The Scholar

by Tess Thompson

  “Thank you,” I called back. Dr. Neal was her son-in-law, having married Martha Johnson. Like many of the other young couples in town, they had a gaggle of children and another one on the way. Which was why we needed another doctor.

  Through the window of the tailor’s shop, I spotted Mr. Olofsson bent over a piece of fabric. His shoulders had a permanent slump from leaning over his work for so many years. His wife was at the counter wrapping a package in brown paper for a customer.

  I passed by the bank. Viktor Olofsson was inside, looking very official as he wrote into a leather ledger. He didn’t raise his head from his work. Although neither of Olofsson boys had followed in their father’s footsteps, they’d inherited his work ethic.

  The boardinghouse had been sold recently, and the new owners had given it a fresh look with a fresh coat of paint and a porch swing and pots filled with colorful flowers.

  I was just rounding the corner to head to the doctor’s office when I ran into Louisa Kellam. Or Louisa Lind, as she was known now, having been adopted by the pastor and his wife. The atrocities of her childhood before then had only been imagined by my siblings and me. Mama had always been tight-lipped about the whole affair, saying only that Louisa had suffered greatly before being adopted.

  “Theo Barnes, is that you?” Her eyes widened from under the brim of her hat.

  I smiled, taking her in as she held out her hand to me. “It most certainly is.” I lightly brushed my lips over her gloved hand. “I start work with Dr. Neal this morning.”

  “A doctor. Your parents must be proud.”

  “I believe they are, yes.” Her golden hair was tucked under a light straw hat with a blue ribbon that matched her dress. She was no longer the malnourished little girl she’d once been; a slight flush in her cheeks and her curves told me she was in good health.

  “Poor Martha says she never sees her husband,” Louisa said. “They’re anxious for your help.”

  “I’m delighted to be of service.” I touched the front brim of my hat.

  She looked down at the tips of her shoes. “You’re looking well. Medical school agreed with you.”

  “As are you.” In fact, she was more beautiful than ever. I felt a tinge of my old crush coming back to life. Never mind, I told myself. She would never be interested in me. I’d certainly learned that with my ill-fated request to write to her during the war. What an idiot I must have seemed to her. I’d certainly felt like one. Despite the embarrassment the memory brought, it all seemed like another lifetime now. I’d gone to school and forgotten her. My infatuation was simply a young man’s fanciful imagination. Not true love.

  She caught her bottom lip with the top one before speaking. “I’ve always meant to say how sorry I was about how I acted that day when you asked if I’d write to you.”

  “Nothing to be sorry about.”

  “I was a stupid child.”

  “And I, the wrong twin,” I said with a laugh.

  “Oh, Theo. Don’t say that.”

  I waved a hand dismissively, smiling down at her. “I’m only teasing. I was simply scared and needed something to cling to.”

  She briefly touched the sleeve of my jacket. “Of course you were scared. Going off to fight a war that had nothing to do with us. And not yet seventeen. I couldn’t believe my ears when you told me you and Flynn had enlisted. You were too young to have to face such a horrible war.”

  “We were but didn’t know it.”

  She glanced upward before smiling. “When Flynn started courting Shannon, I didn’t want to show my face in town. I think the whole town knew I liked him. I was such a lost little lamb—thinking I was in love when I knew nothing about what that really meant.”

  I laughed again. “That describes me as well. How about we agree to never think of it again?”

  “Agreed. I’m glad you haven’t held a grudge. It’s nice to see you.”

  “You too. Are your parents well?” I asked.

  She touched a slender finger to the brim of her hat. “Not entirely well. Father has been fired from the church.”

  “No, really?” Fired from the church? Was that even possible? “Papa wouldn’t let that happen.” He’d found Pastor Lind himself.

  “Things have changed. The town and church have gotten bigger. Your father isn’t able to protect everyone like he used to. The congregation decided they wanted a board to run the finances and staff. They didn’t like Father, and now they’ve pushed him out.”

  I didn’t know what to say. How could they not like kind Pastor Lind? He was jolly and encouraging, especially to the youngsters. “Your father was a great pastor. I can’t comprehend what they didn’t like.”

  “They’re more the fire-and-brimstone types. Father’s style isn’t that way.”

  “I do recall your father’s message to be uplifting rather than threatening.” Pastor Lind and his wife suggested we carry on conversations with the Lord, as if he were an intimate friend.

  She sighed and clutched her package against her chest. “Since Prohibition, a war has developed.”

  “A war?”

  “Between those who believe Prohibition saves souls and those who don’t.”

  “Right, yes. That seems to be everywhere in our country,” I said. “Dividing communities and even families.” Flynn and my father thought the government shouldn’t be involved in business, let alone ban alcohol. Flynn and Phillip were running a secret bar in the basement of the ski lodge. The sheriff looked the other way. When I’d asked Mama what she thought, she’d merely pursed her lips and given a little shake of her head. Phillip and my brother were upstanding businessmen in this town. Did running an illegal bar make them less so? I didn’t think so, but I knew there were many who would disagree. Would those same women who were forcing out Pastor Lind convince the sheriff to shut down the bar? Were my brother and brother-in-law setting themselves up for trouble? For that matter, who was making the booze in the first place?

