Angels Watching Over Me (Shenandoah Sisters Book #1) (12 page)

It was comforting to hear the sound of another person sleeping nearby, even someone so needy and helpless. I wasn’t a girl spooked by every hoot of an owl. But I still felt a heap better hearing another person across the room. If we were the only two people left in the whole world—which was another scary thought I tried to push out of my brain—at least I wasn’t completely alone.

I drifted off again and woke up just as the sun was coming up. She was still sound asleep.

I got up quietly and crept out of the room and downstairs. First thing I had to do was go outside and find the necessary. On my way back, I fetched a bucket of water from the well. I didn’t know yet that there was a pump inside the kitchen. I’d never even imagined such a contraption. As I carried the bucket inside, I started wondering what to do next.

I had a drink myself and a piece of the bread, which was getting pretty stale by this time. Then I looked around the messy kitchen. I figured the first thing I ought to do was try to clean it up some before the girl got up.

That’s when I discovered the water pump and sink. I tried it, pumping a few times till the water started coming out. I just stood staring in amazement. Then I started tidying up the place. I washed the blood as best I could off the floor. I didn’t want her to have to see it again. In the other room, where the edge of the rug was all stained from where her papa fell, I just rolled it up. But there was no rug in the kitchen, so I scrubbed the wood floor, though I couldn’t get near all the bloodstains out.

I picked up the chairs and started straightening things and cleaning and putting stuff away, or at least setting them on counters or shelves and the table. I found a broom and swept up broken dishes and glass, scooped it up, and put it in a pile outside. When I had the place halfway tidy, I took some time to look around and see what I could see.

It was a pretty big kitchen, with a pantry and larder next to it. There seemed to be plenty of staples—bins of flour, oatmeal, rice, and cornmeal, different kinds of beans, cheeses hanging in the larder. I’d never been inside the kitchen of a rich white man’s house, and it sure looked like the girl wouldn’t starve anytime soon.

Then I remembered the cows. I heard them starting their hollering to let somebody know their bags were full again.

I went out to the barn, and that’s when I realized I was going to have to figure out something to do with all that milk. The buckets from the night before were still sitting there full, with the milk likely getting ready to sour if something wasn’t done, and one of them had been knocked over—from a raccoon getting in, from the looks of it.

Right then the cows needed milking, so I just poured the old milk out on the ground outside and started milking them again. As soon as I was done, I let them out to the pasture. The milking didn’t take so long this time since they weren’t so full as last night. I came back to the kitchen with a bucket of fresh milk. At least we could drink some of it.

By the time the girl came down the stairs, I had a fire in the kitchen stove going. I looked over and there she was standing, staring at me.

I saw from the look on her face that she was going through the same struggle I had the morning before— thinking it must have all been a dream. And now she’d come down to find her dream looking at her from the stove where her mama should have been instead.

I saw those big blue eyes fill with tears. I don’t reckon I’ve ever seen such a wretched, forlorn look in my life. Her hair was still uncombed, and the pink dress she’d put on the day before was full of wrinkles from sleeping in it.

That sight of me caused her whole world—the one that a night’s sleep had put back together in her brain—to crumble. If there’s any way the second day could be worse than the first, it’s from having the reality of the nightmare plunge its knife into your heart all over again. And then it’s worse, because you know
for
sure
that it’s just as bad as you thought. Whatever tiny bit of hope you were clinging to suddenly vanishes in thin air.

So as I said, the sight of me in her mama’s kitchen stuck the knife of reality right smack into her heart again.

I walked over to her and once more put my arms around her. She broke down and sobbed like a baby. I don’t know what she felt having a rough colored hand in her nice yellow hair, but she didn’t seem to mind. I felt like I was comforting one of my little baby sisters. I held her and stroked her hair till I could tell she’d calmed down some.

I stepped back and did my best to smile.

‘‘Sit down,’’ I said, leading her over to the table. ‘‘I got a fire going. I’ll fix you some eggs.’’

She obeyed and did what I said.

‘‘Later I’ll bake you some fresh bread or maybe some corn cakes,’’ I said. ‘‘Here—have a glass of milk while you’re waiting. Then we can go out and gather the mornin’s eggs . . . and yesterday’s too, I reckon.’’

She looked up at me and nodded dumbly, then took the glass of milk from my hand and slowly drank a few sips.

‘‘How’d you like a bath after your breakfast?’’ I asked.

She just kept staring straight ahead.

‘‘I’ll boil up lots of warm water. A body feels better after a bath.’’ I was trying to make conversation so she’d get a grip on reality, bad as it was.

‘‘What’s your name?’’ I asked.

‘‘Kathleen,’’ she mumbled in a voice so low I could barely make out the word.

‘‘That what folks call you?’’

She nodded.

‘‘Anything else?’’

‘‘Katie.’’

‘‘Katie what?’’

‘‘Clairborne.’’

‘‘Mine’s Mary Ann,’’ I said. ‘‘Mary Ann Jukes. Folks call me Mayme.’’ I pronounced it
Mame
like my family always had.

If that’s how we were finally introduced, there wasn’t much to it. Katie didn’t actually seem to be paying attention. I could hardly blame her. By now I think I was feeling sorrier for her than for me. I was pretty used to being a big sister.

Katie picked at one egg and a little bit of the leftover bread. It was probably enough, along with the milk, to keep her going for a while.

Me—I ate two fried eggs with some bacon I found, a piece of bread with a hunk of cheese on it and two glasses of milk. In spite of being skinny I knew how to eat. That’s one thing my mama always said about me.

I was glad to find that at least my appetite was back. I was going to need all the strength I could find for whatever lay ahead.

