Promise Me This (4 page)

“No, Mrs. Woodward. I’m sorry to say it is not.” Annie heard Owen’s sigh beyond the wall. “I hope our being here overnight does not cause either of you trouble.”

The widow clucked her tongue. “She’ll never know that much.”

“I hope I’m doing the right thing.” Annie could hear Owen tapping a pewter spoon against the table. She crouched on the stairs and leaned her head against the railing to better listen.

“Of course you are, sir! You can’t be staying there, stuck up like her pretty plaything, can you? It ain’t fitting for a man, is it?” Annie heard the widow’s crumb brush swat table crumbs onto her tray. “I seen it with your old dad, God rest his soul. I don’t mean to speak ill of the dead; no, I don’t. But he should have done just what you’ve done and, better yet, what you’re fixing to do. He should have up and left the old—!” The widow Woodward stopped abruptly. “I didn’t mean that, sir. At least I didn’t mean it unkindly as it sounds.”

Annie smiled in spite of herself.

“No offense is taken, Mrs. Woodward. I needed to hear someone say it aloud.” Still Owen tapped his spoon.

“That’s all right, then.” The widow plunked dishes onto her tray. Annie heard her totter toward the kitchen. She must have turned. “If you don’t go now, Mr. Owen, you’ll be stuck here forever—you and Miss Annie, too. It would suffocate the life out of you, just like it did your poor father. And you’d not be wanting that old spinster’s life for your darling sister. That’s just what she’d make her into—a miniature of her mean and miserable self. Mark my words.”

Annie felt the heat rise up her neck and face. She grasped the stair railing and pulled herself to her feet as the kitchen door swung closed, swatting at tears that insisted on coming, tears that had nothing to do with feminine ploys. She could not ruin Owen’s life by guilting him into staying in England. An ocean was little enough to separate him from Aunt Eleanor. She could not do to him what Aunt Eleanor had done to Father. How she would manage with her beloved brother an ocean away, she didn’t know. But creeping back up the stairs, she determined to try, for his sake.

“Owen?” Annie stood an hour later, carpetbag in hand, outside the widow’s gate. Determined to retain her composure, she lifted her chin. “Who will tend their graves when we’ve gone?”

Owen smiled, and his smile lifted Annie’s heart. He took the carpetbag from her, then dug into his pocket. “This very morning we shall pull the weeds and cultivate the tops of the mounds. We’ll sow all the seeds we have.” He cupped Annie’s palm and trickled tiny seeds of promise into its curve. “We’ve more than enough to cover both. They’ll bloom this summer, then come again next year, and every year, even without us.”

“Won’t they be lonely?” Annie knew her chin quivered, but she blinked back tears.

“I believe Mother and Father are dancing this day in heaven, if truly they can see us.” Owen clasped her shoulders. “They never would have wanted either of us in that house. You know that.”

Annie nodded, determined to smile.

“We’ve a new life to build, and we shall need every bit of English pluck and Irish grit to get us through.”

Annie nodded again. She wondered if Owen had any idea what pluck and grit it would take for her to see him off.

By midmorning Annie’s skirt was soiled. She and Owen had weeded, scraped, turned, and sifted the topsoil of their parents’ plots in the midst of Bunhill Fields cemetery. They had hoed shallow ditches, spaced close enough to crowd out the most persistent weeds, and sprinkled seeds, sparingly, down their rows.

“Mother loved these blue spikes.” Owen smiled, brushing the earth from his fingers. “Father always said they were the color of her eyes.”

“Like mine,” Annie said, smiling faintly.

“That they are. Blue as the bluest lobelia England ever grew!”

Annie sat close to Owen but could not look at him. “But Father . . .”

“What about Father?”

“I heard you and Aunt Eleanor arguing. What did she mean when she said that it was no accident that sent Father to his grave? That it was his own ridiculous pining for a woman too silly to help him manage his business?”

Owen did not answer but stiffened and sat back on his heels.

“She meant Mother, didn’t she?” Annie held her breath.

Owen stood and dusted off the soil from the knees of his trousers. He picked up the pocket rake and spade he carried with him everywhere, wiped them on the grass, and polished them with his handkerchief.

“Owen?” Annie persisted.

Still he did not answer, did not look at her, but packed the tools away and reached for her hand.

Annie stood, brushing her skirt, and stared at her brother until he spoke.

“Did you read the book I sent you?”

“I began, but I’m not fascinated by it. And what has that to do with my question?”

The corners of his lips lifted slightly. “You do not have to be fascinated by it.”

“It was written so dreadfully long ago, Owen. Couldn’t you find me something amusing?”

“The writer is one I hope will become your friend. He’s a neighbor of Mother and Father’s.”

“A neighbor? How silly! He’s been dead for ages.”

Owen grinned. “He might have lived before them, but his work and writings were very much a part of their lives.” He tweaked her honey-colored curls. “I remember Mother reading his book to me when I was younger than you are now.”

“Well—” Annie placed her hands on her hips—“perhaps if I had you or Mother reading it aloud to me, I could take more pleasure in it.”

Owen laughed aloud. “You’ve got me there!” He pulled her aside. “Here, our friend and neighbor—come take a look at his stone.” Owen spread his coat on the ground before Annie. He traced the outlined relief on the side of John Bunyan’s tomb with his finger, as if he had memorized the sculptor’s movements. “This is a picture of the pilgrim, called Christian, from the book. See how he’s weighed down, carrying that heavy load upon his back? He can hardly bear it, and the way is steep and rough.”

