Joseph held another door, one on a swing hinge. She passed through into a dining room. She’d never seen a separate dining room in any house but those belonging to the very wealthy and influential. To see one so far west and inside a comparatively humble home was wholly unexpected.
Beyond the dining room was a sitting room, with tall windows—and a large, stone-surrounded fireplace her eyes lingered on. ’Twasn’t in the most convenient location for cooking, but she could manage it if that was one of her jobs. The house boasted many rooms: a large kitchen, a formal dining room, and an expansive sitting room. Bedchambers were abovestairs, no doubt.
’Twas a lot of space to tidy and clean. If Katie’s littlest was as difficult as she and Joseph made him seem, it was little wonder Katie felt overwhelmed. Add to that the amount of laundry little ones produced and the mountain of food they required, and it was a miracle Katie didn’t spend her days constantly in tears.
Joseph had stepped to the foot of a narrow staircase at the far end of the room. Looking up, he called, “Katie?”
Quick footsteps followed. “By the saints, Joseph. Keep your voice down. If you wake Sean, I swear to you—” She hurried down the stairs, a little frantic, a little flustered.
“Maura’s here,” Joseph said.
Katie looked to her and sighed, not entirely in relief. “We’ve had quite a morning, Maura. I meant to have everything prepared to make this first day a smooth one.”
Joseph watched his wife with concern, much as he had Finbarr. This was a man who cared deeply for the people around him, who wished to relieve suffering where he could. Maura could help with that.
“You leave it to me, Katie,” she said. “I’ll see to whatever work you wish me to do. You need only tell me what it is you want done first.”
Here was a surer footing. Housework was familiar.
“All the floors need sweeping.” Katie spoke hesitantly.
Maura nodded. “And what else? That will not even fill the morning.”
“The kitchen shelves and cupboards are a mess,” she said.
“What of lunch?” Maura pressed. “I can easily prepare a meal in the midst of all those tasks, and then you needn’t worry about that.”
“I don’t wish to ask too much.” Clearly she was still uncomfortable with the idea of handing over the duties she, herself, had been attempting to juggle.
“I am not here as an act of charity, Katie Archer. I mean to work. Joseph.” She met his eye. “When you return to the house for your lunch, we can discuss pay.”
“An excellent plan,” he said.
She turned to Katie once more. “I fully expect you to give your morning over to the task of taking a nap. I remember all too well how rare and precious sleep was when my Aidan was your Sean’s age.”
Actual tears formed in Katie’s eyes. “I am so tired.”
Maura smiled gently. “Rest. I’ll see to the house.”
Joseph mouthed a thank you, then, with an arm at Katie’ shoulders, guided her back upstairs, no doubt to make certain she lay down and rested. Maura missed that—missed having someone who treated her tenderly, who looked after her when she forgot to look after herself.
I’m what I have now, and what Aidan has. I’ll be enough.
A cough arose. Why was it every time she attempted to reassure herself, her lungs put the lie to it?
She allowed but a moment for catching her breath, then set herself to her work.
Katie’s cupboards were hardly the disaster she’d hinted they were. A bit disorganized, certainly, but nothing so horrible as warranted the embarrassment Maura had seen in her eyes. Bringing in a housekeeper, no matter that she’d had one before, was clearly a blow to the woman’s pride.
Maura could tiptoe around that. She knew what it was to be deeply humbled by life. Everything she’d received since arriving in Hope Springs was given out of charity, in large part because she’d begged for it. She’d make certain Katie knew that she was grateful for the work, that it was a blessing to have a job and the ability to provide for herself and Aidan.
Her not-yet-healed hands made her work slower than she’d have preferred, yet she took extra care, knowing if she pulled the wounds open, they’d have to begin healing all over again. As she straightened cupboards and shelves, she made an accounting of the food, planning an easy meal she could cook on the fire without the family suspecting that she didn’t know how to use the stove.
