All She Left Behind Read online

  “Let’s go look in the barn.”

  “No. Don’t want your help.”

  He ran out to the yard, disappeared inside the building. She let him, her head swirling, breath coming short. The distillery. She picked up her skirt and rushed into the drying shed. The plants bobbed their heads, most harvested already. Bottles of oils sat undisturbed. She spoke a silent prayer of gratitude. But the distillery was gone.

  Dougie pranced out of the barn on his hobby horse beneath the full moon. For the moment, placated. Jennie stepped into the barn. It, too, was empty of even the nicker of a horse.

  Back in the house, Jennie walked toward the flat-topped trunk with the name PICKETT stenciled on the side. The words had faded and Charles had told her he’d brought it with him from Virginia. She realized how little she really knew of him when they married. A carpenter. A state employee. A charmer. But where had he really come from? She lifted Dougie’s shirts and pants, stacked them in the open lid, until she had everything out. Or thought she did.

  At the bottom of the trunk lay two blankets, folded, cradling a narrow piece of paper tied with a blue ribbon. It was a trifold official-looking document.

  JANE E. PICKETT. With shaking hands, she opened it. She read and reread. Am I reading this correctly? Charles had been granted a divorce, giving full custody of Douglas to her. All back in July. The 29th, to be exact. She’d been a divorced woman since July? How could she not have known?

  14

  When Change Comes Calling

  Early Sunday morning Jennie built a fire and heated up water in the caldron left hanging on the andiron. She found a tin of old tea in the loft, perhaps left by the previous owner. She fixed some for herself, taking the cup from the well outside while she prayed for clarity. She had missed so many signs, the way she failed to grasp her husband’s jokes. Her hopefulness clouded her vision the way a breath can veil a lens. “Help me see,” she whispered. “Help me know.”

  None of this made sense. Bewildered. Bereft. Betrayed. She searched for words to describe what she felt. Powerless. Yes, that was it. She’d been stripped of confidence, insight, purpose. She slept in a wooden boat caught in an eddy. Tears began. She shook them off. Despite the shame of it, she would talk with DW, her lawyer brother. He would help her figure this out. But now, she and Dougie needed food.

  She slipped out of the house and walked the half block or so to a neighbor who had eggs she traded oils for. Thank goodness she had a credit with her.

  “So early, Mrs. Pickett!” She still wore her nightcap, the flounce framing her chubby face.

  “Yes. I didn’t realize I was out of eggs and I wanted them before my . . . family woke up.”

  She waved Jenny on toward the chicken coop, where Jennie reached beneath a cooing hen, carefully pulling out two warm eggs in her hand. She hurried back to rouse Dougie, who like her had slept poorly on the wood floor. “Have a little tea.”

  “Hungry, Mama. I am very hungry.” He lengthened the word “very,” and her own stomach ached for this child who had yet to experience the real hunger he would face unless she could get his father back. She had no interest in eating but knew she must. “I’ll fix you a big egg. We’ll boil them today, in the pot. All right?”

  He nodded and thankfully didn’t ask where the frying pan had gone. “Where is Papa?”

  “I don’t know for certain.” She watched the pot of water boil, put the cover on, then removed it from the heat. She waited what seemed to be around three minutes—she couldn’t find her watch. She closed the trunk and sat on it now while Dougie sat cross-legged on the floor, eating his egg from the single teacup they had shared.

  “Why isn’t Papa here?”

  “I don’t know that either.”

  “Can we go to Miss Pricilla’s? Maybe he forgot something there.”

  “Maybe he did. I—we’ll see. Let’s hurry now or we’ll be late for church.”

  “He left because he’s mad at you, Mama.”

  “I—I don’t think that’s true, Douglas. I love your father very much. He’s confused, that’s all.” Should I argue with a child?

  “He’s mad at you.”

  Should I ask him why? No, a child should not be asked to witness. “He might be. I’ll talk to him and find out.” She kept her voice light.

  “He’s mad at me.” He lowered his head and his lower lip pooched out.

