by Janet Lunn
“Yes.” Rose clenched and unclenched her hands in her pockets, and in a moment she felt better. After a few minutes she began to hum the song, thinking about Will and about her unknown father.
Eventually they found themselves on what looked to be an old street that ran along the water. It was lined with weathered buildings, most of them crooked and leaning against each other as though seeking comfort against the wind that even on this balmy day carried with it a chill from the lake. There were shops along one side, and a cheerful-looking restaurant with a geranium in the window invited them to come inside. They ate muffins and drank cider together. Sam told Rose what he knew of her father, which was only that Aunt Nan had loved him very much. Rose listened, bemused. Then she tried to explain to him about her own life in great cities around the world.
“No wonder you think nobody likes you,” said Sam after a while, “if the only people you know are those aunts and uncles. You don’t know any people, not kids, not ordinary people. You’re just lucky your father had a sister and she had kids and they’re us.”
“I guess so,” said Rose, but she was too confused in her mind to think clearly about that or any of what Sam had said that afternoon. It had upset everything she’d always thought true, and it was rather wonderful but she didn’t trust it. In fact, she didn’t really believe that Sam didn’t hate her.
But all the way home the next day, Rose thought about what Sam had said, and she felt the beginning of a warm feeling inside her.
When they arrived, Aunt Nan was waiting for them.
The Accident
The car had hardly stopped in the driveway before Aunt Nan was out through the kitchen door and across the yard. Rose got out to meet her, knowing she was going to be scolded. She was not prepared for the hurt and rage that greeted her.
Aunt Nan’s face was white and her eyes were red and swollen. She was in a greater state of disarray than Rose had ever seen her. Her hair looked like an owl’s nest, her skirt was hanging way down at the back where she had not done it up properly, and her sweater was on inside out.
“You must be the most difficult child the world has ever known,” she said in low, angry, carefully measured tones. “You’re ungrateful, inconsiderate, selfish, and cruel. After your Uncle Bob phoned on Thursday I could hardly believe my ears. You knew it was a special outing. I told you so myself. Are you so used to doing absolutely everything you want that you had to go skulking in the back of the station wagon to ruin the trip for Sam and George and Uncle Bob? And all you left me was this. I would never have found it if I hadn’t started to feel sorry for you. I went upstairs this morning to get your dirty laundry and there it was!”
There were tears in Aunt Nan’s eyes by this time, and she shoved a piece of paper under Rose’s nose that Rose recognized as her monogrammed stationery—the letter she had written to Aunt Millicent and never sent. She had forgotten all about it.
“Can you imagine how I felt?” Aunt Nan had lost her careful control and her voice was rising with every word. “Can you just imagine? Well, Miss Rose Larkin, I’ll tell you what I did. I went straight to the phone and called your Aunt Millicent and she was very upset. She said she couldn’t imagine what had gotten into you. She said she didn’t know what to do. She’d have to talk to Arnold and Stella and phone me back. I don’t know what to do with you. I’ve never been so upset in my whole life. But you can just be sure someone will find you a nice orphanage somewhere!”
Aunt Nan had run out of steam. Tears were pouring down her face and she was gripping Rose’s arm as though Rose were a wild animal fighting to get loose. But Rose stood still, utterly shaken. She hardly felt the pain of Aunt Nan’s frenzied grip. She couldn’t speak.
“Nan, Nan, what’s this all about?” demanded Uncle Bob. “Let me see that paper.” He loosened Aunt Nan’s fingers from the now crumpled, tear-soaked paper. The boys stood in awed silence. Aunt Nan let go of Rose’s arm and reached for her handkerchief. Rose thought she was going to hit her and leaped back in fright. She slipped, fell, picked herself up and in a panic started to run toward the back of the house. All she could think of was the safety of the root cellar.
“No, you don’t,” cried Aunt Nan. “You’re not running off. You can just stay right here and face the music, you little coward”—and she lunged after her. She ran a few steps, slid on a patch of wet leaves, her feet went out from under her, and she fell flat on her back. For a moment nobody moved. Then Uncle Bob was kneeling beside her. “Rose,” murmured Aunt Nan and fainted.
