Patricia Wrede - Thirteenth Child

I turned and found Henry Masters, one of Papa’s students, smiling down at me. He looked different in his black gown, with the flat-topped hat shading his brown eyes. His smile, though, was exactly the same as ever.

The smile reassured me, and I said, “Robbie bet me I couldn’t get them to give me another piece without getting caught. You won’t tell, will you?”

“Never,” Henry said solemnly. “Cross my heart.”

“Ah, Henry!” Professor Graham came up behind Henry and put an arm around his shoulders. “Passing on good advice to young Francine here?” Professor Graham always called me Francine, even though I’d asked him very politely once to call me Eff like everyone else.

“Actually, she was giving me some,” Henry said, and winked at me. “She recommends the cake.”

“Yes, very good,” the professor said in that tone that means someone hasn’t really heard a word you said. “So what are your plans now, young man? Going back East to continue your studies?”

“No, sir,” Henry said politely.

“No?” Professor Graham frowned. “Surely you realize what a name you could make for yourself, with your talent!”

“I’m afraid I’m more interested in paying my debt to the Farmers’ Society,” Henry said. He sounded like he was apologizing for something, but he had his shoulders set like a man readying for a fistfight.

The professor’s frown deepened. “You’re not considering going out with one of those crazy settler groups, are you? Think, man! Three years of advanced training in New Amsterdam or Washington, and you’d be in a position to pay them back with double the interest!”

“The Farmers’ Society doesn’t need money,” Henry said, still polite as polite, but starting to get an edge on the underside of his voice. “They need magicians. Without magic to hold off the wildlife, those settlers are gambling with death every year, and sooner or later they’ll lose. That’s why they paid my college tuition.”

“The Farmers’ Society is much too eager to push people out into dangerous territory, in my opinion,” Professor Graham said, as if that settled the matter.

“With all due respect, sir—” Henry began, but he never finished his sentence, because just then Harmony Quillen ducked out of the crowd and took his arm.

“There you are, Henry!” she said. “I’ve been looking all over for you.” She smiled at Professor Graham. “You will loan him to me, won’t you, Professor? Milo and I are having an argument over the riding horses that Susan is training, and I need Henry to back me up.”

“But of course, my dear,” Professor Graham said with a smile. Henry made a polite good-bye and went off with Harmony. The professor stood for a moment, watching them, and his frown returned. I decided that it’d be best if I took myself off before he remembered I was there.

I meant to ask Papa later about the Farmers’ Society and why Professor Graham was so displeased with Henry, but I got a stomachache from eating too much cake and it went right out of my head. I didn’t think of it again until almost a month later, when we went to the train station to see Mama off.

Mama was going back east to Helvan Shores for two months, because Sharl and Julie had both finally gotten around to having babies, and they wanted Mama’s help with their firstings. I didn’t understand it, myself—after all, Sharl and Julie were the oldest girls, so they’d had a chance to practice all the baby care on us younger ones. I thought that when I got old enough to be having babies, I’d need help for sure, because there weren’t any younger ones for me to practice on. But then I thought that maybe Sharl and Julie were worried that they’d forgotten things in the last nine years, and that was why they were so insistent that Mama come back to help.

Not that they needed to do much insisting. Mama was so pleased that she agreed right off, and if she could have, she’d have brought all the rest of us back along with her. But there wasn’t anywhere for all of us to stay; even between them, Sharl and Julie couldn’t put all of us up, and Papa pointed out that the idea was to make less work for the two of them, not more. So Mama was going alone, and we all went down to the train to say good-bye.

The train station was even busier than usual, because the waterways were open and the first loads of logs had floated down the river on the spring floodwaters. Some of them were milled right in Mill City, and some floated farther on down the Mammoth River, but most of them got piled onto flatcars and shipped east to the mills there, to be made into houses and furniture and wagons and boats and all the other things people used. The area around the train smelled of damp and fresh-cut wood as well as coal and steam and grease, and the yards were full of men and logs and flatcars.

The other reason the station was busy was one I didn’t know until Henry Masters saw us on the platform and came over to give us greeting. “Professor Rothmer!” he said to Papa. “You’re not leaving us, are you?”

“No, we’re just seeing Mrs. Rothmer off on a visit to the family back East,” Papa said. “Are you heading out, too?”

Henry laughed and sketched a little bow to Mama. “I am, but not eastward. My settlement has been assigned, and I’m here to pick up our homestead allotment equipment.”

“Where are they sending you?” Mama asked with an uneasy frown.

“To a completely new segment, about a hundred miles to the southwest.” Henry sounded excited. “We’re starting with twenty families, right at the edge of the settlement zone.”

“Oh, Henry!” Mama said. “On the edge? And so far away from the safety barrier!”

“Who’s your backup?” Papa asked.

“There’ll be a circuit-rider every two months, and they’ll send another magician with the next group to join us. It’s not as bad as it sounds; the first year, I only have to cover the central settlement itself. Getting the spells up may be a scramble, but after that I’ll have plenty of time to stretch them to cover tilled land.”

“Wow!” Jack couldn’t keep silent any longer. “You’re going to homestead out West? Will you get to see mammoths and dragons and everything?”

Henry laughed. “I hope not! My job is to keep the mammoths and dragons and everything away from the settlers, and it’ll be much easier if they aren’t around.”

“It’s a big responsibility” Papa said slowly. “And I don’t mean only the settlers.”

“I know that, sir,” Henry said. “I’ll do you proud.”

Mama sniffed. “Daniel has enough to be proud of already,” she said. “If it comes to choosing, we’ll be prouder if you come back safe.”

Before Henry could answer, the train’s whistle blew loud and long, and the conductor came down the platform to warn everyone to board. Mama started hugging everyone all over again, just as if she hadn’t given us good-bye hugs twice already, and Henry wished her good journey as she got on the train at last. Then we all moved up the platform to where we could see her sitting by the window, and we waved until the train pulled out.

I missed Mama from the very first minute. We all did. I think Papa missed her worst of all, though of course he didn’t say anything to us. The boys didn’t say anything, either, but you could tell they felt the same as the rest of us by the way everyone just happened to be right around the front porch every day about the time Papa brought the mail home.

It was a good thing Mama left when she did, because she hadn’t been back East for even a week before Julie had her baby. Papa opened the letter right there at the Post Office, and came home with a big smile on his face, so that we knew the news even before he got in the door. “Your sister Julie has had a little girl,” he told us.