Waiting for Christmas

Chapter 8

CHAPTER 8

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 14

The bedroom was still dark on Saturday morning when Howard awoke. It was too early to get up, yet worry prevented him from falling back to sleep. He was afraid he’d disturb Addy if he climbed out of bed, so he remained there, his mind a tangled snarl of anxiety. Eleven days until Christmas. He needed a plan for today’s search for Jack’s sister, but he didn’t have one.

They could visit a few more orphanages like Addy had been doing, but that process had already taken too much time and money with no results to show for it.

That was Howard’s other worry—money. With the extra carriage fares, new shoes and clothing for Jack, and the added costs of two new servants, finances had become very strained. Christmas was coming, which meant even more expenses. Addy had shared her excitement about hosting a tea in their home, and although Howard was in favor of it, he worried about how much it would cost. He couldn’t tell Addy to economize. He wanted her to have more of everything in life, not less. Nor did he want her to dip into her inheritance. Those funds would be her security if, God forbid, anything happened to him.

He needed to pray, not worry. And he tried to pray, really he did. But Howard’s mind was too disordered to think clearly, and all that came out was, “Lord, help. Please, help.” He repeated that prayer until some of the pressure in his chest began to ease, and the tangled strings of his thoughts began to loosen. He grabbed onto one of those thoughts and followed where it led, mulling over what he’d been told: After Jack’s mother died, and there had been no one to care for the children, the authorities had arrived to collect them.

The authorities.

Which authorities?

The police? Someone—who was it—had mentioned checking the local police precinct in Jack’s neighborhood. Was it the building superintendent, Pawloski? He’d said that Jack had fought like a wildcat. If it was the police who had taken him, and if they had records of relocating Jack, maybe they also had records of finding his sister. Surely someone would have noticed a three-year-old girl wandering around the neighborhood all alone. She couldn’t have remained hidden indefinitely.

But what if she had died?

Perhaps of starvation or exposure or who knew what other danger that lurked in that god-forsaken neighborhood. Jack would be devastated. He would blame himself for leaving Polly alone instead of hiding with her.

Please, Lord. Not that.

His ponderings gave Howard the beginnings of a plan. He would go to the police precinct in Jack’s neighborhood today and find out what they knew. He wished he could leap from the bed and get started, but he needed to talk to Addy first. The room was growing lighter, and he could read the dial on his alarm clock. Nearly six-thirty. Still too early to awaken her. He chose another string of worry—his finances—and began to unravel that one, as well.

If he started going to work an hour earlier each day, and stayed an hour or so later in the evening, he could add more billable hours and earn more money. He would hate to bring work home in the evenings, but that was a possibility, too. Perhaps he could work at home in the evenings when Adelaide attended her suffrage meetings. No matter what, he made up his mind not to say anything to her about his financial worries. He never wanted her to think that he was unable to provide for her.

Then there was his worry about what to do with Jack if they didn’t find his family. Howard had shared his concern with his dad, but hadn’t found a solution. They couldn’t return Jack to Children’s Aid. He would surely run away again and end up living on the streets. Was it the best answer for everyone if Howard and Addy adopted him? Howard couldn’t make that decision without talking it over with her, and he didn’t know how to go about it. She wasn’t ready to become a mother, even if she did have a heart as big as the world.

Howard looked over at his sleeping wife and thought his heart would burst with love. And that brought another pressing worry to mind—what should he buy Addy for Christmas?

Howard was still pondering that question when she finally woke up. They went downstairs in their robes and slippers to fix breakfast for themselves and found Jack already awake and dressed. He looked as though he’d been awake for a long time.

“Can we go look for Polly, now?”

“Let’s eat breakfast, first. Mrs. Forsythe and I haven’t discussed our plans for the day yet.” Jack sighed and slumped in his chair.

“What are our plans?” Addy asked when they returned to their bedroom again. She had opened the wardrobe doors to choose what to wear.

“I’ve decided to go to the police station in Jack’s old neighborhood and see if they have any record of finding Polly.”

