A Family Apart (2 page)

“Never mind,” Grandma said. “I’ve read these stories over and over, and I’ll be glad to tell them to you. Let’s find a comfortable place on the screened porch where the breeze will cool us, and I’ll tell you about Frances Mary Kelly, your own great-great-great-grandmother.”

Jennifer and Jeff followed their grandmother to the
shaded, breezy room with the wide-open windows. Jeff plopped on the floor, and Jennifer—remembering the graceful girl in the photograph!—sank slowly into a plump-cushioned wicker chair.

“Even this journal has a story in itself,” Grandma said, “so I’ll read some of Frances Mary’s own words.”

Early this morning, as the sun rose on the anniversary of my birthdate, my dearest love gifted me with two silver-edged combs and this book, bound in blue.

He gently took the hairbrush from my hand and wound my dark hair around his fingers. “The combs are to capture this silken hair of yours, Frances Mary,” he said, “and the journal is to capture all the stories you carry in your heart.”

“But I’ve told you the stories,” I said.

“You’ve told me, yes. But there will be others who will want to hear them.”

I held the book on my lap, sliding the tips of my fingers over its soft, smooth cover. “I’m not sure where to begin.”

“Begin with your family,” he said “Begin when you were very young in New York. Begin with your own story.”

F
RANCES
M
ARY
K
ELLY
ran into the cobbled street, carefully dodging between two polished and shining hansom cabs. Hurry! She had to hurry. Mr. Lomax, who managed the office building where Frances and Ma worked as scrubwomen, had given her an errand and told her to run. Usually he didn’t complain; but the last time, after he’d sent her to pick up a package, he had grumbled that she had dawdled and had docked ten cents from her weekly pay. She was terrified that he’d do it again. The family needed every penny.

Late September’s warm weather had been swept away by a sudden chill wind from the north. Frances tightly clutched her thin, black shawl in one hand and the envelope Mr. Lomax had given her in the other. She darted forward across Fifth Avenue just as the huge, rumbling, iron-rimmed wheel of a cab dropped into a rut in the street in front of her, drenching the skirt of her faded
brown dress and her bare feet with cold, muddy water. She jumped backward, crying out.

“Watch where you’re goin’!” The driver leaned from his high perch at the back of the cab, yelling and brandishing his whip.

Shivering, her wet legs aching from the cold, Frances scrambled onto the sidewalk. Two more blocks to go. Fighting back tears, she ran down the sidewalk, ducking in and out among the pedestrians, until she came to her destination, a dark brick building with ornate cornices over the doors and windows. Frances shoved open the heavy paneled door and, after checking the names on the inner doors, found the right one and knocked.

“Come in,” a deep voice called.

She pushed open the door and peered into a large, cluttered room. One wall was lined with bookshelves that were filled with dusty books bound in red, brown, and black leather. Frances gasped to see them all. Oh! If only she had so many books to read!

“What do you want?”

She whirled to face a bald, round gentleman who sat in a tall chair behind a desk that needed a good cleaning. An inkstand balanced precariously on top of a stack of scattered papers; and a greasy china plate, which held a dried crust of bread and a scattering of cheese crumbs, topped a stack of long, green, leather-bound books. Frances closed her eyes, inhaling the cheese’s pungent odor. She’d had potatoes, cabbage, and the sausage her brother Mike had brought home at noon, but her stomach rumbled hungrily. There wasn’t ever quite enough food to stop that.

The carpet was warm, and she curled and uncurled her bare toes against it. Ma was putting aside as much as she could to buy shoes for everyone for the winter, but
the cold had come early this year, and there wasn’t enough money for shoes yet.

“Speak up!” the man ordered.

Frances’s eyes flew open in fright. What would happen to her job if the gentleman told Mr. Lomax that he’d been obliged to speak to her twice? “I’m sorry, sir. Are you Mr. Waterfield?”

“Of course I am,” he muttered. “What business do you have with me?”

