Broken Ground (33 page)

And now we hear footsteps, running fast, running toward us. From the light, quick patter, I'm thinking a child will open the door. And a child does. There is the silver cross, and here is Daniel, in my arms.

DANIEL LEADS THOMAS
and me past rows of desks to the back of the building, where Silvia lies on blankets on the floor. She holds a bundle in her arms. Ragged pieces of cotton hide what's inside. Luis kneels beside her. At the sound of us approaching, they look up, their expressions soft and open with wonder. Silvia gently tips the bundle toward us to reveal a pink-faced baby with a thatch of curly black hair, sleeping soundly, thick lashes fanning over smooth cheeks. As she sleeps, her rosebud of a mouth puckers, the sweet sucking motion of a baby trusting she'll be fed.

“A girl,” Luis says.

I kneel down beside them. Cupping my hand gently over the baby's warm head, I thank God she's made it this far and pray for her journey to come.

“We named her Milagros,” Silvia murmurs. “The name of the grandmother who first wrote the black book—at least, that's what my mama told me.” Silvia kisses her daughter's forehead. “And we named her Milagros because she herself is a miracle.”

It proves as Thomas thought: Ezra learned of the raid and was waiting with his friend—a white man, a lawyer—as Luis and Silvia climbed out of the paddy wagon. One look at Silvia, and Ezra's friend threatened the police officers present with legal action. “Unless you take her and her husband and son to a safe place for the baby's delivery,” the lawyer said. The officers agreed, but only after he'd confiscated all of Silvia, Luis, and Daniel's belongings, as well as their legal documents—even Daniel's citizenship papers are now in official hands. Silvia's contractions were fierce by the time Ezra ushered them into the car waiting outside, and soon after they arrived here, Milagros was born. The ease of Silvia's labor shocked everyone. But Silvia thinks it makes perfect sense. “This baby has wanted out for months. She's longed for this world,” Silvia says. “And now here she is, a citizen of this country.”

Ezra has joined us by now. I recognize him as one of the men who intended to help Thomas and me remove belongings from the ditchbank camp in San Jose, but who watched it all burn instead. “The authorities will be checking in tomorrow,” he says. “With how they've been acting lately, I wouldn't be surprised if they come tonight. You know what could happen then.”

Luis shrugs, lifting his empty hands, palms up.
What can we do?

“We can get you out of here, take you somewhere else,” Thomas says firmly. “You might not be deported. Daniel's a citizen, and Milagros, and you have your papers.”

Silvia looks at Luis, and he nods in confirmation.

“We've talked about it, Luis, Daniel, and me,” she says. “We will go back. No more of this. We're fighting for something we'll never win. Steady work. A future here.” She kisses her daughter. “At least we've given her citizenship. So one day she may return. Who knows?
She
may have a future here, if she wants that.”

“Maybe we'll be citizens here together, Milagros and me.” Daniel kneels down beside Silvia and tentatively touches the baby's tiny hand.

“Wherever you go, may we come visit you someday?” Thomas asks.

“
Juntos?
” Luis knows more English than he lets on.

I turn to Thomas, and he regards me, the question in his eyes. I nod in confirmation. “Together.”

“
Claro
.” Luis nods. “
Este es verdad
.” Certainly. This is true—the truth as it should be, I think he means. Thomas and I, together.

But still, I think, this is not the ending anyone wanted. This is not a fairy-tale ending at all.

THOMAS AND I
drive back to Puebla, where we buy food for five for a few days, as well as clothes and blankets for Milagros. We spend the night with Silvia, Luis, and the children.
Their
children—not only Milagros but Daniel, too. At least for a while. They'll look for Daniel's people when they get to Mexico, Silvia tells me. They'll do all they can to find his family. And if they don't, Daniel will always have a home with them.

