The Year We Sailed the Sun

by Theresa Nelson

  So it was almost a relief when Sister Maclovius started handing out scrubbing assignments for the clean-up crews. Never mind the nip in the air, with the wind snapping the sheets on the clotheslines out back and blustering all around the House. The calendar said spring, so it must be spring, Sister insisted, with Easter coming up this weekend and not a minute to lose. And at least we had the day off from lessons, so Spring-Cleaning Day wasn’t a total loss.

  “The highlight of my year,” said Marcella, waving a feather duster over her head. “Come on, Your Majesty, follow me. I’ll show you the safe spots. You don’t want to go near the rug beaters or the stair polishers, believe me.”

  Which is why so many of the rest of us were sweeping and dusting away in the parlor that blustery April morning, as if our lives depended on it, with the windows thrown open to the pale yellow sunshine, and the wind flapping the curtains all around us, when Mr. Hanratty-Maguire’s fine new Cadillac motorcar came sputtering and lurching and kicking and bucking and backfiring up a storm, all the way down Morgan Street, like a one-car revolution.

  We heard it before we saw it.

  “Oh dear,” said Sister Gabriel, looking up from her knees by the radiator grate, where she was scrubbing the black away—or trying to, anyhow. She was smudged all over her face with it; she could have passed for a chimney sweep, except for the wimple. “He’s brought Miss Downey for her lessons, hasn’t he? Did we forget to tell her she had the day off?”

  But before anyone could answer her, the raised voices coming in from the curbside made all of us stop . . . and lift our eyebrows at one another . . . and go running to the windows to peek out at the fight.

  “And why shouldn’t I?” Miss Downey was saying. “Why couldn’t we?”

  “Because it’s nonsense, Cora; you know I’d never agree to such a thing. She’d eat us both alive!”

  “She would not! You don’t know her—”

  “And you do, I suppose?”

  “I do.”

  “You don’t. It’s you I’m thinking of, sweetheart. We’ll have children of our own one day; we have to consider them, too. She bites, remember? Her brother’s in the reformatory. If she’s to be placed, it ought to be with a family of—of a more similar background—”

  “Background? Background? Oh, balderdash, Daniel! I’m a farm girl from Parkersburg, Iowa, for heaven’s sake. Who do you think I am, Queen Victoria?”

  “Who’re they talking about?” Winnie whispered.

  “Three guesses,” Hazel hissed, and my face was burning hot as a skillet on the fire itself but I couldn’t budge. I couldn’t move a muscle. Sister Gabriel was on her feet and standing beside us now, trying to tug us all away, but it was no use. I’d turned to stone again. And now Miss Downey was getting out of the car and slamming the door shut and starting up the sidewalk, and Mr. Hanratty-Maguire was out, too, and coming after her, stopping her, taking her by the arm.

  “Don’t do this, Cora. You misunderstand me. I’m not talking about that sort of background. . . .”

  She shook her head. “It’s you who’s misunderstanding, Daniel. I know you’re not doing it on purpose, but . . . but you don’t know how it felt, that’s all, seeing her out there on the ice, hanging on to that old doll—her friend’s doll, don’t you see? She was trying to help her friend! If you’d only seen what I saw . . .”

  “I’m sure she has her—her good points. If you say so. I’d never wish her ill. I’ll do everything in my power to see that she’s fed and clothed and treated kindly, here with the Sisters. But I’ll not be adopting her. I will not. That’s my final word on the subject. And if you insist on persisting with this madness . . . well, I guess it’s your choice then, isn’t it? You have to choose, Cora.”

  There was only a hairsbreadth of a pause.

  Winnie squeezed my arm.

  “Then I choose the child, Daniel. I choose this child.”

  Another pause. Winnie’s grip got tighter. I thought my heart would bust right out of my chest. Then—

  “You don’t know what you’re saying, my dear. You’re upset, that’s all; you’re not yourself—”

  “I know exactly what I’m saying. And I’ve never been more myself. You’re a fine man, Daniel. Any girl in her right mind would be proud to marry you. But—”

  Daniel gave a hard little laugh. “But you’re not in your right mind? She’s bewitched you, is that it?”

