Saints Among Us (7 page)

“No,” said Karin, surprising her. “My husband and I did. We grew up in Sweden in the same little town. But after he went to university, he was offered a job overseas…so here we are.”

“You speak English so well,” Louise said. “Did you take lessons when you were growing up?”

“My mother is American. She went to Sweden with a friend on a summer visit and met my father. They traveled back and forth a few times to meet each other’s families and were married the following spring.”

“What a wonderful story!”

Karin laughed. “I always thought it was terribly romantic when I was growing up. My daughters, who have lived here all their lives, think she was crazy to give up her whole life to be with him.”

“Just wait until they fall in love. Someday they’ll meet a man for whom they would leave their families and travel far away.”

“So I keep telling them. But I hope they won’t find love too soon. Annika, our eldest daughter, has just begun her junior year of college and Kerstin, the second eldest, is a freshman this year.”

“How old are your other three? I’ve seen your youngest daughter and two boys with you at church.”

“Marit is fourteen. Our first son, Niklas, is eleven and our youngest, Mattias, is nine.”

“That must be a quiet house you have.”

Both women laughed.

“I suppose we better get back to business,” Louise said. “Now that we know the elements we need to plan, we can get more specific.”

“Let’s do food first. That one, I know something about.”

Louise turned a page and began a list as Karin continued. “Most important are the
Lussekatter
, or Lucia buns. Translated literally, it means, ‘Lucia cats,’ because they can be shaped like curled-up cats with raisins for eyes. They’re glazed saffron buns with raisins, baked in any of several traditional shapes.”

“Sounds delicious. I wonder if my sister Jane can come up with a recipe.”

“Oh, I have one I’m happy to share. Will she be helping with baking?”

Louise grinned. “Yes, although she doesn’t know it yet.”

“We might also want to serve ginger cookies or gingerbread, apples or some type of apple food, and coffee. We could add hot chocolate for the children since American children usually are not fond of coffee.”

Louise was scribbling quickly. “Excellent. How about costumes? And what, exactly, does St. Lucia do?”

“She will accompany the children to the front of the church and lead them in singing. In our old church, she also carried a candle and a lit candelabra when she got to the front.”

“Real fire?” That notion worried Louise.

“Only the one candle carried by the
Lussibrud
—Lucy bride,” Karin explained as she saw Louise’s eyebrows rise in question. “The five lights in her crown and all the lights carried by the handmaidens can be electric candles.

That relieved Louise significantly. She made more notes. “And you said something about white gowns?”

“Yes. All the girls wear simple white gowns, and the boys can wear either white gowns or long white shirts. The Lucia wears the crown of greens and lights and a red sash. The other girls become the handmaidens and can have belts and crowns of tinsel. The boys are “star boys.” They carry wands with stars on the ends.”

“Okay. That sounds manageable. We have a few mothers in the congregation who might be willing to help with costuming if their own children are involved. Let’s move on to the service. Is there anything in particular you can think of that is done?”

“Gospel readings about the Light of the World. Shall I e-mail my former pastor and ask him for a list?”

“That would be very helpful.”

“I’ll also ask about the traditional songs and any other special readings he might recommend. We might also want to add some Christmas carols.”

“How long do you envision this service will be?”

Karin looked uncertain. “I’m not sure. It seems as if it was fairly short. Perhaps forty minutes?”

“That sounds workable.” Louise consulted her list. “I’ll wait to select music until you hear from your pastor. We certainly have enough to get started with.”

“How should we inform the congregation? We need children to participate,” Karin pointed out.

“I’ll ask Rev. Thompson to make an announcement at church tomorrow, and I’ll write a short note to go in next week’s bulletin. If we have a poor turnout at the first rehearsal, then we’ll start beating the bushes.”

Alice had thought Sunday would never arrive, but finally it did. She and June sat together during the service, and Rev. Thompson gave them an opportunity to address the congregation in order to share details of their upcoming mission and to ask for prayer.

After the service, Alice was approached by many of her fellow parishioners, who promised to support her with daily prayer. She knew how vital that underpinning was, and she profusely thanked them all.

