On the first night in our new room we discovered that there was a poplar tree outside our window. Its noisy leaves kept Carlie awake. “Why is the tree angry?” she asked, and climbed into bed with me.
But the next morning was bright and fine, and the soft chatter of the leaves seemed friendly, not angry. We had moved to the asylum in June, after our school term was over, so we were soon outside in the sunny weather. Aunt Maude worried when we were out of the house. She appealed to Papa. “Surely it is dangerous for the girls to wander around the grounds of the asylum, Edward. A patient might do them harm.”
Papa was reading a journal. I knew he hated to be talked at when reading. Any answer at such a time would be quick, cross work. He looked up and said, “Maude, that is nonsense. They are perfectly safe here, and fresh air is good for the girls. I would not be surprised to find a little healthy activity to be of benefit to you as well. You would not have so many great concerns over small matters.” With that Papa escaped to his office to work on his book.
After Mama died, he began to write a book about his ideas for curing people in asylums. It was to be called The Closed Mind. Papa would shut himself into his study and work away night after night, so Carlie and I called the book The Closed Door. I believe that when Papa is writing, he doesn’t think so much about Mama. Words are Papa’s medicine. When Mama was alive, Papa used to spend time with us in the evenings. He told us stories about when he was a boy. His papa worked as a printer for a newspaper. Papa would help his father make words with hundreds of pieces of wooden type. He grew to love words. He gives Carlie and me a penny for every new word we bring to him.
Now Papa was back behind the closed door, and Carlie and I were left on our own. But there was so much to explore that Carlie and I didn’t mind. Since we had always lived in a city, the countryside around the asylum appeared vast and empty, but the more we explored, the faster it filled up. The asylum stood in the midst of trees and shrubs. Carlie and I could hide from Aunt Maude in the tangles of shrubs and up in the trees. In the city it had been hard to disappear, because everything belonged to someone who didn’t want you there. But here we could hide for hours.
Many of the trees were newly planted, so the asylum appeared to stretch even higher over everything. It was a small kingdom. Gathered about the large building was a little cluster of houses, like children about their father. Beyond the asylum were its barns and silos and fields. The word silo got me a penny from Papa. At the far edge of the fields was a small lake, but we had been warned against going there.
I knew little of trees and plants. Among the familiar birches and maples we saw many strangers with oddly shaped trunks and puzzling leaves. There were flower beds everywhere: cheerful red geraniums; flocks of daisies; peonies whose pink petals crawled with ants, spoiling their prettiness. Though I warned Carlie that it was forbidden, she couldn’t resist snatching at a flower here or there, so she always arrived home clutching a ragged bouquet.
One day, we discovered a garden tucked away behind the asylum, with a high iron fence all around it and a locked gate. We pressed our faces against the bars of the fence, feeling their cold hardness on our skin. Inside was a fountain making a faint rippling sound as water spilled over into a stone basin. I wondered who was allowed into the garden and how the flowers and trees felt shut up all by themselves.
Often in our explorations we came upon patients strolling about the grounds or making their way to the barns and fields where they worked. At first we were wary of them, keeping out of their way, but we soon saw that they were much like anyone else. Carlie, who could not let strangers pass by without making their acquaintance, was soon calling many of the patients by name. There were nearly a thousand, some of whom, Papa said, were not well enough to walk freely outside. When Carlie and I looked up, we saw faces at the barred windows, kings and queens imprisoned in their castle.
We were assigned a maid, Eleanor Miller, to care for us. When Aunt Maude learned that Eleanor was a patient from the asylum, she was horrified. “A madwoman in our house! Never.”
Papa explained, “It is the custom, Maude, for patients who are making a recovery to assume some work responsibilities. In addition to helping to pay for their costs, they gain experience that will assist them in finding employment when they are discharged from the asylum. Work is natural to man and is an important part of the patients’ treatment.”
Aunt Maude was not calmed. “We will awaken with our throats slit.”
A little shiver went through me, but Papa only smiled and said, “If our throats are slit, I think we will not bother to awaken. I have seen Eleanor’s history. She has been suffering depression and is coming out of it nicely. She wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
Eleanor arrived as Carlie and I were finishing breakfast. Papa was already at the hospital. Eleanor did not look as though she could do anyone harm. She was young and slim, even a little bony. Her hair was so fair that it was nearly silver, and so fine that though Eleanor had knotted it and stuck it in place with many pins, strands and wisps escaped, making her head look surrounded with a silver halo. Her best feature was her eyes, bright blue, under pale lashes. Her worst feature was her hands, red and chafed.
