I remembered the sounds I had assumed were animals in the grass and chuckled.
“You look a mess, Abel, and you’ve a bruise on your cheek. Why do you have a bruise? What’s wrong with your leg?”
We approached the cart by the barn. The horse grazed nearby, but perhaps the man still slept.
“Did you ever ask who he was searching for?” I whispered.
“I was just happy to get out of there,” Apollo answered. “What happened, Abel? Why aren’t you on the train?”
I rubbed my arm. “The fellows threw me off, Apollo. They didn’t want my company.”
His eyes widened. “Threw you off!” he exclaimed.
A head with a serious, coffee-colored face and crisp, dark hair poked out from the front of the cart.
“You didn’t say he was a colored gentleman,” I whispered.
“Was I supposed to?” Apollo answered.
“Why, you’re the lad who picked up my hat for me,” the man said in a rich, deep voice, and I recognized him as the gentleman Mr. G. Marvel had evicted from his Wagner Palace car. He climbed down from the cart.
“This is my friend Abel, Mr. Northstar,” said Apollo. “Abel Dandy. He’s the most best friend in all the world. He’ll steal you an apple in a minute and knock down your enemies in a trice.”
“A fine friend indeed,” Mr. Northstar said, and broke his solemn demeanor with a smile as he held out his hand to me. The smile merely served to make the sadness in his eyes plainer. “William Northstar, at your service.”
I shook his hand.
“They threw him off the train!” Apollo said.
Mr. Northstar sucked his teeth in disapproval. “I’ve some witch hazel,” he said. “You look like you have need of it. I found some eggs while you were gone, young man,” Mr. Northstar told Apollo gently. “Why don’t you gather some fuel for a fire?”
“Yes, sir.” Apollo scampered off into the trees.
“You have a way with puppy boys,” I noted with amusement when Mr. Northstar reemerged from his cart with a dark green bottle. “He’s not so easily bidden, as a rule.”
“He’s still chastened by his experience,” said Mr. Northstar as he dabbed at my face with a cloth soaked in cooling potion, “but if he’s like most boys, he won’t remember long. I shall, however.” His fist tightened and his eyes narrowed. Witch hazel dripped from the rag. “No child should be locked up like an animal.”
I nodded in agreement. “I don’t mean to be ungrateful,” I said, “but what were you looking for in that caboose? It wasn’t Apollo.”
He sighed and sank against the cart. “I was looking for a boy,” he said. “My child, Willie. He is only six years old, and someone has stolen him.”
My mouth fell open. “Why would anyone steal him?”
“He was born with skin as spotted as an Indian pony’s,” answered Mr. Northstar. “I believe someone decided to take him for a show.”
“Who? What happened?” I asked.
“I left my boy in Ohio with my old granny, who had helped me raise him since his mother died in childbirth,” he explained. “A colored man with a law degree has a hard search for a job ahead of him.”
My head cocked in surprised interest. I didn’t know there were colored lawyers. The grim line of his lips and his knowing eyes showed me he had expected this reaction. How uncouth I felt.
“When I came home,” he continued, “I found the door wide open, my grandmother dying of a blow to the head, and Willie gone.” His eyes flashed anger, and his words came from between clenched teeth. “I don’t know how long that old woman had been lying there hurt. The show—the show took him’ were her dying words.”
“What show?” I gasped. Surely no show would steal a child.
“I don’t know,” he answered. “I asked everywhere.” He scanned the woods around us as if he still searched. “The circus had been through days before—Marvel Brothers—and a mud show the previous week, also two small medicine shows. After my grandmother’s funeral I left. I had no time to waste. The circus would be the easiest to find, but it also moved the fastest. That’s where I decided to begin my search.”
That explained Mr. Northstar’s harsh exchange with Mr. Marvel. “And that’s why you were looking around the train.”
“A man brought food to the caboose and locked the door. I thought my boy was there,” said Mr. Northstar. He sighed. “Have you seen such a child?” I could tell by the hopeless look in his eyes that he knew I would have spoken up before now if I had.
I shook my head.
