Carla Kelly (9 page)

Della laughed but did not disagree. “Brother Davis— Brother Owen—said the altitude would get me for a while.”

“He's right,” Parmley said. He held up his hand. “Let's let Mama get William down, and then we'll have family prayer. Join us, Sister Anders?”

“Certainly,” she said, trying to remember the last time the Anderses had gathered together for family prayer. Her uncle had remarked to her once that family prayer was something he always intended to do.

Sister Parmley was back in a few minutes. “We kneel together,” she told Della, as her husband helped her down.

Della joined the girls and their brother Joseph. The bishop prayed for his family, his congregation, and the mines, mentioning people by name—people she didn't know yet but probably would as they took on form and became part of her life.

“And bless us to find a good situation for Sister Anders, who has come to teach,” he concluded. “Touch some family to open their home to her.”

Della added her whispered amen when he finished. He put on his coat again and took the lantern Sister Parmley handed him. He gestured to Della. “Come outside a moment, if you will.”

Della followed him onto the porch, where he stood watching the glimmering lights up and down the canyon.

“I hold their lives and spirits in my hands,” he said. There was nothing of pride in the statement. All she heard was a certain wonder that humbled her. “I've been superintendent here since 1885, and bishop since 1889. I'm your bishop now. If you need me, I am here.”

He spoke so simply.
All the people in this canyon are his responsibility, one way or another
, Della thought, wondering that one man could be both and so calm. “I appreciate that,” she said. “I'll do my best.”

“I thought you would. Sister Anders, my father died when I was six years old, and I went into the colliery in England when I was ten. I know my business, and I only contract men to work here who know their business too. No fears now. Good night.”

He shook her hand again, then went down the steps slowly. Della watched as he walked toward the Wasatch Store. Soon all she could see was the winking light. The door opened, and Sister Parmley came onto the porch.

“What is he doing?” Della asked.

“Summer and winter, he walks the canyon with his lantern. Sometimes members ask him in for a prayer or a word of advice. Sometimes he checks on the horses in the barn. He even visits the Finns, although none of them are members.” Sister Parmley's voice was soft, her love powerfully evident. She put her hand on Della's shoulder. “I asked him once how he bears such responsibility. He just kissed my cheek.”

She gave Della a little shake. “If you don't get to bed soon, you'll drop in your tracks!”

“I'm tougher than that,” Della told her, thinking how puny she was to feel so exhausted, when everyone in this canyon probably worked harder than she ever would.

“You'll have to share a bed with Mary, but she's small, so it won't be a tight squeeze,” Sister Parmley said, all business again as she crooked her arm through Della's and led her into the house again. It touched Della to see her linger a moment at the door, looking out.
The bishop is short, overweight, and smells of coal, and she loves him
, Della thought, as though the warmth of Sister Parmley's love sheltered her too.

She took Della upstairs, regarding her as though she wanted to say something. “It's nothing, really. I've just never seen Brother Davis smile like that, when he ushered you inside the house. Good night now.”

Della slept until the sunlight glanced across her pillow. As she listened, she heard the rumble of coal into railcars. She thought of the small shacks closer to the tipple and wondered if it were possible to blank out the sound. She thought of her first year in the elementary school on the west side of Salt Lake, so close to the rail yards and the smelters, where housing was cheap and immigrants settled. By the time school was out for the summer, she paid the noise no mind. By the time May came here, she doubted she would give the tipple a second thought.

Mentally she reviewed the contents of her trunk, taking an inventory of her shirtwaists and skirts and long underwear. Her cousins had snickered to see her practical clothing as they packed their own trunks for Europe. She hoped her winter coat would be warm enough, considering the chill in the room. Maybe next year, if she felt adventurous enough, she could find a school in southern Arizona that needed a teacher.

She dressed at her leisure, wishing she hadn't been too tired last night to tame her hair into braids. As it was, she could barely drag her big-toothed comb through her curls. “My hair is the curse of the earth,” she muttered, not for the first time.

She remembered the little tintype of her mother that Papa used to put up in every shack they lived in. Aunt Caroline had been aghast when she put it up in her room in the Anderses’ house. “That must go,” Aunt Caroline had said. Dutiful, Della had tucked it away, hiding it in the lining of her shabby carpetbag.

There it had remained for twelve years. Della took it out now and held it up to the daylight. She looked at Olympia's high arched nose, her full lips, and the way her deep-set eyes and heavy lids gave her a sleepy look. Della looked closer at Olympia's ever-so-slightly tilted eyes, a reminder that Greece wasn't all that far from Turkey. She held the tintype up to the mirror, looking at herself and her mother, as close as they would ever be.

But this was not getting her dressed and downstairs. She put away the tintype and hurried into her clothes. She was downstairs five minutes later, sniffing the fragrance of pancakes and molasses.

“Saturday is pancakes,” Sister Parmley said, as she presided over the griddle on the range top. She handed Della the pancake turner. “You're in charge. I'll round up the Parmleys.”

