“You’re such a bully, Socks,” Miriam said, bending over to poke the kitten with a piece of straw. “Leave Star alone!”
Sinking to her knees, she scooped up Anna and Ida, who squirmed frantically until she loosened her grip and they escaped to the floor.
“Some friends you are,” she said, watching them disappear under the trough.
She flattened herself on the floor to watch them. “Where’s your mother?” Right on cue, MC appeared from the corner near Corky and Pickle’s stall. She slunk under the trough to join the two kittens.
Miriam rolled onto her back and looked at the opening to the hayloft. Remembering the fright she’d had on her first day in the barn, she balled her hands into fists, trying to keep calm. But the opening was as dark and quiet as ever.
Standing up, she brushed off her coat, turned to the tower of hay bales and studied the kittens. She still wasn’t sure which one to keep, but she doubted it would be Anna or Ida. How could she choose one over the other? She considered changing their names—it would be easier to separate them if they weren’t named after her friends. Then again, the way they kept running away from her together, they didn’t seem to like her all that much. Bandit was probably a better choice. Or Pirate.
“Or you,” she said, reaching for Star. Star used to be the shyest kitten, skittering away whenever Miriam reached for her. Now she headed straight to Miriam’s hands.
“Star is the right name for you, because you’re pretty as a star,” Miriam said. Settling onto a hay bale, she cuddled the kitten on her lap and leaned in to hear her whispery purrs.
“That’s a stupid name. Stars ain’t pretty. They’re just lights in the sky.”
Miriam leapt up. The kitten wriggled out of her hands.
“Who said that?” she demanded, even though she knew. Hurrying back to the trough, she tipped her head back and looked into the space that only moments ago had been empty.
There, peering down at her, were the same brown eyes she had seen when she was here with Zayde. The eyes looked curious, but not exactly friendly.
Did they belong to a boy or a girl? Whoever it was hadn’t spoken long enough for Miriam to tell. But boys didn’t use words like pretty. It had to be a girl. A girl!
“Who are you?” Miriam asked.
“I’m me,” came the answer.
“What kind of name is that?”
“It ain’t my name.” Whoever she was, she sounded impatient. Maybe even angry. Miriam wondered how old she was and wished she could see all of her face, not just her eyes. “I’m not telling you my name,” the girl added.
“Why not?” Miriam asked.
“I shouldn’t even be talkin’ to you.”
“Then why are you?” Miriam snapped back before she could stop herself. Where had that boldness come from? She had never talked to anyone in that kind of voice before. It felt good!
The girl did not reply. Miriam’s neck was beginning to hurt. She glanced down at the hay bale. If she could lie down on it, she wouldn’t have to keep standing like this, with her head tipped back.
Something touched her boot. She jumped, expecting to see the girl standing right beside her. But it was only Star brushing up against her. Miriam had been so caught up with the girl in the loft that she had forgotten about the kittens. She crouched down and cradled Star. By the time she turned back to the loft, the eyes were gone.
“Where are you?” she asked.
There was no answer.
“Where did you go?”
Still nothing.
Miriam put Star back on the floor with the rest of the kittens. If the girl wasn’t going to show her face, Miriam would find her herself. Never mind that Zayde had said a hayloft wasn’t a place for a girl. Clearly it was.
NINE
The easiest way to get into the hayloft was to climb the wide wooden staircase outside the barn. The men used it in the fall to get the hay inside. The staircase was visible from the corner of the farm where they were building the new barn. It was also visible from the window in the farmhouse kitchen. Bubby often looked out the window while she worked.
The best way for Miriam to get into the hayloft without anyone seeing was to use the inside ladder. It was nailed to the wall near the room with the woodstove. She had watched some of the men use it. They scrambled up the rungs as gracefully as the kittens jumped onto hay bales. They made it look easy.
Now, standing before the ladder, Miriam realized it wasn’t going to be easy at all. She placed her hands on the rung that was level with her shoulders. Because the ladder was nailed to the wall, it was impossible to get a good grip. There was nowhere for her hands to go—she couldn’t hold on to the rungs the way she would a normal ladder.
