Chapter 11: The Underground School

17.

After the wagon left the town limits, I was still so sleepy I could barely open my eyes.

The wheels rumbled over the dirt road, the morning fog rolling over fields of corn and clover. “Mom, where are you taking me?”

My mom blinked. “To the safe house.”

“Huh?” I perked up. “Mom, wait—are there more people like us?”

…

After getting out of the wagon, in front of me was a very ordinary two-story house.

But once inside, the person who greeted me was actually Grandma Ruth, who’d been sent away the previous year.

That time, she’d accidentally broken the cross my grandma used for prayer.

I remember it clearly—my grandma was furious.

That cross had cost a hundred dollars.

In front of the living room, my grandma personally whipped her and wanted to have her sent to Cincinnati as a housemaid.

My mom intervened, even freeing her from service and letting her leave the household.

My grandma thought my mom was being disobedient and wanted to punish her, but when the story spread, everyone praised my mom’s kindness, so my grandma let it go.

Grandma Ruth was overjoyed to see me, kept exclaiming how much I’d grown.

She squeezed my hands and called me her little bean sprout. I was happy to see her too, but even more curious.

It felt as if she’d come alive.

When she was a servant at home, she always seemed gray and lifeless—not dirty, but as if her spirit was dimmed.

Now, still in plain cotton clothes, her whole being was bright and full of life.

Grandma Ruth shyly told me that after being sent away, no one would take her as a maid, and she had no skills.

My mom found her, gave her food, and taught her to read.

Now she could be a teacher and teach others.

She led me to the backyard, where the house had been converted into two classrooms.

One room was full of children learning to read, the other had an old teacher showing older kids how to weave.

I sidled up to my mom, raised my eyebrows, and whispered, “Agent Shimo, your underground work is thriving.”

My mom shook her head, helpless. “Thank you for the organization’s praise.”

I froze.

“Hahahahahaha!”

My sudden laughter startled my mom.

She glared at me and left me behind as she went into a side room.

I doubled over, the sound bouncing off the wooden floors, the air sweet with bread baking in the kitchen, kids’ laughter spilling out the windows, chalk dust floating in the sunlight. For the first time in a long while, I felt almost happy.