Tabitha (20 page)

My desire is to serve him all
of my days, long or short. When I next see you, I will ask again that you be my
partner in this lifelong service. Please hear me, dearest Tabitha: If it is
God’s will that we not have a family, so be it. I will be content in his will.

He went on to share news of the war, but Tabitha could
scarcely take it in. The words of his letter echoed in her heart:
When I
next see you, I will ask again that you be my partner in this lifelong service.
Please hear me, dearest Tabitha: If it is God’s will that we not have a family,
so be it. I will be content in his will.

“Yes!” she breathed. “Yes, I will be your partner, Mason.”

~~**~~

With the Christmas season ending, another joyous event lay
before those at Palmer House: The wedding of Joy and Edmund O’Dell would take
place on the first Sunday of January.

“We desire only a simple, sacred ceremony before our Lord,”
Joy told them, “conducted by Pastor Carmichael in the great room of Palmer
House and witnessed by those we love best.”

While everyone who knew and loved Joy and O’Dell rejoiced
for them, their marriage also signaled great changes for Palmer House:
Following the wedding, Joy would leave the little cottage she had shared with
Grant at the back of Palmer House’s grounds. The newly married couple would
begin their married life in their own home.

“It will be an adjustment for all of us, but I fear I shall
miss her the most,” Rose admitted at breakfast the morning before their
wedding. “I lean upon Joy to help me manage Palmer House; her strength and
wisdom fill up what I am often lacking.”

Aside, Rose confided to Tabitha, “I confess that, with
Mei-Xing happily married and in her own home and Joy soon to do the same, I
feel a great sense of loss. I am so grateful that Breona consented to continue
as our housekeeper after her marriage. But that, too, cannot last forever.
Someday God will need to raise up others to fill their places.”

Tabitha nodded and, again, looked closely at Rose, noting
the years creeping up on her. Rose was every bit as vital and vibrant as she
had always been, but she tired more easily and had taken to retiring to bed
early each evening.

“I am here with you, Miss Rose. You may count on me,” she
whispered.

Rose squeezed her hand. “That means more than you know, dear
Tabitha.”

Joy and O’Dell were to be married Sunday afternoon after
church services. Early Saturday, the girls of Palmer House, led by Breona and
aided by Billy and Mr. Wheatley, cleared away the Christmas greenery and threw
themselves into a thorough cleaning of the first floor. The busy workgroup
removed drapes, trudged through the January snow, shook the drapes, and hung
them on the frigid clotheslines to air. They dusted walls and ceilings and
scrubbed mantels and hearths.

Billy and Mr. Wheatley rolled and removed carpets, taking
them out-of-doors for a thorough beating. Once the carpets were out of the way,
the women swept and cleaned the floors, waxing the hardwood planks and rubbing
them until their arms ached and the wood glowed.

They cleaned the gaslight fixtures and wiped their globes;
they washed every window until the glass gleamed and met with Breona’s
approval. They polished furniture and rehung the drapes. Finally, they
festooned the windows, walls, and doorways with the costly greens and hothouse
flowers Martha Palmer had insisted upon ordering and sending to them.

Tabitha and Sarah stood back with the others, admiring their
combined efforts and breathing in the lily-perfumed air. “It will be so
beautiful for them,” Sarah smiled.

“Aye. That it will.” It was all Breona could muster. With
the corner of her apron, she dabbed at her eyes.

Later the same day, under a bright winter sun, Joy and O’Dell,
accompanied by Rose, Billy and Marit, Tabitha, Sarah, Corrine, and Mr.
Wheatley, rode in two motorcars to Riverside Cemetery. Pastor Isaac and Breona
Carmichael, with Yaochuan, Mei-Xing, and Shan-Rose Liáng, met them there.

Together, Joy and O’Dell placed a garland of flowers upon
the simple grave of Grant Michaels. Joy wept unabashedly. When she placed her
hand upon Grant’s headstone, O’Dell, with his hand covering Joy’s, whispered,
“Grant, my dearest friend, you already know that I am doing my best to fulfill
my promises to you. Joy and I will stand before God tomorrow and make our
solemn vows of marriage, but we do not forget you . . . and we
do not forget Edmund. When we find your sweet boy, I will fulfill my pledge to
you to raise him as my own.”

