A Mother's Promise

by K. D. Alden

  His auburn head came up. He cocked it to the side, trying to figure out who was calling him and from which direction.

  “Over here. Shhhhh.”

  He spied her, gave a nod and threw in another rake-load of leaves. Then he dropped the rake, slid his stump under one handle of the barrow, grasped the other and trundled it toward her, toward the huge pile he was all set to burn in the ash pit. It was hidden behind a brick wall a hundred yards behind the manse. His face split into a grin as he reached her. He set the barrow down and stuffed his stump into the pocket of his overalls. “Ruthie. How’s things—” He cut off mid-sentence, searching her face. “What’s wrong?”

  She told him.

  Clarence was the one person at the Colony who never made fun of her momma. And Ruth Ann was pretty much the one person at the Colony who’d never, not once, looked at him with pity because he was missing a hand. Truth to tell, she barely noticed.

  “I gotta get out of here, Clarence. Doc is going to slice me open like a biscuit.” She shivered. “Glory, too.”

  His smile vanished; his gaze dropped to her feet. “What happened to your toe, Ruthie?”

  “Never mind that. I got a plan for us, but…we need your help.”

  His honest gray eyes met hers for a long, measured moment. Then he gave her a small nod, his broad shoulders settling a notch in resignation. “Crawl under the canvas,” he said. “Quick. You’ll get dirty, but I’ll take us where we can talk.”

  She did it. The leaves were wet and smelled of oak, decay and possibility.

  He trundled the wheelbarrow easily, even with her extra weight, until they were hidden from prying eyes—and ears—by the wall. “Okay to come out now,” he told her.

  Ruth Ann scrambled out, both grateful for his quick thinking and irritated by the humor in his eyes. He chuckled, again stuffed his left arm into his pocket, then stepped forward and picked leaves out of her hair and off her shoulders, dropping them to the ground.

  She squinted at him. “What are you laughing at?”

  “Nothing.” He stepped back and sighed. “So, it’s your turn now.”

  “My turn?”

  “You ain’t aware that Doc’s been doing these operations for a while?”

  She shook her head.

  “He had to stop for a spell, on account of he took some man’s wife and daughters while he was away making a livin’ at a sawmill. Man hired a lawyer and made a big stink. Doc had to give ’em up and got real upset about it. I’m over at the office cleanin’ up the plantings one morning and I hear him shoutin’ at some swell about how did a damn maggot get himself an attorney? But then the swell tells him, calm down, find a medical reason to operate, and he’ll be fine. So Doc says okay, and he done started up again.”

  Ruth Ann wrapped her arms around herself. “He didn’t say there was any medical reason. I told him I was just fine, and he told me that was the problem. That my sort shouldn’t breed. That he’s gonna sterilize me.” A lump grew in her throat, hard to swallow. She figured maybe it was full of tears that just got stuck there in a clog. Could go up, couldn’t go down.

  Clarence got real still. Just looked at her with those rainwater gray eyes, his freckles marching in solemn columns across his sunburned nose and cheeks. He said nothing for a while. Then he looked down at her toe again and blew out a breath. “Ruthie, take off that shoe and give it here.”

  “I don’t care about the shoe! I need to get out of here, or I guess I need me a lawyer.”

  “One thing at a time. Now sit down and take off that shoe.” He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and went to a pail of water he had sitting near the wall, with a tin cup in it. He brought the cup, full of water, back to her and dipped the handkerchief into it. “Ruthie.” His voice was firm.

  Her face heated, and she shook her head. “My shoe…my foot…don’t smell so good.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “And you think mine do? Take it off.”

  “It’s fine.”

  “Jiminy Cricket, you are one stubborn wench.” Clarence reached forward and untied the laces. “Siddown, Ruth Ann.”

  Reluctantly, she did. Gently, he pulled off the horrible shoe, easing the burned, torn edges from around her hideous eggplant of a toe. “Good grief. What’d’ja do to it?”

  “Dropped a hot iron on it.”

  “Well, that were downright feebleminded of you.” He shot her a grin full of mischief and took her foot in his hand. It was warm and firm, and the kindness of his touch made the lump in her throat grow even larger.

  Clarence wrapped the wet, cool handkerchief around her toe after a brief examination of it. “It’s broke. You shouldn’t be walkin’ around on it.”