  “No, Dougie.” She reached for him, her hand stroked his hair, his little-boy neck. Wetness pressed against her breast and she knew he cried. “You did nothing wrong.”

  “I did!” He jerked back like a startled deer not sure how to get out of the path of danger. She opened her arms to him, but he turned his back and cried alone. She stood, touched his shoulder lightly, the action turning him into her skirts, grasping at her legs as though he stood at the edge of a terrible height.

  “Oh, Douglas. You’re a good boy. This is a grown-up problem. We’ll get it worked out. But you are loved by your father and by me. More than anything on earth.” She wiped his face and nose with her handkerchief. “And God loves you most of all. Come on, let’s go find a leaf or two and some twigs for Quilton. He must be hungry, don’t you think?”

  Douglas nodded, and hand in hand they headed outside.

  They walked to the Methodist church and Jennie was comforted by the dahlias in bloom in yards they passed. Flowers brightened the world, then faded, feeding the soil, their host plants resting through the winter and in the spring, would rise again. She had to remember that cycle, remember that after the dying and the resting came the growing again.

  Once at the brick building, she nodded to people as they found their pew, grateful that her father wasn’t preaching, as he occasionally did. She didn’t want to face her family. Divorced. Her mind wandered as people entered. They needed to find a place to stay or somehow refurnish where they were. Divorced. At some point she’d have to tell her family. Or they’d read it in the paper. If only she could meet with Charles, they could get through this impasse. All marriages hit ruts; people learned how to straddle them and go on. When would he file those papers? When would her status appear in the Spectator? Should she speak with Miss Priscilla? No, her brother first. He would tell her what she could do, give her back a smidgeon of control.

  The Parrishes entered. Elizabeth looked stronger still. Perhaps it was the malaise of summer put to rest, the cool nights now taking out the bugs and mosquitoes that brought on summer ague, illnesses, and death. Her improvement meant the Parrishes would have no need of a caregiver for Elizabeth. And besides, she had daughters-in-law who would have been preferred caretakers. Their youngest son, Charles Winn, had married Annie Robb that fall, so all the Parrish sons would likely soon be bringing their children for visits. When they did, they’d be sharing grandchildren, not a sad little boy who longed for his papa.

  She reached out of habit for her pearls. She’d worn them to Ariyah’s wedding. That was her next step: sell the jewelry and buy food and a bed. She and Douglas could sleep together for a time—time she wouldn’t have to tell her parents and siblings about what happened and time to try to talk sense to Charles.

  “I’ve dried raspberry leaves and they make a good tea,” Jennie told Ariyah. “A female tonic. Good for reproductive health.”

  “I’m healthy.” Ariyah glowed with new marital bliss.

  They walked along a path beside Mill Creek, Douglas scrambling before them riding his hobby horse, going nowhere, just friends together.

  “The berries make a fine tea as well. Maybe you could tell others. I’d be happy to supply them.” Jennie thought more of income now, appalled at how quickly her love of healing with oils and aromatics had sunk to mere commerce.

  “Let’s stop on the way back and have some,” Ariyah said.

  “I’ll bring it to your home.”

  “Jennie Pickett, are you keeping me from your house?” She bumped Jennie’s hip with her own.

  “No. No, not really. I just thought maybe Peleg would p
lay the wedding song he composed for you. I’d love to hear it again.”

  “I’m sure he’d be pleased to.” They walked in silence then. “Jennie, these past weeks since I’ve been married, is something wrong? More trouble with Charles?”

  “You’re seeing through the eyes of a married woman.” Jennie kept her voice light. “How have you had time to notice a change in me?”

  She pulled her shawl closer against a sudden chill. Not sharing the challenges of her life with her best friend felt like a betrayal, but she couldn’t expose herself. No one was granted a divorce in the state except for moral failures. The only thing that saved Jennie was having custody. Usually the father got that privilege, even if the divorce was granted because of his “moral failure.”