“That’s a great idea!”

“But I think you and Jack should stay home and let me go to the police station by myself.”

She turned to look at him with a clothes hanger in her hand. “Why? I thought we were doing this search together.”

“Jack’s old neighborhood is a rough one, so I’m sure the police station isn’t the kind of place you should experience.”

The little frown on her face told Howard she was digging in to oppose him. He was right. “I’ve been to that neighborhood before. I know what it’s like. It’s not going to shock me.”

He decided to be honest with her. “Addy, I’m worried that Polly might have died.”

She gripped his arm. “Howard, no!”

“She’s a three-year-old child, left on her own in cold weather without food or shelter. I don’t think Jack should hear it from the police if she has died. We’ll need to find a gentler way to break the news to him.”

“You’re right. But I’m still going with you. We’re doing this together, Howard. And since we can’t leave Jack here all alone, he’ll have to come, too. He and I will stay in the carriage while you go inside the police station.”

He pulled her close and kissed her. “You know, for a beautiful, spoiled heiress, you’re a very courageous woman.” She gave him a playful swat.

Once again, Howard rented a horse and carriage for the day, and they set off across town to Jack’s neighborhood. Jack begged to come inside the police station, and Howard had a hard time convincing him to stay behind. He pulled the boy aside and whispered, “I don’t want Mrs. Forsythe to see some of the brutal sights inside the station. And I don’t want to leave her all alone out here. Can you stay outside and keep watch for me? You know this neighborhood better than the driver does.”

Jack reluctantly agreed, and Howard went inside, bracing himself for tragic news. The station was noisy and chaotic, forcing Howard to wait several minutes before someone attended to him. A raggedy man smelling strongly of alcohol lay across the only three chairs in the waiting area, snoring loudly. A stream of vile cursing flowed from the rear of the station, coming from what Howard presumed were the jail cells. He was glad Addy had stayed outside.

The disheveled cop who finally approached Howard looked in no mood to be polite. To work in a neighborhood like this, cops probably had to be rough characters themselves. “Whadda ya need?” he barked.

Howard slid one of his business cards across the splintery admitting desk. “My name is Howard Forsythe, and I’m searching for a missing child. She’s from one of the tenements in this neighborhood. I’m hoping you can help me.”

“Are ya kiddin’ me? Have you seen how many runaway urchins live in the streets around here? They disappear like roaches when they see a cop coming.”

“The child I’m looking for is a three-year-old girl, not a runaway.”

The cop seemed to weigh something as he gazed at Howard’s card. Then he exhaled. “Ya better come inside and give me the details.” He motioned for Howard to follow him farther into the station and take a seat in front of his lopsided desk.

“This search might be as simple as looking through your records,” Howard began. “The child’s name is Polly Thomas and she disappeared on Octobertwenty-sixth.” He laid out every detail he knew, and the officer finally rose to fetch the record file for the month of October.

The handwritten reports were stained and crumpled, but the cop eventually found the report of the police entering Jack’s apartment with the building superintendent, removing Mrs. Thomas’s dead body, and later finding a small boy hidden inside a cupboard. “It says the kid bit one of the officers when he tried to restrain him.”

Howard could well imagine.

“It says they searched the place, looking for any information about the kid’s relatives, since he wouldn’t cooperate, but found nothing. None of the neighbors seemed willing or able to talk to us. The building superintendent was no help, either. Said he hadn’t seen the father in a while, so they removed the dead woman’s body and wrestled the kid off to Children’s Aid.”

“That sounds about right. But what they couldn’t have known is that Jack’s three-year-old sister was also hiding somewhere.”

“Criminy!”

“Can you look to see if she was found later that day or maybe within the next two or three days?”

The cop’s brow wrinkled with concern as he shuffled through the disorganized pages. Howard whispered a silent prayer as minutes passed and the cop squinted at the handwritten reports.

