“And you didn’t finish what happens, Mama. Does their daddy get mad and send them there to think about minding him better next time? I hope Papa won’t ever do that to us. Do you go there to help them learn to behave?”
The shock of Delia’s questions constricted her throat. For a brief instant, Constance felt a gag reflex. She rose. Then sat back down and took their hands in hers again.
“All right,” she said. “This is hard now. But I will tell you. Sometimes things happen.”
“You said that, Mama. Three times now you said that,” said Delia.
“But we don’t know what happens, Mama,” added Maggie.
Constance knew she had repeated herself. She had to find a way to the next sentence. “Sometimes people die. Sometimes they get very sick, and the doctor doesn’t have the right medicine.” A deep breath. “Sometimes there is an accident—”
Delia interrupted. “Like a horse could kick you or something?”
Maggie chimed in. “Or get runned over in the street if you didn’t see a new motorcar?”
“Yes, yes, something like that.” Constance felt the drain of every word.
“But what about the other one? The mama or daddy that didn’t get sick or runned over. If you have a mama or a daddy, you can’t be an orphan, can you?” Delia was genuinely perplexed.
“You are absolutely right, sweetheart. Something happening to one parent doesn’t make you an orphan. But many of these children are known as half-orphans. In other words, only one of their parents is alive and working.”
“Then why are they there?”
“Their mama or daddy is away from home, working all day, Delia. Sometimes at night. No one is home to take care of them, so they go to live at the orphanage for a while, until they are old enough to learn a way to make money themselves. Then they might go back home and help out. Or they might go and live somewhere else while they work—like a grown-up.”
The girls seemed to be waiting for more, as if somehow she had failed to explain life to them.
“There now, that’s entirely enough for one night. Off to bed, little ones. Analee is waiting for you.”
“But we’re not tired, Mama,” said Maggie.
“Well, your mama is. Exhausted. Now, off with you.”
Constance watched them reach for Analee’s hands, turn, and blow kisses. She blew one back.
As the door closed, Constance collapsed on the chaise, fingers clasped painfully around her shoulders, knees and elbows sharp but inadequate against her terror.
*
The following day, Constance sat at her desk and drew out a sheet of monogrammed stationery. One slow word at a time, then more rapidly, she penned her words, then folded the note and sealed the envelope. Downstairs, she bade goodbye to Analee and the children and hailed a carriage two blocks away. Her determination was the one necessity she now understood. At the stately Italianate Richard house on Prytania in the Garden District, Constance leaned forward and handed the driver her note. She counted each step he took, heard the sharp clang of the mailbox closing. There were no longer any other choices. Her options had disappeared beneath the high trestle of a moving train. She could no more reinstate them than restore the shock waves of dark water folding over Benton’s eyes to their pastoral stillness.
CHAPTER 12
The day and night dragged past. Nothing interfered with her despair. Constance found herself repeatedly jarred, only to discover one or the other of her girls tugging at her, pulling her out of her fog for attention. Her mind was both void and entangled. Analee asked again and again if she was ill. To which she could only shake her head. Analee inquired also about Mr. Halstead’s return. To which, again, Constance could only shake her head. She did not eat. She did not know if she slept or not; she had no sensation of either. She no longer even made an effort at pretense with Analee. Her very being had gone vacant.
On the second day of her stupor, she was aware of a knocking at the front door. A sharp rapping, like that of a man. It was the urgency, perhaps, of that sound that broke into her torpor. Constance blinked her eyes. Here it is, she thought. Here he is. No, he wouldn’t knock. He would break through the door. He would break me. She rose and waited.
“They’s a constable to see you, Miss Constance. Truth be, they’s two. I stood them in the entry by the door to come fetch you.”
They have come for me. It is over. I am undone. Constance gripped the rail as she descended the stairs, one careful step after another, to her fate.
The sun was brilliant and burdensome through the leaded glass as Constance approached the heavy front door, which was slightly ajar. The backlit officers appeared as darkened silhouettes. She nodded. They did not, but stood directly in front of her, blocking her way, in case her impulse to flee overwhelmed her. The taller tipped his cap, staring at her directly, then turned his head to the other expectantly.
“Mrs. Halstead?”
“Yes.”
“Mrs. Benton Halstead?”
She nodded. Whom had they expected?
The officer circled his cap nervously in his hands. “We need to speak with you, ma’am.”
“Yes. Well, here I am. In person. Speak.”
“Well, ma’am. Perhaps it may not be best to speak right here.” A hinge creaked as he pushed the door behind him shut. “You might prefer to sit down. Might we come in, please, ma’am?”
“Am I in jeopardy, then? Do you wish to arrest me for taking hand-me-downs to the orphanage? Stolen goods, perhaps?” Constance astonished herself that her wit had somehow reappeared. But she had been inappropriately flip. She glanced from one to the other in what she hoped seemed like amusement. Then sobered when their faces remained unbrokenly solemn. “Very well, then. Follow me in, please.”
Constance led them from the foyer to the salon but remained standing, in her head a lingering thought that she must remember to oil the hinges on the front door. In the drawing room, where she could see them, her awareness settled on the officers. Perspiration dampened her linen day dress. She bade the men wait a moment while she checked on her children. And tried to still her trembling. When she returned, Constance noted how the men were visually inspecting the house. Finer than they had imagined, she thought, or not as fine as they had expected?
“Now, gentlemen,” she said, “what is it you wish to speak with me about?”
“My apologies, ma’am. Sorry to have to interrupt your schedule. We find ourselves in need of your assistance,” said the shorter of the two.
“Assistance? Whatever for?”
The taller officer took the lead at last. “At the morgue, ma’am. We are in need of your assistance at the morgue, Mrs. Halstead.”
“At the morgue?” She swung her head sharply. “That is what you said? At the morgue.”
“Yes, ma’am.” The taller one was in charge again. “I’m Officer Pulgrum, and this is Officer Dean. We are here to ask you to come with us to help identify a body, ma’am.”
Constance released her hold on the back of the blue velvet chair, swiveled, then lowered herself at last into it, almost in slow motion. “A body?”
The officers had stepped in front of her as she sat. Afraid I’ll faint, she thought.
“We believe it to possibly be that of your husband, ma’am.” Officer Pulgrum’s voice was steady.
Constance sat immobile, silent, choking on her breath.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Halstead. There is no easy way to speak of things like this.”
“No, no easy way,” Constance whispered over her erratic breath.
“It’s possible that it is not your husband. Which is why we need your help.”
Constance jerked her head up toward them, then turned from one to the other. “You have come to have me identify my husband, whom you say is dead, and then you say perhaps it is not my husband and my husband may walk in the door this minute? What in God’s name are you saying?”
The men looked at one another. Officer Dean took the lead. “A corpse was found in a body of water near the railroad trestle on a farm up near the Mississippi border. Apparently, fell from the train. There was a good bit of damage to the face and head.”