Finest Kind

by Lea Wait

  “Agreed, Dr. Theobold,” said Mr. Holbrook.

  “And could you make certain the stove on the fourth floor is lit? The baby needs warmth as well as rest. Perhaps your wife could find her a little gruel later on.”

  “Of course. Jake, would you show Mr. and Mrs. Burke to their room?”

  Jake nodded. The way Mr. Holbrook spoke he could have been asking Jake to show them to a suite at a fine Boston inn.

  As they walked up the stairs, he heard Dr. Theobold instructing Mr. Holbrook to definitely move Thomas Wilson from the lowest floor to one higher, and to give him a cough potion every three hours.

  Jake went to get wood for the stove on the fourth floor, and to tell Mrs. Holbrook that tea was requested. It was good news for everyone that the Burke family did not have cholera.

  30

  Nabby was waiting for Jake as he passed her house on his way home from the jail.

  “Thank you for going with me last night,” she said. “I’ve smiled all day thinking about what we did.”

  “I have too. Even Dr. Theobold was talking about it at the jail today. He said those troublemakers must have had a lot to drink because they’re telling people the devil spoke and threw stones at them!”

  “As long as they leave Granny alone, I don’t care what they say.”

  Violet and Zeke were running in circles around the house. Most of Violet’s hair had come unbraided, and both she and Zeke were barefoot. Jake hoped he wouldn’t outgrow his own boots. He wouldn’t want to go barefoot in November.

  But the two little ones didn’t seem to care. “Jake! You left us apples as a surprise! Are you going to bring us more apples? Apples are my favorite.” Violet tried to look coy but ended up giggling, as Zeke punched her lightly.

  “I remember,” said Jake. “Why don’t you all bring some baskets and we’ll go to the orchard and pick more before it’s dark. In a few days they’ll freeze, or rot on the ground. My mother’s dried as many as we’ll need, and I’ve already stored five barrels of them in our cellar.”

  “Can Simon come too?” asked Zeke.

  “Of course. Where is he?” asked Jake.

  “He’s helping me layer branches around our house for winter,” said Nabby. “Violet, you get the two baskets in the kitchen, and, Zeke, there are sacks we can use in the storeroom. Simon!”

  “Is Simon living here now?” asked Jake.

  “No. Usually by November he sleeps in the stable at the tavern and does odd jobs for people in town. He was in town yesterday when he heard the men plotting about Granny. He came to tell me, and then stayed here last night. Today he’s helping me with chores. Most likely he’ll return to town tonight. See,” she pointed, “we’ve been weaving boughs of spruce and pine around the base of the house.”

  “Why?” asked Jake. Granny had piled branches around her house too, he remembered.

  “When it snows, the branches will hold the snow and keep the winds from blowing through the clapboards. In spring we’ll take the branches away, and the ground around the house will be warm and ready for the lupine and black-eyed Susans that grow there in summer. Simon!” she called again. “Come with us and pick apples. You can take some with you!”

  Simon had been in back of their house. He ran toward them, as though he were a child. Bits of pine stuck to his hair and shirt. “That would be fun! Are Violet and Zeke coming too?”

  “They are. They went to get us baskets and bags to put the apples in,” said Nabby. “You remember Jake, don’t you?”

  Simon nodded. “Jake is your friend.”

  “That’s right. He went with me last night to help Granny. You were very smart to tell me what those men were saying.”

  “They were saying bad things about Granny.” Simon looked at the ground for a moment. “Sometimes they say bad things about me. It is hard to be brave.”

  “You’re right,” said Nabby. “Sometimes it is very hard. But you have to at least pretend. If people think you’re brave, then they won’t bother you.”

  “I try, Nabby.”

  “I know you do.” She turned to Jake. “Was your mother pleased with Granny’s cure for your friend?”

  “She was doubtful, but she said the friend might try it.”

  “Is someone sick?” asked Simon.

  Jake hesitated. Was one more person to know? “A friend of mine, Simon. Granny gave me some medicine that might help him. But”—he turned to Nabby— “remember? She said to add the Oswego tea leaves to white wine. We have no wine, and even if we had money, the tavern wouldn’t sell it to me.”