“The bishop too?”

“He never misses pancakes.” Sister Parmley laughed. “Even though maybe he should!”

Everyone was seated and eating when the bishop came into the dining room, smelling of coal. He rubbed his hands together. “Mary Ann, you are a continual wonder!” he exclaimed, loud enough for his wife to hear him from the kitchen.

“He says that every Saturday,” Maria whispered to Della and giggled.

“I stopped by the schoolhouse on my way back,” the bishop said after prayers as the pancakes went around. “Mrs. Clayson said you may come over anytime.” He reached in his pocket. “Here is a key to the school.”

She accepted it. “I've never had a key to a school before. I guess my principal on the west side never trusted us enough. Do I need one?”

“She thinks you might.” The bishop buttered his pancakes and gestured for the syrup. “Joseph, you're drowning those!” He poured his own syrup and handed it to Della. “The miners are calling you Helen of Troy.”

“Oh, heavens!”

“Apparently the miners on the flatbed overheard that scamp Israel Bowman call you that yesterday,” Parmley said. “It may become your cross to bear. At least, that's what Owen Davis told me this morning when he went into the pit.” He shoveled up a forkful of pancake and eyed it. “Sister Anders, there's not a secret anywhere in Winter Quarters. Get used to it.”

Maria and Mary were her willing escorts to the schoolhouse after breakfast and dishes. Each one carried a sack of supplies and bulletin board trim as they walked past the Wasatch Store, escorted by the bishop, and then to the school just beyond.

“I've never been in here when school wasn't on,” Mary said as they climbed the steps and Della took out her key. She leaned close and lowered her voice. “When I was a little girl, I thought all the teachers lived here and slept in the basement.”

“You're
still
a little girl,” her twelve-year-old sister said, her voice no louder. “Only Miss Clayson lives in the basement.”

“It's haunted,” Mary said.

“Silly, it's only three years old,” the more practical Maria replied, her tone weary in that way of big sisters explaining the world to little sisters. “A building has to be at least … at least twenty years old to be haunted. Isn't that right, Sister Anders?”

“I'm not sure any buildings are haunted,” Della said, amused. “And look, the door is open today. Shall we?”

They went inside, and Della breathed deep of the chalk dust and scent of oiled floors that seemed to shout “school.”

“Isra … I mean, Mr. Bowman said my room was the one on the right.”

“No children in the building until September!”

Della stopped, her hand on the doorknob to her classroom. Mary and Maria crowded close to her. She blinked her eyes to accustom them to the gloom. Miss Clayson stood there, silhouetted against the light, her features not visible. Mary whimpered and crowded closer. Della patted her shoulder.

“Miss Clayson? I'm Della Anders, your new teacher,” she said, holding out her hand.

“These children must go.”

Do you want to frighten them off school before it even starts?
Della wanted to ask, but had the good sense not to. “I enlisted them to help me carry school supplies, Miss Clayson. Thank you, girls. You may go now.”

Without a word, Mary and Maria piled her bag and parcels by her classroom door and fled the building. Della resisted the urge to follow.

“September fifth and not a day sooner!” Miss Clayson called after them. When the outside door closed, she turned to Della. “You are Miss Anders only. No need for the children to know your other name.”

“It was unavoidable,” Della told her. “I'm staying with the Parmleys right now and …” She stopped. “Yes, ma'am.”

“That's better. Let me help you.” Miss Clayson opened the door while Della picked up her parcels. The principal stalked into the room, looking from side to side, almost as though she expected to see some leftover children from May, when school adjourned.

Della set the parcels down on what must be her desk at the head of the room, conscious of the woman's eyes on her, looking her up and down.

“That simply will not do,” she said at last.

“Wh … what won't do?” Della asked, when she found her tongue again, the one the cat had snatched.

“Your hair is an absolute disgrace.”

Della stared at her. She touched her hair, which she had subdued into what she thought was a tidy bun, at least, tidy for her hair. “I don't know what I can do about it, Miss Clayson. It's my hair!”

“Think of something.”

ella gulped, hoping the sound wasn't audible.

“And while you're thinking of something, Miss Anders, tell me what on earth possessed you to ride the flatbed into Winter Quarters yesterday?”

“Israel Bow …”

“… is a scoundrel. I have no idea why the school district, in its infinite wisdom, afflicts me with teachers like Mr. Bowman. And now you.” She pointed her finger at Della. “If I ever hear of you riding the flatbed again …” She paused. Her eyes narrowed. “That dress will never do.”

Dismayed, Della looked down at her dress. It had seemed like a good idea to put on one of the two old dresses she brought along, because she knew she probably would be cleaning and sweeping today. She opened her mouth to say that, then closed it again. She felt that familiar feeling in the pit of her stomach, the one she had endured for twelve years, living in the same house with her Aunt Caroline.
Nothing I say will make any difference
, she thought, wondering how soon she could leave Winter Quarters.