“Sh—your father—” Martha warned, raising a hand to her lips, trying again to listen to make sure they had not been overheard.
“But, he’s alive! I know he is; I can feel it—”
“Yes, he’s alive—”
“Oh, thank God—” Elise said, relief flooding her features as she turned away. “I knew he was. I knew—”
Martha stared at her for a moment, wanting to go to her, waiting to take her into her arms and hold and comfort her as she had done when she had been a child, but unable to. She did not know what to say to Elise, and knew somehow that she would never know what to say to her again—how did a woman talk with a daughter who was now almost a woman herself?
“Where is he? Where did they take him?” the girl asked, turning again to look at her, causing a stab of pain to go through Martha at the memory of the child she had once known.
“I don’t know where he is, just that William had him taken out of the County—”
“Was he all right? Did you see him? You’ve got to help me get out of here. I’ve got to find him. Daddy beat him so bad; someone has to look after him. I’ve got to get out of here and take care of him. I caused all this—”
“No, you haven’t caused anything. Your father did—and you can’t find him; you don’t even know where to begin to look.”
“But I can’t just sit here while Janson’s only God knows where, hurt, bleeding—I’ve got to do something. I’ve got to—”
“You can’t do anything, not now—”
Elise stared at her for a moment, clenching her hands helplessly into fists at her sides, and then she turned away—but not before Martha had seen the look of pain that had passed across her features. It had been genuine and deep and very real, and tearing the girl apart—damn William, he had done this. Martha could not want her daughter to be the wife of a penniless farmhand anymore than William could want it, but she would rather have had that than the hurt she saw within Elise at this moment. There were no words she could offer, nothing she could do or say that would lessen the hurt or worry that was eating away at the girl. William had beaten the man Elise loved, had beaten him and had forced her to watch, and then had caused her to be forcibly dragged away, believing the boy would die for her choice to run away with him. There were no words that could excuse that, and there were no words that could lessen the torment she saw within her daughter at this moment.
“He looked so hurt—” Elise was saying quietly, turned away from her mother, “lying there on the ground, bleeding—I wanted to go to him, but they wouldn’t let me—” Then she repeated the words again, almost to herself. “They wouldn’t let—”
“I know—” Martha said, interrupting her, as if silencing the words would somehow undo all that had been done this day. She went to Elise and put her arms around her, as if she were still that small child Martha could remember so well. “He’ll be all right. He’s young, and he’s strong; he’ll be fine—” The words sounded empty as she voiced them, but somehow they, or possibly her mother’s very presence, seemed to soothe the girl. Martha led her to the bed and they sat down at its edge, Martha taking the girl’s hand in her own to pat it.
“He has to be all right; he has to be. I couldn’t stand it if—” Elise turned her face away, biting at her lower lip for a moment as her mother watched her. “It’s just that, I love him so much. So—”
“I know you do.” Yes—she knew. Elise was in love with Janson Sanders, very deeply in love. Martha looked at her daughter for a moment. “You were going to run away with him, weren’t you?” she asked.
“Yes—” Elise said, bringing her eyes back to her mother, eyes that were suddenly bright with tears at their edges. “We were going to leave and be married, and go some place where Daddy could never find us again—”
“Maybe it’s better that it happened this way. What kind of life could that have been for you, married to a man without a cent to your names, barely scraping by for the remainder of your lives, raising children without any real hope of any kind of future for them—and he’s only half white, Elise, do you realize what it would have been like married to a colored—”
But there was a sudden anger behind the girl’s blue eyes. She withdrew her hand from her mother’s, then clenched both fists in her lap. “Do you think it matters to me that Janson has Indian blood, that he’s only half white? He’s good and he’s decent and he loves me—and we would have a good life. He’s been working so hard, saving every cent he makes, so that we can buy back the land he lost after his parents died. We’d have our own home; we’d never be rich, but we’d have enough and we’d be together, and we’d be where no one could ever hurt him again or try to tear us apart—and I hope all our children look like him; I hope they all show their Cherokee heritage, because Janson’s so proud of his. We’ll have a good life together; we will—”
Martha stared at her for a long moment—I hope . . . our children look like him . . . We’ll have a good life . . .
Surely Elise could not believe the boy would be back for her after the beating William had given him today. Surely—
“I just hope he’ll be careful—” Elise said, her eyes seeming for a moment to be focused on something far beyond this room.
“You can’t really believe he’ll come back for you now, not after—”
Elise looked at her again, her eyes holding an absolute assurance within them. “I know he will,” she said. “He’ll come back. Nothing Daddy ever does, short of killing him, would ever stop him.” For a moment she looked away again, her eyes seeming distant, looking at things Martha could not see—“And even that wouldn’t keep us apart, not forever,” she said more quietly, almost to herself.
Martha stared at her, for a moment believing her daughter had lost her reasoning in the hell she had lived through today. “Elise, Janson would be a fool to come back for you now, and, if anything in this world, Janson Sanders is no fool. William may not have killed him this time, but he could very well do it the next.”