We are sitting side by side on the blankets, she and I, with Milagros sleeping soundly in her arms. Ezra, Luis, Daniel, and Thomas are all outside, finishing the last of the coffee and cleaning up the remains of the supper—canned beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, and bread. For the first time in a long time, Silvia and I are alone, but for Milagros, and for the first time in a longer time still, Silvia seems truly at ease, her expression untroubled, free of fear and pain. Of course, she is exhausted; her head droops forward occasionally as she nods toward sleep. But each time she straightens up with a jerk and blinks the drowsiness from her eyes. When I suggest that she rest, promising that I'll stay by her side and keep watch over the baby, she shakes her head. “Soon,” she says. “But not yet. Who knows when we'll see each other again?”

So we sit quietly together, watching Milagros breathe. The rise and fall of her chest, the flicker of her eyes beneath their closed lids, the slight movement of her fingers or parting of her lips—these things absorb all our attention. In this way, time seems to both stop and expand, until a question comes to me, a question I have to ask Silvia before we say goodbye.

“Why did you take me in when Thomas brought me to your door that night?” I speak in a whisper; still Silvia inclines her body away from me, protecting the baby's sleep. I hesitate then, but she nods for me to continue, so I try to speak more softly still. “Given who I am and who you are, why didn't you ask any questions?”

It has struck me only lately, considering what we've faced, considering what she will continue to face—her immediate acceptance of me, along with Luis's. She opened the door to their home that night, and I followed Thomas inside, stumbling in weariness, woozy from the blow to my head, all but lost in the black fog of a sadness that humbles me now, since I've seen what people like Silvia, Luis, and Daniel endure. How was she able to prepare a place for me—a cot behind curtains—how was she able to share the little food she had, nurse me back to health, teach me her language, push me out the door at night so that we could each patch together some semblance of our individual hopes and desires? If it hadn't been for Silvia, what would I have done? I would have been without a meaningful occupation, as she and Luis are now without meaningful occupation. I would have been without a home, as they are now without a home. I would have been a stranger in this place, as they are now considered strangers. I would have been wandering, as they soon will be. I would have sunk further into bitterness and despair.

Silvia studies her daughter for a moment, as if the answers to my questions might be revealed in her perfect being. Then she looks up at me and smiles, and her smile is sad.

“Two things are both true, Ruth,” she says. “We are entirely different. We are not so different. I choose to put my faith in the last.”

THE NEXT DAY
the police officers come. They want to take Silvia, Luis, and the children back to the station in the squad car, but after much persuasion on Thomas's part, they agree that they can ride with us in the truck. “We'll be on your tail,” an officer warns. “So don't even think about trying to lose us.” We don't think about it—not when Silvia, Luis, and Daniel have made their mutual decision so clearly known. Thomas, Luis, and Daniel climb into the back of the truck, I drive, and Silvia, holding Milagros, sits beside me. Silvia is still weak, and before I know it, the bouncy ride has made both her and Milagros drowsy. She lies down, the baby tucked safely between her body and the seat back. Soon they are asleep. So it's a quiet trip to Puebla—a quiet trip that goes too fast.

“All the others have already been deported,” an officer at the police station tells us as he gives Luis, Silvia, and Daniel their legal documents. “You'll have to depart from Los Angeles, the central train station. There's a train leaving tonight. You need to be on it.” When Thomas and I offer to drive them to the station, the officer snorts with laughter. “Not half likely.
We'll
be the ones driving them this time.
You'll
be the ones following.”

Thomas and I don't say much as, following the squad car, we make the trip into the heart of Los Angeles. He looks as I feel: tired and very sad. We arrive at the station only minutes before the train is set to depart. We collect the things we hope are most important to Daniel, Luis, and Silvia—clothes and other possessions, necessary and important. I make sure to collect the suitcase that holds Silvia's black book, though of course the plants and herbs she so carefully tended will now be lost to her forever. Carrying all that we can, we hurry through the waiting area, locate the correct platform, and find our friends there, under the careful watch of two officers. They stand before an open boxcar crowded with people who are making the same journey.
El regreso
.

“A boxcar?” I say, my throat tight.

“Here.” Silvia ignores my concern, gently laying Milagros in my arms. “I want you to be the first besides her papa and me to hold her.”

