A Family Apart

by Joan Lowery Nixon

  Katherine smiled at Andrew so warmly that Frances felt a stab of jealousy. Why should I feel this way? she asked herself. All she understood was that she liked having Andrew squeezed on the bench so close that she could feel the warmth of his arm against hers. Frances’s face began to burn, and she turned toward the window, letting the cold breeze sting her skin.

  “We’re slowing down!” someone yelled, and the children rushed to fill any available window.

  “Everyone stay put,” Andrew announced. “This will be a quick stop, and I’m not about to leave one of you behind.”

  It didn’t take long for the men at the station to load stacks of wood on the open car behind the engine and to swing a pipe down from a large tank to fill the boiler with water. Andrew emerged from the building with a covered pail and dashed to the steps just as the train began to move.

  Bread and cheese were handed around to the children, and they took turns drinking the warm milk from two metal cups which Andrew produced.

  As the train rushed on, the children shouted out at each new sight. By evening heads were nodding, some of the shrillest voices had quieted, and many of the children had fallen asleep. Those who were awake sat in the aisle or leaned against the benches, listening to the tales told by a young army officer and the gentleman who was seated next to him.

  “You were really attacked by Indians?” Frances gasped as the gentleman finished speaking.

  “Twice,” he said.

  The army officer smiled. “Have you ever heard of the Overland Stage Line?”

  There was silence. Some of the children shook their heads. But Mike spoke up. “Stagecoaches, like in the dime novels!”

  The officer laughed. “This is Mr. Ben Holladay, who has been called by some the ‘Stagecoach King,’ and I am Captain Joshua Taylor of the United States Army.”

  “Don’t you carry a gun?” Mike asked.

  “When I’m traveling I keep it in my satchel.”

  “Are you going back to the West?” Mike asked.

  “Mr. Holladay is going to St. Louis, and I’m being sent to Fort Leavenworth in Kansas,” the captain said.

  “To fight Indians?” Danny asked, his eyes wide.

  “No,” Captain Taylor said, “but I’ll tell you a story about the first time I fought Indians.”

  Frances hadn’t even noticed when the conductor had lit the lantern in their railcar. Now she was surprised to find the train stopping at another station. Its platform was well lit with a number of whale-oil lanterns.

  “Where are we?” Frances asked.

  “In Buffalo,” Andrew said.

  “Buffalos?” Danny’s voice was awed. “Are we in the West then?”

  “Not yet,” Andrew told him. “We’re still in the state of New York. We’ve got a long ride ahead of us.”

  When the train stopped, some of the adult passengers walked up and down the aisle for exercise. A few got off the train. Two women opened a hamper and brought out a meal, which they ate.

  Frances took her seat and stared from the window. People milled about the train. Women in full skirts and warm capes and men bundled into greatcoats with scarves around their necks to shield against the cold night air stood next to trunks and traveling cases. Then Frances noticed a black man being led past the train by two men who carried guns with long black barrels. Flickers of light sparked from the wide metal cuffs that dug into the man’s wrists and were attached to the chains one captor was holding.

  “Oh, no!” Frances cried, jumping to her feet. “What are they doing to that poor man?”

  Captain Taylor joined her at the window. “The man must be a slave,” he said. “He probably tried to run away and is being returned to his owner. Do you know what a slave is?”

  The slave’s shoulders slumped as though every hope had been squeezed from his body. Frances ached for him. “Yes,” she whispered. “I know. I wish he had escaped. This is a Free State. He should have got away.”

  “It wouldn’t have helped,” Captain Taylor said. “A few years ago Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act, which means that officials and citizens of Free States are required to aid in capturing runaway slaves and restoring them to their rightful owners.”

  “That’s not fair!” Frances blurted out.

  “But it’s the law, son,” the captain said. “As good citizens we must uphold the law.”

  “Those men didn’t look like good citizens to me.”

  Nearby a woman commented loudly, “They probably weren’t, not if they were bounty hunters.”

  “What are bounty hunters?” Frances asked.

  “They’re men who make a living hunting runaway slaves,” the captain said.