  “We’re going to have to move out of the house,” Louisa said, pulling me from my thoughts.

  “Where will you go?” I asked.

  Her gaze flickered toward a man walking by us. She seemed to wait until he was out of earshot before turning back to me. “I’ve no idea. Father thinks he’ll find another position in a different town but, Theo, he’s old. This whole ordeal has defeated him. I’m not sure he’s well. He looks terrible.” She paused, shaking her head. “I want him to retire and take it easy.”

  “That isn’t an option? I mean, if you could find a new place to live here in Emerson Pass?” Already my mind had moved forward, thinking through how we could help them.

  “There’s nothing left. Mother needed an operation last year, which wiped out his savings. The rest of it he’d wasted on sending me to finishing school. We’re in terrible trouble.” She tilted her head and peered up at me from under her lashes. I fell backward into the past, as she looked much more like the frightened child she’d been than the moment before. She must be feeling the way she had when she was young, unsure where her next meal would come from or where she would sleep.

  “I had no idea.” I felt certain my parents hadn’t, either.

  “As a matter of fact, I wondered if your mother had any positions open?”

  “Oh, well, I don’t know.” A job at the estate? Not Louisa. She was clever and educated. “What sort of position do you have in mind?”

  “Anything.” Her shoulders heaved as she let out a sharp, quick breath. “I have to find a way to take care of my parents. I owe them my life. If they hadn’t taken me in, who knows what would have happened to me.” She looked sideways as if she wondered if someone watched her before answering. “I’m grateful to Father, but I wish I’d learned something more useful than how to walk with a book atop my head. I didn’t know we were in trouble or I would have done something useful and gotten a teaching certificate.”

  A woman carrying the load of a household seemed unfathomable to me. However, the world was changing. Since
the war, women seemed to have different expectations for their lives. They’d carried on at home while the men were at war.

  “My father has been on the same side as Flynn,” Louisa said. “As have all the early settlers. The newcomers are of a different ilk.”

  “Really? I wouldn’t have predicted your father to be of that mindset.”

  She gave me a tight smile. “He’s a Scotchman, after all. His stance on Prohibition is another reason why the church board wants him out. He and your brother haven’t exactly kept their opinions to themselves.”

  “I worry about my brother and brother-in-law, if you want to know the truth.”

  She fluttered her fingers toward the street. “The whole affair makes me sad. I never thought this town would be in such conflict.”

  “Me either.” I hadn’t realized all this was going on while I’d been away at school. My stomach churned at the thought of my father’s peaceful town having two sides of a debate. In the past, we’d prided ourselves on our tight-knit community. However, I knew the spirits of the early citizens. They’d come from other countries where poverty and oppression had made it impossible for them to live satisfying and prosperous lives. Here in the wilds of the Rockies, they’d had the chance to live lives exactly as they wished. With new people coming in, had the original spirit of our community been stifled?

  “Father’s soul’s broken,” Louisa said. “The trouble with the congregation and my lack of marriage.”

  Why hadn’t she married? I couldn’t imagine she wasn’t sought after wherever she went. “I have to admit, I thought you’d be married by now.” That would be the obvious solution for her. She needed a husband with the financial means to take care of her and her parents. “Is there no one?”

  “No. My father thought I’d meet someone rich and powerful to take care of me. That’s why he sent me away to school. Sadly, I didn’t realize that’s what he wanted.”

  “It’s not too late. You’re young and beautiful.”

  “Thank you, Theo, but marriage isn’t an option. Now go. I don’t want to make you late for your first day.”

  “Yes, I should.” I glanced downward, thinking for a moment. “You know, I think you should go out and visit my mother this morning. I’m not sure she’ll have a position for you, but I know she’ll have some ideas about where you might move to. She and Papa own a lot of these buildings in town. Surely there’s a place for you to go. Papa’s not going to leave his oldest friend without a home.”

  “You’re a good person, Theo Barnes,” Louisa said. “Some things don’t change.” With that, she turned away and made her way toward the church.

  I watched her for a few more seconds before heading the other direction toward the doctor’s office. We’d been going opposite directions since the beginning. That, too, hadn’t changed.

  4

  Louisa

  * * *

  I walked away from Theo uncertain and disoriented as if I were waking from a dream. Theo had been gone a long time. I’d almost forgotten him. He was someone from my past. A past I’d buried deeply in the recesses of my mind. I was only aware now of the present. Going back only led to heartbreak. Theo, though? He was the embodiment of what it meant to be good. He’d always been sweet and kind to me. I’d not returned the favor when he’d needed me. I’d have to live with that shame. After the kindness the Barnes family had shown me, I hadn’t done much to repay them.

  Of the two boys I’d known when I was young, Theo was always the quiet, sensitive twin. However, today I sensed a new confidence in him, along with his enduring kindness. There had always been this look about him as though his skin was thinner than the rest of ours. I knew the rumors about his birth mother. Everyone in town had whispered about her death. Even my own mother, who hated gossip of any kind, had told me that the original Mrs. Barnes was mentally troubled. Shortly after the birth of her fifth child, Fiona, Mrs. Barnes had walked into the snow and perished. Theo had been the one to find her. I suspected that, like me, the traumas of his early years haunted him. Was he able to push them aside as I had?

