Orphan Train

United States was founded on indentured
     servitude. The teacher, Mr. Reed, said that in the seventeenth century nearly two-thirds
     of English settlers came over that way, selling years of their freedom for the promise
     of an eventual better life. Most of them were under the age of twenty-one.
    Molly has decided to think of this job as indentured servitude: each hour she works
     is another hour closer to freedom.
    “It’ll be good to clear out this stuff, Vivi,” Terry is saying. “Well, I’m going to
     get started on the laundry. Call if you need me!” She nods to Molly as if to say All yours! and retreats down the stairs.
    Molly knows all about Terry’s work routine. “You’re like me at the gym, hey, Ma?”
     Jack says, teasing her about it. “One day biceps, next day quads.” Terry rarely deviates
     from her self-imposed schedule; with a house this size, she says, you have to tackle
     a different section every day: bedrooms and laundry on Monday, bathrooms and plants
     on Tuesday, kitchen and shopping on Wednesday, other main rooms on Thursday, cooking
     for the weekend on Friday.
    Molly wades through stacks of boxes sealed with shiny beige tape to get to the window,
     which she opens a crack. Even up here, at the top of this big old house, she can smell
     the salty air. “They’re not in any particular order, are they?” she asks Vivian, turning
     back around. “How long have they been here?”
    “I haven’t touched them since we moved in. So that must be—”
    “Twenty years.”
    Vivian gives her a flinty smile. “You were listening.”
    “Were you ever tempted to just toss it all in a Dumpster?”
    Vivian purses her lips.
    “I didn’t mean—sorry.” Molly winces, realizing she’s pushed a little far.
    All right, it’s official, she needs an attitude adjustment. Why is she so hostile?
     Vivian hasn’t done anything to her. She should be grateful. Without Vivian she’d be
     sliding down a dark path toward nowhere good. But it kind of feels nice to nurture
     her resentment, to foster it. It’s something she can savor and control, this feeling
     of having been wronged by the world. That she has fulfilled her role as a thieving
     member of the underclass, now indentured to this genteel midwestern white lady, is
     too perfect for words.
    Deep breath. Smile. As Lori, the court-ordered social worker she meets with biweekly
     always tells her to do, Molly decides to make a mental list of all the positive things
     about her situation. Let’s see. One, if she can stick it out, this whole incident
     will be stricken from her record. Two, she has a place—however tense and tenuous at
     the moment—to live. Three, if you must spend fifty hours in an uninsulated attic in
     Maine, spring is probably the best time of year to do it. Four, Vivian is ancient,
     but she doesn’t appear to be senile.
    Five—who knows? Maybe there actually will be something interesting in these boxes.
    Bending down, Molly scans the labels around her. “I think we should go through them
     in chronological order. Let’s see—this one says ‘WWII.’ Is there anything before that?”
    “Yes.” Vivian squeezes between two stacks and makes her way toward the cedar chests.
     “The earliest stuff I have is over here, I think. These crates are too heavy to move,
     though. So we’ll have to start in this corner. Is that okay with you?”
    Molly nods. Downstairs, Terry handed her a cheap serrated knife with a plastic handle,
     a slippery stack of white plastic garbage bags, and a wire-bound notebook with a pen
     clipped to it to keep track of “inventory,” as she called it. Now Molly takes the
     knife and pokes it through the tape of the box Vivian has chosen: 1929–1930. Vivian,
     sitting on a wooden chest, waits patiently. After opening the flaps, Molly lifts out
     a mustard-colored coat, and Vivian scowls. “Mercy sake,” she says. “I can’t believe
     I saved that coat. I always hated it.”
    Molly holds the coat up, inspecting it. It’s interesting, actually, sort of a military
     style with bold black buttons. The gray silk lining is disintegrating. Going through
     the pockets, she fishes out a folded piece of lined paper, almost worn away at the
     creases. She unfolds it to reveal a child’s careful cursive in faint pencil, practicing
     the same sentence over and over again: Upright and do right make all right. Upright and do right make all right. Upright
     and do right . . .
    Vivian takes it from