The Uncharted Beginnings Series Box Set

by Keely Brooke Keith

  “Washed and dried.” Doris reached for the pails, which were on the top shelf beside the cook stove. “Did I tell you Olivia will help me make the decorations for the spring dance?”

  “You did. And please call her Mrs. McIntosh.”

  “But you call her Olivia.”

  “Because she is my friend. You must call her Mrs. McIntosh because she is your teacher.”

  Doris wrinkled her petite nose, bringing out her lingering childishness. “That’s the trouble with being thirteen. I’m half grown up and half kid.”

  Hannah recalled her teen years. Doris was right about being at an awkward age, but every age had some awkwardness to it. When Hannah had first started writing Adeline and Prince Aric’s story, she’d been young and awkward and had written Adeline’s character to be the same way. Now, she tried to fold what she’d learned in life into Adeline.

  Had she succeeded in maturing her character? She would ask Olivia’s opinion on the subject the next time she took pages to her for critique. Those rare afternoons of talking with Olivia about the story were Hannah’s only escape from the responsibilities of managing a home. It had been too long since their last visit, but she hadn’t written anything new in weeks. She reached into her apron pocket for her notepaper.

  Christopher Vestal opened the back door and pulled off his muddy boots. “It will be a great day!”

  Hannah smiled at her father as she plucked her pencil from behind her ear. “Plenty of bees in the orchard this morning?”

  “The blossoms are humming with the music of spring.” He hung his field smock on a peg by the door and climbed the two steps from the mudroom into the kitchen. “Where are my morning kisses?”

  The twins scurried to him, giggling. He scooped them up, one in each arm. Their legs dangled as they gave him loud kisses on his clean-shaven cheek. When he’d set the girls down, Doris wrapped her arms around his neck and hugged him as if she were still little. He kissed the top of her head. “Good morning, Kitten.”

  Hannah studied Doris for a moment. With a long neck and cinched waist, Doris looked more like a young woman than a little girl. How had her little sister grown up so quickly?

  Christopher’s heels thumped the wooden floor as he walked to his seat at the head of the table. He gave her youngest brother’s shoulder a squeeze as he passed. “Did you finish that English paper?”

  “History paper,” the young man corrected without making eye contact. He scowled at his milk cup.

  David ascended the mudroom steps with his dog behind him. He washed his hands in the basin then shoved past Hannah like he owned the place. As the eldest son, this farm would one day be his, but that day was a long time coming. The dog scampered around him, trying to get to the table.

  Hannah flicked a wrist at the yellow retriever. “Keep him out of here, please. I scrubbed the floors yesterday, and I’d like it to last more than a day this time.”

  David smirked. “Give Gideon some respect. He became a proud papa of eight last night.”

  Doris shot up so quickly her chair squeaked. “The puppies were born?”

  The twins ran to the door. “Can we see them? Can we?”

  “After breakfast,” their father answered, his voice stern but kind. “Come sit down, girls.”

  Hannah carried a pewter plate of sliced cheese to the table and placed it near her father. She sat next to David and glanced at the empty chair at the end of the long table. She meant to look for only a second, to acknowledge her late mother as she did at every meal, but while her father said the blessing, Hannah’s eyes never closed.

  A layer of dust dulled the ladder-back slats of the dining chair. She should have kept it cleaner. She had meant to. Doris did the dusting last week. Hannah would do it herself this week. That’s what she had promised her mother—not the dusting specifically, but to take care of everything: the home and her siblings, to raise them, to protect them, to teach the girls to be women who would one day take care of their own households.

  She had promised to put her family first. Her father, David, Wade, Doris, Ida, and Minnie—they all depended on her to keep that promise. Put them before your friends and your schooling, Mother had said. Keep writing your stories, but put your family first. They need you.

  Five and a half years later, they still needed her. She touched the folded-up paper in her apron pocket. They needed her and she needed to write. Creating her story made it easier to stay dedicated to her promise and not yearn for a life apart from this house.

