Redfield Farm: A Novel of the Underground Railroad (4 page)

Nathaniel sat looking at his plate. At twenty, he had no plans about life. So far he had been well taken care of, first by Mama, then by his sisters. Like Amos, he was not one to initiate change and slow to accept it.

“What kind of building on?” he asked, skeptical.

“Two story—big parlor for family gatherings, two upstairs bedrooms. This old cabin will be the kitchen. The loft rooms could still be used. I might like one of them myself.” Amos had slept in the main room of the cabin all his life. On a rope bed in the corner. “The rest of you can decide who gets what.”

So it was that simple. Prosperity had caught up with the Redfields. Building had to be done in summer, so at the next Meeting it was announced that Amos Redfield was building on, and help was needed when the haying was done.

On July ninth, twenty or so men and boys from the Quaker settlement turned up at Redfield Farm. Amos, Jesse and Nathaniel joined them, and in two days a two story log house was neatly joined to the east end of the old cabin. A week later, a smaller crew came to cover the roof frame with white oak splits.

My sisters and I wore ourselves out cooking and feeding the workers, including, of course, Elias Finley and Will McKitrick. It was a joyous time, full of fun and promise. As I was laying out food on a plank table in the yard, Elias, up on the roof, stopped nailing shingles to call to me.

Down on the ground, hefting a bundle of shingles to his shoulder, Jesse called, “You’ve got a powerful hunger for all Ann’s cooking, Elias.”

“I know a good thing when I see one,” came the reply. ”And I see one,” he continued, smiling down at me.

I blushed and turned back toward the kitchen. Honestly! Elias could be so bold at times, yet he was awfully slow to make a commitment. We were both twenty-six and not getting any younger. What was he waiting for? Everyone in the Quaker settlement paired us off in their minds, but still Elias dallied. I was sure a proposal would come, but when? If asked, Elias said he didn’t have much to offer a wife. But he and Ben were building a fine horse breeding business. He had a bright future. I consoled myself with thinking it would be worth the wait.

The morning after the shingles were put on, I looked out the back door to see Pru Hartley standing by the springhouse, one hand on her hip, looking over the new house. That girl moved like an apparition. I never knew where she’d turn up.

I didn’t feel like standing around listening to Pru Hartley’s assessment of my family, so I turned and went inside. The men were doing morning chores in the barn, and my sisters were still upstairs. Pru stayed in the yard, walked all the way around the house with her head cocked in that put-on haughty way she had. I went back to my work but looked out the window now and then to see where she was, hoping she’d be gone.

Then she came up on the porch and shouted. “You think yer better’n some folk, but yer not! With your big, new house’n all. S’pose you think Elias Finley’s gonna marry you? Would’ve by now if he was gonna. That’s my guess!”

Why did she love to plague me so? Why was it her mission to bring me misery? I was tempted to answer her. To ask why she was older than I by a year, had two babies and no husband in sight. But it would just bring more wrath on me, so I closed the door to keep her noise outside. Rachel wandered downstairs, holding her ears.

Outside, Pru still stood on the porch, bare feet wide apart, elbows akimbo, looking defiant. Amos, Jesse and Nathaniel started in from the barn, talking among themselves. When she saw them, Pru turned and stepped off the porch, hiked up her skirts and all but ran down the hill.

The addition stood tall and large, dwarfing the old cabin. Jesse and Nathaniel chinked the logs to match the old part, and once that was done the whole place looked like it had always been so. The next step was plaster—both the old and new parts.

Plastering was an art, done by hire. For country houses, there was usually an itinerant plasterer looking for work and a place to stay until the job was done.

Amos let it be known he was looking for a plasterer, and within a day one came to the door. His name was Jacob Schilling, of German stock, from Dauphin County.

“What brings you west?” Amos asked.

“I follow the work,” was the reply. “If the next job is north, I’ll go north. They tell me there’s work at Altoona. Brand new city sprung up to service the railroad. Lots of new houses being built. That’s where I’m figuring on going from here.”

Amos nodded. He showed Jacob Schilling the new addition and explained what he wanted done. They settled on a price, then Amos showed him to quarters in the tack room of the barn.

We three girls watched from the doorway as Jacob Schilling tended to his horse. We all found the handsome young stranger interesting, but none more than Rachel.

Turned out I wasn’t wrong to worry. Rachel found Mr. Schilling interesting to the point of irresistibility, and she made up any excuse to be where he was. Rachel, who flitted about from one suitor to another, was fixed on Jacob Schilling. She watched him work; she took him snacks and drinks; she sat across from him at table and listened to his talk as though she’d never heard English before. They took to walking out after supper, long walks in the summer twilight. After the second walk, they came back holding hands, and one evening I saw dried grass clinging to the back of her dress.