  Perhaps repelled by our similarities, I’d had a crush on Flynn instead of Theo. Foolish as it was, I’d not been able to help myself, attracted to Flynn’s outrageous antics, how quickly he laughed, and his wit. He was nothing like me. I was drawn to him because of the differences. I was truly like a moth, attracted to the light, even while knowing it would burn me. I’d never had a chance with Flynn Barnes. When he’d returned from the war, he’d almost immediately started courting the beautiful Shannon Cassidy, and they’d married a few years later. Now they were expecting their first baby. Even I with my foolish heart wasn’t dumb enough to have clung to the idea that I might turn his head. Not when there were girls like Shannon.

  “I ran into Theo Barnes in town.” I spoke as if it were an afterthought as I scooped coffee into the top of the percolator. “He’s working for Dr. Neal.”

  “Yes, Quinn told me. Isn’t that something?” Mother smoothed back strands of her white hair, tucking them into the bun she wore at the nape of her neck. I’d hung on to my long hair, even though many of the girls had cut theirs. I preferred long tresses. The bobs were too harsh and angular unless you had curly hair or went to the trouble to wear it up in pins or curlers while you slept. I’d even heard about permanent waving. We did not have that option in Emerson Pass. This wasn’t Paris or New York City. Whether or not to cut one’s hair was almost as controversial around here as Prohibition.

  “How did he seem?” Mother asked.

  “Quite well. Stronger than when he came home from the war.” I could remember the narrowness of his thin face and the haunted look in his eyes. He’d taken all of it inside him, the fighting and horror. I could see it there in his eyes. He might have come home physically whole, but there were injuries inside him that I feared would be there forever.

  Mother was quiet as the water boiled and made the familiar percolating sound on the stove. A pleasant aroma of coffee filled the room. I set about cutting a few slices of bread for toast, then mixed some eggs together. “Where’s Father?”

  “I’m not sure. He was gone when I woke this morning.”

  The coffee was done, and I poured Mother and me each a cup. “Careful, it’s hot,” I said to her as I placed it in front of her.

  “I know, darling.” Mother smiled up at me. “I may be old, but I still remember that coffee is hot. “

  I laughed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to patronize.”

  “You need a child to care for instead of fussing over me.”

  “That’s the last thing I need. I have you and Father to look after.”

  She cringed. “That’s just it. I don’t want you wasting your youth on us. You should be married by now, having a family.”

  “There’s no one I want.”

  “Theo always liked you.”

  “Mother.”

  “I know. Wrong twin.”

  “That was all a long time ago,” I said. “Theo seemed oblivious to my charms this morning. I have a feeling there’s a girl back east. And as far as Flynn goes, that was simply a schoolgirl crush.”

  “That Flynn was always wild. I preferred Theo. Flynn could never sit still during Sunday school. And he never knew his verses.”

  I finished making her breakfast, thinking through my next move. Should I tell Mother my idea to ask the Barneses for a job?

  Before I could think of an answer, Father came into the kitchen. “Morning, girls,” he said as he stooped to give Mother a kiss on the cheek.

  “Morning, Father. Did you have a walk?”

  “No, I went over to my office at the church to gather up a few things.” He sat heavily in a chair. “They’ve already hired a new pastor.”

  “How do you know?” Mother asked sharply.

  “Mrs. Poe was only too happy to inform me herself.” He took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “I wrote a few letters to acquaintances of mine who I think will have ideas of where I might land.
”

  “Good, good,” Mother said. “We’ll find something. I just know we will.”

  “Maybe in Oregon or Washington,” Father said. “There are a lot of opportunities in California, too.”

  “California?” I asked, appalled.

  “It’s full of sinners,” Father said, joking.

  “We can’t leave here,” I said. My first mother was buried here. Her tombstone was all I had left of her. But I would never say that to Mother or Father. They had no idea I still went out to see her.

  “We’re going to have to start packing our things today.” Father splayed his hands on the tabletop. “There’s nothing else to do.”

  “I’m going to see Mrs. Johnson,” I blurted out. “To see about a job. Quinn too.”

  “A job?” Father’s tired eyes lifted from behind his glasses to look at me. “You can’t have a job. You’re a young lady.”

  “I’m going to see if I can get a job in the kitchen or as a maid. Anything to keep us afloat. We can move into the boardinghouse.”

  Father’s shoulders sagged. “No daughter of mine is going to work as a maid.”

  “Father, the meek shall inherit the earth,” I said. “I’ll do whatever I have to so that you and Mother are taken care of.”

  My father said nothing as he rose up out of his chair and headed for the bedroom. Mother and I exchanged a glance before she got to her feet and followed.

  I could barely recognize either of them. All our time together had been happy and without strife between us. Now, with what my parents could only see as betrayal from the very people they’d served without complaint for little pay, they had deflated and turned old before my very eyes.