She reached for the side rails. Pressing her knuckles against the wall and her thumbs on the rails, she lifted her right foot onto the bottom rung. Then she pulled up her left foot and slowly began climbing, willing her feet to be steady. It was a challenge, balancing on such a small space. And her feet weren’t even that big. How did the men manage? Flattening her hands and clenching them into fists again, she inched closer to the loft opening. If only she could hold on to the rungs, the trip would go so much more quickly. But the higher she climbed, the more it became apparent that even if she had managed a secure hold, the trip would not have been smooth. As she pressed her hands against the rail sides, she could feel slivers digging into her fingers.
Keep climbing, she told herself. Don’t think about the slivers. Think about how brave Esther was. Do what you have to do.
She kept her eyes focused on the wall in front of her. She wondered if the girl was watching her. But the one time she looked up, she saw nothing except the opening to the loft, and she nearly lost her balance, so it wasn’t a very long look. Steadying herself led to more slivers. She wondered if the girl got slivers when she climbed the ladder. When Miriam got slivers back home, her mother removed them with a needle. How did the girl get rid of her slivers? Was there someone up there to take care of her? She was picturing the scene, a girl and her mother, a needle in a hayloft, when she heard the barn door open.
She looked toward the door and then down toward the floor. That’s when she realized that instead of being almost to the top of the ladder like she thought, she had barely moved. She was only three rungs off the floor! She jumped down and ran as quickly as she could back to the stall with the kittens.
Safely hidden, she peeked through a tiny opening in the swinging doors. There was Joe, walking swiftly toward the back of the barn. Had he seen her attempting to climb up? He went straight to the ladder and took the rungs two at a time. He practically flew up into the loft.
It wasn’t unusual for the hired men to visit the barn in the middle of the afternoon. But why was Joe in such a hurry? And why was it so easy for him and so hard for Miriam to climb the ladder? She quietly closed the stall doors and hurried toward the trough, hoping to hear through the opening whatever conversation might take place up there. It was obvious Joe wasn’t there for hay. He was talking in an impatient whisper.
“Where are you?”
Miriam almost opened her mouth to answer. Then she realized Joe couldn’t be talking to her—he hadn’t even seen her. She got down on the floor and slid under the trough, in case he peered through the opening. The splinters in her hands stung. She brought one hand to her mouth and tried to remove the little pieces of wood with her teeth.
Moses came over and started licking Miriam’s face with his sandpaper tongue just as she pulled out another splinter. Pirate and Bandit put their front paws on her boots. She tried not to giggle as she listened for more sounds from the hayloft.
“Cissy!” Joe whispered. He sounded mad.
Cissy? So the brown-eyed girl’s name was Cissy. But why was Joe looking for her?
“Shhhhh!” The voice didn’t sound anything like the girl who had spoken to Miriam. This person sounded worried—or even scared. For a moment Miriam thought maybe a second person was hiding up the
re. But that couldn’t be. Joe had only called out one name. More likely, Cissy, the same person who had been so self-assured and almost mean to Miriam, was as afraid of Joe as Miriam had been of her. Miriam wished the kittens would stop moving. Their rustling in the hay was making it hard to hear anything.
After the Shhhhh! Miriam didn’t hear another word. The hayloft was big, covering the entire barn. Cissy would have seen Miriam running to the stall. So she and Joe had taken their argument—Miriam was sure it was an argument—as far from the stall as possible. But what were they arguing about? And who was Cissy? How did Joe know her?
TEN
At dinner that night, Miriam sat where she always did, between Bubby and Banjo, across the table from Joe. Since that first day at lunch, she hadn’t paid much attention to him at mealtimes. He did eat a lot, but all of the men did. Bubby said they needed to fill themselves up because they worked so hard.
Tonight Miriam couldn’t take her eyes off Joe. And he noticed. He stared right back, not in a mean way, but not exactly friendly either. He didn’t want to be observed. Miriam turned her gaze to the meat and carrots and beets on her plate, then lifted her eyes so he couldn’t tell that she was still watching. That’s when she saw him dropping food into his lap.
