Palmyra

by Susan Evans McCloud

He scratched at his chin whiskers and shifted his weight from foot to foot uneasily.

  “Latisha . . .” I appealed. But I could see she knew none of this.

  “They came down to the boats yesterday morning early. Asked my advice.”

  My insides were churning. “Concerning . . .”

  “Someone had to decide it—matter o’ fact, I nearly sent for you. But I b’lieve you’d have encouraged them, too.”

  “Whatever are you talking about?”

  “Seems Randolph sent a letter to his brother via Jack. He’s holed up in a jail in Schenectady.” He glanced uneasily at his wife. “ ’Tisha . . .”

  “I’m all right.”

  “He asked the boys to get the money together to bail him out.”

  “The nerve of him!” Latisha shook her head in alarm and displeasure. I shared, at least in part, her sentiments.

  “You should have come to me, you know.” The nervous shuffling again. “Did you three confide in no one? How did you come up with the money?”

  “Peter had a little savings put aside, and so did I. He sold his pony for the rest of it.”

  I felt my temperature rising. “Your money is needed for the baby,” I complained. “I shall make sure it is returned to you. Is the pony Peter’s possession outright? What will his father say?”

  Jonah shrugged. “Can’t answer either of those questions, Miss Esther. But I thought it the right thing to do.”

  “Of course. How long will it take—when do you expect them to be returning?”

  “No more than a couple more days if things go well. Less than a week anyways.”

  “And if they bring Randolph back—what then?”

  “I suspect he’s havin’ trouble with that arm, the way you and I expected. I suspect he’s run himself into the ground some.”

  “I’ll have to think upon it. I shall come up with something, I promise.”

  I brought out the sweater and matching booties I had knit for the baby and turned the conversation to happier things, kissing them both good-bye as I left. “Keep in touch, for mercy’s sake,” I admonished Jonah, “if you hear anything at all!”

  I went directly to Tillie and told her everything; I knew she could keep the secret. She dug into her pocketbook at once and pulled out some bills.

  “I shall send this money to Mr. Sinclair by way of Ruth; she can be trusted.”

  “Have you enough?”

  “And to spare.” She set her jaw in a determined expression, which was not unbecoming. “That is one area in which Gerard dares not oppose me. He knows who butters his bread, and that my father would not want me treated stingily—” She grimaced a little. “Even if Father’s motives be foremost those of pride.”

  I went next to Georgie. Her relief was evident. “I have something for you in return for your troubles,” she said with an impish grin. And she proceeded to lift from a basket behind a chair—I should have guessed it!—a kitten, a kitten as white as new-driven snow, as fluffy as dandelions at seed time.

  “My old cat is still home with Mother, you know.”

  “But kittens so late,” I marveled.

  “Iris believes her ordained task in life is to produce a litter every six months, no matter the time or season!” When she saw me hesitate she dropped the treasure in my lap. “Come, Esther, your house is not really a home, and you’ll admit it, until you have a cat on the hearth.”

  I cannot resist the winsome creatures, and she knows it! Of course, in the end I gave in. “Dandelion,” I said, “be it male or female, that is what I shall call it.”

  “No, that is a name for yellow cats and tabbies.”

  “Dandelion,” I persisted. “It shall mean to me the frothy white softness of the seeds we blew and scattered and wished on as girls.”

  “Very well,” Georgie agreed.

  “Have you an extra you could take over to Phoebe?” I asked, as I was leaving.

  “Yes. I did not think of that.”

  “Can I come along when you do?”

  “Let us do it right now. Plop Dandelion back in the basket, and we shall let Phoebe choose her own from the three remaining.”

  Creatures sensed Georgie’s calm and behaved themselves admirably for her. The kittens curled into balls and rode in the basket that rocked on her arm, causing no disturbance at all. We found Phoebe in the kitchen, her bread turned out warm on the board, a stew bubbling on the back of the black stove. She was sitting beside the fire with Emily’s child on her lap. It was a sweet picture, and I sensed true contentment behind it.

