Caleb and Amos reached it at dusk and waited among the shadows until a woman emerged carrying a bucket of water.
She introduced herself as Sarah Mott, a widow who taught reading to children on Sundays and helped families travel when danger made their homes impossible.
She did not ask Caleb to tell his entire history before allowing him through the door.
Inside, a young woman sat beside a cradle with a blanket over her shoulders.
Caleb recognized Miriam Cole at once.
She rose so quickly that the cradle rocked.
“Caleb?”
“Miriam.”
For a moment they stared, sharing the stunned relief of seeing someone from Hawthorne alive beyond its gates.
Then Miriam sat and began to cry.
“I thought you’d been sold away forever,” she said.
“They told me you were dead.”
“Who told you?”
“Doctor Avery.”
Amos drew a chair near the doorway and listened.
Miriam’s daughter slept in the cradle, breathing in small regular sighs.
Her name was Ada.
Miriam had given birth in a rented room under Augusta Dobbins’s care, and three days afterward a man brought papers ordering the infant delivered to Hawthorne.
Miriam refused, but armed men threatened to take her away if she did not comply.
Augusta insisted on accompanying them, and Mercy followed at a distance.
When they arrived, Eleanor was lying behind a screen, pale and exhausted.
A second infant had been placed in a bassinet near the fireplace.
“I heard the other child cry,” Miriam said.
“But I never saw who held him.”
“Him?” Caleb asked.
“A boy.”
“And your daughter?”
“They took Ada into the next room.”
Miriam pressed her hands together.
“Eleanor told me I would be given a place in the household if I said the boy was born from her body and the girl belonged to someone else.”
“That made no sense,” Caleb said.
“She said people needed to hear the stories in the proper order.”
“Did you agree?”
“I said nothing.”
Miriam looked toward the cradle.
“I was afraid they would take Ada forever.”
A door opened at the rear of the meetinghouse, and Augusta Dobbins entered carrying a bowl of broth.
She appeared older than Caleb expected, with silver hair beneath a brown cap and eyes that missed little.
“You have questions,” she said.
“I do,” Caleb answered.
Augusta placed the bowl on the table and pulled out a chair.
“Then ask the one you fear most.”
Caleb felt his voice fail before he found it again.
