Lucy’s Wish
Authors: Joan Lowery Nixon
FICTION
A Candidate for Murder
The Dark and Deadly Pool
Don't Scream
The Ghosts of Now
Ghost Town: Seven Ghostly Stories
The Haunting
In the Face of Danger
The Island of Dangerous Dreams
The Kidnapping of Christina Lattimore
Laugh Till You Cry
Murdered, My Sweet
The Name of the Game Was Murder
Nightmare
Nobody's There
The Other Side of Dark
Playing for Keeps
Search for the Shadowman
Secret, Silent Screams
Shadowmaker
The Specter
Spirit Seeker
The Stalker
The Trap
The Weekend Was
Murder
!
Whispers from the Dead
Who Are You?
NONFICTION
The Making of a Writer
With thanks to Amy Berkower and Dan Weiss
,
who envisioned the orphan train stories
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental
Text copyright © 1998 by Joan Lowery Nixon and Daniel Weiss Associates, Inc.
Cover art © by Lori Earley
All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House Children's Books, a division of Random House LLC, a Penguin Random House Company, New York. Originally published in hardcover by Delacorte Press, New York, in 1998.
Delacorte Press is a registered trademark and the colophon is a trademark of Random House LLC.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-0-385-32293-5 (trade) â ISBN 978-0-440-41306-6 (pbk.) â ISBN 978-0-307-82731-9 (ebook)
First Delacorte Press Ebook Edition 2013
Random House Children's Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.
v3.1
In the 1850s there were many homeless children in New York City. The Children's Aid Society, which was founded by Charles Loring Brace, tried to help these children by giving them new homes. They were sent west and placed with families who lived on farms and in small towns throughout the United States. From 1854 to 1929, groups of homeless children traveled on trains that were soon nicknamed orphan trains. The children were called orphan train riders.
The characters in these stories are fictional, but their problems and joys, their worries and fears, and their desire to love and be loved were experienced by the real orphan train riders of many years ago.
More orphan train stories by
Joan Lowery Nixon
A FAMILY APART
Winner of the Golden Spur Award
CAUGHT IN THE ACT
IN THE FACE OF DANGER
Winner of the Golden Spur Award
A PLACE TO BELONG
A DANGEROUS PROMISE
KEEPING SECRETS
CIRCLE OF LOVE
LUCY'S WISH
WILL'S CHOICE
F
RANCES
M
ARY
K
ELLY
, J
ULY
1866
Our orphan train is on its way to Missouri. I hope with all my heart that the children in my care will be placed out with loving foster parents.
The children try to be brave. But I can see the fear in their eyes: Will I be chosen? Will anyone want me?
Some of the children want only to be comforted, but others ask for promises they must know I can't make. Today ten-year-old Lucy Griggs tugged at my skirt. Her shy smile and pleading gaze touched my heart.
“Will you help me find a family?” she asked.
“Of course,” I told her.
“I want a special family,” Lucy said. “I want a mother and a father and a little sister for me to love. I've always wanted to have a little sister.”
My heart ached for Lucy. When she was six, soon after coming to the United States from England, her father was killed in an accident. When her mother
died a few weeks ago, Lucy was evicted from the one-room apartment she had shared with her mother. Lucy had no one to care for her until she was rescued by the Children's Aid Society.
I tried to help her face the truth. “Lucy, dear,” I said, “if people already have one child, they may not have enough money to take care of another child.”
But Lucy's eyes shone. “Oh, yes, they will! You see, their little girl will want a big sister. She'll be looking for me.” She held out the doll she calls “Baby” and said, “I'm going to share Baby with my little sister.”
I hugged Lucy, unable to answer.
Please let it be so
were the only words that came to my mind, for I have no way of knowing what will happen to Lucy.
L
ucy Amanda Griggs squirmed between the two large boxes she had found in the alley. Even though she was very tired, she couldn't sleep. The ground was hard and lumpy, and the bright morning sunlight forced Lucy to open her eyes.
