The trees were the wrong trees; the buildings, the wrong buildings; the people, the wrong people. The reek of the streets, of the horse manure, the garbage, the spilled beer, and the drunken piss, it all seemed to say to me, Your mother is dead, your father is dead, your brothers are dead, and no one can help you.
And so I cursed these things. I cursed these wrong trees; the carriages; the low, sooty buildings; the high ones. It was warmer here, the ground not quite frozen, but cold all the same—I cursed that as well. The mud under my feet. I cursed the fine clothes and the poor, the buggies, the trains, the men, the women, the beggars, the horses, and the birds, all of it—I wished it all to burn, to become a fire that would lay waste to the city, for me to turn from ember to inferno under the breath of whatever it was that would listen to my prayer and answer it. And while I’d not cried once for the entire journey, I began to as I began my curses. I wept continuously, though I did not sob or shake.
§
By nightfall I remained more ash than ember. My face burned from where the tears had glazed my face and I had brushed them away. I sank against a stone wall. Nothing had answered my prayers, again. And so, having cursed everything that came near me, I cursed myself.
I was dazed from hunger—I’d never eaten away from home in my entire life. I looked at the window of a tavern full of people laughing and drinking, and saw no clear way to feed myself, no way to join them. I remember I was afraid that it was their house and they would not let me in.
The confidence that came with cursing the people in the street left me, and they frightened me now. They seemed to me like a swarm, indistinct from one another, foreign and of a piece with one another in a way I would never be. And while I was unsure how they fed themselves, what they would eat and drink, they were not unsure at all and this terrified me. I watched for signs of how it was done, in a furious despair. Not for wanting to die, but to live.
Girl, said a voice behind me, and I turned.
Are you lost? he asked.
I shook my head. This, at least, was true.
You look quite cold, more than half froze, he said. He smiled faintly, and a whisper of charm came through the air.
He was pale, somber, very tall. He had dark hair and whiskers, the whiskers a bit frozen from his breath and the wind, and he looked as if even speaking to me grieved him.
Come join me inside, he said, and indicated the saloon. Let me buy you a bit of something and get you out of the cold.
I went in. He bought me soup and a bit of beer, and I knew I might live.
§
Do you need a position? he asked.
I supposed I did.
He needed someone for help with the washing and the cooking, he said. His wife had just died. Was I handy? For it looked like I was. He was a new widower.
I was no good for it, but I nodded all the same, for I wanted at least another meal and a bed. I hoped desperation might make me better at chores.
Can you not speak? he asked, for thus far I’d said nothing.
I decided I could not and nodded yes. It would be easier this way.
Well, okay then, he said.
It was a very short charade we managed. His house that night was cold and clean, the farm large, familiar and unfamiliar both. My parents had never used hired men and women so I was unused to them and greeted them warily with a wave. He showed me to a small room off the kitchen he said was to be mine. When I came back through the kitchen and found him asleep by his bottle, a little whiskey was still in the glass.
I was still cold, and though I had come into the kitchen to be close to the fire, I thought to try this—he had said it warmed one, but had not offered it to me. The taste burned, but the warmth was there and ran through me, consoling.
I sipped again.
I roused him, for he should be in his bed, it seemed to me, and helped him up the stairs.
§
By the end of the next day, it was quite clear I was as bad as I ever had been at the cooking and the wash. He was nice enough, but as I cleaned the table and took his plate, he made a face.
I had found him asleep at the table again. He’d stayed late, drinking by the kitchen fire. I woke him to go to bed, and as I did, he looked at me and I saw his eyes.
I slowly understood; I was close to a lesson, one I had long understood would come. I could tell what he wanted from me.
I’d had to break the ice on the East River to wash clothes that froze before they dried. His eyes reminded me of that ice. I wondered if it would be worse than that and decided perhaps it was not.
I guided him to his room. I laid him out on his bed, helping him off with his clothes, pausing before also draping mine. I stood cold, naked, at the edge of this moment. I told myself I could still leave, though I knew I could not, and climbed into the bed on top of him.