  “Like I have a choice.”

  “You ain’t gonna wanna hear this, but it needs to be lanced and drained.” He found a stray brick and set her foot gently on it.

  She shuddered.

  “You wanna lose it?”

  Ruth Ann shook her head.

  “Then you’d best let me do that. After, I’ll wrap it in a clean hanky. I got an idea for how to get you out of here, and when we do, I’ll give you my left shoe—you can’t use this one anymore.”

  “That’s senseless, Clarence—what shoe are you gonna wear?”

  “Don’t you worry. I got my eye on a pair.”

  “A pair where?”

  “There’s an old man in Distressed, on the ground floor, that don’t hardly get out of bed anymore. I feel bad for the fella, but he surely don’t need his shoes, and his feet are ’bout my size.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “They had me bring him a portable commode for next to his bed.”

  “You won’t get in trouble?”

  “Nah. Who’s been searchin’ under his bed for his shoes lately? Who remembers what they look like?”

  “Well…”

  “So, tomorrow, Wednesday. You and—what’s her name?”

  “Glory.”

  “Glory. You an’ Glory, you meet me back here tomorrow morning just after four a.m. with anything small you want to take with you. I’ll try to get you some extra bread. I’ll wheelbarrow you under the canvas to the dairy barn, where they load up them five-gallon milk jugs to take to the cheese plant. Lots of times they got sacks of seed or beans laying in the wagon, too. So you crawl in right next to them, and cover up with my canvas when he gets out to fetch the jugs. Lay flat as you can. He’ll likely be sleepy and won’t even notice. All right?”

  “That might just work.”

  “’Course it’ll work,” Clarence said, taking her foot again and peering down at it. “Just be quick, be quiet and be smart. Hide in back of the cheese plant all day, ’cause they’ll look for you. Don’t come out till night. Got it?”

  Ruth Ann nodded as he gingerly prodded her toe. She was afraid of discovery by someone at the cheese plant, but maybe they could crawl into a tool shed or something and tell each other stories to pass the time. Then they’d make their way to the main road and follow it to the street where Mr. and Mrs. Dade lived, with baby Annabel. She knew the layout of the house like the back of her hand, and they didn’t bother to lock doors.

  “There,” Clarence said with satisfaction. “It’s still kinda gross, but—”

  She looked down to see that her toe had wept a nasty liquid into his handkerchief and instantly shrunk to almost its normal size. Somehow, while they’d been talking, he must have punctured it! And she hadn’t felt a thing.

  “Ugh. How did you do that?” she demanded, torn between disgust and gratitude.

  “Magic,” he said, slipping a pen knife back into a pocket of his overalls. He smiled at her and patted her foot. “Keep it clean and wrapped, and startin’ tomorrow, in my big ol’ shoe. It’ll have room to heal, that way.”

  “I’d have kicked you if I’d known you were doin’ that.”

  “Yeah, I know. That’s why I didn’t tell you.” He laughed. The laughter lit his eyes, transforming his whole face and making him almos
t handsome.

  Some emotion she couldn’t name gripped her. “Smart man. Thank you. You’d make a real good doctor, Clarence.”

  He blushed, then snorted.

  “I mean that.”

  “Go on. Git back in the wheelbarrow. I got only one hand and not much brain, they say. So I’ll be a doctor as soon as you become first lady.”

  She was really going to miss Clarence.

  Ruth Ann slept hardly at all, her eyes flying open in alarm at the least creak or murmur or snore in the room. Since there were twenty-three other defective, degenerate or despairing girls in the room with her, this was about every seventy-four seconds.

  She yanked her scratchy woolen blanket up as far as she could and secured it under her chin. It would need to come with her. She’d instructed Glory to just put her work dress on over her nightgown, then cinch her apron tightly. They’d roll an extra pair of drawers into their blankets, along with an extra set of stockings.

  The only other things Ruth Ann planned to take were a toothbrush and a dog-eared photograph of Sheila on her wedding day. She looked impossibly young and glamorous; unrecognizable, and therefore even more precious. She was a fantasy momma, with wide eyes and a sweet smile that maybe Annabel would inherit. She couldn’t wait to see her darling girl.

