“I should be helpin',” Lizbeth suddenly said. “I s'pose you're plannin' to fill the table with food.”
“There'll be plenty,” I assured her. “With what the Posts brought and your father's ham. But I'll see to it. You stay here with your father.” I turned to George with a question, but his eyes were so stormy strange, I wasn't sure he'd hear me. “Will Rorey expect her cake today, Mr. Hammond, or tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow.” He breathed a heavy sigh. “I 'preciate you bein' willin' t' make it, Mrs. Wortham, even if I didn't say so before. Lizbeth, you need to be 'bout helpin' her. That's the thing to do, even if she says she don't need it. You be good as gold for her, just like you always been for me an' your mama.”
“Yes, sir.” Lizbeth was looking at me, her hand still on her locket.
“Keep the watch back now for Sam,” he told her again. “Till he's good an' ready for it. You'll know when that is.”
“Yes, Pa.” She turned and walked away into the kitchen because she knew it was expected of her. And I just stood there looking George in the eye, and him looking right back. I wanted to reprove him. I wanted to tell him exactly how I felt about him worrying Lizbeth so. But I couldn't say a word. Finally I just turned my head to the pastor, and he gave a solemn, understanding nod.
No wonder she thought he didn't want them. He hadn't said a word about taking them back home. Now that he'd fulfilled his obligation to Wilametta, it was almost as if he believed he could just turn his back on them and walk away.
Lizbeth was cutting sweet potatoes with her head down. I knew she was trying hard not to cry. “My mama's only necklace,” she told me.
“It was good of your father to give it to you.”
“It weren't good about the watch. That was Mama's pa's watch that he wanted kep' with his children. Pa knows he ain't got no business keepin' it, 'less he stays with us, an' no reason not to keep it, 'less he's fixin' to leave.”
“Now, Lizbeth, it's natural to pass things along as soon as the next generation is old enough to appreciate them, and you certainly are.” But my words had a hollow sort of sound, even to me.
“You know what Sam said?” she asked me.
“No.”
“He said we can't make Pa do nothin'. Not have us home nor stay around nor nothin' else. We gotta jus' let him do what he's gonna do and make the most of it.”
“I suppose he's right up to a point. But your father does love you. I expect that, given time, he'll make the right choice.”
“Sure,” she agreed. “To his mind. But his mind ain't thinkin' like yours.”
As we got food on the table, Emma's favorite Scripture floated through my mind.
“To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”
So many times she'd quoted those words to me!
“A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted.”
She'd been so careful to let me know what those passages meant to her, as if she were a pansy or something, plucked up by God's gentle hands and added to a flower garden in heaven. But while everybody filled their plates with that fine dinner, I couldn't help but consider one of the passages that came next:
“A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance⦔
Nobody was dancing here. Nobody was laughing, though they'd had a fair enough time trying out the sleds. Most of the kids were eating better now, and at least that was a start. Maybe they would laugh before long.
And George was seeming suddenly more cheerful, much to my relief. He ate heartily too, and just seeing him seem so nearly like himself was putting all the children at greater ease. Except maybe Lizbeth. She seemed genuinely surprised when he accepted Willy's challenge of a game of checkers.
“Pa's doin' better,” Kirk told me a bit later in the day. “Reckon we'll go over home tonight?”
“I don't know,” I told him. “You all can stay here if you like. Him too.”
“Nah. Got the chores to think about.”
Harry and Bert were busy throwing their cloth balls up and down the stairs to each other. Franky had moved from Samuel's side to his father's. Rorey and Sarah were sitting under the wall of paper angels, rocking their babies to sleep. I sat down in the kitchen for a minute, feeling numb on my feet.
“Wish we could stay longer,” Juanita told me. “You could use the help.”
“You have to go?” The news was dismaying.
“We promised Oltmeiers we'd stop in tonight. Better to go before dark.”
“Well, you've been so much help. A godsend.”
“That's what I think of you.”
Strange to hear her say such a thing. I'd been wondering what they must think of me, with the attitude I'd had.
