For the next three days, Maud shivered with fever, tossing and turning in gray sheets, inside a run-down boardinghouse a few blocks past the theater. Frank left her side only twice: once to confirm that the show had indeed been canceled, and the next time to bring in a doctor. The doctor offered only a foul-smelling purple patent medicine, but she was unable to swallow it. He advised her to rest until she felt better, then went on his way.
Frank brought her tea and soup, and though she had no appetite, she tried to choke it down for the baby’s sake. She dozed on and off, forgetting her surroundings, and each time she awakened to the sight of the one soot-caked window and the peeling floral wallpaper covered with water stains. She held a clean embroidered handkerchief over her mouth to keep away the stench of faded cigar smoke and tried to imagine that she was home, at the house in Fayetteville, in a clean bed with ironed sheets, and that Mother was periodically coming into the room, laying a cool hand on her forehead. But each time she fell asleep, she had terrible nightmares of being cast adrift on a stormy sea, holding a lifeless baby in her arms, and in some of the dreams, she could see her own dead body, lying blue and pale in a puddle of blood, and she would awake with her heart pounding and her mouth dry. Each time this happened, she saw Frank sitting beside her, gently offering her a sip of cool water.
On the fourth morning, she awoke to find the fever gone. They took all of their belongings from the horrible lodging house and settled themselves in a tea shop, where Maud, her appetite restored, ate enough for three men.
“More sugar in your tea? Let me butter your bread. Do have a bite of this egg and the strawberry jam…” Frank had a pucker of worry between his eyebrows as he fussed over her.
“Frank! Enough!” Maud snapped. “I am perfectly able to feed myself. I’m feeling better.”
Frank’s shoulders relaxed a bit. “I was just so worried,” he said. “I am dreadfully sorry that you got caught in the rain.”
“It’s not your fault, Frank. These things happen.”
He took both of her smaller hands in his, rubbing one finger distractedly along the tip of her left index finger, which was callused and pricked from mending costumes.
“You needn’t worry,” Maud said, slipping her hands from his grasp, then giving his hands a squeeze. “I wired ahead to our next stop. Our run is confirmed. There’s no possibility we’ll face the same situation again.”
“Maud,” Frank said, reaching out and tilting her head up with the tip of his finger. “Look at me, please. We can’t keep traveling. I’m no nursemaid, and I’ll be frantic every time you catch a draft.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. I’m with child, not ill. I’m as sturdy as a horse.”
“Sturdy as a horse,” Frank said. “Normally, yes, but these last few days…” He spread his hands helplessly before her.
“Besides,” Maud continued, ignoring his comment, “we’re booked solid for the next month. You know as well as I do that we can’t back out of our commitments. At best, we’ll have to pay them back, and at worst—they’ll never have us back again. The name of the Baum Theatre Company will be ruined.”
“I said nothing about backing out of our commitments,” Frank said. He stroked his moustache and swallowed hard. “The company will tour without us.”
“But you’re the lead actor,” Maud said.
“And so I was. But now, we have other responsibilities.”
Maud saw a light cloud, like a thin mist of fog, cross her beloved’s expression and settle around his eyes. “The troupe will still be here. We’ll rejoin it later.”
Maud dug into her satchel and consulted a small notebook filled with neat lines of script. “You know we are already booked in Vermilion, Parma, Mentor, Ashtabula, and Erie,” Maud said. “We need those ticket sales to pay off our debts.”
Frank reached out and brushed his finger along the curve of her cheek. “You are a stern taskmaster, my darling. But I insist that after we finish the run in Erie, we’ll head north to be closer to home. Surely we can find a suitable rental in Syracuse.”
“We’ll see,” Maud said, sensing that she might lose this battle. “Let’s see how it goes.”
By the time they got to Erie, even Maud’s deft needlework couldn’t find a way to let out her clothes, and every day when she unlaced her boots, she saw creases in her skin where her ankles had swelled. Frank had begun to talk cheerfully about returning to Syracuse for the winter. He wanted to send the troupe on without them, promising Maud that the two of them would do nothing but clip coupons and live in the lap of luxury on their proceeds. But in the end, it wasn’t his words that persuaded her. She added up the figures and saw that the troupe wasn’t making enough—not to support them in Syracuse, nor to support them on the road. So Maud agreed to Frank’s proposal. The troupe would head south toward Clarion and Brookville to finish out their last two engagements, then continue on to the Baum Theatre in Richburg, New York, where they would pack away the sets and costumes and go their separate ways. Maud and Frank said their goodbyes and boarded the Lackawanna toward Syracuse.
As the train headed east, Maud sat next to the window, the swaying motion of the compartment helping to soothe her sadness. She looked out over the fields and woodlands, now showing the faded browns and yellows of late November. Their train car was empty except for a single man who had pulled his overcoat up over his face and gone to sleep. The dim late autumn light was melancholic. She felt as if the world had cleared out and stilled, leaving a void between the ending of one thing and the beginning of something else.
She snuggled down next to Frank, laying her head on his shoulder. “We won’t make this the end, will we, Frank? We won’t become one of those dull old couples who trade stories of the few adventuresome days of their youth while sitting dumb as doorposts in front of a fire, knees wrapped in blankets, mouths full of old stories?”
“Dear Maudie,” Frank said. “Why ever would you think such a thing?”
“You know I’ve come to love it as much as you do—it’s just that the numbers don’t add up. For the last six months we weren’t breaking even. I’m not sure how to make that change.”
Frank let her remark pass without responding. Maud knew that he didn’t have a head for numbers. He had an optimistic streak that included a firm belief that pennies would fall from heaven, in the nick of time, to save the day.
“Frank?”
“We’ll return to the theater the moment our little girl is born. We’ll have her playing Shakespeare before she can walk. I’m picturing her dressed as Ariel, with flowers threaded through her hair.”
“Our girl?” Maud said, grinning impishly. “And what makes you so sure?”
Frank smiled. “I’m just convinced that the mighty spirit of the Gage women will certainly prevail.”
Boy or girl, right now it was kicking Maud in the ribs. She sucked in her breath and shifted on the bench. Her gloom over their goodbyes had passed. She wasn’t sure what the future would hold, but at least they would face it as a family.
* * *
—
WHEN MAUD’S LABOR PAINS set in, one day in early December, she looked around her trim and tidy home. Her linens were starched and ironed; her layette was neatly folded and smelled sweetly of lavender sachet. Chicken stew simmered on the back of the cookstove, a neat supply of kindling and firewood was stacked by the fireplace, and fire burned in the grate. Out the window, gentle flakes of snow drifted down from a white sky. Turning from the window, she surveyed the order and harmony she had created in their small rented home in Syracuse. As she felt a band of pressure tightening across her belly, and her breath sucked in, then steadied and slowed, she knew it was time, and she prepared to face it well.
Eight hours later, a healthy baby boy, Frank Joslyn Baum, was born.
* * *
—
ON CHRISTMAS EVE, FRANK, Maud, and little Frank, affectionately known as Bunting, stood near the large evergreen festooned with candles and red ribbons in the parlor of her mother’s home in Fayetteville. Maud’s color was high as she shared hugs and kisses with friends and relatives who had come from far and near. But there was a melancholy tinge in the big old house. It would be her first Christmas without Papa, who had succumbed to his fevers earlier that year.
T.C. had arrived from Aberdeen, Dakota Territory, bringing tales of business opportunities in the recently founded western railroad hub. But Julia and her husband could not afford to make an eastern visit this year.
When Maud noticed that her mother and Frank were deep in conversation, she worked her way across the crowded room to see what they were talking about.
“And what kind of work do you plan to do now?” Matilda was asking.