The Believer (30 page)

Ethan wanted to shout when he caught sight of the first Harmony Hill barn. They were home. For weeks his every thought, his every prayer had been focused on somehow getting Brother Issachar home to Harmony Hill. The afternoon sunlight bouncing off the white stone Centre Family House was like a sign that his prayers had been answered. Surely now things would be better. Surely now the wound in Brother Issachar's side would begin to heal.

Brother Issachar had borne the trip from Louisville over the rough roads with courage, but by the time they entered the village, he was beyond knowing where he was. Often on their long journey home, Brother Issachar had lost consciousness, and each time Ethan wondered if he would ever open his eyes this side of paradise again. But Ethan had refused to give up hope as he spoon-fed him water and broth. Brother Issachar wanted to make it home. Ethan had done everything in his power to make that happen, and now at long last home was within sight.

Ethan leaned over close to Brother Issachar's ear and said, "We are home, my brother. Home to Harmony Hill. We made it.

Although Brother Issachar showed no sign of rousing, Ethan wanted to believe he heard his words and that the knowledge he was back at Harmony Hill would begin the healing that Sister Lettie would aid with her good medicines. He wanted to believe Brother Issachar would once more need Ethan to go into the woods with him to bring back a tree for a new chest or table. He not only wanted to believe it. He had to believe it. Otherwise, the guilt mashed down on him until he found it hard to breathe.

More than once on the way home when he was not overcome with pain and fever, Brother Issachar had assured Ethan he didn't hold him at fault. But no matter what Brother Issachar in his goodness said, the wound in his side was a wound Ethan had put there as surely as if he had shoved the knife in himself.

He didn't want to think about what Brother Martin would say or do when Ethan confessed his wrongs. Ethan had practiced the telling of them often in the long dark nights as he watched over Brother Issachar and begged the Eternal Father, the Christ, Mother Ann, any merciful being, for Brother Issachar's life and for his own forgiveness. Ethan dreaded the disappointment he was sure to see on Brother Martin's face, but that paled in the face of his fear of losing Brother Issachar. That thought was a thorn in his heart that worked deeper into a more tender area every time he looked at Brother Issachar's pale, pain-ridden face.

The brothers carried Brother Issachar to the sickroom prepared for him in the Centre Family House. Sister Lettie, who must have been told their wagon was coming, was waiting to lend her help along with Elder Joseph. Ethan had expected to see them. He had not expected to see the young sister, Elizabeth, hovering behind Sister Lettie. He was so surprised by her presence there that he stared directly at her. She met his eyes with such caring he could almost feel it wrap around him and offer him rest.

Suddenly as if it had been only yesterday instead of months ago, he remembered the soft whisper of her breath against his cheek and the sweet scent of her hair as they tumbled to the ground together at the cliff on the day he thought he was saving her from the fall. He moistened his lips as a longing rose in him to walk across the room and feel her arms around him, to surrender himself to the caring he saw in her eyes.

The women on the streets in New Orleans had beckoned to him, trying to entice him into sin, and he never felt the first temptation. Not there. But now here back in Harmony Hill where temptations were supposed to be virtually eliminated, he looked at Elizabeth and wanted to loose all the shackles of Shakerism for the imagined comfort of her hand on his cheek. With shame, he realized he had not rid himself of thoughts of her but had only shoved them into a treasure box of sorts in his mind.

He'd seen young brothers come into the Shakers and bring with them some forbidden treasure from the world they didn't want to surrender as they began to walk the Shaker way. A mother's locket. A father's knife. A Bible with family births recorded in it. A shiny stone. An arrowhead turned over by their plows. Such treasures were frowned on by the elders but sometimes allowed for a while as the young brother adjusted to his new life.

Ethan had brought nothing to the Shakers with him. But now it seemed the treasures he couldn't give up were in his mind. His willfulness. His curiosity. His lack of discipline. His carnal desires. He was a sorry excuse for a Believer. His face hardened in disgust at his weaknesses.

Elizabeth's eyes widened a bit in alarm at the look on his face before she lowered her eyes to the floor. He stared at the top of her white cap and wanted to reach across the divide between them and put his hand under her chin to raise her beautiful eyes back to his. To let her know his anger hadn't been directed at her. To keep the promise of her caring in his heart.

