Free The Orchardist by Amanda Coplin

no longer existed, they were sure of that. You do not save the clothes of a person who has simply gone away.
    They laid the girl’s dress on the dining room table. They discussed where to put the other items—the girl’s boots among the man’s own in his closet, the laces of the baby booties tied and hanging from the same nail as the picture calendar—but in the end the dress laid out on the table was enough, they thought, to let him know they had seen his secret.
    It was just before dusk when he arrived home again. He had been to town. The girls were situated in their apricot tree, facing the cabin this time instead of looking out over the field. They wanted to see his reaction. He led the mule and wagon to the barn and then he was there a long time. It was full dusk when he crossed the grass to the cabin. There was a flare in the window as he lit the lantern.
    The door of the cabin stood open and they waited for the activity and the odor that accompanied the preparation of their evening meal. It did not come.
    Jane scratched her calf in the tree. They were both very hungry, and disappointed about the food. But it was worth it. Now he knew they were paying attention.

 

    A nd then there was a strange movement from deep inside Della, a sort of turning.
    It was morning. Jane, who had gone to vomit a little ways off, behind the outhouse beyond the shed, made her way back to Della now. The sight of Della in pain provoked Jane’s own sickness, and thinking that Della was suffering too from nausea—she was not—Jane gathered Della’s hair hanging over one shoulder and twisted it in her hand, and bent slightly, to support Della if she needed to retch. That movement—that gathering up of the hair in her fist, and leaning close—reminded Della of their mother, who did the same thing when they were sick as small children.
    Earlier, before the sun rose—or maybe it was still night, because the stars were out—Della woke on her back with a terrible tightening in her belly. Lay breathing shallowly until the pain was too great and she attempted to roll onto her side, but could not. She kicked Jane until Jane rose and finally realized Della’s trouble. Jane’s face looming above hers, concerned.
    What is it?
    I don’t know—
    The pain, instead of increasing throughout the day, waned. By evening she felt better than she had for a long time, clearheaded, even a little giddy, her body loose and limber as if she had run a great race.
    The woman, Caroline Middey, came into the orchard that afternoon. She and the man sat up on the porch now. The evening was not yet dark enough to warrant the lanterns.
    Caroline Middey had come into the orchard once before. She had walked in the orchard alone while the man worked elsewhere, and tried to get the girls to come to her. She called to them, even if she could not see them. She sensed they were near. She stalked the orchard, walking slowly, holding her skirts up out of the grass.
    You come to the cabin, she called, and let me have a look at you. Let me have a look at your babies. No one’s going to hurt you, here, there’s no need to be afraid—
    They would not come to her, but she had anticipated this and finally pulled from her front skirt pockets wrapped pieces of toffee, and called: I have candy here, I have toffee, I’ve got—let’s see—the hard kind you can suck, and I’ve got the soft kind, like a caramel, like a butter caramel. And at that Della broke out into a sweat—toffee!—and when she started forward, Jane grabbed her arm. They could see the woman from where they crouched in the grass. Finally Della broke free and came forward, came up quietly behind Caroline Middey so that the woman turned suddenly, and said, Oh! There you are—
    The two girls would not go into the cabin to be examined, and so Caroline Middey made them lie on a table—an enormous twine spool set on its end—in the shade at the side of the cabin. It was where the man sometimes worked on his