I understood her infatuation. Mr. Schilling was worldly compared to the men we knew. He’d grown up north of Harrisburg but wanted none of farm life. He’d even been married before. His wife of two years had died in childbirth. The baby was being raised by Jacob’s parents. His wife’s death put the wanderlust in Jacob, and he took his trade out to see the world.

Oh, he was attractive, all right. Bright, personable, talkative. I could see it, but still I feared for my sister. If this led to marriage, well,.
No!
Quaker women knew that to marry a non-Quaker was to be disowned by the Society. Rachel wouldn’t want that. Besides, what would Papa say? Surely these goings on hadn’t escaped his notice.

The plastering took two weeks, during which Rachel was never there for chores, during which Rachel couldn’t see or hear anything that was not Jacob Schilling, during which I felt more than a little jealous and more than a little overworked. I worried over and—just a little—resented my sister.

When the work was done, Amos paid Jacob Schilling, and he rode away north, toward Altoona. Rachel was strangely serene at his departure. Relieved at the removal of temptation, I tried to reassert my position as female head of the household.

“There’s spinning to be done,” I told Rachel the next morning. “Betsy and I are going to wash clothes.”

Rachel didn’t respond, nor did she spin. She sat around dreamily all day, avoiding my eyes and making a show of writing a letter that I could only presume was to Jacob.

That evening, sitting on the back porch, I shared my frustration with Jesse. “What is she thinking, Jesse? How can she be so silly? Jacob Schilling goes from job to job, loving girls along the way.”

“She’s twenty-four years old and a woman, Ann. You can’t make her over, no matter how hard you try. If she wants Jacob and Jacob wants her, you’ll have to accept it. You can’t run around protecting her from herself.”

I looked down over the hill to Dunning’s Creek, misty in the twilight. “I know you’re right, but it’s hard to stop myself. She’s always been a little dithery. You know, so light hearted and happy, one wonders if she really understands what life is about. I worry what a bad match might do to her.”

“You can’t know it’ll be a bad match. It will be what it will be. Besides, he’s gone. If you’re right about him, she may never hear from him again.”

The following Saturday, Jacob Schilling drove up to Redfield Farm in a livery wagon. Showing no surprise, Rachel raced out to meet him, and, as he stepped down from the wagon, fell into his embrace.

“That’s not the way we do things here. Thee have never even asked my permission to court. It takes months to complete a Quaker marriage. Thee hardly know each other.”

Jacob stepped forward, taking Rachel by the wrist. “She is grown, sir. Her own woman. The world is changing, and you must change with it.”

He led Rachel to the wagon; she sat up proud, even as a tear found its way down her cheek. Jacob turned to address Jesse, standing behind Amos. “Help me with her trunk?”

“No.”

Jacob looked then at Nathaniel. He shook his head.

“All right. I’ll get it myself.” He stalked across the yard and into the house. Rachel jumped down and raced after him. A few minutes later they came out, lugging the heavy trunk between them. Hefting it up into the wagon almost proved too much for Jacob, but still my father and brothers stood rooted in the dooryard. Jacob climbed up beside Rachel, put an arm around her shoulders and snapped the reins over the horses’ rumps.

I watched the wagon disappear down the road. ‘And now we are five,’ I thought. ‘And soon, fewer yet.’ I flipped my apron up over my head to hide my tears and went into the house. Betsy followed me, and the men went to the barn.

From that day on, Amos Redfield never liked the new house. He didn’t move to one of the loft rooms of the old cabin. He kept his rope bed in the kitchen. One month later, Rachel Redfield was read out of meeting “for marriage by a priest.”

Betsy and I each took one of the new bedrooms above the parlor, using the new stairs to come and go. The old cabin, with its uneven floors and curved stairway was left to the men, Nathaniel and Jesse each with a loft room and Papa in the kitchen. Except for cooking and eating, we women spent much of our time in the new part.

As the summer waned, Jesse seemed restless. He didn’t sit still for long. Sometimes he slept in the barn or went off alone without so much as a by-your-leave. I suspected he was moving fugitives again, but I kept my peace and Jesse his. Then, one day, he brought in wood and carpenter’s tools from the barn.

”I’m going to fix up the little loft room,” he announced. He fitted the space under the eaves on both sides with low walls and doors for storage, ending up with a small but airy rectangular room, reaching to the roofline, with a little window on each side of the chimney. He whitewashed the walls, and I found him a braided oval rug for the floor. He bought a bedstead, table and rocking chair at a sale.

It was a cheerful room, but I was puzzled by this domestic turn in a man who cared little for comforts and not at all for beauty. Maybe he was planning to marry after all. Maybe his dreams of going west had died.

Jesse’s intentions in partitioning off his room would make sense to me in mid-September when he stumbled home just before dawn one morning after a three day absence, fevered and wild-eyed. Awakened by his arrival, I took a lantern to meet him in the dooryard.