Brother Martin would tell him to shake free of such worldly desires. That is what he should do, but instead he looked at her and remembered the softness of her hand under his. He didn't want to shake free of the feeling that flooded through him.

As they shifted Brother Issachar from the stretcher to the bed, he groaned and the sound pulled Ethan away from his shameful thoughts. He was a Believer. Believers did not look upon their sisters with carnal desires. They did not live undisciplined lives that brought disaster to their brothers. Not unless they let wrong seeds take root in their souls.

Elder Joseph leaned over and spoke to Brother Issachar. "We're thankful you are home, Brother Issachar. We will labor a song for you this evening in meeting:"

Sister Lettie showed no patience for the niceties of his greeting. "I'm sure your words and prayers will be a comfort to him in time, Elder Joseph, but he has no ears for them right now." She moved in front of the elder to put her hand on Brother Issachar's forehead. "He burns with fever:" She looked at Ethan. "How long has he been thus?"

"The fever comes and goes. He will be burning with it during the night and then with the morning he'll feel cooler. The wagon ride over the roads was hard," Ethan answered. He hesitated for a second before he added, "The wound festers"

Sister Lettie pulled up Brother Issachar's shirt and peeled the bandage back to study the wound. She didn't flinch from the sight or from the odor the bandage released into the room, but Elder Joseph stepped back with a small gasp of dismay. Ethan looked at Elizabeth, expecting her to be pale, perhaps ready to swoon. There had been a time or two in the cabin of the steamboat when he had to fight to keep the smell from overpowering him, but Elizabeth seemed every bit as calm and collected as Sister Lettie as she moved up beside the older woman to be ready to aid her if needed.

Sister Lettie looked up at Elder Joseph. "We should call in the doctor from town"

"Nay," Ethan said. "Brother Issachar asked me to tell you not to do that if he was unable to speak. He trusts in what you can do for him and fears a doctor from the world will only delay his healing"

I may not be able to pull him back from death:' Sister Lettie stared across Brother Issachar's motionless form on the bed at Ethan. "The wound is very bad"

"Yea, but he made me promise:"

She looked at Ethan for a long moment before she let out a sigh and mashed her mouth together in acceptance of Ethan's words. "Very well" She turned to Elder Joseph. "We need hot water and some chicken broth from the kitchen"

"Send Sister Elizabeth for what you need,' Elder Joseph said.

"Nay, I need her here. She has a gift for healing and we of a surety need all the gifts Mother Ann will send down to us for Brother Issachar to recover."

Elder Joseph looked a little discomfited, but he turned to do Sister Lettie's bidding with no more argument. And in truth, Elizabeth was already placing cooling cloths on Brother Issachar's forehead and bathing his face and neck with great gentleness while Sister Lettie began to cut away Brother Issachar's shirt. The two seemed to work as one without the need for words to pass between them.

Brother Issachar moaned and then called out. "Eva. Don't leave me. Eva!"

"Eva? For whom does he call?" Sister Lettie glanced up at Ethan.

"The wife he had in the years before he began following the Shaker way. He said she died many years ago in childbirth:"

"Ah;' Sister Lettie said as she turned her full attention back to pulling the bandage away. She must have heard Ethan pull in his breath, for she spoke without looking up. "Get the young brother a chair, Sister Elizabeth. He is weakened from his long journey home"

Elizabeth quickly lifted a chair down from one of the pegs and pushed it under Ethan. "Have you been eating, Brother Ethan?" Elizabeth asked quietly even as she kept her eyes away from his face. "You look gaunt:"

"Worry not about me. I am not the one with the wound:" His voice was brusque.

"As you say, Brother." She turned back to tend to Brother Issachar, but her words had brought Sister Lettie's attention to him.

"She's right,' she said as she eyed him. "You have spent much energy in caring for your brother and of necessity have neglected proper care of your own body. Go wash the grime of the journey from you. The dinner bell will soon ring and you need to be ready to eat food that will bring you back to proper strength. Sister Elizabeth and I will care for our brother, and if we have need of help, we'll send for you or one of the other brethren'

Her words brooked no argument, but Ethan didn't want to leave Brother Issachar. He feared leaving him. He had listened to his every breath in the last few weeks until sometimes it seemed as if he had lent his strength to him in order for him to continue breathing. If he deserted him now, would the next he heard be that Brother Issachar had passed over the divide?

