Blessing (14 page)

Blessing wondered at this request but rose obediently to accompany her. Halfway to the gate that led outside the large garden, Ducky halted. She leaned close and said just above a whisper, “As soon as that girl is well enough to travel, you need to get her out of the city. Her pimp is a mean one, and I think he’s killed girls that don’t obey him. And he never gives up a girl he wants to keep. Everybody knows about this place. He’ll come after her.”

The words, spoken urgently, chilled Blessing. “I will.”

“Good.” Ducky hurried toward the gate. She opened it and turned back. “But you didn’t hear it from me, right?”

“Right,” Blessing agreed, following her.

Ducky impulsively grabbed Blessing’s hand and kissed it. “Thank you for taking in my Danny.” As if embarrassed by her own action, the woman rushed away, the gate flapping shut behind her.

After latching the gate, Blessing stood still, her hands pressed against the wooden slats as she prayed for Ducky—not only about her life but her soul. Then the need to take action to protect Rebecca asserted itself.

Blessing had to come up with some plan of escape for the girl. For now, she might need to hire a strong young man from Joanna’s church to sleep in the carriage house with the driver. No man would try to break into the orphanage in daylight, but nighttime was a different matter. Satan did not give up his prey easily.

SEPTEMBER 22, 1848

Blessing paused inside her front door, pulling on her gloves as she prepared to leave. She had come to a decision about Rebecca and was taking action. She only hoped her plan would succeed in protecting the girl and providing her with a chance to change her life.

She turned to her housekeeper, Salina. “I’ll probably stay the night. Or even another day after that. So don’t worry about me.”

“I never do,” Salina said. “If I did, I’d have to quit. You always goin’ to the docks at all hours—”

“Salina,” Blessing cautioned.

“Yes, ma’am,” Salina said sharply, almost saluting.

“When thee accepted the position—”

Salina stopped her with laughter. “We are a pair for sure. Don’t
you
worry—”

Both of them were interrupted by the tapping of the brass knocker.

Salina moved forward to answer the summons yet only opened the door halfway, shielding Blessing from view. “Mr. Ramsay, good morning, sir.”

“I know it’s early, but I heard Mrs. Brightman was leaving town this morning and I wanted to catch her before she left.”

Salina looked to Blessing, who came forward.

“Is thee keeping track of my movements, Gerard Ramsay?” she asked in a withering tone.

“When I need to.” The man smirked at her and held out an envelope. “I’ve come to invite you to join me and
Stoddard and your friend Miss Foster in attending a play at the seminary.”

“A play? At the seminary?” He’d certainly broached the unexpected.

Ramsay chuckled. “A bit unusual for such an institution, I confess, but it isn’t a professional production. No paid actors. Or actresses. The students themselves have decided to perform one of Shakespeare’s plays—
Hamlet
, to be specific—and have persuaded the seminary faculty that it is a worthy project. There will be only one performance, and I’ve already obtained four tickets.” He waved them at her again. “Will you accept the final one?”

Blessing stared at him and the ticket he offered. He must know that Quakers and a number of other Christians didn’t attend the theater because of the vagabond and loose lifestyle of many actors and actresses. While married to Richard, Blessing had gone to a few plays performed by traveling troupes, and she had enjoyed them. But she had returned to the meeting now. “Thee knows I cannot.”

He tilted his head. “A lady who goes to the wharf most every night can’t attend a cultural event at a seminary?”

When he put it like that, her resolve was hard to defend. Yes, she did go places that most Christian women would never frequent. But it wasn’t as if she ventured onto the wharf for her own entertainment. The elders at her meeting had approved her work, though they did not like it much.

“I will leave the ticket with you,” he said, laying it on the foyer table and replacing his hat on his head. “And will visit you again after you have taken time to consider my invitation.” Then he bowed and left, whistling.

Blessing and Salina exchanged glances.

“That man up to something,” Salina muttered.

“Yes, he is—all the time.” Blessing tied her bonnet ribbons and walked outside, where her gig awaited. She must be off while the sun was still ascending. Rebecca already sat in the vehicle, looking fearful. Blessing patted her hand and smiled reassuringly, praying that this carriage would take the girl to safety.

Blessing and Rebecca sat side by side in the gig as they threaded through the outskirts of the city. The cooler autumn weather was pleasant, so Blessing had chosen this open vehicle for the trip. The highest leaves of a few maple boughs were tinged with scarlet. Once the women were outside the city, aptly nicknamed Porkopolis, Blessing breathed in the sweet fresh air.

The girl beside her was still painfully thin, but her color had returned and the bleeding had stopped. Today, with Rebecca dressed in new clothing and a wide-brimmed bonnet, Blessing doubted anyone would have recognized her. She had told Rebecca little about the reason for this trip, but the girl appeared to trust her—or perhaps she was simply desperate enough to follow her lead.

As they neared Sharpesburg, however, Blessing decided it was time to explain her plan. “Rebecca, I am taking thee to visit my family.”

