“I’m . . . sorry,” I whispered to her back.
Aasta stopped with a halt, then turned slowly, her crossed arms dropped to the sides of her stained apron. Her eyebrows arched beneath her wrinkled forehead. “Sadie,” she whispered. “Did you say something? Or do I lose my blessed mind?”
I nodded. “I’m sorry,” I said again, this time the words coming out with more confidence.
Aasta’s blue eyes filled with tears, and she placed her warm hands on either sides of my face. “Eleven years. Eleven years since you was found. Eleven years since you say a word! Oh, the biggest miracle! A blessed miracle! I never thought to see this day. They say you once chattered like little sparrow before you—”
I reached for Aasta’s hand. I wanted to ask her more. Who’d told her about me once chattering? Someone from the boardinghouse? I tried to speak, but my words iced over. I mouthed Aasta’s name, but my words were frozen. Was I to lose the gift of speech as soon as it had come back? My head felt thick and spongy as deep moss and pain needled the back of my eyes.
At the edge of my vision, a man loomed closer in a three-piece, pinstriped suit. I edged closer to Aasta as E. W. Ennis drew near us.
His height and broad shoulders matched those of a draft horse. Eyes the color of sky-tinted snow peered down at me from a broad, pink-sunburned face and well-set Roman nose. His breath wafted the hairs of my scalp and his cologne pinched my nose as he gripped my elbow in his pliers-like hand, not hard, but firmly enough to know I wasn’t leaving without his say-so.
“Sadie Rose.” His voice was commanding, warm, and frighteningly deep.
His hand steadied me, and for a moment I was glad. My vision turned fuzzy, something that happened from time to time since I was found in the snow. The doctor had said I’d outgrow it someday. I could only hope.
“I just stepped in and couldn’t help but overhear. I’m not sure if I’m more stunned to find you here on Red Stone, posing as a maid, or that you have found your voice. I did hear you speak, isn’t that so?” He looked to Aasta, as if she would confirm his conclusions.
Unable to contain her smile, she clasped her hands and held the flat of her thumbs to her lips and nodded silently.
I felt unsteady. Nauseous. I knew he expected me to answer, but I was speechless.
“Aasta,” he continued, “I don’t think the Worthingtons would like to know that Sadie Rose is working here, would they?”
“No, but Mr. Ennis, your cook she asked me to help, so I think Sadie Rose can come with me, just for the day.”
“I see. I have no problem with your working here, Aasta, but I’m not sure that Walter and Elizabeth would like Sadie Rose acting like she needs to earn her keep. They have taken her in out of good Christian charity, not for her to be a servant.”
I didn’t understand why Mr. Ennis should be concerned if I helped out. Maybe he knew more than I did about the Worthingtons’ intentions. Perhaps they were considering adoption after all.
“People may question their generosity . . . wonder why she’s being forced to find paying work. It might not serve the senator well.”
“Ya. I see.” Aasta nodded.
“Escort her to the guest room on the north wing. We keep it open, for emergencies, someone gets sick, that sort of thing. And Sadie Rose,” he said, patting my shoulder, “you do look a little pale. I suggest you stay there—rest—until Aasta is finished here today.”
In the guest room of the Red Stone lodge, I napped and dreamed of a girl that was and wasn’t me.
From her cave in the snow, she waited for the wind to stop. In her muted shelter, she felt contained. Safe. But she knew she couldn’t stay long. She had to find her mama. She lifted her head for a quick look around. The jail building and meeting hall blended in with the white and whirling wind. And that’s when she saw her mama, sleeping, facedown on the snow-covered sidewalk, the drift covering her bare legs like a warm blanket. Move, the girl told herself. You must get to Mama! But she couldn’t move her fingers or toes, her arms or legs. Her whole body was immovable as stone.
When I woke up, I lifted a washcloth off my eyes and expected to be in my bedroom. But then I remembered. I’d been ushered at Mr. Ennis’s direction to the guest room. I lay with my head near the window, beneath a candy-striped blanket, and was startled to notice a young woman sitting across from me on the other twin bed.