“You've been my honest-to-goodness friend, Julia, when some of the ladies of the church seemed afraid to be that. You were pure blessing to Emma too. She told me. And now, helping Georgeâ”
“I'm not helping George,” I blurted without thinking. “I'm helping his kids.” Immediately I regretted opening my mouth.
“Now, Juli, it comes out about the same, doesn't it?”
“Yes. And I'm sorry. But you ought to know, I guess, that I'm not so good as you think I am. It's too much that he doesn't even try.”
“Maybe he's trying, in his own way. It takes time, sometimes, settling everything in your heart when hard things happen.”
“Well, he's had time to think, that's for sure. But we haven't. Not without a hundred other things going on around us. Juanita, I just want to sit in the quiet and think on Emma a little, if that doesn't sound silly.”
“Oh, Juli, I know.” She reached out and took my hand.
“She used to talk to the Lord like she could see clear to heaven or like he was standing right at her elbow or something. I'm needing that. Lately he seems so far away. And I've come close to being too tired to care.”
“It'll get better. George knows he can't just keep leaving it all on you. Don't feel guilty about sending them home when you get the chance. You made it, Juli. And they'll make it too.”
I'd made it, losing my mother young. Yes, they'd make it too, though I was not much comforted by her words.
Samuel went out to hitch the horse to the sleigh, and Pastor took the time to speak with George. “Just try,” I heard him say. “Give the hand of the Lord a chance.”
“He don't need nothin' from me,” George replied stubbornly. “He's the one ain't give us much a chance, seems to me.”
“You know what I'm saying,” Pastor persisted. “Trust him. Believe he'll provide for you and the children andâ”
“Right fine bit a' Christmas they've had,” George interrupted.
“Yes. And God has plans to take care of all of you beyond this.”
“He can get to doin' it, then.”
Pastor was quieted a moment by George's embittered words. When he spoke again, his words were quiet. “He's available to you. But it's not all on him. You're their father, and you'll have to do your part. Your kids need you to do what's right by them. They need to know they'll be taken care of.”
“They will be,” George promised. “I been doin' plenty a' thinkin' on it, an' I'll do the best I can for 'em. You got my word.”
I sucked in my breath, hoping he meant those words as much as he seemed to.
“We have to be going,” Pastor was telling him. “But we'll be looking in on you again in a few days.”
George nodded his head and shook the pastor's hand. I gave Juanita a hug. “It'll be all right,” she whispered in my ear. “He's going to be okay.”
But as soon as Pastor and Juanita left, George was looking just as gloomy as he had a while before. “Be better t' have the kids here another night,” he told me. “Seein's it's Rorey's birthday tomorrow an' you're bein' so good as to fix the cake. No sense walkin' 'em over an' back in the cold.”
“We could bring the cake to you there,” I offered.
“Oh no. Rorey's enjoyin' bein' with yer little Sarah, anyhow. That's the kinda birthday she'd want.”
I didn't feel like arguing, though I could almost shake him silly for going back on his word so soon. How could it be best for the kids to keep on staying with us and not go home? It just left them wondering if they really had a home anymore. “After a birthday dinner, then,” I told him, “you need to take them all back. It's hard on them, missing their own house.”
“Ain't nothin' 'bout that to miss,” he maintained. “Nothing but their mama, an' there ain't no help for that.”
He started to go. He would have gone. But Samuel stopped him when he went to put on his coat. “It's still Christmas,” he told George. “And tomorrow's like a holiday for your family too. If you want the kids to stay for it, then you ought to stay and keep the day along with them. That's the way it should be. So long as they're here, George, I want you here too.”
He obviously wasn't happy with that. “You're doin' fine,” he told us. “Better'n I could do.”
“No. We can't replace you.” Samuel was adamant. “And we won't.”
George didn't make any effort to reply to that. But he stayed. He sat in the corner by the fireplace hearth and watched the boys in one checkers game after another. He let Berty sit on his lap for a little while, and I was glad of it. But Berty went to Joe when he needed the outhouse, to me when he wanted a drink, and to Lizbeth when he started to get tired.
