Chapter 5: Of Trains and changes...

Aunt Maggie's wagon pulled up to the Cuba train station with plenty of time to spare. The train was expected at 9:45 and they had arrived by 8:25... so the trio went to a small cafe across the street from the depot. Marion was allowed the special treat of a doughnut and milk while Maggie and Grace each had a cup of coffee. The conversation between her aunt and mother was sad, quiet and yet hopeful. The obvious affection between the two women suddenly awakened in Marion a sudden "missing" of her Aunt Maggie, who had always been like a second mother to her and a guardian angel.

The last bit of their time together slipped away and they returned to the depot, Marion and Grace hugged Maggie tightly with heavy sighs on all sides. The two women hauled the meager suitcases out of the back of the wagon and set them on the platform. Maggie then climbed up into the seat of her wagon and turned the horses back towards Steelville while her sister-in-law and niece stood bravely awaiting the train's arrival.

Marion watched her aunt's wagon dwindle in size until it turned the corner some blocks away. She fought back tears, knowing that she had to be brave for her mother's sake and because Aunt Maggie had whispered, "Don't cry. Be the strong brave adventurer I've always known you to be!", in her ear.

The little girl squeezed her mother's hand and looked up into the face she loved so well. Grace smiled at her daughter and asked, "Are you scared honey?"

Marion thought about how to answer for a moment, "A little Mama, but I'm trying to be brave."

The mother hugged her daughter a little closer and said, "You're a good girl and that helps me to be brave too."

"Mama, what are Grandmother and Grandfather Whitney like?"

Grace paused at that inevitable question, but continued momentarily, "They really are good people, but when I was young we just didn't agree on some things. I think that will be different now."

Considering that, Marion asked a new question, "What is different now?"

Taken aback, the child's mother said, "Well I have you and your future to consider, before it was only mine. And your grandparents, your Aunt Maggie and I all agree on that."

"What kind of future, Mama?"

"Honey, that story is mostly yours to write, but I want you to have as many choices as possible."

"But did we really have to leave Steelville?"

"Yes, Marion, we did. If we stayed there, you would only have what I chose and none of the ones I threw away so many years ago."

The child suddenly jumped to another track, "Mama, do you think they will like me?"

Slightly confused, Grace asked, "Who sweetie?"

"Well, everybody... Grandmother and Grandfather Whitney, the kids at school... everybody..."

"I'm sure you will do just fine... and I am sure your grandparents will love you just as much as Granny and Gramps in Steelville did."

"Will I get to see Granny and Gramps again?"

"Of course love, there will be visits."

Marion dug the toe of her shoe into the dirt and stared intently at the ground, "I hope so."

However, the time for nerves and wistfulness was over as the train came easing up to the depot. In a rush, their bags were safely stowed in the rack over seats nicer than any the child had ever known, their tickets were checked by the conductor and they gliding towards the big city.

Chapter 4: Moving

4.

In 1927, when Marion turned 10, Grace finally decided that she could no longer make enough money in Steelville for her and Marion to have any kind of life. Grace also despaired of her daughter ever "getting out" of the small town that had trapped her when she was wooed there by Cyrus Snow so many years before. Grace's parents, Dora & Samuel Whitney, had never liked Cyrus, and had, in a manner, disowned their daughter when she married the man, but they always told their daughter that their door was open to her if she left him.

Grace was inordinately proud and bullheaded. Also very intelligent, she was, unfortunately at times, very aware of it. That, coupled with her pride and tenacity, led her into marriage with Cyrus. She ran off with the slick-tongued bastard, and then found herself mired in a situation beyond her worst imaginings. Still, however, only reaching the brink of disaster would bring any admission of error or request for aid.

Maggie Snow worried long about Grace & Marion and had long conferences with sister-in-law regarding their situation. Maggie had tried to get Grace to write to her parents in St. Louis since Cyrus' final departure, but she would possibly have had more luck arguing with a rock. However, once her sister-in-law saw how desperate the situation had really become, she wrote to Dora & Samuel for the first time in more years than she could remember.

The return missive from the Whitneys arrived promptly for 1927, full of welcome and anticipation for Grace and Marion's impending arrival. The most important item in the envelope, apart from $20, was a pair of train tickets from Cuba, MO to St. Louis Union Station, dated for Monday, May 3rd, just weeks after Marion's 10th birthday. The train left mid-morning, so they'd had to leave Steelville in the grey spring dawn to load up in Aunt Maggie's horsedrawn wagon.

Only having made the 8 mile journey to Cuba a few times in her short life, Marion's sense of adventure heightened somewhat, despite the wagon jouncing her brain around for nearly 2 1/2 hours. She experienced growing apprehension as the familiar slipped away behind her Aunt's wagon... every bird and tree and stream were dear to her, as were the cousins and grandparents she had grown up with. Too soon, all she had known was out of sight, but would never be out of her heart.

Vaguely trying to picture what was going to happen today and in the very near future, Marion knew a whirlwind of change was hers, to be sure. Travelling on a train, meeting grandparents of whom she had barely been aware, leaving behind her painting and dreaming in the library, as well as her wild wanderings in the woods and closed up houses around Steelville. Her whole body shook as she thought of closed up spaces, too many people, and feelings of suffocation and darkness swirling sickeningly around her. Marion let her mother and aunt think that the shaking was from the cool morning air while she tried to focus her mind on the adventure instead of her fear.