Light Over Water (20 page)

          Alison nodded at the
blushing young boy and thanked him.  “I’m sorry about your sisters,” she said.

          His face suddenly
looked as old as his father’s as he shrugged and looked away.

          Alison hurried up the
steps and into the kitchen where Esther met her.  They embraced for a long
time, tears coming easily with their mutual sympathy.  As Esther pulled away
she swiped the tears off her cheeks and said, “I don’t think Cleo will
recover.  She wants to see you so much.  I don’t know why, but she’s been so
insistent that you come.”

          Alison moved towards
the stairs before Esther added, “I should warn you.  She’s had such a high
fever that her we cut off most of her hair.”  She gave a trembling little laugh
that turned to a sob, “Just like she wanted!”

          Alison climbed up the
stairs, steeling herself for this sight.  Cleo was the vain one, who used her
egg money to buy a hand mirror.  She was pretty and had a zest to match her
looks.  Alison tapped on the door and Cleo’s father opened it.  His gaze at her
was sorrowful and a bit ashamed.  “So you’ve come,” he said.  “I want to speak
with you after you visit Cleo.”

          He left them alone. 
Alison tied a handkerchief around her nose and mouth, and then drew near to the
bed where Cleo lay.  The air in the room was stale with the smell of disease. 
As she sat in the chair just vacated by Reg, Cleo turned her head.  She looked
hollowed out and blue, and was breathing with difficulty.  Most pitiful was the
sight of her nearly bald head, only a short thatch of blonde strands left.

          “Alison!” Cleo moved
her hand slightly, and Alison clasped it.  “I had to tell you before it was too
late.”  She stopped to take a couple of breaths.   Alison could feel her
trembling.  “I told my father.  I’m sorry.”

          For a short moment
Alison was confused.  “Told him what?”

          “About your baby,”
came the strangled whisper.  “I heard you talking to the teacher one morning. 
I’m sorry,” she repeated.  “But I told him what really happened, that it wasn’t
your fault.  Yesterday, Alison.  I told him yesterday.”

          Alison stared at the
dying girl.  She shook her head for a moment, feeling cold inside.  “How did
you know?” she demanded.

          Cleo’s head fell
back.  She closed her eyes.  But her words came out slightly stronger.  “He
tried it with me…Aubrey Newell.  The night of the clam bake.  That‘s why I
always locked the bedroom door, and why I hated him after that.”

          “Oh!” Alison gasped. 
She knelt down on the floor and drew the girl into her arms.  She cradled her
and murmured, “I’m sorry, Cleo.  I’m so sorry.  Did you tell your father that
too?”

          Cleo bit out the
word.  “Yes.  I couldn’t not tell him, could I?”  Then she gasped for breath
and Alison settled her back on her pillow.

          Between breaths Cleo
said, “Forgive me…please?”

          Alison smiled, then
realized Cleo couldn’t see it for the handkerchief.  She stroked the pale
cheek.  “There’s nothing to forgive.”

          For a moment Cleo
opened her eyes and was still.  Then she whispered one word.  “Sam.”

          Reg Eliot sat in a
chair in the hallway with his head bowed down.  He sat up slowly, and then
stood.  “I’m very sorry for what I did, Allie.  I know it was unforgivable,
especially since it obviously wasn’t true.”

          Alison pulled the
handkerchief down around her neck.  She met his eyes, and then looked away. 
She was so glad to hear him call her Allie. “No, Mr. Eliot.  I was pregnant
when we last spoke.  And it happened the way Cleo told you.  I lost the baby,
in the spring.  The day we last spoke.”  Alison found that her whole body was
trembling now, remembering that terrible day.

          Reg groaned and sat
back down.  He seemed as hollow as Cleo had looked and she wondered if he was
sick too.  “So much death,” he whispered.  “So much sorrow for someone so
young.”  He shook his head.  He swallowed and gazed at her.

          Alison stood, meeting
his eye.  She watched him stand and go to the table in the hall, open a drawer
and draw out a slim packet of letters.  “I never should have kept them.  I’ve
probably caused him so much hurt too, with you not writing.”

