The Believer (29 page)

"Sister Elizabeth!" Sister Ruth's voice demanded an answer as she hastened her steps to catch up with Elizabeth. She grabbed hold of Elizabeth's arm.

Elizabeth stopped and turned with a growing sense of dread. Sister Ruth would not be running after her for any small matter.

Sister Ruth, not accustomed to rushing, had to catch her breath before she could speak. Her scowl could have bent nails. "You are not to ignore me, Sister. Ever"

"Forgive me. I had my mind on my coming duties and didn't hear you:" Elizabeth felt little guilt for her lie. `And you have often warned me it's not proper to talk along the pathways to our daily work, so I didn't expect anyone to call to me'

Sister Ruth's cheeks flushed red as she narrowed her eyes on Elizabeth, who gazed back at her innocently. She poked Elizabeth in the chest with her finger. "You may act humble with the other sisters, but you don't fool me for one little moment. You have no thought of living the Shaker way. You're only here to make trouble"

Elizabeth stepped back away from Ruth's jabbing finger. "Nay, you are wrong. I have no desire to see trouble come to any among you.

"Perhaps you don't, but there is devilment within you that you do not care to weed out of your thoughts. Devilment that grows wicked desires in your heart"

Sister Ruth's words didn't bother Elizabeth. She'd heard them from her many times before and had given up trying to change the woman's opinion that trouble had befallen the Shakers because of her. Perhaps it was true. Elizabeth bowed her head. "I will beg forgiveness of the Lord as I strive to weed out wrong desires from my heart:"

"Words are easy for you, are they not, Sister Elizabeth? As easy as striking fire is for your brother of the world"

Elizabeth looked back up at Sister Ruth whose eyes were boring into her. "I know not of what you speak. If you talk of our Brother Payton, he's embracing the Shaker way and would certainly do nothing to harm the village. You have only to look at him during meeting to see that"

"So it would seem. But there was another fire last night. A small one in the West Family men's bathhouse:" She paused to give her next words more impact. "Shortly after this brother you speak of had been there:"

"I heard no alarm' Elizabeth's heart sank at word of another fire. It couldn't be Payton. It could not. For she had spoken nothing but the truth when she said he was following the Shaker path. "Was the building badly damaged?"

"Nay. The fire was small. Easily extinguished. Almost as if a child had set it. But the brother of whom you speak is not much more than a child:'

Elizabeth tried to hide her concern, but the gladness that filtered into Sister Ruth's eyes was proof that she wasn't completely successful. "What do you want of me, Sister Ruth? More words of sorrow? For me to fall prostrate here on the walkway at your feet?" Elizabeth didn't try to hide the anger that pushed up within her as she stared at Sister Ruth.

"Such action might prove you were finally opening yourself to the spirit. Not that any of us expect that to ever happen:" Sister Ruth sniffed with disdain as she pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket to touch to her nose. "But it isn't what I want that's important. It's what Mother Ann wants:"

`And have you had a vision or message from her that tells you what that is? For I have not:' Elizabeth met the other woman's eyes without wavering.

"Nay, and I daresay you will not. A Believer cannot have a strife-filled spirit as you do. Or as the white-haired demonpossessed child you brought with you:"

Elizabeth softly blew out her breath and purposely uncurled her fists down at her sides as she stared at Sister Ruth. The woman was not worth her anger. "You're wrong," she said quietly, but firmly. "Hannah is a child like any other"

"It isn't your place to tell me I err" Now anger flashed in Sister Ruth's eyes. "It's no problem to see the trouble you have brought our village. Trouble that followed poor Brother Issachar to New Orleans. Trouble that won't stop besetting our village until you're gone from us. You with your pretty ways full of vanity and the demon child and the one who has a love for fires. Those of the Ministry will see. They have eyes that watch and they won't be blind to your transgressions forever." Her voice got louder as she spoke, until one of the brethren walking some ways away looked toward them curiously.

