Honor (24 page)

Honor was shocked into silence. She could barely move her fingers to sign the gist of the conversation to Samuel.

Sitting high in Samuel’s arms, Eli watched, looking confused. He pushed to be released, and Samuel let him down.

“Well, will you take him?” the man demanded with obvious frustration. “You can teach him how to do those signs with his hands, and maybe he can learn your man’s trade. We can’t tarry. We got to drive back to Cincinnati now in good time to make it to our boat.”

As Honor signed these words, Samuel gripped his fists as if to keep from attacking the man. He signed to her, “This man is asking us to take in his wife’s son like a stray dog?”

Honor responded urgently. “We must take this child. If we don’t, this man might abandon him somewhere. We can’t let that happen.”

Samuel nodded, still clenching and unclenching his fists. “Tell him we will keep the child.”

Honor translated this, and the woman began to sob openly.

The man got down and lifted one of the boys from the rear of the wagon, pushing him toward Samuel, then turned to climb back on the wagon.

“What is his name?” Honor asked over the woman’s sobbing, her heart racing. This was all happening too quickly.

“Caleb. His name is Caleb Mason,” the man said. “His father was John Caleb Mason.” Regaining his place on the wagon, the man tried to prevent his wife from getting down. But she leapt to the ground.

She dropped to her knees and clasped the child to her, weeping. “Please, Thomas, isn’t there any way—?”

“We agreed before we went to the preacher. I need a
wife. You need a husband. But I can’t do anything for Caleb. These people can. I know it’s hard. But it’s for his best too.”

She continued to sob, holding Caleb tightly. The boy looked to be nearly eight. He was thin with brown hair and eyes and dressed in ragged clothing. His expression mixed fear and confusion.

Slowly his mother regained her composure. She turned to Honor, rising. “When Caleb is able to understand you, please explain to him. I can see you’re good people. I got the newspaper saved. When we get settled, I’ll write to you so I can keep in touch with my son.”

Honor didn’t know what to say. They were going to leave this boy here with them. How would she explain this to a child who didn’t hear and hadn’t learned to sign? Panic fluttered to life within her.

She moved forward with the woman, who let her husband pull her up onto the wagon. “Is thee sure this is what thee wants to do? Stay with us and learn to sign, and then—”

“I can’t have a deaf kid,” the man said without a hint of apology. “People will think we’re odd. Treat us as peculiar. I can’t do it.”

Honor tried to think of an argument, a persuasion. Judah had come out of the kitchen and was heading toward them.

“Much obliged. She’ll write!” The man slapped the reins, backed up the team, and made a wide turn in front of the barn.

One little boy sitting in the back of the wagon cried out, “No—don’t leave Caleb! No, Ma! No!”

Caleb screamed, “No!” He ran after the wagon. “No! Ma! Chad! Seth! Ma!” he wailed in a strange-sounding voice as he ran.

Lifting her hem, Honor ran after the child, his screams going through her like icy needles.
Dear God, help!

The man sped up the team, shaking them off.

Finally, farther down the track, both Caleb and she gave up the chase. The little boy collapsed on the ground, facedown, shaking, sobbing.

Honor dropped to her knees. She didn’t know whether to comfort him or just sit and wait for him to exhaust himself. What had just taken place in this quiet setting had shaken her to the core. Sympathetic tears coursed down her face. After her father had died, she’d felt like this child in a way.

And now she feared in some tight place in her heart that Samuel might never accept her as his wife. It was irrational, she knew, but it was real. This boy’s anguish and rejection were hers. She swallowed her own sobs.

Eli came near and sank to his knees on the other side of the boy. He too looked bewildered. Samuel and Judah joined them, standing over Caleb.

Samuel touched her shoulder but made no sign.

She pressed her hand over his. Why did he only touch her when she needed comfort? Still she touched her cheek to his hand. What were they going to do?

Honor looked up at Samuel and saw in his eyes that he was suffering along with this child. She nodded and signed, “This is Caleb.”

Finally the boy lay still. Eli touched him. Caleb turned
his head toward Eli. Eli pointed to himself and, with his chubby little fingers, signed and said, “I am Eli.”

Honor pointed to Caleb, saying and signing, “Thee is Caleb.” Eli repeated the sign.

The child stared at him.

Honor picked up Caleb’s hand and helped him move his fingers to say, “Eli.” Then she lifted Eli’s hand. “Keep showing him thy name, Eli, till he learns it. We must teach him how to speak with his hands.”

Obediently Eli followed her instruction.

Honor sat back on her heels, watching. Would Eli be able to open up communication with the boy?

C
ALEB REFUSED TO
be distracted by Eli and refused to get up. Honor did not want to give in to tears again. The child needed her to be strong now. Weeping with him would not help him face this awful parting, this slicing of family ties.

“Can’t just leave him in the middle of the road, ma’am,” Judah said. Approaching the boy, Perlie and Royale paused, concerned. “He might try to go after them, get lost,” Judah continued. “It’s not safe out here for a child alone. Bear and wolves around.”

Eli looked troubled, and she didn’t know how to reassure him. He’d just been through a terrible ordeal himself.

