Dorothy Garlock (17 page)

G
RAHAM
G
RIER STOOD
down the street from the
Victory Gazette
office, peering anxiously around the corner of the grocery store, his eyes locked upon Hermann Heller and his pickup truck.
He’d been watching the man for nearly ten minutes, the afternoon slowly inching closer to five o’clock, as his stomach busily
tied itself into knots. Even though he was in the shade, he constantly needed to wipe his brow, his dark hair plastered to
his forehead.

I can’t believe I’m lurking out here like some common criminal!

Unlike Riley, Graham couldn’t bring himself to simply wait for Sophie from across the street, watching in plain sight; the
very last thing he wanted was for her to see him. He was still so embarrassed about being tied up in the whole scandalous
mess that he wished he could hide under a rock. From down the street, he could still keep an eye on the newspaper’s door.

After all, Sophie isn’t the only person I want to avoid…

Standing so close to the newspaper’s office dredged up all of the memories that Graham constantly struggled to repress: the
liquor he’d consumed that fateful night, the full moon shining outside the bedroom window, and even the soft feel of the woman’s
skin beneath his fingers. Though the pleasure of that moment had been exciting enough to send his heart to racing, the agony
Graham had experienced ever since weighed on his heart as if it were a blacksmith’s anvil.

Carolyn…

Guilt still gnawed at him over his having lied to his father. Calvin Grier had asked him to attend a meeting with Franklin
Sweeney, the president of Victory Bank and Trust, but Graham had begged off, claiming that he hadn’t been feeling well. He
knew that his father wished to groom him to someday take over his duties as mayor, but Graham simply could not risk angering
Ellis; the danger to his and his father’s name was far too great. While Graham knew that Riley could just have easily continued
his duties of watching Sophie, he was certain that Ellis had given the task to him as a means of reminding Graham that he
was under the man’s thumb, that he was being kept on a short leash that could be yanked tighter at a moment’s notice.

Chafing at his own foolishness, Graham silently cursed himself. It was as if he were an animal that had been caught in a trap.
To do nothing meant that he would undoubtedly starve to death, full of fear as he resolutely waited for the inevitable. To
fight against the bonds that held him meant to shred his body against the metal of the trap, a horribly painful end. In the
real world, his choices didn’t seem any better. If he were to disobey Ellis, he would never recover from the damage that would
be inflicted. But to go along with Ellis and Riley made him every bit the lowlife they were…

He simply didn’t know what to do.

Nervously, Graham checked his watch. It was just after five; he knew Sophie would be appearing soon. He was nothing short
of a mess; sweat ran down his face in rivers just as shivers raced across his arms. He was startled to realize that he had
been holding his breath in anticipation of seeing her and forced himself to exhale. It felt as if he had been waiting for
hours.

Suddenly, there she was. Sophie stepped from the newspaper office, heading straight toward her father. But unlike her terror
that Riley had described as her reaction upon seeing him, she didn’t seem the least bit worried. Not once did she glance around,
looking for a menacing face. Instead, she seemed happy, even elated, as if she didn’t have a care in the world. Smiling brightly,
she was more beautiful than he’d ever seen her. Confusedly, Graham watched as she laughed at something her father said, slid
into the battered old truck, and headed out of town.

Graham was so surprised by her demeanor that he blindly stepped out from the shadowed safety of the building and out onto
the sidewalk. He watched, slack-jawed, as the truck drove past him, Sophie chatting cheerfully with her father. Squelching
the sudden urge to call out her name, to obtain the attention he had been so carefully avoiding, Graham’s heart pounded in
his chest. Helplessly, he stared at the truck until it was completely swallowed from his sight. Sophie never once looked back.

“What the hell?” he muttered.

A cascade of worry crashed through Graham’s thoughts. Try as he might, he simply couldn’t find any rational explanation for
what he had just witnessed. He had dreaded seeing her overwrought with fear, but this…

Why had she been so happy?

Hermann pulled the truck into the long drive that led to the house, bouncing over every hole and divot. Lacking rain, the
ground had hardened as if it were cast in concrete. The truck lurched hard to the left, then forward, and then left again.

