Borrowed Children Read online

  “I couldn’t sleep either,” I say, by way of announcement.

  She gives a start.

  “Good gracious, Mandy, I didn’t hear you at all.”

  “What are you doing?” Being the only other one awake makes me bold.

  “Just business.”

  “With a jeweler?” I can see the envelope she’s addressed: Ostriker’s Jewelry in Memphis.

  She studies me for a moment. “Well, Amanda, you are my oldest girl, so I guess I can tell you, but you must promise not to tell Daddy.”

  Not tell Daddy? We’ve never kept a secret from him. But still I nod.

  “I’m ordering a ring.”

  “For Daddy?”

  “No, no. A little emerald ring for me. You see, I haven’t had anything pretty of my own in years—not since David was born. And every woman needs something pretty. It’s like rain for the garden. Otherwise, she’ll dry up and blow away.”

  But Mama, I want to say, look at that swollen belly. You’re not exactly withering.

  “Don’t rings cost a lot?”

  “Not always. Besides, fine jewelry is a good investment.”

  “I see,” I say. “I guess I’ll go back to bed.”

  “That’s my girl.”

  I don’t know. I look at her hard: rosy skin, brown hair fanned out around her face.

  “Good night,” I say, but I leave the room wondering why she gets a ring and I get leftover clothes.

  6

  We’ve been in school a month now, and the weather turned gray as winter. But this morning, sunshine is back. Even the air glistens. David and Ben groan and stamp like horses on plowing day. Anna bounces:

  School days, school days,

  Dear old golden rule days.

  Reading and writing and …

  “No singing at the table,” Mama calls from the kitchen. “School will have started before you get out the door.”

  For some reason, she’s decided Helen has to go to school with us too. Helen’s only five and nobody likes the idea.

  “I don’t want to go,” Helen whispers to me, a tear sliding right into her oatmeal.

  “But you’ll love it,” I say, spooning brown sugar. “And Anna will be there.”

  “Where will you be?”

  “I told you—I’ll be right in the next room. And I’ll see you when we go outside for lunch.

  Helens eyes widen.

  “I have to stay with you or Mama.”

  “No, you don’t. You’ll be perfectly …”

  “I have to!” Helens voice climbs to a wail.

  Mama fills the doorway.

  “Well, for today Mandy can take you to Mr. Aden’s room.”

  “I cannot!”

  “Of course you can. Its just for one day.

  “But its not allowed.”

  “Amanda, Don’t tell me what’s allowed. Today it’s necessary.” She bends down with difficulty, smoothing Helens hair. “You boys get going. David, remember what I said.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he answers.

  “It’s not fair! Its bad enough that Helen has to go at all. She’s not old enough. Miss Bledsoe won t want her. But for me to have to take her to Mr. Aden’s room—”

  Mama gives me a blazing look. “I don’t want to hear any more about it. You’ll do as you’re told.”

  Someday I wont, I tell myself, jabbing at the oatmeal.

  We set off up the road. Anna’s still bouncing and Helens pacified, but I feel robbed. What will Mr. Aden think when I come dragging in a five-year old? He’ll think I have no respect for his classroom, that’s what. And how can I pay attention with Helen pulling at my hand? She stops to look at a caterpillar measuring the road. “Come on? I say, yanking at her braid. “The bell will ring and we’ll still be in sight of home.”

  She looks up at me puzzled. Doesn’t even say ow. But she gets moving.

  “Please, Mr. Aden. Its only for today.”

  He takes a folded handkerchief from his coat pocket and blots his face. Harmon Wilson snickers.

  “All right. But it s up to you to keep the child quiet.”

  Up to me! I smell tears starting and blink hard. She’s not my child! But I nod.

  And now I’ve displeased Mr. Aden. I glare at Helen as if that could stitch up her mouth.

  She’s good all morning, though, and dozes after lunch. We do Latin. I’ve forgotten a lot but I still like it. Roma Creech has forgotten it all and acts like it’s Mr. Aden’s fault.

