Effie set the bowl down and brought the blessedly cool cloth back to bathe Dana’s face. “I can’t just leave you here, girl. It’ll get us both in trouble.”
“I promise I’ll get better.”
Effie smiled, a rare sight. “You can’t do such a thing.”
“What does it matter if I die here or there? Don’t make me go.”
She seemed to consider. “I can only come to you in the early morning and late at night.”
“That’s more than anybody else.” She could have died already, and no one would have known—or cared.
Before leaving, Effie fetched in a wooden crate, from which she fashioned a makeshift table beside the bed. Here she placed a fresh pitcher of water and a stack of soda crackers, moving a bucket close by for any necessities. All of this was a blur to Dana, as was most of the earlier conversation. For two days, measured by Effie’s visits, she coughed when she wasn’t sleeping, her body shifting in and out of fevers until her gown was soaked stiff with salt. When consciousness allowed, she prayed: thanks for Effie, and deliverance from death.
Unless death would bring her to her mother.
“Oh, Mama.” She hadn’t said the word aloud since the moment Mrs. Karistin christened her Baby Killer. She said it now again: “Mama.” And then, “Father.” The heavenly Father in whose hands she placed her life.
For what she’d done, for the greed and envy that plagued her that terrible night, for the anger she held toward Mrs. DuFrane and Judge Stephens, she begged forgiveness.
Take my sin and bring me peace. And if that peace meant death, it held no fear.
“Dana, girl.” Effie’s voice edged into the darkness of her sleep, and she opened her eyes, feeling rested and whole. “Wake up.”
She felt Effie’s hand on her brow and could tell the woman was pleased.
“I’ve brought you some food and tea. Time to get your strength back.”
Dana struggled to sit up, feeling a welcome ravenousness. Effie handed her a cup of lukewarm tea; a plate with a scrambled egg and a biscuit sat on the overturned crate. She ate slowly, carefully, finishing only half the food, but drinking all the tea and wishing for more.
“That’s my girl,” Effie encouraged. “I’m going to try to see you again today, and tomorrow. You need to be better tomorrow.”
Dana pinched off one more corner of biscuit. “Why?”
“Because—” Effie’s eyes darted, as if someone could be listening—“I don’t know if we got ourselves in trouble or not, but the warden wants to see you.”
Two flights of steps separated the warden’s office from the prisoners, and midway through the second, Dana found herself clinging to the banister, her legs burning with the effort of the climb. A trickle of sweat dampened the back of her dress, and a good, reinvigorating breath seemed as far away as the third floor.
Ahead of her, Marvena offered little encouragement other than “C’mon then,” and only the thought of freedom gave Dana the strength to take one more step. And then another.
By the time she stood outside the door labeled Warden Brewster, her entire body shook and her legs felt like ribbons beneath her. Marvena opened it and motioned Dana inside, where a woman she had never seen before looked up over a pair of narrow spectacles and blinked incessantly, a thin, sharp pencil poised in her grip.
“And you are?”
“Prisoner Dana Lundgren, here to see the warden.”
Blink, blink. “And is he expecting you?”
“I should hope to glory so.”
The woman buried the pencil in a mass of graying hair, stood, and went to yet another door, opened it, and peeked inside. Dana, meanwhile, thankful for the delay, prayed for enough strength to walk across the room.
“You can go in now,” the woman said, holding up a thin hand to stop Marvena from following. “Just her.”
Marvena shrugged halfheartedly and was about to settle her weight on the cushioned bench across from the desk when the woman said, “I’ll summon you when it’s time to bring her back.”
The door to the inner office had been left open, and Dana walked across the threshold trying to look stronger than she felt. After all, at first glance, Warden Brewster seemed so much stronger than his predecessor as he stood upon her arrival and asked her, please, to shut the door behind her.
“I don’t believe we’ve met face-to-face before,” he said, extending a hand across his desk. She stared at it, not knowing quite what to do, and he turned the gesture into one indicating the chair in which she should sit.
She’d seen him before, of course, looking out from his window over the courtyard, occasionally walking the halls. But no, they’d never spoken.
“Now, Miss Lundgren.” He drummed his fingers on a thin brown folder. “Some issues have come to my attention regarding your stay here, and I believe there has been an error in judgment.”
Dana leaned forward, feeling a new beat in her heart. This wasn’t about her refusal to go to the infirmary. This was much, much more. “Then you know?”
He opened the folder and thumbed through some of the few pages within. “What I know is that you entered as a juvenile having committed a very serious crime and, without benefit of counsel, have perhaps been improperly transitioned—”
“I never had a trial.”
“I have here a coroner’s report listing the death of one Mary DuFrane, aged four months, ruled an accident, but I have also your signed confession.” He held out a sheet of paper, and she instantly recognized her writing, remembering the moment when she sat in the cozy police station, painstakingly recalling the events of that horrible night. She knew every detail without benefit of reading, since she lived it in her mind as a final thought before going to sleep each night, but she forced her eyes to take in word after word, ascending them as she had the stairs. Though she found nothing in them that spoke of murderous intent, each one brought weakness to her argument for freedom.
