One Shenandoah Winter (25 page)

When she saw he was unable to carry on the conversation himself, she glanced again at the window and said, “I hope they have better weather for the picnic.”

His gaze turned guarded. “You know about that?”

“I know the whole town is busy keeping a secret from me.” She inspected his face. “You know what it is, don't try to tell me different. What is going on here?”

“Connie . . .” He sighed his resignation. “If you insist, I'll tell you. But I wish you'd just wait. Please.”

Because it was Nathan who asked, and because her heart was already full of surprises, she answered him with a smile and a playful, “So how is it that you know about this secret surprise and I don't?”

“Because, well, it was my idea. Sort of. Part of it, anyway. The rest was Brian's.”

Connie found it necessary to bite her lip before she could ask, “You thought up a surprise for me?”

Nathan started to respond, then saw the look she was giving him, and a new light came to his eyes. “Have you ever been kissed in a doctor's office before?”

When Connie told Nathan her farewells and walked back into the waiting room, she found the entire crowd watching her. Instantly she knew Hattie had told them. For once she did not mind the incredible speed with which news spread through this town.

When Connie stood by the door and said nothing, Hattie's hands gradually scrunched the paper she was holding into a tight wad. “Well?”

Connie took a breath. Despite the faint scents of illness and disinfectant and age, despite the closed-in odors of an overcrowded waiting room on a cold and rainy day, she felt as though the breath could go on forever. She smiled at Hattie, at the room, at the folks, at the day. “Doctor Nathan Reynolds is going to stay in Hillsboro.”

There was a sense of the whole room sharing in her breath, drawing in her smile. Hattie said weakly, “You're sure?”

“Sure as I can be of anything in this crazy world.” She looked down at her friend and nodded her head. “I can't hardly believe it either.”

Hattie permitted herself a shaky little laugh. “This is just plain wonderful.”

“It's better than that,” Connie said, feeling like they all must see the sun she felt rising in her heart. “It's a miracle.”

Twenty-Nine

T
he day was a gift. And it just kept getting better.

The village church bells woke Nathan, ringing sweetly in the winter air. He went straight to his window and was astonished to find sunlight there to greet him. He reached for his watch, could not believe it actually read eight o'clock. Then he glanced back at the sunlight. And he laughed. The drenching rain was nothing but a memory, the future blazing with light and promise.

After church, Nathan rode up to Poppa Joe's with Dawn and Duke. People were honking and waving and shouting back and forth even before they left the parking lot. It seemed as though the entire town must have been either in front or behind them, there were so many cars and station wagons and pickups. They made their noisy way up the winding roads, waving at the occasional car coming down the other way, calling at them to turn around. Nonsense gaiety, no reason for it other than the fact that it was a beautiful day for a winter gathering.

Duke and the other young men had been busy all week, and it showed. The branches were cut back from the uphill track, and the worst of the gullies had been filled in with fresh gravel. Even so, he was hanging on and whooping with the others as they powered up the steepest bit and crested the final rise.

A large swatch of meadow had been mowed and lined with rope, designating the makeshift parking area. They left the truck, carrying baskets and blankets and bags. Kids and dogs went streaming by, filling the hillside meadow with their racket.

Trestle tables had been carted up and settled in long lines over beside Poppa Joe's old cabin. A pair of thick-chested mountain men with beards and long hair tended a huge barbecue pit. They would have looked dangerous save for the aprons and the laughter and the light in their eyes. Mothers stayed busy keeping the kids off Poppa Joe's porch and away from the huge tarpaulin-covered bundle there in front of the cabin. Nathan found himself shaking hands with people he had never seen before, talking with them as easily as he would his oldest friends. It was just that kind of day.

“Here she comes!”

The call brought them all around. The chatter died as though it had been cut off with a knife. The meadow was suddenly so quiet they could hear the doors slam in the distance and then Connie's voice cry out, “Let go of that basket, Hattie! It's bad enough we had to get up here last. I'm not an invalid. Now give me something to carry!”

It was enough to set the entire gathering to howling with laughter. Nathan found himself slapping a total stranger's back, wiping his eyes, agreeing with one of Will Green's musicians that it was definitely Connie over there. Yessir. The one and only.

They grew quiet again, though, when Connie got close enough for them to see her face. They watched her take in the huge bulk wrapped in canvas there before the porch, then glance at all the faces smiling her way. Her shoulders tucked in a little, as though she were too uncertain under all that scrutiny to be her normal assertive self.

“Nathan? Where's the doc?” Fuller Allen stepped through the crowd, spotted Nathan by one of the tables, and waved at him. “Get on over here, Doc. This here's your doing.”

“No, it's not.” But he started walking anyway. “Earl's the one who did it.”

“Earl supplied the sweat. You gave us the idea.” When he was up close, Fuller swept Nathan up in one arm and said, “Connie, honey, we've got something for you.”

She tried for a little of the old bluster, but her nerves showed with the trembling in her voice. “Who's we?”

“Near 'bout everybody you see here. We all chipped in a little.” Fuller was beaming so hard his red-cheeked face looked ready to split like an overripe fruit. “It's our way of saying thank you, honey.”

She crossed her arms, squinted at the canvas, then said, “I haven't done a thing worth getting thanked for.”

“Sure you have. You've seen us through thick and thin.” The hand squeezed Nathan's shoulders. “Why, you even brought us Doc here.”

