A VOICE INSIDE my head begged me to turn back—had been begging all afternoon. But I hadn’t listened to it, and now I stood before a white clapboard house. The elm tree in the back was larger than I remembered, but the crooked porch was much the same. I climbed the stairs and knocked on the side door. It opened to reveal a great turnip of a woman, none too pleased for being disturbed. “What do you want?”
I stood straight, as though that would hide my rags. “I would like to speak to the master of the house.”
The woman grew larger still. “I am the master of this poorhouse,” she said. “The men’s beds are all taken, and we don’t give handouts.”
“I’m not looking for food,” I said, hungry as a stray.
“Well, what then?”
“I’m asking after a girl who lives here.”
“And who is that?”
I paused, barely able to manage the words. “Helen Slater.”
The woman seemed briefly startled. Her eyes narrowed, and her voice dropped to a menacing whisper. “And what would your business with her be?”
The answer to that question was a box of stones that I had to lift and hand to her. “I am her mother.”
The woman gave her head a quick shake, having supposed me to be a drunkard and a man. I thought she was going to tell me to go away, but she moved aside. “Come in.”
The room smelled of soap and hot water, as two women were washing clothes in a tub off to the side. I was led past them, down a hall and into a parlor. The woman closed the door behind us and folded her arms. “I am Mrs. Florence McNee, resident housemaster. Who are you?”
“Lucy Ann Slater,” I said, with a slight stumble. I hadn’t called myself that in a long time. It didn’t sound right. I tried again. “Mrs. Lucy Ann Slater.”
“And you say Helen is your daughter?”
I nodded. “Does she still live here?”
The woman shook her head. “No. She’s gone.”
“Gone where?”
“To Pennsylvania. A farmer took her.”
“A farmer?” I said, unsure. “And he will marry her?”
“No, dear,” she said, seeming more kind. “He took her to live with his family. She will be his daughter. A good man, I think, or I wouldn’t have let her go.”
My feelings ran in all directions. I was glad that Helen was safe, pained to my soul that I wouldn’t see her, and relieved that I wouldn’t have to. Yes, I felt that as well. It had taken strength to set aside my fears and come in search of her, but those fears hadn’t gone away. I looked back at Mrs. McNee. “When did she leave?”
The woman took a long breath. “Just a month ago.”
Could this be? After years apart, had I missed my daughter by a matter of days? If true, there was only one way it could have come about. God had sent a Pennsylvania man to save my daughter from me. What other explanation?
The tears began. I hadn’t cried for seven years, since the day I’d been attacked by Willie McAllister. But once that dam broke, the feelings that poured through were not just for the loss of Helen, but for everything—all my troubles at home, and those in Minnesota, and after that, the cold years alone in the woods. And then I must have fallen, for suddenly I was on the floor looking up at Mrs. McNee who was kneeling over me. Others were in the room. “Joan, heat water for a bath. Audrey, help me take her clothes.”
“Shall I boil them?”
“Burn them.”
A little later, I was in a warm tub. Mrs. McNee took a coarse cloth to me and then told me to lie with my head back. “There’s no help for it,” she said, taking a scissors and cutting my hair down to the scalp.
Once bathed and shorn, I was put into a nightshirt and led upstairs. I fell into a sleep that went on for a day. When I finally woke, I found myself in a real bed with ticking and sheets. I wasn’t awake but a short time when Mrs. NcNee came into the room. She took the chair by the bed and patted my hand. I supposed she was there to say that it was time for me to leave, but she just sat there and looked out the window.
“I was married when I was sixteen,” she said at last. “A year later I had a daughter, but I lost her when she was two. Scarlet fever. Everyone said it was God’s will, but I could see no purpose to it. I cursed God and haven’t been to church since. Then my husband died when his wagon turned over.”
“I’m sorry, ma’am, about your little girl,” I said, not knowing why she was telling me these things. “And about your husband.”
Mrs. McNee gave a nod to accept my regrets, but she had more to say. “You should know that in Helen I found the daughter that had been taken from me. I did not want to let her go, but I believed she’d have a better life on Mr. Fortnam’s farm. I miss her terribly. Then you arrive, and I don’t know what to make of it.”
I didn’t know what to make of it either. Here was a woman who had seen Helen grow. Had given her love and been the mother I had not been. “I haven’t seen Helen since she was small,” I said.
I thought those words would condemn me in Mrs. McNee’s eyes, but instead she smiled kindly. “Then let me tell you. Your daughter is as warm as the sun in the morning. Funny, brave, and kind.”
Your daughter. Suddenly, I saw my little girl on the grass outside our house on Basket Creek, all of ten months, standing up and with shrieks of delight, taking her first steps. “Yes,” I said, “she was like that, even as a little one.”
There was a worried look behind Mrs. McNee’s smile. “There’s something you should know.” I was afraid of it, but I met her eyes. “Helen thinks you’re dead.”
