The House on Malcolm Street Read online

  “I can’t imagine why you’d need to know.”

  “Maybe I don’t.” He shrugged. “But it does pay to be considerate to your pack mule. A little conversation on the way to a destination never hurt anyone.”

  Something about his tone rubbed me the wrong way, and I wished I could yank my bags out of his hands and make him disappear. “I did not ask you to carry my things, Mr. Walsh! I would never call anyone a pack mule. And I see no reason for personal conversation with a stranger, as I have already told you.”

  “Whatever you say. Can’t make a lady converse, I guess. Won’t hurt to try, though. Pleasant train trip?”

  I ignored his question. The sooner we got to the boardinghouse and were rid of him, the better. I hoped he didn’t ask payment for carrying our things. I had nothing to give him.

  Eliza stumbled on a rock, and I reached quickly to keep her from falling. “Do you want me to carry you, sweetie?”

  “No, Mommy, I can make it just fine.” She held my hand and looked all around us, taking in what she could as Mr. Walsh glanced back at us again and turned a corner.

  “The stars are pretty,” she observed. “Aren’t you glad it isn’t raining?”

  “Yes. Very glad.”

  Four blocks, he’d said. Surely we were almost there. Eliza was thoroughly awake now, kicking at the occasional rock in front of her toe. Then as I tried to hurry her along, she began skipping.

  “Do you think Aunt Marigold’s gone to bed already?” she suddenly asked. “I hope not. It’s a lovely night and I want to meet her.”

  Mr. Walsh stopped in his tracks and turned to look at us.

  “We’re right behind you, sir.” I tried to sound pleasant. “I can carry the bags the rest of the way if you’d like to go on to your home. Thank you again – ”

  “I’ll be finishing what I started, if you please, ma’am.” He took a few steps and then stopped again. “Marigold McSweeney is your aunt?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He shook his head. “I didn’t think there could be more than one Marigold in a town this size. Least not without me hearing about it.”

  I wondered if he thought everyone’s business was his own. Why would it matter who my relatives were? But he wasn’t done with the questions.

  “Is she kin on your father’s side or your mother’s?” he asked on.

  “My husband’s,” I said tersely, hoping he’d decide to drop the subject.

  He looked Eliza and me both over a little more thoroughly. “All right,” he said almost absently. And then he took such a big breath that I could see his shoulders rise. “Any notion how long you may choose to stay in our fair village?”

  Once again, his prying fed my ire. “Mr. Walsh, I have no intention – ”

  “Of telling your business to strangers. Right.” He turned and started walking again, faster. If we’d had a long way to go, he surely would have left us far behind this time, even with Ellie’s determined skipping. But in the next block of houses, he suddenly stopped.

  “There she is.” He pointed to an old two-story home, large but not particularly extraordinary. “Marigold McSweeney’s boardinghouse.”

  I expected him to set my bags on the walkway, but he didn’t. What would I tell him if he expected payment? I couldn’t ask Aunt Marigold for money first thing. It was enough to expect her to provide us a bed.

  Eliza had stopped just to stare at the house, but I hurried her along, glad to be done with our walk.

  “Thank you very much,” I told Mr. Walsh. “I’ll gladly take my bags so you may go – ”

  He didn’t seem to hear me, just marched right on toward the house with my luggage still in hand. We had to hurry to keep up until finally he stopped at the front door.

  “Thank you so much,” I said again. “You may set my things here on the porch, sir, and be on your way – ”

  Once again, he ignored me, stunning me this time with seemingly overwhelming audacity. With one of my bags in hand and the other slung over his shoulder, he turned the knob, flung the door wide, and tromped right into the house.

  Eliza moved to follow, but I held her back and stood on the porch, uncertain. Mr. Walsh dropped my bags recklessly at the base of a curved stairway and turned to motion us in. “Don’t worry,” he said in answer to my silence. “I live here. Aunt Mari!” he called toward the back of the house. “You’ve got guests!”

  Aunt Mari? I was struck speechless. Did he mean Marigold? Was this – this – gentleman a relative of my husband? My John had never mentioned his name. I was absolutely certain.