  “You’re not old enough,” agreed Nabby.

  “Some people drink too much. Like those bad men last night,” said Simon. “I don’t drink whiskey or wine.”

  “That’s wise, Simon,” said Nabby. Violet and Zeke handed them each a basket or sack and then raced on, heading for Jake’s orchard. Nabby and Simon and Jake followed them. “But if the wine would help your friend . . . then you need it. Maybe your father could stop at the tavern on his way home from the mill.”

  “Father’s gone to the woods lumbering,” said Jake. “We don’t know when he’ll be back.”

  “Can wine be like medicine?” said Simon.

  “Some say so,” said Nabby. “Granny said when someone has fits, then the wine was important.”

  “I’ll save my money, and when Father is home, I’ll ask him to get the wine,” said Jake. “I wish he’d come home soon.”

  “Wishes are like daytime dreams,” said Nabby. “If you hope hard enough, then sometimes the way to get your wish becomes clear.”

  “I have dreams,” said Simon. “I dream about living in a real house some day, like I did when I was little.”

  “I dream about being safe, and warm, and not having to worry so much. And—having a red Sunday dress!” Nabby stopped. “And you, Jake?”

  “I want my family together again,” said Jake. “And enough money not to worry about food and fire and medicine.” A year ago he would have taken those things for granted.

  31

  Jake was at the jail three days later when Mr. and Mrs. Burke were told they could leave.

  “You’re all fine,” said Dr. Theobold, after checking each one of them to be sure. “I see no reason you shouldn’t head on to Bangor. There’s a stage this afternoon. After I check the prisoners, I’ll drive you to town myself.”

  “We greatly appreciate your help,” said Mr. Burke. “Not only in giving Erin medicine to calm her stomach, but in getting us away from those people who were so set upon our being ill. The good Lord knows, we are thankful not to have cholera. It’s a horrible disease.”

  “It is, indeed,” agreed the doctor. “We’re lucky Maine has escaped for the most part so far. But with so many vessels sailing here from across the Atlantic, we won’t be lucky forever.”

  “At least this was not the time,” said Mrs. Burke, holding Erin close.

  “On the chance there are people in town who still question your health, I hope you’ll allow me to keep you company until the stage leaves,” said Dr. Theobold.

  “We would be honored,” said Mr. Burke.

  Dr. Theobold went down to see his other patients. Jake added enough wood to the stove to keep it burning while the doctor saw the other prisoners. “Have you come far?” he asked Mr. Burke.

  “From Ireland,” Mr. Burke replied. “Erin was born on the seas. I wanted to call her Atlantic, but my good wife insisted she be named after my mother, who wasn’t able to make the journey.”

  Erin made a gurgling sound that no doubt meant she was happy not to have been named Atlantic.

  “Another woman on the crossing named her son Ocean,” said Mrs. Burke.

  “Erin’s a good name,” said Jake. “I wish you well on your journey.”

  “Thank you. My oldest brother is in Bangor,” said Mr. Burke. “He wrote that there are lumbering jobs in the north of Maine.”

  “My father is lumbering.”

  “In this great land the
re are so many trees there will never be an end to lumbering,” said Mr. Burke. “In Ireland there were too many people, and too few possibilities. My wife and I came here to start over.”

  “Starting over can be difficult,” said Jake.

  “Nothing worthwhile is simple,” said Mr. Burke.

  “Jake! Come down here!”

  “Pleased to talk with you. And a fair journey.” Jake ran down the stairs. Sheriff Beals was talking with Mr. Holbrook in the entryway of the jail. Behind him, hands chained, was Simon.

  “Hello, Jake!” Simon said. “Now I have a friend here.”

  “Jake, would you check to see if one of the cells on the second floor is ready? We have a new prisoner.”

  32

  “Simon!” Jake blurted. “What are you doing here? Why is Simon chained?”

  “Caught him stealing from Whittier’s Tavern,” said Sheriff Beals.

  Dr. Theobold joined them. “Simon, are you all right?”

  “My wrists hurt,” said Simon. “And I’m hungry.”

