Since the beginning of the fall semester, Sean had taken to meandering after school, unwilling to face his empty house after his parents’ divorce. The desire for the comforts of nothing had become a habit of mind, and over the months, he cultivated his solitude. Alongside the woods, he allowed a measure of free imagination, enjoying the small discoveries of the natural world. Head bent to the ground as he walked, he had found the body of a flicker, the bright yellow wings neatly folded against the mottled gray torso and the band of red feathers. The shin-bone of a fox or small dog swarming with red ants. And treasures he could keep: the perfect spiral of a giant snail's shell, a dozen rocks that glistened with quartz facets. A glass bottle with the year 1903 embossed on its amber bottom, a baseball card of Roberto Clemente, hero of the 1971 Series, a five-dollar bill and eighty-nine cents in loose change. A hand-size Bible caked with dried mud. Eyes raised to the skies and worries sloughed from his soul, he watched the changes of season, the air filled with leaves and birds and clouds. Many autumn afternoons he had witnessed the old lady who lived by herself, walking alone as well, looking for something misplaced.
The way home required him to either scale or duck beneath a rail fence at one end of the old lady's yard, put his head down as he traversed the open lawn, hop another fence at the property line, and trot straight to the fronting street. He did not like the risk, but the shortcut meant a mile saved, and using it had become a matter of principle. Each time he crossed the boundary, he recited, “Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us,” not entirely sure what the words meant, which only reinforced their magic. From behind closed curtains, she spied, he was sure, waiting for the time when he might trip and fall, and she would come flying on a broomstick straight out the chimney top. Sean glanced at the kitchen window, bowed his head again, and then picked up the pace. Under his breath, he muttered another penitential prayer.
As he straddled the rail at the top of the second fence, Sean spotted the old woman and the little witch in glasses beside her. Hidden by the shadows, they lurked at the corner of the house. The lady stood stiffly wrapped in her greatcoat, a thick scarf wound around her throat, hair white as the moon, her face broken into angles dominated by a beaked nose. She watched his every move through merciless eyes. The ragged girl bounced on her toes, and when she saw his disadvantage she rushed forward.
“You're not supposed to cut through people's property.” She wagged her finger in his direction, then waited, hands on hips, for him to untangle his feet. Half of her face was in darkness and half blazed in the sun, her features coming slowly into focus. Unsure of the rules of the game, Sean did not know whether to climb down to meet her or to retreat in haste across his footprints or to wait eternally upon the rail. A mourning dove, startled by the girl's voice, whistled and flushed from a sugar maple, crying as it rowed across the pale sky. He swung his leg over and crept down rail by rail as Mrs. Quinn stepped forward to confront him.
“You realize this is my yard?”
Stunned to be approached, he nodded. She would lure him with warm gingerbread and then pop him in the oven.
“What is your name, young man?”
“Sean Fallon, ma'am.”
“How old are you, Sean? What grade are you in at school?”
“I go to third grade, and I'm eight and a half.”
Norah sidled up to him, inspecting his face. “Ah, really? And when is your birthday?”
“August twenty-third.”
“You're not eight and a half. It's only January. You're just eight and a quarter.”
The boy blinked in the sunshine. Or fatten him on bread and milk in a cage that hung from the ceiling.
Mrs. Quinn stepped between the children. “I see you cutting through here every day. Sometimes twice a day—once in the morning, once in the afternoon. On your way to and from school?”
He looked at the snow between his boots. And grind his bones to make her bread.
“You'll take her with you from now on. And walk her home. She's in third grade just like you. Show up a few minutes early tomorrow, and take her to the principal's office. They can send me the paperwork to enroll her. Do you understand me, Sean Fallon?” With two fingers, she lifted his chin so that he could see her smile. Sean assented with a simple nod, and the two started to go back inside. Halfway there, she turned to the boy. “By the way, my name is—”
“Mrs. Quinn,” he said. “Everyone knows who you are. Everyone knows who lives in this house.”
Margaret pulled the girl to stand in front of her so that he might memorize her face. “And this is Norah.” The girl squirmed beneath her hands and stuck out the tip of her tongue at him. “Norah Quinn, my granddaughter.”
6
Piece by piece, they unpacked the few clothes from Norahs valise. As Mrs. Quinn inspected each article against the light, the girl described its history and her sentimental attachments, and then it would be folded into one of two piles: those that could be washed and mended to wear again, and the clothing that must be discarded—thrown away, or better yet, taken out back and incinerated in the wire-mesh barrel. Occasionally, she let the girl plead and triumph. A doll's execution was commuted. A white sweater with browned stains at the wrists was spared. Socks fit to be darned. But mostly, the orphan's stale things were simply too wretched.
“How can you live like this?” Mrs. Quinn asked, holding up a dull gray pair of underwear peppered with holes.
Norah twirled once and flopped upon the bed. “I have been lucky. I've been blessed.”
“Let's find you something proper.” She went to the closet and tugged out the cedar chest, which had been gathering dust for the better part of a decade. “These are old. You don't mind old, do you? From when she was your age, twenty years ago. If Erica's things won't do, I'll go shopping while you're in school tomorrow.”