Far From Home (22 page)

“I'm going home,” she told the girls that night, her chin up. They looked at her from their beds. They were silent at first. Then Becky, who rarely spoke to her, rushed to wrap her arms around her. “You don't need to go home. Sure, you've got a fine fit here.”

All the girls' faces softened towards her. She knew then, the longing they had without the hope she had. Their mothers were dead. They had snitched on her and accused her of being a pet, but now that she was leaving, going to a real home, they came to hug her, one by one. “I wish I had a real mother,” Imogene said wistfully.

“Yes, Emma Jane,” Becky said. She pulled on an eyelid as if she had something in her eye.

“Let's play jackstones, Clarissa, before you go,” Imogene suggested, beckoning all the girls in the room to join in.
Imogene isn't so bad when she smiles,
Clarissa thought. Imogene's fingers were long and knobby-knuckled, and the marbles stayed on the back of her hands. It was easy for her to win the game – and Clarissa's cat's-eye. “Take your favourite marble home, Clarissa,” Imogene said, letting it slide off the palm of her hand into Clarissa's lap.

Clarissa dropped the marble into her pocket. “Try to walk on my crutches,” she said softly. “Have a turn, all of you. Whoever does it best can have my bumblebee marble.”

“Your bumblebee marble!” The girls' voices rose together.

They were all red-faced by the time they had stumbled across the room. “I wish I'd known how hard it is getting around that way,” Imogene said in a meek voice.

The other girls nodded when Imogene added, “Keep your bumblebee marble, too.”

Clarissa tried not to cry, but tears suddenly filled her eyes and ran down her face. Missus Frances, passing the open door, shook her head and said in a sad tone, “If I were leaving, I would cry a barrel of tears.”

Clarissa lifted her head. “And make more work for God.”

Missus Frances's forehead creased. “Why, Child, whatever do you mean?”

“Nurse Smith told me that God bottles everyone's tears,” Clarissa explained.
He must be the only one who cares about
the tears of orphans,
she thought. She had cried so many tears that all the water draining out should have shrunk her. Instead, crying made her body feel heavier and heavier.

The mistress came into the room and put her hand on Clarissa's shoulder. Impulsively, she said, “You left the safety of your mother's body to be born, and the safety of your house to get help for your paralysis, but you did not leave your mother's heart. You will find yourself in it when you go home.”

Clarissa looked up, her heart swelling with hope.

29
MYSTERY BOX ON
TEA HOUSE HILL

T
he next morning, Clarissa went outside to sit on the orphanage steps.
I should tell Cora I'm going home,
she thought reluctantly,
I'll have to tell her
. She watched Ben and Johnny clumming around, locking arms with each other on the ground until Jakot came running with a mouse by the tail. The boys scattered, squealing. Jakot kept running until he got to the landwash, where he tossed the mouse into the water. Even though the boys were working in the mission barn, milking cows and doing other jobs the caretaker had for them, they still found time for mischief.

The sweet smell of the newly scythed grass the boys were raking and tossing hit Clarissa's nose. She heard Uncle Aubrey calling sternly, “Boys! Be quick with the grass. 'Tis on for burning up in the sun, and when you put the hay in pooks, don't round it too much before it's high or you'll have the boar's back.” Clarissa knew that “the boar's back” meant a job done poorly.

Just then a cloud came, wrapping the sun and cooling the air. Clarissa no longer needed to squint against bright sunlight. She looked towards Cora, high in the air on a swing, her lemon-coloured dress like a splash of sunshine. Clarissa drew a deep breath and called: “I'm going home – to my real home.”

The swing settled into a straight pull. Cora jumped off and ran towards Clarissa, her long, dark legs rushing like whips through the air. “You're goin' home where yer mother and father are. I knew you would someday,” she added in a resigned voice. She flounced down on the grass, gasping for a good breath. “You can go home, but I can't; I can never go home. After Pappa died and Momma moved us here, someone else took to living in our house.” She smiled lamely. “We can always be sisters of the heart. That sounds poetic.”

“It is,” Clarissa said, relieved at Cora's response. A thought jarred her.
What if the mistresses send me away
before Cora and I get to go back up on Tea House Hill?