By lunchtime, she had decided to make a soup to serve with what remained of a loaf of soda bread she found in a covered basket.
Maura was stirring the pot hanging over the low-burning fire in the sitting room when Katie came downstairs, Sean on her hip, his dark brown hair sticking up every which way. He looked over the room with wide, eager eyes. This was a child, Maura would wager, who never missed a detail, large or small.
“Did you rest, Katie?” Maura asked.
“I did, and I cannot tell you how desperately I needed it.”
“I remember the exhaustion of having a little one,” Maura assured her. “And I had only the one, not three as you have. My Aidan was no older than wee Sean, here, when m’ husband left to join the fighting. ’Twas only the two of us after that, which comes with its own set of difficulties.”
“I can imagine.” Katie watched Maura a moment. “I’ve not cooked over a fire in ages.”
Would Katie ask why she’d not used the stove? If Maura had to admit she didn’t know how, she might be deemed ill-suited to this job she so desperately needed.
“I should again,” Katie said. “Nothing tastes quite as much like home as a fire-cooked meal. My ma only ever cooked that way.”
“Mine as well.” Maura left it at that. Katie’s nostalgia for fire cooking was a stroke of unforeseen luck.
The remainder of the day was long and quiet, though Maura had no complaints. She’d steeled herself against hearing a worryingly low offer of pay from Joseph, only to be shocked by the generosity of his proposal. She and Aidan wouldn’t live in high cream by any means, but they’d no longer be hungry, and she’d likely even have enough to buy them coats for the coming winter. In time, she might save enough to expand the barn if that, indeed, proved necessary.
She’d not heard anyone mention a doctor in Hope Springs, which was just as well. The money from Grady’s ring was gone. And while her income was more generous than she had anticipated, it wouldn’t stretch beyond the necessities of home to doctoring and medicines. She’d known when making the decision to come west, that she was giving up her hope for medical treatment in order to save Aidan from a future of misery. Yet facing again the truth of it dealt her a blow. She’d watched friends die of brown lung, and, if she were fully honest, she was a little afraid of the fate. ’Twas a terrible way to die.
She finished the work assigned her for the day just as the Archers’ daughters arrived home from school, meaning Aidan was likely on his way down the road as well. She took off the work apron she’d borrowed from Katie, not having brought one from New York, then stepped into the sitting room and waited for a break in Katie’s conversation with her girls.
“If you’ve no objections,” Maura said, “I’ll be returning home now. If you’re needing longer workdays in the future, I’ll have Aidan come here after school while I work. He’ll keep out of the way.”
“Thank you, Maura,” Katie said, a genuine smile on her still-weary face.
Maura offered a nod.
Ivy hopped off the sofa and rushed to her, throwing her arms around Maura’s waist in an enthusiastic hug.
“What’s this for?” Maura was both pleased and utterly confused.
“For Aidan,” the little girl said, hopping back to her spot beside Katie. “Tell him it’s from me. Then he’ll shake his head and twist his eyes about like this” —she demonstrated— “but then he’ll smile a little.”
How easily Maura could picture Aidan doing precisely that. “He does this often, does he?”
Ivy nodded. “Emma tells
me not to torture him, but she’s just embarrassed because he is ‘very handsome’ and that makes her flustered.”
Emma muttered her sister’s name through clenched teeth. ’Twas likely for the best that the discussion not be drawn out any longer.
“I will offer Aidan your greetings, Ivy,” Maura said. “And I will see you tomorrow, Katie.”
She stepped back through the dining room and the kitchen and out onto the back porch. Her first day at this new job had gone well. She’d maneuvered her way through the challenge of cooking for the family. She felt she’d done an admirable job of not pricking Katie’s pride. She’d worked exceptionally hard at holding back every cough and hiding every hint of illness.
And she was exhausted.
Chapter Twenty
Maura’s first week working for the Archers had gone well. She’d managed her tasks without too many coughing fits. and Katie seemed pleased with the work being done. On Friday, Maura was sent to the mercantile on Katie’s behalf. The list of needed items was blessedly short; carrying too many things back from town would have been difficult to manage.
