Circle of Love(8)

The train gave a final jolt as it pulled to a stop. Frances managed to collect her carpetbag, hang on to Stefan, and climb down the steps to the wooden platform. Stefan, dropping his cardboard box, ran into his uncle’s arms.

The plump woman made her way to Frances and held out a hand. “I’m Claudine Hunter, Miss Kelly. Thank you for escorting Stefan.”

“It was my pleasure,” Frances said. “He’s a dear boy.”

Miss Hunter’s smile widened. “You’ll be lodging with me in rooms at the Children’s Aid Society. Perhaps you remember our offices on Amity Street. Andrew MacNair mentioned in his wire that you had been an orphan train child yourself.”

“Yes, six years ago.”

Stefan rushed over, tugging along his aunt and uncle, eager for Frances to meet them. The Gromeches spoke little English, but their joy at being reunited with Stefan was obvious.

Frances hugged Stefan and said goodbye. Mr. and Mrs. Gromeche had found employment at a hotel in New Jersey, and they were ready to take Stefan to his new home.

Miss Hunter led Frances to a buggy that was waiting for them. “It’s a good thing the Gromeches arrived so soon after Stefan was sent out to be placed,” Miss Hunter said. As the driver helped her climb into the back seat after Frances, she added, “If they had come a year or two from now, it might have been impossible to locate Stefan.”

“Don’t you keep records?” Frances asked.

“Such as we can,” Miss Hunter answered. “We try to keep track of the children, but there are so many, so very many of them. Also, sometimes the foster parents move and don’t tell us. Sometimes the placement doesn’t work out, and instead of informing us, the foster parents will give the child to friends or relatives, and we’ll lose contact. Sometimes there are deaths. Sometimes a child’s name will be changed, even without official adoption. And the war, of course, caused great confusion.” She shook her head and sighed. “This placing-out program is a very difficult task.”

Not as difficult as it is for the children, Frances thought, remembering the strangers she had had to face at their stop in St. Joseph. She shivered with the same chill she had felt six years before when she had wondered if anyone would want the Kellys and prayed that those who did would be kind and loving. Frances and her brothers and sisters had always been close, and they’d clung together desperately after Ma had sent them west to new homes. It had been unbearably painful to be parted. And yet, she had to admit, Reverend Brace’s placing-out program seemed to be the only way to keep so many children alive.

Miss Hunter had continued to chatter as though unaware of Frances’s silence. She’d apparently changed the subject, because she cocked her head like a large robin and looked at Frances as though she’d just asked a question.

Frances blushed and said, “I’m sorry. I’m afraid I wasn’t listening. I was thinking about my own orphan train ride.”

“Of course, dear,” Miss Hunter said. She patted Frances’s arm. “Will you visit your former home while you’re here?”

“Yes,” Frances said. “And there are other places I remember that I’d like to see again.”

“Good. You’ll have this afternoon and most of tomorrow,” Miss Hunter said, looking as pleased as if she’d arranged the timing herself.

It was early afternoon by the time Frances had stowed her carpetbag in one of the small bedrooms in the building.

“Perhaps you’ll want to rest,” Miss Hunter suggested, but Frances shook her head.

“I want to visit my old neighborhood,” she said.

“And where is that?”

“West Sixteenth Street,” Frances answered, remembering the row of crowded, soot-stained buildings, the constant smell of grease, boiled cabbage, and unwashed bodies.

Miss Hunter bit her lower lip and frowned. After a pause, she said, “Please be careful. There has been an epidemic of cholera in New York, and the authorities believe it festers in the slums.”

Frances was offended. “Where our family lived was a poor area, no doubt about that,” she said. “But slums? That’s an ugly word. Are they now calling the neighborhood a slum?”

Even though she was embarrassed, Miss Hunter didn’t give up. “Oh, dear Miss Kelly, what I’m trying to say is, it’s not just the cholera I’m concerned about. Please, please arrange to return well before dark.”

“I will,” Frances said, and smiled. “Don’t worry about me, Miss Hunter. I’ve long been able to take care of myself.”

But Miss Hunter didn’t smile back. “In the past few years your old neighborhood has been taken over by criminals. Things are different now.”