THE CALVERTS
Chapter Six
May 10, 1912
John walked down
the street, oblivious to the activity around him. He had just gotten off work
at his factory job, and was on his way home.
He had rented a
small apartment in an immigrant section of the city two weeks before, and had
found his factory job a few days later. He sighed, running one hand through his
hair. Factory work was not his ideal occupation. The hours were long, the work
hard, and work area so noisy his ears rang afterward. Fortunately, the foreman
in his department got along well with the workers, and John had no complaints
with him.
Factory work was
not what he wanted to do forever, but it would pay the bills. He had to do
something. The money that he had retrieved from Mary’s pocket, while a
considerable amount, would not last forever, and he wanted to save it in case
of emergency. The job that he had obtained paid enough that he could afford the
apartment and enough food for all of them, plus the other things that they
needed less frequently. There were even a few dollars left over when their
needs were met, which he carefully put away.
The main problem
that he had encountered with this job was the question of what to do with Mary
and Nadia while he was working. Most families had a mother or other female
relative to watch the children, and many older children were either in school
or working alongside their parents. The oldest children were often left to fend
for themselves during the day, if there was nothing else for them to do, or put
in charge of younger siblings.
John had no wife,
or any other female relatives in America, and the toddlers were much to young
to work, or to be sent to school. They were also too young to fend for
themselves, even in the apartment. When he could, he left them with a neighbor,
but this wasn’t always possible. When he had to leave them alone for the ten
hours a day that he worked, he locked them into one of the three rooms of the
apartment, leaving them food, water, toys, and blankets to sleep on. He had
checked the room carefully, locking the window securely so that no curious
child could fall out, and had removed everything he thought might be dangerous
to them. Still, he hated leaving them alone; the two-year-olds were incapable
of taking care of themselves if something should happen, and Nadia was still turned
so far into herself that Mary often wound up being in charge.
He thought the
problem over as he walked in the direction of his neighborhood, some six blocks
from his workplace. He had to do something about them, he realized. He had
thought of two solutions--one, he could marry again, or two, he could try to
hire someone to watch the girls.
There were a large
number of single women in the neighborhood, many of whom would have jumped at
the chance to get married. He knew that he could afford to support another
person, though money would be tight, but he wasn’t eager to remarry this
quickly. Miriam was still very much in his mind and heart, and she had only
been gone for three and a half weeks. He wouldn’t even have considered the
possibility of remarriage this soon if he hadn’t had the children to take care
of.
The other option
was to hire someone to watch them during the day, or even someone to live with
them, if necessary. There were always people looking for work, but he was
afraid to entrust the girls to a stranger. Some people resented them because
they were immigrants, and a few had reacted angrily to Nadia’s presence,
because she wasn’t one of them. Miriam had been right, he thought, about the
way that those who at the bottom of the social ladder and those who were of a
different race or ethnicity were treated. The promised land of America was not
all it was cracked up to be.
Absorbed in
thought, he failed to notice the woman stalking out of the soot-streaked
factory building ahead until he ran into her, almost knocking her off her feet.
"Excuse
me," he said, reaching out to steady her.
She pulled away
from him. "Don’t worry about it. It was my fault." Her voice was
tight with tension.
He looked at her,
recognizing her now. "Miss Dawson. We meet again."
Rose looked up at
him. "Please, call me Rose."
"All right. If
you will call be John."
"John."
"What are you
doing in this neighborhood?"
"I’m looking
for work," Rose replied, a downhearted look appearing on her face.
"But what I always hear is that I’m too well-educated, and don’t have
enough skills." She paused, giving him a confused look. "That doesn’t
make sense."
"They’re
probably afraid they’ll have to pay you decent wages if you’re educated. What
kind of work are you looking for?"
Any kind of work,
so long as it doesn’t take me back to my old life. I’ve tried factories,
department stores, offices--so far, no luck."
