The Spirit of Cattail County

by Victoria Piontek

  Every time she thought she was getting a leg up on Auntie Geraldine, some new betrayal surfaced. She had thought the idea of someone else living in Dalton House was the end of the world. Now she knew it wasn’t. This was.

  Sparrow pushed down the sick feeling so she could speak. “Get the details worked out? So you haven’t bought it yet?”

  “No. Not officially, yet. But soon.”

  It wasn’t a done deal. Sparrow still had reason to hope.

  She forced herself to focus.

  Tomorrow was the Casto family party. Maeve and Johnny had the proof she needed to claim Mason Casto as her father. Once she did, he would buy Dalton House. Johnny had vouched for Mason. He said Mason would do what needed to be done. Mason would save Dalton House, Sparrow would help the Boy, and the Boy would bring Mama back.

  Sparrow prayed the gossip about Mason making a fortune in the oil business was true. If Mr. Monroe planned to build a strip mall, he must be offering Auntie Geraldine a lot of money for the property. They were going to need a fortune to wrangle Dalton House from the Monroes’ clutches.

  Ansley walked into the library. She held a glass of lemonade in one hand and a cloth napkin in the other.

  “Ansley, that’s lovely. Your timing is perfect,” Mr. Monroe said as he turned back to the bookshelves.

  Ansley handed the lemonade and the napkin to Sparrow.

  Sparrow found her polite voice and said, “Thank you.”

  “My pleasure, I’m sure,” Ansley answered, just as pleasantly.

  Sparrow took a sip of lemonade and nearly spat it out all over the newspapers. Ansley had filled the glass with salt instead of sugar.

  Ansley smirked. “Enjoying the archives?”

  Sparrow took another sip of lemonade to prove she could. She had no intention of letting the Monroes best her. She set the glass on top of the cloth napkin. “Thank you, Ansley. This is delicious.”

  Ansley huffed and plopped down in a chair.

  Mr. Monroe turned around with another big book. He’d been so caught up in his search for tidbits of Beulah history to share with Sparrow he’d missed the entire exchange between the girls. Sparrow begrudgingly gave Ansley credit. She knew how to be sneaky, that was for sure. Sparrow would find it nearly impossible to pull off a prank like that right under Auntie Geraldine’s nose.

  “The record of your family tree is in here.” Mr. Monroe placed a new book on top of the other one. He thumbed through it until he found a page entitled THE DALTON FAMILY.

  Sparrow moved the lemonade glass as far away from her as possible. She examined her family tree. She traced the lines going up and out. She found Mama’s name and then Auntie Geraldine’s. Two sprouts from the same branch, though they were nothing alike. She followed the branches to where her name should be recorded, but there was no entry.

  Mr. Monroe leaned over Sparrow’s shoulder. “Hmm … we seem to be out of date. We’ll have to get that fixed.”

  Sparrow wondered if he would. She shut the book and pulled the bound newspapers to her. She flipped page after page, scanning headlines. She felt like she was looking for a needle in a haystack. Then she saw “Orphan Train Rider Adopted.” The word orphan stopped her. The way she kept running into it, she felt like it was taunting her.

  Mr. Monroe leaned over her shoulder. “Yes, that’s an interesting story. As you know, we’re quite proud of our family’s commitment to philanthropic causes, and it all started with that orphan train.”

  The phrase orphan train pecked at Sparrow’s brain like a rooster looking for scratch. It made her edgy, like nothing good could come of those two words together. “What’s an orphan train?”

  “Ansley, get one of our books for Sparrow, would you?”

  “Is she going to pay for it? The proceeds are for charity,” Ansley said haughtily.

  His smile tightened. “Oh, I think we can afford to spare one copy for a fellow historian.”

  Ansley rolled her eyes but left obediently.

  Mr. Monroe watched his daughter go and then turned back to Sparrow. “In the nineteen hundreds, there were so many orphans roaming the streets of New York that a minister came up with a grand idea. He decided to put the children on trains and send them across the United States to find new families. Mostly, the trains went to western states, but my ancestors arranged for a train to be sent to Cattail County.”