M
OVIN’
O
N
16

I
HELPED KATIE WITH A BATH AND DID MY BEST to wash her hair, let it dry, and fix it nice. It felt funny after never feeling any but colored hair in my life. Hers was long and soft and light and moved around easy in my hands like I imagined silk would feel, though I’d never seen or felt silk either. But I didn’t say anything to Katie about what I was thinking. I just tried to fix it how I’d seen white girls wear their hair.

A person always feels fresher after a bath and clean clothes. I think Katie did too, though she still hadn’t smiled. Not that I expected her to. Who’d be able to smile after what she’d been through? But I was trying to get her to feel better and start thinking for herself before I had to leave.

While she was finishing up and getting dressed, I told her that I was going out to finish the burying and to stay inside till I was done. Then I went out and got back to work on the graves. My arms were plumb wore out from yesterday, but the holes had to be deeper and I knew I had to finish it today.

I spent the whole morning at it and was dog tired when I was through. But finally I got each body in the ground maybe about three feet, which I figured was enough, and covered with dirt.

When I was done I stood there and said the Lord’s Prayer over them. Seemed like something that ought to be done. Then I took a deep breath and said, ‘‘God, take care of ’em.’’

Then I found myself a wooden tub and washed myself real good.

I knew I couldn’t stay much longer. This was a white man’s plantation, and a colored girl like me had no call to be sleeping here and eating their food and all. I figured Katie must have other kin that’d come for her by and by. When that time came, the best place for me to be was good and gone, else they’d likely think I had something to do with the tragedy. So I was thinking it was about time for me to be heading on. But I wanted to do what I could, with Katie so helpless, to get her through the first few days till whoever it was came for her.

The rest of that day I tried to clean up the main floor of the house as best I could, with her making stabs at trying to help. By that second night it was mostly put back together, though I couldn’t do anything about the broken windows. I also made a batch of bread to make sure Katie’d have enough to eat for a while after I left.

She lingered nearby as I worked, pitching in sometimes or just watching. I had to get her to help lift the dish cabinet and some bookshelves because they were too heavy for me to lift all by myself. She wasn’t too strong, but we managed to get them back upright. Most of the glassware was broken. The few things that weren’t, I put away again.

Then there were the books. There were more books in that house than I’d ever imagined could be anywhere. How could one family have so many books? I thought it would be awfully nice to be smart enough to read books like these.

As I started putting them back on the shelves, I just stuck them in any which way. Katie, who’d been watching me absently, now came over and started rearranging them, turning some of them over and taking some out and putting them somewhere else, and collecting different ones together with others. She seemed to know where every single one had been before. Sometimes she’d stop and look at one of them a few seconds, maybe turning over a few pages and looking inside. I could tell she loved them.

‘‘You can read these?’’ I asked as I picked up another pile from the floor and brought them over to the shelf.

‘‘Some of them’’ was all she said. She was holding one with a few pictures in it, and now walked over and sat down on one of the chairs and started reading it. I kept taking the ones from the floor and stacking them on the shelves. I thought anything to distract her mind for a spell was a good thing, and I was glad she’d found a book she liked.

For the rest of the day Katie helped me and read, took a couple of naps, and cried a few times. When we were cleaning up and she picked up her broken violin, the tears poured down her cheeks. I could tell it was really special to her, and we didn’t throw it away like the broken dishes.

Every once in a while Katie would disappear for an hour or so. Then suddenly I’d see her a little ways off staring at me again. I didn’t quite know what to make of it. She didn’t say a word unless I asked her a question.

One thing I started to be curious about was the Clairbornes’ slaves. Why hadn’t anybody come around—white
or
colored? That’s when I realized their slaves must have been killed too. And were those two women I’d buried the day before the only house slaves? I thought maybe I ought to have another look around. I didn’t want poor Katie stumbling over any more dead bodies.

But I didn’t find anyone in the main house or anyplace nearby. And I didn’t feel too inclined to wander off and look for the Clairbornes’ colored quarters. I knew if anybody found me doing what I was doing, I’d be in so much trouble I didn’t even want to think about it.

When night came I helped Katie into bed and slept on her floor again.

The next morning I got up, made a fire, milked the cows, and got things as ready for Katie as I could. She came downstairs, looking a little like she was starting to get used to the notion of what things were like. I fixed us breakfast and ate as much as I could myself, since I figured it’d have to last me a good spell.

I didn’t have anything to pack since I’d come with nothing, but I did stick one of the loaves of bread I’d made under my arm. Then I turned to Katie, who was sitting at the kitchen table.

‘‘Well,’’ I said, ‘‘I reckon you’ll be okay now, Miss Katie. You got bread and plenty of food to last you. Just make sure you keep the cows milked so they don’t dry up.’’

‘‘I can’t milk a cow,’’ she said, just staring at me.

‘‘I reckon you’ll have to learn, then,’’ I said. ‘‘ ’Cause it’s time for me to be saying good-bye.’’

She looked at me with a confused expression. Then it slowly changed to horror. Her eyes got wide like she’d heard the most awful thing in the world.

‘‘Why . . .
why
are you saying good-bye?’’ she whispered, then a little sob followed.

‘‘I gotta go,’’ I said.

‘‘Go,’’
she repeated, as if the idea hadn’t ever occurred to her. ‘‘Why . . . go where?’’

‘‘I don’t know. Just go.’’

‘‘But . . . you can’t . . .
leave
!’’ she said.

All at once something dawned on me I hadn’t thought of before. She probably figured all this time that I was one of the Clairborne slaves.

‘‘I ain’t one of your daddy’s coloreds, Miss Katie,’’ I said.

‘‘Why are you here, then?’’ she asked.

‘‘ ’Cause my family got killed too.’’

‘‘Oh,’’ she said. ‘‘But . . . but you can’t . . .’’