Angel Sister (29 page)

______

Nadine stood at the fence and waited. She’d done as Victor asked and told the men to go home, but Father Merritt had pushed past her and led the men on across the pasture field and into the trees. She hadn’t stopped praying since.

When she saw the first flames rising up out of the trees, she sent Evangeline and Victoria to Gertie’s house to sound the alarm. The church bells were still pealing. Over and over. The evening air vibrated with the sound. With danger.

Behind Nadine, doors were slamming and people were yelling, but she stayed by the fence, staring at the edge of the woods, straining to see Victor and Kate and Lorena come out of the trees and run across the field to her. Night was falling, but there was enough light to see.

Father Merritt came out first. He walked across the field to the road in front of the house without glancing once toward the fence where Nadine stood. Nor did he look behind him. She called to him, but he didn’t raise his eyes from the ground in front of his feet as he kept walking. He didn’t seem to be aware of the church bells ringing or the fire blooming up out of the trees behind him or the men yelling at him as he passed.

A few minutes later the other men broke free from the trees and hurried across the field toward their houses. Victor was with them, but Kate and Lorena were not. His eyes were fastened on her as he came straight toward her.

When he was near enough, he asked, “Has Graham brought the girls out?”

“No.” Her heart leapt up in her throat so that she could barely push out the next words as he stopped on the other side of the fence in front of her. “So you saw them? They’re all right?”

“I did not.” He put his hands on the top rail of the fence and lifted himself over. He put his arms around her for a moment. “But Graham went for them. He’ll find them. He thinks they’re with Fern. That she must have been the one who rescued Lorena from Ella’s closet.”

“We never should have let your father take her from us and give her to Ella.”

“My father.” Victor’s voice was flat. “He’s the reason for this.” He waved behind him at the fire.

“What do you mean?”

“No time to explain now. I’ve got to get my axe. We need to cut a fire break to slow down the fire.”

Nadine looked over Victor’s shoulder. The fire had tripled in size already. “Will you be able to save Graham’s house?”

“The big house maybe. I don’t know. As dry as it is and the way the wind’s blowing, the cedar thickets will go up like tinder. There may be no stopping it.” Victor tightened his arms around her and then turned loose. “I’ve got to get my axe.”

She followed him around the house. “I can go with you. Help somehow.”

“No, you stay here and wait for Kate.” The door creaked when he opened the shed to pull out his axe. The cow heard it and began bawling again. “You’d better milk her or else her bag will go bad and we won’t have milk. Just don’t leave her in the barn.” He started back toward the woods.

Nadine grabbed his arm and made him turn back toward her. “Surely we don’t have to worry about the fire getting the barn. Do we?”

“No, I don’t think so. We’ll stop it. But if we don’t, no sense losing the cow.” His voice softened as he touched her cheek. “Kate will be all right, Nadine. I know she will.” Then he was gone, running across the field back toward the fire.

Nadine didn’t bother putting the cow in the barn. She just poured some corn out on the ground and milked her where she stood. The old cow had always been extra gentle, and even with the smell of smoke in the air, she only lifted her feet a couple of times to show her uneasiness. Each time Nadine took hold of the cow’s leg and gently pushed her hoof back down on the ground. The barn would be dark. She didn’t want to light a lantern and take the chance it might get knocked over and start a new fire.

It was bad enough the fire was growing by leaps and bounds in the woods right across from her. Bad enough that she had to worry about Kate and Lorena somewhere in the middle of that. She leaned her head against the old cow’s side and patiently stripped the milk out of her teats into the bucket. Some things had to be done no matter if the world was burning up around you.

And hadn’t she always done what had to be done? So had Kate. She was the one child of Nadine’s who was most like her in that way. Kate knew what had to be done and did it. That’s why she’d run away to the woods to get Lorena. She knew Lorena would need her. That was why now she’d be running away from the fire and finding somewhere safe. Besides, Nadine didn’t just have to depend on Kate’s own good sense. Graham would have found her. He knew every tree in Lindell Woods. He’d find a way out. He’d see that the girls were safe even while his whole world was burning down.

Poor Graham. He’d already been through one life tragedy back when the influenza had taken his parents and the same as taken Fern. He’d had to give up his dream of being a doctor to care for Fern. Such a gentle man with such a kind spirit. Nadine had never seen him be hateful to anyone. Even when they made fun of him or Fern and the way they lived, keeping the big house as a shrine to his mother. Now it looked like that might all go up in smoke.

