little boy, Stevie. He’s from the river too. I can’t just leave him here.” How am I gonna manage it? I know where Stevie sleeps, but getting him from the toddler room and bringing Fern and not letting anyone see us…
It doesn’t seem possible.
Even so, Silas being here makes me sure of myself. It makes me brave. I feel like I can do anything. I’ll find a way. I can’t leave Fern or Stevie here. They belong to the river. They belong to us. Mrs. Murphy and Miss Tann stole enough from me already. I want it back. I want to be Rill Foss again.
Before this is over, I’ll find all my sisters and my baby brother and bring them home to the Arcadia. That’s what I’ll do.
Silas reaches out, and his long, thin arms circle me. I lean toward him, and his cap tumbles off. His forehead rests against my cheek, his raven’s-wing hair tickling my face.
“I don’t want you to go back in there.” He slides a hand over my hair, soft and careful. My heart speeds up.
It’s all I can do not to bust through the fence right now. “It’s only one more day.”
“I’ll be here tomorrow night,” Silas promises.
He kisses me on the cheek. Something new shivers through me, and I close my eyes hard against the feeling.
Leaving him there is as hard as anything I ever did in my life. As I crawl off, he packs mud on the bars so nobody’ll see the fresh cuts in the metal. If one of the big boys happens to lean against the fence while they’re in their tunnel, I hope it doesn’t break.
I’m back to the house and up the stairs without even breathing again, it feels like. At the top, I check the hall and listen for sounds before starting around the railing where we line up for our baths. There’s nothing but moon shadows from the stairway window and sleep noises. One of the little kids talks in his dreams. I freeze, but then he goes quiet just as quick.
Only fifteen more steps and I’ll be back in my room again. I’ve made it. Nobody will know where I went. Tomorrow, it’ll be even easier now that I’ve done it once. James was right. It’s not that tough to get away with things here, if you’re smart.
I can fool all of them. The idea swells inside me. It makes me feel like I took something from them, something they stole that was mine. Power. I’ve got power now. When we’re safe on the Arcadia, the river carrying us far away from here, I’ll forget all about this place. I’ll never tell anybody what happened here. It’ll be like it never happened at all.
A bad dream with bad people in it.
I’m so caught in the idea, I step wrong. A floorboard creaks under my foot. I hold back a gasp, look down, then decide the best thing I can do is hurry on in case one of the workers shows up. If I’m in the bed, they won’t have any way to know who was—
I almost don’t see Mr. Riggs till I’m right on top of him. He’s coming out of the toddler room. He stumbles back, and so do I. His shoulder hits the wall, and he whispers, “Ooof.”
I turn to rush off, but he grabs me by a fistful of nightgown and hair. His big hand clamps over my mouth and nose. I smell sweat and whiskey, tobacco and coal ash. He bends my head back so far, I think, He’ll snap my neck right here. He’ll snap my neck and drop me down the stairs and say I fell. That’s how it ends….
I strain my eyes to see him. He looks around, tries to decide where he can take me. I can’t let him get me to the basement. If he does, I’m dead. I know it. Fern will come back tomorrow, and I won’t be here.
Checking the stairs, he wobbles on his feet. His boot comes down hard over my toe, and stars shoot across my eyes, and I moan. He clamps his hand harder, cutting off my air. I hear my backbone crack. I twist and push and try to get free, but he only crushes me tighter against him, lifting me off my feet and dragging me down the hall into the shadows by the bathroom door. His fingers fumble for the handle to open it. I whimper and struggle