Out of the corner of her eye, Alice noticed Louise standing with one of her piano students’ mothers, making small talk. Her back was to the sanctuary, but she was angled just enough to see their aunt. A short distance away, Ethel stood surrounded by a circle of women from the Seniors Social Circle. She looked like a general issuing orders as the ladies nodded repeatedly in response to whatever she was saying.

It saddened Alice that Louise and their aunt were not on speaking terms. As she watched, Ethel swept out of the sanctuary without a backward glance, and Alice saw Louise register the slight. Her shoulders slumped just for a moment before she regained her customary proper posture, but Alice knew she was hurt. Ethel regularly stopped and spoke with each of her nieces after church. She already had hugged Jane and bid Alice good-bye. To fail to greet Louise today made Ethel’s pique as plain as if she had painted a sign saying that she still was angry with Louise.

“Alice?” She heard June call her name and looked toward her traveling companion. “Are you ready to go?”

Excitement swelled within her, sidetracking all other thought. “Just let me say good-bye to my sisters and then we’ll be off.”

Chapter Seven

W
 e’re here! We’re finally here!”

“I’m so excited.” Alice looked around as June pulled the huge SUV into a lane where a sign welcomed them to Camp Compassion Monday afternoon. They had left Acorn Hill right after church Sunday and taken turns at the wheel every three hours, driving straight through the night.

Alice was stiff and creaky and tired of being in the car, but those feelings vanished as she looked forward to finally getting started.

There was a chain-link fence with a closed gate blocking their path. An enormous man in a T-shirt that bore the phrase, “I love my Chihuahua,” with a heart symbol substituted for the second word, ambled toward them.

June rolled down her window. “Hello.”

“Can I help you?” he asked in a Southern accent so heavy Alice wasn’t sure she’d understood him at first.

“We’re here to volunteer,” said June, ruffling her short silver blonde hair and massaging her neck. Alice leaned across the console dividing the front seats and added. “Dr. Mark Graves is expecting us.”

“Hey, come on in. We can always use more hands. I’m Kyle.” The man’s wide smile flashed in his dark face, revealing a gold front tooth.

“I’m June and this is Alice. We’re happy to be here.”

Kyle unlocked the gate and stood back to motion them through.

As they drove forward, June looked around. “Which way should I go, do you think?”

Alice pointed to the right, where a muddy track showed tire marks. “It looks like vehicles went this way.” She rolled down her passenger window and smiled as a woman passed them and waved. “Could you please tell us where to park?”

The woman pointed with her free hand; the other had a firm grip on a leash against which a fat black Lab was straining. “If you’re staying, we pitch our tents back there. If you have supplies, drive over to the little white house and ask for Joe.”

June turned toward the house. “We need to drop off all these supplies first, because we can’t even get to our tent until we do.”

As the SUV rolled to a stop, Alice opened her door and stepped out. Going around to the rear of the vehicle, she opened the gate and surveyed the floor-to-ceiling stacks of boxes. “I hope you ate your Wheaties this morning.”

June groaned, her slight shoulders slumping as she joined Alice. “I wonder if we can get some help with this stuff.”

“Alice!” She barely had time to turn around before a man’s arms swept her into a bear hug.

“Mark! For heaven’s sake.” She was laughing, but her heart gave a little skip at the sudden reunion.

“I’m so glad you made it. How was your trip?” Mark stepped back and smiled at her.

“Long,” she said with a heartfelt sigh. “But we’re here now. With your supplies,” she added, hitching her thumb at the packed vehicle behind them. “Mark, you remember June Carter.”

“Great to meet you.” Mark shook June’s hand. A tall man, he dwarfed Alice’s traveling companion. “Let me find Riley and introduce you two. He is the supplies manager, and he will need to inventory all this stuff before I start grabbing it out of his hands. We need the antibiotics badly.” Mark looked around, then cupped his hands to his mouth and yelled, “Riley! Job for you.”

A young man in a red T-shirt with sleeves raggedly torn off at the shoulders appeared from around the corner of the house. In one ear he wore five silver earrings in different sizes. Both wrists were tattooed so heavily that he appeared to be wearing bracelets, and his hair was dark at the roots and colored a bold yellow blonde at the tips, cut short to spike straight out all over his head. “Yo, Doc. Whassup?”