“And well she might,” I whispered. What I would not explain was that I had been sick, sick for years, a fever of the mind. I had lived in huts in the woods, not much better than an animal. I didn’t talk to anyone. I certainly didn’t write letters. I didn’t see or hear from my sisters, and that would have been near impossible, for how were they to know what state or county I was in, or even if I were still alive? It was all my doing, not theirs. I went into the woods, because it was that or be put in a cage. Later, when I was better, I did not want to be seen by anyone who had known me before. I was ashamed. I thought it best for all if I just stayed dead. But none of this I wanted to share with Mrs. McNee. She accepted my silence, stood, and ran the wrinkles out of her dress. “You can stay here, if you want.”
I was weak and had no prospects. “Thank you,” I said. “Yes. At least for a time.”
“You know, of course, that everyone here works, from sunup to sunset—six days a week.”
“I’ll do anything,” I said. “I’m good with an axe, and I can hunt.”
Mrs. McNee looked amused. “Well, perhaps a wild boar for Christmas would be a treat. But first we must get you dressed. There’s a room downstairs where we have some clothes. Why don’t you go with Audrey and find a fresh dress to wear?”
“I don’t want a dress.” The words were out before I could grab them. But how to explain? “I’m sorry, ma’am. It’s just I wouldn’t know how to wear one. It’s been ten years.”
Mrs. McNee thought for a moment. “You can wear what clothes you like so long as you don’t dishonor this house. Do you want to be called Lucy or Mrs. Slater?”
“Ma’am, if you don’t mind, I’d liked to be called Joseph.” And why did I have say that? It was the last straw, for sure—I’d be on the road within the hour.
The housemaster was not pleased and looked at me hard. “But you told me that your name was Lucy, Lucy Slater.”
“It was Lucy,” I said, almost pleading. “But it isn’t now. Most people just call me Joe.”
Mrs. McNee raised her eyes to the ceiling. “Lord knows I don’t give people their names. Folks here can call you what they like or what you like—that’s between you and them. And you can tell people about Helen or not. I haven’t said a thing, and it won’t come from me. I know a lot of things that I keep to myself. As for us, it’s your conduct that’s my concern. Live honestly here and we’ll be fine.”
* * *
The Delaware County Almshouse sat on the river flats across from the town of Delhi. It needed paint and leaned to the south, but the roof kept the rain out. The kitchen and eating hall were on the first floor, as was the large room off to the side where the men slept in bunks. The women and children stayed in the many small rooms upstairs. One of these, hardly more than a closet, was given to me.
After seven years alone in the woods, I had to learn again how to live with others. Mostly, I did what I was told and stayed out of people’s way. I wore pants and a shirt, and when my hair grew back, I kept it short. I wasn’t pretending to be a man. These were the clothes I wanted to wear, and no one seemed to mind. They called me Joe, for Joseph, or Jo, for Josephine, I don’t know which because you can’t tell how people are spelling things when they are speaking. I didn’t mention Helen to anyone, and Mrs. McNee kept my secret. For the house register, I went by the name of Lobdell.
I worked that summer in the large garden out back. After hunting for so many years, I came to enjoy the dirt. It was alive and ripe. Caring for plants calmed me. Not so calming were the daily moans and howls from the building near the garden. It might have been a barn for chickens, it had that look, but it wasn’t. It was a barn for the insane, and it never failed to throw a terror into me.
Mrs. McNee had strict orders to keep the inmates, as they were called, confined. But every now and then, when one seemed to have promise, the garden crew, with Mrs. McNee’s consent, would ignore the order and bring the poor soul out to work. Sometimes the sunshine and companionship brought about a cure. It did good things for me. I had just spent seven years in the gray land between the dead and the living. Now I was back in the living world, but even so, it was a world without hopes or expectations. And I didn’t want any—they had only caused me trouble in the past. Now there was nothing for me beyond each day as it unfolded—one day and the next, trying to follow the Lord’s commandments. People got used to having me around.
* * *
I had been at the almshouse for several months when one afternoon Mrs. McNee asked me to come to her office after dinner. I didn’t like the sound of it. Once the table was cleared and the dining room swept, I went to her office where she was at her desk, making notes in a ledger. She asked me to sit and forced a smile in my direction. I wanted to run.
“I received a letter yesterday,” she said.
“It’s from Helen.”
I tried to calm myself. “Is she well?”
“Oh, she’s fine,” said Mrs. McNee, letter in hand. “If you’d like, I’ll read it to you.”
I nodded but was strangely afraid. I wanted to hear Helen’s words but feared the failings they might call to mind. Mrs. McNee adjusted her spectacles.