  “And what if she has? I’ve spent my whole life being so . . . so careful, don’t you see? Always looking before I—” Miss Downey broke off there and lifted her eyes. It was me she was looking at now, in the window. Me she saw, looking back at her. “Sometimes you just have to go ahead and leap,” she finished.

  “Go ahead and what?” said Mr. Hanratty-Maguire, not understanding.

  “Leap,” I whispered.

  He couldn’t have heard me. I hardly heard myself. But he looked where she was looking, then, and saw me—saw all of us—watching him: three windows full of saucer-eyed orphans and nuns—not just Sister Gabriel but Sister Bridget and Sister Maclovius now too. When had they joined us? I wondered. And the poor man colored clear up to his carefully trimmed sideburns, and made two stiff little bows—first to Miss Downey, then to the rest of us—and turned and walked back to his fine car, opened the door and got in, and got it started, finally (on the fourth try), and drove off down Morgan Street, sputtering and lurching and bucking and backfiring, with his head held high.

  And Miss Downey watched him go.

  Then she turned back around again and started walking up the walk to the House.

  And the nuns, seeing her coming, looked at one another and raised their eyebrows, and then hustled all the other girls away (though it wasn’t so easy, with some of ’em; they had to practically drag Hazel down the hall), and left me there, waiting for her, with my heart thudding.

  I opened the door.

  “Hello,” said Cora Downey.

  “You’re a farm girl from Parkersburg, Iowa?”

  “I am,” she said.

  “Did you . . . have chickens?”

  “I did.”

  I took a deep breath. “And—and cows?”

  Miss Downey smiled. “Oh my, yes. Cows aplenty. It was a dairy farm, first. May I come in, Julia?”

  I nodded, but I couldn’t move. We were both still standing in the doorway. I held on tight to the knob, to keep from falling over.

  “So why did you come to St. Louis?”

  “To visit my aunt—my favorite aunt—Aunt Lizzie? I think I mentioned her to you once. But she died last fall. And I would have gone home, but I had met Daniel by that time—at the club, you see; Aunt Lizzie was a member. And then he asked me—that is, we became engaged—but that’s off now, of course.”

  “Because of me? Ah, Miss, you can’t just—you shouldn’t—”

  “No, no, no, Julia. It’s for the best; really it is. It’s not because of you. . . . Not only because of you . . .” She had her arm around my shoulders now, and was leading me back to the parlor.

  “Then why?” I asked as she sat us both down.

  She sighed. “It’s hard to explain. It’s no one thing. It’s true, what I told him; he’s a good man, Julia. And loyal as a dog. And he loves me, and I know I’ve hurt him. And I’m sorry for that, I’m truly sorry, because he doesn’t deserve it.” Miss Downey’s eyes filled up all of a sudden. “But—”

  “But what?”

  “Well . . . he’s a bit of a stuffed-shirt, I’m afraid.”

  “A bit?”

  “Just a bit. And he tells me I laugh too loud. And he never gets a joke unless I explain it, and then it’s not funny anymore. So then I get cross, and he gets cross, and round and round we go. And have you ever in all your life seen such a terrible driver?” She wiped her eyes. “Oh, it never would have worked! So you see—”

  “I see.”

  “It wasn’t just you.”

  I nodded.

  We sat there for a minute.

&nbs
p; And then I cleared my throat. “Do you ever . . . would you ever . . . think of going back to the farm?”

  “The farm?” she repeated. “In Iowa, you mean?”

  “Yes’m,” I said, trying to keep my voice from trembling. “I was just—well, you know. Just wondering.”

  Miss Downey shook her head. “I don’t think so. To visit, of course, but not to live. Not anymore. Not since my parents died. It belongs to my brothers now, you see—three of them—and their wives and children. Quite a houseful. They don’t need me underfoot all day, every day. Or sitting in some corner, knitting.”

  “Do you knit?” I asked, trying not to look disappointed.

  “Not really,” said Miss Downey.

  “Me neither.”

  In my mind’s eye, a whole herd of mournful-looking milk cows trotted away, mooing softly.