Do not judge
, Alice reminded herself. He’s here, so he must be a good man. “Hello,” she said, offering her hand. “I’m Alice and this is June. We’ve brought medical supplies for Mark—Dr. Graves—and some other things from our community.”

Riley shook her hand enthusiastically. “Cool beans! Let me round up a few more hands and we’ll get this stuff inside.” He shook a stern finger at Mark. “And don’t you be making off with any of it until I’ve had a chance to log it in.”

“Wouldn’t think of it,” Mark assured him with a grin. As Riley sprinted away, Mark turned back to Alice and June. “Riley worked at a shelter that was destroyed in the storm. He single-handedly rescued seven dogs and nine cats whose cages were flooding. Some of the dogs in the lower cages had to swim in place before he could get to them. He put them all in his pickup and barely got out before the road washed away.”

“I suspect we’re going to hear many stories of miracle workers this week, aren’t we?” Alice said.

Mark nodded, and she thought she saw the sheen of tears in his eyes for just a moment. “The selflessness of all these people who dropped everything in their daily lives and came to help is overwhelming. Every single one of them—you included—is a miracle in my eyes.”

“We haven’t done anything yet.” Alice smiled to lighten the mood.

“Joe.” Mark beckoned to another man who was hustling by with a clipboard in one hand and a walkie-talkie in the other. “This is Alice, and this is June. They’re friends from home, here to work for a few days.”

“Great!” Joe shook Alice’s hand with an enthusiastic grip so firm she winced. Then he produced a pen. “Write down your names and addresses for me, the dates you’ll be here, and what expertise you may have.”

“I don’t work with animals on a regular basis,” Alice confessed as she took the clipboard and began to write.

“She’s a nurse,” Mark said at almost the same moment.

“A nurse. Fantastic. We don’t just need animal-care workers, although we love them.” Joe motioned to the front door of the house. “If you wouldn’t mind, there’s a girl inside with a pretty ugly cut across her palm that you might take a look at. She doesn’t want to go to the medical center, but I think she should.”

“I’d be glad to check on her.”

Alice turned, but Joe grasped her elbow. “It’s been cleaned and bandaged. It’s not urgent. I’d just like to know if she’s going to need stitches.”

“I work with cats,” June told him, “but I can help with other things too.”

“Do you do laundry?” Joe looked sheepish. “It’s not a glamorous job, but it’s desperately needed. We’re running out of towels again. It’s near the cat room,” he added with a hopeful expression. “You could work in there between loads.”

“Lead on,” June said. “I don’t mind a bit.”

“You’re a saint.” Joe turned to Mark. “You busy?”

“Not right this second.”

“Want to give them the two-minute tour before they get started?”

“With pleasure. Let’s help Riley unload this stuff first.”

With the help of Mark, Riley and two female volunteers he’d rounded up, Alice and June got all the supplies they’d brought unloaded in a few minutes. Then Mark hopped into the SUV and took them quickly around the camp.

In the tiny house was the critical care unit, where very sick dogs were taken; the cat room; a room for exotics and birds; the laundry room; and the office, where supplies were kept. Outside the house was a canopy under which were several lawn chairs for people taking breaks. A tractor-trailer bed parked beside the house held pallets stacked with dry pet food, blankets, towels and kitty litter. Cat pans and dog kennels were stored beneath it in orderly fashion, arranged by size. There was another canopied area under which were baby pools for bathing incoming animals, pools of bleach water for sterilizing bowls and kennels, and a table full of every kind of pet shampoo imaginable.

Next they walked a path through a mountain of supplies. Two women were separating the food, blankets and towels, leashes, collars and other items into groups, and several other people were carrying them back to the tractor-trailer for storage.

Farther along the track were long lines of chain-link dog kennels, nearly all full. Canopies above them provided shade, Alice was glad to see. Some held several dogs, and Mark explained that as they got to know the animals, the ones that were not aggressive were housed together to make room for newcomers. A dog-walking area was roped off with bright yellow rope, and a large area surrounded by chain-link fencing was available for exercising dogs with balls and Frisbees.

At the very back of the extensive setup were the “accommodations.” Tents, picnic canopies, a few campers and one enormous RV filled the space. Behind the house, just a short walk from the tent area, were two portable toilets and an enclosed area that Mark explained was partitioned into a primitive shower. Water was at a premium, so people were asked not to use the shower more than once every couple of days.