Mrs. Johnson set a cake of lye soap in Maura’s basket beside the bag of nails, small stack of parchment, inkwell, and bottle of liniment she’d placed inside already. The proprietress checked the list once more, then stepped to the jars of sweets. She placed a few peppermints and butterscotches on a small bit of paper, which she folded and tucked into a little packet. She set that in the basket as well.
“That’s the entire list,” Mrs. Johnson said. “Unless you’re wanting something for yourself.”
Maura wanted a great many things, but she couldn’t afford any of them. She wouldn’t be paid until the end of the day and refused to buy on credit. “I’ll be by tomorrow with a list of my own. And I’ll bring m’ Aidan so he can carry the heavier items.”
Mrs. Johnson thought a moment. “If you’d like, you can tell me what it is you intend to buy tomorrow. We can have your purchase crated and ready for you. Then you need only send your son to make the purchase.”
Her first inclination was to refuse. She wanted so much for Aidan to have the childhood he’d been denied. To be carefree. To spend his days in play and laughing with his friends. But life had not afforded them that luxury. Even here, away from the weight of the city, he was having to grow up quickly. He had a sickly mother, though he didn’t realize how sick yet. She had to admit to herself, and she had to accept, that she had limits, and that those limits would only grow.
“I will send him in the morning.” How she wished that weren’t necessary.
Mrs. Johnson pulled a small pad of paper from her apron pocket, along with a stub of pencil. “Tell me what all you need.”
Maura knew her list by heart, having reworked it time and again in the past few days, searching for the best way to balance their needs and wants against the price of goods and the size of her income. She wanted the money she made to last. She would save everything possible so Aidan would have a bit set by to live on. Should her lungs fail quickly, while he was still in school, he’d not have to abandon his education. She wanted schooling for him. Grady would have wanted that for him.
She meticulously listed each item and their amounts she’d previously determined. Mrs. Johnson took a moment to calculate the total, then told her what each selection would cost. The total came to exactly what Maura had anticipated. That, at least, had gone according to plan; so little had lately.
“I am hoping soon to send a letter or a telegram back to New York,” she said. “But I’m not certain how to do that.”
Mrs. Johnson nodded. “Any letters or telegram messages you’d like sent you can leave here. Once a week our oldest makes a trip to Bartonville, a few hours from here. They have a telegraph line now and a stage stop where mail is collected.”
Maura had sent letters across that same distance and knew what price to expect to post them. But she had no experience with telegrams. “Is a telegram terribly expensive?”
“One to New York would be quite expensive,” Mrs. Johnson said.
Maura nodded. “When does your son leave with the letters?”
“On Tuesdays.”
She would have a letter ready for Eliza by then. Though the pennies required could be put to use elsewhere, she needed that connection with her “sister.” She missed her and worried about her. She wanted Eliza to know she wasn’t forgotten, that someone, however far away, yet cared about her. And if there was any way for Eliza to join her here, she wanted her to.
She had another bit of business as well. “Do you sell coats, by chance? My boy outgrew his at the end of last winter.”
Mrs. Johnson shook her head. “We seldom have ready-made clothing. I have wool, though. Two different bolts, both thick enough for a fine coat.”
Maura had made most of their clothes until recent years, when there’d simply not been enough time in the day. Factory hours were long, and her health had been even poorer in New York. But she could make him a new coat now. If she sized it a little large, it’d last more than one winter.
Next winter, he would have it and would think of her when he wore it. ’Twould be a little piece of her, a reminder that she’d loved him.
“I’d like to see the wool, if you’d not mind.”
Mrs. Johnson stepped around the counter and walked with Maura to a nearby table, one laden with bolts of fabric and a large basket of sewing notions. She indicated the two bottom-most bolts, one gray and one green. “These are both well-suited to a coat for our winter weather.”