  The woman sniffed. “It doesn’t seem right to me that those dreadful men can go into Free States chasing down slaves. Two of those bounty hunters once pushed their way onto our place in Ohio, and my husband had to run them off with a shotgun. Like to scared me to death.”

  The train started up in its usual bumping fashion. It was late and dark, with only the dim light from the swinging lantern casting wild, moving shadows across the car. As Frances stared out at the landscape, she could see clustered lights of houses that winked through the night. Then the lights became more scattered, until finally there was nothing outside the train but a black, empty world without moonlight or stars.

  Frances shifted under the weight of Petey’s head on her lap and leaned against the wooden frame of the window, closing her eyes. Megan sniffled beside her, and she reached over to take her hand.

  “I keep thinking about what Andrew said,” Megan whispered, “about how people don’t take all the children in a family. We’re going to be sent to different homes. It frightens me. Does it frighten you, too?”

  “Yes,” Frances said, keeping her voice low. “It does.”

  “I don’t want to think about being parted from you,” Megan said. “We’ve always been together.”

  Frances squeezed Megan’s hand. “Maybe we won’t be parted. Maybe someone will say, ‘We want all those fine Kelly children!’ And they’ll take us to their house—a big white house with green—no, blue—shutters, and they’ll have a horse for Petey to ride and—”

  Megan interrupted. “None of your dreams now, Frances. Dreams are just pretending, and you know they don’t come true.”

  “I wish this one could.” Frances groaned. “Oh, if only Ma hadn’t—”

  But Megan interrupted, her voice breaking. “Please don’t talk about Ma now. I miss her too much.”

  They were silent for a few minutes, and soon Megan fell asleep, her head resting heavily on Frances’s shoulder. One of the smaller children in the car was crying, and Frances could hear Katherine’s low, comforting murmur. Before long the only sounds in the car were the creaks and groans of the wooden seats and the clatter of iron wheels against the rails, all of which flowed into a steady rhythm. Soon Frances was sound asleep.

  7

  “WAKE UP, FRANKIE. I want to go home.”

  Frances awoke stiff and tired as Petey buried his face in her neck, whimpering, “I want Ma!”

  “I want Ma, too! Are we ever going to see Ma again?” Peg wailed.

  “There, now,” Frances soothed, “of course we are.” But she kept her eyes downcast, unable to meet theirs. How could she tell them this when she didn’t believe it herself? Every turn of the train’s wheels took them farther and farther away from Ma. Frances tried to smile, to bolster their spirits, because she was in charge. The others mustn’t know that she felt like crying, too.

  Frances looked up, feeling Megan’s appraising eyes upon her.

  Megan brushed back her long, dark hair and whispered, “What will happen to us, Frankie?”

  “Why—we’ll find good homes. We’ll have new families and good food and warm beds,” Frances parroted. She reached across Petey and gripped her sister’s hand. “Oh, Megan,” she whispered, “I honestly don’t know what will happen.”

  One of the younger boys fell into the a
isle and let out a yell. At the sound of it another child began to cry.

  “Can’t someone shut those urchins up!” Mr. Crandon bellowed as the train lurched into motion.

  “They’re only children,” a woman snapped at him.

  Mr. Crandon puffed up like a pigeon guarding the only crumb of bread. “Madam, we are entitled to as much peace and quiet as this railroad company can provide.”

  “I’m sorry.” Andrew raised his voice over the din. “We’ll feed the children at the next stop, and I can guarantee that will help the situation.”

  “If you can’t control them—” Mr. Crandon began.

  But Mike suddenly jumped into the aisle and shouted to the older children, “Hey there, chums! How about a bit of music?” He cupped his hands together and held them against his lips, creating a lively, nasal music as he hummed, and to the music he danced a few wild steps of a jig.

  The children who had been crying stopped to stare, then broke into laughter as Mike leaped to click his heels together, lost his balance, and sprawled in the aisle.

  Frances saw the twinkle in Mike’s eyes and knew he had taken the fall on purpose.

  “More! More!” Petey shouted.

