Aunt Alice sat in the parlor with the shades drawn and cried like her heart was broken. “Auntie, please, Pa was sick a long time and mebbe it is better that he don’t suffer any more and has gone on to heaven,” I said. Nothin’ helped Aunt Alice and I wasn’t really sure about all that heaven stuff anyway. Men from the church laid Pa in the parlor. I washed away the blood on his face, thinkin’ that would make him feel, or at least, look a little better. No one patted me on the back and said everything would be all right. There weren’t no one to do that, in the whole world. Rachel was too far away to say sweet things in my ear. The world was dark.
Pa was still warm when the Reverend Hiram Pendelton and his daughter Bessie took charge. The Reverend was on the plump side and always wore a black swallow-tail coat and grey vest with a pearl stick pin. He was slick and smooth, especially when they passed the collection plate. Bessie was a confirmed spinster with a sharp nose; her hair was always pulled back in a tight bun and if she had a female looking body, it was well hid. Bessie taught violin, played the organ in church and led the temperance society. She had studied at a woman’s seminary and marched in parades with women who wanted to vote but never had much luck with the boys’ Sunday school class. One morning, Billy Malone passed a little fart then another boy let one slide. We all laughed until the tears came. Miss Pendelton tried to make us into Christian gentlemen. The deacons didn’t exactly approve of her stirring up the gentle sex to vote and starting a temperance society. Mr. Farnum took over the class on account of he was awful thick with Reverend Pendelton and always took up the collection.
Pa hadn’t gone to church regular but he’d been baptized and Aunt Alice went twice a week to make up for his backsliding. The church ladies arrived with enough food for the whole town. Aunt Alice stayed in the parlor and stared into space. When the Reverend and Bessie came, I crawled into a corner of the old stable out back and cried until night came. Later, I looked at Pa’s poor frail body and thought about the times I hadn’t done what he wanted and how hard his life had been since Ma died. I slept out in the barn in the straw so as to get away from all the ladies who were consoling Aunt Alice. I had to stay home and look after Aunt Alice instead of going to Chicago.
Almost the whole town was at to Pa’s funeral. Old Isaiah and his family came from all the way across the river and were as respectful as white people but Reverend Pendelton made them stay outside the church. The little dark children never let out a peep. The reverend preached his usual hell and damnation sermon about Catholics and Democrats. Once or twice he mentioned Pa. but never said a word of comfort for Aunt Alice. Pa’s friends carried the pine wood coffin out the front door to the black hearse and most folks got in carriages but Old Isaiah and the darkies walked all the way to the cemetery, carrying their hats.
It took two men with pickaxes and shovels to dig a hole in the hard dry ground. I balled when they lowered the coffin and filled the grave. Mr. Friday the saloon keeper shook my hand, like I was a grown up and said he was sorry. When most of the white folks left, Isaiah and his family stayed.
“Your Pa was kind to us folks and always gave the chilluns a peppermint,” Isaiah said. Obediah got a bucket of dirt and wildflowers out of the wagon. They all helped dig little holes and planted the black eyed susan’s and the wild daisy’s.. “I’ll bring water every day, so’s next spring there will be flowers on his grave,” Isaiah said.
The church ladies twittered around Aunt Alice, who sat in her black bombazine church dress and never said a word. It was like she had gone off into a world of her own. She had grieved over so many folks who had passed away and had held our little family together for so long, she had given up. Aunty didn’t even get up for breakfast the next day. There was plenty of food in the house, but I wasn’t hungry.
Just before noon, Mr. Farnum drove up in his surrey and came through the front door without so much as knocking, like he already owned the place. He settled down on the horsehair sofa and talked fast while he spread papers out on a little table. He never once looked me square in the eye.
“Your Pa was behind in his payments.. Way behind. This house and the store belongs to me. The only way to get my money back is to take over all those bottles of medicine and this here furniture to pay the debt,” he said.
He shuffled e important looking papers with his fat fingers and studied the shine on his shoes. “The bank will collect the money that people owed your father and I will sell the stock of medicines.”
I never thought to ask questions and Aunt Alice was too helpless to know any better. I walked around in a daze, wondering how I could tell Dr. Steele I couldn’t come to Chicago. The words in books didn’t mean anything and the anatomy book reminded me of Pa’s organs. I curled up in a ball and let the tears come.