  “You might as well come in,” he said. “Aunt Mari’ll probably be a minute. She doesn’t move very fast right now.”

  I stood still, not quite able to do as he said or find the words to explain why not. Eliza looked at me, expecting some kind of response. When I gave none, she broke the silence.

  “Mommy? Do we live here now?”

  “We’re just visiting for a while,” I answered, afraid to voice more than that in front of this man. It should have occurred to me that Marigold might have boarders, even several boarders, including male ones. But I hadn’t given it much thought, and I’d never considered the possibility that she might have other relatives staying with her. She hadn’t mentioned it. And I wasn’t sure how it might affect the situation for us here. I looked past Mr. Walsh into the house, hoping to see Aunt Marigold approaching us, but there was no sign of anyone.

  He seemed amused by my discomfort. “I suppose you think I should’ve told you we were going to the same place.”

  I could readily agree with that. “Someone so quick to inquire of other people’s business should certainly be willing to disclose their own.”

  He smiled. “You didn’t ask. But I gave you my name anyway. And yours is . . . ?”

  “Breckenridge,” I told him, feeling a pinch of nerves in the pit of my stomach. “Leah and Eliza.”

  He nodded. “John’s wife.” It wasn’t a question, just a statement of what must have been obvious. I almost asked if he were a cousin to my husband, but a shuffling sound drew my attention and then the door behind him swung open. A short, white-haired lady in a fluffy apron ambled in, limping in such a manner that I could not determine which leg she might be favoring.

  “My – you must be here off the train – so late at night with a young’un.” She stepped closer and eyed me carefully.

  “It’s Leah Breckenridge,” Mr. Walsh told her solemnly.

  “Leah? Oh my stars! I might have guessed.”

  “Where do you want me to put their bags?” he asked just as soberly, the attempts at levity in his previous conversation somehow gone. Now he seemed pensive, anxious to be away from us. I wasn’t sure if it might be because of his aunt’s presence or because he knew for certain now who we were.

  Aunt Marigold gave me a hug I didn’t expect and then squeezed Eliza just as much. “Oh, my dears! Did you have a good trip? Are you hungry? I wish I’d known you’d be here tonight. I’d have had some scones all baked and ready.”

  Scones? I’d never in my life even seen any.

  “Take their things to the master room, Josiah,” she quickly directed. “Best place to put the two of them together.”

  I wasn’t sure what the “master room” was, but it didn’t seem quite right for us to be placed there. “Oh, I don’t want to put anyone out,” I ventured. “Any room will do, and I am so grateful that you’ll have us.”

  “Not to worry, dear,” Aunt Marigold told me. “Used to be my room, but I haven’t slept upstairs in months. Can’t take all those steps the way I used to.”

  Josiah went straight up the stairs with my luggage, but she called to him quickly. “Come on down and join us for a bite to eat once you get their things up there.”

  He shook his head. “I believe I’ll just go on to bed.”

  “Nonsense. You’re always hungry when you get home. Don’t be playin’ shy now. I know better.”

  He disappeared, and she shook her he
ad. “Never mind him,” she whispered conspiratorially. “He can be quite the character sometimes, but God love him, he’s a real good boy.”

  Josiah Walsh must have been nearly thirty years old. To hear her call him a boy was a bit unusual. But she looked ancient. I wasn’t really sure how old. John had never told me.

  She took my arm and started back in the direction she’d come from. Eliza stayed at my side, watching her every move.

  “Now, tell me, dearie,” Marigold asked as we went through the doorway and into a generous dining room. “How have you been? God love you, what a rough go of it! How’d it come about for you to be gracing me today? I got your letter and I wasn’t sure when to expect you, but I’m sure glad you’ve come.”

  She talked a mile a minute, but her steps were so slow and careful I thought surely her hand on my arm was more to steady herself than to lead me anywhere. I decided to make what I hoped would be considered a polite inquiry. “Have you been well?”

  “Oh yes. No complaint ’cept the rheumatiz that just gets worse and worse. You know how that is.” She stopped and smiled. “No, I suppose you probably don’t, young as you are. And you’re a beauty too. John never told me he’d married up with someone so pretty.”

