Maude Brown's Baby (8 page)

“Oh?” The
spoon wavered.

“And a letter written by a doctor on duty that day. He wrote to let hi
s wife know he had survived, and he told her about me. She kept the letter and eventually traced my name to the DePelchin Home in Houston. She wanted me to have it.”

Clara leaned forward, elbows on the table, one hand lightly touching her throat.

“The doctor’s name was Lealand. He was on duty at the hospital,” Donald repeated. “Charles Lealand?” he asked hopefully.

She
echoed the name. “Lealand. No, I don’t know that name. But my mother could have. She worked at Sealy from 1900 until last year.”

Clara refilled their cups,
squeezed a few drops of lemon into her tea and glanced at Donald. His face seemed relaxed, even serene. She had heard of children who lost parents in the storm. An orphanage. What could life be like, without a family, and not even knowing who they were?

“We always had clean clothes and plenty to
eat,” Donald said.

Clara started, as if he had been reading her thoughts.

Donald noticed and smiled. His face relaxed. It was easy to talk about the children’s home; the storm was another matter.

“The staff was kind,” he continued, “but with so many children to care for, we had to stay on schedule. We rarely did anything out of the ordinary.”

“Did you attend school? From your speech, it sounds as if you did.”

“Thank you, Miss Barnes. Yes, we all went to school. The matrons were quite strict about that. I didn’t do well at first because of my eyes, but then one of the wealthy patrons
from the women's guild noticed and made sure I got my first pair of glasses.”

“How kind. Who was she?”

“Nina Carhart. Perhaps you’ve heard of her?”

“No.”

“She’s often in the society pages, but she prefers to be known for her charity work. After her husband died in 1910, she devoted herself to various causes.”

“Did you ever see her again, after she provided your glasses?”

“Oh yes! You might say she became my mentor, even after I went to live with the Stokes. We still talk about books and art, and we share an interest in photography.”

“That’s delightful, but strange.”

“What?”

“For a society woman to be a photographer.”

“I never thought of that as strange. Photography seems the most natural thing in the world to me. Mrs. Carhart is a brilliant woman with many interests.”

Clara eased her chair from the ta
ble and crossed to the cupboard, returning with the cookie jar. “Have another, Mr. Brown?”

He looked down. The one
on his plate had disappeared.

“Thank you. That would be great.”
             

“How long did you live at the orphanage?”

“Until 1912, when I was taken in by Clarence and Naomi Stokes.” Donald scooped up the last crumbs from his plate. He smiled at Clara. “I want to be on my own soon, but haven’t decided just how.”

“Are you a professional photographer?”

Donald paused. This was new, a young woman interested in what he had to say.

“Not yet. I repair cameras and build tripods for some of the newsmen, and I take pictures for myself. Jake help
ed me find a job at the
Chronicle
. I’ll probably take it.”

“You don’t sound happy.”

“About the job? No. It’s a good one; that’s not what I mean. The trouble is that I think it would be grand to be free.”

“Free? How so, Mr. Brown?”

“If you work for someone, others tell you what to do and when to come and go. If I’m a newspaper photographer, my editor will tell me what to photograph.”

“Still, it sounds like interesting work. Everyone has a boss.”

“I’d rather be the one deciding what to shoot.”

“Shoot?”

“I’m sorry. Jake says that. I mean, what to photograph.”

Clara laughed, leaned back in her chair, closed one eye and made a pistol of her hand. She pointed it about the kitchen
. “Shoot is a good word for it. I can see why you say that. Are you shooting tomorrow?”

“Jake’s here working on a story about the new extension of the seawall.”

“Oh yes, so you said. And you’re inquiring about Mr. Sparks.”

“Yes, he and Jake are good friends.”

The mantle clock in the parlor chimed four sets, then ten single tones in a row.

“
Goodness, ten o’clock already. It seemed much earlier. “Am I keeping you up, Miss Barnes?”

“Not at all
. There’s another cookie here with your name on it.”

Donald reddened
but grinned as he reached for the jar. “They’re delicious! Did you make them yourself?”

“Of course. The nuts came from a tree Mama and I planted after the house was raised to its present grade. The tree is only now beginning to bear pecans. The first of them dropped a few days ago
, and I found them before the squirrels did.”

Donald was distracted. When Clara’s li
ps smiled, her eyes smiled too. Suddenly he remembered the large book in the carriage house.

“
Are you a nurse?”

“Yes. Well, a nurse in training. It takes time to become certified. My
classes resume next week at Sealy. They’re hard, and sometimes I wonder if I can keep up.”

Clara looked
across at Donald. He nodded in return.

“I love the work,” she continued. “I just hope I can equal my mother’s skill. My father taught at the medical school and they met one day when he lectured to her class. Mama earned her certification, but didn’t work while Papa was alive. Everyone was needed after the storm, so she vol
unteered. Nursing soon became her full-time job.”

From the kitchen, Donald noticed a small lamp shining
at the far end of the parlor. “I’m sure,” he said slowly, “your parents would be proud of you.”

“Thank you.” Clara follow
ed his gaze, then remembered the photograph he had mentioned earlier.

“Your baby picture. Did your mother leave it with the nurse at the hospital?”

“I don’t know if the woman who left me was my mother, but yes, the photograph was tucked in my blanket.”

