Chapter 1

St. Louis 1865 

Hannah POV

Did I really want to do this? Was this the next step for me? Was I ready to leave the place I called home for the last seven years? Would he be kind like my papa? Would I be a good wife and mother just like my momma? So many questions and I had no answers, only the butterflies in my stomach. So lost in thought while sitting on the swing in the backyard of the boarding house, that I didn’t hear them sneak up behind me.

“Gotcha!” they all screamed at the same time, causing me to jump and almost fall out of the tree swing.  

“Ah! Don’t do that to me! You know how that makes my heart race,” I growled at them as they laughed. My friends, just like me, were now ready to begin striking out on their own, ready to face the world. We all lived at the boarding house, and assisted Mrs. Sheffield and her brother, Mr. Knight in caring for the boarding house and the orphanage next door.

Mrs. Sheffield became a widow about twenty-five years ago and decided to open her lovely home to young ladies and orphans. Her brother, Mr. Knight, lived across town but was often around helping as well. Mrs. Sheffield wouldn’t tell us her name. We did manage to find out, quite by accident, that her name was Matilda and her brother’s name was George. Even still, she refused to allow us to call her by her given name. Her brother, on the other hand, relented and when he was at the boarding house, we called him George. In mixed company, he was Mr. Knight. Mrs. Sheffield was a tall, lithe, and beautiful woman of about twenty years my senior and her brother was a few years older than that. Mrs. Sheffield often said that she was never blessed with children, but when her dearly departed husband passed on after a severe bout of influenza, she felt led to help orphans who had no mother. She felt that sharing the love she had was a way to give back. When the first young orphan girl became of age, Mrs. Sheffield made the decision to allow room and board for young ladies who were either traveling or new in the area.

Known as St. Louis Boarding House & Orphanage for Lost Souls, the house was well cared for and Mrs. Sheffield’s efforts were lauded all over St Louis. She was admired for her dedication to care for the orphans and training them up to be successful members of society. She never took in more orphans than she could care for and she always had alternative housing for those she couldn’t. She had developed a coalition with others in the community who shared her vision and they would take in any overflow that she couldn’t.

But my friends and I enjoyed working with the orphans, because it allowed us just a glimpse of motherhood. For me, it was how I repaid Mrs. Sheffield and George for their kindness to me when I lost everything in the fire that took my family from me. One young family that was new to the orphanage had arrived just a few weeks ago. Five children were orphaned when their little town was destroyed by bandits. The oldest child, Lizzy, was very cautious about sharing any details about her family. Only that she was the oldest and they had no family left. She told Mrs. Sheffield that they had been wandering for about a month before they stumbled into town. The children were all so sweet but scared little things as well. Lizzy was fourteen and already showing signs of being a lovely young lady. Her brother, Jacob, age five, liked to think he was the protector, even at his young age. Julie and Jane were twins aged four and little Anna, aged three, all of whom could barely talk. From the tale that Lizzy told, they were all so traumatized by the attack on their town it was a miracle they had survived. We had taken to showing them whatever love and patience we could. Lizzy begged to be kept together and Mrs. Sheffield promised she would try. I think the woman could tell how desperate Lizzy was that they remained together. The mystery with those five was that they looked nothing alike.

Catching my attention and pulling me out of my thoughts, “Mrs. Sheffield said to tell you that everything is ready for your trip tomorrow,” Abigail shared with me excitedly. She was nineteen and had arrived at the boarding house almost a year ago. A petite and sweet girl, with long blonde hair that fell straight down her back and the prettiest shade of blue eyes that I had ever seen. She came to the boarding house when her father tried to marry her off to his business partner, a man twenty years her senior. I can’t even imagine what her father was thinking.

I looked at Emily, aged nineteen, who had been at the boarding house for two years. She and I were fast friends. The thought of not talking with her every day made me sad. As her eyes met mine, I thought back to the day we met. She had just arrived, so full of life, that I couldn’t help but love her. When she told me that her mother wanted her to become a nun, I burst out laughing. Her mother was widowed and didn’t want her only daughter to fall in love and marry, only to find herself without a husband when he either died or ran off to be with someone “more refined”. Meaning that her mother thought she was corpulent and would not hold a man’s attention for long. Emily, while not extremely thin, was not what I would consider plump. She was average for women in the area, with brown hair and brown eyes that had flecks of green in them when she smiled. Pulling me out of my thoughts, she took my hand and squeezed it, saying, “This is the time for you to be who you were meant to be. You told me long ago that you knew you would marry and have a family. Now is the time. You will be fine and we will write often,” Emily said, knowing just what I needed to hear.

I stood up and leaned down slightly to give her a hug and a small smile. “You always know what I need to hear, don’t you?” I looked each of my friends in the eye as tears began to fall and I pulled them into a hug. “I will miss each of you.”

Charlotte pulled me into a tighter hug, and being the oldest, she had seen many ladies come and go. “Hannah, you know this is the purpose of the orphanage and boarding house. To see the lost and lonely trained in decorum, etiquette, and the running of a household. To ensure that each one finds a place they can call their own,” Charlotte reminded me gently. The oldest of our group at twenty-three, she had decided that she wasn’t yet ready to leave the boarding house. Charlotte had been orphaned as a very small child of three. Well, they think she was three. She was found on the steps of the orphanage early one summer morning. They searched for months but never found any trace of the family. I wondered if she would ever leave or if she had truly found her place with Mrs. Sheffield.