          “I did write.  I kept
writing.  You couldn’t stop me doing that.  I knew I was innocent, and…” she
stopped as the truth of it rang in her head.  She smiled suddenly.  “I love Sam
so much.  I couldn’t stop.”

          Reg handed her the
letters.  “Will you forgive me?  Please?  I was trying…” he stopped then.  His
eyes were bleak with so much pain from the losses he’d sustained that her heart
swelled with pity.  Impulsively she embraced him.  She nodded, but couldn’t
speak.

          He returned her
embrace and she felt how spare his flesh had become.  He sat back down
abruptly.  “I think Cleo’s going to die too,” he said bleakly.   Then, “Do you
know where Aubrey Newell went?”

          “No, sir.  I don’t
know where he went.  He was going to join the military.”

          Reg’s fists clenched
and on his pale cheeks two spots of color rose. 

          Alison said lamely,
“I’d best be getting home.  I pray Cleo gets better.”

          As soon as she got
home she ran up to her room to give herself time with her letters.  Ida still
kept vigil in the kitchen, and Louise was washing bed linens.

          Settling in her
little chair by the window, Alison read each one.  He described some battles
and some of his friends.  He spent one whole letter telling her all the things
he missed from home, including her.  Some were short and poignant – “My heart
rushes toward you like the turning tide” – and others were cryptic and censored. 
She had read five of them when she came to a letter in which he described his
nearly fatal experience.  He spoke about them laboring through the mud in their
attempt to move a gun, how the shell exploded so near them that the horse was
killed and landed on him.  He described his despair and his gradual realization
that he would die.  Then he told her how he prayed and God gave him the
strength to move his hand out.  “He wrote, “I stuck my arm out and yelled ‘God
help me!’ and someone grabbed my hand.  When they managed to budge that horse
and pull me out, guess who had come looking for me?  Aubrey Newell.  He saved
my life, Allie.  He’d just finished thirty-six straight hours of work, but came
to look for me when our chaplain told him I was missing.  I’d still be there if
it weren’t for Aubrey.”
          Alison dropped the letter on the floor and stared out the window.

Patiently, Gallantly, with
Dignity

          Ruth Hudson awoke
gasping with tears seeping from under her eyelids.  She had another nightmare
about Tom that seemed so real that it took several moments for the images to
fade.  He was lost and she felt such a sense of urgency that she needed to find
him.  She knew where he was but couldn’t get there fast enough.  She was in the
barn trying to hitch up the wagon, but her arms and legs were slow, clumsy, the
halter and reins tangled, or the horse shifted or even disappeared.  She was
crying in the dream because no one would help her.  In fact, Naomi and the boys
either laughed at or ignored her.  She heard a loud crash behind her and looked
out the barn door to see the house collapsed and she realized that Tom was
inside.  She ran across the yard, her legs unable to move fast enough.  She was
aware that her sister and all the orphans were inside too, but she kept
screaming for Tom.

          Sitting up in her
bed, Ruth moved carefully to avoid waking her sister who had been sleeping with
her since Tommy left.  She hated dreams like this that seemed so real you
couldn’t shake them from your head, or the panic from your heart.  But as her
breathing slowed, she realized that the other side of the bed was empty.  Naomi
wasn’t even in the room.

          Ruth stood and pulled
on her robe without bothering to light a lamp.  She slid her feet into her
slippers and hurried into the hallway.  A quick check of the boys’ rooms
revealed that all was quiet there.  Naomi wasn’t up tending anyone.  She
listened from the top of the stairs for any noises below.  She moved swiftly
down and into the kitchen.  The room was quiet but for the ticking of the
mantle clock and a steady snoring from beyond the kitchen where Riley Morse was
staying.  Could Naomi have…?  No!  Ruth dismissed that errant thought as she
bit her lip.  She pulled a barn coat over her nightclothes and lit a lamp to
carry outside.

