Chase the Wind (29 page)

She slowly began to move about the pond, feeling the bottom with her feet for any stout piece of wood that might have been
blown in by a storm. All she felt was mud, and the occasional
nibble of a fish tasting her toes. Logan stood before her, taunting her with her shirt. Joe, who had been scrambling around behind him, came up with her camisole and pantalets, waving a garment
in each hand. He let out a whoop at his discovery, and Logan
turned and began to curse him.

“Jenny?” Jamie called from the trees.

“Jamie, come quick!” she yelled. In the next instant she was
rewarded with the sight of his determined face scowling at Logan,
who flipped her shirt up in the air and took off through the un
derbrush, with Joe on his heels. Jamie’s long legs overtook the pair
in seconds, and he shoved Joe out of the way before he brought
Logan crashing down by diving and tackling him around the knees.
Marcus was coming behind him and hauled the protesting Joe up
by his collar. Jenny took advantage of the diversion and splashed
out of the pond, gathering her clothes before disappearing behind a tree. Jamie hauled Logan to his feet and sent him sailing into the
water head first. Marcus had Joe on the ground, and Jamie
promptly picked him up and flung him squealing into the pond, too. Joe crashed into Logan, who had just come sputtering to the surface, and they both went under in a tangle of arms and legs. Jenny had scrambled into her clothes, and she joined the two on
the bank as they dissolved into laughter at the sight of Logan and Joe spitting and cursing in the water. Jenny was wringing the water
out of her hair as she watched them shake their fists and fill the air with empty threats. Mary joined them on the bank and began
to giggle.

“We’d better get out of here,” Jenny suggested and took Mary’s
hand. She led the little girl back towards the mission, and Jamie and Marcus joined up with them after they made sure the two bullies took an alternate route home. They knew that their wet shoes and clothes would slow them down, but the four hurried anyway, Jamie taking Mary on his broad shoulders and Jenny
braiding her hair as they walked briskly towards the orchard. They
came up on its back side and walked beneath the branches which were heavy with ripening fruit. When they reached the clearing
that led to the mission, they separated, Jamie and Marcus heading towards the barn, Jenny taking Mary and hoping to reach the shelter of the dormitory before they were discovered.

Logan and Joe were not as lucky. The first person they ran into
while trying to steal back into their dormitory was Father Clarence,
who personally escorted the twosome to his office by grabbing on
to their ears. He quickly sent for Jamie, Marcus and Jenny when Logan and Joe told how Jenny had tempted them with her body and her cohorts had then attacked them without mercy.

Jenny was made to wait in the hall while the boys were all taken
in together, each one protesting at the lies the others told. Jamie finally threw his hands up in frustration and challenged the pries
to do whatever he was going to do and quit wasting his time. Jenny cringed as she heard each lick being given by the priest’s wooden paddle. The four soon came out, Logan giving her a look that would have caused trembling in a weaker person; it just made Jenny raise her chin a notch. Joe was sniveling behind him, rubbing his bruised posterior. Marcus rubbed his loo, but he was smiling. Jamie just tugged on her braid and flashed his grin.

“I’ll be close by,” he whispered as Father Clarence summoned her in. She walked with what she hoped was a confident step into the dark confines of the office, but couldn’t help shivering when she heard the click of the lock behind her.

Father Clarence sat down as his desk and indicated a chair. She sat with her arms resting on the arms of the chair, willing her pounding heart to slow down as the priest surveyed her over his steepled fingers.

“I knew you were full of sin from the first day I saw you,” he began. “You have the body of a temptress and the soul of a whore.”

Jenny could not believe the words that were coming out of his mouth.

“We must purge the evil from you.”

“I didn’t do anything,” she protested weakly. The look in his eyes terrified her.

“You will not lead me into temptation, not this time.” Jenny’s eyes grew wide as she realized that he was confusing her with someone else. “I will be stronger than the evil that is within you.”

She heard someone testing the latch of the door.

“Father Clarence?” It was Sister Mary Frances.

Jenny bolted to the door and fumbled with the lock. She heard the priest’s footsteps behind her as he came around his desk. She finally turned the bolt and flung the door open, causing the nun to stumble back against Jamie, who was standing with fists clenched and a murderous look in his eyes. Jenny ran past them, and Jamie took off after her when he saw the fear in her eyes. Father Clarence watched the two disappear with a look on his face that caused the nun to cross herself and send a quick prayer up to heaven. Father Clarence went back into his office and bolted the door without saying a word to Sister Mary Frances.

“Jen, what happened?” Jamie asked when they had reached the safety of the courtyard. “When he locked the door, I panicked and went to find Sister Mary Frances.”

Jenny began pacing around the birdbath in the center of the
courtyard. “He thinks I’m someone else.”

“What do you mean, someone else?”

“I don’t know. He was talking crazy. He said I was a whore, and
I wasn’t going to tempt him again, that he needed to purge the evil
from me.”

“He’s crazy!”

“He scares me. Oh, Jamie, can we please leave?”

Jamie ran his hands through his hair, pushing the growing mass back out of his eyes. “Jen, we’ll tell Sister Mary Frances what he
said. She’ll know what to do.”

“I want to go.”

“We’ve no place to go. It’s going to be autumn soon, then winter.
There is no way we can survive by ourselves.”

Jenny flopped down on the bench and crossed her arms in front
of her. “I’m not sure I can survive him either.” She said it so quietly
that Jamie went and sat beside her. He gathered her slim hands into his big bronze ones and gently squeezed her fingers.

“We’ll be careful. We’ll watch out for you, me and Marcus. We’ll
make sure you’re never alone where he can find you, I promise.”