A few days later, Mr. Farnum returned. “It is settled. You are going to an orphanage and your aunt will have to go to the county poor farm,” he said. “Can I take my clothes and books to the orphanage?” I asked. “You can keep you clothes and one book. Everything else will be sold to pay your Pa’s debts,” he said.
Reverend Pendelton came later and went back in the kitchen. He put a pen in Aunt Alice’s hand. “Sign these paper,” he said. Alice took the pen and didn’t ask questions.
The next day, the sheriff came in a wagon for Aunt Alice. I fixed a bundle of her clothes, some old letters, and a few pictures. She walked out of the house like she didn’t even see me. Just before she got up on the wagon, she ran back, held me tight and let down the tears like her heart would break. The sheriff took her by the arm. I don’t even remember if she said goodbye. Billy Malone came to say he would miss me. I bawled so hard I could hardly see him through the tears.
The Reverend dug his fingers into my arm and led me to his buggy. I wore the suit Aunty had sewed out of heavy woolen cloth, a bundle of my regular clothes and Gray’s Anatomy. I didn’t know nothing about the orphanage, except that once a year the missionary ladies collected old clothes for the poor children like it was in the middle of Africa. “You are lucky the orphanage has a place for you. This way, you won’t be a burden on the church,” Reverend Pendleton said.
Folks at the depot were all excited about a fire in Chicago. According to the newspapers, thousands of people had lost their lives and all the main buildings were burned. One article said the Rush Medical School had burned along with the rest of the city. Even if Dr. Steele was alive and would still take me, there wasn’t any school left. I might just as well lie down next to Pa and die. I bawled and bawled until the Reverend slapped my face. “Stop sniveling,” he said.
I smoldered with hatred for that man and decided to never, ever cry again. I stopped being a boy and grew up.
Pretty soon the train came chugging along and we got into a car. Riding in a train had always been exciting, but this time, I hardly looked out the window. We got off at Bureau Junction where trains on the siding were loaded with food and supplies for Chicago. The reverend rented a sorry-looking hack with a sway backed gelding from the livery. We clopped along until a blue bottle fly stung the horse. He flung his head back and stepped sideways. The Reverend whipped him until the old horse settled down. Along the way, we passed heaps of slag from the coal mines. It was a dismal looking country. The wind had shifted to the northwest and low dark clouds were scudding across the sky. I scrunched down and pulled the collar of my homemade suit up around my neck and had a fit of shivering. It could have been getting colder or it could have just pure misery.
We jogged along for about an hour before we got to a sorry collection of miners’ houses and a store. A little further on down the road, there was a big archway over an iron gate with a sign:
PRESBYTERIAN HOME FOR ABANDONED ORPHANS
“The man who started the mine and founded the town gave money for the orphanage. He needed the boys to work the mines when they got old enough,” the Reverend said. “I don’t’ want to work in a coal mine,” I said. “You ain’t got much choice.” When we drove under the arch, thunder crashed and lightning struck a field not far away. We got to the gray stone building just before the rain. The Reverend beat on the door with his cane, and after a while a woman dressed in black with a face like a dried-up apple peeked through a little window in the door. Spectacles perched on her nose and white hair hung down to her shoulders. . “What’s your business?” She asked.
“I got a boy,” the Reverend said. “Come in,” she said.
We shuffled through a dark hall to a stuffy little room where coals smoldered in the fire place. The man behind the desk was nearly bald with a meaty nose, bags under his eyes and folds of skin hanging down over his jaw. His bushy white side whiskers sagged like his face was made out of putty. The shade was drawn over the one window and a smoky lamp on the desk made just enough light to see a case with a few books and a picture of Christ feeding little children. The room smelled worse than any combination of an outhouse, swamp, dead animals and stale food. The man must have brought manure in on his feet and hadn’t had a bath in a month.
“He’s got a boy,” the woman said.
The man at the desk raised his head and his side whiskers twitched.
“I’m Reverend Gideon Burns.”
Reverend Pendelton put a piece of paper on the desk. ‘The boy’s father died and his aunt is turning him over to the home. He don’t have no other kin.”
Reverend Burns looked me up and down like I was a side of beef. “He’s too old and doesn’t look very strong. Is he a trouble maker?”
“His name is Tom Slocum. He’ll work hard and won’t make no trouble.”
Reverend Pendelton put another paper on the desk. “I expect to get paid for bringing him here.”