Her hair was cut into a fashionable short bob, with waves of pale blonde falling toward green eyes. She was one of the two young women from the Emma Louise.
“Hi,” I heard myself say and lifted myself up on my elbow, amazed with the ease the word took shape and lifted into the air, but my head throbbed with the slightest movement, and I lay back down again.
“You’re not feeling well?” The young woman leaned forward, and I recognized the soft perfume and smell of fresh soap from earlier on the boat. “Aasta, that’s the woman’s name, yes? She told me you’re supposed to rest. So you’re the girl the Worthingtons took in years ago? I met you once, but I doubt you remember me—a Fourth of July party with lots of people. You were quite absorbed in a book, as I recall, as if nothing else in the world mattered.” She laughed, her voice sweet and clear—and a little too loud for my throbbing head—and chatted on.
“Well, you’re to be in my care until Aasta’s done with the banquet.” Unlike many well-to-do women, this young woman’s face was unusually tan from the summer sun. She apparently didn’t believe in living under parasols or indoors to protect an ivory complexion.
“I’m not sure I’m the best chaperone,” she said, with a wag of her finger, “but I’ll try.” She laughed and jumped up, her dress strikingly short—all the way up to her knees. She must have changed clothes on the island. Mrs. Worthington wouldn’t approve of her flapper style, but I envied how daring it looked. “I’m nineteen—only a few years older than you. So frankly, I’m not sure I’ll be the best influence on you. But I promised to look in on you.”
“Your name?” I asked, stunned again at my own voice, at its timbre and that it rose from my throat into real words.
“Trinity Baird,” she replied, then lifted an eyebrow into an exquisite arch. “But I always thought you didn’t speak. Guess I was wrong. So a little about me. I summer on a nearby island with my family, who, quite frankly, are dreadfully boring.”
She shrugged her shoulders. “Say,” she began, leaning closer conspiratorially, “maybe you and I—once you’re feeling better, that is—maybe we might try our hand at friendship. I have two older sisters, and when they come home to visit all they want to do is sip tea, embroider, and make plans for their weddings. Me? I just learned to dive this summer! And not just from the end of a dock, mind you, but from cliffs here on the lake. It makes your blood turn cold, but when you fall through the air for those thirty feet—it’s almost like flying.” She spoke briskly, and my head continued to tighten and pound, trying to keep up with her. With everything.
“Speaking of flying, you know that I met the Wright brothers in person, and Wilbur took me on a short spin? It was swell! I’m telling the God’s honest truth, even though when I was at the hospital they tried to tell me I’d just imagined it. But—oh. I see from your expression you probably don’t believe a word of what I’m saying, but I’m serious about the flying. And diving, too. Victor Guttenberg taught me.”
My mind caught on his name like a hook. How coincidental that I’d just met him.
“But, oh, maybe that kind of adventure doesn’t appeal to you at all. It’s just that I’ve heard rumors that you’re a little unusual, too, and well, I’m not exactly what my parents always want me to be either, and I thought—”
My eyelids felt heavy.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Trinity continued. “Here you’re not feeling well and I’m chitchatting away. But I’ve been so unbelievably bored, you cannot imagine. So do forgive me. A
nd my cousin who traveled north with me, well, you might as well put an anchor around my foot and drop me off the end of a boat. She’s just that much fun.”
I felt a smile spread across my face and I laughed, which made my head hurt more.
“Well, finally, a sign of life!” Trinity exclaimed, as if she were a midwife who had just wrestled an emerging baby from the womb and delivered it into the world of the living.
Chapter 7
Trinity left, and I drifted in and out of sleep. When the clattering of pots and dishes and the murmuring voices died away, and mosquitoes buzzed in their evening chorus outside the screen, Aasta returned.
“Sadie Rose,” she said, standing beside the bed. “It’s time we go home then.”
I eased my legs out from under the blanket and sat on the edge of the bed.