Nathan found himself glancing around the circle of faces, those in jackets and those in coveralls, those with strength and youth, those with beards and weather-beaten features, those who wore poverty like a second skin. He saw some gap-toothed smiles, and some deeply creased features. He saw how some of the kids stood and watched while others ran in the distance shrieking with the joy of the day. Not patients to be catalogued and treated. People. His people. The people of his home.

Fuller Allen drew him back with, “Go on, Nathan, open her up.”

Nathan started to object, then decided, “Earl, come on over here and give me a hand.”

The lanky mechanic was blushing to the roots of his hair as he walked forward and took hold of one corner of the tarpaulin. Together they started drawing it off, walking slowly backward so they could watch as the truck came into view and see Connie's expression at the same time.

Connie's mouth opened and stayed that way. Her eyes widened, and grew wider still. Nathan looked from her to the truck, then to the people watching and grinning, and back to Connie.

Then he did what felt natural. He clapped Earl on the shoulder and he said loud enough for all to hear, “You've done yourself proud. That is one beautiful truck.”

Earl beamed and replied, “Ain't she, though?”

Connie took a little step toward the truck. Somebody called, “Go on, honey, she won't bite.”

Hesitantly she reached forward and touched the polished sky-blue surface. The truck positively gleamed. The newly galvanized surfaces shone like solid silver.

Connie opened the door. It swung on new hinges. In fact, the entire truck was almost completely new, right down to the wheels and rims. Nathan watched as Connie leaned into the truck, felt the old steering wheel, and took a long shaky breath. When she turned back around, her eyes were brimming over and her throat was so tight she was barely able to say, “It still smells like him.”

That was enough to bring them all around. They laughed and crowded up and congratulated Earl and clapped Nathan's back and chattered and exclaimed. Nathan could not recall ever having seen so many smiles in one place before.

The lunch was long and lazy and noisy. Nathan sat at a table across from Connie, but they scarcely spoke to one another. Having so many people around left them both a little bashful. Every once in a while she would look over at him, though, and give him a glance that melted his heart.

Finally Brian Blackstone rose to his feet and raised his hands for silence. Nathan found his gaze snagged by Sadie, who was seated there beside him, the baby nestled in her arms. As the crowd quieted for Brian, the baby gave a chortling laugh. Since the eating problem had been resolved, Nathan had never known a happier baby.
His people
.

“I'd like to thank everybody for making this the finest picnic I think I've ever been on,” Brian said. When the applause and chatter died down again, he went on, “But there's one more thing to do before this day is over.”

“That's right,” a woman called out. “Clean up this mess!”

“Okay, okay,” Brian said, quieting them. “Two things, then.” He turned his smile toward Nathan. “Our Nathan has asked if we would baptize him up here in Poppa Joe's lake.”

Someone farther down the table said something to Nathan, and he looked down and smiled his reply. But he really did not hear them. His mind was held by two words the pastor had said.
Our Nathan.
It was the most remarkable title he had ever been given. A prize to carry with him all his life long.
Our
Nathan.

Then he looked back at Connie and saw the tears streaming down her face. It was hard, but he knew he had to do it then, walk around in front of all of those people and raise her up and take her in his arms. She buried her face in his shoulder, shaking her head back and forth as she wiped her eyes and her cheeks. Nathan felt his face go flush at the sound of all those people laughing and clapping at them. But he held on just the same.

When he started to release her, she took a grip on his hand that kept him close, and she turned and sniffled and called out, “Dawn, Duke, come over here a minute.”

As the pair of them approached, Nathan wondered at the wary look they gave Connie. But she just sniffed again and wiped her face another time, and said loud enough for all nearby to hear, “I was meaning to do it all up legal and proper first. But there won't be a better time than this.”

She reached over and took hold of Duke's hand with her free one. The act caused both Dawn and Connie's chins to quiver. She squeezed the hand firmly and she said in a loud voice, “I'm giving you a piece of Poppa Joe's meadow as your wedding present. I want you to build yourselves a home up here.”

The noise spread out in a grand wave of surprise, but the center remained utterly still. The couple's faces there before Nathan were shocked to silence. Connie gave Duke's hand a little shake and said, “He would have wanted this. I know it for sure and for certain.”

Then before they could recover enough to speak, she turned back to Nathan, and said, “All right. It's your time now.” And she hugged him again. “You are a good man, Nathan Reynolds. A good man.”

Nathan carried that with him as Brian motioned him over and asked, “We usually like to have a little hymn to start us on our way. Do you have a favorite?”

“As long as I don't have to sing,” Nathan replied, and waited until the chuckles stilled to add, “I'd love to hear Will give us, ‘I Will Arise and Go to Jesus.'”

As they all rose and started off behind Brian, Will's bow scratched across the strings, and once more the voices rose and chimed out the timeless words. The sun was so bright that the day was not permitted to hold even a trace of winter chill. The meadow was a golden sea, the mountains alive and echoing with their own response to the hymn.

Nathan walked there between Brian and Connie, down the path that led into the forest, and the hymn and the people followed along behind. As he walked through the sweet-scented woods, he felt as though Poppa Joe had suddenly sauntered over to walk with him. And Nathan knew he would never forget this. Not even if he lived a thousand years.

They came out into the clearing, and the people stretched all the way around the lake's stony rim. Nathan stepped into the lake there beside Brian, not minding in the least how cold the water felt. It seemed as though the sun itself had come down to reside there among the people. For this moment, this instant of timeless perfection, the light of heaven became a reality so strong it joined to his heart, and united all the pieces of life and dreams into a new and certain whole. For this moment, though his mind would ask new questions every day remaining to him on this earth, all the mysteries of life were calmed, and all the wounds healed.