  Jennie’s lawyer brother had not been optimistic that anything could change. Jennie rubbed the nubby wool like the shawl she’d worn that day in her brother’s Portland office.

  She had pulled off her shawl, flung it over the back of his office chair. “But it says here . . .” She pointed to the document, read with hesitation. “‘When the divorce is granted on account of misconduct of the husband, he has then forfeited his right to the property and the woman should be endowed with his lands.’”

  “Does Charles have lands?”

  “I—he made purchases for reselling. I don’t know the status of those. Or even of our home.”

  “I’ll see what I can find out. Were there . . . signs of problems?” He didn’t look at Jennie as he asked the question, the papers taking his attention.

  “There was . . . drinking. Cocaine. An infidelity.” Shame washed over her.

  “Father told me about the night Charles failed to tend to Douglas. Maybe, Sister, he did you a favor, letting you go, granting Douglas safe harbor.”

  He lifted his eyes to hers, so full of concern.

  “You don’t have to explain to anyone why your marriage failed, Jennie. He’s done it for you. The divorce is granted to you, yet you didn’t have to prove it in court. He’s accepted blame in that sense.”

  “Do you see him, ever? Hear anything from his friends, from Joseph?”

  DW shook his head. “And another thing to your advantage. So far the divorce filing hasn’t appeared in the paper. The editorials they print with those announcements often beg litigation. Yesterday with the posting of the Hutchinson divorce, the editor wrote, ‘If daughters would be more careful in their selection of their friends, there would be fewer divorces and desertions, seductions and heartbreaks in this wide world and we might therefore have a great deal more of sunshine and less of shadow.’ Is it the paper’s business to make such comments? I think not.”

  “They make it the woman’s fault for having chosen friends poorly.” As if her choice of friends had anything to do with Charles’s desertion.

  “But meanwhile”—his voice became lawyerly—“you and Douglas can’t stay on in an empty house. You’ll come live with us.”

  “No. Not yet.” Shame and isolation helped Jennie tell herself half-truths.

  She had heeded some of her brother’s advice, drank his tea that day, taken her woolen shawl, and left.

  “Jennie?” Ariyah grabbed her arm, tugged on the soft wool.

  She was back, walking with a friend.

  “Where’d your mind go? You’re chilled.” She hugged the wool to Jennie’s neck. Jennie looked for Douglas. He was still in sight. “I’m sorry, Ariyah. I really am.” How long did I give time to the past at the expense of the present? “It’s easier if I bring the tea to you. Then you’ll have it when friends stop by. I’ve wild strawberry too. Serves the same purpose.”

  “Are you trying to get me with child?” She grinned.

  “I hope to be a godmother one day.”

  She nodded and they walked again, joy piercing her heart with the thought of Ariyah having a child.

  “Dougie and I visited the forest for berries. You should have seen my shoes, all muddy. Dougie was a mess.” Jennie laughed, hoping she would not pursue troubling issues.

  “That’s another thing. You’re always out gathering herbs. I thought your distillery would help you refine your work, allow you to have oils and not rely on wild plants.”

  “It’s the season,” Jennie said. “Things have changed.” She didn’t tell her that they picked up branches and hauled them back for firewood on those forest forays or that she’d dismantled the drying tables to burn the oak to keep them warm. That she no longer had a distillery. Nor of the growing anxiety of how they’d weather the winter on their own.

  She knew that before winter came in force, they’d have to do something different. She’d sold the pearls and made a small payment to the Parrishes, avoiding seeing them by leaving the envelope—with cash and a note—with Minnie when she answered the door. With the remaining funds she’d purchased a bed, table, and two chairs and bought food and a cabinet to act as a pantry. And everywhere she went, every time she walked beside Salem’s brick buildings, looked in an alley, or listened outside a saloon, she hoped she’d hear Charles’s voice or he’d stumble into her and she could hold him through this disastrous time and change his mind. But she never did. It was as though this city had consumed him.