We made popcorn. We read the beginning of
Pilgrim's Progress
out loud, up to the point where Pliable abandons the truth at the Slough of Despond.
“That's the most tomfoolinest story I ever heard,” George complained.
“I think it's sorta wise,” said Lizbeth, surprising me. “It shows pretty plain that we hadn't ought to just quit and go back when things gets hard.”
George looked at her. “What do you know about it? That Christian fellow's as much the fool as t'other one, goin' off on some journey without his wife when she didn't even want him to go!”
“He had to, Pa!” Franky added. “He couldn't help it if she wouldn't go! Besides, it don't mean a real journey, like going up to Belle Rive or somewhere.”
Franky looked at me as if he were hoping for verification. And I was even more amazed at him than I was at Lizbeth. How could an eight-year-old who couldn't read have such a grasp of John Bunyan's sometimes difficult wording? To my astonishment, Franky continued.
“It just means the kinda stuff that happens when we're doin' what we're suppose to. Right, Mrs. Wortham? All a' that journey stuff might a' been goin' on and him still in the very same house as his wife the whole time.”
“That's a bunch a' baloney!” Kirk declared. “It plain said he was out across the field, didn't it? You're jus' ignorant!”
Not wanting to take sides, I tried to be as gentle as I could. “Now, we could consider you both to be right. It does say he was walking in the fields and then fell into a bog. But it's also true that the whole journey represents our Christian walk, whether we leave our houses or not. The author says that too, in his apology at the beginning.”
“I never heard a' nobody apologizin' for his book,” Willy said. “If he thought it was so bad, why'd he write it?”
I almost laughed. “Not an apology like saying you're sorry. It means an explanation, a defense. His book isn't bad at all. It's helped a lot of people for hundreds of years.”
George shook his head. “Don't much see how them crazy kind a' words can help anybody.”
“It's Old English.”
“I'm not old,” Rorey said quickly. “I guess that's why I don't unnerstand it.”
Several other children nodded in agreement. But not Franky or Lizbeth.
“Can't we read some more?” Franky asked timidly.
“No!” Harry protested.
“I'll tell you what. It is a little hard for children to grasp.” I glanced at Franky, who truly looked puzzled. “I'll read something else now and then read more of this to whoever wants to hear more later.”
Franky smiled, and Willy elbowed him in the ribs. I read the story of Jonah from our Bible storybook, though some of the bigger boys paid precious little attention.
What a mixed bag they were! Ruffians and sensitive sorts. Loud, quiet, insulting, insightful. How could George and Wilametta have come up with a lot like this? I looked over to George and realized that his children were well on the way to surpassing him. He had no education, no ambition, and didn't seem particularly concerned that they acquire any either. What would they do, this whole family, if they were left alone?
TWENTY-FOUR
Samuel
I rose up several times in the night, restless. And then in my dream I heard the door. I woke up in the stillness, and the first thing I did was check to see if everybody was still there. Juli and the children all slept peacefully. But in George's place there was only an empty blanket.
I pulled on my coat and boots in a hurry. The boys had planned on chores this morning, his farm and ours, so he didn't have any need to be up and gone without saying a word. I ran out into the cold and was surprised to find fresh snow almost to my boot tops and more coming down. Much of the snow had melted in the warmer spell we'd had. But here it was, back again. It was dark with no moon, but there was a faint glow to the east, enough for me to make out George's fresh tracks heading off into the timber toward home.
“Let him go,” some people would've said. “Maybe he just needs to be by himself a while longer.”
But I had a nasty feeling, a burning in my gut that I knew wouldn't leave me alone.
The wind was picking up. Juli and the kids would be waking any minute. I knew I should go in and tell them what I was doing, but I didn't want them worrying all over again. I didn't want them all rousting out and trying to come with me to see whatever it was I'd find.
Oh, Lord, help,
I prayed.
Let me be wrong about all this.