“I was twelve years old. I’ve been here now for more than half of my life.”
Warden Brewster scowled. “You’ve lived far longer than Mary DuFrane. Do not misunderstand me. What I am presenting to you here is an error of clerical oversight, not a miscarriage of justice. Had you been sentenced, properly and legally represented, I’ve no doubt you would have been given the opportunity to go before a parole board, and they might have had the mercy to end your sentence. But that did not happen.”
“No.” She choked on the word and recovered. “No, sir, it did not.”
“And do you believe, were I to arrange such an opportunity, that you would be capable of exhibiting remorse for your actions to the degree needed to satisfy such a board’s desire to act with mercy?”
His serpentine sentence confused her, and she risked asking for clarification.
“Do you regret your actions of that night? Can you, with a clear conscience, ask the state to forgive you of your crimes? Are you sorry for what you did?”
“I am. I wake up every morning wishing that baby hadn’t—”
“Do you regret your crime?”
“It wasn’t a crime. I only—”
“Do you deserve forgiveness?”
“I know God has forgiven me.”
“That is not the same. And it is not enough to grant you freedom from this place. I’ll go back. Do you regret your actions?”
“With all my heart. If I’d only realized the baby—”
“Not the baby!” He slammed his fist on the desk and stood, looming toward her once again with his hand outstretched, only this time not in a gesture of welcome, but with a single, accusatory finger. “You! Do you understand your actions to be a crime? And do you regret that crime? And can you promise upon what little honor you retain never to commit such a heinous act again? Because that, my girl—” he moved his hand, now shaking, to point at the cross-stitch on the wall—“is the truth that shall set you free.”
She followed his finger to stare at the words. “But it isn’t true.”
> “Nonetheless, it will bring to a close what I’m sure has been a sufficient amount of time for you to reflect on your actions and pray for a new path. Am I correct?”
“I have been here a sufficient amount of time, yes.”
Warden Brewster sat down, composed himself, and reached for a clean sheet of paper. “Now, then,” he said, unscrewing the top of a thick, black pen, “I shall arrange for a parole board to be gathered directly.”
“But I won’t be able to say that—” she searched her recent memory for his exact wording—“that I understand my actions to be a crime. It was a tragedy, yes. But not a crime.”
“We do not grant pardons for tragedies.”
“Then perhaps you shouldn’t imprison people for them, either.”
He stopped the scratching of his pen and looked at her, and for the first time, she saw a flicker of fear in the eyes of authority.
“It does not fall to me to determine who walks in through these doors. I am charged only with maintaining order and overseeing the process of who walks out and when that privilege is granted, in accordance with the sentence imposed by the judge, of course.”
“And what sentence was imposed upon me? I’ve never known.”
“It is—” and he squirmed like something trapped as he shuffled the papers in the folder—“indefinite.”
What hope she had was extinguished with the word, like a single flame plunging her future into darkness.
“I take it to mean, in light of Judge Stephens’s death, that I maintain some discretion. And that should you satisfy the conditions of a parole board—”
“I won’t.”
“Then it shall have to suffice to grant you a change in status. You are hereby a trustee.”
She tilted her head, suspicious. “What does that mean, exactly?”
“It means you are granted certain freedoms within Bridewell, as well as some responsibilities. You may move about unescorted, given that you report to your cell each night for lockup, and to the mess hall for each meal.”
“You’ll have to remind Marvena to let me out.”
“I’ll make a note.” He crumpled the previous sheet of paper and tossed it to the side before taking out another. “Take this to the children’s dormitory. Do you remember where that is?”
“Of course.”
“We’ve allowed it to become a hospital of sorts, for those suffering with this influenza that has the hospitals overflowing. Go, ask what they need you to do, and then do it.”
She stared dumbly at the paper when he handed it to her, reading the words as they reflected what he’d just said.
“So I’m free to go?”
“What you are is free to stay and build our trust.”
“For how long?”
He tapped his finger on the file. “Indefinitely.”
She stood to leave, then turned one more time. “Sir, is there anything in there that would be able to tell me whatever happened to my mother?”
The look that crossed his face came close to pity, and his voice took on what she would have called a fatherly cadence as he said, “No, child. It doesn’t. I’m sorry,” leaving her no choice but to believe him.
She walked out, fully aware of her change in status, and handed his handwritten note to the woman she now knew to be Mrs. Tooley, who in turn gave Dana a small yellow slip of paper, instructing her to go to the laundry facility (behind the kitchen, ’round left) to receive a new dress. No more stripes. She would have a plain, blue garment. Two if she liked, so as to always have one clean.
Going down the stairs proved to be much easier than going up, and she realized for the first time what it meant to move about without the constant sound of rattling keys behind her. She did as instructed, getting no questions at all from the laundry attendant, she herself in blue, and went to her cell to change. The door had been left open and, once inside, she left it as such, knowing she had no way to get out once it closed.