“Uppsie-Daisy,” her father said, as he did every time.

Sophie clung tightly to the doorframe, smiling every bit as warmly as the sun; not even being bounced around the inside of
the truck as if she were in an earthquake was enough to dampen her mood.
Cole Ambrose took me on a picnic lunch!
Pleasantly, she wondered if she would ever stop smiling, a thought so wonderful that she let out a laugh.

From the moment that the young teacher had returned her to the newspaper office, she had felt as if she were walking on air.
Spending time with Cole had proven all of her thoughts about him to be true; he was well-spoken, kind, considerate, and certainly
easy on the eyes. She’d been certain that everyone in the office had known exactly what she had been thinking. For his part,
Walter had taken one look at her, chuckled, and said, “I do believe I’d have to be a blind man not to know you had yourself
a good time, and even then I ain’t too sure I wouldn’t know!”

For a short while, all of her many problems had vanished as if they were so much smoke. Though it had been difficult, relief
had flooded her upon telling Cole the truth about Ellis, Riley, and Graham. Although part of her still worried that he would
feel compelled to tell the police, she believed Cole to be a man of his word. He had promised to protect her, to watch over
her and her family, a thought that brought her no small amount of comfort. When they had parted, they had vowed to see each
other soon, a timeframe that both beckoned and taunted her all at once.

I cannot wait for it to be soon!

Up ahead, Karl continued to clear away the last remnants of the burned-out barn, sweat glistening on his brow and bare forearms
as he strained to pull a long, twisted piece of blackened metal free from its entanglement. Sophie was surprised to see how
little of the barn remained; every day, more and more of it vanished. Now only a few charred beams, the odd farming tool,
and the scorched earth remained to speak of what had happened.

“It will not be long now until it will be time to build again,” Hermann explained as he brought the truck to a halt and shut
off the engine. “Soon, it will be good as new.”

For once, Sophie found herself agreeing with her father’s belief in the future.

“Does Mother need help with dinner?” she asked.

“I think that all is ready,” Hermann said, grunting softly as he got out of the truck. “Go and wash up. Karl and I will be
there soon. You know how your mother gets when food starts to grow cold.”

Sophie hurried to the house and headed indoors. She had hoped that there might be time for her to rush to her special spot
in the woods before dinner; the day had been so wonderful, so full of possibility, that she wanted some time alone to revel
in it. But just as she was about to rush up the stairs that led to her room, her grandmother called to her. “Sophie, my dear,”
she said, her voice carrying both the frailty of age and the richness of surety. “Could you join me outside for a moment?”

Following her grandmother’s voice, Sophie found Gitta sitting quietly on the long porch that wrapped around the rear of the
Hellers’ home. From such a vantage point, the view gave nearly as rich a bounty as the land: gently rolling hills of cornstalks
stretching skyward toward the sun; stands of majestic trees, their gnarled limbs now thickly covered in leaves; and even the
roughly cut path that Sophie followed from the house to her special place among the tall rocks, gurgling stream, and peaceful
quiet.

Gitta loved the porch. Even on the hottest days of summer, sticky afternoons when the air felt thick enough to touch, she
liked to sit in the meager shade the porch offered and simply watch the world go by, content to bear witness to the subtle
shifts of the seasons; for Sophie, seeing her grandmother on the porch was as much a part of the landscape as any of the trees,
rocks, or fields. Now, sitting in a wicker chair that faced all the beauty nature had to offer, she looked serene. Gitta’s
wrinkled face brightened when she saw Sophie.

“You seem very happy, my granddaughter,” the older woman observed.

“I am,” Sophie admitted. Her heart skipped a beat at the thought that her happiness was so obvious, clear enough to be seen
without a single word being spoken.

“I suppose this has something to do with that young man who drove you home.”

The perceptiveness of her grandmother’s words startled Sophie, leaving her momentarily stunned.