The door of the Medicine Shop opened behind Elizabeth. "Sister Elizabeth, I wondered where you were;' Sister Lettie said as she stepped out of the doorway. "You do know that such gossiping is not proper, my sisters:"

"Yea, you are right, Sister Lettie. Forgive me. Sister Ruth was pointing out the error of some of my ways:" Elizabeth turned from Sister Ruth with relief and slid past Sister Lettie into the shop.

"There are better times and places for confession, my sisters;" Sister Lettie pointed out.

Elizabeth didn't glance back at Sister Ruth, but she had no problem imagining how the anger must be consuming her. Steam would surely be rising from her head as she said, "Yea, Sister Lettie. I will confess my error to Eldress Rosellen."

"Very well, Sister Ruth;' Sister Lettie said. "The morning hour is passing. You do have a duty to attend the same as Sister Elizabeth, do you not?" Sister Lettie stepped back into the Medicine Shop and shut the door firmly behind her, ending any conversation. She looked at Elizabeth. "Are you all right, my sister?"

"Yea, I'm fine:" Elizabeth put her hands under her apron to hide their trembling. She didn't know why Sister Ruth's words so upset her unless it was that she heard truth in them. "What work have you for me to do?"

Sister Lettie studied her a moment before she pointed toward two bowls of ground roots. "We have powders to mix, an equal amount of each, and two even spoonfuls of that mixture into each packet. Your measurements need to be exact:"

Elizabeth picked up the measuring spoon and dropped it with a clatter. She picked it up again, but then spilled the powder as she tried to put it into the packet.

"That is enough, I think:" Sister Lettie put her hands on Elizabeth's shoulders. "Come, child. It's time you shared your troubles." She pushed her down into the chair next to the table where she'd been preparing the medicine packets. "Tell me what has happened to make your hands tremble so?"

Elizabeth didn't know what she should say. She didn't want to burden this kind sister with matters that couldn't be helped.

Sister Lettie was patient. "Take your time. We have a while yet before the bell for the morning meal sounds. There's no hurry, but sometimes it's best to just let the words out instead of searching for the ones you feel are proper. I have a good sifter here:" She smiled and pointed at her head. "I'll be able to sort out the words that matter the most"

Elizabeth sighed. "I have no desire to bring you trouble, Sister Lettie. To bring any of you trouble, but that's what Sister Ruth thinks I've done. That a wrong spirit dwells within me that's causing problems in your village'

"A wrong spirit?" Sister Lettie took a chair down from the peg on the wall and sat down directly in front of Elizabeth. "And what problems does she speak of?"

"Brother Issachar being injured. The fires. She says there was another last evening"

"So I've been told, but it was inconsequential. Hardly a concern." Sister Lettie threw out her hand in a gesture of dismissal.

"It's surely a concern that someone is setting fires, intending harm:" Elizabeth frowned. "The fires don't seem to be accidental:"

"The Ministry thinks it is those of the world" Sister Lettie's light blue eyes probed Elizabeth's face. "Do you have reason to believe differently?"

Again Elizabeth hesitated to speak as she looked down at her hands. Again Sister Lettie waited. Finally Elizabeth said, "Nay."

Sister Lettie laid her hand softly on Elizabeth's arm. "I hear a thousand other words behind that nay. Tell me what worries you, Sister Elizabeth. It will be held in confidence:"

"Even from the Ministry?" Elizabeth looked up at Sister Lettie.

"Yea, even from the Ministry. I've told you before there are no eyes watching in this room. A doctor must have the trust of his patients. My father taught me that when I was but a child. He threatened me with his strop if I ever spoke of any of his patients' ills to any other, and he wasn't one to lay his hand on me in punishment'

There was so much kindness in Sister Lettie's face that the words spilled out of Elizabeth. She told it all. How as a child, Payton had had a fascination with fire. How their father had sickened and died in one terrible night. How they had run from Colton Linley, who expected Elizabeth to come to him in payment of a debt he said was owed him, and how Payton had gone back and set the cabin afire.

