The All-True Travels and Adventures of Lidie Newton_ A Novel - Jane Smiley [28]
And then there was the question of usefulness. There was plenty of time, as the days passed in the ladies’ cabin, to observe the other women and their children and, as well, to dip into Miss Beecher’s book. One moment I would watch a mother’s agile fingers as she brushed and plaited her three daughters’ silky hair, never losing patience with the flyaway wisps that made me, from across the room, desire to yank them out of the child’s head in frustration; the next moment I would read: "At least twice in the twenty-four hours, the patient should be well covered, and fresh air freely admitted from out of doors. After this, if need be, the room should be restored to a proper temperature, by the aid of a fire. Bedding and clothing should be well aired, and frequently changed; as the exhalations from the body, in sickness, are peculiarly deleterious. Frequent ablutions of the whole body, are very useful...." I looked up. Here was the German girl, finishing off the sleeve of a child’s knitted jacket that she had begun just an hour before. I read: "In selecting carpets, for rooms much used, it is poor economy to buy cheap ones. Ingrain carpets, of close texture, and the three-ply carpets, are best for common use." My eyes drifted down the page. "... cannot be turned ....," "... black threads ... rotten ... ," "... begin to cut in the middle of a figure.... ," "... ball-stitch ..." Beside me, a mother sat with her little boy, reading from an alphabet book. Every second or two, she said in a low voice, "Robbie, pay attention to what I’m telling you, now. Don’t kick the chair runner. What is this letter? Well, then, what is this picture? Robbie, look at the book with Mama." Robbie said, "I’m hungry, Mama! Don’t you have a bit of something to eat? When will they have dinner?" My book fell closed, and when I opened it again, I read: "It is wise, therefore, for all persons to devise a general plan, which they will at least keep in view, and aim to accomplish, and by which, a proper proportion of time shall be secured, for all the duties of life." I was surrounded by all the useful things that I was unable to do, had until now never desired to do, but would soon be required to do. It was all very well to tell myself that Thomas had been apprised of my uselessness. He had seen what he wanted to see in me, just as I had in him.
And I who could run and swim and ride a horse and write a letter and walk any distance now languished half asleep in my chair, lulled, or perhaps numbed, by the book in my hand and the quiet activities all around me. Indoors! Indoors! Even in Kansas, no doubt, most of my life would be spent indoors, doing what Annie and Alice and Harriet and Beatrice had been doing all my life while I was outside. Here, indoors in this cabin, the curtains were mostly drawn, and I felt as though I were stifling. All around me, the others were getting on with their useful business, unaffected, while I was suffocating.
And then the bell rang for dinner, and everyone ran for the door.
It was hard traveling so late in the year, with the river so low. It seemed that the boat grounded on a sandbar every hour, day and night. There would be a jolt and a shudder, then yelling and running, then she was up and over, or they’d floated her back. Twice the passengers all unloaded— according to some, for fear of explosion, and according to others, simply to lighten the load. Stories of this wreck and that explosion and the other accidents that resulted in so many deaths and injuries abounded, but in spite of the horror and the dread, daily activities went on quite smoothly, as if only a real explosion could prove to passengers and crew that there could be an explosion. Only our actual slow progress up the