  The imaginative process wasn’t enough though. It was the actual pencil to page that made the story come alive. If only she had more time—time alone, time to write, time to think. The busyness of a full house kept her on her feet and at the stove for hours each day, and school would be out soon, so there would be even more voices and more needs to put before her own.

  She had promised to raise her siblings, but the twins were only seven now. Could she do this for a decade more? The weight of the years pushed on her shoulders as if she were strapped with a fifty-pound sack of flour. How pleasant it would feel to drop that sack and run! But no. These people were her family, the anchor of her promise.

  Still, the glum ache remained. She could only write that yearning, that desperate stirring for something more, into Adeline’s story.

  As Christopher said Amen, Hannah closed her eyes and opened them again, this time careful not to look at her mother’s dusty chair. The twins needed help with peeling eggs, and Doris’s chatter rose over the twins’ whining about seeing the puppies.

  Her brothers held a quieter conversation about the dogs and which family in the village would get one. Christopher interrupted them. “We must offer the puppies to those in village-supported positions before trading with other families. I doubt the reverend, the doctor, or our schoolteacher will want another dog, but we must ask them first. Then we’ll talk about the puppies that are left.” He looked past the twins and winked at Hannah. “Delicious breakfast.”

  Her father’s approval made everything feel better. Almost everything.

  After they ate, she packed the children’s lunches while Doris dashed into the bedroom she and Hannah shared. Doris plodded out a moment later, frowning. A pink ribbon dangled from the end of one of her braids. She touched the other braid. “I guess I’ve lost one of my ribbons somewhere. I don’t remember when I wore them last.”

  Hannah covered each lunch pail with a square of cheesecloth and tied it with twine. “Forget about the ribbon and come get your lunch pail.”

  “I can’t go to school today.” Doris’s chin quivered. “I can’t be seen like this.”

  Hannah’s father and David were already back to work in the orchard, and the other children were standing on the stoop, waiting to walk to school with Doris. There was always some stall, some lost item, some emotional upheaval before school, but once she got the children out the door, the day was hers to do her housework and to think.

  Hannah wiped her hands on her apron and turned Doris around. She untied the long pink ribbon and draped it over her sister’s shoulder as she unwound the two braids. Using the same gentle touch her mother had used with her, she combed out Doris’s dishwater blond waves and wove them into one thick plait. The kitchen fell quiet, save for Doris’s sniffles.

  “I remember the way it feels,” Hannah said. She tied the ribbon into the prettiest bow possible. “Wanting the other girls to like you, wanting to feel pretty. You are as pretty as Sarah Ashton and Roseanna Colburn and the others.”

  Doris turned, pulling the fresh braid to the front of her dress. The tip of her nose was as pink as the ribbon. “But all the boys like Sarah.”

  “Things change very quickly at your age. They might all like her today and all like you tomorrow.”

  “Did that ever happen to you?”

  Hannah had spent her early teen years helping her bedridden mother with twin infants while her father planted the orchard. There hadn’t been time for school or ribbons or boys. The isola
tion had stopped bothering her once she started writing, but looking back, a lonely pang echoed inside her heart. She rubbed Doris’s arm. “My adolescence differed greatly from yours. Enjoy your freedom and your friends.”

  Doris pointed at the ribbon. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “You sound like her… like Mother. Sometimes I dream about her and hear her voice. When I awaken, I realize it was your voice in my dream.” Doris spun to pick up her schoolbooks from the edge of the table, leaving Hannah gaping as the words took hold. Her sister had spent as many years being cared for by her as by their mother. Doris’s young mind had given their mother’s image Hannah’s voice.

  The significance of Hannah’s influence on the children pressed her insides together. Her siblings had no mother, but they had her and would as long as they needed her. She passed a lunch pail to each of the girls and a second pail to Doris. “Hand this to Wade, please.”