Aasta brushed the back of her hand across my forehead. “The steamer will be here soon.” As I began to stand, the sharp pain behind my eyes returned, and I squeezed my eyes shut.
“Sit. Let me rebraid your hair. It’s not good.” She undid my braid, then started over again, tightening the braid as she talked. “I feel bad you get such pain. Lucky Mr. Ennis didn’t get a doctor. Then word of your being here will fly like bird to Worthingtons. Now,” she said, standing and examining my appearance, “we better go, ya?”
Along with the other workers, we boarded the Emma Louise for the mainland. And as we settled on our bench and the steamer pulled into the open water, I looked back at Red Stone. On the island’s high western edge sat a black cannon. It appeared to be aimed directly at Falcon Island across the bay. The deckhand boy had been telling the truth after all.
I knit, mostly to please Aasta, and tried to imagine life on my own. In the past two days, I’d lived more than I had in the past eleven years. It was as if I’d been asleep and was for the first time awakening to the world around me.
As the steamer chugged across a quiet lake of golds and blues, seagulls hovered above the boat’s frothy wake. From the top deck, passengers flung chunks of bread, which seagulls caught in midair. I thought of some of the village children who would be grateful for extra bread . . . and I might easily have been one of them. The Worthingtons had scraped me off the streets. Every day under their roof, I’d felt I owed them for my very existence . . . but how could I ever repay such a debt?
I looped the thin yarn of blue wool over the tips of my knitting needles, adding to the stubby beginnings of a scarf. Aasta had heard me speak, and yet she sat there knitting, as if it hadn’t happened. We rode in silence and I was glad.
As we traveled west toward the descending sun, light threw shards on the water, blindingly bright. Everything was too sharp, too vivid. I let my eyes close and rested my head on Aasta’s shoulder.
A few passengers away, two kitchen women spoke. “Y’know, Dimples, the circus is coming next week. Gonna have to dip into my penny jar to take the kids.”
The woman named Dimples replied, “Oh, my kids would never forgive me if we didn’t go. It’s the highlight of our year!”
Eyes closed, my first and only circus played out before me. It was the summer after I’d been taken in. The Worthingtons drove their automobile—though it was surely close enough to walk—and parked in the field across from the railroad tracks. Smells of dung and sweat rose over the trampled, dusty dirt. Robinson’s Touring Circus returned every year by train, and villagers wore the anticipation on their faces of something exciting about to unfold. I’d gripped Mrs. Worthington’s hand as we were swept in with the crowd and past the ringmaster, who shouted, “Death-defying feats! Superb artists! The Wonders of the World brought to your door!”
But when a clown clomped toward our wooden bleacher, I became terrified. His shoes were too long, his nose too red, his white face and painted red smile too scary. I’d started crying, and Mrs. Worthington leaned over and said, “It’s just a clown, Sadie Rose. Clowns are friendly—and funny. He won’t hurt you.” And I had cried all the harder, until Mr. Worthington, who sat on the opposite side, eventually backhanded my head. “Stop that. This is a circus. None of that blubbering now. We’re going to enjoy ourselves.”
And I’d stopped, stinging from his reprimand. But despite the lone elephant doing its tricks on a small green platform, despite the vendors selling popcorn and peanuts, despite the glittering trapeze artists swaying overhead from ring to ring and bringing “Oohs” and “Ahhhs” from the audience, despite the ballerina-style riders in sequins and pink ribbons on white horses . . . all I wanted was to go home. After that, with each passing year, I’d stayed away.
But this year could be different.
As the steamer neared Ranier’s docks, I already knew who might be the perfect companion. Trinity. Our new wall phone at the cottage was a party line. Islanders did not have such conveniences. But I could post a letter and send it to her. Perhaps she would reply via the mail boat. A thrill danced through me.
When we returned, I sat with Aasta and Hans in the kitchen.
“Sadie,” Hans said, “Aasta tells me you can talk.”
I smoothed my floral cotton dress across my thighs and nodded. “Yes,” I said softly.