While changing her dress, she noticed it was shortly past noon, and her newly restored appetite urged her to obey the warden’s instruction to take all her meals in the main dining hall. It wasn’t until now, strolling unencumbered and unaccompanied through one hallway to the next, that she realized the extent of the prison’s emptiness. At least as far as the women’s side. The men, she knew, lived crowded upon each other. In her world, cell after cell sat empty, quiet as a series of small, square tombs. There might be tenants toward the end of the week, when laborers received their wages and chose to spend unwisely, but for now, she didn’t encounter another soul. When she walked into the dining hall, a few familiar faces presented themselves—some she had known for years, others whose names she hadn’t bothered to learn. Feeling disguised within her own skin, she took a tray and walked to where Cookie—the same sweet, dark-faced woman who’d been ladling out her food since her very first supper—greeted her with a comforting smile.
“Got you wearin’ the blue now, do they? Bein’ a trustee, it the first step out.”
In celebration, she gave Dana a serving of shepherd’s pie rimmed with oven-browned potatoes, and a molasses cookie purloined from some secret place.
Marvena sat alone at a table, but it felt unseemly to join her, given only a few hours separated Dana from being subjected to her key. Still, with a nearly imperceptible invitation, the woman made room on the bench beside her, and Dana complied.
“So, you’re one less thing for me to trouble myself with.”
“I guess so.”
“Brewster send you to the infirmary?”
“He did.” She took up her cookie, broke it in two, and gave the larger half to Marvena.
“I’m headed there myself, if you want to walk with me.”
“No, thank you,” Dana said, glad to have given a peace offering. “I can find it myself.”
CELESTE, AGE 14
1919
THE HOUSE HAD NEVER held so many people. They congregated in the front room, filling the furniture, even perching on the arms of the sofa, much to Mother’s chagrin. The few children in attendance had been permitted to go upstairs, where both Calvin’s and Celeste’s rooms held well-preserved playful treasures. Calvin’s treasured soldiers remained in the specific battle formation they had been in when he left for the war, resting under a clear glass case Papa had commissioned when they learned he would not be coming home. But there was also a train set and building blocks, as well as a host of pretty dolls and dishes across the hall for the girls, not to mention the vast backyard with Celeste’s beloved playhouse and room to kick a ball.
“Look at them,” Mother said, her voice full of disdain. She and Celeste had moved to the back patio both to greet those who congregated there and to escape the crowded stuffiness of the house. “Have their parents taught them nothing? Don’t they know where they are?”
“Oh, Mother. They’re children. It’s good to see some joy, don’t you think?” She wanted to add that she couldn’t remember the last time she heard laughter in their home. But there was sadness enough this day; no need to dredge from those gone by.
“I’m going into the kitchen to see if Graciela needs any help.”
If not for the solemn occasion, Celeste might have issued a laughing challenge. Never in her memory had she known her mother to help in the kitchen, unless one counted emptying the icebox a valuable skill. Without a doubt, she would find her seated at the small corner table, gleaning from the serving trays left by the waiters hired for the afternoon.
“People expect to see you, Mother. You were his wife.”
“These are your father’s friends—and yours. Not mine. I don’t know a soul here.”
She left with a more pronounced heaviness to her step, and Celeste’s heart went with her. She took a deep breath and squared her shoulders for the burden of the afternoon.
“Was that your mother?”
“Mary,” Celeste said with a smile that carried far more congeniality than she felt. Mary Pickford. This little woman might be A
merica’s sweetheart, but Celeste knew her to be a ruthless, career-crafting shark, hogging two roles in the film Stella Maris, in which Celeste had been relegated to the part of an uncredited street hooligan. “Yes, the poor dear. It’s been so hard on her with so much loss. My brother, and now . . .”
The word caught in her throat, though she was stronger today than she had been a week ago, when a messenger arrived at their front door with news that her father had been taken away from his office at Technicolor after suffering a heart attack. The intervening time had been spent making arrangements, meeting with lawyers, and sitting vigil at Mother’s bedside in perpetual darkness.
“I didn’t know your father,” the actress was saying, her voice sweet and pleasant, perfectly matched to her persona. “I hear he was a lovely man. I’m so sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you.” A response as perfunctory as the statement. “I’m just curious, if you didn’t know my father, then why are you here?”
Mary patted her arm. “Such a kid. You and I have quite opposite problems. People will always think of me as a child, and you . . . Well, what are you? Fifteen? Sixteen?”
“Fourteen.”
Mary cringed. “Ouch. Better be careful, or you’ll have these lechers giving you quite the chase around. Especially Chaplin. Stay away from him. And Arbuckle.” She made a face. “They might call him Fatty, but don’t be fooled. When it comes to chasing girls, the man’s an athlete. Beautiful dress, by the way, and smart choice pinning up your hair.”
Celeste withdrew her arm, increasingly uncomfortable with the conversation. Not that she found it inappropriate, but guilt tugged at her for finding it far more useful than dumbly agreeing upon the sadness of the occasion.
“Thank you,” she repeated, this time with something close to heartfelt meaning. “For the advice, I mean. And for treating me like a grown-up.”
“Let me guess. Your father acted as your agent?”
Celeste nodded.
“Then you’ll need to find a new one, and I’ll bet half the people here would angle for the job. I’ll send you some names.”
All for a Sister Page 24