  After this train of thought came an unrelenting procession of awful what ifs. What if Glory didn’t wake up? What if one of the other girls saw them sneak out? What if a board creaked so loudly that Mother Jenkins and all the bats in her behind awoke?

  What if the milkman got sick? What if the cows stampeded overnight and there was no milk for him to deliver? What if—

  Stop it. Just stop it. Count sheep.

  But her own unfortunate remark to Glory haunted her, and the first fluffy little lamb she conjured jumped straight into the slaughterhouse, bleating something fierce.

  At long last the infernal clock finally struck three in the morning. Ruth Ann sat up. She waited, listening for her bunkmate’s breathing. It was even and deep. All clear.

  She crept out of bed, pulled on her gray work dress and apron, shimmied into her stockings, eased into both her shoes. She wiggled her toe, surprised at just how much better it felt since Clarence had drained it. Then she rolled up the blanket around her few belongings and headed for the door.

  Outside, a cold white moon still hung in a lilac sky streaked with sleepy clouds. It was too late for crickets, too early for even the most ambitious bird. Glory didn’t come out of the opposite dorm right away. Had she gotten cold feet? Decided to report her to Mother Jenkins, instead?

  Finally, the dark figure of her friend slid out, easing the door closed behind her. “Sorry,” Glory whispered. “I thought one of the other girls might be awake. She sneezed. But I s’pose it must be possible to sneeze an’ still be asleep.”

  Ruth Ann tried to quell her jitters, laid a finger across her lips and motioned toward the ash pit. They hurried around back of the manse, where Doc Price and his cheerless wife lived. One hundred yards safe.

  They passed the little stone wishing well, the gazebo, the box hedge in the shape of a cross. Two hundred yards safe.

  Glory panted for breath beside her as they made it past the little duck pond. Almost to the wall that hid the ash pit. Three hundred yards safe!

  Then Ruth Ann saw a light flicker on in her peripheral vision. Top floor of the manse: servants’ quarters. Someone had seen or heard them.

  Ruth Ann’s pulse thundered in her ears. Her heart caught in her throat; her lungs quit on her. Her knees gave out and she sank to the ground as Glory kept running, unaware. She disappeared behind the wall as a frozen Ruth Ann fixated on the light.

  Who is it? What’s it mean? What’ll happen next?

  And then, by the grace of the good Lord, the light went out again.

  Ruth Ann wrapped her arms around herself and slumped forward, rocking, sick with relief.

  Something rustled beside her, igniting her panic once again. But then Clarence’s voice whispered, “It’s okay, Ruthie. It’s okay.” He found her hand in the darkness and pulled her to her feet. “C’mon, now. Your chariot awaits.”

  God bless the man. She could have kissed him.

  How Clarence, with his one hand, could possibly wheelbarrow them all the way to the dairy barn was little short of a miracle. But Clarence demonstrated daily that he could do most anything, and wheel them he did. It was some rough, bumpy going. Ruth Ann and Glory clung to each other not only out of nerves, but also so as not to knock heads.

  It took a good quarter hour, Ruth Ann reckoned, and not once did Clarence stop, cuss or complain. He just made steady progress and whistled on the way. At last he set them down, and with a shhhhhh! he went to scout any movement on the front side of the barn. Ruth Ann huddled against Glory, heart in her throat.

  Presently, they heard Clarence trudge back toward the wheelbarrow. He patted the side of it reassuringly and whispered, “Here ’e comes with the wagon.”

  They heard the rumble of the wheels, the steady beat of a horse’s hooves, the jingling of the harness as the driver pulled up outside the barn.

  “C’mon out,” Clarence said, under cover of the noise.

  Ruth Ann and Glory scrambled out as quietly as they could, though it was hardly a graceful process.

  “Get ready,” he instructed. “Once he’s inside to fetch the milk jugs, you make a run for the cart. I’ll be right behind you. Get flat on the grain bags right behind the seat. Flat. I’ll cover you with the canvas and a couple o’ the full bags. Move fast as you can.”

  At his signal, they hitched up their skirts and sprinted as if Mother Jenkins and all her bats were in hot pursuit. Clarence lifted two bags of grain and hefted them to the ground, the horse entirely uninterested in any of them. Ruth Ann threw herself bodily over the low, flat side of the wagon and burrowed down as far as she could into the remaining burlap bags of grain and seed. Glory did likewise.