  Sparrow quickly read the article. At a New York City depot, thirty orphans had been put on a train headed to Cattail County. As the train made its way down the coast, it made several stops. At each depot along the way, the children were lined up on the platform and offered up for adoption. By the time the train reached Beulah, there was only one child left—a boy. The Monroe family took him home. The fact that the Monroes not only organized the train but also took a child in was looked on as a great charity, and the Monroes were praised for their altruistic deeds.

  “It’s because of my ancestors’ involvement in organizing that train I wrote the book.” Pride filled Mr. Monroe’s voice and he seemed to stand taller.

  Ansley walked in carrying a thin paperback. “Here you go, Daddy.”

  Mr. Monroe took the book from Ansley. He got a fancy pen from his desk and signed the inside cover with a flourish. He handed the book to Sparrow. “For you.”

  Sparrow stared at the title. Orphan Trains: Small Towns, Big Hearts. Knowing that a train full of parentless children had sped down the railway to Cattail County in search of families made Sparrow’s throat tighten. She didn’t like living with Auntie Geraldine, but at least she had a place to call home … for now.

  “Unfortunately, that foray into philanthropy ended badly.”

  “What happened?”

  “Don’t tell that part of the story, Daddy,” Ansley said. “It ruins the first part.”

  “It’s a sad story, dear, but no fault of ours. One can only offer a helping hand. Whether or not the offer is accepted is up to the recipient.” Mr. Monroe quickly flipped through the pages until he found another article. It read “Orphan Thief Dies.” He tapped the page.

  “The orphan was a thief ?” Sparrow felt it was awfully unfair to label a kid as both an orphan and a thief.

  Mr. Monroe shrugged. “A lot of those street children were pickpockets and ruffians. Habits are hard to break. As the story goes, the boy became obsessed with a Monroe family heirloom. The orphan insisted the heirloom was his. He claimed his father had given it to him before he died. A ridiculous claim, of course. Imagine a penniless orphan with an heirloom?”

  “What was the heirloom?” Sparrow asked, transfixed by the story.

  “Sadly, specific details have been lost over time, but some versions of the story mention a timepiece. What I do know is one night the orphan stole the heirloom and ran away, causing his own death. My family never did get it back. No good deed goes unpunished, I guess.”

  Dread settled into the pit of Sparrow’s stomach and spread out like a weed, invading her whole body, and though she feared the answer, she asked the question. “How did he die?”

  “After he ran away, they called out the hounds, of course. The dogs easily picked up his scent. He was a city kid, you understand, not accustomed to our marshlands, but he got surprisingly far. When he heard the dogs coming for him, he ran into the swamp. Unfortunately, the night he ran away there was a king tide. I’m sure you can imagine what happened. You know the warnings.”

  “He drowned in the marsh?”

  “Yes. Out by your place, actually. Where we’ll be building the strip mall. Who knows? Once we start to dig, maybe we’ll find that lost family heirloom.” Mr. Monroe rubbed his elegant fingers together expectantly, as if he already held his missing heirloom between them.

  The revelation slammed into Sparrow—the orphan had died in her marsh. She felt the blood drain from her face.

  The Monroes’ orphan was her Boy, and his story squeezed her heart tighter than a vise.

  Mr. Monroe scrutinized Sparrow. “Are you sure you’re well? Yo
u look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  Sparrow hadn’t seen a ghost. She’d found one.

  Sparrow and Auntie Geraldine didn’t speak to each other on the way home from the Monroes’.

  Auntie Geraldine stared straight ahead, navigating the back roads with the precision of a local, while Sparrow stole sideways glances at her in search of signs of her traitorous nature. Sparrow thought of all the times Auntie Geraldine questioned Sparrow’s claim to the Dalton name. Auntie Geraldine had some nerve. No rightful Dalton would EVER consider selling the house and the marsh, much less to the Monroes so they could build a strip mall. Every time she pictured the Monroes’ bulldozers digging up the marsh, Sparrow’s stomach rolled.

  Sparrow stared out the window and let her mind drift toward the Boy. At the thought of him, her throat constricted and a weight settled on her heart.

