Fourth Month 21
This morning, Frau V. and I were chopping onions for soup, and the kitchen air was dense with their pungent irritant. As tears wet our cheeks, she returned to the question I’d avoided answering the other day.
“Why aren’t you with your father? He must need you, with your mother gone.”
I gathered courage and told her of my clandestine pregnancy and my secretive departure. To my relief, her first reactions were sympathetic. But soon she became agitated.
“You didn’t try to find the baby’s father?”
“I had no address. He sent no letter, and my brother—he’s not the letter-writing sort. He’s rather shy.” I took up a rag and cleared my eyes.
Leaving the board of onions, Frau V. reached into a package for a fish to scale. “So you did nothing?”
“I didn’t have the money to travel to Pittsburgh. Even if I had, where would I have stayed, as a woman alone in my condition, and how would I have found them?”
She didn’t answer.
“Besides,” I tried, “I was weak. I could hardly hold down a bite of food.”
These reasons had seemed insurmountable at the time. But in the face of this determined mountain of a woman, they shriveled.
She let out a huff. “And your family gave no help.” She threw a scaled, beheaded fish into the bucket of ice at her feet.
I hesitated to agree with so final and condemning a statement. If Mother had lived, she would have helped. No—if Mother had lived, we would have continued to attend Meeting, and I’d have married Johan there. With her gone and Father derailed by grief, however, I had no one to count on. I told the cook all this. “I did give my baby’s father’s name to a solicitor,” I concluded. “He might be found and convinced to give support.”
“All right.” She nodded. “Maybe that solicitor can get you some funds.” Wearing a doubtful scowl, she rinsed her hands at the faucet in the iron sink, lifted the big soup pot to the stovetop, and added a dollop of fat. I pushed the onions off the board into the pot.
“But thee needn’t worry,” I told her. “I intend to become a sewing woman and raise my baby beside me.”
She clamped her hands to her thighs and turned her substantial body toward me. “You intend to keep your baby? Without a husband?”
“Yes.” I stirred the onions and dared to look at her. “She’s with a wet nurse now.”
A strained noise came from Frau V.’s throat. “I didn’t know you were mad!” She gestured with her head toward the windows, indicating the outer world that would treat us terribly. “Your lives will be a torment!”
Her reaction flooded me with dread. But I reminded myself that the harder way is often the truer. Almost twenty years ago, my father and two others from our Meeting were conscripted in the War of the Rebellion. They opposed slavery, of course, but they opposed killing, too. So they stood among rifle fire unarmed and were much abused by the other men for their refusal to carry guns. They held firm, drew the attention of commanders, gained their release, and took part in tending the wounded instead.
“Why didn’t you write to the baby’s father?” the cook demanded.
“I told thee, I had no address.” What did she expect, that I would write to every domicile in Pittsburgh?
She stopped her labor to examine me. “But you can write to anyone care of the post office. You can write your young man that way.” She walked to the table and sat on a bench, shaking her head. “Such a smart girl, didn’t know that.”
It’s true; I hadn’t known. I’d never had cause to know. “But even so,” I objected, “why would he seek mail from me at the post office, if he has no need for me anymore?”
“Sit down,” she directed, patting the bench. I picked up a load of potatoes and heaped them on the table. Her wide body took up much of the seating, so I stood to keep my elbow from jabbing her as I peeled. With a heavy exhalation, she reached an arm for the peeler.
“Give me,” she said. “I can’t stay still. You get a knife and start to cut them.” As she peeled and I sliced, she continued. “Young men, they’re ignorant. They don’t know the value of a woman’s love. But if you told him about the baby, maybe he’d come back. If you begged him, he might marry you.”
I shook my head side to side.
She admonished me: “Don’t be so stubborn.”
I stood and walked to the stove to shake down ashes. When I lifted the top and poured in more coal, a wave of red heat rushed out. My fury is that hot, I thought. Turning to her, I asked, “Was thee ever deceived and abandoned by a man thee loved—the father of thy child?”
“My Joseph is a good man!” she exclaimed. “We’ve been married thirty-two years.” She nodded and lifted her shoulders proudly. “We have seven children.”
Just as I’d expected. “Then thee has no idea of the loathing I feel. To grovel before Johan for help or marriage? I’d rather live on the street! And don’t call me stubborn.”
“I see you won’t be easy to convince.” Her wry tone irked me further, and I replied with more than a little warmth.
“That’s correct. If thee wants to help me, consider my poor baby’s situation. I’ve never met her nurse, haven’t heard from that woman despite sending a letter, and can’t visit to see my baby’s condition for nine more days. To be of use, join thy prayers to mine.”
I ran out and up to my room, where I’ll remain till Henry calls.
Could I have made Johan come back, if I’d sent a letter? I must put this pencil down, so I can lower my head to my hands and weep.
Fourth Month 23
Still no word from Gerda. I pulled two pages from this book, one to write on and one to fold into an envelope and post with my last stamp.
I intended to bring this letter directly to the kitchen to see if anyone was stepping out and could mail it. I walked from my room to the second story, and in the hall I paused to rest on a chair, feeling light-headed. Clementina must have heard my movements, for she called me to her office. Her original purpose was cast from her mind when she saw my envelope.
“To whom can a servant need to write—her mother?” She toyed with a red pendant at her neck.
The woman has an astringent effect on me, and I didn’t want to answer.
“No,” I said. “My mother passed away.” I fingered my locket, its metal as smooth to my fingertips as Mother’s cheek.
“From what did she die?”
I spoke the truth that rose to my head. “From the bleeding and prescriptions of an allopathic doctor.”
“My father is an allopath,” she said. “A noted one.”
“Pardon me,” I replied. “This one killed my mother, so I didn’t much like his methods.”