Clarissa looked at Cora. “We have something to do before I go home. We have to sneak up to Tea House Hill.”

“Maybe today. It's Wednesday – Woden's Day,” Cora suggested impulsively.

“Woden's Day?” Clarissa wrinkled her nose.

“Odin's Day, then. The day the moon was created. 'Twas in a library book I just read – about Odin, a Norseman god.”

“Reverend Penny would call Odin godless, so don't breathe that name into his ear,” Clarissa warned her. “Some things are best kept to ourselves.”

Cora's eyes flashed. “Sure, you won't catch me breathing that into Reverend Penny's ear.”

Clarissa suddenly thought of Treffie. She had not told anyone – not even Cora – that she had heard Treffie call her name as plain as day the afternoon she died. She hoped Treffie was looking down on her from somewhere beyond the sunsets and sunrises. She knew that when someone you love dies, you have to carry the weight of their life inside your heart.
It's not so heavy if you let them dance there,
Clarissa thought. She often imagined Treffie as one of the Merry Dancers.

Cora's voice cut into her musings. “The mistresses won't get ampery with
you
, but they'll punish me if we're caught goin' up on the hill. Now that yer goin' home, they'll treat you easier.”

Clarissa grimaced. “I wouldn't count on that.” Then she smiled broadly. “We want to go up to see if the box is still there, so what are we waiting for?”

Taking a deep breath, Cora said, “I've been not wanting to go up for fear 'tis a fairy box, but now that yer leaving I'm hauling up my courage. But,” she added, “I'm turning my sweater inside out for good luck.” She pulled her sweater over her head as she walked backwards.

“You and your fairies.” Clarissa shook her head and started towards the gates. Cora followed, pulling her sweater back on, inside out. She ducked to avoid a stick young Johnny was throwing into the air and catching.

“It could be Pandora's box!” Cora said under her breath. They had both read about Pandora.

“It's not.” Clarissa's eyes narrowed. “Hers was already opened, and all the evil in the world let out. That's why we have boys like Jake, The Great Big Snake.”

Cora added, “It can't be St. Patrick's box, the one the Irish saint threw into the sea after slammin' the lid on the snakes. There's no shamrocks on it.”

The girls chattered about the box until they started up Fox Farm Hill. They stopped to sniff the white flowers of Indian tea casting its dainty fragrance.

Cora, looking pale, went a ways, then stopped to lean against a big spruce tree, her breathing noisy. “By the time I finish climbing Tea House Hill, I'll be looking for me breath.”

“I want you to be better of your influenza or bronchitis, or whatever it is you got,” Clarissa said impulsively.

“I will,” Cora promised, “when this bad spell goes away.” She pulled out a hair from the top of her head and pushed it up under the loose bark of the tree. “Here,” she said, putting her hand over Clarissa's, “say with me ‘In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost – be gone.'”

“You are my best friend, Cora Payne, but I'm not sure we should be mixing magic cures with Christian prayers. Ask your mother to stir molasses and turpentine bladders in hot water. That might loosen your breath.”

“Come on,” Cora implored. “Let's forget about everything but the box.”

The girls went on their way in silence, hoping no one had been up to the Tea House since their last visit.

When they reached the Tea House, their mouths dropped open at the sight of the place: it looked worse than it had the last time they were there. Now it was like a trapper's squat. A windowpane was broken and leaves rustled against split steps leading to the broken door. Shards of dishes lay in the fading grass as if a prowler had taken them from the Tea House and strewn them around. The curtains had been torn down from the window and the chairs overturned, but the floorboards were still in place. The girls' eyes bored into each other's for only a moment. Then Cora set a chair back up on its legs for Clarissa to sit on. She got down on her knees to lift up the boards. She hesitated, then blurted, “For all we know, the devil, himself, could be in there with his hooves and his horns and a big prong.”

Clarissa reasoned, “What would the devil be doing shut up in a box? He's out in the world stirring up mischief in the minds of people like Jake and Imogene. Likely all we've got is an old tea chest; there's probably nothing in it but bugs. You don't have to open it if you're too scared.”