He jumped up, pulled out his chair, and with one hand on the chair back, danced a little jig around the chair. “That’s wonderful! I knew you could. I always say to Aasta, just you wait and see. Someday, someday!”
“Hans, settle yourself,” Aasta scolded. “You scare Sadie when you act like silly child.”
Hans sat down and exaggeratedly folded his hands in his lap and bowed his head.
I chuckled.
And then Hans started to laugh and Aasta joined in as well. There were few times when I could remember enjoying their company as much. Even so, the day left me exhausted, and I excused myself to my bedroom.
The next day, as Aasta was doing lunch dishes and Hans was busily repairing a lamp, Victor Guttenberg came knocking. At the sound, I rose from the piano just as Aasta opened the swinging door from the kitchen. “I’ll answer,” I whispered.
Aasta smiled back, and I knew she was as happy to hear my voice as I was to use it. But now with Victor, I clammed up, unsure that I could trust my voice, and grabbed my slate board and chalk.
Aasta—bless her—returned to the kitchen.
“Good morning, Sadie Rose,” Victor said from the other side of the screen door. “Is Mr. Worthington at home?”
I shook my head, then wrote on the slate board. “He will return Friday evening.”
“Oh, I thought—I heard there was a meeting yesterday on Red Stone, and I assumed . . . Sorry to disturb you. Friday then.” He turned and strode down the walkway to the dock, where his canoe was tied.
A train rumbled as it started across the lift bridge.
With an impulse new to me, I followed him to the dock. He undid the ropes from the cleats, stepped lightly into his canoe, and pushed off.
Then he looked at me, standing above on the dock. What did I want? I couldn’t name it. But an urgency built in my chest.
“What is it?”
My shoulders scrunched up. I opened my mouth to speak, but my voice was gone. I shook my head and turned to the slate crooked in my arm. I scribbled the words quickly. I turned the board to show him what I’d written.
A fish stirred the water at the dock’s end.
He read it aloud, squinting, “Ah, what does that say? Can I—um—come with you?” Then he studied me, from my bare toes and navy skirt, to the crisscrossed ties of my ivory blouse. “With me?” he asked, tilting his head.
I nodded.
“I’m not sure I should say yes, but why should I say no, either?” he mused aloud. “And you don’t speak?”
I didn’t move but held myself in check, afraid at what I’d begun. What if he misread my intentions? And what were my intentions? Yet there was something about Victo
r that made me trust him. As if he belonged to no particular class, no particular group, but moved through life as a genuinely free person.
“Your parents aren’t home,” he said, dropping his voice to just above a whisper, apparently understanding that voices travel across water. A conversation on the lake could be heard a far distance away. “And I don’t want to get you in trouble. So tell me. Why do you want to join me?”
I wondered if Aasta and Hans were watching me now from the house. If so, with the train’s clanking and droning as it crossed into Canada, they wouldn’t be able to hear Victor. More likely, they weren’t watching at all.
With the hem of my skirt, I brushed away the white chalk from the board and wrote again. “To leave here and canoe for a few hours only.” This time I wrote smaller, the letters tight and sharply cursive.
“Fair enough,” he said. “And I need to practice my arguments. I’ll make you a deal, Sadie Rose. You sit in the bow and pretend to listen. If you do that, I’ll paddle until you say to turn back.”
He paddled back alongside the dock and motioned me in. “Now, keep your weight low and centered, or you’ll tip us.”
When I’d settled on the cane seat, facing the bow, Victor began to whistle a tune from behind. I sat, head high, and gripped the sides of the birch-bark canoe.
“Do you swim?” he asked.
I glanced back and shrugged. I swam, but I was sure I wasn’t the kind of swimmer Trinity must be with her ability to dive off tall cliffs.
“Well, then, I’ll do my best to keep us upright. If we should go over, just grab for the canoe. But I’ll try to be just like the Voyageurs. You know, the Hudson Bay Company used to hire men who couldn’t swim—figured they’d take fewer risks that way with valuable cargo.”
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