When she saw me looking at them, she hid them behind her back. “Farm girl hands,” she said. “I’m used to scrubbing and cleaning.” She turned to Aunt Maude. “I’m not afraid of work. Just tell me what I must do.”
“There will be plenty to do,” Aunt Maude said. “I only hope you know how to handle nice things. I don’t suppose you were used to them at the farm.”
“My mama has a bowl, all cut glass,” Eleanor said. “With the sun on it, it shines like a diamond.”
“We don’t have time to listen to what your mother may have,” Aunt Maude said. “The kitchen floor needs a good scrubbing.”
Eleanor hurried to fill a pail and went to work, humming to herself until Aunt Maude said, “There is no need to make that noise,” but after watching how hard and cheerfully Eleanor worked all day, Aunt Maude had to admit to Papa that evening that Eleanor “had possibilities.”
Much to Aunt Maude’s irritation, Carlie took to following Eleanor about all day like a little puppy. When Carlie learned that she could speak German, she begged Eleanor for German words. Eleanor taught her Haus, Brot, Schwester for “house,” “bread,” and “sister.” Carlie ran to Papa with the words and got three pennies.
At first I didn’t pay much attention to Eleanor, but one day we both were out in the backyard, Eleanor beating dust out of the rugs and I sitting in the shade of an apple tree, reading a book. I put my book down and asked Eleanor, “Do you like coming here every day instead of being at the asylum?” I was curious about Eleanor. Even though she was a patient, she didn’t seem all that different from me.
“Oh, yes. It’s dull there without much to do, and it’s bad for my melancholia when I’m shut up.”
“What does melancholia mean?” It sounded more like something you ate than a disease. I repeated the word to myself, thinking I could get a penny from Papa for it.
“The doctor says it’s a kind of sadness,” Eleanor said. “It’s like a tune that stays in your head, and you can’t get rid of it.”
When I asked her why she was sad, Eleanor only shook her head. “I keep my sadness to myself,” she said. “There is no need to make you sad as well.”
I knew exactly what she meant, for Mama’s death was like that for me. When Carlie thought of Mama and missed her, she cried and let everyone know what she was feeling, but when I thought of Mama, I just wilted like a flower kept out of water and didn’t let anyone know how I felt. I decided Eleanor and I were alike, and after that, I knew I had someone I could talk with as I used to talk with Mama—and couldn’t talk with Aunt Maude.
The first chance I had to be alone with Papa, I begged him, “Send Aunt Maude away, Papa. I’m twelve now and I can take care of Carlie, and Eleanor will take care of the house.”
“Verna, I’m ashamed of you. You should be grateful to your aunt for all she is doing for us. Of course I won’t send her away. Eleanor is not entirely well and can’t manage both you girls and the house.”
“Not entirely well,” Papa had said. But Eleanor, who was cheerful and, in spite of Aunt Maude’s complaints, went about her work singing to herself, did not seem ill to me. I thought how pleasant it would be to have Eleanor instead of Aunt Maude to care for us. When I saw that Papa would not send Aunt Maude away, I resolved to find a way to make her leave, giving no thought to what my scheming might mean for Eleanor or Aunt Maude. I thought only of what I wanted.
We were welcomed to our new home by the wives of the other asylum doctors, who came wearing hats like platters heaped with flowers and feathers. They brought covered dishes of scalloped potatoes, roast chicken, apple coffee cake, and molasses cookies. Mrs. Thurston, the wife of the hospital’s superintendent, brought little frosted cakes, each one with a real sugared violet on top. I thought them the most beautiful cakes I had ever seen, and Carlie asked if they were fairy food, but Aunt Maude declared them frivolous. (Later, when the women were gone, I looked up the meaning of the word so I could take it to Papa for a penny. The dictionary said frivolous meant “lacking serious purpose.” I did not see why everything must be put to a serious use. I reminded Aunt Maude of the Bible’s lilies of the field, which “toil not, neither do they spin” and she said I was being “impious,” which got me another penny from Papa.)
Aunt Maude had me put on my best dress and pass the refreshments. I heard her confide her fears to the women. “How can an asylum be a suitable place to bring up children?” Though Eleanor was nearby in the kitchen, taking care of Carlie, Aunt Maude did not bother to lower her voice but asked, as she had asked Papa in different words, “Are not the patients dangerous?”
