The Mandie Collection (26 page)

As Mandie read the short note, she realized with satisfaction that her mother had not even mentioned the baby brother or sister due in June. Mandie didn't want to think about the baby. That was like a dark cloud hanging over her future happiness.

Although she tried to get over her jealousy, the thought of sharing her mother with another child still made her angry sometimes. Then she would scold herself and try to get her mind on the Washington trip. Whenever she thought about meeting the President of the United States, all other thoughts and worries vanished.

On Saturday, February 23, just a little more than a week before they were to leave, Mandie awoke to find Asheville in the grips of a terrible snowstorm. Before breakfast, as she and Celia sat on a settee in the parlor reading the newspaper, they discovered that there was snow from Charleston, South Carolina, all the way to Texas. LaGrange, Georgia, had ten inches already; Atlanta had five; and Birmingham, Alabama, had six inches. Asheville itself had ten inches, and the weatherman was predicting more snow for the next day.

“Oh, Celia,” Mandie moaned, looking up from the paper. “What if it snows so much that we can't get to Washington?”

“But, Mandie, you're going by train,” Celia reminded her. “I think trains can get through all kinds of weather. It never has hindered us in Richmond that I can remember. And we have lots more snow at home than Asheville has.”

“But it could get worse.” Mandie stood and started pacing up and down the wooden parlor floor. “Remember, it snowed six feet of snow in San Francisco, California, on the fourth of January this year, and I don't think that place ever gets much snow.”

“Mandie, stop worrying,” Celia scolded. “I think God will see that you get there safely. He has helped you this far. I don't think He'll let you down now. You have to trust Him. That's what you've always told me.”

Mandie walked back to her friend and sat down again. “You're right,” she said, taking Celia's hand. “I think our special verse would help right now, don't you? Because I'm afraid I won't be able to go. Let's say it together.”

Celia joined her as she quoted the Bible verse: “What time I am afraid I will trust in thee.”

Then smiling reassuringly at each other, they settled back on the settee and waited for the bell in the backyard to ring for breakfast.

“You know, Celia, I was just thinking,” Mandie said after a few minutes. “I don't believe we've heard a single noise in the attic since that night we ignored it. And nothing else has been bothered in our room.”

“You're right,” Celia replied. “And we haven't seen the mouse anymore, either.”

“I just wish we could figure out what has been going on around here with people disappearing for days at a time.” Mandie sighed. “The only one who is here every day is Millie, I suppose.”

Celia gave her a warning look. “Like Aunt Phoebe said, that doesn't really concern us, so I think we'd better quit worrying about it. If we start poking around and Miss Prudence finds out, we'll both get into trouble.”

“Just wait until I get back from Washington. Then we'll see what we can find out,” Mandie promised.

The snow stopped the next day, and it was all gone by the day of Mandie's departure. Mandie felt silly for all her worrying, but she was so excited about leaving that all else was soon forgotten.

Mandie rushed around “like a chicken with its head cut off,” as Aunt Phoebe said, trying to get her packing done in time. Ben was to pick her up on his way to the depot with Mrs. Taft. Celia received permission to go to the station with Aunt Phoebe to see her friend off.

After countless goodbyes, Mandie carried Snowball in the special box Uncle Ned had made and followed her grandmother onto the waiting
train. Her eyes filled with tears of joy as she hurried to her seat. Quickly setting the box down, she opened the window and waved to her friends as the cold air rushed in the window.

Aunt Phoebe and Celia stood on the platform with Ben and waved back as the train pulled out of the station. Mandie kept waving until the train rounded a curve and she couldn't see her friends anymore. But for a moment, she just stood there at the open window, staring out into space, hardly able to believe she was finally on her way to see the President.

“Amanda,” Mrs. Taft scolded, pulling her fur cape closer about her shoulders. “We're out of sight now, so please close that window before we freeze to death.”

Mandie closed the window, then set Snowball's box on her lap and let the kitten out. Setting the box on the floor by her feet, she began petting the soft white kitten in her lap.

Mrs. Taft pulled on her fur cape again. “I don't think the window is closed all the way, dear,” she said. “I feel a draft.”