“I’ve found lots of dry wood,” cried Apollo. He tripped and tottered, with his arms full of branches and a trail of twigs behind him. “Isn’t the morning glorious? I saw a fox! Honestly! A real fox.” He tumbled the wood onto the ground. “I told the bunnies, ‘Beware.’ Then I laughed because I was talking to bunnies. That’s a caution, isn’t it, Abel? But us furry folk gotta stick together, right?” His laughter pealed like Christmas bells in the clear morning air.
I resolved not to mention the piebald child. He didn’t need to learn that people kidnapped boys who were different.
“You will take this child home, will you not?” asked Mr. Northstar as he built a fire.
“No, Abel!” cried the puppy boy with a short memory.
I felt a lump in my throat. “Yes, sir,” I said, glancing down. “As soon as I can.” Well, I’ll send him home, at least, I thought. “I’m afraid I shall have to earn some money first, however,” I added. That was true enough.
“If there are colored folks in town, I may find news of where there are jobs to be had,” he said. “Get that basket by the rear wheels,” he told Apollo. “Bring the pan that hangs on a hook inside the back of the cart,” he told me. “There are plates and forks in the red storage box.” He rummaged in a pack and pulled out a loaf of bread. Soon we were gobbling down mouthfuls of scrambled eggs and bread toasted over the fire. Breakfast had never tasted so good.
After I ate, I could barely keep my eyes open.
“You need sleep,” I told Apollo, watching him yawn cracks in the dried egg around his mouth. He refused to look at me.
“There’s a mattress in back. Use it,” said Mr. Northstar, with tenderness in his voice despite his stern words.
“Abel hasn’t slept either,” protested Apollo.
“Both of you,” said Mr. Northstar. “Boys need their sleep.”
“Go wash your face in the stream,” I told Apollo. “You’ll give me nightmares if you sleep next to me like that.”
“That’s an unusual last name you have,” I said while we waited for Apollo.
“Indeed,” said Mr. Northstar. “I have my grandfather to thank for that. He named us after the star that led him and granny to freedom, rather than bring a name with him from slavery. I’m glad the man had more dignity than humor, else I would find myself named Dipper, not Northstar.”
My heart warmed at his attempt to be funny, knowing how unhappy he must be. “How did you become a lawyer?” I asked.
“I had a sponsor,” he told me. “A Quaker woman whose parents helped my grandparents on their journey north. She came to visit us in Ohio once and took a liking to me. She said she’d pay my way to Howard University, in Washington, D.C., if I did well in school.”
“We were almost neighbors,” I exclaimed. “We’re from Maryland.”
This time his smile reached his eyes. “Neighbors, but far apart,” he said.
At that moment Apollo ran back from the stream. “There’s a lady coming.”
11
FOR A SECOND MY BREATH LEFT ME as I imagined a dancing girl coming down the path, but it was a handsome, dark-haired woman of middle years, wearing a checkered morning dress, who bustled up to us and brought me back to my senses. Was she about to throw us off her land?
“Are you the boy who knocked on my door this morning?” she asked me, ignoring Mr. Northstar.
“If it is a red door, yes, ma’am,” I answered. I wondered if I should change that to
“madam.” Why was a businesswoman out on her own errands?
She coolly inspected Apollo. “I thought as much. I am Mrs. Delaney. I had a dream I should find luck on my doorstep this day.”
I wasn’t the only one having odd dreams. I introduced my companions and myself. “How may I help you?” I asked.
“It seems I am in need of a boy after all,” she said. “Mine has left, and it’s hard to get help from town when you’re in my line of business.” She glanced at Apollo again. “I’m sure I could find enough work for two—if you mean to stay.”
This amounted to a generous offer, and yet I was apprehensive.
“What kind of work would you be offering these fine young men, Mrs. Delaney?” Mr. Northstar asked. He kept his eyes lowered and his tone even. He didn’t have to worry about two boys not his own, but I was glad he did.
I don’t know whom she believed him to be—not our father, obviously. She sized him up and must have decided that a civil answer might be expedient. “Nothing a lad would be ashamed of,” she replied. “Kitchen chores, gathering up glasses, fetching and carrying for my gentlemen.”
