Chapter 1 - Trout

Eloise Thinker had to be the strangest girl I ever met. For starters, Eloise Thinker wasn't her real name. It was Eloise Tenker , she just wanted us to call her that. And that was just the start.



When I first met her, it was June 14, 1861, about two months after the start of the war. I was living in a boarding school then, in Baltimore, Maryland. My mother and father sent me there a year before from Washington D.C. because of all the hints of war springing up. Needless to say, they were worried the next year. As you may know, Maryland was, as some call it, a boarder state. It was right in the middle of the country, and many people with different ideas about the war lived side by side.



There was plenty of blood shed, so many people with opposing view points, crammed in one place was just calling for trouble. The owner of a grocery store where the school did much of it's shopping was killed by a confederate bar keeper for selling pipe tobacco to men who were joining the union army. Like-wise, the grocer's kin killed the barkeeper's brother. And then the barkeeper's family killed one of them, and so on. It was very difficult times.



I myself was part of this madness. My mother and father themselves were abolitionists (although they thought this war was pure nonsense), so I grew up with those teachings. I was the president of the `abolitionist club' in school (which had to be kept secret, because the headmistress didn't believe clubs to be lady-like). We didn't do much more then talk over tea, but we sometimes had fundraisers to help the Union Army.



Sadly, we never really got that far, since there was only four of us: Annabelle Thomson (me), meek, little Nancy Pringof, Susan Meriot (well, that's just what the school, and everyone not in the club knew her by. Her real name was Channa Levitsky, but she feared it would reveal she was a Jew, and let's just say, that was not safe), and last, but defiantly not least, intelligent Mary Markes.



The other girls consisted of southern-sympathizers, and girls to scared to join. But we made do with what we had. We knitted mittens, and when that failed (Only Mary could knit something that didn't resemble a blob) we collected food; nobody felt like donating. Our next attempt was to knit blankets. We were mildly successful, and were able to donate six to the army.



It was five days before Eloise appeared when we were thinking about what to do next. We were in mine and Channa's quarters. Mary sighed, and plopped down on my bed, which was a revolting shade of green. I detested the color green anyway, but this was particularly bad, a cross between vomit and olives. I would have picked a nice violet, but they didn't ask for my opinion, did they? Anyway, Mary sighed again and looked at us. “Is there ANY ideas on what to do next?” she asked us. When only silence replied, she slapped her face.



“Lordy, lordy. We'll never make a difference this way, will we?” Channa yelled `Aye Aye', earning a glare from Mary. We thought for a couple of minutes, when Nancy shyly looked up and said “ What if we were to…um…what was the word….Collect! That's it! What if we were to collect old rags and such so someone could sew them coats…Or such…” She quickly looked down. All was silent for a moment, till I broke it by saying “That's a great idea Nancy! I heard the soldiers are always cold!” Everyone smiled and it was unanimous: We would collect material to be made into coats! We were very excited, to say the least.



Easier said then done. None of us were part of any sewing circles, and if we were, the scraps used were carefully checked for some reason, none of us ever knew why. Mary and me tried stealing some rags from the kitchen, but we were only able to steal three (we were a bit too cautious) and only one of them was fit enough to be sewn. On the third day of our rag crusade, we had in our stock: 2 rags, a piece of a felt rose, a yellow ribbon, and a barely used handkerchief; our raid wasn't all that successful.



We sighed, and recounted our stock. It seemed even more pitiful.

“Cheer up! It's only the third day!” Channa smiled. You could hear the disappointment spilling off her words. Her smile fell when I gave her one of my famous `you're insane' looks. She sighed and joined us in our moping.

“Alright, alright, it'll take a miracle for us to accomplish anything.”



That miracle came on a rainy afternoon on June 19. We four girls were in the parlor, playing cards, when one of the teachers, Mrs. Pofot, a particularly stingy teacher of music, came up to us with another girl following her. Mrs. Pofot sniffed, as if testing if the air surrounding us was brimming with unladylike behavior (we were playing cards) and tapped the table for our attention, which she had already won.



“You should be pleased to know we have a new arrival at Pixfox's School for Young Ladies. She stands before you now, so please give her you undivided attention. We stared. This girl had ginger colored hair held in a bun, blue eyes, and a big grin plastered on her face. This alone was strange. Most girls already had their shoulder's sagging and long frowns on their faces when they arrived. But what she said was even stranger.



“Mrs. Low, of city Cherryhow, didn't know how, to eat a…Eat a… Oh what was it, I'm sorry you'll have to give me a minute to remember…” She grumbled, her grin turning into a tight frown. Mrs. Pofot didn't look to interested in what Mrs. Lou couldn't eat.

“Ms. Tenker, I need to leave now. Now girls, please show young Eloise (We noticed just then at how young she looked, probably only 16 or 17. We were all 18) around the school, and no filling her head with notions!” She almost yelled. She glared at us one more time, then stomped off.

“So…Eloise was it? Where are you fr-“ Mary was stopped right in the middle when Eloise giggled and exclaimed “ Trout! That was it!”

You are not authorized to comment here. Your must be registered and logged in to comment