  “We all know Simon. Perhaps there’s been a misunderstanding,” said Dr. Theobold.

  “Afraid not, Dr. Theobold.”

  “But Simon’s slept in the tavern stable for years. Sometimes they even allow him to sleep in the kitchen where it’s warmer. He’s never stolen anything.”

  “He did this time. Took a bottle of wine from the kitchen and tried to hide it under his shirt,” said Sheriff Beals.

  Jake gasped. A bottle of wine?

  “Simon, what were you going to do with the wine?” said Dr. Theobold. “I’ve never known you for a drinking man.”

  “I don’t drink wine,” Simon agreed.

  “Then why did you take the bottle?”

  Simon looked at Jake, and smiled. “For medicine. For a friend.”

  “Did someone ask you to steal the wine?” questioned Dr. Theobold.

  “No one asked. I did it all myself.”

  Jake couldn’t hold his tongue any longer. “The wine was for me, wasn’t it Simon? For my friend.”

  Simon nodded. “For you, Jake. For a surprise. But the sheriff took it away.”

  The men turned to Jake. “Why was Simon getting you a bottle of wine?”

  Jake had to make them understand. “It was for someone I know who’s sick. Granny McPherson gave me some leaves she said I should soak in white wine, as medicine. But I didn’t have any white wine to use, and Simon knew that.”

  Mr. Holbrook looked at him doubtfully. “You’re sure the wine was for a friend? I can’t have anyone working in the jail who’s a drunkard.”

  “I don’t drink! I’m only twelve!”

  “Age never stopped some in this town,” sniffed Sheriff Beals.

  “Would you take those chains off Simon?” asked Dr. Theobold. “Sheriff, Simon was trying to help Jake. Surely you don’t need to lock him up.”

  “He stole a bottle of wine. He’s got to do his time.” Sheriff Beals unlocked the chains on Simon’s wrists. “Don’t you think of going anywhere, Simon. You’re still in my custody.”

  “Yes, Sheriff.” Simon shook his hands in the air to loosen their cramping from the chains.

  “You know the wine wasn’t yours and you shouldn’t have taken it,” said Sheriff Beals.

  “But there were crates of wine at the tavern. They didn’t need it all,” Simon explained.

  “It wasn’t yours, Simon,” said the sheriff.

  “I know. And you took it away, so now I can’t give it to Jake.” Simon looked sadly at Jake. “I’m sorry. I tried to help.”

  “It wasn’t his fault!” said Jake. “You’re not really going to put him in jail are you?”

  “Two months is the sentence for stealing,” said Sheriff Beals. “I can’t make exceptions, or we’d have half the town stealing wine and whatever else they wanted.”

  “But we all know Simon is a little slow,” said Dr. Theobold.

  “Simon admitted he took the wine. He knew it wasn’t his. We can’t excuse the feebleminded any more than we can excuse a lunatic who kills someone because the moon is full.”

  They were all silent.

  Sheriff Beals was stern. “Simon, you’re going to have to spend two months here at the jail, so you’ll remember not to take what isn’t yours.”

  Simon nodded. “I’m going to stay here. Can I have some food? I’m hungry.”

  “Jake, go and get that cell ready,” said Mr. Holbrook. “And then ask Mrs. Holbrook for some food for our newest prisoner.”

  Jake swallowed hard and headed upstairs to ready Simon’s cell. When he got there, he kicked the door. Hard. It wasn’t fair that Simon was being punished for trying to help him. It just wasn’t fair.

  33

  “Can Simon have visitors?” Jake asked after Sheriff Beals and Dr. Theobold had left.

  “Depends on who. He’s got no family around here that I know of.”

  “He must have had family once.”

  “He grew up over near the mill. Sad situation. His mother died when he was little, and his father couldn’t handle a child who was slow. Simon didn’t learn to talk until he was three or four.”

  “Where is his father now?”

  “Took off for the West when Simon was six or seven, and left Simon behind. No family wanted to take in a child like that, so he grew up in the poorhouse.”

  “How awful,” said Jake.

  “Makes you wonder about a man who’d father a child like Simon and then not stay around to pay for his mistake.”