  “You didn’t teach us that,” she whines, her head bobbing.

  Mr. Aden goes on. When he asks a question, Jimmy Halter rings out:

  “Ain’t no Latin in a coal mine.”

  Suddenly the sleepy room listens.

  “Oh, but there is! Many of our everyday words come straight from Latin.”

  “Can’t heat a house.”

  Irma giggles. Harmon winks at her across the aisle.

  “The glow of knowledge has kept many a poor soul warm.” Low groans.

  “I favor a fire,” Jimmy drawls.

  Mr. Aden comes down the row, hands behind his back.

  “Mr. Halter,” he begins, “do you know your way to the driftmouth?”

  Half-laughs at this.

  “If you mean Darby, up Burning Springs Road, I’d be a fool if I didn’t.”

  “Then go right along and volunteer your services.”

  Jimmy just stares.

  “They’re not needed here.”

  A long pause. “Are you kicking me out?”

  “No. But I’ll oblige if you feel unable to walk.”

  This time the laughs are on Mr. Aden’s side. Jimmy gets up and slinks toward the door.

  “Now,” Mr. Aden resumes, “the next sentence …”

  Helen fairly dances on the way home.

  “Your teacher threw a boy out of school! A big boy, bigger than Daddy.”

  “No, he’s not.”

  “Sent him off to mine coal!”

  Then she stops, her smile fading.

  “Will Miss Bledsoe do that?”

  “What?”

  “If I can’t read, will she send me down in the mine?”

  “You silly!” Anna says. “Girls aren’t allowed in coal mines. It’s bad luck.”

  “But she might make me a checker or weigher.”

  That’s what Mr. Skidmore does since he got hurt.

  “Not until you can count.”

  “Anna, don’t tease her. Miss Bledsoe won’t send you out at all,” I tell Helen. “Mr. Aden only did that today because Jimmy said coal mines were better than books.”

  “Are they?”

  “Not for a minute.”

  “You can’t eat books,” Anna argues.

  “You can’t eat coal either.”

  “But you can sell coal.”

  Suddenly I realize how tired I am, how glad that we’re almost home.

  “The point is, Helen,” I go on, “books give us something just as real as food or fire but we can’t see it.”

  “Why not?”

  “Can you see that?” Anna breaks in.

  It’s Mrs. Skidmore coming down the road.

  “Mandy!” she calls. “Mandy!”

  She looks strange without even one child in tow. But it’s not just that. Her cheeks are flaming, her hair swarming out of its knot.

  “You’re not to go home,” she declares, still ten feet away. “You’re to bring the girls to my house.”

  “But why?”

  By now she’s square in front of me, hissing like a hot iron. “The baby’s coming!”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Your mama sent David for Doc Bailey this morning, and Mr. Skidmore’s gone after your daddy. Now come along. I left my babies.”

  She turns and huffs on down the road. Her blue-checked dress-tail snaps like a flag.

  7

  So we spent last night at the Skidmores’, which could have been worse but mercifully was not: a scrawny chicken red at the bone for dinner,
the littlest triplet spitting up in his plate. Daddy had brought some quilts over, along with pickles and a basket of eggs. It was good to have something of home to bed down on. And I fixed the eggs for breakfast—just right.

  We’ve hardly got started toward school when Daddy runs up behind us.

  “You have a little brother!” His face is so white it’s shining. “And Rena—your mother came through fine. She’s going to be just fine. You come on home after school.”

  A brother! I’m astonished. I guess I assumed all the ones after me would be girls.

  “Now we are three each,” I tell Helen. “And you are a big sister.”

  She takes a deep breath, swelling her dress front. “Come right home,” Daddy says again, turning back toward the house.

  We’ve just crossed the creek bridge when I realize we don’t have any lunch—Mrs. Skidmore didn’t remember and neither did I. But its not just the prospect of hunger which bothers me. Its something about Daddy insisting Mama will be fine. Of course she will. Why did he have to say that?