Resentful that she had no choice but to be polite to this horrible, greasy-lipped person, she thrust the envelope toward him, and he half rose from his chair to snatch it. His vest strained to stay fastened over his stomach, and one of the buttons had popped.

To keep herself from staring, Frances looked down at the floor. A crumpled newspaper lay near her toes. She picked it up and skimmed the headlines: “Discussion of treaty with China” … “
Lady Elgin
Sunk!!! 400 Lives Lost!!!” … “From Missouri: Mr. S. Harbaugh, Lexington newspaper publisher, was run out of town by fifteen proslavery men and his printing office destroyed.”

An advertisement offered, “
The Life of Abraham Lincoln
by an Illinois Republican who knows well the man and his history … a compact pamphlet … 4 cents a copy … address the
Tribune
, Tribune Building, New York.” Abraham Lincoln was running for president of the United States, and the voting would be the next month. Da had admired the man and had told her about him. How she would love to read that pamphlet!

Frances blurted out, “Sir, if you no longer want this newspaper, may I have it?”

Mr. Waterfield raised his head from the letter he was reading and scowled at her. “That newspaper is of no use to me, but just what do you think you’d do with it?”

Frances stood as tall and straight as she could. Stupid man! What did he think she would do? “I would read it,” she said firmly.

He laughed loudly, then jeered, “Read it? Ha! As if you urchins could read! Toss it over there—in that basket.” He reached for the inkwell and soon was penning an answer to Mr. Lomax’s letter.

I hate you!
Frances thought as she followed his orders.
You’re a fat, horrible bully! Who are you to decide whether I can or can’t read? You don’t know me!
She clenched her fists, wishing she could speak the words aloud.

She still treasured the memory of when she was a very little girl and Da had held her on his lap, the newspaper before them.

“What’s this word?” she’d asked, pointing. “And this one?” she’d insist as soon as he answered. “And this one?”

“Ah, Frances Mary,” Da had said one day, “I think you’re after learnin’ to read.”

She had nodded vigorously. “Teach me to read, Da,” she had begged, so he did. She loved to read and was proud of her reading because it was pleasing to Da.

Since they were unable to afford the clothes or books that sending the little ones to school demanded, Frances had tried to pass on her father’s teaching to the others. Mike had learned eagerly, gulping in words as hungrily as he gulped in food at supper. Danny had learned, too, following Mike’s example; but after a few mistakes, Megan had hung back, unsure of herself, and could read very little.

Mr. Waterfield suddenly stood up, breaking into Frances’s thoughts. He tucked his sheet of paper into an envelope and held it out. “Get this answer to Mr. Lomax right away,” he snapped. “And no dawdling!”

“Yes, sir,” Frances said. Still furious, she took the envelope, threw open the door, and ran down the hallway to the street. She walked briskly, this time able to notice the people around her. There were gentlemen dressed in ankle-length topcoats that swung around their legs as they walked. Many of them wore top hats and carried canes, some with heads of polished silver. The women wore long coats or capes that covered their full skirts almost to the hems. Most wore gloves, but a few had tucked their hands inside fur muffs. Tilted over their foreheads were hats, decorated with silk flowers and tied under their chins with matching ribbons.

A woman brushed past her, sweeping her skirts out of the way. Her snug-waisted, bottle-green coat was fastened by a row of jet-black buttons that winked and sparkled as they caught the light.
Wouldn’t Ma, with her red hair, look grand in a coat like that!
thought Frances. In her mind, she could see her mother, tall and elegant, with the skirt of her coat swirling regally around her legs as she walked. Frances ached as she thought of Ma’s patched and faded clothes and shabby shawl. She wished with all her heart that she could buy a bottle-green coat for her mother, but she knew that a coat like that would cost much more than all the money she made in a month.

Near the intersection of Fifth and Broadway, Frances nearly bumped into a girl of her own size who was looking into a shop window. The girl wore a flared, pale blue velvet coat and matching bonnet, and her hands were tucked into a white fur muff.

“Look, Mama,” the girl said to the woman who stood next to her. “Look at the doll in the pink dress.”