  Her new knowledge of the Boy’s last hours tormented her. She couldn’t stop envisioning the rising tide or the all-encompassing darkness of the marsh at night. Even with a full moon, shadows shifted and morphed into strange shapes that hammered at the nerves and unsettled the mind. The marsh at night was no place for a kid and a horrible place to die.

  Sparrow thought about the way Mr. Monroe had spoken about the Boy. He had called him a pickpocket and a ruffian, but the description didn’t fit.

  The Boy was mischievous sometimes, but never malicious. He was most likely to act up when Sparrow needed a friend. When he blew the dirt at Mama’s funeral, Sparrow had not wanted anyone to throw dirt onto her casket. When he hit Auntie Geraldine in the shin with the swing, Sparrow had wanted to be left alone and not forced to talk to people. When he slammed the screen door, Auntie Geraldine had been yelling at Sparrow. That day with Ansley and Andrew, they had ganged up on her and called her an orphan.

  And when no one else was there for her after Mama died, the Boy had been her only comfort. Her only friend.

  Sparrow bit her lip. Mr. Monroe’s accusation didn’t make sense. Sparrow knew in her heart the Boy wasn’t a thief. He was a good soul. She wasn’t sure how, but Mr. Monroe had gotten his story terribly wrong.

  When Auntie Geraldine pulled into the drive, Sparrow pushed open the car door and hopped out before Auntie Geraldine had a chance to put the car in park. She stormed up the front steps and let the screen door slam shut.

  Auntie Geraldine sniped at Sparrow, but Sparrow wasn’t listening.

  There had never been a Dalton more awful than Auntie Geraldine. There had never been anyone more awful than her, period.

  Sparrow went to her bedroom and locked the door. She changed out of the horrible sailor dress and threw it in the corner. She’d never wear that ghastly thing again.

  Sparrow sat on her window seat and unfolded the newspaper articles.

  Mr. Monroe had kindly made copies of the first article for her when she asked, thrilled that she’d taken an interest in the story of the orphan train. Especially since it pertained to a part of his heritage that made him proud to be a Monroe.

  He had been less thrilled when she’d asked for a copy of the second article, the one that detailed the Boy’s death, but had complied anyway. Beulah’s strict adherence to manners allowed Sparrow to get her way.

  The second article told the Boy’s story just as Mr. Monroe had. He had become obsessed with a family heirloom and run away. But what Mr. Monroe hadn’t told her was the Boy had hidden at Dalton House. The Boy had made it all the way out to her house and had sought refuge on the front porch.

  Sparrow read the relevant part of the article. When the orphan thief heard the hounds approach, he burst through the screen door of the Dalton place. He ran into the marsh in an attempt to throw the dogs off his scent. Acutely aware of the many dangers of the swamp, the sheriff’s men wisely gave up the chase at the shore. They waited on the bank and called to the orphan thief, but he refused to heed their warnings.

  Sparrow recalled her nighttime experience in the marsh. At the mere thought of that night, primal fear shot through her, and her body tingled as if electrified. The marsh had truly frightened her and she was a local. For a city kid like the Boy, it must have been terrifying. Sparrow’s heart wrenched.

  She took a deep breath to brace herself for what would come next and scanned the rest of the newspaper article. The night the Boy ran away, the moon had been full. Shortly after the Boy went into the marsh, a huge storm rolled in, and it started to rain. Then the tide started to rise.

  The Boy never came out of the marsh again. He had walked into the marsh on a full moon at high tide. He never had a chance.

  Tears rolled down Sparrow’s cheeks. The Boy’s death had been tragic and lonely. As much as she loved the marsh, it had a dark side. The wild landscape sometimes claimed what didn’t belong. She swiped her cheeks and vowed to help the Boy find peace.

  Sparrow set aside the article and opened the book Mr. Monroe had given her, Orphan Trains: Small Towns, Big Hearts. The book chronicled the train’s journey from New York City to Beulah. It talked about each town the train stopped at on the way south and gave a history of all the families who adopted kids.

  There was very little mention of the orphans themselves, which Sparrow found rather neglectful and sad. She felt like no one cared about the kids who got adopted.

  Sparrow flipped to the back of the book and discovered a collection of photographs. There were a lot of pictures of the Monroes’ ancestors, and on the very last page was a picture of the all the orphan train riders before they left New York City.