Maura knew on the instant which one she’d pick. The green. She ran a finger along the folded length of the fabric. “It’s quite soft.”
Mrs. Johnson nodded. “And not so itchy as wool often is.”
“It likely still needs to be lined.” That would add to the expense.
“And not only for comfort,” Mrs. Johnson said. “We’ve found that coats are blessedly warmer when lined in thin flannel. Winters are shockingly brutal here. Lining is a necessity.”
“Have you any?”
Mrs. Johnson pulled another bolt of gray fabric from the pile. “This is our most popular choice for coat linings. Soft, again, but not overly expensive.”
Maura knew all too well that “expensive” was a relative term.
The door chimed, meaning another customer had entered. Mrs. Johnson would need to help the new customer but Maura needed a bit more information first.
“How much is the green wool?”
She checked a list on the table. “Two bits a yard.”
Maura swallowed hard. ’Twas far more costly than in New York. “And the flannel?”
“Fifteen cents to the yard.” Mrs. Johnson anticipated her next question. “Buttons are two cents apiece. A spool of thread is ten cents.”
“Thank you.”
Mrs. Johnson slipped away. Maura did some calculating in her head. She’d need nearly five dollars to make Aidan a coat. It wasn’t enough to put them in the poor house, but she’d labored over the numbers. They would have mere pennies left over after buying food, feed for the chickens, supplies for the house. They couldn’t do without those things, but neither could Aidan go without a coat. He needed one desperately. Hers still fit—one of the benefits of being fully grown—but it was thin in the elbows and worn to threads at the cuffs and collar. His need was more pressing by far.
“What can I do for you, Ryan?” Mrs. Johnson asked.
Maura didn’t know how many Ryans lived in Hope Springs, but had her suspicions she knew which one of them this was. She looked out of the corner of her eye. Sure enough, Ryan Callaghan stood at the counter.
“I’m needing some Dover powders,” he said. “For my ma. Her joints are aching something fierce. I think I’d best find something stronger than the teas she’s been using.”
Maura hadn’t been home during the day the last week and therefore had seen very little of Mrs. Callaghan. When Maura returned home with Aidan each day, the woman had generally b
een napping. The day before, Maura came home to find that Ryan had already taken his mother back to her other son’s house.
“I haven’t any Dover powders,” Mrs. Johnson said. “Jeremiah will be bringing some back with him, but he won’t return for at least another week.”
Ryan shook his head. His posture spoke of worry and frustration. “You haven’t anything?”
“Only more of the tincture she’s been using.”
Ryan rubbed his mouth and chin. “I hate the idea of her hurting so much for another week. Sometimes the pain subsides, eases a bit, but you can’t know when that’ll be. Right now, she can’t even sleep. A good night’s rest always helps.”
“I’m sorry,” Mrs. Johnson said. “Is there anything else you need while you’re here?”
“Likely. Give me a moment. M’ mind’s spinning a bit too fast for clear thinking.”
Mrs. Johnson returned to Maura. “Would you like the wool and flannel?”
Of course she would like it, but she had to be careful. “Just the wool today,” she said. “I can start on the coat, and eventually have enough to make the lining.”
“Any thread?” Mrs. Johnson pressed.
She did need thread. Fortunately, she had needles and a good pair of scissors.
Mrs. Johnson pulled her notepad out once more. She talked through the items on Maura’s list. By reducing the bacon and molasses, as well as slightly reducing the flour and sugar, Maura brought the total down to a number that made adding in the purchase of wool and thread possible.
“I’ll send Aidan for everything in the morning.”
Mrs. Johnson nodded. Once more, she returned to Ryan, not too far distant. Though the mercantile was not a large space, running the business on her own certainly kept the woman on her feet. “Have you decided on anything else you need?”
“There likely is something,” he said, “but, lands o’ mercy, I can’t think straight. I’m wanting to get back and check on my ma.”
“I’m so sorry I don’t have any powders,” Mrs. Johnson said.
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