Free Broken Ground by Karen Halvorsen Schreck

official-looking men in suits and hats stride into the depot and take up posts outside the entrance to the train platforms. They are followed by two policemen, blackjacks drawn, leading perhaps thirty people. Two other policemen bring up the rear of this group. When an elderly couple falls behind, they prod them forward. There are men and women of all ages, boys and girls, babes in arms. They fall into an uneven line, all the while remaining strangely silent. Only a few murmur exchanges, and these are shared so sporadically that it takes me awhile to realize many are speaking Spanish. The people are well dressed, well groomed, and brown-skinned, not sunburned. Mexicans, I suppose they are, given the fact that this is California. Watching them, I can’t help but think of the circle of people I saw with Mother and Daddy late last spring, soon after my return to Alba. The people were gathered together in a field near the Thorne place. We heard the sound of their drums before we saw them dancing. It was Good Friday. We were driving to a nearby town where a church was presenting a reenactment of the Crucifixion. “Some kind of powwow,” Daddy said scornfully as we passed the gathering in the field. He blared the horn in an effort to disrupt their meeting. As we drove on, I watched out the rear window, unsettled by the dancing, the drums. The whole affair seemed of another time, another world altogether. When the gathering was finally out of sight, I sank back into my seat, vaguely comforted that I was me, not one of them.
    What would Miss Berger have thought of such comfort? What would she think about the comfort I’m feeling now? Whatever bad thing is going to happen is not going to happen to me after all . What would Miss Berger think of the line of people before me? I shiver, though the air is anything but cold, and sit down again on the bench.
    The people begin to shuffle toward the platform entrance. As they pass beneath the archway, the adults in the group hand slips of paper to the official-looking men, who make notations on thick documents clamped to clipboards. “Step on it!” a police officer occasionally snaps, or “ Vámonos! ” At this, some of the people start, casting anxious glances to either side or over their shoulders. “No dallying!” “Don’t waste time!” a police officer says. “Eyes forward.” Lot’s wife, turned to salt all because she looked back—the story from Genesis flashes through my mind. But this is no hurried flight from fire and brimstone. This—whatever it is—is conducted with practiced efficiency by the officiators and docile resignation by those officiated.
    The last people pass through the platform entrance, and porters soon follow, pushing trollies stacked with luggage, trunks, and crates. The group’s belongings, I gather. There are surprisingly few items for so many people.
    There’s a sharp whistle and the now-familiar screech of brakes against metal wheels. A train is approaching; there are its last gasps of steam. I glance at the clock on the wall and leap to my feet. The porter’s promised hour has come to pass. This must be the train that may— will —hold my suitcase. Maybe it’s the same train that will take these people away. But I don’t want to think about them now. All I want is my suitcase—retrieving it, and what’s inside: my clothes and toiletries, the photographs of Charlie and me, my wedding dress and veil, the bright quilt beneath which we slept. Find my suitcase and I’ll be so relieved that a late-night walk through this unfamiliar city will be a breeze. I have a map, after all. Finding a place to sleep—my dorm room, I hope—most likely waking a sleeping roommate I’ve never met . . . all this will seem no real challenge at all once my suitcase is in hand.
    I head toward the platform, intent on locating what’s left of my life.