“Oh, never in the world,” Mrs. Thurston said. “There is nothing of that kind here. Of course there are disturbed patients in the back wards, but they don’t go about. You could not find a more pleasant spot than the asylum to raise children: fresh milk and butter from the asylum’s own cows, fresh vegetables from its gardens, help in the house, and a congenial society.” She smiled. “Of course we are isolated here, and in any close society there will be little quarrels and gossip, but I would be surprised if the saints in Heaven itself didn’t have their little differences.”
Aunt Maude frowned. She did not like jokes about holy things.
I was about to hear some of the gossip Mrs. Thurston had mentioned. Mrs. Larter, who had a hat with what looked like a small dead bird resting on it, said, “Last year there was a very unpleasant episode when a staff member became too friendly with one of the patients. The staff member had to be let go because—”
Mrs. Thurston’s glance fell upon me. She interrupted Mrs. Larter, saying to us, “Unfortunately, Verna, just now the doctors’ families are an older group, and there are no children your age here, but you and your sister will have each other and will make friends when school starts this fall.”
I loved my sister, but I was eager for a friend whose idea of a good time was something besides making hollyhock skirts for clothespin dolls.
Mrs. Larter said, “Of course it’s just a one-room schoolhouse.”
“A one-room schoolhouse?” Aunt Maude’s eyebrows flew up. “Surely the girls could be taken to the school in the nearby town.”
“Oh, dear, no,” the women all said nearly at once.
Mrs. Thurston explained, “You can’t imagine what the winters are like up here. The snow falls until there is nothing left to see but the tops of the trees. If the girls tried to travel into town, they might get to school in the morning and not be able to return home for a week. They’ll have to attend the country school.”
With the excitement of snowstorms to come and the novelty of attending a whole schoolhouse contained all in one room, I couldn’t wait for winter. But until that time there was still summer to get through, and summer meant Aunt Maude.
Carlie and I considered Aunt Maude as menacing as a hornets’ nest, and we learned to keep our distance. While Carlie turned to Eleanor, I opened a book. But Aunt Maude was a terrible trouble to Eleanor. She had a great need to tell people how they must improve, and since Carlie and I were stubborn and would not listen, she concentrated on trying to improve Eleanor. Papa frowned upon these criticisms. “She is doing her best, Maude,” Papa said, so Aunt Maude did not criticize Eleanor when Papa was near.
Aunt Maude refused to see how hard Eleanor tried—how she polished the dining room table until it shone; how she made gingerbread, knowing it was a favorite of Carlie’s; how she struggled to make the dainty cucumber sandwiches Aunt Maude liked with her afternoon tea. Nothing Eleanor did satisfied Aunt Maude. Eleanor did not air the beds before making them, or the airing took too long and the beds were not made in a timely fashion. The piecrust was too tough or too crumbly. Eleanor forgot to put down crumpled damp newspaper to catch the dust before she swept, or she wasted too much newspaper in the crumpling.
It seemed the harder Eleanor tried to please Aunt Maude, the more fault Aunt Maude found with her. Once, after one of Aunt Maude’s scoldings, I came upon Eleanor crying. When I asked what the matter was, she quickly began peeling an onion and blamed it for the tears.
Eleanor often looked longingly out the window. When I asked what she was looking at, she said, “The out-of-doors. I feel like I am stuck inside someone’s pocket. At the farm on a day like this,” she said with a sigh, “I’d be picking the first strawberries. We always picked before breakfast, when the berries were still plump with the dew and the sun hadn’t turned hot.” Instead Eleanor had to stay in the kitchen, kneading a great lump of dough, for Aunt Maude had taken a dislike to the bread put out by the asylum bakery and wanted Eleanor to bake bread according to Aunt Maude’s own recipe. The woodstove was fired up, and waves of heat settled in the kitchen.
Carlie and I were free to escape into the July day.
“Why does Aunt Maude scold Eleanor all the time?” Carlie asked.
“I don’t know,” I said, but that wasn’t exactly true. Aunt Maude was stingy with her love and thought other people were too. She seemed to believe that if Carlie and I loved Eleanor, we wouldn’t have enough love left over for her. I noticed that when Carlie shadowed Eleanor around the house, Aunt Maude would find a way to get Carlie’s attention and draw her away from Eleanor. That gave me an idea, the first good idea I’d had on how to get rid of Aunt Maude. I’d tell Carlie not to be shy about letting Aunt Maude see how much she preferred being with Eleanor to being with her. Perhaps Aunt Maude would be so jealous of Eleanor that she would leave.