Honor covered her face with her hands, her heart torn in two. Grandfather had betrayed her just as this child had been betrayed by his family. When would this stop happening? One parting, one sorrow, followed another. At an outcry from the boy, she dropped her hands.

Samuel had picked the boy up and was carrying him toward their cabin. Caleb screamed, beat and kicked Samuel, but the child’s fighting didn’t deter her husband. He marched onward. When he arrived in front of their door, he set the boy down.

The child looked up at the big man, knuckling his red, swollen, tear-clogged eyes.

Samuel knelt in front of him, eye to eye. He gripped Caleb’s thin shoulders but in a sign of acceptance, of affection even. Then Samuel signed to Eli, “Play here with this boy. Help him.”

Eli obeyed, sat down beside Caleb, and showed him his carved wooden horses. “You can have this one,” Eli said and signed. He shoved one into Caleb’s hand and galloped the other horse down his own leg, demonstrating how to play with the toy.

At this act of generosity, Honor blinked back tears. Royale edged closer to her, offering silent comfort.

Caleb finally grasped the horse but only stared at his new toy.

“We must go about our business,” Samuel signed. “Let Caleb have time to accept us as we are. But he needs Eli as company.”

The sentence, so insightful and wise, raised Honor up onto her toes so she could put her arms around Samuel. Once again the man’s instinctive kindness came to the fore and drew her near. Then, embarrassed in front of Judah and the others, she pulled away.

Samuel motioned for Judah to follow him to the barn. The men left her with the boys, sitting by the door. She
wanted to hover over Caleb, make him welcome somehow. But she trusted Samuel’s instinct.

Caleb must face this cruel abandonment. Perlie reached into her white apron pocket and held out two oatmeal cookies, one to each of the boys.

Caleb let his lie in his lap while Eli started eating his immediately.

“Eli, stay with Caleb and try to teach him to sign
horse
and thy name. If he tries to leave, call me.”

“I got a brother now,” Eli said, still nibbling deftly.

“Yes, now thee has a brother,” Honor agreed. Caleb wasn’t the first child who had been sent away from his family. And though she didn’t like Caleb’s stepfather, in a way he had acted in the boy’s best interest.

Samuel would teach this child what he needed to face the world as a deaf person. But how could she communicate this to an abandoned child who couldn’t hear her comforting words, whose heart had been broken?

Honor came awake abruptly and sat up in bed. Cold night air blew around her face and ears, chilling her. The faintest moon glow peeped in through the window and the open door. Why was the door open?

Instant fear shot through her. Instead of sleeping with Royale in the kitchen, Eli had decided to keep Caleb company in the loft above their bedroom. Honor threw back the covers and hurried to the ladder outside the bedroom door. She climbed up and found Eli sound asleep, wrapped in a quilt. But Caleb was not in the other quilt.
Oh no.

Honor let herself down the ladder, nearly falling in her haste. She shook Samuel awake. When he sat up, rubbing his eyes, she pointed toward the door. “Caleb isn’t in the loft,” she signed, then realized he couldn’t see her hand in such dim light. She moved and held her hand in front of the glow from the low fire, signing it again.

She heard rather than saw him get out of bed. He clambered up the ladder as if checking her statement. She didn’t blame him. She could hardly believe a small boy would venture out alone into the black night. When Samuel came down, she heard him pulling on his clothing. She hurried to do likewise, donning her dress over her nightgown and tugging on shoes and a shawl as quickly as she could.

He passed by her and lifted the candlestick from the mantel, lighting the taper from the fire. The candle illumined his face, where she read his concern. He handed her the candle and signed by the light, “We must go after him. I will light the lantern and get my staff.”

Before he moved, she signed and said, “Where will we look?”

“The road. His mother went down the road.”

She signed her agreement. Within minutes the two of them stood just outside the door, the chill hitting her full in the face.

“Caleb!” Honor called, then felt foolish for calling a deaf child.

With the lantern, Samuel went out back to make sure the boy hadn’t gone to the necessary. He peered into the window of the kitchen before coming back and shaking
his head, letting Honor know Caleb wasn’t with Royale. Then he paused. “I’ll check the barn.”

He returned within minutes and again shook his head no. Judah hurried out of the barn, joining them. In the thin light from the high quarter moon, Samuel grasped Honor’s hand, and she his. Samuel must be as afraid as she of their losing each other in the dark. But he released her in a moment, bowing to the necessity of signed communication.

“How far do you think he could get?” Samuel asked her, holding his free hand in front of the lantern light.

“I don’t know.” Judah had mentioned wolves and bears, but a child could die of exposure just by getting lost among the myriad of trees and not finding his way out. The surrounding forest loomed, impenetrable and threatening. “But we must find him.”

Judah stood nearby, shivering a little. Samuel paused and told Judah in sign to stay—to protect Royale and Perlie, check on Eli from time to time, and watch for Caleb. The boy would likely head toward Cincinnati, not away. Honor interpreted to ensure the message was clear, and Judah hurried to the kitchen. Honor accepted Samuel’s decision. She could only be grateful that he didn’t send her to wait while he searched alone, for she couldn’t have borne that.