“Here! This might be it!” He looked up briefly and ran his fingers through his hair, which explained its disheveled state. “It says a very young child was seen wandering the streets all alone, looking dazed. That’s not unusual except that she was much younger than most street urchins. And she didn’t run off when our patrolman approached her.” He turned the page over and read more before looking up again. “Hey! You can talk to the guy who found her. O’Malley’s here today.” He scrambled to his feet and disappeared into the back, calling O’Malley’s name. Howard’s heart leaped with excitement, even as he tried not to raise his hopes toohigh.

Officer O’Malley was a burly fellow who looked as though he could lift the desk with one hand. He seemed young, barely eighteen or nineteen years old, and spoke with an accent, which Howard guessed to be Irish.

“Ah, I remember the little gal. I don’t think I’m likely to be forgetting her for a good long while. She was walking down the middle of the street, she was, looking like she was in a daze. Muddy, and soaking wet. Cold as ice. She felt like skin and bones when I picked her up. I hurried back to the station with her to warm her up, and I gave her my sandwich. She was an odd little one. Never seen the likes of her. She never cried or said a word in all that time. Mind you, we all tried our best, but we couldn’t get her to tell us who she was or where she lived, so we kept her here overnight, waiting for a missing person’s report. It never came. We even went back to where I found her, asking if anyone knew her, but no one did.”

Howard could barely contain his excitement. “That sounds like it could be her! Where is she now? What happened to her?”

“When we were convinced that no one was looking for her, we had no choice but to take her to an orphans’ home.”

Howard closed his eyes in relief. Polly was alive! The police knew where she was. Jack could be reunited with his sister. Their prayers had been answered. He rose to his feet, eager to leave right away. “Which orphanage?”

O’Malley winced. The pained look on his young face made Howard’s stomach turn.

“Tell me.”

“There was something not quite right about her, you see. She wouldn’t talk, even though she was surely not a babe, and old enough to talk. She seemed half wild. Made noises like an animal. The sergeant told us we’d better take her to that home for the insane and feebleminded.”

“Oh, no.” A new fear arose in Howard’s heart. “Not the insane asylum on Blackwell’s Island?”

“That place closed down five or six years ago,” the first cop said. “All because of that lady reporter. What was her name?”

“You mean Nellie Bly?” Howard asked.

“Yeah. That’s the one.”

Howard knew all about Nellie Bly. A young journalist for the New York World , she had pretended to be insane and gotten herself committed to the New York Lunatic Asylum on Blackwell’s Island. Her report on the conditions there shocked the city. She had said that a few days in the asylum could drive even the sanest people insane. “So where is Polly?”

“They took her to Randall’s Island.”

The news made Howard’s stomach sink even further. Along with Blackwell’s Island and Wards Island, Randall’s Island was a place of last resort for New York’s poorest and most damaged residents. He thanked the officers for their help and hurried outside to tell Addy and Jack the news. “I think I may know where she is. The police found a little girl matching Polly’s description wandering in the street and took her to an orphans’ home.”

Jack gave a cry of joy. “You found her?”

Addy gripped Howard’s arm. “Where? Which orphanage?”

He lowered his voice, hoping Jack wouldn’t hear or understand. “It’s a terrible place, Addy. I need to take you and Jack home first, and—”

“Nothing doing. We’re going there together.”

“Addy, they house insane people there.”

“I’m coming with you!” Jack cried. “I know what Polly looks like! And she knows me!”

“He’s right, Howard.”

“All right, I’ll take Jack with me, but you should—”

“Stop arguing. We’re both coming with you.”

Getting to Randall’s Island, located between the Harlem and East Rivers, proved to be a long and frustrating journey. Howard paid off the carriage driver and let him leave as they waited to take a ferry to the island, knowing it might take a long time to locate Polly within the maze of public institutions. While onboard, Jack wandered off to explore the ferry, giving Howard a chance to tell Addy what he knew about Randall’s Island. “That unfortunate island has become a dumping ground for all the so-called ‘undesirable’ people no one knows what to do with.”

