Gather The Children (Chronicles of the Maca Book 2) (34 page)

Mina was bored as only a seven-year-old could be after being sternly warned not to make noise or bother anyone. She had put on her winter coat and dutifully buttoned it all the way down so she could sit on the front porch while Rity slept. “There may be other boarders and you mustn't disturb them,” her sister had admonished. Mina didn't think there was anyone there besides them. She hadn't seen anyone. All she had for company was Dolly, the rag doll Papa had brought from Arles. So far Dolly hadn't been much company. Mina was trying to figure out why Mama had left her with Rity when Mama and Lorenz went to the hospital with Papa to “care” for him. Maybe Papa was sicker than anyone would tell her.

When Mina first went outside there were delivery wagons making their rounds through the muddy November streets, but now they were gone, and the morning sounds had stilled. She looked at the overcast sky trying to figure out the position of the sun and what time it was. Rity would surely yawn awake soon to eat. Then they would go to Marie's place for fittings. That was also boring and tiresome what with slipping in and out of clothes made too large with room to grow, but at least it meant a trip through the streets and there were shops and other people to see. For amusement, Mina began leaning over the porch railing to see how far she could stretch before falling. If Mama or Rity saw her, they would scold and tell her such actions were unladylike.

“Du are much too tall. People think du are older. They expect much more from du.” Those were Mama's words. Mama scolded a lot now since Papa had been shot this summer. Mina closed her eyes to blot out the sight of Papa lying on that door and being dragged home. She'd never told anyone that she didn't stay in the cabin with Armeda. She prayed and prayed that God would forgive her and heal Papa and the operation (whatever that was) would make Papa walk right again. Papa and Mama had told her the doctor was very smart and was supposed to be able to make Papa well.

Mina heard horses clopping through the mud, and it brought her attention back to the street. She watched a pair of smart-stepping bays pulling a utilitarian cart with an extended bed and built-up sides draw closer. She knew enough about horses to know the bays were expensive. She widened her eyes as the cart drew up by the gate, and she watched with admiration as a woman climbed down from the passenger's side. She was, in Mina's eyes, a magnificent woman dressed in fine black woolens, the head topped with a fancy hat such as even sister Rity would approve. It was her size that fixed Mina's attention. The woman must be almost as tall as Papa and she looked even broader. She easily reached over the cart boards and picked up the bulky packages, stepping high to avoid the puddles. Mina continued to stare as the woman strode up to the porch.

“Dinna yere parents tell ye tis nay polite to stare?”

Mina was awestruck and her light brown eyes grew darker and larger. The lady even talked like Papa. She gave a quick curtsy. “Yes ma'am.” There, that was polite.

The woman made a “Harmph,” rumbling in her throat and looked more closely at the wee one she had consented to let into her boarding house. Normally, the guests were male with their occasional female companions: discrete, of course. She had never rented to a family, but this was the off-season, and the spring and summer had been as economically dry as the rest of the country still suffering what the papers called an after-the-War depression. When a regular customer wrote her and recommended letting the rooms to this family who was paying cash, she accepted. She continued to stare at the child and found she couldn't possibly determine the age. It was odd that the child felt no fear. “I am Mrs. Gordon.” How strange that name sounded after nearly fifty years. “And how are ye named?”

Mina's voice was clear and firm. “I am Wilhelmina (she pronounced it like Mama with a v sound) LouElla MacDonald.”

LouElla was rocked to her core. Here she called herself Louise. How could this wee one name her? “How did such a wee lassie come by such an oversized name?” LouElla rolled the r's as rapidly as MacDonald, and Mina had no problem understanding.

“I'm named for mine grandmothers. They are in heaven, and Papa says now they live on in me.”

LouElla smiled. “Tis a lovely thought.” She was more disturbed than she wished to admit and started towards the door, but she wanted to know more and she turned.

“I twas about to have a wee bit of sustenance. Would ye care to join me?”

“Oh, yes, ma'am.” Mina happily trailed LouElla into the house.

The Irish maid, Milly, took the packages handed to her and stopped with a blank look when Mrs. Gordon ordered cookies and a glass of milk be brought with her morning tray. LouElla led the way to the door and opened it. They stepped into her very private world.