          Heavy wet air with a
chill in it told Ruth they’d had rain.  Perhaps she’d heard a clap of thunder
in her dream.  She stepped carefully around the puddles in the yard, hoping to
see another light in the barn.  But it looked dark.  Irritation fought with
fear as she thought about her sister. Naomi suffered from occasional periods of
deep melancholy and did things that had the potential to destroy her.  She took
to drink, a habit they tried so hard to hide from everyone, and also took to wandering. 
The most terrible time was three years earlier when she made it all the way to
New York City and was entangled there for five months.  She became involved
with a man whose intentions were as far from honorable as anyone’s could be. 
Divine intervention brought her back to them, a broken and bitter woman who
softened in her work with the orphans.  At times she mocked both Ruth and Tom
for their persistent vigilance over her moods.  Then by times she was maudlin
and sentimentally grateful in an overdramatic way.  She lacked the ability to
simply leave the past and start fresh.  She claimed to love the man who had
entrapped her and tried on two other occasions to go back to find him.  She got
scared both times before she ever got on the train.  Her innate timidity was
both her safety and her downfall.

          Ruth knew before she
opened the door that Naomi was gone.  The wet ground showed the tracks of the
horse and wagon clearly even in the dim light of the lamp.  Sighing, Ruth
turned back to the house.  Her feet were cold and damp now despite her attempts
to avoid the wet spots.  Cold seeped into her heart as she thought about her
sister taking away their wagon and their horse.

          In the kitchen, Ruth
set the lamp on the table while she stoked up the fire in the stove.  She knew
she ought to check the household money, but she wanted to get warmed up first. 
August was almost over and the nights were cool now.  Soon the apples would be
ready to harvest and they’d have a boost of income as their apples were distributed
all over the valley.  But for right now the budget was tight, both for the
orphanage and for Ruth and Tom.  Without his chair money, they were living on
his army pay. It seemed such a small amount sometimes.

          Ruth realized she’d
been standing in front of the kitchen stove for several minutes.  The fire was
roaring now, so she added another stick and closed the damper.  She gazed at
the cupboard where the money tin was kept.  She felt herself reach up, pull
down the old tea tin and lift the lid with her eyes closed.  The weight of it
told her already it was empty.  She found she was holding her breath and she
barely opened her eyes to peek inside.  It was empty, but for a torn piece of
paper Ruth lifted out.  “Sorry, Ru,” her sister had written.

          Again tears sprang to
Ruth’s eyes as she wondered when she’d ever stop feeling sorry for her sister
and get mad.

          Gradually the noise
she’d been hearing since she came in the kitchen broke through the daze she was
in and she wondered what it could be.  It came from Riley’s room.  She stood
outside the door listening to what she had assumed was snoring but sounded more
like painful breaths.  She tapped on the door.  “Mr. Moore?  Are you unwell,
Mr. Moore?”

          A moan answered her. 
Ruth pushed open the door.  She could always tell when one of the children was
sick, for the very air of the room would smell different.  She knew as she
entered his room that Riley Moore was very sick.

          Moving to his
bedside, Ruth set the lamp down and looked at him.  Riley Moore was a member of
their church family and a community member whom everyone knew.  He was
described as an imbecile, but Ruth preferred to think of him as a big boy.  He
lived with his elderly parents and had occasionally helped at the orphanage. 
After Tom left for France, Riley came to stay with Ruth and Naomi and help
permanently.  He knew an enormous amount about animals and growing things.  He
had no math skills, nor could he read.  He was close to sixty years old, a
compact but strong man who had a gentle way with the orphan boys.  His hair
stood out from his head in grey crinkles, he shaved clean every day and had all
his teeth.  His eyes were a green brown color that seemed to change with the
light.  Ruth had grown so fond of him since he came to help that the sight of
him now brought the tears back in full force.  His skin was pasty white, but
his forehead and his cheeks, when she felt them, were burning.  He seemed to be
shaking and his breaths as he sucked them in sounded as if they were drawn
across the blade of a saw.

          Ruth spoke his name
again and shook his arm a little.  His eyes dragged open slowly at her voice.