She patted the old cow’s rump to let her know she was through milking her and carried the bucket of milk into the house. She left it sitting on the kitchen table. She didn’t bother lighting a lamp, but she did light a lantern now. She’d told the girls to stay at Gertie’s, so she was alone in the house. She couldn’t go search for Kate and Lorena. She couldn’t be all that much help on the fire line. She thought about her father and how the church bells ringing and the sight of the fire moving closer to his house and the church might upset him. She’d go there second.

First she walked across the field and straight toward the Lindell house. The fire wasn’t there yet, but the smoke was. She had time. She could hear the men shouting back and forth as they felled trees and worked frantically to clear a firebreak. The noise of the flames consuming the trees was terrifying, and Nadine prayed out loud and walked faster.

The house was still standing, but it would take a miracle for the men to save it. The woods had edged too close on all sides since the house had held a family. She looked over her shoulder at the flames lighting the sky as she pushed open the door and stepped through it into the front hall. Here Mrs. Lindell had once greeted people and held lavish parties for her father, the senator. She had been a beautiful woman with a heart as kind as Graham’s. The air in the house felt too still, as if the house itself was holding its breath as it awaited its fate.

Nadine had the eerie feeling she wasn’t alone, but she shook it away. The spirits of Mr. and Mrs. Lindell had long been gone from this place. Long removed from the worries of this world. She had come for one thing and one thing only. It was the least she could do for Graham while he was saving Kate and Lorena. She had to believe he was saving Kate and Lorena.

The painting of his mother hung in the parlor over the mantel. Nadine had never been in the house with Graham when he didn’t show her the painting and talk about how beautiful his mother was. Sometimes he talked to the painting as if the woman gazing out at him might even yet hear his voice. He’d be heartbroken if it was lost. Nadine set her lantern down on the hearth and pushed a chair over to the mantel.

She ignored the feeling that she was being watched and resisted the urge to talk to the woman’s face in front of her the way Graham did as she lifted the painting off the wall. It was heavier than she had expected and awkward to hold. The chair that had seemed steady enough when she’d first stepped up on it now felt wobbly as she tried to shift the painting in her hands to set it down on the floor.

“What are you doing?” The voice spoke right behind her.

Nadine jumped and would have fallen if rough hands hadn’t grabbed her and lifted her off the chair and set her on the floor. She kept hold of the painting and looked around at Fern. “You scared me, Fern.”

“I scare a lot of people,” she said. “What are you doing with Mother’s portrait?”

“I wanted to save it in case the men couldn’t stop the fire. I know how much it means to Graham.” Nadine looked at Fern in the dim light of the lantern. “And you.”

“Brother says paintings don’t matter. People matter.”

“Where is Graham?”

“That’s why you’re here. You think if you save his painting he’ll save her. Like a trade.” Fern stared at Nadine for a moment before she shook her head sadly. “But it doesn’t work that way. People die no matter what you try to trade.”

Nadine moistened her lips and tried to mash down the panic growing in her. Kate and Lorena had to be with Graham. They had to be safe. “They aren’t going to die.”

“Maybe not,” Fern said. “Probably not. Brother had them. He’ll get them out but not because of this.” She pointed at the painting.

Relief washed through Nadine and made her legs weak. She set the painting down against the wall and held onto the back of the chair.

Fern grabbed Nadine’s arm again to keep her from falling. “I used to swoon. Stopped that.”

“I never swoon.” Nadine straightened up.

“Could be the smoke, but looked more like a swoon.” Fern let go of Nadine and went to push open a window and lean out it. “Fire’s not here yet, but it will be.” She pulled her head back in and went to the middle of the room. Her shadow in the light of the lantern stretched across the room and up the wall. “Laughter here. Once.”

“Did you come back to say goodbye to the house?” Nadine asked softly.

Fern turned to Nadine. “Houses don’t have ears.”

“Maybe not, but their walls ring with memories.” Nadine looked around at the faded rose wallpaper and sheet-covered furniture. There was something so lonesome about an empty house.

