by Diane Noble
Stand up for my honor? He almost laughed.
But all this was impossible to explain to a child, so he kept his silence. Daily he went about his teaching duties, almost mechanically, it seemed. And at night he prayed for a miracle. For himself. For them all.
Daisy headed from the schoolyard one cold evening a few days before Thanksgiving. She had finished writing the final scene for Come, My Little Angel two weeks before, and now planned to begin practice. When the news first spread that she had written to Mister Otto Ringling himself, the excitement rose to a feverish pitch. Children wanted to be with her, thinking she had some kind of magical presence because she had dared to write to someone so elevated.
But when the days passed with no answer, they stopped walking with her on the schoolyard. They stopped asking her to share their lunch pails. Worst of all, no one wanted to be in her play. They began laughing at the notion of such a foolish endeavor.
She went to Miss Penney for help, but her beloved teacher said her sister in Sacramento was expecting a baby the week before Christmas. Sorry as she was, she needed to be with her sister the night of the play.
On the night of the first tryouts and rehearsal, Daisy waited with Cady and Wren near the music room until it was clear that no one was coming. Downhearted, Daisy sat alone long after her friends left for home. Then, with a heavy sigh, she walked slowly along the dirt road, heading toward the mercantile in the center of Red Bud square.
She crossed the wooden porch leading into the unpainted store that doubled as just about everything in town: mercantile, barbershop, post office, and socializing place around the potbellied stove for the older folks in tipped-back chairs. The smell of pipe tobacco filled her nostrils as soon as she set foot in the store, mixing with other scents: barrels of pickles, bushels of freshly picked apples, and bolts of newly delivered calico.
After a longing glance at the glass jar filled with sticks of horehound candy, she smiled up at the storekeeper, Mister Ferguson, who looked across the counter at her through wire-rimmed spectacles.
“Good evening, Mister Ferguson. May I have the family mail?”
He smiled, then turned to limp across the rough wooden floor. “You’ve got quite a boxful today, little lady.” He reached for the James family box, but not before she noticed the four small envelopes, one standing taller than the others, tilting kitty-corner inside.
He teetered back to the counter and placed them in her hands.
Afraid to look quite yet, she clutched them close. Then, holding her breath, she peeked at the envelopes, beginning with the smallest.
“Something important, is it?”
She looked down again at the letters, then her eyes widened, and a smile took hold of her face. “Yes, sir!”
In the left-hand corner of the largest piece was a fancy rendering of a circus tent with the words, Ringling Bros. The Greatest Show on Earth. Below it was scrawled in ink, O. Ringling.
She brought it close to her chest and sighed with delicious anticipation. It was from him. Really from him! Holding it out again, she drank in the signature—Imagine it! Otto Ringling!—almost shivering as she imagined the words inside.
Clutching the four letters to her heart, she ran from the mercantile, down the steps and across Red Bud square. Her braids flew out behind as she raced toward the path in the woods that led to her house. The windows glowed in the twilight, beckoning her to hurry home as she rounded the last corner.
But as she opened the picket gate she halted, breathing hard. She looked down at the letter, turning it one way, then the next. What if it was bad news? She would not want the family watching as she read it, feeling sorry for her and tsk-tsking over her squashed dreams.
Everyone would know that her talk of angels, both real and the playacting kind, and angel choirs and Christmas drama shows would be nothing more than dreams that did not come true.
She frowned at the letter, then walked slowly around the house to the swing that hung from the old oak tree. Lifting the flat stone that was nearby, she placed the letter beneath it and dropped the stone back into place.
Curious as she was to know what Mister Ringling had to say about sending the circus tent, she would wait until daylight. First thing after breakfast, she decided, and no later—no matter what. As soon as the little ones were fed and their homework done, she would race outside and tear open the letter.
Smiling to herself, she headed for the kitchen door.
Abigail woke the following morning feeling something was not quite right. The house was quiet, unusually quiet. In the predawn hours she would normally hear the subdued voices of Orin and their sons wafting from the kitchen as they boiled coffee and made toast before leaving for the ready room near the company commissary.