  She was delighted at the idea of the kitten, and let the baby’s hands touch and feel before she made her selection, placing the tiny creature against the infant’s soft cheek. Little Esther was nearly ten months old now and made the loveliest noises. Phoebe placed her on the floor with the kitten, and she scooted about, chasing and calling out to the frolicsome bundle of fur.

  “I could not love her more if she were my own.” Phoebe’s wonder was in her voice, lending it an almost musical quality. “I did not expect this—a love so fierce and tender.”

  “I am glad of it,” I said, kissing her.

  “You certainly keep a spotless house,” Georgie observed, looking around.

  I wanted to ask about Simon, but did not dare. Phoebe, reading my mind, as she does, gave me one of her gentle smiles. “Things with Simon are improving. In some ways it is slow going with him. At first—at first I believe he was afraid to love me, afraid to even touch me, as if his love would hurt me, as he felt it had somehow hurt her.”

  How complicated human beings are! I thought, with a touch of dismay. I rose and kissed both Esther and her mother good-bye. Walking back I asked Georgie, “What will you do with the last two kittens?”

  “Keep them, of course.”

  “It will get out of hand,” I warned her, “and you’ll have more cats than you have dishes in which to feed them! What will Nathan say?”

  “He likes them, thank goodness. In fact, that is one of the conditions I set down when he asked me to marry him.” It is so wonderful to laugh with Georgie when she is in one of her moods!

  When I took my own white kitten home Eugene was waiting. “That is where you’ve been!” he said. But he took the delicate thing into his arms, and found a small box and old blankets we could use to make a bed for him.

  “Dandelion is better than Fluffy or Snowball,” he decided, when I told him the name. “Cats are women’s substitutes for children. You know that, don’t you?”

  I was taken aback by his unexpected comment. “I never thought of it that way before.”

  “Babies are the answer,” he said, with a wink.

  “But they are ever so much more trouble,” I bantered back, tying my apron and getting out matches to light the stove. “You can’t stick them in a basket and forget them, or push them out to play when they get underfoot.”

  “I suppose you are right.” He came up beside me, parted my hair with his fingers, and kissed the back of my neck. “Babies are still to be preferred,” he said. And I wondered where in the world that came from, and what was going on in his mind.

  Chapter 17

  Palmyra: December 1829

  Latisha’s baby came before Jack and Peter returned with Randolph. Her daughter was born on Josephine’s wedding anniversary. I went with Tillie because both girls wanted me there. If Tillie and I were a bit envious of this delicate, curly-haired creature who went to her mother’s breast so easily, we did not say so out loud. Nor did I tell my own sister the date of the baby’s birth, though she heard from another source.

  “Heaven help us!” she exclaimed, when we met at Mother’s for Sunday dinner. “I’m glad it was her and not me. To be tied to an infant and a schedule of nursing—with the holidays coming.”

  The emptiness behind her words was appalling. I wanted to take her into my arms. I glanced toward Alexander, who was carefully dishing potatoes from the platter. His arm had frozen mid-air.

  “They hav
e named her Sarah,” I said, because I could think of nothing else in my panic.

  “A nice enough name, but rather common,” was Josephine’s comment.

  “You have become more adept at cooking since we left,” I teased my mother, and for once she had the sense to respond. We talked then of crops, and the dam some of the men were building upriver, and of the alterations Alexander was making in the rebuilding of his mill trace, and the tense moment relaxed and passed.

  Later, as Eugene and I were leaving, Josie asked if we were going to the Christmas dance.

  “I shan’t miss a chance to wrap my arms round this beautiful girl,” Eugene said, surprising me again.

  A brief flicker of disappointment touched my sister’s features. It was gone in a heartbeat, but I fancied I saw the gray film it had left behind on her flesh.

