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Rebekah nodded. She understood the words, and understood the sadness, but didn’t quite understand the meaning behind what Mrs. Cheng said. She thought it best not to press her.

“So,” Mrs. Cheng said brightly. “Me and you. We need to make dress.”

She jerked the dress out of Rebekah’s lap and hobbled to the sewing machine.

“My little brother Thomas would love this machine.”

“I see.” She cut a thread and yanked the dress that was there before out of the way. She sat it on a chair, on top of many other dresses. Sadie’s dress was still on the table across the room.

“Um—”

“Watch how machine work.” Quicker than anything she’d ever seen, Mrs. Cheng sewed the hem of her wedding dress by pulling it under the needle and pushing a pedal with her tiny foot.

“I’ve never seen anything of the sort!” Rebekah looked at Mrs. Cheng. “I do not mean to be ungrateful, but it is a rule that we make our own.”

“Good girl to follow rule.” Mrs. Cheng nodded, a severe frown still on her face. “But you see, you follow rule. Dress already made.”

Her wrinkled face lifted into a wry grin. “Mrs. Cheng, she make it pretty.”

Rebekah chuckled. “I suppose there’s no harm in having a pretty wedding dress. Thank you, Mrs. Cheng.” Rebekah looked thoughtfully out the window and over the sea. “At least with you sewing it, I know it won’t fall off.”

“Oh goodness!” Mrs. Cheng smiled a sincere smile, revealing several missing teeth. She rocked back on her sewing stool and slapped her knee. “No, dress no fall off that Mrs. Cheng sew! The one Rebekah sew...”

Mrs. Cheng held up her hand and did a so-so motion. Then pointed at Rebekah and laughed.

Rebekah laughed too, knowing that the kind old woman was kidding. Anyone who would take care of girls dressed like Sadie, giving them discounts and trying to talk sense into them, so it sounded, and then take in someone like Rebekah and doctor her up with no knowledge of who she was, whatsoever—there was no meanness there. No. Only good-natured joking.

“I am honored to have your help, Mrs. Cheng. Thank you.”

“Honor, yes. Chinese and Ah-mitch. They know honor.”

Zip. She whisked the dress through again to reinforce the long line of stitches up the back to the buttons.

***

“Newspaper, Mrs. Cheng.” A young boy with a flat hat, like the one from the train depot, stood at the door.

“Leave it there. You look for your dime outside. Near Mrs. Cheng’s flowers.”

“What a polite young man,” Rebekah mused from her chair in the middle of the room. She felt helpless and lazy, but every time she tried to move or offered to help, she was rebuked.

“Good boy. Orphan, no parents.” Mrs. Cheng’s frown deepened as she studied the dress. “So I hide his dime to pay for paper. He gets to look for it. Gets to be young.” She glanced up at Rebekah, her black eyes twinkling. “To be young is a gift, Rebekah.”

Rebekah nodded and glanced over to where the young boy had left the paper. Left it, not flung it, but put it down neatly against the wall. She looked back at Mrs. Cheng, then back toward the paper with wide eyes. The headline screamed at Rebekah from the paper across the room.

November 14th. New York World reporter Nellie Bly successfully departs New York City in an attempt to surpass fictitious journey of Jules Verne's Phileas Fogg by traveling around world in less than 80 days.

“Oh no, Mrs. Cheng, we are too late.”

“Too late?”

Rebekah pointed at the paper. “The girl we were coming to find, another Amish girl, our friend Katie. She was traveling with that English woman.”

Mrs. Cheng glanced at the newspaper. “Yes, Nellie Bly. She left few minute ago from ship right outside Mrs. Cheng shop. Right before you fall down.”

“I see.” Rebekah stared into her lap and began to rock. “We were too late.” The tears began to track down her cheeks on their own. Before she could stop them, Rebekah was sobbing. “Katie’s gone.”

Mrs. Cheng came over and thumped her on the back with awkward thumps. “There. There. There.” Mrs. Cheng was smiling when Rebekah looked up at her. “What else to make dress? This one is done.”

Rebekah smiled through the tears. “Now I have to start on the dresses for my newehockers.”

“What that?”

“Maids to the bride.”

“Ah. How many?”

“Two.”

“I see.”

“Mrs. Cheng, thank you for your kindness. And for taking of me.” Rebekah sniffled and her words shook. “But I have to go find Joseph and Peter and tell them Katie is gone. So we can go home to Indiana.” She sucked in a sob. “Without her.”

Her eyes filled again and the old woman pulled Rebekah’s head to her stomach and held her. No doubt as she wanted to hold the daughters and granddaughters that she never had. “I am so sorry, dear. So sorry.”

Rebekah sucked in a breath and cried into Mrs. Cheng’s shirt. She wrapped her arms around the older woman, who had the heart of an Amish mother. “It be okay, child. It be okay.”

After she finished crying, and was all cried out, she felt empty. Empty, but comforted. She pulled back from Mrs. Cheng, who patted her on the head with a snaggle toothed smile.

Are sens

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