  “Why doesn’t Simon live in the poorhouse now?”

  “He’s a grown man; he does chores for folks in town and earns enough to keep himself Maybe not keep himself the way you or I would want to live, but people like him don’t know any better.”

  Simon did know better. His dream was to live in a house.

  “Could Nabby come to visit him?”

  “We don’t allow children to visit the jail. Not even when their ma or pa is staying here. A prison isn’t any place for a child.” Mr. Holbrook paused. “You work here, though, and there’s no reason you can’t talk to him. I suspect Simon’ll be as lonely as any man in that cell.”

  “In jail? How can the Sheriff have put him in jail for two months?” asked Nabby. “It isn’t fair. Simon doesn’t see life the way other people do.”

  “The sheriff said he understood well enough,” said Jake. “He heard that I needed a bottle of wine, and he tried to help me.”

  “Simon always wants to please people.”

  “Every time I look at him in that cell I feel guilty. If only I hadn’t mentioned the wine.”

  “You didn’t know what he’d do,” said Nabby.

  “Two months is a long time. He’ll be there until 1839,” said Jake. It was already the middle of November.

  “Have you caught anything in your traps?” asked Nabby. She had explained to Jake how to set the wooden traps, and he was using the little dried corn he had left as bait.

  “Two squirrels,” said Jake. “It wasn’t fun to clean them. But Mother made them into a tastier stew than she’d imagined.”

  “Stew is good, but remember to put a little salt on the meat and hang it in your chimney to smoke when you can,” advised Nabby. “That way you’ll have meat when snows are deep.”

  “Setting the traps and checking them, and then cleaning the animals, all takes so much time. How do you manage it all?”

  “Someone has to. I’ll be glad when Violet and Zeke can be of more help. They check the traps for me, and tell me when we’ve caught something, but I don’t trust them with sharp knives. Perhaps in another year, when they’re six.”

  Six, Jake thought. Frankie is six, but he’ll never use a knife.

  Though he had swallowed a bit of squirrel stew.

  “I keep forgetting to ask, Nabby. Where do you get your wool for knitting? Mother would like to knit socks for winter.”

  “Alice Chase, who lives farther down the Alna Road, gives me her worn knitted goods
, and I unravel them and knit from those. I have some yarn I haven’t knit up yet. Could your mother use it?”

  “She would, I’m sure. Thank you.”

  Nabby ran into her house and came out with two skeins of yarn, each lengths of different colored yarns knotted together. “I have another I’m going to use to knit socks for Simon. You said the jail is cold. But your mother can use these two.”

  Jake wondered what Mother would think of this yarn of many colors. Nevertheless, wool socks would be welcome. Every day now was colder than the one before. This morning he’d seen a spider web frozen in the corner of the privy.

  34

  “Simon?” Jake made sure Mr. Holbrook was occupied with one of the other prisoners before he knocked on Simon’s cell door. “I got you an extra piece of bread from the kitchen.” He slipped it through the little opening at the bottom of the cell door.

  “Thank you, Jake. I like bread.”

  “Nabby can’t come to see you, but she and Violet and Zeke wanted me to tell you they’re thinking about you.”

  “I think about them, too.” Jake could hear Simon chewing the bread. “I think about all the streets in Wiscasset, and the people who live there. I look through the window with the bars and I see birds. I think about what they see, and where they are flying.”

  Jake leaned against the cell door. “Where do you think the birds are going?”

  “To special bird places. To see their friends.” He paused. “I have a lot of friends.”

  “Yes, you do, Simon.” No one had come to visit Simon.

  “Do you have lots of friends too?” asked Simon.

  “I have you, and Nabby. I know boys in Boston.” Boys he hadn’t taken the time to write to, Jake realized. How could he tell them about the life he was leading now, trapping squirrels for food and emptying slop pails from jail cells? “I’ll be going to school soon. I’ll meet people there. Did you ever go to school?”

  “When I was little. Children laughed at me. They were nice when I helped them do their chores, but at school they made fun of me and pushed me down in the mud. So I didn’t go to school anymore.”