  All day I worry. Even Mr. Aden sharing his cheese and fruit with us, eating lunch outside like a student, doesn’t stop me. And now that we’re walking home I feel like a rope in a tug-of-war. Part of me is pulled forward, around curves and right up the path to the house. The other part is tugged back to the schoolhouse, away from whatever’s behind that door.

  “What’ll we name the baby?” Helen asks for the twentieth time.

  “I don’t know. Maybe Jim after Daddy.” “Or Helen after me.”

  “But you’re a girl,” Anna says. “Besides, you don’t have two people in one family with the same name.”

  “Then how could they name him Jim?” Helen asks.

  “She means two children,” I explain. “They’re going to rename you Miss Question Box if you don’t hush up.”

  Across the creek, around the big tulip poplar, and there’s the house, same as always. Except Doc Bailey’s buggy is tied up in front.

  “What’s he doing here?” Anna wants to know. “He already brought the baby.”

  The door is open, everything strangely still. And the glass on the door has been broken and boarded over.

  “Mama?” I call. “Daddy?”

  “Just a minute, Mandy,” comes Daddy’s voice. “Wait in the parlor.”

  We stop, barely inside the door.

  Daddy comes through the dining room, even paler than this morning.

  “Sit down,” he says.

  “I want to see the…”

  “Not yet, honey.” Something in his voice stops Helen.

  We all sit on the couch, our sides touching.

  “Your mother has had a bad time of it. She—she got into a bit of trouble today—Doc Bailey will explain it all when the boys get in—she’s resting now, but she is real weak and needs quiet. For a long time she’s going to need quiet. You girls can help me with that?”

  We nod.

  “Is the baby okay?” I have to ask. There’s not a whimper in the house.

  Daddy’s face brightens. “Healthiest early baby youc ever saw. Bigger than Helen was and she didn’t come till she was ripe.”

  “What’s his name?” Anna asks.

  “Your mother wants to call him William.”

  “William?”

  “After her brother who died. William Marion.”

  “Marion’s a girl’s name!” Anna protests.

  “It was my father’s,” Daddy corrects her.

  “William Marion Perritt: sounds awfully big for a baby.”

  “Amanda Virginia started out loose on you, too.”

  I hear David and Ben come into the yard. They didn’t stay at the Skidmores’, so they’ve already seen the baby, and come trooping into the house as usual. Then they see Daddy’s face.

  “What’s wrong?” David begins.

  “How come Doc Bailey’s back?”

  “Have a seat, boys. That’s what we need to talk about. I’ll see if Doc is ready now.”

  Ben eases into the rocker by the fireplace. David drops onto the couch.

  “Babies cry,” he declares. “That one in there cried all night.”

  “He’s William,” Anna ventures.

  “He’s loud? David finishes up.

  Daddy and Doc Bailey come out of the bedroom, collecting dining room chairs as they pass through. Then they sit in front of us, formal as church. I don’t like this. It makes my stomach hurt.

  “It’s a good day and a bad day for you Perritts,” Doc Bailey begins. Daddy clears his throat. “What I mean is, you have a big healthy brother, here to be a help and a credit to you all. But not quite yet. There’s a lot to be done for this boy before you can send him out to hoe corn.”

  Daddy attempts to smile at this; David and Ben look like posts. Doc Bailey goes on:

  “A baby takes a lot of raising, and a household takes a lot of running, and your mama is not going to be able to do much of either for a while. She hemorrhaged—”

  Daddy clears his throat again, looking from Doc Bailey to Anna and Helen.

  “Women often do when babies are born, but this was an especially—an especially strong one, and she’s lost a lot of blood. If she’s to rebuild that blood and get her strength back, she’s got to stay in bed, absolutely in bed, for six weeks.”

  Six weeks? Who will cook and do the wash and the sewing, not to mention take care of the baby? Who will take care of us?

  “And after she’s up,” Daddy explains, “it will be a while before she can do what she used to. So we are all going to have to pitch in. We’ll have to do things we’ve never done before. And do without some things we’ve always had. We’ll have to take care of your mother, who’s always taken care of us.”