Joy and O’Dell bowed their heads to pray silently.

In his own silent prayers, O’Dell added,
And, Lord,
please
bless our friend Mason Carpenter. Where we have exhausted our own means, he has
poured from his wealth into our search for Edmund. Lord, our friend is not far
from where the war rages. We ask you to keep him safe and bring him home to us.

The adjustment was, as Rose had suggested, difficult for
those left at Palmer House. Joy and O’Dell departed on their honeymoon trip and
were gone for three weeks. When they returned, radiant and rested, Joy again
took up the reins at Michaels’ Fine Household Furnishings and O’Dell his
management of the Denver Pinkerton Office. The newlyweds set up housekeeping in
a tiny house O’Dell rented for them.

Joy and O’Dell made a habit of meeting the Palmer House
residents for church on Sundays and having dinner at Palmer House afterward,
but Rose keenly felt the increased burden of Joy’s absence from the day-to-day
running of the house. More than that, Rose missed the daily presence of her
daughter.

“It is only right and normal,” she insisted, but Tabitha did
what she could to fill the void Joy’s departure had created.

I can never fill Joy’s shoes
, she admitted,
but I
want to do whatever I can to ease Rose’s loss.
She surprised herself when
she added,
Even if it is only for a short while.

Weeks after the wedding, Tabitha received an unexpected
communication from Mason Carpenter. It was only a note, dated February 7. It
arrived February 26.

My Darling,

If you have heard the news, I did not wish you to worry.
Yes, the Germans sent their airships across the Channel to bomb eastern
England, but we are much farther north than Great Yarmouth where they did the
most damage. We do not know if the clouds obscured their pilots’ view or if
their targets were intentional, for the airships did not bomb any military
bases. Instead, they hit innocent civilians. Sadly, several villagers were
killed.

In response to this cowardly attack, the Army has
directed the Royal Flying Corps to mount guns upon its aeroplanes so that our
pilots can shoot down German airships before they can release their bombs. We
are working out how to best do so, and hope to prevent another such incursion
by the German “blimps” or Zeppelins as some call them.

As I said in an earlier letter, the Army has a limited
number of aeroplanes, and we have lost a third of them already. We hear that
the French are building newer model aeroplanes, apparently in response to new
German models. The British Army has asked to purchase a number of these French
planes. I sense a great shift in the war coming upon us. The Allied Forces are
now considering the use of aeroplanes to bomb enemy troops and to shoot other
planes from the sky.

Tabitha, the wounded are arriving from the front in more
numbers daily. Every hospital in England will soon be filled and yet the end of
the war is nowhere in sight. We are also hearing disturbing rumors from the
western front, rumors of German shells filled with poisonous gasses falling
upon Russian positions. If the report is true, this is devilish behavior
indeed.

I will write more as I can, but I must get this note onto
the mail truck before it leaves. Be at peace, Tabitha. Our times are in
his
hands.

With all my love,

Mason Carpenter

Tabitha replied to his letter that evening. As she wrote,
his words regarding the wounded overflowing England’s hospitals occupied her
thoughts and she found herself, in her imagination, caring for them and
providing solace. She could not shake the images of the wounded before her.

When she had completed her letter to Carpenter, she rested
her chin upon her folded hands thinking. The pictures of the wounded in her
mind were insistent. Urgent.

Finally, she bowed her head and prayed.
Lord? Am I hearing
you? What are you asking of me?

The following Sunday, those who lived at Palmer House
occupied their customary two rows at Calvary Temple. Tabitha closed her eyes
and lost herself in the worship of many voices raised in unity to glorify God.

When the singing ended, Pastor Isaac Carmichael stood to
bring the message. He took his text from Romans 12.

For
as we have many members in one body,
and all members have not the same office:
So we, being many, are one body in Christ,
and every one members one of another.
Having then gifts differing according
to the grace that is given to us,
whether prophecy, let us prophesy according
to the proportion of faith;
Or ministry, let us wait on our ministering:
or he that teacheth, on teaching;
Or he that exhorteth, on exhortation:
he that giveth, let him do it with simplicity;
he that ruleth, with diligence;
he that sheweth mercy, with cheerfulness.