“Oh, Charlotte, you need to lighten up. We KNOW the purpose of this place. It doesn’t make it any easier knowing that we won’t see our Hannah anytime soon,” Mary Jane exclaimed. Looking at me, she handed me a paper and, with a smirk on her face and eyebrows raised, she said, “Mrs. Sheffield wanted me to give this to you. It’s the details of your husband to be”

Mary Jane joined our group a few months before Abigail and was by far the most knowledgeable of us all. Having grown up in a brothel, you might expect her to be ready to follow in her mother’s footsteps. However, she didn’t want that life and promised her mother that she would make a better life for herself. She would learn to be a lady and would find a man who would treat her with respect and dignity. She always had her nose in a book or was learning how to do something. When she arrived, she could barely read and had none of the skills required to be a wife and run a household. So, in exchange for reading, cooking, sewing and etiquette lessons, she taught us the finer points of pleasing a man. The goal being that when each one of us married, we would know what was expected of us. Mary Jane shared the secret that most women didn’t know; men don’t want a woman who just lies in bed and acts like being together is a chore. No, men really want a woman who is not afraid to ask for and to give pleasure. A woman who is comfortable with her body and isn’t afraid to share intimacy with her husband.

As I took the paper from Mary Jane, I wondered, again, what my husband would be like. “Well, no time like the present. Let’s see who has chosen me for his bride,” I chuckled nervously. I opened the paper and read aloud, “Mr. Robert Beecham, age twenty-two, owner of Weston Ridge Ranch, Paris, Texas.” Texas! I was going to Texas. Oh my gosh, I had heard of the vastness of Texas. They said that Texas was like a whole other country. Land you could see for miles, good cattle land, a place where you could be anything you wanted. I looked up at the girls and smiled, “He owns a ranch, that’s encouraging. At least I won’t be destitute, right?”

Mary Jane, being her obnoxious self, tilted her head to the side and said, “I wonder how big his willy is?” We all looked at her and our mouths dropped open, “Mary Jane! Oh my god, that is unladylike!”, I admonished her, knowing it would do no good. Mary Jane would never change, and in many ways, I am glad about it. You could always count on her to ask the questions we all wanted to know. We giggled together over her antics.

“Well, I suppose I should go and finish packing for my trip,” I sighed, rising from the tree swing. They all grinned back at me but their eyes also held a hint of sadness. Sadness, that I too felt.  My friends, I will miss each one of them. Quirky, smart, pretty, and each one different, but they are my family. I really don’t know what I would do without them. We hugged once again and then made our way into the house so I could finish packing and prepare for my journey.

Back in my room, I pulled several hair ribbons from my jewellery box on my dresser. I hadn’t used hair ribbons in several years. Deciding to give them away, I made my way out of my room on the third floor and wandered to the orphan wing on the east side of the property. I walked up the short flight of stairs and knocked on the second door on the right. When the door opened, I said, “Hi Lizzy. Can I come in for a moment?” Lizzy was such a shy child. Determined to keep her siblings together, she never strayed too far from them.

“Sure,” she said as she moved the door wider to allow me to enter.

“I am leaving in the morning for Texas and I wanted to give you something. I haven’t worn them in ages and I think they will look lovely in your hair. I hope that when you wear them you will remember me,” I told her as I reached out with the ribbons in my opened hand. I really hoped that she would take them. She never asked for anything and never took anything, claiming she didn’t want charity.

She looked at the ribbons and then looked up at me, tears in her eyes as she said, “Oh, Miss Hannah. They are lovely. Are you sure you want me to have them?”

“Yes, Lizzy. I do. Please say you’ll take them.”

She smiled through her tears and said, “the last ribbons I had were given to me by my momma. I miss her so much.” With that she began to sob and I reached out and pulled her to my chest. This poor child. I definitely understand her grief. I still had days when the loss of my own parents was too much for me and I would burst into tears, sometimes with no warning.

“Oh sweetie. I am so sorry that your heart still hurts. I lost my parents when I was younger too. I wish I could say that it goes away, but I can’t”

“Does it ever get easier?” she mumbled, sniffling into my shirtwaist. 

“Sometimes it is easier. And other times it is like I just lost them. But I will tell you this,” I leaned back and made her look at me, “every day you will grow stronger from the loss. You will grow up and make them proud. I can see how determined you are to stay with your siblings. You are so brave to refuse to allow anyone to adopt just one of you. Mrs. Sheffield can see it too. That’s why she doesn’t push about adoption anymore. In just a few short years, you will be old enough to find a job or marry and then you can make a home for all of you.”

“Do you really think so?” she asked as she took a deep breath. Her sobbing had resulted in hiccups and she was trying to make them stop. As another hiccup racked her small frame, she began to giggle due to the loudness of the sound. I hugged her tightly once more and said, “I am sure. So sure, in fact, that if you want, you can come to Texas and live near me. Would you like that?”

She nodded her head and said “Maybe. I’m not sure. But I will definitely consider it”

Once she had calmed down completely, I left her alone and returned to my room to continue packing. Once the packing was completed, I laid down in my bed and whispered to the night, “Papa, Mama, I’m scared of this new adventure. What if this is a mistake? I have safety here. I have friends. I just want to make you proud of me. Two weeks on the stage is a long time. Can you ask God to keep me safe? I miss you both so much. I love you and think of you all of the time.” With that, I snuggled into my bed and began to drift off to sleep, knowing that in the morning, the next chapter of my life would begin.

Texas here I come.