Finding Grace: A Novel (8 page)

She had just picked up her basket of beans
when her mother called to her from the back porch.

"Gracie Ellen, come on in here!”

There was something unsettling in her
mother's tone. When Grace slowly made her way to the kitchen, she
realized then what that strange tone was for. Mr. Langdon sat at
one end of the table, his face and clothes still dusted with black
soot. Mrs. Langdon sat down beside him, and from the look on her
mother's face, Grace realized that something was not right. They
had plotted something for her…she just knew they had…and she was
almost afraid to hear them speak. He pulled out a chair, pointing
her to it.

"Sit down Gracie.”

She did, but was prepared in an instant to
jump up if need be, the fight or flight response throbbing strong
in her veins. Her father stood over her, scowling.

"You're the only girl. So by God, we’re
going to do what we have to do for you. We ain’t gonna be around
forever, and we've got to be sure you’re tended to."

He paused, looking at Rachel, who had her
eyes fixed on the table before her. Both avoided their daughter's
eyes. And at last he came to his point.

"I've talked to Charlie, and I told him
you'd marry him."

Without thought she bolted up, fear driving
her.

“
No I won’t! I won’t marry
that man!”

Her arm was suddenly snatched in a vise-like
grip. Her father pushed his face up close to hers, his eyes black
with rage.

"What did you just say to me?"

She cried out again. "I said no!" Madness
had gripped her, splintering open a shell of submission. Even as
her father took her other arm, pinning her painfully with both his
hands, she did not relent. Something within her had been released,
and it made her wild. "I won’t be bullied into anything!"

Her father’s face twisted with anger.

“
You’ll do whatever the hell
I tell you to!”

She felt herself being shaken like a
ragdoll…but she heard her own voice, screaming like one
possessed.

"No I won’t!"

A violent backhand to the cheek knocked her
down to the floor…and for several moments she lay there, stunned by
the blow. She had never been hit in the face in her life. She’d
been switched on the back, and on the legs, but she’d never been
struck in the face. The shock of it made her ears ring. Her eye
felt like it might burst from pain, and for many moments she
remained on the floor, paralyzed.

But a rebellion started to rise inside of
her, and the voice of her literary mentor came to her, wise and
powerful.

…
I was conscious that a
moment's mutiny had already rendered me liable to strange
penalties, and like any other rebel slave, I felt resolved to go
all lengths...

Her mother had come to her side, trying in a
useless way to comfort her. But suddenly she pushed those hands
away and ran, dashing into her room and slamming the door behind
her as hard as she could. She knew it would infuriate her father,
but even if it was only for a moment, she felt delightful revenge
in the sound of his fist pounding on the locked door, unable to get
in.

"You open this door or I'll bust it
down!"

The moment of victory had passed. She knew
he meant what he said. When he got past that door, he would drag
her out of the house and switch her to within an inch of her
life.

There was only one thing to do now.

Grabbing up her flour sack, she rushed to
the open window as her father started ramming the door with his
shoulder. She slipped out and hit the ground running, tearing
across the corn patch and down the hill toward the spring. Finding
the spot at the cliff bottom, she dug into the ground like an
animal tearing up earth, and at last found one of the mason jars
filled with money. She muttered to herself as she stuffed the bills
in her pocket.

"God, forgive me for this. Don't condemn me
to an eternity in hell.”

She threw down the jar, rushing up the other
side of the hill away from the spring. Moments later she was in the
woods, running again as fast as her legs could carry her, toward
the distant and lonesome sound of a train's whistle.

* * * * *

She clutched her bag closely. Looking down,
she saw her own hands trembling. It was beyond her control…but she
knew where it came from, without a doubt. The same terror gripped
her senses and made her heart hammer against her ribs. For a
moment, she wondered if she might be insane for doing all of this.
With trembling fingers she reached up and clutched the little
silver cross that hung around her neck, praying.

"Dear Lord, see me through this.”

She jumped when the train whistle suddenly
blew. A moment later the train began to move and she nearly jumped
up, ready to cry out for them to stop and let her out. She could
still go home… there was still a chance to go back and make
everything right. But something kept her from it.

I could not turn, nor
retrace one step. God must have lead me on,
she recited in her head.

From those words, she felt a deep faith and
power that calmed her a bit.

A higher power was leading her, she was
certain of that. How else could she have gotten this far?

She sat back in her seat, watching out the
window as the land swept by, and she realized that with every
passing moment, she was being drawn farther and farther away from
everything she knew in the world. It wasn't long before she knew
that the moment of return had gone by, and it became a matter not
of what she had left behind, but of what was to be found ahead.

When she thought of how she'd gotten here,
on this train, it almost made her laugh. She had stopped in the
woods and thrown on the trousers, tucking the hem of her dress into
the waist. She'd twisted her braid up and tucked it under the hat,
put on the boots, and finally put on the glasses. At the depot she
had been terrified of discovery, but something had moved her
forward anyway, right up to the window where she nervously asked
for a ticket to Chicago. She put her money down on the counter, and
waited with quaking nerves to see what would come about.

And then, it was over and done with.

The agent took her payment, handed her the
ticket, and that was that. He hardly even looked at her, probably
because he was busy talking on the phone. Maybe it was the
distraction, or just pure luck. Whatever the case, there had not
been the slightest of trouble, and now, here she sat.