  So Mike pranced and danced with his odd music, and when some of the older children recognized a tune, they joined in, singing the words. Frances knew “The Irish Washerwoman” and “Old Dog Tray,” and when Mike began “Oh! Susanna,” some of the adults on the car began to sing, too, Captain Taylor’s deep baritone as loud as Andrew’s.

  Suddenly, with a jolt that tossed Mike sideways onto Katherine’s lap, the train shook and rattled to a screeching stop.

  “Good work,” Katherine murmured to Mike as she helped him regain his balance.

  Captain Taylor stretched forward to shake Mike’s hand and said, “A wise choice of action, son.”

  Frances was proud of Mike. He’d been able to make them all forget their aches and fears. Ma would have been proud of Mike, too, if she could have seen him.

  Her thoughts were interrupted by the frantic cry of “Fire!”

  The conductor threw open the door of the passenger car. “Sparks from the train set a brushfire!” he shouted. “All able-bodied males are needed to help put it out!”

  “Come on!” Mike grabbed Frances’s arm and tugged her into the aisle. “ ‘All able-bodied males,’ ” he wickedly muttered under his breath. “That means you, too!”

  “Don’t be frightened, boys.” Andrew stopped Frances with a firm grip on her shoulder and handed her a wet feed sack as she leapt from the railroad car. “It’s not uncommon for sparks to set small brushfires. Just take this sack and join the others.”

  Deep orange and scarlet flames crawled and crackled through the burning grass, and yellow smoke rose in choking clouds.

  Most of the men and boys had poured from the train, grabbed the wet sacks, and were slapping them at the smoldering grass. Frances, hands shaking with terror, copied their actions. Working hard, slamming her dripping sack on the flames, dipping it over and over into the bucket and slamming it again, she was soon absorbed in beating back the low spurts of flame.

  “Look out! You’re on fire!”

  Frances jumped, but it was Amos Crandon Mike meant.

  Mr. Crandon froze with fear as the back of his shirt-tail burst into flame.

  “Your shirt, man! Pull it off!” Andrew shouted and began to run toward Mr. Crandon.

  But Mike was faster. He dove toward the backs of Mr. Crandon’s knees. Mr. Crandon bent in two and fell over Mike, sitting down hard. Mike scrambled on top of the man and pushed him on his back, rolling him over and flinging himself across him.

  Mike sat up and examined the scorched shirt. “Fire’s out,” he announced happily.

  Mr. Crandon angrily sputtered, “How dare you push me to the ground? You ought to be whipped!”

  Frances wanted to defend Mike but was too furious to do anything but sputter. She was glad that Andrew seemed as surprised as Mike by Mr. Crandon’s outburst. She caught her breath as Andrew spoke up: “Your shirt was on fire. Mike put it out and kept you from getting burned.”

  Mr. Crandon glared at Andrew. He brushed the dirt from his clothes and, muttering to himself, unaware that two large spots of very pink skin were showing through holes in his trousers, stomped to the train.

  Andrew patted Mike’s shoulder, and Frances said, “You did the right thing, Mike.” But it wasn’t at Mike that she was looking. Andrew was a fine man, a really good and kind man like Da. Oh, how Frances yearned to be called Frances Mary again!

  “On board, everybody,” the conductor yelled as he collected the dirty, charred feed sacks. “Fire’s out. Get back on board so we can get under way.”

  “After this train ride is over,” Mike muttered to Frances as they climbed the steps to their car, “I hope I’ll never see ol’ Crandon again!”

  The train rattled its way west, stopping every twenty-five miles or so for water and wood. Frances gazed dreamily out over the open hills, the dim forests, the tidy squares of farmland, and the rippling, gray-gold grass-lands. The train crossed trestles and bridges and passed towns that all began to look alike to Frances. Occasionally she’d wonder if this type of farm or that kind of house would be like the one where she’d live. Sometimes she’d just sit back, her arm around Petey, and let herself be rocked by the steady rhythm of the rackety wheels that clattered over and over, “New life, new life, new life.”

  “But I don’t want a new life,” Frances murmured to herself.

