Poydras Asylum for Girls had been established by a dedicated group of Protestant women to care for younger children, primarily girls, but it also accepted some smaller boys, especially siblings. At the age of eleven, the children were separated by gender, and the girls went to the upper levels of the Poydras Home, where they might learn a trade if they were not reunited with family members. The city was well supplied with asylums, as the orphanages were most often called; the need was unfortunately great. How Constance wished she had the power to give all of them the more fitting title Home for Children, regardless of the sponsor.
In truth, a large number of these children were not actually orphaned. A good number were half-orphans and stayed for a period of two to six years. But children in need were everywhere. Yellow fever was rampant and unmerciful in New Orleans in the summers, even when not at epidemic levels. That and cholera frequently left children with only one parent, who was often unable to care for them and also work. In spite of the times and the religious leanings of the city, families tended to be fairly small, which meant the orphanages were often able to keep brothers and sisters together, to be cared for and educated until their trade training began when they were older, enabling them to become self-sustaining. Constance rejoiced when a family could be reunited at that point, though she worried about all that had been missed, the effects of those long-term separations.
The wrought-iron gate opened quietly for Constance. She was impressed by how well oiled it seemed. She rang the bell at the door and greeted the matron, Mrs. Guidry. The staff had become accustomed to Constance’s frequent visits. She nodded and smiled, made her way straight to the courtyard in back. Classes for the day were dismissed by the time Constance arrived, and a number of children were at play on the grounds. From the shadow of the doorway, she studied the groups. One troupe of girls ran in little circles, holding hands. At one point they twirled in a tight circle, erupting into giggles, until one girl tripped and fell. When her neighbor slapped away the hand she held up for assistance, she ran sobbing to the teacher in charge, who knelt, took her by the shoulders, spoke quietly, and sent her back to her playmates. At the far corner, a group of boys crouched on the ground with their marbles. A cluster of older children took turns pushing little ones in the two swings, while a handful of others jumped up and down impatiently, waving and pleading for their turn. Almost all were girls, and the few younger boys were probably siblings. Alone at the side of the building, one little boy sat digging his hands into the dirt, wiping at his face with his grubby fingers. Constance saw the tears when he turned his grimy face up to her. These were the ones she came for.
Constance pulled her long skirt aside—she had not been dressed for play—and settled beside him. She had already removed her gloves and laid them on the ground. The boy lowered his head and held his hands still against the earth. Without a word, Constance reached down, stuck her fingers in near his scratchings, and began to dig. The boy looked up at her in something of wonder. She continued to dig, carving a curved line in his direction. He watched, fascinated. She watched him watch. In a moment his fingers moved. Made a short, broken line in response to hers.
As she continued her line, Constance said without looking up, “What is your name?”
There was a long silence, in which his finger swirled, as if he might obliterate all the lines. “Walter,” he said at last.
By now, Constance had brought her line full around, completing a circle that encompassed his jagged lines. As he leaned over to inspect it, she sat back and watched. The boy must have been about seven. His brown hair was washed and trimmed neatly. Hands and nails would have been clean except for his agonized scratching in the dirt.
“Are you new here, Walter?”
He nodded.
“Have you made any friends?”
He shook his head.
“Would you like to?”
Walter nodded again.
“Who would you like to be friends with? Do you know yet?”
Walter hesitated, looked around the courtyard, raised his hand and pointed toward the cluster of boys with their marbles.
“Johnny,” he said. “He sleeps in the bed next to mine.”
Constance picked up her gloves, brushed off her skirt as she stood, and took Walter’s dirty little hand. She didn’t bother to wipe it off. Together they walked toward the boys.
*
On her ride home, Constance tapped her gloves against her knee, then brushed at a bit of soil on her skirt. She lay against the seat of the carriage as if to nap, but her eyes were intent on the sky. How blue, she thought. How constant. And then, No, never constant. Fickle, uncertain, unknowable—like life. A life to which she must return. Uncertain. Acutely, piercingly uncertain. How could she ever know anything again? She might live on, not knowing if Benton was living or dead. Surely at some point she would know, but what would it mean? Would she be the wife who had tried to kill him or the wife who had reached out to save him? Would she be a widow by tragic accident or a criminal? And who was that man? What was he doing there? No innocent person would have then disappeared. She could not reconstruct the event. Too much was a blur of chaos. She could not see through the blur to find the blue sky. Perhaps she never would.
The steps to the house almost proved to be her undoing. Constance’s breath came hard and fast, but her feet dragged with uncertainty up the front steps. Because she couldn’t find the strength to lift her skirt, she tripped once. Constance ignored the sound of the ripping hem and pulled herself upward. She hesitated at the door, hand on the knob, listening. When she heard only silence, she entered and looked around. The house was the same, clearly. Yet not. Silence deadened the air as she walked from one empty room to the next until she reached the kitchen. From the backyard Constance heard the voices of her children, the quick laughter, the shrill little screams interrupted by giggles. One hand on the batiste curtain, she lifted the ruffle aside to view her girls playing chase as Analee folded dry laundry from the line and dropped it into her basket.
Constance exhaled. She had been conscious neither of holding her breath nor of the weakness with which her body sagged now that she could sit again. In her exhaustion, Constance dropped into one of the wooden chairs, knowing this respite would not endure. She laid her head on the kitchen table and closed her eyes, her ears ringing with the glad signs of her children’s temporarily protected spirits.
CHAPTER 10
Chicago did not hesitate in getting cold. The winds whipped through the city. Shawls and hats went flying, unless held tight by gloved fingers, which would have fared much better in deep pockets. The mud began to freeze in treacherous strips along and between the planks, so that walking back from the White Way, arms loaded with clothes to be altered, became a challenge in diligent attention for Alice. In the flat, she would drop her load on the bed and warm her hands at the radiator, staring through the fogged window at the bleak city outside.
Once Alice had regained her sense of balance, she would slip into the bathroom, hold her hands under a stream of warm water, and examine her underclothing. For nothing. Day after day. Now week after week. How many weeks? She could not be sure. No, not true. She could be sure if she simply would. But she knew. She had known, despite some level of denial, for a while. Now the denial had to be put aside. She was with child.