"Have you ever
considered caring for children?" John asked, an idea suddenly forming in
his mind. If she was looking for work, he might be able to hire her to watch
Mary and Nadia, and he already knew that he could trust her with the children.
"I’ve thought
about it, but being a nanny or a governess is likely to bring me into contact
with...people I knew before."
"If you worked
for a rich family, yes, but...I need someone to care for Mary and Nadia while I
work. I could pay you three dollars a week, plus room and board. I know it
isn’t much, but..."
"And you would
only be expecting me to care for the children, not anything else?" Rose
looked at him suspiciously, wondering what else he might have in mind. To be
sure, he had kept his hands to himself when they had shared a hotel room, but
she still didn’t know him that well.
"Well, if you
could help with the cooking and cleaning, that wouldn’t hurt."
"And you
wouldn’t happen to be expecting any other ‘benefits’ from this arrangement,
would you?"
He sighed.
"You are suspicious. No, no other ‘benefits’. You’d share a room with the
children, and it would be strictly business."
Rose looked down,
considering. He did seem trustworthy, and the children liked her. True, three
dollars a week wasn’t much--she doubted she could live on that alone--but such
an arrangement would also provide her with food and shelter, eliminating the
need to buy such things.
"All
right," she told him. "I’ll take it. Just let me stop by the boarding
house and get my belongings."
"Where are you
living?"
She told him the
location, just three blocks from his apartment, and he accompanied her there,
helping her carry her few belongings the short distance to his apartment.
He had managed to
leave Mary and Nadia with a teenage girl who lived in the same building, and
after collecting them, he brought them back to their apartment. Rose was
already inside, putting away her things and waiting for them.
Mary was thrilled
to see her, and rushed forward, squealing in delight, while Allegro, now much
larger than he had been a few weeks earlier, rushed after her, yipping and
wagging his tail so hard his whole body shook.
"Aunt
Wosie!" Mary shouted, running up to Rose, and tugging on her skirt.
"You stay dinner?"
"Actually,
Mary, I’m going to stay a lot longer than that--your Daddy has hired me to take
of you and Nadia while he goes to work during the day. I live here now."
"You do?"
Mary’s eyes grew wide. "You our Mommy, now?"
"No, Mary, I’m
not going to be your Mommy, but you can keep calling me Aunt Rosie. I’m going
to stay with you now."
Mary jumped up and
down, tripping and almost falling before Rose caught her and swung her up into
the air, giggling. Nadia just watched them, her thumb in her mouth.
Rose set Mary down
and knelt down to look at Nadia. "Do you remember me, Nadia?"
Nadia stared at her
uncomprehendingly. John spoke up.
"She doesn’t
speak English yet. In fact, she hasn’t spoken at all since we last met."
"Did she ever
speak before that?"
"On the ship.
From what Miriam told me, Nadia saw her mother crushed under a falling
smokestack, and that may be why she doesn’t speak."
"Poor
thing." Rose looked at Nadia. Pointing to herself, she said, "Aunt
Rosie." She pointed to Nadia. "Nadia." Smiling, she waited for a
response.
Nadia took her
thumb out of her mouth, but didn’t make a sound. Still staring at Rose, she
crept over to John and wrapped her arms around his legs.
Rose sighed.
"All right, Nadia. You’ll get used to me eventually. Shall I make
dinner?"
"I help,"
Mary offered, toddling toward the kitchen area. Nadia let go of John’s legs and
followed Mary.
"I’ll show you
where I keep things," John told her, gesturing in the direction the
toddlers had headed.
Rose allowed Mary
to set the table, while Nadia followed them around, still leery of Rose and
afraid to let John out of her sight.
Rose hadn’t cooked
much when she was a member of the upper class, but the weeks on her own had
already taught her some survival skills, and she did a fair enough job of
preparing the meal with John’s help.
As the little group
sat down to eat, Rose gave John a reassuring smile, telling him that she was up
to the task of caring for the children, and that he wouldn’t have to worry
about them any more.