue disappeared from her lips. By then, she’d told him she was pregnant.

  Now he was throwing up his guts. He pulled into the school parking lot and parked in his usual spot, between two cars buried in snow. He turned off the truck and slumped forward, wrapping his arms around the wheel, pressing his forehead against it. “Jesus, Pint.” He could hear the distant laughter of classmates across the parking lot. He focused on the voices, and one of the girl’s squeals tipped him off. His teammates were throwing snowballs at some of the cheerleaders.

  Not a care in the world. When was the last time he’d felt that way? Brick squeezed his eyes shut, and thought about his brother, Harry. Never, not since Harry died, had he felt safe enough to just play around.

  His classmates’ laughter ended as quickly as it had started, leaving him alone in the silence. He opened his eyes. For the first time in months, Brick thought about his future and felt a sense of relief. The decision had been made for him. He pulled on his sweatshirt and his jacket and pushed open the door. His sneakers had barely hit the ground before he heard Coach Bryant’s voice.

  “Brick! Where the hell have you been?”

  Brick whipped around. “Hey, Coach.”

  Sam Bryant walk
ed toward him, his bald head a red and shiny beacon. “Principal Stanley is looking for you. Said he heard that you ran out this morning and left school grounds in your truck. You know the rules on game day.” He shoved his hand under the snow on the truck’s hood. “Engine’s still warm. Looks like he’s right.”

  Brick stared at the ground. “I had to get some cigarettes, Coach.”

  “Try again, Brick.”

  Brick took a step back.

  “It’s me, son. I can tell by the look on your face that something’s wrong. You can trust me. You’ve got no reason to lie to me.”

  Brick stomped his feet to knock off the snow. “I’ve got a lot on my mind, Coach,” he said, jamming his hands in his pockets. “A lot to figure out.”

  “Let’s go,” Coach said, pointing to the door. “Let’s go solve whatever problem you think you have.”

  For the next few weeks, Ellie plotted her crime.

  That’s how it felt, all the secret machinations, the guilt simmering in her gut. Slowly, one piece of clothing at a time, she packed the suitcase that belonged to Pastor Woodruff. “Don’t fill it all at once,” he’d said when he handed it to her. “Be discreet.”

  She had thought Pastor Woodruff might be the one person to help her, and she was right. Brick had dropped her off at the church last Friday morning, when she knew the minister would be in his office working on Sunday’s sermon. As soon as she saw Pastor Woodruff’s face, she started to cry. Within the hour, without judgment or lecture, he had arranged for Ellie and Brick to be married by a pastor friend of his in Cumberland, Maryland.