Then she remembered. This was the day that Orin was taking Alfred to work in the blasting tunnel. That meant they had headed up the mountain on a cable-pulled cart, up the railroad grade paralleling the pin stocks, while it was yet dark. They were needed at the mouth of the tunnel by the time the eight o’clock whistle blew.
As the older of the two, Alfred had been chosen for the better paying job, while Grover had been put to work sweeping the shavings off the floor in the welding shop. Orin had assured Abigail that the blasting tunnels were safer now than ever before. The company had strict guidelines about such things. Such a responsible position, he had argued, would make a man of Alfred and keep him out of trouble.
Abigail swung her legs over the side of the big iron bed and padded down the hall. Opening the door a crack, she peeked into the girls’ bedroom. Daisy, Violet, and Clover were still sleeping soundly in their trundle, their sweet faces pink-cheeked, their hair mussed in the predawn light. From the corner, sucking sounds carried from the wooden crib. Baby Rosemary lay topsy-turvily on the thin mattress, eyes closed, fingers in mouth, a tumble of blanket around her.
Abigail crossed the room, unable to resist caressing the baby’s soft curls. For a moment she studied each of the faces of her girls. First Violet’s, with the three tiny moles on her cheek, one in the shape of a heart. Then Clover’s, with her sprinkle of freckles and small pointed chin.
Finally she studied Daisy, her heart swelling with love and pride. She resisted the urge to move the long plait that Daisy had flung across her forehead sometime in the night. The child sighed in her sleep and turned slightly. The early morning light touched the profile of her cheek, showing its sweet curve and the seashell contour of her ear.
Too quickly she had grown, this precious daughter.
Abigail stood beside the trundle, gazing down at Daisy for another minute. In years past she loved the early mornings best. It was the time she’d spent alone with God, praying for her babies, for their hours in her care, for the days and years ahead when they would no longer be under her wing.
In those long-ago days she sang lullabies, believing every word about God’s watchful care and about angels guarding each one of her babes.
But that was long ago. This was now. Lips clamped tight, Abigail grabbed her old chenille robe from the hook behind her door, stepped into her worn scuffs, and headed outside to the privy. She had taken only a few steps from the back porch when loud rumblings carried down the mountain. The ground beneath her trembled, and she reached for the porch rail to steady herself. Her breath caught as she turned toward the sound, one hand rising to her mouth.
The tunnels were eastward, high on a pine-covered bluff. The sun, yet to rise in the cloudless sky, was just behind a dome of granite above the cliff, causing shadows to fall across the unpainted company houses and the gray, hopeless people of the village below.
Abigail shivered and waited to hear the company’s three-blast whistle, signaling Emergency! All available men to the tunnels! She had heard it before and grieved for the injured, the dead, and their families even before knowing the details.
Now she thought of her boys—Alfred, with his shock of red hair and streak of mischief; Grover, with his luminous, trusting eyes and g
entle ways—and she leaned against the porch rail, squeezing her eyelids tight and thinking she surely might die if anything happened to either one.
She waited one minute, two… three, then gulped a breath and held it. The three-blast emergency whistle did not sound. Four, five, six. Her knees finally stopped their quivering. Seven, eight, nine… She breathed again and continued across the dying winter grass, wishing she still believed in a God who listened to prayers.
Daisy woke just as the sun rose above the granite dome, its winter-sparkling light clear and grand as it streamed through her bedroom window. She stretched and yawned, and sat up and stretched again.
Then she remembered the letter. Being careful not to wake her sisters, she tumbled from the bed, and still barefoot, ran through the house to the back door. She pushed it open and headed to the big oak and the nearby flat rock. She knelt beside the stone and dug for the letter she had placed beneath it.
With trembling fingers, she tore open the envelope and began to read:
Dear Miss James,
I regret to inform you that the seven Ringling Brothers are in Europe at the present time, touring The Greatest Show on Earth. As the nephew of Otto Ringling, I am authorized to act in their behalf, and much as I would like to help, I must tell you that the cost of moving a circus tent across the country by train to your High Sierra backcountry town of Red Bud prohibits The Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey Circus from making such a commitment.
