Orphan Train

adds.
    “And you did not change her surname.”
    “Of course not.”
    “You weren’t considering adoption?”
    “Mercy, no.”
    He looks at me over his glasses, then back at the paper. The clock ticks loudly above
     the mantelpiece. The man folds the paper and puts it back in his pocket.
    “Dorothy, I am Mr. Sorenson. I’m a local agent of the Children’s Aid Society, and
     as such I oversee the placement of homeless train riders. Oftentimes the placements
     work out as they should, and everyone is content. But now and then, unfortunately”—he
     takes his glasses off and slips them back into his breast pocket—“things don’t work
     out.” He looks at Mrs. Byrne. She has, I notice, a jagged run in her beige stockings,
     and her eye makeup is smeared. “And we need to procure new accommodations.” He clears
     his throat. “Do you understand what I’m saying?”
    I nod, though I’m not sure I do.
    “Good. There’s a couple in Hemingford—well, on a farm outside of that town, actually—who’ve
     requested a girl about your age. A mother, father, and four children. Wilma and Gerald
     Grote.”
    I turn to Mrs. Byrne. She is gazing off somewhere in the middle distance. Though she’s
     never been particularly kind to me, her willingness to abandon me comes as a shock.
     “You don’t want me anymore?”
    Mr. Sorenson looks back and forth between us. “It’s a complicated situation.”
    As we’re talking, Mrs. Byrne drifts over to the window. She pulls aside the lace curtain
     and gazes out at the street, at the skim-milk sky.
    “I’m sure you have heard this is a difficult time,” Mr. Sorenson continues. “Not only
     for the Byrnes but for a lot of people. And—well, their business has been affected.”
    With a sudden movement, Mrs. Byrne drops the curtain and wheels around. “She eats
     too much!” she cries. “I have to padlock the refrigerator. It’s never enough!” She
     puts her palms over her eyes and runs past us, out into the hallway and up the stairs,
     where she slams the door at the top.
    We are silent for a moment, then Fanny says, “That woman ought to be ashamed. The
     girl is skin and bones.” She adds, “They never even sent her to school.”
    Mr. Sorenson clears his throat. “Well,” he says, “perhaps this will be for the best
     for all concerned.” He fixes on me again. “The Grotes are good country people, from
     what I hear.”
    “Four children?” I say. “Why do they want another?”
    “As I understand it—and I could be wrong; I haven’t had the pleasure to meet them
     yet, this is all hearsay, you understand—but what I have gleaned is that Mrs. Grote
     is once again with child, and she is looking for a mother’s helper.”
    I ponder this. I think of Carmine, of Maisie. Of the twins, sitting at our rickety
     table on Elizabeth Street waiting patiently for their apple mash. I imagine a white
     farmhouse with black shutters, a red barn in the back, a post-and-rail fence, chickens
     in a coop. Anything has to be better than a padlocked refrigerator and a pallet in
     the hall. “When do they want me?”
    “I’m taking you there now.”
    Mr. Sorenson says he’ll give me a few minutes to collect my things and goes out to
     his car. In the hall I pull my brown suitcase from the back of the closet. Fanny stands
     in the door of the sewing room and watches me pack. I fold up the three dresses I
     made, one of which, the blue chambray, I haven’t finished, plus my other dress from
     the Children’s Aid. I add the two new sweaters and the corduroy skirt and the mittens
     and gloves from Fanny. I’d just as soon leave the ugly mustard coat behind, but Fanny
     says I’ll regret it if I do, that it’s even colder out there on those farms than it
     is here in town.
    When I’m done, we go back in the sewing room and Fanny finds a small pair of scissors,
     two spools of thread, black and white, a pincushion and pins, and a cellophane packet
     of needles. She adds a cardboard flat of opalescent buttons for my unfinished dress.
     Then she wraps it all in cheesecloth for me to tuck in the top of my suitcase.
    “Won’t you get in trouble for giving me these?” I ask her.
    “Pish,” she says. “I don’t even care.”
    I do not say good-bye to the Byrnes. Who knows where Mr. Byrne is, and Mrs. Byrne
     doesn’t come downstairs. But Fanny gives me a long hug. She holds my face in her small
     cold hands. “You are a good girl, Niamh,” she says.