The baby gives a mew and looks up at me with wide black eyes. She blinks, studying me. A wise sage, that's how she seems to me. Perhaps she will be a healer, too, like her mother. I bow my head close to hers. “You're a miracle. Never forget that. You can be anything you want.”

The conductor blows his whistle, and Luis takes Milagros from my arms. There is an emptiness where her small, warm body was. I turn to Silvia, and we hold each other, and for a moment, at least, that emptiness evaporates.

“
Mi amiga
,” I say.

“My friend,” she says.

Thomas helps them lift their suitcases into the boxcar. There's one additional bag that contains food and baby things. But then there is nothing more. Everything else they have to leave behind, strapped to the truck's bed. I hug Luis, and then I wrap my arms around Daniel.

“Thank you,” he says, touching his silver cross.

I can't find the words to thank him. I kiss his dark hair instead.

They climb into the crowded boxcar now, this little family, our friends.

For as long as we're able, Thomas and I wait on the platform where we can see them. But soon the train is too crowded to catch even a glimpse of Luis's white shirt, Silvia's yellow dress, Daniel's silver cross, Milagros's curly hair. Still, we wait while the train huffs to life. We wait while it thunders away. We wait, the two of us alone on the platform, while it shrinks to a pinpoint and vanishes altogether. Only then do we leave the station.

In silence, we return to the truck and their things piled high in the bed. All that Thomas owns is tucked away in there somewhere, too—the picture of Lupe and other mementos he has yet to show me—along with what I've held on to from one place to the next and have yet to show him. My wedding dress and veil, the pictures of Charlie and me, the quilt he and I shared, a Bible and a collection of fairy tales, a few clothes, a pocketbook that holds a check, a little money, and a wedding ring, and school supplies that will have no use now if something isn't done. We look at these things, so many of which are not ours. To me, they feel a heavy load to bear.

“What now?” Thomas asks.

I don't know the answer. Unlike our friends, we can go most any place we want without fear. We are what many call “Americans,” at the expense of so many others who are called otherwise. Just look at the world around us, palm trees, and fruit trees, and flowers. A Golden Land, tarnished for me now. Look at it long enough and the black fog will soon cover it all.

Go
. Again, the voice, the one I can't ignore.
Go
.

Where? To another college or another job, courtesy of the WPA? To Helen, or Alice and Talmadge, or Mother and Daddy, or Miss Berger? East, or still farther west, so that I may dip my feet once more in the ocean?

Someday, maybe, to all of that. But not now.

Go
.

I turn to Thomas. “There are people who try to help, you said.”

He cocks his head, confused.

“People who try to return what's been lost or left behind.”

“The ones who drive to Mexico, you mean, like Ezra.”

I nod. “Like Ezra.”

“Yes, there are those who do that. That's what we hoped to do with the cedar chest at the ditchbank camp. But it was too late.”

I look at the truck again, the things piled there. “It's not too late now. Not yet.”

“Ruth,” Thomas says, and then he is quiet. But his eyes are bright with understanding.

I get in the truck and settle myself behind the steering wheel. Thomas climbs in beside me, props his crutches between us.

“It's not going to be easy,” he says.

“Far easier for us than for Silvia, Luis, and the children.”

“We don't know where we're going.”

“We'll go back to the train station, and ask where they were bound.” I shrug. “Then we'll get a map—and there will be people to ask.”

“We might not find them.”

“But we can try. We have that privilege, and with it comes a certain responsibility, don't you think? And if we don't find them, say we don't find them . . . maybe there will be a school that needs supplies.”

His eyes brighten with understanding. “You're sure.”

I turn the key. The truck rattles to life. “Let's go.”

W
hen I started researching
Broken Ground
, I had no idea that I would end up writing about the deportations without due process of untold numbers of people of Mexican heritage, many of them U.S. citizens. In fact, I knew nothing about the involuntary “repatriations” of the 1930s. I started out writing a story about a young woman who, after experiencing devastating loss, makes a journey west to pursue an education. In fact, I wanted to write a novel based on my mother's experience—an experience that has always inspired me, though she never had the chance to speak of it to me herself.