I am truly sorry. We wish you the very best in your endeavor.
Regards,
Orville Ringling
Shivering in the winter-morning chill, Daisy blinked back her tears and held the letter scrunched to her bosom. Maybe her dreams would not die if she clutched this last hope close.
“Child?”
Her mother’s soft voice came from behind Daisy, and a warm arm encircled her shoulders. She buried her face in Ma’s old chenille robe that smelled faintly of pine smoke from stoking the fireplace, and bacon from months of breakfasts.
“Child, child, what is the matter?” Ma murmured, rocking Daisy gently in her arms, both still kneeling on the damp, cold ground.
Daisy gave her ma the crumpled letter. “My drama show about angels…” She sobbed softly. “It can’t happen now. It’s all over. And the church, and everything…”
Her mother laid her cheek on the top of Daisy’s head, and for a moment did not speak. Finally, she said, “Disappointments happen in life, Daisy. But they can make us stronger. Really, child, they can. You need to learn that you can’t count on others for your happiness or to make your dreams come true.”
“But I prayed it would happen, Ma. I prayed so hard.”
Her mother did not answer, and after a moment, she stood and helped Daisy stand in front of her. “Listen to me, baby.”
Daisy nodded.
Ma lifted Daisy’s chin gently with the crook of her index finger. “You need to be self-reliant. Fend for yourself, so you don’t get hurt. Be strong so’s no one can ever make you cry again.” She had set her mouth in a tight line, looking angry. Daisy figured it was at what had happened about the Ringling Brothers.
“Most of all,” Ma went on, “don’t dream about things that can’t ever happen. Those kinds of dreams are childish and mostly made up of nonsense.” Ma sighed heavily, looking old and tired. “I’ve come to conclude, child, such dreams are just ways to keep a body from being responsible for how life turns out.”
She peered hard into her daughter’s face as if it were a lesson she wanted to make sure Daisy learned well. “You understand?”
Above them a morning breeze was lifting the pine boughs, causing the delicate needles to flutter and sparkle in the sunlight. A tree full of angels, Daisy had always imagined. But that was when she was but a little tyke. Now she knew better.
“I understand,” she whispered.
And she followed her ma into the house without another glance heavenward.
THAT SAME DAY as the children pulled out their fiddles and horns for music lessons, Daisy announced that tryouts and rehearsals for Come, My Little Angel would not be held after all due to lack of caring and a place to perform it. Afterward, she sat down in her folding chair and dared not look at Mister Taggart, who had hugely disappointed her. And especially she did not look at Wren and Cady for fear of their pitying expressions.
Through the rest of the hour, she pressed her lips in a straight line to keep from weeping. And when class was dismissed she scurried from the room without a word to anyone. To Daisy’s great relief, she saw Miss Penney standing in front of the schoolhouse doorway across the play yard, holding the handbell and looking as if she would ring it any minute.
Head down, Daisy barreled her way across the winter-brown field. She had not gone far when Brooke Knight-Smyth and her teasing friends blocked her path. An odd light in their eyes told Daisy they were in a mean-spirited frame of mind. She swallowed hard and tried to give the older girls a friendly smile.
Brooke tossed her blond sausage curls over one shoulder and laughed as she planted her dainty, leather-booted feet squarely in front of Daisy. “So, you thought the mighty Ringling Brothers might loan somebody like you a circus tent?” She exchanged a knowing glance with Edmonda, Cordelia, and Emma Jane, who stood at her elbows.
The four sixth-level girls lorded it over everyone else in school. Daily they flaunted their pretty dresses that had never known a patched hem or darned elbow. Daily they stuck their noses in the air, bragging about the fact that together, their kin owned most of the Western Sierra Electric Company. Not a week passed that they did not remind everyone their fathers had the power to hire and fire all the other fathers.
Brooke studied Daisy with the same curiosity one might examine a bug. “What made you think the circus masters would loan you a tent?” Her tone was singsong. Daisy tried to brush past Brooke, but the taller girl stepped sideways to block her path again. “I asked you a question, squirt.”