  “Mike and I are going to be together,” Danny came to tell Frances.

  Terror showed in his eyes though, and Frances said what she knew he wanted to hear: “There’s a very good chance you will be.”

  “The people who adopt the children—are most of them kind, do you think?” Megan whispered so softly that Frances could hardly hear her.

  “I’m sure they are,” Frances said. “Why else would they come?”

  “That’s a good question,” Mike said, “and I haven’t found an answer to it yet. Just why would anyone want us?”

  Frances put on a brave face and even managed a laugh. “Because we’re a fine lot, we are, and those who get us will be lucky! That’s why!”

  For the moment they were content, but Frances’s heart ached as she realized her words meant nothing. If she was saying only what they wanted to hear, was that what Katherine and Andrew were doing, too?

  Days became nights, and nights broke into early daylights with passengers so stiff they grimaced as they stretched their legs and rubbed their arms and necks. The children and the other passengers dozed, ate, and talked. Occasionally conversation in the car grew lively, especially when the topic turned to politics and the pros and cons of slavery. Frances listened and soaked up the words when someone echoed what Da had told her.

  The children changed to another train in the massive Chicago railroad station. This one would take them to the Mississippi River, where they’d cross over, heading toward Hannibal, Missouri.

  Missouri! Frances would be glad to see the long train ride end, but her hands grew damp and she found it hard to breathe whenever she thought about what might await her and her brothers and sisters in St. Joseph.

  The car in which they rode southwest toward Hannibal looked much the same as the first one. Outside the city, even the farms and houses looked like those they had seen for so many days, and most of the passengers on their car were the same. Frances knew that everyone was as exhausted as she was, even the adults. She remembered the flounces and parasols and grand top hats the ladies and gentlemen wore when they got on the first train in Albany. Now their once-elegant suit coats and wide, bustled dresses were wilted and dusty.

  When Petey put his mouth to Frances’s ear and whispered loudly, “Some of the people stink,” Frances could only nod in agreement.

  Mike and another boy got into a shoving match in the aisle, and Frances found herself scolding Mike with an overly sharp tongue. Mike snapped back,
rudely sticking out his tongue, and it was all she could do not to slap him.

  Arguments exploded among all the children as quickly and often as sparks from a burning, sap-filled log. Tousled and rumpled, Peg and Danny poked at each other unmercifully, and Petey cried over every little thing. Even Megan, who was usually gentle and even-tempered, huddled into a miserable heap next to the window.

  Early one evening they reached the broad Mississippi River, which they would cross by steamboat. Standing with the others who clustered at the rail of the big paddle wheeler, Frances begged, “Please, could we stay outside to watch?”

  “It’s cold and damp,” Katherine said. She touched Frances’s cheek. “You’ll be soaked by the mist rising from the water.”

  “We don’t mind,” Frances said. “It’s such a big river, and so many, many boats!”

  Jim stepped up beside her. “Please?” he echoed. “We want to see it all!”

  Katherine laughingly agreed, but while most of the children ran up and down the deck, Jim pointed out some of the types of boats to Frances.

  “I’m going to work on a boat,” he said. “Maybe one of those big steamboats with twin stacks.” His voice filled with yearning as he added, “Maybe a captain and his wife will adopt me.”

  He continued to lean on the rail, eagerly studying the heavy river traffic. But Frances soon lost interest in the boats and kept an eye on the Missouri shore ahead, watching it appear from the mists as they grew nearer.

  When they arrived in Hannibal, Missouri, many passengers left to journey to St. Louis, and other passengers joined them on a third train.

  We’re actually in Missouri, Frances thought, and she couldn’t eat a bite of the food that Andrew had brought on board for their supper.

  Although Danny gobbled down his meal, Mike’s appetite seemed to have disappeared, too. Frances glanced at Mike just as he looked up at her, and she knew that he shared her terror of what they might have to face when they reached St. Joseph.

  “Frances,” he said, then quickly corrected himself. “Frankie, I’m sorry about all this. I know that being sent west has been awful hard on you, what with you and Ma so close.”