Strange, how that small part
of her quest had been so quick and easy, when the idea of it had
given her such trouble. She might have thought it over a little
more, but there were other matters on her mind now. Rifling through
her meager possessions, she found one of her books…a copy of
Pride and Prejudice
. She
opened it to the middle, where there rested a small envelope. She
looked at its front and read the address…

Mr. and Mrs. John Langdon
5739 Lincoln Avenue
Lincoln Park, IL

She had no real idea where Lincoln Park was
or just how to get there. She had seen it on a map many times
before. She’d pointed it out to herself, so she knew it was within
the city limits of Chicago. Her imagination had gone wild, thinking
of what it must be like to go there. But now she wondered…how on
earth she was going to find it out there in the real world?

These details were driving her crazy, and
she realized she had two choices. She could either sit there,
continuing with this madness…or she could push the thoughts aside
and think of other thing. She chose the latter of the two.

As she looked out the window, she thought of
Jack and Alice. What would they think when she suddenly showed up
at their front door?

She hadn't written to them. There just
hadn't been time, as fast as all this had happened. When she
suddenly appeared out of the blue, would they welcome her? For a
moment she had her doubts. But then she shook her head at her silly
fears. Jack and Alice had always loved her. They had often invited
her to come and stay with them for the summer, but that had been
impossible. Her folks would never have allowed it, as opposed as
they were to Jack and Alice as a married couple. Besides that, they
wouldn't have let her take a trip anywhere, especially by herself.
And so, she had always written back and politely declined. She
smiled now as she thought of what their faces might look like when
she arrived. Suddenly, a different kind of anxiety came over her.
One of excitement, of hope…and wonder at what the future held in
store.

* * * * *

She was nervous about leaving her seat, for
fear that someone might take it from her. So she sat quietly in her
place all through the afternoon, reading to pass the time. But her
body had its natural requirements, and eventually, they became
quite demanding. She felt like a fool not knowing what to do, but
despite her embarrassment, she forced herself to seek help from the
porter as he passed by. Her voice was small.

"Sir," she said, "Will the train leave
without me if I step outside for a minute?"

He smiled kindly and shook his head. "No
Miss, not if you are quick. You have a few minutes before the next
departure."

She rose and stretched, and with much
caution, she moved to the door and stepped down to the ground. The
porter stepped down a moment later to tend to something, and though
she was ashamed to ask the question in her head, she could not help
herself.

“
Is there a place where I
can go...” She stopped mid-sentence, mortified. “Is there
a..."

She stopped again, and found she couldn't
utter another word. But the gentleman seemed somehow to read her
mind, and he spoke kindly.

"There is a lavatory on the train, Miss.
It's in the last car. You'll see the small door when you get back
there."

Her eyes widened in surprise. She thanked
the man, and went in search of what she called, in her head, an
indoor outhouse. It was little more than a wooden bench with a hole
in the bottom, and it served its purpose. There was even a little
wash stand with soap and a bucket of water to wash her hands. As
primitive as it would have been to some, she was amazed that such a
thing existed. She wondered what happened when the train was
moving, but right away she chastised herself for such a dirty
thought. The train whistle blew, and the cars began moving as she
made her way back to her seat.

As she sat back down, another basic urge
began to rumble through her - in her stomach. She hadn't eaten
anything since noon, for she'd run off before supper, and now her
hunger was quite strong. But what could she do? She'd heard of
dining cars, and she was sure there was one on this train, but she
was completely ignorant of how to get there. Besides, there would
probably be ladies and gentleman travelers there, and they would
not want to see a poor little country girl like her. So she sat in
her seat, the car dim now with the night outside, and only a small
light shining above the doorway. She leaned against the window and
tried to rest, for now she found herself getting sleepy as well as
hungry. She was just about to doze off when the porter came by, and
she jumped nervously when he stopped close to her. She looked up at
him as he reached out to her, handing her a blanket.

"This will keep you warm for the night. And
I thought you might be hungry as well, so I brought you something
from the store room." He handed her an apple, and she smiled
gratefully at him.

"God bless you, sir," she said sweetly.

He nodded and smiled back.

"It's just part of my job, Miss. If you need
anything else, just let me know."

He moved quietly away, leaving her alone,
and after savoring the sweet taste of her little meal, she pulled
the blanket over herself and let the swaying of the train lull her
to sleep.

Chapter 5

“
A
Journey
”

The sun shined against her eyes. She opened
them slowly, blinking against the harsh light of day. Then, looking
out the window, her eyes widened in awe at the new world before
her.

It was the third day of her journey now. So
far, everything she’d seen outside her window had been somewhat
familiar. High rolling green hills, low lying valleys…thick
clusters of dark woods. But this morning brought a very great
change.

She had never seen such flat plains…vast
stretches of land crowded with row upon row of young, bright green
corn stalks and mounds of soybeans. The fields seemed to go on
forever, reaching out toward a vast expanse of blue horizon. The
land was only broken here and there by a bright red barn or a
pretty white farmhouse. She'd never seen such wide open spaces.
Though she had lived her whole life on a farm, this was nothing at
all like the cropland back home.

The porter walked by, bidding her good
morning as he went. He was such a kind man, bringing her fruit to
keep her from going hungry, and inquiring after her to see if she
needed anything. When they’d changed trains the day before, he’d
helped her along, kind gentleman that he was. This morning, she
asked only a question of him.

"Sir, where are we now?"

He smiled politely. "We've just come into
Illinois, Miss. We'll be in Chicago by this afternoon."

Jack had once described all of this to her
in a letter. But until now, she had never been able to quite
picture it. As the hours went by she kept watching through the
window, seeing how things gradually changed from open farmland to
small towns, and then to little villages. There were other changes
around her that she didn't much notice, like the number of
passengers that grew around her with each stop. She was too busy
gazing out the window to pay them much attention. Soon the
buildings began to be closer and closer together, and they began to
rise up in height until some of the structures cast shadows on the
windows, forcing her to crane her neck up so she could see the roof
tops.