  In mid-October, Jennie dressed in her yellow linen to look her best, then walked to Miss Priscilla’s. She’d asked Ariyah to watch Dougie for a few hours and made her way to the house with a wide porch and a gardener tending the lush shrubbery, preparing it for winter. His black face smiled up at her and she saw pity in his eyes.

  Does he think I’m coming here to . . . work? She hadn’t thought of that. Jennie’s face grew warm.

  “I’d like to speak to a Miss Priscilla, if I might.” She used her most dignified voice toward the woman who answered the door. “I’m looking for my husband.” She said it loud enough so the gardener would hear and only later wondered why. The maid’s skin was the color of good earth.

  “May I tell her who’s callin’?”

  “Mrs. Charles Pickett.”

  “She indisposed right now. Maybe you leave your card and—”

  A petite woman wearing a pink dress over a mountain of petticoats approached from a side room. “I’ll see Mrs. Pickett, Emma.”

  “Yes, Miz Priscilla.” The maid pulled open the door and Jennie followed Miss Priscilla inside, sat when she was directed. Miss Priscilla took a seat across from her, covering what appeared to be a colorful cross-stitched scene of barns and horses beneath a blue sky. She rested both elbows on the curved arms of the wide chair. Her posture said “confident,” but her blinking suggested something else.

  “What can I do for you, Mrs. Pickett?”

  “You can tell me where my husband is.”

  “That, sadly, I do not know, though it is my understanding that he is no longer your husband.”

  Her childlike voice cut deep. “Charles told you that?”

  She nodded. “While you may not believe me, I tried to dissuade him. I urged him to stop his pursuit of liquor and powder and—”

  “Adultery.”

  She nodded. Her cheeks took on color. Was she younger than Jennie?

  “You will sit there and tell me that you did nothing to bring about his downfall in this—this place?” Jennie spread her arms to take in the opulently furnished room. “Fresh flowers in expensive vases does not give legitimacy to what goes on here, to what disasters befall both your clients and . . . and . . . and . . . other young women in ruin.”

  “Charles said you were a moralizing woman.”

  “Moralizing?” Jennie blinked away tears. He had spoken to this woman of her, of their lives. The betrayal seared almost as much as his abandonment. “I came to ask if you know where he might be.” She softened her words. It had been easier to shout at this woman than at her own husband, where the blame belonged. “His son misses him and assumes he’s responsible for his departure. If you can’t help me, perhaps you could consider a small boy who wonders about his father.”

  “The very reason I
urged him to work things through. But liquor, as you may know, can take over a man, or woman for that matter.” She looked down, then back at Jennie. She had a very small mouth and tiny white teeth that sat like piano keys on her lower lip. “But he said that was the very reason he needed to go away, that he could not resist whiskey, nor the white powder, and that he could not drag you into that life, neither you nor your son. He divorced you out of his care for you and to keep Douglas and you from exposure to those substances. I did not introduce him to those, despite what you might think.”

  She hated that she used her son’s name, as though she was familiar with him. “But you served those vile substances here.”

  “People bring it in. They sell it.”

  “You did this to my son.”

  She shook her head. “Not the powder, no. But he did consume a bit of rum. I called it giggly candy. That was poor of me, I admit. But I needed time to try to talk sense into your husband, and your son demanded all his attention. I had the best of intentions.”

  Jennie snorted at that, a most unladylike response. “My husband gave him cocaine.” Miss Priscilla’s eyes grew large. Jennie didn’t stop. “There are oils and aromatics known to help curb the desire. Are you aware of those? And offering rum to a child, for whatever reason, is . . . is . . . despicable. And letting cocaine powder lie around.”

  “Spoken like a good mother.” She picked at her bodice, raised her eyes, woman to woman. “I don’t blame you for being angry with me. It’s easier than being angry with our men or ourselves. We women are powerless against so many forces. That’s why I chose this profession. Here I control certain things and I can support myself. A doctor visits or we go to him. We have no disease here. Being abandoned as you are will be harder for women like you. Harder to admit that there is little you can do to change the world of men.”