  Jack and Peter brought Randolph to my place as I had instructed Jonah they do. All three boys looked like tramps who had been begging from town to town. It was a bitter cold day, clear and biting. I ushered them in and poured hot water for them to bathe in, and gave them old clothes of Eugene’s to wear, even before I would feed them or let them speak to me at all.

  “It was a grand and foolish thing you did,” I began, fixing my eye upon Jack, who had the least emotional involvement in the matter. “You could have trusted someone as confidant, if only to ease the anguish your parents have been suffering.”

  I explained how I had stumbled upon their secret and that no one knew but Tillie, Georgie, and myself, besides Jonah and Latisha.

  “You will have to explain to your fathers,” I said. Jack, who was not afraid, nodded, but I saw Peter wince.

  “I’m not going back to my father’s house,” Randolph declared vigorously. I had not yet dared meet his eyes. How dim and faded was the spark of light within them. I looked at him steadily. “No one is saying you must.”

  All three appeared relieved. “But you have to do something, and I mean it—something useful, to justify the sacrifice these lads have made for you.” I thought he looked terribly pale, and his lips were drawn in a tight line, but he nodded.

  “Do you have something in mind?” Peter asked. “Not the bank, surely.”

  “Not the bank.” We all chuckled a bit, to help ease the tension.

  “There isn’t much I can do.” Randolph spoke the words stoutly enough. I had noticed already how he favored his arm, let it hang limp, or rest in his lap, using the other almost exclusively.

  “I suppose not,” I replied evenly. “You’ve not even managed to destroy yourself yet, though I suspect you’ve given it a rollicking good effort.”

  I felt the others draw in their breaths and the room went silent.

  “I’ll not sit back and baby you,” I continued. “I care for you too much for that. What’s more, I’ve seen what self-pity can do to people—even in the case of my own sister. I do not want that for you.”

  To my astonishment he nodded again, whereas I had expected him to curse me roundly, perhaps to even stomp out of the room.

  “Heaven willing, I’ve worked the poison out of my system,” he said. “But I do not know where to go now.”

  I resisted a strong urge to weep and draw him into my arms to comfort him. I drew a ragged breath. “Josephine’s husband, Alexander Hall, runs the grist and saw mills on the edge of town. You know them?”

  He knit his brow, but he nodded.

  “I’ve spoken to him. There is work you can do for—”

  “I do not want charity from anyone.”

  “He will not be offering you charity, Randolph. But if you reject others’ help and even their compassion, you will find yourself back where you were—only worse.”

  He saw the truth of what I spoke and fell silent. I continued with care. “Alexander understands your limitations; I have explained already. There are several processes at either site to which he could train you. For instance, you could be taught to grade the lumber—”

  “But not sort it.”

  “In some cases, even that. The flour mill might lend itself better. You could oversee the cleaning and tempering of the wheat kernels before the milling process begins. I do not understand all of it, but there is the care of the millstones themselves, and organizing the sale and distribution of the flour, once the process is completed.”

  “Manual labor.”

  “Not altogether. Good, honest labor to keep you occupied while you decide what it is you want to do with your life.”

  The bitter look he gave me seared into my marrow. “Do with my life?”

  I refused to be led where he was taking me. “There are universities, Randolph, which would welcome a mind as fine as yours. There are a variety of professions you could embrace. Once you put your heart into it—”

  That was a mistake. There was no heart left in him; no self-respect, very little hope. He pushed his plate back. “Can we sleep in your barn?” he asked.

  “Of course not! I’ll fix beds up for you here in the kitchen. Jack, would you like to go to Georgie’s?”

  His face lit. “I would, if I might.”

  “Yes, and you can return home in the morning, after I’ve taken Randolph out to the mill site.”

  “What of me?” Peter asked.

  I squinted at him, trying to think. “I do not want to send you back,” I said honestly. “Mr. Whittier, as well as your father, is bent on making an example of you. When they learn where you have gone . . .” I glanced in Randolph’s direction. “Let’s sleep on it, lad, and we’ll make our decision in the morning.”