“Then why in the world did they take a three-year-old child there?”

Howard glanced over at Jack, standing by the rail, and lowered his voice. “The police said the same thing everyone else has been saying about Polly. There’s something strange about her. And she wouldn’t talk.”

“Jack has been saying that she’ll only talk to him.”

“Well, let’s hope she’s still there. And that she’s all right.”

They approached the largest building after landing, and endured an interminable wait before speaking with someone in charge. Even Addy’s connection to the Stanhope Foundation didn’t seem to make a difference. The man who finally approached them seemed harried and unapologetic. “We’re looking for a missing child,” Howard said, handing him his card. “We were told by the police that she was brought here.”

“Brought where? This is a big place.” He put the card into his pocket without looking at it. “There’s a poor house, the House of Refuge for young delinquents, a homeopathic hospital, an asylum for hopeless drunkards, another one for idiots, and the city’s asylum for the insane.”

Howard exhaled, trying not to imagine a frightened three-year-old in any of those places. “Where would I most likely find a child about three years old, without a name or any identification? She doesn’t talk.” He wanted to add that the police had described Polly as “wild,” but he didn’t want to say it in front of Jack.

“Try the Idiot Asylum. They take children.” Addy drew a sharp breath at his words. Howard quickly gripped Jack’s shoulders to keep him from leaping to Polly’s defense, recalling how he’d attacked another boy for calling her feebleminded.

“Thank you. Can you direct us there?”

The man gave them directions, and as they made their way to the building, Howard tried to warn Jack and Addy that what they were about to witness might be very difficult to see. And he was right. The entrance lobby alone made Howard shudder. It smelled foul and echoed with the distant sound of moans and cries. After another long delay, they finally were escorted to the asylum director’s office. A grumpy-looking, gray-haired woman with the attitude and defensive posture of a prison guard met them. “The director doesn’t work on Saturdays,” she told them. “I’m his assistant. What do you need?” She showed no compassion as Howard told her Polly’s story. She began shaking her head before he’d even finished. “You may as well make an appointment and come back another day. It would take hours to look through all our records.”

“You would only need to go back to the end of October,” Addy said. “Barely two months ago.”

“We’re very short-handed at the moment.” The woman remained standing beside the director’s desk, arms crossed, making no move to begin the search.

Howard battled not to lose his temper. They were so close to finding Polly, and he wanted to shake this woman. “How can we get the process started?” he asked.

“We’re willing to help any way we can,” Addy added. “We’ll help you search the records if—”

“Our records are private. And this isn’t my office. I would need authorization.”

Howard knew they could easily go inside and search for Polly among the patients, but clearly, the woman had no intention of letting them proceed any further. He guessed that because of Nellie Bly’s exposé, the administrators didn’t want outsiders and reporters to see the asylum’s living conditions. He turned to Jack to see how the boy was handling this latest disappointment—but he was gone.

“Where’s Jack?” he asked Addy.

She shook her head as she glanced all around. “I-I don’t know. He was here a moment ago.” She looked up at him, and Howard could tell she was trying not to smile. “But I can guess where he is. He did this once before at one of the orphanages we visited.”

“Let’s go.” Howard grabbed Addy’s hand and hurried from the office without waiting for permission.

“Sir! Ma’am! Where are you going? Wait!”

Howard turned to shout over his shoulder. “The boy is looking for his sister. If she’s here, he’ll find her!”

“But you can’t just—”

“It’s the simplest way.” Ignoring her protests, Howard and Addy hurried through room after room on the first floor, calling Jack’s name. Howard thought he’d been prepared for what they might witness, but conditions in the asylum were more shocking than he could have imagined. Vulnerable human beings of all ages and disabilities, society’s most helpless people, were being forced to live in appalling conditions simply because they were poor and disabled. He didn’t know if the director’s assistant was still chasing them or if she was summoning the guards. He didn’t care.