The girl looked sideways at her but said nothing.

Blessing read the uncertainty and the fear that always lurked in Rebecca’s eyes. “I want to warn thee before we
arrive that my family may appear a bit different from most. My father became deaf as a child, and my adopted cousin, Caleb, is also deaf. So my family members all speak with their hands in a sign language.”

“None of them talk?” the girl blurted out.

“They speak in words and sign at the same time—” Blessing demonstrated by signing what she was saying—“so that my father and cousin can understand what is being said. It puts some people off, so I hope thee will be kind.”

Rebecca looked concerned. “I never been around deaf people before.”

“My parents are unusual in another way too. Most others judge people based on their pasts, but my parents don’t judge. Thee will be welcomed by them as an honored guest.” She waited, giving the girl time to absorb this.

“Will they know what I’ve been?” she asked in a little voice.

“They may guess, but they will not comment on it or make inquiries. Thee isn’t the first girl I’ve brought to them.”

“Why do I need to be brought to them?”

“I don’t think thee wants to go back to the docks, and thee can’t stay forever at the orphanage without being found out. We must begin the process of helping thee find a better, secure way of life far from there.”

The girl laughed mirthlessly. “I’m a fallen woman. Nobody wants me but . . . customers.”

“Rebecca, all have sinned. I know society says that girls who have been prostitutes can never be forgiven or reclaimed. But I reject that, and so do my parents. They have helped two other girls in thy situation find respectable husbands.”
Blessing didn’t mention that a third girl, given the same chance, had never made it to Sharpesburg. Addicted to alcohol and laudanum, she’d run away from the orphanage and back down the bluff to the quay. But Blessing was confident Rebecca would not follow that path—in any case, as confident as possible under the circumstances.

Rebecca said nothing but did not look convinced.

Two deer emerged from the woods and stared at the gig, negotiating the rough road.

Blessing patted her companion’s hand. “We need not look too far ahead. For now, thee will take refuge with my family. Thee will be safe there.”

Rebecca shivered. “I don’t know why you’re doin’ all this for me. I’m nothing.”

The desolate phrase pinched Blessing’s heart. She squeezed Rebecca’s hand. “Thee has never been nothing. God loves thee, and he gives us new beginnings by his grace. Thee didn’t choose the life thee lived, did thee?”

Rebecca replied with a sound of derision.

Blessing decided enough had been said.

Before long they arrived at Cathwell’s Glassworks. As she glimpsed home, Blessing’s heart lifted. Over the years, her parents’ two-room cabin had grown to four rooms. And the nearby cabin where Joanna’s parents lived had also doubled in size since she was a child. Before the gig arrived at the door, her mother had already come out and was waving in welcome.

“Mother!” Blessing waved back. Soon she was surrounded by her younger sisters. Then her father, Samuel; her brother, John; and her cousin, Caleb, all streamed out from the large glass workshop.

As always, coming home felt bittersweet, reminding Blessing of her marriage and how it had separated her from these dear ones for nearly six years. Amid the hubbub of greetings, Rebecca hung back beside the gig.

“And who is this?” Honor, Blessing’s mother, finally asked with a smile.

Blessing introduced Rebecca and let her mother take over the hospitality. A look passed between Blessing and her mother, and she knew that Rebecca would be invited to stay. She could always count on her mother.

After all, Honor had never given up on her when she’d chosen to marry Richard and forsaken the meeting. And when Blessing had returned as the prodigal daughter, she’d been welcomed not with recriminations but with grateful tears and the fatted calf too. Not for the first time, she silently thanked God for the family she had been born to.

After dark, when everyone else had turned in for the night, Blessing and her mother sat beside the low fire. Blessing had trouble believing at times like this that she had ever been tempted to turn away from her family. She’d been barely eighteen when she married Richard, yet youth explained only part of her reason for rebelling.

She’d mistaken the plainness of being a Quaker for hypocrisy and lifelessness. And as Joanna had said, Richard had laid siege to her, and before she knew it, she’d stepped away from family and faith.

Reunification with her family had brought with it the gift of conversations with her mother, a gift she no longer
took for granted. Now she longed to discuss several people with Honor. Rebecca, of course, who was sharing a room with Blessing’s two younger sisters; as well as Tippy . . . and perhaps Gerard Ramsay.

“I take it Rebecca was engaged in prostitution,” Honor began.

“Yes. She just miscarried her first child.”

Honor let out a sigh of weariness. “The poor girl. We’ll do what we can for her. But she’s still so young. And I think that children who have been perverted have a harder time breaking free. Their scars run deeper.”

Blessing let a glance reply for her and gazed into the scant flames, gathering her words. Ramsay pushed to the forefront of her concerns. “Mother, I need thy advice on something that has come up—or, I should say, on a man who has intruded into my life.”

“A man? Intruded?”

“Yes. He’s from Boston, a wastrel from all I’ve seen. I keep bumping into him at the docks. He’s the cousin of the man who is courting Tippy Foster.”