“When someday you become my age, dear, you will find that very greatest of pleasure you have is watching life go on around
you,” Gitta explained, knitting her wrinkled hands together. “When that day comes, then there you will sit, as quiet as church
mouse, and no one will notice.”

“You saw us?”

“I did.”

Color rose in Sophie’s cheeks at the realization that her grandmother must have seen her running away from Cole, tears streaming
wildly down her cheeks. The burden of her shame pressed down upon her and though she and Cole had spoken about what had happened,
she could not bring herself to completely forgive herself for how she had acted.

“Is he the reason you feel so happy?”

“Yes.” Sophie nodded. “He is.”

“Then why were you so upset that day?” Gitta asked. “I may have somehow become old, but I still know tears when I see them…
I am not so deaf that I cannot recognize sobs behind closed door when I hear them.”

Sophie didn’t know how to answer her grandmother. After all of the horrible things that had occurred that day, from hearing
the hateful slur in the diner to being grabbed by Riley Mason, her emotions had been as shaken as if they had been trapped
in a tornado. Looking upon Cole’s disfigured leg after he had painstakingly made his way around the truck had simply been
the last straw, breaking her will and sending her running to the house in tears.

“Is it because of his leg?” Gitta asked as if she were reading Sophie’s mind.

“Yes… no,” Sophie tried to answer. “At that moment, right there and then, it might have been, but now it’s not like that at
all. Now, I’m ashamed of how I acted. Now, it’s not important.”

“Because now you know who is this man on inside.”

“Yes, I believe I do.”

Gitta sat silently for a moment, a gentle breeze rustling the air, carrying with it the myriad smells of the farm. She regarded
her granddaughter curiously, as if weighing some hidden truth. “Would you like to hear a story?” she finally asked.

“Yes,
Oma
,” Sophie answered softly.

“When I was young girl in Cologne, I met man who makes my heart swim and my knees shake,” she explained, her thin lips lifted
in the gentlest of smiles. “The first time I see him, he tells me that he is to marry me someday, and I laugh and tell him
he is fool, but he sees that I am not quite telling the truth. He is man who makes me smile, laugh, and when he is not there
I cannot wait until I see him again. He feels same way for me that I feel for him. We are falling in love together. Do you
know about these feelings?”

Sophie could only nod.

“But it is not meant to be easy.” Gitta frowned. “My father is too strict man. To him, all that matters is standing, what
kind of family my suitor is from, what money they have. To my father, they do not have enough, are not good enough. My mother
understands but she cannot go against the wishes of her husband. At first, my heart breaks and I cry and cry. It all seem
hopeless. But then I start to think different. I start to feel different. Do you know what I did?”

“What, Grandmother?”

“I decide to fight,” her grandmother said proudly. “I decide that I will live my life as I want, as I choose. My father have
to accept. It was then that I married Konrad Heller, your grandfather. Every day of our marriage, I know that I am right.
Through many good times and some bad, through marriage, through birth of our children, and until Konrad passes, I have no
regrets for what I have done. Even now, an old woman living in America, there is nothing that I would change. No mistakes.
My love for Konrad is greater than all.”

“I didn’t know,” Sophie said. “You never told me this story.”

“That is because it does not matter,” Gitta said as if it were the most obvious truth in the world. “From the moment that
I fall in love with Konrad, nothing else mattered. Not that his family make less money than my own, not what anyone thought,
nothing but our want to be together.” Her eyes held Sophie’s for a tender moment, letting the weight of her words sink in.
“Do you understand what it is that I am saying to you, Sophie?”

Sophie knew with certainty what her grandmother was trying to tell her; that the handicap that ravaged Cole Ambrose’s leg
did not matter if she could find it in her heart to love him. What was truly important was the man he was on the inside; decent,
hardworking, possessed of a true heart that clearly returned her feelings. For an instant, she thought of Ellis Watts and
how his movie-star good looks hid an inside that was rotten straight to the core. Though she still found Cole to be a very
handsome man, she knew that others would see only his flaw. She doubted that there would be anyone who had ever met him who
would deny that his inside was a thing of beauty.