Why am I doing this? LouElla wondered, and then she realized that this wee one, unlike all the others had no fear of her size. She twas tall for a woman, but the bulk was natural in her land, and there she twas called magnificent. Here men, women, and children looked at her as though she were one of the freaks on display at Barnum's American Museum. She laid her hat and purse on the side table and hung her coat over the chair. Mina was staring at the oversized furnishings with total fascination.

“Papa has a chair just like that one, almost. He had it 'specially made because everything is too small for him.” She pointed to the chair and parlor table set near the window to catch the sunlight for reading. LouElla caught herself staring at her small visitor. The chair had been made like a Thalian chair, done in the blue of Don. There was no possibility that another existed on this world.

“Tis yere fither truly such a big man?”

“Oh yes, ma'am. He's much, much taller than you.” The brown eyes were all innocence. Mina took off her head covering and revealed brownish hair twisting in small curls around her face and the rest pulled back into rebellious, turned up braids that wisped escaping pieces of hair.

“And how do ye ken that he tis much taller?”

“Because your waist is this high on me and Papa's is this high.” Mina moved her hand five or more inches to indicate the difference. She then set about trying to unbutton her coat, the small fingers tugging at the large buttons.

LouElla knelt to give a hand and found her own large fingers weren't much better at the task. “Mama made the holes tight so I vouldn't run around with my coat open.”

Again the wee one used the v sound for the w. Probably German, thought LouElla. She kenned that much about this world, and sometimes the Germans could be large people. “How eld are ye?”

“I just had my birthday and I am seven.” Mina held up seven digits and smiled.

LouElla felt a deep sense of satisfaction. She had argued with her dour clerk and bookkeeper, Miss Walls, about the wee one's age. Miss Walls insisted that the child had to be ten to be so tall, and was probably backward since she behaved so childishly. LouElla had felt the child behaved as a Thalian nine-year-old. Finally the last button slipped through the hole and the coat placed on the same chair as her coat when a discreet knock at the door was heard.

Milly brought the tray in and set it on the table by the window, looking sideways at Mina. She wondered how this child could be so privileged as to enter the mistress's quarters. “Anythin' else, ma'am?”

“No, thank ye.” LouElla turned to Mina. “Are ye ready for some sustenance?”

The amber brown eyes sparkled. “Oh, yes, I'm very hungry.”

LouElla chuckled and took Mina's hand to lead her across the room. How good it felt to hold a wee one again, if only by the hand. “How do ye ken the word sustenance?”

“That's the word Papa uses. He always tells Mama that he's ready for a wee bit of sustenance.” She boosted herself up on the straight back chair and waited expectantly.

LouElla poured her brew into a large stein and picked up a hunk of cheese. “Ye may help yereself to the cookies. The milk tis already poured.” Nay matter how hard she tried, her words nay sounded right in this alien land.

Mina eyed the platter of cookies and selected one. Her small teeth bit an even round and she grinned impishly. “Verry good.”

LouElla found her heart leaping again. It had been at least some ninety Thalian years since a wee one had said such words in her hearing. Dear Gar, had she heard correctly, or twas the darkness reaching for her again? And what twas it the lassie had called herself? She struggled to say the name correctly. “Vil-“

“Oh, everybody calls me Mina. Only Mama calls me Wilhelmina when she's mad.” Mina took a swallow of milk. “May I have another?” The brown eyes were sparkling.

“Aye, take as many as ye want.”

She considered the child again. “Ye have been most well behaved during yere stay here.”

Mina nodded. “Thank you. Mama said I must be good and sister doesn't like noise.” Mina wrinkled her nose. “Sometimes I think she doesn't like me.” The smile left her face and she pouted. “Rity never plays games with me like Lorenz, and she makes me do lessons at night. If I do them in the morning, she says I make too much noise and ask too many questions.”

The staff had familiarized LouElla with Miss Lawrence's comings and goings, her late sleeping habits, and total indifference to Mina's activities in the morning. Miss Walls had sniffed during the recitation, “If it weren't for the quality of her clothes, I'd call her a fancy lady. She's too tall and independent.” That Miss Walls was also describing her employer obviously didn't occur to her. Gentlewomen were small and delicate, with mincing gaits, docile manners, and relied on the men in the family. It was doubtful if Miss Walls considered LouElla a woman. Few in this land seemed to. LouElla jerked her mind back to her wee visitor.