  A black-and-white photo showed thirty children of all ages lined up in a row. There were even a couple of babies being held by older kids.

  Looking at all those parentless kids pulled at Sparrow. Even though they had lived their lives long before she had been born, she knew exactly how each one of them felt at the moment that photograph had been taken—heartsick.

  Sparrow looked at each face one by one; she wanted to honor them by truly seeing them. When she got to the middle of the first row, recognition made her heart flap against her chest like a butterfly trying to escape a jar.

  In the center of the front row a boy with round cherub cheeks and dark hair cut close posed with a cocky stance. He wore a white dress shirt unbuttoned at the neck and cuffs, black pants a tad too short, and black boots unlaced with the tongues flapping. Her Boy.

  She carefully tore the picture out of the book and drew the page close.

  Sparrow’s body went numb. Dangling from his hand was her pocket watch.

  Sparrow’s mind raced to process the facts. Mr. Monroe had mentioned a timepiece, and Sparrow wondered if the Boy’s pocket watch and the missing family heirloom were one and the same. They had to be … but if the Boy had the watch before he got on the train in New York, then Mr. Monroe was wrong about him. He’d not been a ruffian and a thief. He had not stolen a family heirloom from the Monroes. He’d reclaimed what belonged to him in the first place.

  And if the Boy was innocent, then Sparrow had found it. The thing the Boy needed for peace—her pocket watch.

  On Saturday morning, Sparrow awoke with a renewed sense of hope. If all went as planned, by the end of the day, she would have everything her heart desired—the Boy, Mama, Dalton House, and a daddy.

  Eli had been right. The Monroes’ archives were the key to discovering the Boy’s story. She now knew what he needed to give him peace—the pocket watch. She remembered the Boy’s face the day she had taken it to sell to the watch vendor. He had reached out and tried to grab it, but she had closed her fingers over it, keeping it from him. Every time she remembered that moment, her throat got tight.

  But now that she knew, she could fix everything. She’d return the watch to the Boy, and the Boy would help Mama. Eli told Sparrow he would have the watch for her on Saturday. That was today, the same day as the Casto family party. She’d go get it right after. Maeve and Johnny could go with her.

  Now that the day of the Casto family party had arrived, Sparrow’s emotions twisted and
tangled into a confusing array of contradictions. Excitement, nervousness, and a touch of sadness coiled in her belly like a slipknot. She wondered if she could be two things at once—a Dalton and a Casto.

  Sparrow pulled her Easter dress out of the closet. The day Mama bought it for Sparrow had been one of the last times they’d gone out together. Mama drove Sparrow to Havisham to shop at the children’s clothing store there. Mama watched as Sparrow tried on dress after dress until they’d finally settled on a lilac one with a matching hat and gloves. They’d bought black patent-leather shoes, and a purse to go with it, an unexpected extravagance. Then they had a fancy lunch at a nice restaurant. Sparrow wished Mama had shared all her secrets that day because they ran out of time after that. Mama started resting a lot, and Auntie Geraldine moved into Dalton House to take care of her, which she seemed to think meant keeping Sparrow out of the way.

  Holding on to Mama felt like carrying water in her palms; every second a bit more of her slipped away and she wanted to keep as much as she could.

  Sparrow tucked Mama’s picture, the newspaper articles, and the picture from Mr. Monroe’s book in her purse and slid it on her arm. Then she put on her sneakers. She was walking to the Castos’, and she couldn’t do that in fancy shoes, so she decided not to wear them. By the end of the day, she’d be part Casto anyway, and shoes would be optional.

  Sparrow climbed out her window and down her oak.

  The walk to the Castos’ was a long one. Finally, the Casto place came into view.

  The run-down house leaned precariously atop one-story stilts that raised the building off the ground so that air flowed under it. In theory, the elevation kept the house cool. In truth, nothing could combat the Beulah heat.

  Rusty bikes and half-broken toys littered the front lawn, and a rope sagged low, heavy with clothes. At the far end of the property, a dingy white trailer was parked under the oak trees. This was a new addition to the Casto land, and was Mason’s home. In comparison, Dalton House was a mansion.