  She closed the door and waved goodbye through the window in the back door. Her breath fogged the glass, which had once been a window in the sterncastle of the ship that brought them to this uncharted land. After that arduous voyage aboard the Providence, the families had spent years building the settlement of Good Springs, but before she could enjoy the new village and schoolhouse, her mother passed away, entrusting her with the task of mothering five children.

  A stack of dirty dishes called to her as did the dough that needed baking and laundry that needed washing. She traced a finger over the folded piece of paper in her pocket. She might not have the freedom to choose her lot or experience her own romance, but she was the master of her stories, the creator and controller of an ideal universe where adventure awaited, health abounded, and love made people glad to be alive.

  If she couldn’t have the life she dreamed of, she could create it for Adeline and Aric. They deserved to live happily ever after. Now if only she could finish her story in a way she felt was worthy of her noble characters, even though no one besides Olivia would ever read it.

  Chapter Two

  Henry Roberts loathed waiting for his brother. He worked better at the letterpress by himself anyway. If Simon hoped to improve his typesetting skills, he should have come straight to the print shop after breakfast too.

  Henry rubbed the palm of his left hand and stretched it wide, trying to relieve the phantom itching in his two missing fingers. Keeping himself busy at the press helped to keep his mind off it. His hands were as eager to set type as he was. Only a few more pages to print for an order of eight readers for the school and he could work on his next project: Shakespeare’s Sonnets. He checked his pocket watch. It was pointless to wait for Simon any longer.

  Henry stepped to the shop door and picked through a box of sorts, examining the copper-platted letters in the early morning light. After years of learning what had been his father’s trade back in Virginia, Henry’s letterpress skills now surpassed his father’s. Though his brother had learned the trade too, Simon’s pages were far inferior, certainly not worth binding.

  Reverend William Colburn walked past the print shop. He pushed his spectacles higher on his nose. “Good morning, Henry.”

  Henry tucked his half-hand into his apron pocket. “Good morning, Reverend.” He nodded politely then returned to the worktable inside. He found the letters he needed for the final pages and set the sorts in the bed of the press, carefully aligning the type. Precision in the row produced excellence on the page. Every page deserved perfection.

  The late spring wind blew loose petals past the doorway. Henry glanced up, expecting to see Simon. A stack of yesterday’s misprints rustled beneath a rock on the desk. If Simon came to the print shop today, Henry would have him find the sorts instead of setting type. A helper might speed the work, but he wasn’t in the mood to waste ink and paper on Simon’s shoddy work today.

  Nor was he in the mood to teach.

  Teaching slowed him. Henry’s father had taught him well and had known when to let go. That’s when Henry’s enjoyment of the letterpress grew into passion. If he did nothing else for the rest of his life but print and bind books, he would die a satisfied man.

  A satisfied man with a disfigured hand.

  Of course, he would spend his life making improvements to the press. There was no such thing as a perfect process. If that fact wasn’t obvious in making books, it was obvious in the way Good Springs was being governed. Only one elder from each of the eight families that formed the settlement had a voice in the weekly council meetings. As the oldest son who would one day inherit his father’s position on the council, Henry had spent years attending those meetings in silence.

  The elder council expected the next generation to learn by listening, but the leaders had too much control. Ideas for improvements had swirled inside Henry’s mind, locked behind closed lips during the weekly meetings. A man could only tolerate mediocrity for so long. The flawed system needed an overhaul.

  He squatted to open one of the thin drawers at the bottom of the press cabinet. An array of rarely used sorts crowded the drawer. The way his father organized the type needed an overhaul as well. If Henry was going to continue to share the print shop with his father, they needed to have a talk about organization.

  A man’s voice carried on the wind, and a moment later a shadow darkened the shop. Henry continued setting type and didn’t look away from the rows of reversed letters. “You’re late again, Simon.”