“And who tis Lorenz?”

“He is mein brudder, no my brother. Mama says I must listen to how Rity says things.”

LouElla emptied the last of the brew into her stein. “And how eld tis Lorenz?”

“He's eighteen now, but he still plays checkers with me, and he's teaching me to ride. Well, he was before Papa got shot, and he had to work harder.” The soft skin wrinkled over Mina's nose as she leaned towards her new friend. “Are the doctors really, really good in Saint Louis?”

LouElla half-way gulped her beer, and dabbed at her mouth to delay an answer. In her opinion the doctors here were nay Medical at all, for they could nay cure and oft did much harm. From what she'd seen of the returning army men, most would have been better off without them. How was she to answer this wee lassie? “I have heard that the doctors are verry good here. Tis said that one must travel to New Orleans or New York to find one better. Are ye worried about yere fither?”

“Ja.” Mina nodded her head and her slight body rearranged itself on her chair. “He had a bullet by his backbone that Dr. Huddleson couldn't get out.” Suddenly all of her fears came rushing out of her mouth. “Rity never answers my questions, and she thinks I'm too little to worry about things. Mama has to care for Papa in the hospital and can't watch me, so she sent me to be with Rity. And they won't let me see Papa at the hospital, and I know the doctor's done the operation, but nobody tells me why I can't go now, and why Mama has to work so hard, and I'm afraid he's going to die, and I can't even be there.” The brown eyes filled with tears at the thought of never seeing Papa again.

She took a deep breath and began again. “I've been really good so that Rity would take me to see Papa, or else Mama or Lorenz would come here and tell me that Papa is all right and getting better.” By now tears were rolling down Mina's face.

LouElla held out her arms to the wee one. There was no answer she could give. She considered the hospitals here little better than death houses, and she would nay want one of her own there. “Hospitals are nay places for wee ones,” she managed to say as Mina ran toward her arms.

Suddenly she stopped and hung her head. Mina knew Mama would not want her to act like this, but this lady was so much like Papa. “Mama says I shouldn't bother other people. I sorrow.” The last phrase was said softly as she looked up into LouElla's eyes.

“Dear Gar, where did ye learn to say 'I sorrow'?”

“Papa taught me.”

How could this wee lassie stand there and say the words of Thalia? “Did he teach ye what ye do when ye say that?” Her arms were still outstretched.

Soundlessly, Mina was in her arms, the head on one side of her throat and then the next while LouElla made the clucking sound in each wee shell of an ear. Mina relaxed on her shoulder and LouElla hugged her tightly. “Ah, darling lassie, from whence have ye come? I dinna how, but I ken yere fither twill be all right. Mayhap I can make some inquiries for ye.” This was madness. She had nay right to interfere in another's family's affair, but the wee lassie had brought her a measure of Thalian courtesy that she ached for. She must do something for the wee lassie.

“Does yere sister greet people in this manner and say yere words?”

“Oh, no,” said Mina as LouElla set her down. Rity was grown before she came home.”

The lassie did have a way of making statements that were confusing. What twas one to make of her words?

“Only Lorenz does that with Papa because he is true brother.” Mina produced a hanky from her pocket and blew her nose. “I know that's not polite, but I had to.”

“Is Miss Lawrence nay yere sister?”

Mina blushed. “Well, yes, but Mama was married before and she had four babies, but Papa adopted Lorenz, and so he is my real brud-brother. Rity and Daniel don't call Papa, Papa.”

“And what happened to the other wee one?”

“He's with Jesus just like my other true brother that Mama and Papa had. Mama called him Gephardt Llewellyn.”

LouElla felt her jaw slacken, and she lowered her huge frame into the chair. She had fought Justines, Kreppies, the emptiness of space in a battered ship, and the empty, sterile alien ways of this planet after she admitted she was stranded here, and never had she felt more defeated. “Gephardt Llewellyn?” her words came softly for she did nay wish to frighten the already upset wee one, “what tis yere fither's name?”

“Zebediah L. MacDonald.” Mina said the words with pride.