Lyddie

Dear Lyddie,

The world have not come to an end yit. But we can stil hop. Meentime I hav hire you out to M. Cutler at the tavern and fer yr. brother to Bakers mill. […] Lv. at once you get this.

Yr. loving mother,

Mattie M. Worthen

[…] [Charlie] took the letter from [Lyddie’s] lap, and when she wiped her face and tried to smile, he grinned anxiously and pointed to their mother’s primitive spelling. “See, we can still hop.”

Lyddie laughed uncertainly. Her spelling was no better than her mother’s, so she did not really see the joke at first. But Charlie laughed, and so she began to laugh, though it was the kind of laughter that caught like briars in her chest and felt very much like pain.

“I was my own schoolmaster,” he said. “At first I only wanted to read the Bible so I could preach to my people. But”—he smiled again, showing his lovely, even teeth—“a little reading is an exceedingly dangerous thing.”

[…] “I couldn’t leave my home,” [Lyddie] said.

“No? And yet you did.”

“I had no choice,” she said hotly. “I was made to.”

“So many slaves,” he said softly.

“I ain’t a slave,” she said. […] “We own the land. We’re freemen of the state of Vermont.” He looked at her. “Well, my father is, or was, till he left, and my brother will be…” But Charlie was at school and living with strangers. She hated the man for making her think this way.

Lyddie wrote the brother. He was only in Cambridge—less than a day away by coach or train—but there was a three-week delay before he wrote to say that he was studying for his final examinations and would, perhaps, be able to come for a visit at the end of the term.

Betsy only laughed. “Well,” she said, “he’s our darling baby boy.” Then she fell to coughing. There was a red stain on her handkerchief.

“But you sent him all the way through that college of his.”

“Wouldn’t you do as much for your Charlie?”

“But Charlie is—” Lyddie was going to say “nice” and stopped herself just in time.

“Our parents are dead, and he’s the son and heir,” Betsy said as though that explained everything.

Dear Brother Charles,

I hope you are well. I am sorry to trouble you with sad news, but Uncle Judah come tonight to Lowell and brung Rachel to me. They have put our mother to the asylum at Brattleboro. Now they are thinking to sell the farm. You must go and stop them. You are the man of the family. Judah won’t pay me no mind. They got to listen to you. I got more than one hundred dollars to the det. Do not let them sell, Charlie. I beg you. I don't know what to do with Rachel. Children are not allowed in corporation house. If I can I will take her home, but I got to have a home to go to. It is up to you, Charlie […]

She could hardly keep her mind on her work. What was the use of it all anyway if the farm was gone?

She turned unbelieving from one man to the other, but they ignored her. She fought for words to counter the drift the interview had taken, but what could she say? She did not know what turpitude was. How could she deny something she did not even know existed? […]

She opened her mouth. They were both looking at her sadly, but sternly. In the silence, the battle had been lost.

Lyddie spent the night with Diana. Everyone was kind. Diana had her family at last. Then why had something snapped like a broken warp thread inside Lyddie’s soul? Wasn't she happy for Diana? Surely, surely she was—happy and greatly relieved. “You must write to Brigid and tell her you are fine, ey?” Lyddie said as they parted the next morning. “She can read now, and she worries.”