“Is this a boardinghouse you run?” he asked.
“We ply the oldest trade at my establishment,” she said.
Her honesty surprised me. I peeked at Apollo but saw no glimmer of understanding there.
“But my girls are clean,” Mrs. Delaney continued, “and I teach them manners if they have none. This includes leaving the staff to their business.”
“Well, you speak fair and plain,” Mr. Northstar admitted. “For the sake of their mothers I would beg you to honor their youth, however.”
A spark of irritation lit her eyes.
“How much does it pay?” I asked. I appreciated Mr. Northstar’s concern, but I hoped my youth would not be respected too much.
“Eight dollars a week for both of you,” she replied as if this were a fortune.
I almost protested. I had made ten dollars a week with the circus all by myself, but where else in this unknown place would I find employ? “Does the job include room and board?”
“Certainly,” she answered, and bestowed a glowing smile upon me. “As well as clean bed linens, and a bath on Sunday. We lodge the boys down by the kitchen, away from the business, before you ask,” she told Mr. Northstar. Her lips tweaked with amusement.
Mr. Northstar accompanied us back to the house, leading his horse and cart. He declined to come inside, however.
“I’ll check on you boys before I leave town today,” he said, “in case you find the work doesn’t suit you after all. Mind you keep Apollo out of the parlor and away from upstairs,” he said to me.
“I’m housebroke,” complained Apollo.
Mr. Northstar shook his head and smiled.
“My dear child,” said Mrs. Delaney, stroking Apollo’s furry cheek with her fingertips. “No one doubts it, but we wouldn’t want to cause a stir among the guests, would we? You know how ungenerous some people can be.”
Indeed, Apollo did now, if he didn’t before. He beamed at Mrs. Delaney. “I’ll keep out of sight,” he promised.
“I’ll bid you good day, then,” said Mr. Northstar. He mounted his cart and cracked the reins. I hoped he would find good news in town.
“Here are the boys, Elsie,” called Mrs. Delaney as we walked through the door. The girl we’d seen earlier ran downstairs, now clad in an Oriental wrapper.
“Try to be sensible and not swoon this time,” said Mrs. Delaney. “This is simply a very unusual boy. Now, off with you to bed.”
That seemed an odd thing to say in the morning, but of course, the lady in question must have been up all night.
Mrs. Delaney rang a bell, and the frazzled maid who appeared showed us to our quarters—mine a small room off the kitchen, Apollo’s a box room under the back stairs, just big enough for a cot. The maid pulled a worn but serviceable canvas shirt and a pair of pants from a nearby airing cupboard and handed them to Apollo gingerly. They appeared to be almost the right size for him. She offered me a pair of dungarees. I hesitated but took them. I didn’t know when I might clean and mend the garments I wore. She then directed us to the outside pump, in case we wished to rinse off, and scurried away, with one last wide-eyed look behind her. I stowed my suitcase under the bed and insisted Apollo join me outside.
“I washed in the stream,” he protested.
“Not with soap,” I said.
The rough lye soap made my scrapes sting, but I felt the better for the wash.
After he’d scrubbed and I’d combed the tangles from his fur, Apollo brought water in for the cooking and cleaning, while I refilled the kerosene lamps. There was no indoor plumbing and the gas lines didn’t come out this far, although the houses down the road by the train station had their water and gas piped in, even if they weren’t rich folk, the cook told me with envy and pride.
I chopped wood for the cookstove and groaned with pain every time I raised the ax. Then I was sent to clean the grate and lay a fire in the parlor in case the night turned chilly in the wee hours, and my bad knee played up rotten when I knelt. As I set down a layer of kindling, the door opened and a pair of girls in summer frocks entered. The redhead, who appeared to be the younger of the pair, whispered in her blond companion’s ear and giggled.
“My name’s Lillie,” she said to me. “What’s yours?”
Surely this was not a woman of easy virtue—she couldn’t be older than me—but she was bold, I’d concede to that. “Abel Dandy, miss,” I said, and rose awkwardly to my feet. A twinge in my hip made me grimace.