  I’d never thought of myself as pretty. As far as I was concerned, my nose was too big, my hair too unmanageably curly, and my figure more like a stick than anything to be noted with admiration. No one but John had ever countered my opinion, and I’d concluded that that was just John. Outspoken and generous with his praise, sometimes to a fault.

  “You know,” Marigold talked on, “I wanted to come over for your wedding, but dear Petunia was ailing so poorly with the dysentery that I didn’t want to leave her. Expecting her eighth child too. A miracle we didn’t lose them both.”

  “I remember that. John’s aunt Daisy was beside herself with worry for both of you.”

  She shook her head. “I told and told that Daisy. I was far too stubborn to take the dysentery or anything else off of Petunia! She needn’t have worried on my account.” She turned her eyes quickly to me. “But tell me, dear, how have you been making it? God love you, I cried over your last letter. All you’ve been through! Are you fully recovered? Are you and your little Rose both well?”

  I wasn’t sure what to think of her calling Eliza by her middle name. Or her talkativeness when I was little more than a stranger, relative or not. “We’re well,” I answered simply. “I’m so sorry to surprise you like this. I would have written again and told you for certain when we’d be arriving, but . . . but our departure was so sudden that there wouldn’t have been time for the letter to get here.”

  Barely seeming to hear me, she ushered us through the dining room and into a small kitchen with bright yellow walls and fringed curtains. “Do you have plans? Have you just come to visit? Or can you stay a spell? Have you worked out what’s next? Poor dear, you’ve hardly had time to get your feet under you again.”

  I don’t know what I expected from her. She had every right to ask. But I was tired from the trip and my two nearly sleepless nights. I didn’t want to talk. Not yet.

  Eliza was not so minded. “We come to see you ’cause you was nice enough to invite,” she announced. “We don’t know yet where we’re gonna live after this.”

  “Dear child,” Marigold said with a sigh. “You’re welcome to stay as long as you need to. I’m pleased to have you.”

  I felt I needed to tell her something our letters hadn’t addressed. “I – I’m afraid I can’t pay. Not yet, at least.”

  Marigold waved her hand and dismissed the notion. “I’ll not be asking for pay. Just a hand with things now and again. Josiah, though, that’s different. He’s got a good job with the railroad. A man can afford to pay a mite for his board. It’s only right.”

  I almost protested that if one relative were paying, it wouldn’t be proper for me not to. But I decided instead to take a more realistic approach. “I don’t want to just lend a hand now and again, Aunt Marigold. As long as I’m here I want to work daily at whatever it is you need done. I can see that you need the help.”

  “That’s not the reason I asked you,” she said, her eyes filling with tears. “I know how hard it can be after – after you lose a husband, to make ends meet on your own. I wanted to help.”

  I wished she hadn’t gotten teary. Now there was no way I could hold back. I didn’t want to cry in front of her, but it was just no use.

  She hugged me again. She didn’t say anything at all this time, only led me to a chair and held her arm around me the whole time. When I saw her reach her other hand to Ellie, I knew I’d made the right decision to come here, at least for a little while. For a safe and accepting shelter where I could take the time to think things through and decide what to do next. “Thank you,” I managed to tell her again.

  “Don’t even think of it. I’m glad I’ve got the room. Though I’d have squeezed you in sideways if need be.”

  “I still mean to help you all I can.”

  “I’ll let you, I suppose. Eventually,” she agreed. “Especially upstairs. I haven’t gotten up there to clean in an unspeakably long time. Ashamed to have you see it.”

  I heard a sound behind us and turned just enough to know that Mr. Walsh had come in. I looked away quickly, toward the window above Aunt Marigold’s sink, hoping to clear my eyes and regain my composure.

  “Josiah says he’s been helping me,” Marigold said with a wink in her nephew’s direction, “but I haven’t been able to get up there to inspect. Who really knows the shape those rooms are in by now? It’s no wonder my other boarders moved out.”

  “They both took jobs away from here,” he answered her quickly. “Don’t blame me.”