  At this, Helen starts to cry.

  “Now, Missy,” Doc Bailey tells her, “you’ve got to be brave. But don’t forget you have Mandy.” He turns his watery blue eyes on me. “She’s been a big help to her mother already. She won’t let you go hungry and ragged, will you Mandy?”

  I shake my head.

  “Now, I have to be getting along. Alafair will have supper waiting and I’ll be in a stew myself if I don’t get there to eat it. Haven’t been home in three days.”

  Daddy walks him to the door. I remember the boarded-up hole.

  “Who broke the door?” I ask when Daddy comes back.

  “Maggie Skidmore. I’ll tell you about that later. Right now I want to explain what we’re going to do. For a while things will have to be very different—there’s no way around it. I’ll have to come home every night from the mill. Boys, it will be your job to keep the wash going. And with a baby that will be a lot of work. As for the fires, I’ll do them in the morning and you can see that they’re built up in the afternoon.”

  “Yes sir,” Ben and David answer.

  “Mandy, you’ll be the cook.”

  “I can cook it if you can eat it,” I say. Weak smiles all around.

  “You little ones,” he goes on, looking at Anna and Helen, “are not the littlest ones anymore, and you’re going to have to do your share. Helen will keep going to school, and you’ll both help around the house. We don’t want it looking like a pigsty.”

  Solemn nods. He takes a deep breath.

  “And Mandy,” his eyes search my face, asking for something. “The only way to handle all this and the baby is for you to leave school for a while and take care of him.”

  I should have known this was coming, but I didn’t. Tears knot up my throat and I can’t speak. Daddy waits for a moment, then goes on:

  “I know this is hard, Mandy, but it’s not forever, and I see no other way to manage. I can’t stay home and be a nursemaid. That’s what you’ll be, like Florence Nightingale.”

  I try to feel big-hearted. But Florence Nightingale didn’t stay home, she didn’t even stay in her own country. And school is the one thing I’ve got. I don’t want to give that up. Willie’s not my baby. I don’t know how to take care of him and I don’t want to eit
her. It’s not fair!

  “You’ll do that for me, won’t you Mandy?”

  Just then Willie cries, softly at first, then higher and louder with each breath. Daddy bolts for the bedroom. We sit silent, looking at the space he left.

  In a minute he’s back, carrying a bundle. Is there really a baby in all those blankets?

  “Get up, son,” he tells Ben. “Give Mandy the rocker.”

  We change places, like partners in a dance.

  “Meet your brother,” Daddy says. “One-day-old Willie Perritt.” And bending over, he puts the baby in my arms.

  8

  A baby is a very heavy thing, any mother will tell you. Willie, settled in my arms, grew heavier than the house.

  All month I’ve held him, bathed him, diapered him, carried him to and from Mamas breast. The little daylight he shuts his eyes to I spend working: meals, floors, Mama. I haven’t crossed the creek or opened a book since Daddy put him in my lap.

  I try to plan time for myself, but something always takes it. Like right now. The boys got behind on wash, so I’ve just finished a tubful of Willie’s gowns. Had to string them up in front of the parlor fire since it’s raining like Niagara Falls.

  Now it’s time to start peeling potatoes for dinner, and here come Anna and Helen from school. I hear them in the parlor. Why do they stand with the door open while they take off their coats? We can’t heat the creekbed.

  “Mandy!” Anna calls, the way I used to call “Mama!”

  “I’m in the kitchen.”

  “Guess what!”

  Anna dashes in, wet hair stringy, cheeks red.

  “Miss Bledsoe says we can have a Christmas tree at school and were each to bring an ornament. Vera Wilson gets to make the star, but Helen and I want to do angels. You’ve got to help us, though. We’ll need—”

  “Mine won’t be an angel.”

  “Fancy cloth and tin foil and something soft for feath-ers—

  “Not mine.”

  “What did you say, Helen?”

  Helen stands behind Anna, almost in the dining room.

  “I don’t want an angel. Mine is a wise camel.”