“I know that, and so does Janson—but that won’t stop him. Nothing will. Nothing—”
Martha looked at her for a moment, seeing the calm belief in her eyes, hearing it in her voice—Elise knew her heart, and perhaps she knew Janson Sanders better than anyone else could. If William had not found them out, Elise could very well have been a married woman by now—her daughter, married to a half-Indian farmhand who hadn’t a penny to his name. Elise, married to a dirt farmer, a boy who was only half white—it still did not sit well.
But, as she looked at her daughter, there was something in Elise’s eyes there was no way around, something that no number of beatings or violent, enforced separations would ever break. Elise was in love with Janson Sanders, and perhaps he was truly in love with her. If that were true, the trouble they had already faced would be nothing compared to the hell they would yet have to fight if they were to be together—that is, if Janson Sanders were really enough of a fool to return for her.
“Your father has no intention of ever letting you marry him. If he comes back—”
“I know—” Elise said, cutting off her words, refusing to hear them. “But, he will come back for me. And, when he does, I’m going with him.”
There—the words had been said. If Janson Sanders came back, Elise would leave with him. There was no question in the girl’s eyes, no doubt.
“Are you certain you want to do this, to go with him if he does return for you? You can’t know the kind of life, all you would be giving up—”
“I do know. I know that once we leave here, I’ll never be able to come back again, and that I may never see you or Stan again for the rest of my life—but it’s what I have to do. I have to be with Janson, and we can’t be together here. We have to go someplace where Janson can be safe from Daddy, someplace where Daddy can never hurt him again. It’s what I have to do.”
Martha look
ed at her for a long moment. Suddenly it seemed she was already so very far away.
“You’re really certain that he’ll be back for you?” she asked, quietly.
“I know he will be.”
“And, when he does—”
“I’m going with him. I have to,” she said.
Martha looked at her. Knowing. Understanding. Suddenly there were tears in her eyes and Elise’s arms were around her, her wet cheek pressed to Martha’s own. “I’ll miss you. I don’t know what I’ll do without you here—”
“I know—” Elise said, looking up at her again, her eyes bright with tears as Martha reached to pat her wet cheek.
“You’re all grown up now; I just don’t know when it happened. I keep remembering my little girl—but you’re almost a woman now. It’s hard to believe you’re almost seventeen, when it just seems like yesterday that I held you in my arms for the first time—you’ll know what I mean one day, when you’re a mother yourself. It’s a feeling you never forget, knowing that little person needs you so completely—”
Elise’s eyes left her mother’s for just a moment, the expression in them something Martha had never seen there before. “I know—” she said quietly—and suddenly Martha understood.
Elise was pregnant. There was no doubt in Martha’s mind in that moment. The expression on her daughter’s face was the same she had seen on her own reflection the first time she had known she was with child—but it could not be! Elise was only a baby herself, not even seventeen yet, only a child—what could she know of a man’s needs, or the physical intimacies between a man and woman. Martha had never been able to even bring herself to tell Elise of the intimacies of marriage, had wondered how she would ever be able to tell her—it could not be! The mother within Martha screamed out in protest—but the woman knew. Elise had been ready to run away with Janson Sanders today, ready to run away with him to be his wife, and it was likely they would have been married months earlier if it had been possible. They had been kept from becoming man and wife out of a fear of William, a fear at knowing what he might do to keep them apart, a fear of what he had almost done this day—it was likely that, having been denied a legal marriage, they might have begun to share the intimacies of marriage anyway. Elise could very well be pregnant, and, if she were—dear, God, it could only make matters worse.
Martha stared at her daughter, almost afraid to ask the question, afraid to hear the words that would confirm what she already knew to be true. “Elise, I know you love Janson, and I know you and he have wanted to be married,” she said, reluctantly. “Sometimes things happen that we never thought would happen, things that shouldn’t happen between a man and a woman who aren’t—” Why couldn’t she think of the right words; why was she saying this all wrong. “Elise—have you and Janson become closer than you should have? Have you done things—” Why couldn’t she think of what to say, what to ask. “Elise, are you going to have a baby?”
Elise looked at her mother for a long moment, a moment that Martha thought would never end. When she spoke at last, there was no shame in her voice, only a pride and a dignity in her manner that for a moment reminded Martha so very much of Janson Sanders. “The only way that Janson and I are not married is in name only,” she answered quietly. “And, yes, we are going to have a baby.”
For a moment, Martha could only stare, feeling as if all the breath had been taken from her body. Then breath and feeling seemed to return at the same moment, along with words she could not stop. “That’s why you were leaving today, why you had to be married so soon! Because he—”
“No, we were leaving because it’s not safe for Janson if we stay here; he doesn’t even know about the baby yet.”