“Call the doctor,” barked Uncle Bob. White-faced, Sam ran into the house. Aunt Nan opened her eyes.
“Thank God,” said Uncle Bob. “Now lie absolutely still. I don’t think you should move until Dr. Best gets here.”
The twins had started to cry and George was angrily telling them to shut up. Rose, halfway to the corner of the house, had turned and in anguish watched the scene as though it were happening at a great distance. George turned to glare murderously at her, but otherwise no one paid her any attention.
Dr. Best was not long getting there. She looked Aunt Nan over carefully, felt for broken bones, got her to stand up, and with Uncle Bob’s help led her into the house.
After she had gone George turned on Rose. “Are you crazy or something?” he yelled. “You could’ve killed Mom. You’re the most selfish person in the whole world!”
The twins stared from Rose to George and back again, their faces solemn, their eyes big and round and frightened. Sam came out through the door.
“Come on, you guys,” he said to the twins. “Mom’s okay. The doctor’s in there talking to her and I heard them laughing. You want to play race cars? You come too.” He turned toward Rose.
“No,” said Rose hoarsely.
“Come on,” he said, coming over to her. “It wasn’t your fault. Mom gets like that sometimes. She goes hairy. That’s all this is. The doctor says she’s okay. Come on.”
“No.”
“Well, all right, but—all right.” Sam went inside the house. With one withering look, George followed them.
“She’s going to die,” Rose whispered to herself. “She’s going to die and the baby’s going to die and it’s my fault.” She had not moved from where she had stopped half an hour before, when Aunt Nan had fallen. She could not move, her legs would not carry her. The scene replayed itself in her mind—the shouts and shrieks, her breaking loose from Aunt Nan’s clutch, Aunt Nan running after her and the fall, over and over again, the fall.
The doctor came out of the house. At last Rose moved.
“Please,” she said, “is Aunt Nan going to die?”
“Oh, no, of course not,” said Dr. Best. She was a small, sturdy woman who in her brisk movements exuded a sense of confidence. “No, she’s going to be fine, the baby’s going to be fine. The only problem is that she’s wrenched her back and she’s going to have to stay in bed for at least a month. As long as she’s careful she’ll be fine. You’ll all have to help. Don’t you worry.”
“Thank you, thank you very much,” said Rose, and without stopping to say good-bye she ran around the corner of the house and threw herself to the ground beside the root cellar doors.
“I don’t care,” she said again and again to herself. “She’s all right and I didn’t kill her. She hates me, but she’s going to be all right. I didn’t kill her. Sam’s wrong. I don’t belong here. I don’t.”
She was so consumed by her own misery that she almost let the shadow of the thorn tree slip past the opening between the doors. Just in time she jumped up and ran down the steps.
When the Wind Comes Up
Rose sniffed the summer air hungrily. But she didn’t have the strength of spirit to go looking for Susan. Instead, she sat down and clasped her hands tightly around her knees and put her head down. The words still pounded in her head: “ungrateful, inconsiderate, selfish, cruel.” “You could’ve killed Mom.” Then she heard again Sam’s voice: “Not exactly the friendliest person in t
he world, you know.” She shuddered and tried to push the voices out of her mind but still they hammered at her. “I didn’t kill her,” she whispered. “I’m not going back there ever, if I get to be three hundred and seventy-five years old. Never!”
“Rose?” said Susan’s soft voice. “Rose, are you sick?”
Rose looked up. “Oh, Susan,” she said and, for the first time she could ever remember, she burst into tears. “I did something really awful and Aunt Nan almost died.” Through her tears she told Susan what had happened.
When she had finished there was a silence that to Rose seemed filled with her shame and unkindness. Then Susan said, “Well, I don’t see you been so terrible bad. I don’t suppose you ought to have stowed away in the cart, but it ain’t such a terrible thing. The letter was too bad. You wrote it when you was mad. You can see how it would be a hard thing to come across. And besides, your aunt’s pregnant and sometimes that makes a person chancy. Even cats and cows when they’re pregnant can be some upset. Not that you have to be pregnant to have a chancy temper. I guess you ain’t used to hearing people get riled like that. From what you say, your gran never did.”