As Mandie stood to check the window, Snowball scuttled over into Mrs. Taft's lap, which he had never done before, and curled up in the warm folds of her fur cape.

Mandie struggled with the window, using all her weight to finally get it closed all the way. But before she sat down again, she noticed that a few rows back there was a strange-looking dark-haired man with a small black mustache, staring at her intently. Mandie tried to smile, but there was something about the way he looked at her—

“Amanda, dear,” Mrs. Taft interrupted Mandie's thoughts. “Please either take this cat or put him back in his box.”

Mandie laughed nervously as she sat down and reached for her white kitten. “Come here, Snowball,” she said. “You'd better stay by me. I don't want to have to put you back in the box.” Trying to dismiss the sight of the stranger, she turned to her grandmother. “I'm so excited, I'll never be able to sit still,” she said.

“You're going to have to sit for a long time, dear, I'm afraid,” Mrs. Taft reminded her. “Just relax and watch the scenery go by.”

“I'll try, Grandmother,” Mandie promised. Curling up in her seat with Snowball in her lap, she pulled her own new fur cape about her. “This cape is so nice and warm I might just go to sleep since I had to
get up before daylight this morning. I'm awfully tired from rushing

around so much to get ready.”

“That's fine, dear,” Mrs. Taft replied. “Just relax.”

Before long, Mandie lost interest in the trees whizzing past and her eyes began to feel droopy. The next thing Mandie knew, her grandmother was gently shaking her.

“Amanda, dear,” Grandmother said, “I just thought you'd like to see where we are.”

Mandie blinked her eyes and tried to wake up.

“Look, we're about to cross the state line into Virginia,” Grandmother said. “I don't believe you've ever been to Virginia, have you?”

Mandie sat up and rubbed her eyes as Snowball clung to her lap. Glancing back, Mandie felt uneasy. The man with the small black mustache seemed to follow her every move. She shook off the feeling and tried to get her mind on something else.

Pressing her face against the window glass, Mandie could make out a village just coming into sight. Alongside the railroad track, there was a sign that read: Welcome to the Commonwealth of Virginia.

Mandie looked at her grandmother in amazement. “We're actually going into Virginia!” she exclaimed. “You know, I've never been anywhere out of North Carolina, except to Charleston, South Carolina, to visit my friend Tommy's family. Are we almost to Celia's town?”

“Not quite, dear,” Mrs. Taft replied. “I'm sure it'll be dark by the time we get to Richmond. But Celia's mother wrote that someone would meet us at the depot.”

“Then we'll be leaving early tomorrow morning, won't we?” Mandie asked.

“Yes, dear,” Mrs. Taft nodded. “We'll have to get the early train to Washington.”

“I won't have time to see much of Celia's farm, then, will I?”

“Probably not,” her grandmother agreed. “But there will be other times. . . .”

As the train chugged on, Mandie could sense the man's eyes on her every minute. Who was he?

The sky grew dark, and soon the conductor came through the train, yelling, “Richmond! Next stop, Richmond!”

Mandie felt relieved. She had been aware of the numerous calls for various stops along the way all day, but now her heart beat faster. At
last they could get off the train and leave the mysterious man with the mustache behind—she hoped.

Putting Snowball back in his box, Mandie stood with her grandmother, and a redcap came to take their luggage off the train for them.

As they started down the aisle, Mandie turned around to speak to her grandmother. The man with the mustache looked directly at her but did not move. Mandie's heart began to thump. Why did that man keep staring at her? Suddenly she couldn't remember what she had meant to say to her grandmother. She tried desperately to shake off the fear that hung over her.

Stepping off the train onto the depot platform, Mandie clutched Snowball's box tightly and looked around. “So this is Richmond!” She gasped.

People were getting off the train. Redcaps were carrying baggage into the waiting room in the depot. But Mandie could see little else in the darkness, and the train alongside the platform blocked whatever view there was.

“Come on, Amanda,” Mrs. Taft called.

The redcap walked ahead of them with their luggage, down the platform toward the waiting room door.