  Eugene, coming in late with tired shoulders and ink-stained fingers, was pleasant with the boys while he ate a late supper and helped me prepare their beds. They were bone-weary, I realized, and when their heads found a pillow their heavy eyes shut of their own accord. We left them to the lingering warmth of the hearthstones and the banked fire, and the kitten curled at Peter’s feet. I sensed there were things Eugene might have wanted to tell me, simple talk of the day, but we were tired as well. I was happy to close my eyes, with my head curled beneath his chin, and let the darkness blot out the entangling perplexities of the day.

  It is true I arose later than usual. Eugene had refused to wake me when he went off to his father’s shop in the morning. “You need your sleep,” he had told me the night before. I was certain both boys would be sleeping out their exhaustion, too; and so it appeared when I first entered the kitchen, with the fire Eugene had built burning merrily and the kitten mewing for his morning milk. I went about my tasks for several moments before hearing Peter groan and turn over, half rising, then falling back to his warm quilts again. I knelt down beside him. Perhaps I would not wake him until later, until I returned from taking Randolph . . .

  I shifted my attention to the other pile of blankets, rumpled and—empty. I sat back on my heels and stared. What in the world has he gone and done? My heart constricted painfully. Ought I to go and search for him? And, if so, where to start?

  Perhaps feeling my perplexity, Peter opened his eyes. When he looked into my face, he knew. “Where do you suppose he has gone?” I asked.

  The boy gazed back at me, sad and deflated. “Anywhere, Esther. I could not begin to second-guess him.”

  “Nor could I.”

  We ate a sad, dispirited breakfast together, and the minutes dragged on our hands. At length Peter offered to bring in some wood Eugene had chopped and left piled in the yard. After that he stood on a ladder armed with my long feather duster and pulled down the cobwebs that had gathered in the corners and crevices of the ceiling. We did not say much. We were waiting. But I think we both believed we were wasting our time.

  A little before noon I heard a horse in the yard. I started, then froze. There were definite footsteps making their way up the path.

  “You have sharp ears,” Peter whispered. The footsteps came closer. We saw a slender shadow, a hand reach and pull open the creaking door.

  When Randolph entered I knew something had happened. He walked
differently. He even stood with a different stance. And there was something in the depths of his eyes that had not been there before.

  “I am sorry, I apologize to both of you,” he began, “but I could think of no other way to handle this.” He sat down. We stood staring at him. A hint of a smile played on his lips.

  “I am sorry,” he repeated. “Sit down and I’ll tell you where I have been and what has happened.”

  I sat, expectant—but never guessing what it was I would hear.

  “It was my place to go, no one else’s. I spoke to Eugene this morning and he let me borrow Tansy. I hope that’s all right, Esther.”

  I nodded.

  “I went to my father’s office and waited. I know it is his habit to arrive very early, before the business of the day begins.”

  “You went to your father.”

  He was pale, but he was calm. “I had to,” he said.

  Peter leaned forward, his hands clenched on his large, bony knees, looking no more than ten years old. I realized that his memories had flared up to meet his concerns, and he was truly worried.

  “Tell us quickly,” I said.

  “I explained all to him. In the beginning each word stuck in my mouth, Esther. At times I thought I would choke. I could not look at him—” His face contorted a little. “I kept my eyes fixed on a spot of wall where the paint was peeling, a few inches above his head.”

  Randolph drew a deep breath. “I showed him my arm, limp and useless. I gave no quarter and I asked for none.” How well he knows his father, I thought. “I told him—the kind of disgusting life I have been involved in. I made no excuses, and I asked for nothing, at least not on my own account.”

  I glanced toward Peter. Randolph drew himself up a bit as he, too, looked at his brother. “I told him that if anyone undertook to punish Peter on my account they would live to rue it, for I would expose their unjust conduct, as well as my own vivid crimes.”

  “Did he take your meaning—entirely?”

  “I believe so.” Randolph spoke slowly. “But just in case, I did mention a name or two specifically, besides his own.”