“Bad memories too.” Fern went over and leaned the painting out from the wall to pat the back of its canvas. She stood up and stared toward Nadine. “Brother keeps money there. If you bother it, I’ll know. Got to get my box.” Without hurrying she went to the hall where the stairs climbed up to the second floor.

Nadine picked up her lantern and the painting to follow her. The smoke was getting thicker, and she couldn’t keep from coughing a little as she said, “Hurry.”

Fern stopped halfway up the stairs and looked down at Nadine. “Go home before you swoon again.”

“I won’t leave you,” Nadine said.

“That’s what he said. I didn’t believe him. The boy came and I ran away. I shouldn’t have run away. I could have stopped it. Kept him from knocking the boy into the water. Kept Brother from hitting him. Stopped it all.” She stared over top of Nadine’s head, seeing something that Nadine knew nothing of. “Boy came up and Brother saved him, but the water took my love away. Stole him from me, but it wasn’t the water’s fault. It was mine. I want to blame that man, but it was my fault. All mine.”

So many words seemed to empty Fern out, and she had to grasp hold of the banister for a moment before she gained the strength to keep climbing. Nadine stood at the bottom of the staircase and tried not to think about the thickening smoke as she waited for Fern. She could hear the woman walking around in the room above her, and Nadine wanted to run up the stairs and grab Fern and pull her out of the house. But the fire hadn’t reached the house. There was surely time for Fern to get whatever dear possession she wanted to save. Nadine wouldn’t deny her that when the poor woman had been denied so much already.

She blew out a breath in relief when Fern started back down the steps. Fern almost smiled when she got to the bottom of the stairs and looked at Nadine. “Faithful like Brother.” She thrust a small wooden box at Nadine. “Here. Take that and Mother. I can chop trees. Stop the fire.”

Nadine took the box, but before she picked up the painting, she surprised both Fern and herself by grabbing Fern in a hug. “I’m sorry.”

Fern pulled loose. “For what?”

“I don’t know, but you do.”

Fern looked at her for another minute before she went out the front door, picked up her hatchet, and started toward where the men were working against the fire that was leaping out of the trees toward the sky now. The men looked small in front of the flames.

It was awkward carrying the painting, the box, and the lantern. Halfway across the field back toward Rosey Corner, Nadine blew out the lantern and set it down on the ground. The fire was throwing enough light her way that she didn’t need it anymore. She didn’t stop at her house but carried the painting and Fern’s box to Gertie’s house in the middle of Rosey Corner. If Gertie’s house burned, all of Rosey Corner would be lost.

Gertie and the girls ran down off the porch to meet her. They were full of questions Nadine couldn’t answer, but she told them Kate and Lorena were safe with Graham. She needed to believe it was true as much as they did. Then she left them with Gertie and walked to her father’s house. Here the fire was much closer, only a short open field away.

Carla and her father were on the porch in their rocking chairs. Carla was rocking furiously and talking nonstop. Nadine could hear her before she went through the yard gate. Nadine’s father wasn’t rocking at all as he stared out toward the fire.

“Nadine!” Carla jumped up out of her chair when she saw Nadine. She ran down the steps to grab Nadine’s arms. “Tell your father we have to leave. He won’t listen to me. For a while he kept praying the Lord would keep the church building safe, but then he sat down and now he won’t say anything. Just sits there.”

“Calm down, Carla,” Nadine said.

“Calm down!? How could anybody be calm with that right on their doorstep?” Carla gestured wildly toward the fire.

Nadine pushed Carla’s hands away and stepped past her to the porch. She knew why her father was so silent even before she went up the steps. The fire had claimed its first victim.

______

The men worked feverishly to get a firebreak cleared to save the Lindell house, but the fire was too big to stop. Fern was working beside Victor when the house caught.

When she’d shown up earlier with an axe and her hatchet and started to chop down the nearest bushes without a word, he’d shouted to her over the noise of the fire and the axes. “Where are the girls?”

She stood up and looked straight at him. “With Brother.”

He could barely hear her. “Safe?”

She just kept looking at him, her face not showing any feeling in the reflection of the fire. She didn’t look a thing like the girl he’d remembered weeping and running up the steps away from Press Jr. that night so long ago. Finally, without making any kind of answer, she turned back to the brush and began chopping again. He’d done the same. There was nothing else to do. Nothing but pray. Pray and keep fighting the fire.

