A Girl Called Samson (3)

“Sylvanus did not tell us you were so grown. You are so tall for ten and already a young woman.”

I nodded but did not smile. I expect I looked rather fierce too, though I was simply afraid. She introduced me to her sons, oldest to youngest. Nathaniel, Jacob, and Benjamin were eighteen, seventeen, and sixteen. All three were midheight and slim with dark hair and freckled noses, which they wrinkled at me. I don’t know what they were expecting, but I was clearly not it. Elijah was heavier set with lighter hair and an easier smile. He was fourteen, and thirteen-year-old Edward was his mirror image, as if Mrs. Thomas had birthed her sons in sets, whether they were born at the same time or not.

Twelve-year-old Francis and Phineas were actual twins, and the dark hair and sparer frames of their older brothers reemerged with them. I was taller than both, and the one named Phineas scowled when his mother cooed over my height. David and Daniel were twins as well, and ten like me, with curly brown mops that needed grooming. I was a sight taller than them too.

Jeremiah was the youngest, at six, and the only one who didn’t seem to have a double. I was hopeful, for Mrs. Thomas’s sake, that the six years after Jeremiah meant she wouldn’t be having any more.

“We will try not to overwhelm you, Deborah, though we are very excited to have you here. It will be good to have another female in the house. You will help civilize my sons.”

Someone snorted at that, though I could not be sure who. Mrs. Thomas turned and looped her arm through Reverend Conant’s and announced that supper was ready.

“Wash and come inside, boys. Deborah, bring your things. I will show you where you’ll sleep.”

Mrs. Thomas turned her attention to Reverend Conant, and they walked into the house, chatting like old friends. Deacon Thomas was already leading the horse to the trough, and I hoisted my satchel, hiked my sagging stockings, and prepared to follow. The Thomas boys had fallen into quiet conference, and I froze, my back toward them, straining to hear.

“She’s plain as a fence post.”

“Shaped like one too.”

“And her hair is the color of straw.” Whoever was speaking snickered. “Maybe she could stand in the field and scare away the birds.”

“Her eyes are pretty. I don’t think I’ve ever seen eyes like hers.”

“They’re creepy! We’ll have to set up a watch each night, to keep her from slaying us all in our beds.”

I laughed at that, the bark of mirth surprising us all, and I turned to flash a wicked grin in their direction. Better they fear me than dismiss me.

“Her teeth are good,” someone muttered, and I laughed again.

“She’s downright peculiar,” the oldest brother said, but the boy named Phineas had begun laughing too, and one by one, the others joined him.



I did not civilize the boys.

It might even be said that they radicalized me.

They slept in the big loft above the great room in berths built into the slope of the roof. Only David and Daniel, the youngest set of twins, slept in a regular bed, and it was hardly big enough for the two of them. They slept with their heads on opposite ends, their feet tickling each other’s noses.

I was given a room of my own. It was but a closet, separated from the kitchen by a thin wall and a door, but it was big enough to hold a narrow berth, a pair of drawers, and a table a foot deep and two feet wide. And it was mine. I had my own bed, my own space. Being a female in a house full of sons had its benefits, even if one occupied the position of servant.

In the early days, the Thomas brothers kept their distance, eyeing me like I was a thief or a leper. It was Jeremiah, the littlest one, who warmed to me first. Perhaps it was that we were both loose ends, but he latched on to me quickly and made me his cohort. We were even born on the same day. I turned eleven the day he turned seven, and Jeremiah took that as a sign.

“Will you be my twin, Deborah?” Jeremiah asked, looking up at me with mournful eyes. “I have no one.”

I laughed. “You have nine brothers, Jeremiah.”

“But I’m the runt. I have no one who belongs to me. And you don’t even have a ma or a pa or sisters and brothers.”

“I do . . . somewhere.”

“Well, what good is that?”

“Not much good, Jerry. Not much,” I agreed, and my heart was oddly lighter for speaking the truth of it.

“So you can be my twin.”

“And what do twins do?”

“A twin is the person you love most. Do you think you could love me most?”

“That will be easy.”

“It will?” His toothy smile made my heart swell.

“It will.”

“I love Ma an awful lot, but loving Ma is kinda like loving God. She’s not really a person.”

“Jeremiah!” I gasped. “She is too.”

“I just mean . . . that she belongs to all of us. I want someone who just belongs to me,” he repeated.

“All right. But I will try to love your brothers too, because that is what Reverend Conant says I must do.”

“Even Nathaniel?” He looked doubtful. “And Phineas? He’s mean. He told you no man would ever have you.”

“No man will ever have me because I won’t have him. And I won’t need him.”

“I’ll have you, Deborah.”