Everything sounded muffled and distant. I stared at Lilah, tucked neatly between the smartly dressed Mr. Lybrand and the pristine beauty of Miss Maeve on the car’s shiny leather seat. She looked like the happy ending to a sad story, the fortunate child rescued by wealthy benefactors.
Lilah waved a hesitant goodbye over her shoulder. I lifted my hand in reply, dazed, as a cloud of dust covered their departure. And in one fell swoop, I was utterly alone.
Sheriff Loftis watched the car disappear, then marched away, spurs jingling. Miss Pimsler’s attention was immediately taken by a family asking questions about their new little boy. I snatched the opportunity and slipped away. Something she’d said had given me an idea.
My trunk sat forlorn on the dusty ground near the front of the church. I flung the lid open, pausing at the sight of pages covered with Lilah’s looping cursive.
With no blank sheets left, I tore the flyleaf from a biology text. Damaging Papa’s book felt almost sacrilegious, but it couldn’t be helped. Using Lilah’s pen, I dashed off a letter to our aunt Susan.
After folding another flyleaf to form a makeshift envelope, I gathered my few remaining coins for postage and hurried across the square to a post office I’d spied earlier. I borrowed some sealing wax from the postmaster and sent the letter off with a silent prayer. “Please let this work,” I breathed.
Stepping back out onto the awning-covered sidewalk, I paused to let a buggy driven by Sheriff Loftis pass. A dark-haired girl of about my age rode beside him. The sheriff ignored me, but the girl gave a covert wave. I nodded my acknowledgment and crossed back to the churchyard, where Miss Pimsler was fluttering about.
She turned a mildly annoyed gaze my way. “Where have you been, Verity? There aren’t many families left who haven’t made a choice, and it’s harder finding people to take the older children.” She pursed her lips. “Especially those who don’t try to make themselves agreeable.”
“In that case, you’ll have to excuse me.” I gave a slight curtsy. “I need to mingle with the good people of Wheeler and find someone in the market for a disagreeable girl.”
I made my way back to the court square, looking for any adults holding adoption paperwork who didn’t already have an orphan-train passenger by their side.
A skinny woman with well-worn furrows on her forehead and a mountainous man sporting a white push-broom mustache appeared to be the only remaining couple. The woman picked a stray bit of hay from the man’s overall strap as she spoke in an anxious voice. I moved closer, catching fragments of her words. “… supposed to have been older ones. The paper said all ages, girls and boys. If we’d seen that list with their names and ages before we came to town, we could’ve saved the trip.”
I paused a few feet away from the pair and cleared my throat. The woman turned, crossing her arms. “Do you need somethin’?” She was a direct person, then. I could deal with direct.
“It looks like I’m the runt of the litter and nobody wanted to take me home.” The woman set her lips in a grim line. “I’m Verity Pruitt, and I need a place to stay.”
“Hettie Weatherington,” she said. “And this is my husband, Big Tom.”
A wordless exchange passed between them, and then the giant man said in a slow, deep voice, “We could always hire a hand from the next county over.” The final few carriages rolled away, leaving me standing before my last hope, a couple who didn’t seem to want me.
“No, please.” I moved closer, tilted my head up to look the towering farmer in the eye. His shaggy gray brows lifted in surprise. “Whatever you need help with, I can do it, if you’ll only give me a chance.” I’d manage to spin straw into gold if it meant holding on to my last opportunity for staying near Lilah.
Hettie shot a glance at Big Tom. “What do you think?”
He raised one shoulder in a slow shrug. “I reckon it can’t hurt to give her a try.” He stretched the a in can’t so that it rhymed with saint.
“You strike me as a girl with a lot of want-to.” Hettie tightened the knot of graying hair at her nape, then thrust a sinewy hand in my direction. I tried not to wince at her grip. Hettie was short and thin, but strong.
“We’ll do this as an indenture, on a trial basis, mind you,” she said. “After a month, if you’re doing well, you’ll start earning a wage. It won’t be as much as a hired hand would make, but it’ll be something more than you’ve got now.”
And enough, I hoped, to get back home when the time came. “Thank you. You won’t regret it.”
Hettie nodded, looking dubious. “Go on and tell that woman we’re taking her,” she said to her husband. Big Tom’s mustache slid up with a hidden smile as he ambled away to do his wife’s bidding.
When he returned a moment later, Miss Pimsler scooted along in his wake like a tugboat after a steamer. “I believe you’ll find farm life suits you far better than you expect, Verity,” Miss Pimsler said, rubbing a hand over tired eyes. “Hard work and fresh air are wonderfully invigorating.” She looked suddenly weary, as if worn out by her own relentless optimism.
Big Tom proffered the indenture papers. We’d been told older children might be indentured rather than adopted, since we were close to adulthood and, theoretically, independence. If only the Children’s Benevolence Society had waited a few more months, until I was of age, Lilah could’ve stayed with me and none of this upheaval would’ve been necessary. I stooped to rest the papers on the trunk that held the remnants of my former life, then crossed the t’s in my last name with a violent slash before handing the documents back to Miss Pimsler.
Despite my resentment toward the woman, a part of me understood she was doing what she believed was best. She just happened to be wrong. “Goodbye, Miss Pimsler. Have a safe trip back to New York.”
“I’ll see you and all the others when I return for a welfare check in the fall,” she said, her face unexpectedly somber. “Verity, give this new start the chance it deserves. Try to bloom where you’re planted.”
I turned to follow the Weatheringtons, thinking how foolish it would be to put down roots in a place I’d be leaving soon.
My trunk left shallow trails in the dusty ground as I dragged it to Big Tom’s buckboard. I heaved it in, hauled myself up, and leaned against the splintery wood of the side rails. Fatigue crashed over me. I yawned and didn’t bother to cover my mouth. If Big Tom or Hettie cared to examine my molars to see if their new workhorse was a good one, now was their chance.
When Big Tom resumed his seat and the wagon was again in motion, Hettie gave me a bundled napkin and a Mason jar of water. “Figured you’d be hungry.” She’d packed a slab of salt meat and a thick slice of fresh bread for the boy she’d expected to bring home. I wished Lilah were here to share it. Had she eaten yet? I chewed, forcing my eyes to stay open, and watched the tiny town of Wheeler fade until it was swallowed by the endless sky.
We followed a dirt road that was little more than wagon-wheel ruts, heading toward the woods I’d noticed earlier. But when the path drew within shouting distance of the tree line, it abruptly broke off, running parallel to the woods in both directions. In my weary state, I wondered why the road ringed the little forest instead of passing straight through. Perhaps everyone here was so unhurried, the circuitous route hardly mattered.