Jenny looked at the handsome face of her brother, at his deep
blue eyes so like her own. She saw the depth of his concern, saw the fear for her, and the fear for himself. The ridges of the scar on the side of his face were pale, contrasting greatly with the deep
bronze of his skin. His hair was longer than it had ever been,
covering his ears and brushing against the collar of his shirt. The front continually flopped down over his eyes, and he was forever
shoving it back and clamping his hat down to keep it in place. Jenny reached up and pushed the mass back, looping it over his ear in hopes that it would stay, but it wasn’t long before it fell forward again. Jamie grinned at her attempt, and she threw her arms around his neck, burying her face under his chin. Jamie
spread his arms out in surprise, but when he realized she was
trembling, he wrapped his arms around her and pulled her close.

“Don’t you know I’ll always take care of you?” he said into the
crown of golden blond hair. He felt her head go up and down in
a nod under his chin. “You just have to try to stay out of trouble. Lord knows that will be a chore for you.” Jenny punched the back
of his shoulder with her fist.

“Was the lickin’ worth it?” she finally asked when she felt she
had her emotions under control.

“Oh, yeah.” She felt his grin above her head. “It wasn’t anything.
He can’t hurt me, and even if it did hurt, it was still worth it. It
felt really good to throw those bullies in the water.”

“This won’t be the end of it, you know.”

“I know. We’ll just take it as it comes.”

Chapter Fifteen

The long hot days of summer began to fade and the weather became cooler, the days shorter. Jenny stayed as close as possible to Sister Mary Frances, who had become pensive after the incident with the locked office door. Jamie and Marcus became a shield for Jenny also, each one making sure that one of them was within calling distance whenever they were about the grounds, or going to and fro in the halls.

Father Clarence began to take some of his meals in the privacy of his office and even missed several of the evening devotions, leaving the sisters to read some scripture, lead the group in a few songs and dismiss the happy children early. The sisters cared for their charges with puzzled looks on their faces, but beyond prayer, they didn’t know what they could do. Most of them were relieved not to have to put up with the priest’s oppressive company.

One afternoon the cook came and asked Jenny if she would be willing to go to the orchard and find what was left of the apples for some cobbler. She agreed, having seen Father Clarence depart the mission earlier in the buckboard to conduct some business in town. She went to see if Mary could join her, and the two went hand in hand to the orchard, anxious to be outside on such a beautiful day. They all knew that the mild days they were enjoying wouldn’t last much longer, and Jenny looked at the task as a blessing. She was dreading the long winter and the confines of the orphanage walls.

When they reached the orchard, Jenny took off her shoes, tucked the tail of her skirt in her waistband and swung up into the branches to search the uppermost part of the tree. She smiled to herself when she remembered both her mother and father claiming to be the source of her talent for balance and climbing, then laughing as if sharing a secret joke. She had heard her mother say on more than one occasion that she was grateful for the oak tree that grew outside her bedroom window. Then her father would remark that he was going to make sure there was no such benefit for any suitor of his daughter.

She looked down below her at Mary, who was picking up apples off the ground, inspecting them, then heaving the discards with great relish into a pile, laughing with delight when a particularly rotten one spattered across the grass. Jenny laughed along with her as she made her way from branch to branch, finding a few good specimens to add to the bag looped over her shoulder. She made her way to the top of the tree and paused a moment to watch a few billowing clouds float across the deep blue sky. She sucked in the clear, cool air as she swayed on the thin branches at the top of the tree. She look down to see Mary scanning the branches, trying to find her.

“Jenny, I want to come up.”

“No, you can’t. You’re too little.”

“I’m always too little.” Mary pouted, and Jenny watched her go scuffing off, kicking rotten apples out of her way.

She decided that she had picked this tree clean and made her way down to tie another one, knowing she would need to fill the bag in order for everyone to get cobbler. The afternoon passed pleasantly enough, with Mary roaming around below, finding caterpillars and one time startling a small green snake which beat a hasty retreat from her squealing voice and stamping feet. The bag was so full that Jenny knew she’d have to drag it back, and debated whether she should send Mary for help. After testing the weight of the bag, she decided she could handle it, and the two of them started back for the mission, each one holding a comer of the bag, but Jenny doing all of the work.

They hadn’t taken ten steps when they saw Logan and Joe coming their way, looks of pure glee on their faces at finding the girls
away from their protectors. Jenny didn’t even stop to think, she bent down and picked up an especially rotten apple and threw it
with all her might at Logan’s leering face. The apple hit him square
in the forehead and exploded into a gooey mass that began to run down his face. She followed up with another bomb that smacked Joe in the chest, and with the help of Mary, whose throws mostly
fell short of the target, continued the bombardment until the two turned tail and ran. Jenny laughed gleefully at the empty threats they hurled over their shoulders in their retreat, and Mary spun
around for sheer joy after realizing that they had bested the bullies.

They continued on their way, with Mary giggling and chattering the entire trip, until they reached the huge kitchen that serviced the mission. The cook was nowhere to be seen, so Jenny emptied the bag of apples into the sink to be washed while Mary spun circles around the room, chanting a rhyme about the defeat of Logan and
Joe. She spun so much that she became dizzy and crashed out of control into a wheeled cart that held the plates waiting to be set on the table for dinner. The cart tipped with the impact of her
small body, and its contents went sliding onto the hard floor, shattering with a crash. The little girl looked up from the disaster with her mouth wide open, her hands flying up to her face. Jenny heard
the scrape of a chair followed by a loud thump from the dining
hall beyond, and she grabbed Mary to her.