Far From Home Read Online Free Page A

new clothes on ’em. Otherwise, learning t’ings I don’t need to know is a waste of good earnin’ time.”
    A woman, wrapped in a torn blanket, lay on a sack mattress on a frame beside a wall. A hole in one of her knitted leggings showed a bit of scabby, white leg above a bandaged foot. She was so thin and old-looking that wrinkles seemed to have fallen out of her face into her neck. When she moved to sit up, the girls noticed spots on her face.
    â€œShe’s going to die soon,” Cora whispered.
    â€œHow do you know?” Clarissa whispered back.
    â€œYou can tell by looking at her face. It’s started to spoil – gone mildewy.”
    â€œPeople’s faces don’t spoil.”
    Cora shrugged, and the woman who had let them in asked sharply, “Don’t der mistresses at dat cracker box tell yers dat whisperin’ is der same as crackin’ lies?”
    â€œBut we’re not telling lies!” Clarissa insisted.
    â€œThen speak it out.”
    The girls looked at each other. Cora said quickly, “We gotta go.”
    â€œYes,” Clarissa added, “we had better be going. Thanks for letting us get warm.” She moved across the hard clay floor. Cora quickly opened the door, letting in a blow of cold, fresh air.
    The woman put her hand on Clarissa’s shoulder. “Sure, you stepped over der back stock of a gun. You better step right back or ’twill be bad luck in yer days ahead.”
    â€œâ€™Tis best not to leave der gun on der floor,” the old man called as Clarissa lifted her crutches to step back over the gun and go around it.
    â€œDat it is, den,” the woman said, nodding; she glared at the man. She reached down and picked up the gun.
    Clarissa had heard that the woman was given to charming. She turned back and asked impulsively, “Can you charm someone’s life so it can be as they want it to be?”
    The woman’s sharp eyes lifted, seeming to travel. Then she turned and looked at Clarissa. “Take a piece of bark from a tree and carve yer wish in it, then leave it under yer bed. But never expect anything to be exactly.”
    Clarissa nodded. “We may come back again.”
    â€œSo do,” the woman answered with a yellow-toothed smile. From the stool the man called after them: “ Meeami Abashish .”
    Cora called back, “Goodbye for a little while to you, too.”
    The snow had stopped but the sky was low and grey. Clarissa was happy to be moving away from a home so different from the large, tidy orphanage.
    The girls turned towards the cold breath of the harbour. The Prospero had sailed as far away as Boston, and was now sitting out in St. Anthony harbour, alight from stem to stern. Along with mail, it had brought passengers. Some were still on the boat, looking over the rail watching barrels of flour, molasses and oil winched down to smaller boats.
    Clarissa wished she would get her own letter from her real home in Humbermouth. Instead, letters asking about her were always addressed to the headmistress.
    As she swung her legs up the orphanage steps, Clarissa almost fell on her face. She was now in as much of a rush as Cora to get inside the orphanage and up the stairs before Missus Frances asked them where they had been, and punished them for not staying on the grounds as they were supposed to do – except on church and school days. The mistress must never know the girls had been in a shack where the man likely had no wages and the children likely carried lice – and worse.
    Cora rushed on ahead while Clarissa regained her footing. She had to get upstairs and wash before supper, or there might not be any food for her. Cora was on her way down the stairs to the dining room when Clarissa left the bath and toilet room, which Miss Elizabeth called a lobby.
    Clarissa was relieved to get downstairs and hobble into the dining room before the last bell rang. Looking over at the table of