"I know he set that fire. I saw the smoke and smelled it on his clothes when he came back to where Hannah and I waited for him. He didn't deny it. But he was distraught over our father's death and angry at me for forcing him to leave everything he loved behind. He had witnessed Colton trying to force himself on me on the day we buried our father, and so Payton's anger turned on him. I think he couldn't bear thinking of him touching me with such ownership, and I fear that feeling somehow transferred over to the books and other things he loved so well in the cabin:'

When Sister Lettie just looked at her without saying anything, Elizabeth hurried on, appealing to her for understanding. "He is young to have suffered such loss. Our mother and then our father so unexpectedly. But he told me he didn't set the first fire in the Carpenters' Shop, and he would have told me the truth. Besides, he likes it here. He has put his feet on the Shaker path. His spirit doesn't war against it the way Hannah's does' Elizabeth looked back down at her hands and admitted softly. `And as mine does as well. I have promised Hannah we will leave in the spring if she has not accepted life here by then. I know not what we will do, but I will somehow have to keep my promise to her'

"Worry not about the spring. Young Sister Hannah's spirit may soften. I hear she likes working with the silkworms:" Sister Lettie laid her hand on Elizabeth's cheek. "The Lord's Word says each day has worries sufficient unto the day. Your first worry is the fires, and I believe you speak truth in that Brother Payton has no part in those. He did wrong that he will have need to confess before he can sign the Covenant, but he is too young for that by several years. He will grow in the spirit before that time comes and be more ready to admit his wrongs. And you needn't worry he'll be accused falsely. The Ministry will set eyes about to spy out whoever is lighting these fires. Not much stays secret from the Ministry." Sister Lettie patted Elizabeth's cheek one more time and smiled. "Outside of this shop at any rate"

"Thank you, Sister Lettie. I feel easier in my spirit"

"Good:" Sister Lettie stood up and hung her chair back up on the peg. "Come, let us get these powders mixed before we are called to the morning meal"

They worked in silence for a few moments before Sister Lettie said, "Tell me what seemed to ail your father that took him from you so swiftly."

"I don't know. He seemed fine when he came in about midday. He had been to town the day before. Had stayed with a friend there overnight and then went by to speak to Colton about some business matter on the way home that morning, or so Colton told us later. By nightfall he was deathly ill with terrible heaving and cramps and much pain. Before daylight he passed on. I had no thought he would die so quickly. Not even from the cholera if that was what it was:"

Sister Lettie frowned as if considering his symptoms before she shook her head a little. "I doubt the cholera. Wrong time of year in the general way of that horrible disease, and even it rarely takes its victims in a day." Sister Lettie was silent for a moment before she asked, "And he was healthy before this? No other times when he suffered from heaving and such?"

"Nay. He was strong and full of vigor."

"Poison;" Sister Lettie said with no doubt. "He must have eaten something that poisoned him. Perhaps the wrong sort of mushroom. Perhaps arsenic, although I know not how he could have gotten enough to make him so ill without it being on purpose. His own or someone else's. He wouldn't have taken his own life, would he?"

"Nay, he loved us. He wouldn't have left us alone. Especially not Payton and Hannah"

Sister Lettie looked up at her. "He surely loved you just as much:"

"Yea, but I am older, more able to care for myself than they."

"Then it must have been some sort of accident, but it was surely poison. That is the only thing that could take one in such health so quickly:" Sister Lettie carefully stacked her packets of medicine in a wooden tray box. "It was probably a wrong mushroom in something he ate in the town. Some are very deadly, you know, and easily mistaken for those one can safely consume"

The breakfast bell tolled. Sister Lettie stood up and put her hand on Elizabeth's shoulder. "Whatever the cause, I see your sorrow. He must have been a fine man"

"Yea, he was. Brother Issachar reminds me of him:" Elizabeth was surprised to feel the prickle of tears in the back of her eyes. `And now he may die as well:'

"Death cannot always be cheated. I have seen much of it in my time helping my father and even among the Believers. But at least here, there's little sting to death. It's simply like stepping across a divide. Heaven here. Heaven there:" Sister Lettie made a back and forth motion with her hand before she took her cloak off the peg and draped it around her shoulders. "But that doesn't mean we won't try to keep Brother Issachar with us longer. I've been searching my books for the best combination of herbs and roots for the treatment of wounds and the infections they can cause. When he gets here, we will war against such for Brother Issachar. You can be sure of that"