“Dear Mrs. McNee,” she began, in a voice meant to enliven the words. “I’m sorry I didn’t write sooner, but the days have flown by. I was very sad when Mr. Fortnam took me away, but now I am content. Tyler Hill is a lovely place, and everyone has been more than kind …”
Helen told about the Fortnam farm and her new brothers and sisters. She said that she worked long hours, but that she didn’t mind, for everyone worked hard and she was treated well. She said that she missed Mrs. McNee very much and promised not to wait so long to write again. She signed it, Love, your Helen.
Suddenly, I felt bare. I had told myself when I left home many years ago that I was going to find work and a place for myself and my daughter. I failed. And somewhere along the way, I had begun to look for something else—freedom for myself. I had found it only in bits and pieces. But what good is freedom without love?
“She sounds happy,” I said.
“Yes, I think so. But you worry, because people sometimes take a girl, and the child finds herself a servant.” Mrs. McNee paused. “I will write back to her, Joe. Do you want me to say you are here?”
“Oh, please no!” I cried. “It’s enough to know that she’s well. If she thinks I’m dead, then perhaps that’s for the best.”
Mrs. McNee seemed startled by my outburst, but she didn’t ask why it would be for the best. But then, of course, she might know. She, herself, had given up Helen, broken her own heart, and let Helen go so that she might have a real home. And now that she had one, was it for me to suddenly appear and curdle the milk? What did I have to offer, except my shame and destitution? Beyond that, I was sure that Helen would hate me less if she thought me dead, and in this, I was thinking more about me than her—about what I could bear. And I didn’t want things to change for me. It might seem that I had fallen as far as a person could—that I had nothing to lose—but that wasn’t so. I had been to a place far below. I had been cold, hungry, and lonely enough for ten lives, and I never wanted to go back. At the almshouse I had a bed to sleep in, food to eat, and people to talk to. Things I hadn’t had for years. And if you haven’t had those things, you don’t think of them as nothing.
* * *
When the weather turned and the ground became hard, those of us who worked in the garden were offered to the townsfolk as house helpers. The fee for our labor, paid to the county, was small, so many people took this service. But suspicious eyes fell on any new arrival who might be a thief as well as poor. I thought this peculiar, for in my experience, poor people were no less honest than others. Often, I found them more so. Still, because I was new and a little strange, I was given work two days a week cleaning the courthouse and the sheriff’s office, where my good conduct was thought assured.
Sheriff Evans was at his desk the day I first came.
“And what can I do for you?” he said, leaning back in his chair.
“I’m Joe Lobdell, sir,” I said, in military fashion. “I’m a resident of the County House and here to work.”
The sheriff shrugged as if to say it was all right with him, whatever the county wished to send. My hair was still short, and I was wearing trousers, but he knew, of course, who I was and that I was a woman—my story had made the rounds. I think he was a little amused, but whatever he was thinking, he didn’t make my time difficult. He went about his tasks, and I went about mine. Had it been my choice, I would have remained at the almshouse and done any kind of work, just to be with people I knew and not have to think of things to say to people I didn’t.
Curtis Evans was a close-shaved man with a tarnished pistol on his hip. He lived just outside of town with a wife and two daughters. I learned this from Mrs. McNee, for the sheriff and I didn’t talk much. That changed one afternoon when Evans saw me stop to admire the rack of rifles chained to the wall. “You know what you’re looking at?” he asked. I nodded. “You know how to shoot?” I nodded again. “Well, I’ll be damned.”
“Most likely,” I said. That answer made him laugh. The sheriff then took out a key and unlocked the guns, pulling down a breach-loading carbine he was fond of. I saw his surprise when I held it with ease.
“I used to hunt,” I said. “Along the Delaware. And in Minnesota.”
The sheriff gave a disbelieving look. “You were in Minnesota? When?”
“Before it was a state.”
I handed the rifle back, and he leaned it against the wall. “I had thought to go myself,” he said. “How was it?”
“Cold in the winter, but I liked it fine.”
Evans smiled. Maybe he didn’t believe me. For my part, I hadn’t spoken of Minnesota in years.
“Did you see Indians?” he asked.
“Not many. Most of them had been penned up.”
“Lucky you weren’t there for the uprising.”
“Oh, I was. It just wasn’t as big as people first thought.”
“No,” said the sheriff. “I mean the one three years ago. Hundreds of settlers were killed—entire towns wiped out.”
Entire towns? I remembered the fear I had seen the day I walked into Manannah.
“Do you remember what towns?” I asked. “Would the names Manannah or Forest City sound familiar?”
The sheriff shook his head. “No. I just read that they got burned. Then they sent in the soldiers and rounded up all the redskins. Had a big hangin’ day. They won’t be bothering anyone now.”
Hanging day? I felt a rush of sadness for the settlers and the Sioux. And then the questions: What about the people who had offered me their kindness—the Whitmores, the Blanchards, Noah White, and Jenny Lindross? What had become of them?