  Now Miss Downey cleared her throat. “But a farm—well, somewhere—wouldn’t be entirely out of the question. Because of Aunt Lizzie.”

  “Aunt Lizzie?”

  “She left me a bit of a legacy, God bless her. Not millions, of course; she wasn’t a Rockefeller or anything. But enough to—well, to tide us over for a bit. Make a fresh start somewhere. Though there’s no rush about deciding, of course. . . . You’ll need some time to think it over. . . .”

  I was having trouble breathing. “Could Bill come too? And Mary?”

  “Well, I . . . I’m not sure about that, Julia. About all the—well, the legal ramifications and so forth.”

  “Oh,” I said, nodding, trying to look like I understood. “Ramifi—fi—what? Ficay—”

  “Fications. But they’d be welcome to visit us, of course. They could come anytime and stay as long as they like. Your family and friends would always be welcome.”

  My heart gave a leap. “But—but where? Welcome where?”

  “In our home.”

  Our home . . .

  Was I dreaming? I must be dreaming. Don’t wake up, Julia. . . .

  But Miss Downey was smiling at me again, and getting to her feet, and offering me a hand. “Tell you what,” she said. “Do you think the Sisters can spare you for a bit? We’ll take the trolley. There’s someone I’d like you to hear.”

  Chapter 33

  And there he stands in the Grand Hall at the Union Station, under the great arch with the ladies holding their lamps up: the Razzle-Dazzle Man himself, making his pitch for the day, just as dapper as you please. Sparkling, is what he’s doing, though he ain’t wearing diamonds or rubies or naught like that. It’s in his eyes mostly, this sparkle—black as two shiny black buttons—but the shine is all around him, too, shooting out of him somehow from every which way. Lord in heaven, can’t you feel the heat? His shoes shine and his eyes shine and the little silver moons in his cuff links shine and his black hair shines when he takes off his hat and bows to the crowd—the whole crowd, sure, but the ladies in particular—and waves his hands and talks and talks:

  “Montana, ma’am, that’s the state of the future! Montana with a capital M for magnificent! Mountains reaching straight to heaven and rivers running with the purest water on earth, all of it spilling down on farmland so rich it defies description. Montana! Oh my, yes. The New Eden, that’s what no less a man than Mr. James J. Hill has christened it. That’s what the great Mr. Hill himself has sent me here to tell you today. And he isn’t the sort of feller given to exaggeration, no sir, though I wouldn’t blame you for suspecting otherwise. I didn’t believe it myself till I saw it with my own eyes. That’s virgin land, ma’am—begging your pardon if I seem to speak indelicately—untouched till now, the last of its kind in the country. And what might you grow in this paradise, you ask, sir? Why, anything you please! You just drop a seed in that pristine prairie soil, it’ll sprout so tall, so fast, you’ll be thinking you dreamed it. You’ll be looking for giants humming ‘Fee-Fi-Fo-Fum’!”

  And it’s the ladies in particular who smile back this fine spring morning, smoothing a curl in place or touching their faces, as if they suddenly feel the need to assure themselves they’re still all there—eyes, noses, mouths, chins—as if in the heat of so much blinding razzle-dazzle, they might have somehow melted clean away.

  The other ladies, that is. Miss Downey was her usual self the second he shut up, and busy with practical questions: How much and how far and the name of a good builder and “Would it be possible to take a piano?” she wondered. Though I never did hear—I missed the exact moment—when she signed on the dotted line. Once the lady decided to leap, she didn’t fool around.

  “Montana?” Marcella said when I gave her the news. “You’re going to Montana?”

  “Why?” said Hannah.

  “Where’s Montana?” said Winnie.

  “Is it even a state?” said Hazel.

  “Wasn’t that where Custer had his Last Stand?” said Geraldine Mulroney.

  I knew they were all just jealous. Any one of ’em would give her eyeteeth to be going to Montana with Miss Cora Downey.

  “Some people have all the luck,” Agnes said with a sigh.

  But I knew it was more than luck.

  I choose this child. . . .

  I knew a miracle when I saw one.