At first she thought she was imagining it, but the second time a hunk of Bubby’s brown bread slid off Joe’s plate and disappeared and he failed to reach down to retrieve it, she remembered that first lunch at the farm. Now she understood. He was taking food for Cissy. And he knew Miriam was still watching, because after that second piece of bread disappeared, he didn’t take another morsel of food. Cissy wasn’t going to get much to eat tonight, and it was Miriam’s fault. She wished she could let Joe know that his secret was safe with her, that he could take as much food as he needed and she wouldn’t say a word. But right now that sort of communication was not possible.
What was possible, she realized later that night as she got ready to recite her prayers, was Miriam helping to feed Cissy. “God bless Mama, Papa, Uncle Avram, Rafael, Gabriel, Anna, Ida, Bubby, Zayde and all my other family and friends,” she said as her grandmother listened at the edge of the bed. “Keep them safe and healthy, and bring Mama and Papa and Uncle Avram and my baby cousins back home very soon.”
“Good night, Miri,” Bubby said, giving her a kiss. Then she turned off the light, leaving Miriam to devise a plan.
The next afternoon, with a chunk of cheese in one coat pocket and the last two hamantaschen wrapped in a handkerchief in the other, Miriam hurried to the barn. More elaborate meals would have to wait until she could find a proper container and had mastered the ladder. Until then she needed both hands. She was sure she could climb the ladder now—she had practiced it in her head so many times before falling asleep, she was surprised she hadn’t dreamed about it.
All she had to do was press the toes of her boots against the wall and grip the side rails with her fingertips. The trick would be to catch Cissy by surprise. That required entering the barn in silence. Miriam was huffing and puffing like a train about to sound its whistle. She stood in the cold trying to catch her breath and praying that the door wouldn’t stick as it often did. When that happened, it made a horrible noise.
“Please be quiet today,” she whispered as she reached for the wooden handle. Gritting her teeth, she slid the door open just enough to slip in sideways. Then she tugged it gently closed, hoping it wouldn’t squeak or groan. Her wish came true. The door didn’t make so much as a whoosh.
When she reached the ladder, she stopped and studied it. How could it possibly have gotten so much longer overnight? And had the rungs been that narrow yesterday? She was certain that wasn’t possible.
“Don’t be scared.”
That’s what she was saying in her head. Don’t be scared. But the words sounded like they were outside her head.
She heard a voice again.
“What are you so scared about?”
Miriam shook her head, then tapped each side. It wasn’t until she heard the giggling that she realized the words weren’t actually coming from her.
“What you doing?” she heard Cissy ask, the end of the sentence lost in laughter.
She couldn’t believe how friendly Cissy sounded. She’d changed overnight, just like the ladder. Her voice was so much warmer than it had been when she’d peered down from the hayloft.
Miriam realized the voice wasn’t coming from the hayloft. Cissy wasn’t talking to her. She was talking to the kittens!
“You stop pesterin’ your mama like that,” she continued. “You keep doing that and she ain’t going to feed you no more.”
Miriam backed away from the ladder. Slowly, stealthily as a tiger, she tiptoed toward the stall and the sound of Cissy’s voice.
“Stop that!” Cissy was laughing louder now, a cross between a hiccup and a gulp. “You’re tickling me!”
Which kitten was she talking to?
Miriam heard a little thump and then mewing.
“You’re all right,” Cissy said. “Don’t you be fussin’. You’re just fine.”
Miriam wondered what had happened.
“I’m going to take care of you, don’t you worry. Oooh! You stop that! Stop tickling me!” She laughed again, the hiccup and gulp.
Miriam put her hand to her mouth to stop herself from joining in. She was curious about the way Cissy talked. Papa and Zayde chopped off their words, sometimes at the beginning, sometimes at the end. But Cissy’s words slid off, softly, almost like a melody. Miriam liked it. Part of her wanted to remain out here all afternoon, pressed up against the wall, eavesdropping. If she walked in, Cissy might run away or, worse, be as unfriendly as she had been the day before.