"Set down your burden, my brother. We'll care for him" Sister Lettie spoke the first words kindly before she stiffened her voice and ordered him from the room. "Now go. You can come back after the evening meal to check on him before meeting. You will want to go to meeting after so many weeks away."

"Yea, it will be good to shake the sins of the world from me;" he said even as he stared at Brother Issachar's still form on the bed and hesitated. He couldn't make his feet turn toward the door.

Without looking up, Elizabeth spoke. "Brother Issachar has much love for you. He would tell you to go eat"

Her words rankled. He didn't need anyone to tell him Brother Issachar cared for him. He already knew that and the knowing made the thorn in his heart stab deeper. He jabbed back at Elizabeth with a hint of scorn in his words. "Do you have a gift for knowing the thoughts of others as well as a gift for healing, Sister Elizabeth?"

Sister Lettie started to speak, but Elizabeth held up her hand to stop her as she lifted her eyes to his face. "Nay, Brother Ethan. I know not another's thoughts, but I did know Brother Issachar's great kindness when he came upon me and my sister and brother on the road and how he looked upon us, three strangers, with compassion and love. He surely has even greater love for you:"

"'Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends:" He spoke the Bible verse aloud as it came unbidden to his mind. Preacher Joe had taught him that verse even before he came to the Shakers. And Hawk Boyd had hurt Preacher Joe too.

"And is that what happened?" Sister Lettie asked. "Did he step in front of the knife to save you, young brother?"

"Nay, but I should have done so to save him. It was my sin that brought the man to our door. I am the reason he lies here so gravely wounded:"

"Ah, the burden of sin can weigh us down and give us much sorrow if we don't confess our wrongs so that we can be forgiven" The lines of Sister Lettie's face deepened with compassion. "Is Brother Issachar your appointed confessor?"

"Nay, that is Brother Martin:"

"Then speak to him at your first opportunity. Unburden yourself, for unconfessed sin can fester in our souls the same as this wound festers in our brother's side" There was a tap on the door. "That will be the hot water," Sister Lettie said as she turned her attention back to Brother Issachar.

Elizabeth turned from the bed to go to the door. As she stepped past Ethan, she said, "All is not yet lost. Sister Lettie will fight to keep him this side of the divide for a little longer." She spoke so softly that Sister Lettie didn't seem to note her words as she tended to Brother Issachar. Elizabeth didn't touch Ethan, but her voice seemed a caress. "As you have been doing:" Her eyes touched on his for the barest second before she went on to the door to take the basin of hot water from the sister there.

She understood without him telling her how he had fought to bring Brother Issachar home while he yet took breath. Perhaps she did have the gift of knowing the unspoken thoughts of others, but however she knew his thoughts, her words seemed to finally release Ethan. He was able to turn toward the door and surrender the care of Brother Issachar to her and Sister Lettie.

He went straight to the bathhouse and dropped the water down over him from the barrels above. The water was only heated for the morning baths, but Ethan didn't mind the chill of the water running over his body. He rubbed his arms and chest with the lye soap the sisters made until his skin tingled before he used the last of the water in the barrel to rinse off. The barrel would be filled again from the pipes that ran down from their holding pool. Brother Issachar had shown him how to take his first bath in the bathhouse after the pipes had been run. They had laughed at the novelty of having a waterfall inside of four walls.

"It takes a whole man to be a Shaker," Brother Issachar had instructed him as he dressed after his bath.

"Yea, so Brother Martin has told me. He says that it's wrong to neglect our body or our soul. That Mother Ann has supplied us good food for both and it is a sin not to partake of the blessings she rains down on us from heaven"

"Especially when it's the gift of our sisters' good cooking' Brother Issachar had smiled with a little wink at him.

That was the thing about Brother Issachar. He always had a smile ready. Even if Ethan couldn't see his smile on the outside, he knew he was smiling on the inside. That wasn't something shared in common by most of the Shaker brethren and sisters. Most claimed peace. Most sought spiritual joy during meeting, but frivolity while going about their duties was frowned upon by the Ministry. A Believer gave his hands to work and his heart to God. If one had a gift of laughter, then there were others who might say a gift of silence was better. Brother Martin was one of those. He looked upon any high jinks among the young brethren he taught with great disfavor.