  “With good reason.” Simon stepped into the print shop but stayed in the doorway, leaving on his straw hat. His bottom lip protruded the way it had since they were children, making him look unhappy even when he wasn’t.

  Their father walked in too, but he was grinning wide enough to puff his gray side whiskers. “We had a calf born this morning, Henry. You should see her. Beautiful cow. That’s three so far this spring.”

  “I’m glad you’re pleased.” Henry continued working. “Will you have the paper finished in time for me to start my next project this afternoon?”

  “I should, yes.” Matthew Roberts scratched his cheek as he moved to the type cabinet. He opened one of the drawers Henry had reorganized. “You run your print shop far more efficiently than I ever ran mine and produce much finer pages than I did.”

  Henry dislodged his attention from the letterpress. “This is your shop, Father.”

  Matthew closed the drawer and studied Henry, his eyes sharply focused beneath his drooping brow. “It’s time we made some changes, son.”

  Simon smirked and his thick bottom lip curved.

  Henry wiped his fingertips on a dry rag and stuffed it into his back pocket. “What kind of changes?”

  Matthew lifted his chin toward the letterpress. “I brought all this from Virginia to teach you my trade. You mastered it. Now that I’ve developed an efficient method of making paper from the gray leaf tree pulp, I want to give that my full attention. And your brother,” he motioned toward Simon, “isn’t suited for indoor work. He has taken to the farming.”

  Henry crossed his arms. “What are you saying?”

  Matthew rested his palms on the edge of the worktable and leaned forward. His mouth worked, adjusting his porcelain false teeth. “It’s my duty as a founder of this settlement to make sure my sons have work that sustains them and improves the settlement. You are the firstborn, and I intended for you to take over the farm, but things aren’t going the way I planned when we first settled here.”

  Henry looked out the window at the new stone building next door. The empty library’s tapered door—made from the planks of the Providence—stood ajar. He’d much rather print the books needed to fill the settlement’s library than work on the farm, especially after the accident. He rubbed the scarred nubs where his pinkie and ring finger had been torn off. “Are you dissatisfied with my preference for print work?”

  “No, son, I’m not. You followed my footsteps, and now I’ve found something that demands my attention more than printing. The elders agree with me that I should foc
us my time on making paper for the village. I’ll still care for our livestock, but Simon will manage the fields. I want you to take over the print shop… permanently. It’s time for you to have your own livelihood.”

  “Livelihood?” Henry’s gaze dropped to the rows of letters awaiting ink. He loved the work and planned to move away from home someday, but running the press all day wouldn’t leave time to clear land and build a house and plant and harvest food. He needed his father’s involvement in the print work to justify his still living at home. “I’ve had a few orders, but there isn’t enough work for me to trade for a living. I’m not charging anyone for this order of books for the school.” He picked up a jar of freshly mixed ink and stirred it. The air filled with the mixture of soot and walnut oil. He breathed in the aroma. “I wish this were a living, but it isn’t. Not yet. I would have to spend my time planting and hunting just to survive.”

  Matthew looked at Henry’s damaged hand and compassion filled his voice. “You have a bed at my home—always will, unless you marry.”

  Simon snickered. At first it rankled, but then Henry joined him. It was true: he would never marry. No woman wanted a man with half a hand, and he didn’t know a woman in the village who would warrant the effort of courting. Women required too much adoration and still found offense at a man’s every comment and gesture.

  Matthew examined a page hanging up to dry. “Son, with your skill and speed at the press, I believe you could produce enough books for the library and school and church to earn a living.”

  “You talk as though the elders would make the press a village-supported trade. Last I heard they planned to fill the library over the centuries. Did I miss something in one of the meetings?”

  His father brushed Simon’s shoulder. “Go on back to the farm. I’ll be there shortly.”

  After Simon left, Matthew walked to the doorway. He pointed toward the stone building next door. “The elders wouldn’t have approved the building of a library if books weren’t important to this village.”