  Then Clarence tossed the canvas over them, tucked it in at the edges and muttered an apology as he slapped the other two bags of grain over them, squashing the girls under their heavy weight. “You’ll be fine,” he murmured. “Slip off when he makes the first stop. It’ll be the Russell plant. Luck of the Irish to ya, Ruth Ann. Be well, Glory.” He lightly smacked the side of the wagon, and then he was gone.

  Within minutes, the driver could be heard wrestling heavy, five-gallon, tin milk jugs into the wagon, as the horse stood patiently. Thunk, scrape, grunt. Thunk, scrape, grunt.

  It was hot and suffocating under all the grain and canvas, but Ruth Ann and Glory didn’t dare move. The driver, by the grace of God, didn’t seem to notice anything amiss and climbed up into his seat. He took the reins, relieved himself of an impressive burp and then urged the horse forward. They were on their way to freedom.

  Ruth Ann held her breath, not only against the damp, musty, yeasty odor of the wagon and its contents, but out of exultation. She was on her way to get her daughter. She could almost feel the delicious warmth and weight of little Annabel in her arms: her baby, not Mrs. Dade’s. Hers and nobody else’s.

  And as for Doc Price? He wouldn’t get his scalpel anywhere near her female parts. This was her body, not his. Hers and not the state of Virginia’s.

  Five

  Ruth Ann’s heart beat in time to the rumble of the cart’s wheels, and her breath hitched with every lurch of the wagon. Her right cheek pressed against Glory’s left one.

  Again, the forced intimacy felt awkward and unwelcome, but she and Glory were in this together now, so it also felt right, if peculiar. They clung to each other and sweated in rhythm with the wagon’s progress, bathed in the morning’s humidity and the sweet-sour aroma of the milk jugs behind them. The sacks of grain piled on top of them were as heavy and unyielding as corpses.

  They were on their way to freedom. Annabel. A new life.

  Clip clop, clip clop, rumble, rumble, jiggle, sway, squeak. Clip, clop, clip, clop, rumble, rumble, sway, squeak. The
driver cleared his throat, hacking and gurgling to free his lungs, maybe of the previous night’s pipe fumes. Glory quivered silently beside her.

  The journey seemed to take forever, though in reality it took perhaps half an hour. At last they made a sharp right turn, the gravel under the wheels changed to soft earth and the rumbling of the cart subsided to mere squeaking.

  Ten yards? Twenty? And then the horse stopped. It expelled a grateful snort, the harness jingling as it did so.

  The driver climbed down from the wagon, and they heard his booted footsteps hit gravel again before they receded as he called out, “’Mornin’, Tommy!”

  “Hiya, Fred. Gonna be a scorcher.”

  “Sure is.”

  “Come on inside for the paperwork. Then we’ll getcha unloaded.”

  “Sure thing.”

  Boot steps echoed on wooden planks. A door complained as it was opened and shut.

  Ruth Ann wrestled with the bags of grain on top of them, succeeded in shoving them to one side and poked her head out. Fred and Tommy had gone inside a long, low wooden building silhouetted against the dawn light.

  “C’mon, Glory. We got to move. Now.”

  They struggled against more heavy bags, shoved them aside and wriggled out. Ruth Ann tugged out Clarence’s canvas, briefly wondering where he’d get another for his wheelbarrow and if anyone would notice this one was missing.

  Glory leaned against the side of the wagon, disheveled and panting. They took grateful drafts of the fresh morning air as the horse eyed them, unsurprised. It smelled ripe and salty; its chest was dark with sweat and its flanks steamed. Ruth Ann ventured a hand toward its velvety, warm muzzle and stroked it. “Thank you,” she whispered.

  The horse blinked and tossed its head as the girls hitched up their small bundles and ran for a large woodpile, visible behind the cheese-processing plant. They collapsed behind it and panted some more. Ruth Ann shot Glory a smile of triumph, ragged at the edges with disbelief.

  Had they really left behind the Virginia Colony for the Epileptic and Feebleminded?

  She shifted, pulled a rock out from under her backside and wiggled her toes in Clarence’s big shoe. It was an oversize slipper from a prince of a boy who had an even gaze pure as fresh rainwater. She would miss him.