“Jack! Jack, where are you?” he continued to call out. They came to a sunroom at the rear of the building that might have been a pleasant room on a warmer, sunnier day. Today it was as chilly and bleak on the inside as outside. Howard had taken one step into the room when Addy stopped him.

“Howard, look!”

Jack stood on the other side of the room, clutching a frail wisp of a girl in his embrace. He was weeping and saying “Polly! Polly!” over and over as he rocked her. The sound of his cries, whether from joy or sorrow or both, echoed off the glass windows and tiled floor. Polly made a keening sound, like a wounded animal, as she clung to him. Would she ever be the same after living in a place like this for nearly two months? The other patients had stopped what they were doing to stare.

Howard started forward, but Addy stopped him again. “Wait. Give them a minute.” She was using her handkerchief to wipe her tears. He pulled out his to wipe his own. He couldn’t remember a more poignant, fulfilling moment in his life.

Then he heard footsteps behind him and turned to see that the assistant director had caught up with them. She was breathing hard. “What are you doing? You can’t just go running through here! I’ve called for the orderlies to escort you out!”

Howard pointed to the two children, his emotions so intense he could barely speak. “That little girl is Polly Thomas, Jack’s sister. We’re going to take her home with us.”

“You can’t do that. There’s paperwork that must be filled out. We’ll need proof that she belongs with you.”

“Look at her with her brother. Do you need any more proof than that?”

“And what is your relationship to these children?”

“Children’s Aid has placed Jack in our care. We’ve been helping him search for his sister. Orphaned siblings aren’t supposed to be separated, but unfortunately, these two were. We’ve spent a great deal of time and effort trying to find Polly, and now she’s coming home with us. Today.”

Howard’s calm insistence seemed to surprise the woman. She sputtered for a reply. But the admiring look that Addy gave him made all Howard’s time and expense worthwhile. He’d become her hero. She squeezed his hand before releasing it to walk over to Jack and Polly. Howard watched his wife kneel to talk to the children, ignoring the assistant director’s final, sputtering protests. Jack had released Polly, and was gesturing as if telling Polly who Addy was and how they’d been searching for her. Polly smiled, then clung to Jack again, as if determined to never let go. Howard swiped his tears and repeated what he’d already told the woman. “Polly Thomas is coming home with us today. If there’s any paperwork, you’d better do it quickly.”

A few minutes later, Addy stood and walked back to Howard, beckoning for the children to follow her. “Howard, I don’t think Polly is feebleminded,” she whispered. “I think she’s deaf!”

The asylum had discarded the clothing Polly had arrived in, so Howard carried her outside to the ferry landing in the rough gray gown that all the inmates wore. It was much too large for her, and nearly threadbare, so he swaddled her in his own coat as they recrossed the river by ferry, then flagged down a carriage for the journey home.

Jack sat on the floor in the upstairs bathroom, refusing to leave Polly’s side while Addy bathed her in the tub and washed her hair. The fragrant aroma of rose-scented bath salts filled the air. When Polly was dry and wrapped in one of Addy’s bathrobes, they all went down to the kitchen and raided the larder and icebox, spreading the food Mrs. Gleason had left for them on the kitchen table. All four of them dove into the celebration feast, with Jack and Polly sharing the same kitchen chair. The silence between the children as they communicated with their eyes and hands seemed strange, yet the joy and love they shared were obvious. Howard couldn’t stop smiling.

“You’re right,” he told Addy. “I can tell by the alert intelligence in Polly’s eyes that she isn’t feebleminded.” As a test, he dropped a copper pot on the kitchen floor behind her back, but she never flinched or turned toward the noise.

“I can’t imagine the suffering those two children have endured in their short lives,” Addy said when they were alone in bed, later. Jack and Polly had insisted on sleeping in the little maid’s room near the kitchen, refusing to be separated again. Howard didn’t blame them.

“And they’re just two of many thousands of children in this city with tragic stories,” he replied.

“I’m going to do something about it. At least, I’m going to try,” Addy said. Howard held her close, loving her for her courage and her tender heart.