Clara sensed that Donald
had more to say. She fixed her eyes on the table top and chose her words carefully.

“The picture surely means a great deal to you, Mr. Brown. As a photographer, I suppose you’ve spent hours studying every detail.”

“It looks like someone’s home,” he said abruptly.

“Excuse me
?”

“I mean, it’s not a typical portra
it from a professional studio. It was taken in an ordinary room.”

Clara leaned forward, but continued to gaze at the table while Donald described the print.

“My hand is resting on the arm of a chair. I’m dressed in a baby’s white smock, with embroidery on the front. There’s a door and striped wallpaper in the background, and books or boxes are leaning against one wall
…”

“Ah!” Clara gripped
the table’s edge with both hands.

“What's the matter?”

“That image—a baby in a chair—sounds familiar. I may have seen it before.”

“What! Where?”

“After the storm, Mama saved photographs that she and others found in the debris.”

“Why would
…” Clara raised her hand to stop him.

“My mother was a nurse, s
o at first light, the morning after the storm, she left me and my brother with our aunt and made her way to the hospital. One poor man she met was clutching a photograph and sobbing. He told Mama it was all he had left of his family. Mama never forgot.”

“But you said she collected photographs?”

“Yes. She was walking home that first day, picking her way through the wreckage, when she found a photograph. It was damaged, but not so much that you couldn’t see who was in the picture. She remembered the desperate man she’d met in the hospital and brought the photo home.”

“Did she recognize anyone in it?”

“I don’t think so, but from then on, she watched for pictures. As soon as Mama’s friends heard what she was doing, they brought more. Mama numbered each one and wrote down where it was found, who gave it to her and when. She did her best to preserve them, drying the paper prints and cleaning off the mud. I remember seeing batches of them here on this table, spread on dish towels to dry.”

“Was your mother able to identify the people?”

“Only a few. And sometimes strangers who learned about her collection would come here. If they recognized a family member and asked for the picture, Mama always gave it to them.”

“But she kept the rest?”

“Yes, wait here.” Clara hurried upstairs. When she returned, she found Donald pacing the kitchen.

“Here,” she said, setting a handsome cherry wood case on the table.

“Wow! My pa—I mean Clarence—would be impressed with the craftsmanship.” Donald ran his hand over the lid. The box had recessed hinges and handles made of polished brass. The wood reflected the kitchen’s electric lights. “Look,” he said, “these joints fit so perfectly that you can hardly see the seam.”

“Father Shannon made it,” Clara said, resting he
r hand on the top. “He wanted something to honor all the people he’d lost in his parish.”

Clara stood to Donald’s right, facing the
box. She released a small latch and lifted the lid, which opened silently until it came to rest on two brass supports. Inside were a mix of vertical compartments and trays for different sizes of prints. Clara removed a book from the top tray, opened to the first page, placed her finger along the edge and began reading aloud.

Dear Reader:

September eighth, 1900 began a night of terror from which those of us who survived shall never fully recover. For some of the dead, these few photographs are the only proof they ever lived. Please guard them with all of the loving care they deserve.
— Martha Barnes, January 10, 1901

“The only proof,” Donald repeated, lightly touching his head.

“Mama made a lot of entries in the first three months,” Clara said. “After that, most of the photographs she found were too badly damaged to save.”

“Yes, the paper would have deteriorated quickly after it got wet, or the sun would have faded the image.”

She handed the journal to Donald. The second page began a sequence of numbered entries. Each was the same: first an image number, then the date and place where it was found, along with the name of the person who
found it. Following that, a paragraph—sometimes as much as a page—told anything more that was known about the people in the picture. The last entry, number 324, was made on June 23, 1901.

Clara stood over the box. Two trays were on the table, and she was leafing through a collection of cards in the third tray when she pulled one out.

“Ah, here,” she said, examining the card closely.

For a moment, Donald couldn’t breathe. On the b
ack he saw the familiar inscription:
b. January 1, 1900
.

“P
lease,” he said.

Clara handed him the photograph
. He stared at the date a moment more, then turned the card over in his hands.

Clara lowered herself into the ch
air beside him.

“Is this the picture you described?”

“Yes,” he whispered, “that’s me.”

Thirty seconds passed with only the sound of the clock ticking in the parlor. Clara leaned gently toward Donald, waiting.

“So, there were at least two copies,” he said, finally looking up and tapping the print against the fingers of one hand. “The card I have in Houston has
writing on the front. Other than the number your mother added, this one is blank.”

Clara pulled away, amazed to see Donald remove his glasses and study the print like a jeweler inspecting a diamond ring.

“Then what …” Clara struggled to regain her composure. “What does it mean, the fact that there’s a second photograph?”

“I’m not sure. I need more,” Donald said, looking with unfocused eyes toward the far wall. “A name, an address; anything would help.”

“Do you think your parents took the picture of you? Your father might have written your birth date on the back. Your mother could have written ‘Maude Brown’s baby’ on the front.”

Donald turned to face Clara. “If my parents did make this photograph, it means
that they probably took more—lots more. Whoever made this image used good equipment and knew how to handle the light. They may have had a darkroom to process the negatives and make prints. In 1900, the negative for a print this size would have been glass.”