Delia’s face went blank.
“The other girls don’t know it’s good that he did it. Wouldn’t the nice ladies tell us he hadn’t if it was bad? Wouldn’t they tell us? Wouldn’t they tell the girls it wasn’t true if it was bad?”
We never lie to them, of course. Although it would be easier to lie than tell the orphans the truths of their still-living relatives. Peter Kelley disappeared, with eyes sewn shut or wide open we didn’t know, so for Honora and Delia, there was no decision to make. If you don’t know the truth, there is nothing that is not true. We only just got the other girls back to bed. Honora seemed totally unfazed.
She does tell stories, but they are not exactly lies. Her eyes go so black they absorb light as she channels stories that no child could invent. Her chubby work-worn hands gesture to embellish the tales. Of her father colonizing India wearing tan clothes and a hat so hard she could stand on it without hurting it. Of the brown-skinned boy her father will bring her to marry when he stops back in Boston to retrieve her. Of how she and Delia, their two elder sisters, their living grandfather, and their mother will all return to Ireland once the adults get their affairs sorted. Of her mother dining in Kensington Palace at Queen Victoria’s table, not as a servant, but as a guest, an ambassador to both Ireland and India.
Her parents’ whereabouts are unknown. We have no knowledge of the elder sisters. After a few weeks, we could even doubt that Delia was related to Honora. Delia is a few years older, though we don’t know how many, and her face is so much fairer, her hair so much thinner, here eyes so light and luminous one wonders if she can see anything at all, if she doesn’t just sees through everything. Her mind wanders, and we often find her having conversations with no one in the stairwells. It is easy to forget that those girls were associated at all.
All the girls in the asylum love her, too young and so eager to believe her to notice the fantasies’ inconsistencies. Honora always stands amid a gaggle of admirers once her chores are finished—and although this isn’t often, there is never an open moment when she is alone. She gives them hope. False hope, but hope nonetheless. It seems harmless.
The women at Boston Female Asylum love Honora, too. We even gave her the nickname Nora. No matter what the task, she works at it till it is completed and satisfactory. True, her calling us to observe her progress grows tiresome, but with just a little praise, she will do anything, even to the point of asking for more chores. If one of us arrives to admire her work, she is the happiest girl. She takes on chores no other girls want to do, which makes them all like her even more.
Only once, when one of the new staff chastised her for needing constant approval, did Honora behave badly, spreading slander about one of the older orphans which we then toiled to dispel and diminish. We should not tell you what she said, as that would only perpetuate the lie—and this was a lie, no probability of trueness, just a childish vendetta to scare the other wards from being friends with the girl. Nora was punished with the paddle, but she seemed to learn her lesson about the importance of a girl’s reputation. After one of us consoled her, she returned to her chores, and by the end of the day, she was back to her normal garrulous self. That’s all we know about her.
Nora is a hardworking girl. She will be a blessing to anyone’s home.
The faces of the indentured wards and their families stared up from the scrapbook at Mrs. Ann C. Toppan. All were in the fashion of early photographs, each young, expressionless face a shade of the one before it. She waited in the parlor office of the Boston Female Asylum on a blush velvet sofa. Though it was obviously inferior to her own, the décor impressed her, and the service of the ward who let her in—though much older and more beautiful than she had anticipated—overmatched her expectations as well. The girl reentered the parlor office with a tray of tea and cookies and placed it by the scrapbook on the coffee table. “Cream and sugar, madam?” the ward asked as she streamed tea into the cup. Mrs. Toppan noted the arc of the liquid, how not a drop was spared, how the girl lifted the pot with a strong wrist, from the shoulder, and she straightened her mouth when she replied, “No. Thank you.”
The ward bobbed a quick curtsy, asked if she could provide Mrs. Toppan with anything while she waited, and then exited with imperceptible footsteps to find the matron.
Mrs. Toppan studied the parlor while she waited, and studied the dress of the families in the photographs. They were always significantly more indulgent than that of their wards’ plain maid dress, and she decided that she was in good company among them when the thin-drawn countenance of the matron entered. Her dress was of low-quality gray cotton, unfashionably practical, but pressed and clean as a woman of her position would require. Mrs. Toppan, Matron Greene noticed, was far overdressed for the occasion, which in her experience meant overcompensation, that she needed to appear wealthier than she actually was.
“Mrs. Toppan, so lovely to have you in our residence. I hope you’ve found the service amenable. I’m Matron Greene, and I see you’ve met Fiona.” The women pinched their fingertips together.
“Yes, she’s much older than I thought she would be.” Mrs. Toppan was not in the habit of hedging her criticisms among her inferiors, especially not those meant to serve her.
“Fiona is one of our eldest wards. She has not been indentured, and she will be emancipated next month.” She crossed opposite the mahogany coffee table and perched rigid on the edge of a wingback chair. “Are you familiar with the Boston Female Asylum, Mrs. Toppan? May I tell you about our mission?” Mrs. Toppan nodded once for her to continue. “When Reverend and Mrs. Stillman founded our asylum in 1799, we were refuge only to those girls who had neither father nor mother, but since then, we have opened our doors to any suffering child—”
“Pardon, Mrs. Greene—”
“Matron Greene.”
Mrs. Toppan paused, taken aback, and waited for Matron Greene to sputter an apology which Mrs. Toppan would begrudgingly accept. When Matron Greene offered none, Mrs. Toppan continued, quite stern. “I was led to believe that all your wards were parentless. I do not care to deal with parents interfering with the way we run our home.”
Matron Greene turned up the corners of her mouth in a gesture meant to reassure, but the rest of her face did not change. Instead it looked as if someone had briefly smeared her portrait. “For your purposes, indeed the children are parentless. Each parent signs a form of surrender in which they relinquish all right and claim to their daughter. They promise with their signature that they will not interfere with the management of her in any respect whatsoever. It is in every way as if the parents do not exist.”
Mrs. Toppan laughed. “I didn’t know their parents could read. How could you be sure they understood what they are signing?”
Matron Greene’s face remained motionless for she was used to women like Mrs. Toppan, once of significant means and now unsettled in their class because of industry, widowhood, or some such thing that threatened their unseating. Matron Greene did not sympathize with such women. She guarded her girls against them: their insecurities made them cruel. She continued her explanation without flourish: “I assure you that we take very disciplined precautions to ensure that each parent understands the requirements of surrender. If they cannot write their own signature, we help them leave their mark.
“Each girl under our care at the Boston Female Asylum receives traditional education only as far as is necessary for her class. Most of their education is in the skills of homemaking; sewing, knitting, cooking, mending, laundering, all the necessary housekeeping skills. When each girl turns eleven, we do our best to place them into homes that will treat them kindly.”