“Yes, but you’ve still not answered my question about Father.” Annie tugged her brother’s sleeve.

But Owen seemed to ignore her. “That’s the way of our lives—all of us. We’re loaded down with burdens too heavy to bear—disappointments, losses, sin. Even guilt about our inability to overcome the burdens that bend us low. The longer we tread with that heavy load on our backs, the more we are likely to despair.”

A full minute passed before Annie reached out and tentatively touched the stone. “Father was terribly sad after Mother died, wasn’t he?”

Owen’s eyes met Annie’s at last. “She was the light of his life. Losing her took everything from him. A year passed and he could not let go of his grief.”

Annie narrowed her eyes, concentrating on the shapes in the stone. “Father was caught by the Giant Despair.” She bit her lip. “Do you think his death . . .” Annie could not make herself form the words. “Do you think it was not an accident?”

“I don’t know. Only God and Father know that.” Owen clasped her hands between his palms. “I only know that despondency, even despair, is not the end of the story. I want you to know that too. No matter what pain, what hard things come to us in life—and pain and trouble come to all of us—no matter what dark roads we walk or poor choices we make, it is not the end of the story.” He stood and pulled her to her feet. “Come see.”

Annie grabbed Owen’s coat from the ground.

He pulled her to the opposite side of the tomb and spread his coat again, then tugged her down beside him. “Look here, at the picture.” He pointed to the tomb’s relief. “Do you see?”

“He’s no longer burdened!”

“No, his load—his guilt and sin—have all been cast aside.”

“He’s not weary-looking or sad,” Annie said in wonder, tracing the lines of Christian’s burden-free back. “Because he’s reached the cross?”

“Because he has reached the cross and taken hold of it. See how he grasps it, how he clings to it—a living relationship with the One who bore it! It is all in all to him. He kneels upon the solid rock and is looking up—not down at his burden!”

“It’s the entire book in a picture—in two pictures!”

“But there’s so much more in the book. Christian’s long journey is a companion for our life’s journey. Promise me you’ll read it—all of it—then read it again. And write to me of what you think as you read, just as we write of everything.”

“I promise.” Annie tucked her skirt beneath her feet. “It won’t be the same as having you here, but . . .”

“But you’ll not be alone. You are loved far better than I can love you, Annie.”

“Sometimes I need arms,” she whispered, leaning against her brother’s back, willing him to wrap his arms around her.

Owen drew her round from behind him, and she buried her head in his chest. “Of course you do. We all need arms about us. We shall trust the Lord to watch between us until we meet again. It won’t be long—not a minute longer than I can manage.”

Through the night and the long next day, Michael skittered from pillar to post, from deck to stateroom, and finally climbed into a freezing lifeboat hanging from its davit—anywhere he might dodge the crew and builders’ representatives as they tested, measured, and tested again each small device aboard the wondrous ship, finally put to sea.

Shy of midnight he started, waking to the shrill whistles of the tugs. Michael knew without seeing that
Titanic
neared its mooring. The great engines stopped. He’d have to find the right moment to steal ashore.

By the time pink stained the sky, men worked quickly to close and cover ventilators and louvers, sealing doors.

“Finished,” exclaimed a voice too nearby.

“For now, you mean.” A second voice spoke. “We’d best take our tea while they’re coaling her. We’ll be cleaning stem to stern soon as they’ve finished.”

Michael knew the coaling of a vessel could take hours. He also knew that in the careful cleaning of the fine layer of coal dust it left behind, and in the final inspection, even a lifeboat would be no safe place to hide.

He did not want to be anywhere near the ship when the stokers finally filed ashore, lest he be caught by his uncle Tom. Dozens of men came and went on a dozen different errands. It was no small feat for Michael to slip from his hiding place and blend into those hastening to and fro. But amid the general bustling, drifting away along the dock was child’s play.

Chilled to the bone, Michael searched till he found a pub with a back alley. He’d learned long ago that even pubs that bolted their doors did not always bolt their windows. Some did not wash their glasses before closing up late at night. Drops from a dozen glasses could send a warm stream down his throat and build a weak fire in his belly.

Michael spied the sign of a fish-and-chips shop in the next block. He waited. No dog cried the alarm. Michael’s tongue ran over chapped lips. His mouth watered at the thought of fried-fish grease soaked into the pages of newsprint wrappers. If lucky, he’d find bits, remnants stuck to the paper, crumpled in the dustbin. Fish heads weren’t to everyone’s liking, Michael knew, but he’d seen the wharf rats eat them, and they surely thrived. It could keep him in body for another day. But even those pickings ran slim this morning.

Michael’s stomach rumbled, angry at the waking that offered no real satisfaction. Cold and hungry as he was, he was more than weary after two nights of half waking, half sleeping, ever dodging and fearing discovery.

Farther into town Michael came upon a stone building. The morning light showed the garden torn apart, bricks and flagstones askew, tarps strewn over building and gardening supplies. Small shrubs, draped, stood sentinel against the stone wall.

Michael blew on his hands to warm them, stomped his feet to feel his toes. He pulled the tarps from the shrubs, thinking they couldn’t be as cold as he, and dragged one over wooden planks. Stretched along the plank bed, Michael pulled his thin coat tight about his aching ribs, wound himself head to toe inside the second tarp, and sank into a deep sleep.