“But I want to open it.” Cora turned her head and looked up at Clarissa, her eyes as clear as saltwater crystal. “I've made up my mind.”

Clarissa leaned forward and lifted her crutch. She tapped the box. “There's no one home,” she joked.

“I'll get a sharp piece of rock,” Cora said. She hurried out of the Tea House, taking her time going down the ramshackle steps. Clarissa sat as still as the box until Cora came back, out of breath and holding a rock. She scrooched down on her knees and bent towards the lock, banging on it.

“Don't wake the dead,” Clarissa said, laughing. She leaned back, recoiling against the back of the chair as one rusty hinge flew off with a ping. Tiny screws scattered along the floor. Cora banged on the other hinge. It popped up, its screws dropping away. Cora's eyes looked as big as pools with blue flowers floating in their centres as she bent back on her heels. “If I lift the cover, we could be looking at filthy clobber cast off from some rat-infested ship.”

The girls faced each other, locking eyes. Clarissa leaned forward, holding her breath. She stuck her crutch under the lid and it flew up. With one voice, they exclaimed, “Seaweed!”

“Seaweed as brittle as old leaves,” Cora said flatly.

“Seaweed can cover things,” said Clarissa. She grimaced at the sight of dead insects flattened inside the lid like pressed grey flowers. Cautiously she reached in and lifted out the dry, rusty-coloured seaweed. She fell back squealing as a large, round-bodied, black spider ran across her hand. Icy fear slithered down her spine.

The girls sat back shuddering, both afraid to reach their hands and grab the seaweed. Cora took a twig and pushed it timidly into the brittle covering, lifting it.

“An old sealskin coat and a beaver hat. And a hide of some kind,” Clarissa said. “We haven't waited all this time not to see the bottom of the box.”

Cora went outside. Soon she was back with a large stick. She shifted it under the hat and tossed it on the floor. Then she pushed her stick under the mildewed and fousty-smelling coat and hoisted it out. She gasped as a gold coin flew into Clarissa's lap.

Cora dropped the coat and grabbed the coin. Her hand closed over it. Without looking down, she muttered, “It's the devil, himself, on it, I'm sure.”

“Look at it,” Clarissa said impatiently. “Find out if it's the devil or a king.”

Cora opened her hand and squinted. She rubbed her sleeve over the rough and dirty coin in her palm. There's 6p and an angel and a dragon on one side, and a man on the other. It's probably too old to be worth anything. Still,” she brightened, “I could keep it – sort of as a good luck charm like a rabbit's paw.”

“The rabbit wasn't too lucky or it wouldn't have lost its paw,” Clarissa retorted. “Look what happened to Ben. Maybe his mother carried a rabbit's paw, and that's why he was born with a harelip.” She turned to look at the coat. “There may be other things in the pockets.”

“I can't put my hand in there,” Cora squealed. “There's sure to be a mouse or some other frightful creature hiding – or dead.”

The girls faced each other; each wanted the other to go first.

“I'll do it.” Clarissa's face had a determined look.
I might
find enough gold coins to be able to hire a great surgeon to
make me well
, she thought. She slid off the chair to the floor and slipped her hand into the opening, closing her eyes as squeamishness filled her. Her hand went deep, filling the pocket. One finger went though a hole. She pulled back her hand, disappointed.

“Empty,” she said glumly.

“Sure, there's another pocket. Since you ventured yer hand inside one, you may as well do the other one,” Cora said hopefully.

Clarissa slowly slipped her hand into the other pocket, praying that a mouse or some other furry creature wouldn't squirm under her fingers. Her fingertips touched something smooth and hard between the cold, damp linings. Her hand closed over it and she pulled it out.

“Look! I put my hand into that old trapper's coat for a piece of rock!” She threw it on the floor in disgust.

Cora picked it up. “Not just a piece of rock,” she said in awe. “'Tis the same kind of flint as Peter carried.”

“It can't be,” Clarissa said in scorn. She stopped then, remembering her dream.

“Sure, there's a hole in it,” Cora added, reaching around her neck and taking off a string of rawhide. A piece of flint hung from it. She laid the two pieces together.