The fire was a ravenous monster riding on the wind. The more it ate, the hungrier it got. They would fight it back in one place only to see a new bush farther along flash into flames as though gasoline had been poured on it.

The wind was the reason they lost the Lindell house. It was blowing hard against them almost as if a storm was brewing. Victor even thought he heard a clap of thunder, but when he looked up to check for clouds, all he could see was the glow of the flames dancing against the black sky.

And then they were dancing across the roof of the Lindell house. At first it was just a spark or two, but minutes later flames were chasing each other across the old shingles and sliding down the walls.

Beside him, Fern straightened up and stared at the house. Victor moved over beside her. He touched her shoulder, but she shrugged off his hand. “Just a house,” she said.

Victor dropped his hand to his side, but didn’t move away from her. “But your house,” he said.

“Brother’s house. Trees mine.” She looked from the house to the trees flaming around them. “All gone. No place left.”

“We’ll find you a place. Don’t worry.”

Fern looked at him. “That’s what he would always say. Don’t worry. And then he would smile. Do you remember? That smile.”

He knew whose smile she was talking about. “Press was my hero.”

“He said don’t worry, but I did. Worry, worry. Weep, weep. Hurt, hurt.” She put her hand over her heart as she turned her eyes back toward the house. Her voice didn’t change as she went on. “Then I stopped. Like swooning. Didn’t help.”

“I’m sorry,” Victor said.

“Sorry don’t help any more than swooning.”

The roof of the house fell in, and flames exploded out the windows. They watched it silently for a moment before Fern said, “Brother will cry.” Then she picked up her axe and moved to where the other men had started clearing a new line.

Victor followed her, as the prayer rose inside him that Graham would have the chance to cry over his lost house. That would mean he was still alive along with the girls. They had to be alive.

A half hour later he again heard a rumbling boom. This time there was no denying it was thunder. Several of the men stopped working to look up at the sky. Victor knew they were praying, and he lifted his own prayer up to join theirs.

“Rain. Dear Lord, send rain down on the fire.”

The first big drops hit his head before all the words were out of his mouth.

Kate had no idea how long they’d been standing in the water. It seemed like an eternity as the fire flashed through the trees and surrounded them while the reflection of the flames shimmered on top the water. The fire was terrible to see, yet at the same time so awesome Kate couldn’t turn her eyes away from it.

Graham stared at the fire and whispered, “We shall behold the great and mighty works of the Lord.”

Lorena kept her face hidden against Graham’s shoulder. “I’m scared.”

“I know, they can be fearsome acts,” Graham said as he stroked Lorena’s back. “But don’t you worry. The Lord, he’s taking care of us. Helped us find the pond. And appears like we’re not the only ones. Look over there.” He pointed. “That looks like old Carson Coon. Me and Poe have been chasing that old rascal all summer, and here he is coming out to swim with us. And here comes a possum. The good Lord sure didn’t waste no pretty parts on him, now did he?”

Lorena lifted her feet out of the water. “He won’t eat my toes, will he?”

“No, your toenails would be way too crunchy for him,” Graham said.

Lorena giggled and let her feet dip down in the water again. More animals came out of the woods to ease into the water as they kept a wary eye on the humans and dog in the pond. Kate was beginning to feel like she was in a soup pot in the middle of a campfire. No more had that thought run through her mind than she imagined the water was getting warmer.

Kate leaned over to whisper to Graham. “The water won’t get too hot, will it?”

She could see his smile in the light of the fire. “You don’t have to worry none about that. We won’t be onions in fish soup here. It’s a big pond, and the fire’s moving past us fast. Just burning the cedars and underbrush. It may not get the old trees.”

Kate stared back at the fire and couldn’t imagine it leaving anything standing. It seemed to be devouring everything in its path the way the fire Elijah had called down from heaven had consumed his sacrifice, the wood, the rocks, and even licked up the water in the trough around the altar. Kate shook her head a little. She didn’t want to think about fire licking up water. She dipped down until her chin was level with the pond surface.

A few minutes later, Kate almost laughed out loud when the first raindrop hit the pond water beside her. “It’s raining!” she shouted to Graham.

“It’s raining,” Lorena echoed.

Even Poe got into the spirit with a howl, and then Graham did laugh out loud.