“No, she didn’t.”
“Well, it seems to me your aunt is one who does. You’ll get used to it. When you go back there you’ll feel lots better.”
“I’m not going back. Ever!”
“Oh, Rose, of course you will! Them folks is good. You’ll catch on to how to get on with ’em.” Susan pushed back a strand of her bright brown hair and smiled.
Rose sighed quaveringly. Susan’s soothing voice and kind words at least restored her to calm. She remembered why she had come. She fished into the pocket of her jeans for Will’s song and handed it to Susan. “Did it work?” she asked eagerly. “How long have I been gone?”
“It’s a week since you come last.”
Rose breathed a happy sigh. “It’s a week for me, too.”
Susan gave the song back to Rose. “You better keep it for now. Will said you brought good luck when he wanted so bad to talk to the birds. And it worked to bring you now, so mebbe, if you keep it, it will bring us both luck, and Will, too.”
“Then you keep my rose.” Rose put the song back in her pocket. “Susan, I saw Will’s name on a list in Oswego.” She told her about Mr. Ancaster and Fort Ontario.
Susan had only one thing to say. “He didn’t find no list that said when they come back.”
“No, but he said that didn’t mean they didn’t come. It only means they didn’t come when most of the others did. Susan, what we have to do is go to Oswego and find out.”
The idea had sailed into Rose’s head so swiftly and neatly that she had hardly time to notice it before the words were out. “I had a booklet, but I left it in the car with the copy of the list. It told where all the battles were. I can remember quite a lot of them. But we can find out more if we go over to the fort again. They’ll know. And we can go to see Stephen Jerue’s family.”
“Rose, we can’t do that!”
“Why not?”
“It’s too far.”
“It isn’t. I’ve been there. I’ve just come back from there.”
“I never been farther than Soames. I can’t go.”
“Susan, what if Will is sick or wounded and can’t get home and can’t let us know, and they could tell us at the fort where to look? Maybe Stephen Jerue is home already and he can tell us.”
Susan looked doubtful.
“What if not going means we never see Will again?”
“I’ll go,” said Susan. Her eyes were large and fearful. She clasped and unclasped her hands nervously. “I’ll go,” she repeated. “But whatever’s the missus going to say?”
“It’s for Will, isn’t it? We’ll go across Lake Ontario on one of those schooners and we’ll find the Jerues. I’m sure they’ll help us. Then we’ll find—Susan, we don’t have any money!”
“I got some.”
“Go get it.”
Although she was now three years younger than Susan, Rose suddenly realized that she, not Susan, knew what had to be done this time. She knew that she had to take charge now or they would never leave Hawthorn Bay, never find Will, never be able to face any danger or difficulty that might lie ahead. It was as though Susan, too, understood. She hesitated for a moment, then ran off into the house.
She was gone long enough for the last of the afternoon to fade into evening. An oriole trilling his three liquid notes flitted higher and higher into the shadowy leaves of the big maple tree. A chipmunk scurried along the rail fence that separated the garden from the rest of the back yard. Susan came out of the kitchen. Her face was stiff and white. Her mouth was set in a straight line. “Will’s ma’s raising an awful ruckus, crying and carrying on about how Will wouldn’t never have gone if it wasn’t for Steve’s bad influence. As if anyone could make Will Morrissay do a thing he hadn’t the mind to.”
“Does that mean you won’t go?”
“I’m coming and, what’s more, I made her give me five Yankee dollars.” Susan opened her fist and showed Rose a handful of money. “And I got more. At the bottom of my trunk. Forty dollars—Yankee, too. Ma and Pa saved it from their wedding trip in the States and left it for me to get married with, but I figure mebbe this is more important.”
“Then we can go. All we have to do is get a ride on a ship.”
“First thing in the morning we can go on up to Jamie Heaton’s. Like as not they’ve got a load going to Oswego. Rose, would you mind saying you was a boy, like me and Will thought the first time we saw you?”
“Why?”
“Well, you know. Boys get paid more mind to and, what’s more, I’d be safer.”
“How come?”