Suddenly a large black woman materialized out of the darkness of the platform, giving Mandie a start. The woman stepped forward to speak to Mrs. Taft. “Y'all must be de people what's 'spected out at de Hamiltons',” she said in a friendly voice.

Mrs. Taft smiled. “Yes, we are,” she said. “I'm Mrs. Taft, and this is Miss Amanda.”

Mandie took a deep breath, trying to calm herself.

Grandmother spoke again. “Do you have a rig here to take us out to the Hamilton place?”

“Yessum,” the Negro woman replied. “My name's May, and me and Abner been waitin' fo' y'all. Abner be in de rig.”

Mrs. Taft laid her hand on the woman's arm. “Then stop the redcap with our luggage up there, please, and show him where your rig is,” she said.

“Yessum.” The woman scurried ahead to catch the redcap, then motioned toward the rig waiting at the end of the platform. The redcap turned and carried the luggage over to the wagon where a small, thin Negro man sat waiting.

Mandie and Mrs. Taft followed.

Abner jumped down from his seat and helped the redcap store the bags in the rig.

May looked at Mrs. Taft. “Y'all jes' git in, Missus,” she said.

Mandie jumped inside the closed-in rig and Snowball meowed loudly at the rough treatment. Mandie talked reassuringly to him as Mrs. Taft climbed in and sat beside her granddaughter.

As soon as May and Abner were settled on the seat up front, Abner whipped the horses and got the rig rolling without another word.

Mandie peered into the darkness as they rode through the streets of Richmond, but it was impossible to see much. She sighed. “Oh, I wish I could see everything,” she said impatiently. “You know this is not only the capital of Virginia, but it was also the capital of the American Confederacy from 1861 to 1865.”

Mrs. Taft patted her hand. “Evidently you have been studying your history,” she said.

“And Grandmother, did you know that Thomas Jefferson planned the state capitol building?” Mandie asked.

“Why, yes, I believe I had heard about that.” Mrs. Taft sounded amused.

“Just think,” Mandie went on. “This time tomorrow, we'll be in the White House! It's so exciting! I can't wait to tell my friends Joe and Sallie all about it . . . and Celia, too, of course,” she added.

Staring out into the darkness, her thoughts wandered to the excitement that awaited them.

Celia's mother, Jane Hamilton, and Celia's Aunt Rebecca, whom Mandie had met at the school, welcomed them to their enormous white-columned mansion called Woodlands.

Mandie looked around in awe at the immense house and all the expensive furnishings. But later when she and her grandmother said good night in the hallway upstairs, Mandie confided, “It's all beautiful and huge and everything, but I don't believe it measures up to your house, Grandmother.”

Mrs. Taft spoke in soft tones. “Well, your grandfather had a little more money than the Hamiltons,” she said proudly. “And he felt the best place to spend part of it was on a home that could be passed down from one generation to another.”

“This house is almost a museum, I think,” Mandie said in awe.

“Well, just relax and enjoy your brief stay, dear,” her grandmother replied. “We must be getting to bed. We have to get up early to catch the train to Washington, and we want to be well rested.” She bent to kiss Mandie's forehead. “Good night, dear,” she said.

Mandie gave her a big hug. “Good night, Grandmother. I hope I can sleep tonight, but I don't think I'll really be able to relax until this trip is over and I'm back home again.”

“Well, at least try,” Mrs. Taft urged, heading down the hallway to the room she was to occupy.

After Mandie went to bed, she tossed and turned, excited about the next day, but also bothered about the mysterious man on the train.
At least he didn't follow us off the train
, she thought. Finally she fell into a fitful sleep, dreaming about trains and mansions and men with mustaches.

When the Hamiltons' maid woke her before dawn the next morning, she quickly jumped out of bed, looking forward to the exciting day ahead.

After a quick breakfast, May and Abner drove Mandie and her grandmother and Snowball to the train depot. The excited travelers were soon on their way.

But as Mandie looked curiously around the train car, she caught her breath. There, two rows back on the other side of the train sat the man with the small black mustache. His dark eyes bore into her, and he did not smile. Mandie's heart pounded louder and louder in her ears. What was
he
doing here? Was this man following them? And more importantly, why?