“Oh, and he is dandy, isn’t he?” said the blond girl.
“Hush,” said Lillie, but she burst into laughter nevertheless.
“Are you a little stiff?” asked Lillie.
The blonde choked back a snort.
“Do you need to be … rubbed with liniment?” asked Lillie in a breathy way that suggested slippery caresses of the one muscle that hadn’t throbbed until now.
I wasn’t used to girls that forward. I didn’t know how I should act. I would have liked to be saucy in return, but words abandoned me. I stood there like a codfish out of water.
“Cat’s got his tongue,” said the blonde.
“Has it?” said Lillie huskily, drawing closer. “Let’s see.” She reached out a finger and grazed my lips, and my knees went weak.
“Lillie! Agatha! Leave that boy alone, you trollops,” said Mrs. Delaney, entering the room. “Save that for the paying guests. Off with you, Abel.”
I left on unsteady legs, and I don’t think I took a breath again until I reached the kitchen, where I was brought down to earth with a jolt right beside Apollo, cleaning chamber pots with carbolic soap.
“I don’t like working,” complained Apollo.
I had to agree with him in this instance.
Right before supper, when I was in the middle of filling the bedroom pitchers with fresh water, a maid called me to the kitchen door.
“I came to check on you, as I said I would,” said Mr. Northstar. “Do you think this situation will suit you?”
“Yes, sir,” I replied. “The staff are pleasant, and the work is tolerable.” I didn’t mention that cheeky red-haired girl I wished to see again.
“Well, keep in mind what your dear mother would want for you,” he said.
I hoped I didn’t blush. “Did you find any news of your boy in town?” I asked as I walked him down to his cart.
“I read an advertisement in the paper for a show of oddities in a town north of here, so that’s where I’m headed. Damn these unnatural exhibitions.”
Mr. Northstar had been nothing but generous, but his words bothered me. In the everyday world my parents would have been confined to the home at best, living on the charity of their parents, having none of the rewards of a normal life, never meeting each other, and seeing only those who either pitied or scorned them. “Even oddities deserve to make a living,” I said.
“And to live a normal
life,” he agreed. “But more than one person has offered to buy my son, as if he were chattel. My family had to struggle for their freedom; I’m not about to sell my son back into slavery.”
“No, sir,” I said. His point was clear.
“I’ll come back to see how you fare,” he said. “I’ll be on my way home if I find my son, and retracing my steps to pick up another trail if I don’t. Say good-bye to young Apollo for me, and be sure to cherish and protect him. Don’t let him fall into evil hands.”
“Yes, sir,” I answered, and held out my hand. “I wish you luck.”
He took my offered hand and shook it solemnly. “And luck to you also.”
At dusk I lit the kerosene lamps. As I worked my way down the corridor from the entry hall and through the parlor, women rustled downstairs in cheap finery that, like stage costumes, owed its elegance to the concealing magic of artful lighting. They talked in hushed, excited tones like ingenues before the performance. In the parlor the dark, flocked wallpaper and the heavy, ornate furniture took on richer tones in the lamplight, and the aspidistras formed an impenetrable jungle between the overstuffed sofas. As the women took pains to arrange themselves around the room, someone tugged on the doorbell pull.
“Showtime,” Lillie trilled, and giggled as she left to answer the ring.
This was a different show than I knew. Part of me wanted to see it, but the stronger part hastened me away. I felt dead on my feet, and I knew Apollo must be too, but I needn’t have worried about putting him to bed; he lay curled up on his cot, fast asleep already, in his clothes. I undressed him, covered him up, and then retired myself to a strange bed in a room more larder than bedchamber, where the ghost of bacon lingered in the air. The sheets were rough and reeked of disinfectant, and the straw mattress crunched as I tossed and turned my aching bones despite fatigue, while unfamiliar voices burbled in the distance.
What if someone tried to kidnap Apollo like someone had stolen Mr. Northstar’s son? I had to earn him train fare home. This should be simple, but nothing had gone right lately, and I had already led him to employment in a house of ill repute. What else could happen?