Frances looked, too, at a doll with a creamy china face and blue glass eyes, dressed in a pink silk dress
made with dozens of tiny tucks and pleats and trimmed with ribbon rosettes. Frances gasped aloud. “Oh! The wonder of her!”

The girl in blue glanced at Frances and smiled. For an instant they shared the same delight in the elegant doll. But the woman turned toward Frances with a look of horror and disgust. She tugged at the girl’s hand, yanking her away. She whispered to the girl, but Frances could catch some of the words: “… do not talk to one of
those
children.”

Frances turned away from them, burning with humiliation. She stared with frustration at her own reflection in the window, seeing what the woman had seen: a barefoot girl with tattered, mud-splattered clothing.
It’s not fair
, Frances cried to herself. She rested her forehead against the cold glass, embarrassment erupting into hot tears that ran down her cheeks. She hated being so poor. It wasn’t her fault.

A rough hand gripped her shoulder and spun her around. A policeman demanded, “What mischief might you be up to?”

Frances stiffened with fear. “No mischief,” she managed to stammer.

His voice softened as he saw her tears. “Then be along with you, girl! Go about your business! Don’t dawdle here with your betters where you don’t belong.”

Frances turned and broke into a run. Why should she be treated as though she had done something wrong? Wasn’t she allowed even to stop and rest? Her betters? Just because they wore nicer clothes? “It’s not fair!” she sobbed aloud.

“Look where you’re going!” a top-hatted gentleman barked at her.

She stumbled against the cane he thrust out, then
angrily turned and grabbed it from his hand, tossing it to the ground.

“How dare you—you!” he sputtered, but Frances ran on.

Heedlessly she dashed across streets, ignoring the clang of wagon and cab wheels against the cobblestones and the angry shouts of drivers. She darted through clusters of peddlers and shoppers as she hurried back to her job. Her chest hurt, and her stomach churned with shame and anger. All she wanted was to be with her mother. Ma, with her smiles and loving words, would make everything right again.

By the time she reached Mr. Lomax’s office, Frances was out of breath, but calmer. She delivered Mr. Waterfield’s reply, then hurried from Mr. Lomax’s office, thankful that he had made no mention of docking her wages again.

She hurried to find her mother. She knew that Ma would be already hard at work rubbing the brass on the ornate staircase that rose from the lobby to the second story of the office building on Twenty-third Street. The narrow, two-story building was not as elegant on the outside as those in Mr. Waterfield’s neighborhood; but its sweeping, curved marble staircase and brass-trimmed, teakwood balusters and balustrade made up for it.

Ma swept some flyaway strands of hair from her eyes, looked up, and smiled at Frances, then blinked with surprise. “Frances Mary, it’s wet and cold you are!”

Frances crouched beside her mother, who wrapped her arms around her daughter, briskly rubbing her back and shoulders. “A cab wheel hit a puddle,” Frances said. “No harm. The running kept me warm.”

“Better now?” Ma leaned back and smiled.

“Much,” Frances said. There wasn’t time to tell her mother how much warmer she felt just being near her, so she reached to squeeze Ma’s strong, firm hands.

Frances thought again about the beautiful green coat, and she clutched her mother’s hands more tightly. Ma would be the first to say she would have no need for a fancy coat like that, but Frances knew that what Ma needed and what she deserved to have were not the same. Then the memory of the girl in the pale blue coat and the words her mother had whispered sprang unbidden to Frances’s mind.

Ma looked at Frances intently. “What is it, love?” she asked. “You look troubled. Is there something you’d like to tell me?”

Frances tried to smile as she quickly shook her head. She wouldn’t want her mother to share the hurt and shame she’d felt. “No, Ma, nothing,” she answered.

Behind Frances a voice spit out words as though they had a bad taste. It wasn’t difficult to recognize fat Mrs. Watts. “Ah, Mrs. Kelly, your girl has finally returned. Well, if she soon gets busy it will make the work load a little lighter for the rest of us.”