“None of your business,” Daisy said evenly.
“And all this business about believing in angels…” taunted Cordelia, who rolled her eyes at Edmonda.
By now Cady and Wren had caught up with Daisy and planted themselves, one on either side.
“Oh, now we have three little peas in a pod.” Brooke laughed and gave another toss of her golden curls. “Three little babies who believe in angels.”
“And circus tents sent from a benefactor a continent away,” snorted Emma Jane. “Think of it.” She snickered. “A tent full of angels! Now, what a sight that would be! Can you imagine?” She doubled over in gales of laughter. “A high top filled with angels. Now, that would be a three-ring circus no one could forget.”
“I suppose you’ve never stopped to consider—” Wren sounded not the least bit doubtful—“that even a high top couldn’t hold a real angel.”
The girls stopped their laughter and taunts.
“It’s true,” Wren continued. “Real angels aren’t the little cherubs you see in paintings and drawings. Real angels are some of God’s mightiest beings.”
Edmonda, Emma Jane, Cordelia, and Brooke stared at Wren. Cordelia was the first to find her tongue. “How do you know that?”
Wren shrugged. “Think about it. Do you think God would’ve had tiny baby angels guarding the ark of the covenant? Or singing together when He created the world?” She laughed. “Babies can’t do much more than coo.”
“Really.” Brooke sneered, obviously not impressed by Wren’s knowledge and description.
Wren raised a brow. “Really. And that’s not all. He sent Gabriel to tell Mary that she was going to have a baby. Gabriel was so mighty, so glorious, Mary fell to her knees in awe.” She laughed softly. “Now, tell me, do you think Mary would do that if a little chubby cherub with golden curls suddenly appeared to tell her she was pregnant with God’s son?”
Pregnant? Daisy’s face flushed at the forbidden word, but speaking it did not seem to bother Wren.
“Angels are mighty
beings. Mightier than we mortals can imagine. Likely so big and powerful and filled with light that we wouldn’t be able to stand looking at them,” Wren continued. “They’re sent to guard us in our ways, but if we ever saw one, we’d likely fall on our faces the way Mary did.”
Emma Jane narrowed her eyes. “How come you know all this?”
Wren gave them a superior look. “I just do.”
“Her family reads books—all the time.” Cady lifted her chin with pride.
“It’s true,” Daisy managed. “Every night Wren’s family sits around the fireplace after supper reading and talking about books and ideas.” She had seen the family do exactly that, each one contributing. No ideas were too ignorant, no questions ridiculed. Wren’s ma and pa seemed to have all the time in the world for their family. The place between Daisy’s nose and eyes smarted as she pictured a room filled with such warmth and love. She blinked before any tears could escape, especially in front of the big girls.
Miss Penney rang the bell, but no one moved.
“I suppose you think you convinced us of something we didn’t already know.” Brooke gave a final toss of her curls. She looked at Daisy and frowned. “Believing in angels, indeed. And circus owners you thought would loan you a tent. What a baby you are!” Thus declaring, she marched away with her perfect little nose in the air, her friends trailing along behind.
Daisy eyes smarted, and she bit her lip to keep from bawling. As soon as the children in front of her had filed into the schoolhouse, she stepped closer to Miss Penney and whispered behind her hand, “I must go to the privy. May I please?”
Miss Penney gave her a quizzical look. “You’ve had your recess time to take care of personal matters.”
“I’m sorry.”
“All right, then. Hurry back.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
As soon as Miss Penney closed the schoolhouse door behind her, Daisy bunched her skirts with her fists and raced across the play yard and through the rusty gate.
She did not look back, but continued running down the dirt road as fast as her legs could carry her. If she held her pent-up sadness inside one more minute she might surely burst. She ran straight to the hillside next to the tavern and plopped down on a smooth rock. Sitting in the one-room schoolhouse for the rest of the afternoon was beyond her heart’s capability. And the bawling-out she knew would come later mattered not even as much as a flea bite.
