The Star Garden by Nancy E. Turner

squeal of alarm. “Wait!” Blessing shouted. “Wait, Aunt Sarah!”
    I stopped the horse and turned to see her. “Was there something we forgot?”
    “Are you going to leave me here?”
    “Well, ye
s.
You said you wanted to go.”
    There was panic in her voice. It came out a shriek. “You can’t leave me here to wait all alone. I’m a little girl!”
    “Well, if you’re leaving, I’ve got to go tell your poppy and brothers. They’ll be awfully sad, of course.” I gave a great sigh. “Maybe he’ll find another girl someday who wears a red cape and wants to hear the story.”
    “He can’t do that.”
    “Oh, well,” I said. “He is already so sad, with Mommy up in heaven and all, having to lose you too will just make him cry day and night. Maybe I’ll read ‘Little Red Riding Hood’ to
him,
so he’ll remember you before you left him.”
    “I wouldn’t leave him! Poppy needs me.”
    I turned the buggy around. Blessing stood at the edge of the platform. A train whistle howled from the west; the evening Santa Fe was pulling into town. “He needs you more than ever,” I said, “but you want to leave. He’s too sad right now to tell you to behave yourself. He doesn’t scold you or paddle you when you’re naughty because he misses your mommy so much. He might forget that underneath the tantrums you can be a good girl. Who is going to remind him of how good you can be, if you aren’t there? Why, he might keep crying until he’s old.”
    She put her fists into her eyes and rubbed, crying loudly. “I want my mommy,” she crooned between sobs.
    I got out of the rig and went to her, kneeling. “Blessing, Mommy can’t be here. She’s looking down from heaven, hoping you’ll help her take care of Poppy. She’d want you to come home.”
    Suddenly, she threw her arms around my neck, nearly sending me sprawling on the platform. “I want my poppy. Mommy needs me to be with Poppy.”
    “Yes, she does,” I said. Tears brimmed over in my own eyes. “Shall we go now?” The air began to hum with the low rumble of the train approaching. “Train’s almost here. You could get on it.”
    “No!” She crushed my neck. “Don’t
let
me go away. I want my poppy.”
    I picked her up and sat her in the buggy, her valise at her feet. We drove back to the house, and the whole way there, Blessing nestled against me, sniffling and whimpering. Soon as we got to the yard, she called her papa, and hopped down so fast when she saw him I had to brake hard and haul back on the line for fear of running over her.
    I went to Harland, who looked exhausted. He patted Blessing’s head as she clung to his knees. He said, “Oh, Sarah, there you are. Can you please help me and watch her for a bit? Just do something with her to keep her from underfoot.”
    “She was running away from home,” I said.
    He stopped short. “Running away? To where?” He picked her up.
    Blessing said, “To find Mommy. But Aunt Sarah said you’d have to read ‘Red Riding Hood’ to someone else because I was gone away. So I corned home.”
    “You corned home?” he said. Harland looked over her head at me.
    I said, “She was at the train depot. Fixing to get on the seven-thirty to Lordsburg.”
    “You need me, don’t you, Poppy?” Blessing asked.
    He looked puzzled and sad. “Yes, of course.”
    “Where’s Mommy?”
    Harland shuddered. “Go in the house, precious. Be a good girl. Find Rachel, and play with her. Go upstairs and … play. Wait until I can tell you the story again.”
    She went. I handed him the valise. “Here’s what she was taking,” I said. “She may try this again. I think she wants to believe she can find her mother, so much that it might happen. Like a child sitting on a rug waiting for it to fly like a magic carpet.”
    My brother scratched his head. “I’m making a mistake, aren’t I? I can’t do this without you.”
    I forced myself to say, “Yes you can. This moving commotion will be over. You’ll have