Alice and June exchanged wry glances. “I’m glad we were forewarned, or we might be having heart palpitations right about now,” June said.

“So that’s everything,” Mark said. “Let’s set up your tent. You probably won’t get back here again until bedtime, and by then you’ll be awfully glad you did.”

With Mark’s help, they got June’s tent pitched quickly, their air mattresses inflated and their sleeping bags unrolled. June hung a lantern from the center of the tent and set up two camp chairs and a tray table. Since June owned so much equipment, they hadn’t needed to borrow Shelby’s things after all. “There. Home sweet home.”

“Almost.” Alice went to the SUV and rummaged in her bag for a moment. Returning to the tent, she laid her Bible on the table. “There.”

Mark nodded. “An excellent touch. I brought mine as well. Sorry to rush off, but I need to get back to the house.” He ducked out of the tent.

“Wait for me. I need to look at that girl’s hand,” Alice said.

“And I have laundry and kitties waiting.” June started off along the path toward the front of the lot where the house stood.

“Bring a flashlight,” Mark said to Alice as they prepared to follow June. “It gets dark quickly, and that path is rough when you can’t see where you’re walking.”

Alice immediately headed for the house. The young woman of whom Joe had spoken lay on a sofa in the office, which consisted mostly of a small desk, two sofas and a table surrounded by piles and piles of pet medications.

“Hi, I’m Alice,” she said to her patient.

“I’m Frannie.” The young woman held up her roughly bandaged hand. “And this is the result of my losing battle with a bale of wire.”

“Ouch!” Alice winced as she began to unwrap the wound. “Let’s just take a quick look at this.”

“I don’t want to go to the hospital,” Frannie said quickly. “It’ll take too much time away from my work here.”

“Which you’re going to miss anyway if this gets infected,” Alice pointed out. She pulled away the gauze and inspected the cut that stretched across the young woman’s palm. “I really think you should get this stitched up. I can put some butterfly bandages on it to hold the edges together for now, but you need to see a doctor.”

Frannie sighed. “I knew you were going to say that. Can’t you just stitch it up?”

Alice shook her head. “Not without a doctor seeing you. And you probably need a tetanus shot as well.”

After another volunteer drove Frannie off to the nearest emergency clinic, Alice cleaned and bandaged a succession of minor injuries. She monitored one young woman who’d had an asthma attack and sent someone back to the tents for the girl’s inhaler.

In between nursing people, she helped in the canine critical care unit. Mark took one small dog with a large wound on its belly to the mobile vet clinic, leaving in charge one of the two veterinary technicians who had come along with him.

Gina was dark-skinned with enormous brown eyes and a smile that lit up the room. “I’m afraid your nursing talents may be wasted here,” she told Alice with a grin. “Mostly, we clean up messes, give medications and check vitals.”

Alice smiled back. “And just what do you think nurses do?”

Gina laughed. “You have a point.”

“So where shall I begin?”

“You could start taking the dogs out for their late walks. Be sure you don’t bring them back in until they’ve relieved themselves. Plastic bags are on the table you’ll pass at the entrance to the dog-walk area, and there are garbage cans for the waste. Several water stations are set up around the camp.”

“All right.” Alice hesitated. “I’m willing but not particularly knowledgeable. Could you show me how to get a dog out of its cage? After all, they don’t know me from Adam. Will they bite?”

“That’s unlikely. However, I can’t promise you it will never happen. Over here is a poster with canine postures and expressions on it. You usually can tell when one is scared as opposed to aggressive. The important thing to remember is to move slowly and speak gently. We don’t want to scare them any more than they are already.” Gina took a leash down from a hook on the wall and demonstrated the correct way of using it by slipping the lead onto Alice’s wrist. Then she let Alice try it on her. “I’ll get the first dog out for you.”

Gina released the latch on a cage and put the slip lead on the first dog, which she said was a beagle mix, probably still less than a year old. Then she lifted the dog down from the waist-high kennel, and Alice could see its ribs and hipbones. “A lot of these guys have been starved and their energy’s pretty low. They may not be able to jump in and out of the higher kennels.”