  The days all swam together after that. Lent was over and Easter was over and the floods were still flooding. Everything was speeding up, breaking loose, rushing-roiling-tumbling forward, spilling out of its banks and changing all the time, turning into something different. Something more. Nothing was the same; nobody was who I thought they were. Miss Downey wasn’t a millionaire and Betty was an heiress. The poor old unsinkable Titanic was at the bottom of the sea. And then, one Saturday morning—

  “There’s someone here to see you,” said Sister Gabriel, looking fit to bust with her news.

  “Someone to see me?” I said, following her to the parlor, and there was Miss Downey, sitting across from Mary, who was on the couch next to Henry the Hired Boy, who’d brought her in the Lenahans’ trap to see me and meet the lady. He was holding his cap again and his ears were as red as ever, but he stood up when I came in, as if I was somebody, so I liked him again. And Mary! She stood up, too, and I swear, she was four inches taller than before. She looked—why, all grown up and lady-fied herself, that’s what. “Hello, Julia,” she said. She sounded the same anyhow, and she was smiling like her old self, so I stopped being shy and near knocked her over, hugging her.

  “Did they tell you? Did you meet Miss Downey? Are you coming to Montana with us?”

  “Well, not—not right away,” she said, and now she was the one looking shy.

  “Well, why not, for Pete’s sake? It’ll be grand, Mary! You’ll love it!”

  But her cheeks went scarlet then and Henry’s ears got even redder, though he didn’t say a word himself—I couldn’t recall him ever saying a word, now that I thought about it—and after a good deal of stammering and blushing, Mary managed to say that he’d asked her to the May Day Dance at the Parish Hall.

  And then I understood.

  “Ah, for heaven’s sake, Mary,” I whispered to her, when Henry was watering the horse before they left. “Fat Eddie’s cousin? You like Fat Eddie’s cousin? You ain’t planning on marrying him, are you?” And even her nose turned cherry-red then, so I knew it had crossed her mind, no matter how hard she tried to pretend it hadn’t.

  “He’s a nice boy, Julia. You can’t judge people by their relatives.”

  “But it’s Montana, Mary! It’s perfect! Just wait’ll you hear. . . .”

  And Miss Downey talked then, and explained it all (she’d thought the whole thing through by this time, and made it sound wonderful—and sensible, too), and you could see that Mary approved of her. She was glad for me anyhow, and she promised to come visit, when Miss Downey invited her. But she didn’t know any more about Bill than I did. She’d had no letters, no messages; she’d written him once, but she didn’t know if he’d gotten it.

  So I wrote him, too, telling him where he could find me out West, and I gave it
to Sister Bridget to mail, and she promised she’d do it.

  Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye . . .

  And then there was the judge and the doctor and the dentist to see, and shopping to do for boots and clothes and such. Miss Downey took me to Tyroler’s Department Store itself and fitted me out with everything I’d be needing—she said I’d been getting so tall lately that the old things wouldn’t do now—and a grand new suitcase to put ’em all in.

  And then before I knew it, it was Leaving Day, with the whole House gathered in the hallway, just before Sister Bridget and Hyacinth—good old Hyacinth—took me to the station.

  Miss Downey wasn’t with us. She’d gone ahead three weeks before me to make the arrangements about the house and the land and all.

  “We wish you Godspeed, Julia Delaney,” said Sister Maclovius, “in hopes that the memory of our time together will warm your heart in the years to come, as it certainly will ours.” And she gave me a gift—my own personal copy of the New Testament, with a holy card to mark my place: a picture of Saint Prudentiana, lying on a bed of coals.

  And then it was time to go and everyone was shaking hands and saying goodbye—“Look out for rustlers,” said Marcella, cocking an eyebrow at me—and Sister Sebastian was running out with Gypsy Breynton (my very own now, she said), and Sister Genevieve was stuffing my pockets full of biscuits (only slightly burnt), and Sister Gabriel was hugging me hard, and wiping away tears, and slipping a rosary in my pocket.

  Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye, goodbye . . .

  “Bon voyage!” called Sister Sebastian.

  But I didn’t see Betty. I couldn’t find her anywhere. I couldn’t leave without telling Betty goodbye; it made my whole chest ache, but no one could find her and the train wouldn’t wait.