“Doesn’t know!—but you’ve got to tell him! You’ve got to be married right away! If your father finds out—” Dear God, if William found out, Janson Sanders would not even live long enough to marry Elise. He was already threatening to kill the boy on sight if he should ever return, and was planning on sending Elise away to school again just as soon as arrangements could be made, to put her in a place where Janson Sanders would never reach her—if he found out now that Elise was with child—
Oh, how Martha wished she had never laid eyes on Janson Sanders! He had come into their lives, had turned everything upside down, and now he would come back to take her daughter away forever. And, if he did not come back—she could not allow herself to think about that, of Elise being sent far away to have her baby, of a quiet arrangement for someone else to take the child in. Elise could never give birth in Endicott County, and she would never be able to keep the child—no, William would never allow—
Elise was talking, and Martha tried to drag her attention back, to somehow hear what her daughter was saying.
“You’ve got to find out where it is they’ve taken him, and how badly he was hurt. And you’ve got to help me get out of here so that I can find him—”
Martha looked at her for a long moment—Elise, a mother; dear God, where had the years gone. “You really love him, don’t you?” she asked quietly. “You’d still marry him, even if it weren’t for the baby?”
“Yes, I would.”
She nodded. There was nothing else she could do. Then she sighed, the sound coming from deep within her. “I’ll help you, as much as I can,” she said, knowing the words would take her daughter from her forever, just as they would drive a wedge between herself and William, a wedge that might never be removed. “But, for right now, you’ve got to eat something.” She got up from the bed to take the tray from the dresser top where Elise had sat it earlier. “It’s cold by now, but—”
“I don’t think I could eat anything. I’m not hungry, and—”
“There’s nothing we can do tonight. You’ve got to eat and get some rest. I’ll see what I can find out tomorrow.”
“But we’ve got to find him before he can come back. Daddy might—”
“I know—” She did not have to hear the words. She knew William might very well kill Janson Sanders on sight this time, without even knowing that the man had gotten his daughter with child. “But we’ll worry about that tomorrow. For now, you just think about eating—” She placed the tray over the girl’s lap, then raised a hand to silence the protest she could see coming from her lips. “No—you’ve got to think of yourself and the baby tonight. You’ve got to eat and get some rest; tomorrow we’ll worry about finding out where Janson is—you want to give him a healthy baby, don’t you?” she asked, seeing a touch of William’s stubbornness within the girl. “Now, eat.”
Elise obeyed, unfolding the linen napkin and uncovering the plate of ham, buttered potatoes, snap beans, and biscuits, long grown cold now, and beginning to eat—but Martha knew it was more for the sake of her child that she did so, than for herself. She watched the girl, feeling suddenly so very old, so very tired. All she could remember was a little girl with long, reddish-gold braids and big blue eyes that had forever held the wonder of the world—but here sat this young woman before her now, her own daughter, a woman with child. There was such an absolute faith in Elise’s eyes, such a belief in Janson Sanders, and Martha could only pray, for all their sakes, that her faith was not misplaced. Elise said he would be back for her, and Martha suddenly found herself praying to God that she was right, even though she knew it would mean she might never see her daughter again through the remainder of her days.
She crossed the room to stare out the dark windows at the rain that had slowly begun to fall outside, her mind on the young man out somewhere in that darkness. Janson Sanders had already faced death once to be with Elise, knowing fully well what William had threatened to do should they ever try to leave here together, and Martha found herself praying that he would not be afraid to face death again. If he did not come back for Elise, then the girl’s life would be forever ruined. If he did, it would be forever changed, but it would be the life Elise had chosen for herself long before
this day, a choice they would all have to live with now—that is, if Janson Sanders could only survive long enough to make her his wife. William had almost beaten the boy to death this time, and Martha knew there would be no almost the next time. If William saw Jansen Sanders again, he would likely kill him on sight.
A cold, steady rain had begun to fall that night, drowning the windshield before Stan Whitley, and thoroughly dampening the inside of the car. Stan knew he was in trouble already. His father had allowed him to drive the Model T on the condition that he be home by supper—but supper time had long passed now, and Stan knew there would be hell to pay when he reached home. He had gone directly to a friend’s house for dinner after church that morning, and had not arrived at his own home until well into mid-afternoon—when he had asked to use the Model T to take Sarah Pate for a drive, he had never expected that his father would give in, much less that he would give in without a moment’s hesitation. Stan had never been allowed to drive an automobile alone before—he had felt so grown up, so trusted, as he had driven away in the Model T—but it would probably be the last time as well, he kept telling himself, for he should have been home hours ago now.
He turned the Ford off on a narrow, little-traveled road that cut off from the main one. He had been down it only a few times in the past, but knew it was a shortcut home—he was in enough trouble already; getting home now as quickly as possible was the only hope he had left. He took out his handkerchief and wiped at the foggy windshield for the hundredth time, straining his eyes through his spectacles, trying to see the muddy road before the car—why could the thing not have a wiper to knock the rain from the windshield as some other automobiles had. He had never driven at night before, and was amazed at how very little the dim headlamps of the Ford aided in picking out the road ahead. With the darkness and the rain, he was certain at any moment that he was going to end up in one of the ditches alongside the road—his father would wear a belt out on him for that, he told himself, for William Whitley had threatened it often enough. His father would—
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