The raindrops began making circles in the water around them, and then the rain came down in a swoosh that swept across the pond surface. The water dashed against their faces and felt cool and refreshing. Kate opened her mouth and stuck out her tongue to catch some of the raindrops. In the woods around the pond, the rain beat down the flames as steamy fog mixed with smoke rose from the ground.

Above their heads thunder rumbled and lightning lit up the sky. The rain kept falling. “Will it put the fire out?” Kate asked Graham.

“Enough of it. See, look. Some of the critters are heading out already.” When the lightning lit up the pond, Graham pointed toward the raccoon swimming toward the bank.

“Can we go home now?” Kate asked. She wanted to go home more than anything in the world. She wanted to see her mother and father. She wanted them to know she and Lorena were safe. “Please.”

“Home. I don’t see why not.” Graham leaned over close to her ear. “A person can always go home.”

Lorena pushed her head in between Graham and Kate. “I want to go too. Home with Kate.”

They stomped around in the mud close to the pond bank to try to find Kate’s shoes, but the mud must have swallowed the shoes whole.

“Oh well,” Kate said as she climbed on out of the pond. “I can go barefoot. My feet are tough.”

“Tough enough till you step on a hot coal.” Graham followed her out on the bank and set Lorena down. He pulled off his shirt and began tearing it into strips. “We’ll have to make you some shoes of a sort.”

Kate tore a few strips off her dress tail to add to what Graham was wrapping around her feet. The first heavy dash of rain gave way to a gentle, steady shower that was slowly quenching the flames. But the fire smoldered in the old logs and put out thick, choking smoke. After Graham wrapped the rags around her feet, he soaked strips of what was left of his shirt to tie over their noses and mouths before they left the pond.

It was very dark with the rain falling around them and the clouds blotting out any sign of the moon or stars. Kate had walked between her house and Graham’s pond a hundred times, but now nothing was the same. She had no idea if they were going the right direction as they made their way between snags of burned tree trunks and fallen trees. The lingering smoke burned her nose even with the wet rag to filter out the worst of the ash. Kate couldn’t imagine what the place would look like in the morning light. She didn’t want to imagine it. Sunrise would bring the truth soon enough.

And then they stepped into a different world. A world where the trees were still standing and the rain was filtering through a canopy of leaves over their heads to wash away the smoke that lingered in the air.

Graham pulled the rag down off his nose and then off Lorena’s face too, as he sat her down on her feet. He looked back at Kate.

“See, I told you the old girls would make it through.” He stepped up beside one of the oak trees and laughed as he laid his hand on its trunk.

Kate freed her face from the wet rag and looked up. The night was very dark, but she could sense the trees towering over her. Trees that had been there since long before Rosey Corner had been settled. The fire had gone through, but it hadn’t taken any of the trees down. When the song rose up inside her, she let it out. “Praise God from whom all blessings flow.” Kate always wanted to sing when she was under the great trees, and never more than now.

Graham joined in with her. He didn’t have much of a singing voice, but he sounded joyful. “Praise him all creatures here below.”

Lorena sang the amen with them.

“The strong find a way to keep standing. No matter what happens.” Graham patted the tree trunk closest to him. Then he put his hand on Lorena’s head and Kate’s shoulder. “That’s us. Strong. We’re still standing.”

“Because you knew where the pond was.” Kate wasn’t feeling very strong, just blessed. Mightily blessed.

“It’s the Lord who gives us strength,” Graham said. “To face all the fires of life.”

“You sound like Grandfather Reece,” Kate said.

“If a fellow can’t preach a little after what we’ve seen tonight, there’s something wrong inside his heart.”

“Can we go on home now?” Lorena asked in a small voice. “Or are we lost?”

Kate picked up Lorena. “No, sweetie. We aren’t lost. We know where we are and who we are. Why don’t you say your name now?”

“Okay, but put me down so I can say it right.” Lorena stood down on the ground and lifted up her head to shout at the tops of the trees. “My name is Lorena Birdsong.”

Kate laughed and shouted after her. “My name is Katherine Reece Merritt.”

Graham echoed his name right behind them. “My name is Graham Barclay Lindell.”

Then Kate shouted. “And we are alive.”

The word
alive
bounced off the trees around them. She pulled in a deep breath and wanted to sing again. And dance. And laugh. She’d never before thought about how good it felt to breathe.