  Marigold left my side and hobbled over to start water heating in the large teapot on the stove. “Don’t just stand there,” she admonished her nephew. “Grab the teacups and the sugar for me. Would everyone like a slice of soda bread with some ground-cherry preserves? I’ve got chicken and dumplings too, if you want something more substantial.”

  “Oh,” Ellie said quickly. “Lovely!”

  She’d been so patient. Aunt Marigold had no idea. Eliza looked at me with her eyes aglow. “Oh, Mommy, doesn’t that sound really good?”

  My face grew hot and I hoped they wouldn’t realize that my poor child was half-starved for want of a decent supper. “Yes. It sounds delicious.”

  If Marigold realized, she didn’t let on. “Well, I do love guests with hearty appetites. Help me, Josiah. Bring the pot from the icebox and cut the bread for me.”

  I watched as they worked together, the short squat old lady, and the tall, well-muscled man. I tried to discern some family resemblance, but neither of them looked a thing like my John at all. I knew Marigold was John’s mother’s much-older sister. But I had no idea where Josiah fit into the picture. Another sister’s son, most likely, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask.

  His presence was my only uncertainty about staying here. I knew I’d not be comfortable with a man about. Even bearing no resemblance, he would still be a reminder of John, and it was difficult to watch him working beside his aunt already. But besides that, his manner toward me on the way here was a concern. I’d always been wary of men. It had taken John a long time to win my confidence. How could I be sure this man could be trusted, a relative or not? He was bold to do a kindness, admittedly. But bold nonetheless.

  Aunt Marigold served the best chicken and dumplings I’d ever eaten. With homemade bread, preserves, and a cup of tea on the side. Eliza ate hungrily, and I admonished her to be careful of her manners.

  Aunt Marigold didn’t think I needed to worry about it. “It’s just a late snack after traveling,” she said with a smile for Ellie. “There’ll be time for being ladylike another day.”

  Josiah ate a remarkable amount amazingly quickly despite his earlier hesitation. But then he tried to excuse himself.

  “Wait just a minute,” Marigold told him. “You know I can’t
show these ladies to their rooms the way my knees have been lately. You’ll have to do it for me, as soon as they’re ready. And please make sure there’s plenty of water, clean soap, and fresh towels at the washstand too. Be extra nice and I’ll have a pie made before you’re home for supper tomorrow.”

  She smiled and turned to me, not giving him a chance to respond. “Wasn’t it just the blessing of God to put you all at the depot at the same time? Most days Josiah’s on a different train and you’d have missed him altogether. The good Lord must have seen fit for you to have an escort right to our door. I don’t believe in any such thing as luck. Nor coincidence. Must all have been divinely arranged, no doubt about it.”

  Her words stirred a bitter response in my heart. Divinely arranged? Why should God care if I met anyone to carry my baggage? He hadn’t cared about my far greater needs. John should be here enjoying dumplings with his aunt. And I should have a babe in my arms.

  Mr. Walsh didn’t seem to appreciate her comment any more than I did. He stood with a frown and began clearing the table though Eliza wasn’t finished yet. I couldn’t eat anymore. What appetite I’d had disappeared quickly as Ellie excitedly related the story of the orange and her prayer on the train. What I’d wanted to remain hidden was now fully in the open. I sat like a stone as Aunt Marigold exclaimed with joy over Ellie’s tale of provision. Only once did my eyes stray unintentionally to meet Mr. Walsh’s, and he looked away. No doubt he thought us little more than beggars who’d come to cadge what we could off his aged, rheumatic aunt. No wonder he looked so solemn.

  Soon enough, Aunt Mari hugged and kissed Eliza and we followed Mr. Walsh up the stairs to our room. He said nothing at all, nor did I, but Ellie was humming all the way. We’d been given a large room, a most generous room, with lace curtains and a full brass bed. I was too tired to care that there was dust on the dressing table and the crystal lamp. I only wanted to sleep and put the day behind me.

  Apparently in this house, running water extended only to the lower floor. Josiah filled a bowl at the washstand with the pitcher he’d carried from downstairs. He opened a drawer and pulled out a cake of soap. I thanked him, but he simply set the pitcher down and walked away as if he didn’t hear me. Eliza was still humming as he stepped out into the hallway and shut the door behind him.