“I wish us to first look at a very profound statement,”
Pastor Carmichael said. “
So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and
every one members one of another
. In plainer language, God’s word tells us
two important and connected truths:

“First, Christ has but one body. His body is not
this
church. It is not the church down the street. It is not one denomination or
another. Christ’s body includes
every individual connected to Jesus through
his blood
.

“The second truth flows from the first: All parts of
Christ’s body are
members one of another
. How can we restate this,
members
one of another
, with greater clarity?”

He leaned toward his congregation and they inclined their
hearing toward him.

“Let me be plain,” he said softly. “We belong to each
other.”

He stood tall. “We belong to Christ. Christ has but one
body, and every part belongs to the others. You,” he made eye contact with
several individuals, “and you, and you, and you, belong to each other.”

He let his words sink in then continued. “The rest of the
passage, regarding the gifts God has given us, refers back to these two truths.
Whether we prophesy, minister, teach, exhort, give, rule, or show mercy, our
gift belongs not to ourselves, but to the other members, to the rest of the
Christ’s body.

“And I cannot put too much emphasis upon this: What gift God
has given you is necessary. Important. Vital. For Christ’s church to accomplish
its mission, every part must work together. For Christ’s body to minister to
the world, every piece must be present and functioning.

“Do not think you may elect not to serve. No, you and your
gift belong to Jesus—and he has said you belong to each other.”

He stared around at his congregation. “Every piece. Every
part. Every one of us. We are necessary. Important. Vital. We are Christ’s
hands and feet upon the earth.”

A few nights later, Tabitha and several of the girls decided
to assemble a jigsaw puzzle. The Christian women’s society that often aided
Palmer House had donated several boxes of used puzzles, all with intriguing
images on their box lids.

“Ohhh! Do look at this one,” Gracie suggested. Her selection
was of a large passenger ship plowing through a turbulent ocean.

“Shall we make it first, then?” Flora asked. “It is very
dramatic, I think.”

Tabitha regarded the image and experienced a peculiar pull
toward it. “Yes, that one will do. Shall we turn all the pieces right side up
and separate them into edges and non-edges first?”

“To build the outside you mean?” Gracie had already dumped
the many pieces upon the table and was sorting a handful.

“Um-hm.”

The girls were content and quiet as they turned, sorted, and
separated the small pieces. Soon they had identified three of the four corners
and were connecting edge pieces onto the corners to form the puzzle’s frame.

As Tabitha uncovered another edge piece her attention
lurched to a standstill.

A voice, one she immediately recognized, spoke to her heart.
Every individual I call is necessary for the success of my work. The work
cannot be complete without all the parts and pieces.

The words were so clear that the hair upon Tabitha’s arms
lifted. Gracie and Flora did not notice that Tabitha seemed frozen.

The edge piece between her fingers grew warm.

I call some to be the frame for the work, to make the
vision plain. Those whom I call to frame the work are vital to my plans
,
the voice spoke.
They lead so that others may follow.

Tabitha scarcely breathed.
Lord, I am listening
.

She opened her hand and stared at the edge piece resting in
the hollow of her palm. Except it was not an edge. The fourth corner of the
puzzle stared back at her.

You are vital to my work.
The whisper of His voice
faded.
You are vital to my work.

“There it is!” Flora pounced on the corner piece and placed
it on the table. “See! These all fit together now. Goodness. I had begun to
think the last corner was lost—and then where would we be?”

“Excuse me. I-I have something pressing I need to do.”
Tabitha pushed away from the table and stumbled upstairs to her room.

“Well! We wish you would have thought of that before we
began!” Flora grumbled to her back. “Olive! Jane! Do come and help us. Gracie
and I can’t do this all on our own.”

Tabitha sank to the floor next to her bed. “Lord, I feel
your call upon me. Please show me what I should do.”

She prayed for some time. Then, with a nod of decision, she
picked up pen and paper.

Dear Dean Gunderson,

Greetings from Denver. I hope this letter finds you well
and flourishing in the grace of God. My work in the hospital here is quite
satisfying, and I am often grateful for the excellent training I received from
our school in Boulder.