Miriam jammed her hands into her pockets. Her fingers brushed against the hamantaschen and cheese. If someone brought me food, she thought, I wouldn’t be mean to them. The only way to find out if Cissy would be the same was to open the stall door.
ELEVEN
A black girl was sitting cross-legged on the floor, her back to the door. Her hair was short and fuzzy. It stuck out all over, like dandelion fluff, only darker. When she heard the door swing open, she bolted up and turned around so fast that Miriam jumped back and the kittens scattered.
“What are you doing here?” the girl demanded.
Seeing all of Cissy, not just her eyes, shocked Miriam into silence. She had never seen anyone so skinny in her entire life.
Cissy was only slightly taller than Miriam, but she was no wider than a broom handle. She wore thick wool stockings and a plaid dress—if you could call it a dress. Miriam was positive it was a shirt that was clearly intended for someone far bigger. The sleeves were rolled up so many times it looked as if Cissy wore donuts on each wrist. Her boots didn’t appear to fit any better—there was no way anyone as short and skinny as Cissy was could have feet that big. The boots probably weighed more than she did.
“Ain’t you supposed to be making cheese with your granny?” Cissy demanded, not taking her eyes off Miriam. “That’s what your grandpa said. I heard him. What are you doing back here? Don’t you dare tell anyone you saw me.”
She began moving toward the door. Miriam, who was closer, backed up and blocked it. Cissy looked her up and down.
“What are you doing?” She was more confused now than angry. “Get out of my way.”
Miriam shook her head, the words be brave, be brave swimming in her brain. She reached into her pockets again. Now did not seem like a good time to offer up cheese and cookies.
“I have to go! Your granny’s going to come here lookin’ for you. She’ll find me and—just get out of my way! Don’t make me push you.”
“Nobody’s coming,” Miriam said firmly. She was surprised at how bossy she sounded. But it worked. Cissy stepped back as if she’d been pushed. “It’s just me. Bubby’s making cheese, like you said, but by herself. So be quiet! If someone does come, you can hide. You could hide in the trough and nobody would see you.”
“I ain’t going in that trough. I ain’t that skinny. I’d get stuck in there.”
“I don’t think so,” Miriam said.
Cissy shook her head. “I know so.”
“How do you know?” Miriam asked.
“’Cause I did get stuck in there, that’s how,” Cissy said, crossing her arms across her chest.
Miriam pictured Cissy trapped in the trough, unable to free herself, the kittens crawling around on top of her, licking her, scratching her, getting their claws tangled in her puff of hair. She covered her mouth, but it was too late. Out burst the laughter she’d been holding in since before she entered the stall. She started laughing so hard she was crying.
Cissy looked indignant. Her eyebrows scrunched, and Miriam wasn’t sure if she was going to scold Miriam or snap at her.
But then, much to Miriam’s surprise, Cissy began to laugh too. It started small but quickly grew to a whoop. The next thing Miriam knew, Cissy was crouched over, hugging her knees and trembling. Miriam had never seen anyone shake with laughter before and wondered if Cissy might actually be crying. Then Cissy tumbled head over heels onto the floor.
“Are you all right?” Miriam asked. “Are you hurt?”
Cissy turned her face toward Miriam. “Fine,” she said between giggles. “I’m fine!”
Miriam pulled the food out of her pocket. “I brought this for you,” she said, waving it in front of Cissy’s face. “To eat.”
Cissy sat up and took the food. “I wouldn’t have thought you’d brought it for me to wear on my head.” She unwrapped the package, inspecting the hankie before she paid any attention to the food.“This is awful fancy,” she said. “Too nice to use.” She wiped her face on her arm. “That’s what sleeves are for.”
Miriam wiped her eyes on her own coat sleeve.
That started Cissy howling again. “Are you telling me you ain’t got a hankie for your own nose? You’re going to mess up that pretty coat? Your granny’s going to whup you!”
Miriam's Secret Page 4