The Reverend Burns held the scrap of paper to the lamp and read out loud. “Four dollars train fare, five dollars for the horse and buggy and fifty cents for lunch.”
“We didn’t have no lunch, I haven’t et since early morning,” I said.
Reverend Pendelton just about jerked my arm out of its’ socket. “Don’t pay him no mind, the boy forgot.”
I bit my lip and had a real bad feeling about the Presbyterian Home.
“What’s that book? He don’t need no book here,” said Reverend Burns.
“I need that book so I can learn to be a doctor,” I said.
“You ain’t got no need for book learning here.”
Reverend Burns opened Gray’s Anatomy, turned the pages and ran his fingers with broken dirty nails down the pages. His face got redder and redder until it looked like he would boil over. “Evil blasphemy, oh, the worse sins of mankind, unclothed bodies,” he shouted.
The Reverend Burns ripped out a page at a time, then tore out whole chapters and threw them on the coals. Each page smoldered, then caught fire and went up in flames. I grabbed for what was left of the book. “No, No, it belongs to Dr. Steele,” said I.
The Reverend Burns came up out of his chair like he was shot and grabbed my left ear. He was stronger than he looked and twisted and yanked my ear until he drew blood that ran down my neck. The pain was awful; I tried to get away, but he yanked harder and harder. I didn’t cry maybe that made him madder.
“Boy, you gonna learn to keep your mouth shut.”
He was breathing hard when he sat down and went to tearing pages and throwing them in the fire. I watched the book burn, page by page, while the Reverend Pendelton took his money and left.
“There, that’s the end of this nonsense,” Reverend Burns said.
I felt like crying but there weren’t no more tears, just a hard, cold knot of anger that seemed to grow and grow.
He pulled a big ledger off the bookcase. “Boy, what’s your name?’
“Tom Slocum.”
He reached over the table, cuffed my ear, then dipped a pen in ink and scratched in the ledger. You gonna learn to say ‘sir’ when you speak to me. Age?”
“Fifteen-- sir.”
“Employed, farm work or anything useful?”
“I go to school and work in Pa’s shop--- sir.”
“Here, if you want to eat, you work. If you work hard, obey the rules and lead a moral life, we might find a family that wants a boy. You can start by digging potatoes.”
The witch woman opened the door a crack. “You finished?”
“Take this young cur to bed without supper.”
I stared at his enraged face and didn’t talk back. My torn ear hurt like blazes. The woman yanked me into the hall and then to a low dark room. There were about thirty children of all ages gobbling food at two long tables under one smoky coal oil lamp. The kids didn’t look up from their plates. I brushed against one boy.
“Excuse me,” I said.
The boy ducked his head and flinched like he was used to being beat. The old lady jerked my arm and didn’t offer supper, even after she went to another table and grabbed a meaty chicken leg for herself. My stomach growled and flat against my backbone. I was too scared to ask for food. I didn’t know anything about mothering, but most women were kindly to boys. That woman didn’t have any human kindness. She lit a lamp and we went through another door, and up a flight of stairs to a hall that ended with two doors, one marked “girls”. The place for boys was a long narrow attic under a pitched roof. The lamp didn’t make much light, but I made out a small iron stove set on a box of sand and a row of wooden sleeping pallets built next to the wall. The one window was tight closed, and there was a powerful smell of stale pee and poop. The lamplight threw our shadows against the wall like two ghosts. I felt all hollow inside and shivered like I had the ague in that forlorn place. She showed me to an empty bed near the end of the room. “Sleep her tonight and get a straw tick tomorrow.”
A frayed blanket that looked like it had seen use in the war was at the foot of the pallet. She went away and the darkness closed in. I took off my good clothes and shoes and put them at the foot of the pallet and used my bundle of regular clothes for a pillow. The wooden planks dug into my back and my ear hurt so bad, I grit my teeth to keep from crying. The scratchy blanket was pretty thin and the wind whistling through the cracks in the eaves was mighty chilly. The pain in my ear and my growling stomach kept me awake until I dropped into an uneasy sleep. When a crying baby woke me up, I had to pee real bad. The door was locked, but in the dim light from the window, I found a chamber pot and peed.
The wind sighed, the roof creaked, a boy moaned in his sleep; I pulled the blanket over my head and bit down on my lip to keep from crying.