“Folks will think I got protection. And, anyway, nobody’d believe you’re a girl in them britches and your hair all cut off.”
“All right. I don’t care. You can say my name is David.”
Rose slept that night in the barn. She was up and ready when Susan came for her at dawn. Susan had on a blue and white checkered dress and a small black bonnet with a pink flower in it. She looked neat and pretty. She was carrying Rose’s overnight bag in one hand and in the other a small square straw one of her own.
Gratefully Rose took her bag. “I forgot I left it here,” she said.
They took turns rowing up the bay, eating bread and cheese as they went. They startled a big blue heron away from his breakfast. He gronked crossly at them as he took off, his huge wings pumping up and down like some great prehistoric bird. From somewhere behind them a loon called in his high fluttering tones. “It isn’t like any other place in the whole world,” sighed Rose. Susan nodded.
Within ten minutes they heard men’s voices and soon pulled into sight of a wharf where a small sailing ship was being loaded with grain.
“It’s Arn Colliver. I expect he’ll take us,” said Susan. Her voice was tight and nervous. “Captain Colliver,” she called, shipping the oars and tying the boat to the wharf. “If you’re going to Oswego, me and my friend—David—want to sail with you.” She climbed up onto the wharf. Rose scrambled after. “Will, he ain’t come home yet from the war and I figure to go looking for him.”
“Well now, Susan Anderson, can you trim a sail?” asked the captain. Without waiting for an answer he walked away from them down the plank into the ship.
“Isn’t he going to tell us if we can come?” Rose was worried.
“He’ll take us. When the wind comes up.” Susan perched tensely on the edge of a large wooden box. Rose followed suit, watching the short bulky figure of Captain Colliver as he moved about on the deck of the ship, overseeing the loading of the grain from the wagons drawn up to the wharf and for half a mile behind. It was a long, low ship with three masts and a single cabin on the deck. The grain was being loaded into the hold below. One by one the wagons were emptied, the farmers “geed, hawed” and “giddapped” their horses, leaving the captain, and the three boys and the man who made up his crew,
to level the grain.
“That’s Billy Foster and Joe Heaton and I don’t know the other boy. Hank Bother’s the cook,” Susan told Rose. “The two boys belong to our Church. That Billy Foster was an awful one for making trouble when he was a little feller. Him and Will’s brother Adam, they was a pair of terrible teasers. If it hadn’t of been for Will there’s times I might have run off. I come to Morrissays to work when I was nine. Them boys made things miserable for me. I used to hide back in Bothers’ woods and Will, he’d come and find me and make Adam leave off.”
The sun got hotter and hotter as they talked. Finally, just before noon, a breeze started up and Captain Colliver came out of the cabin. “All right, lads,” he called. “Looks like a wind’s coming up. Let’s get going.” He shooed away several cats and a large dog and nodded at Rose and Susan. “Come aboard, you two.”
“This here’s David,” said Susan. Captain Colliver nodded brusquely but said nothing. “Island folks is like that,” Susan told Rose later. “They don’t pry into a body’s business though they’re busting to know things.”
The girls went down the gangplank into the schooner and sat down on a coil of rope. With the captain at the wheel giving orders, the three boys untied the ropes that held the ship and with long poles pushed away from the wharf. They drifted slowly out into the lake and hoisted a sail. As the wind caught the sail the captain straightened the schooner, the boys hoisted the remaining sails, and they were away.
There was the odor of fish, the musty scent of the grain below, and the sharp smell of fresh coffee brewing in the cabin. Rose felt the cool wind against her back, lifting the hot hair from her head. She smiled at Susan. Weakly Susan smiled back.
At noon they ate pork and onions and potatoes and rhubarb pie. By this time the neighbor boys had made Susan acquainted with Robert James, an Oswego boy who said he knew Will’s cousin Steve. While they ate, Robert spoke of Steve and the other boys who had gone to fight in the war. “The regiments have been coming home since April,” he said, with awe in his voice. “We’ve been having some mighty celebrations for them. The 147th come in July and there wasn’t more than a hundred and forty-seven of them to come neither. The 110th ain’t home yet.”