Until We Find Home

by Cathy Gohlke

  Miranda handed the brandy back to Mrs. Newsome. “I think you need this more than I do.”

  Mrs. Newsome didn’t demur. She swallowed the thimbleful in one go, shuddered, and breathed deeply. “Thank you.”

  Miranda reached for the older woman’s hand. Mrs. Newsome nodded in understanding, then glanced significantly across the room toward David and Claire, whispering near the piano.

  “I see,” Miranda replied, “more than you know.” She squeezed Mrs. Newsome’s hand and stood, thinking it time to send the older children to bed. Gaston and Elise, Franz, Josef, and even Ingrid were fast falling asleep as they stretched over carpets and chair arms. “There’s nothing more we can do tonight, children. Aimee is home and Dr. MacDonald is caring for her. Mrs. Newsome will see you up. Please, Mrs. Newsome, tuck each one in tonight, even the boys.”

  Bertram grunted his disapproval, but Franz half smiled.

  Mrs. Newsome clapped her hands. “It won’t hurt a one of you, and it will do my old heart good. I might even be compelled to kiss you.”

  At that, the boys all groaned aloud, except Gaston, who sleepily and gallantly offered Mrs. Newsome his arm to escort her upstairs. “Madame,” he said in his most courtly French.

  Mrs. Newsome patted and looped his arm, winking her appreciation.

  They’d just stepped through the door when Claire thanked her aunt. “I should have seen them to bed, Aunt Miranda. I’m sorry. I’m just not thinking.”

  “Nor should you be. Our concern tonight is for Aimee. You’ve done wonderfully, Claire. If it hadn’t been for you and David—”

  The library door opened again and Nancy scooted through. “She’s awake and calling for you.”

  Claire flushed and set down her teacup and saucer. “Thank you, Nancy!” She was halfway to the door before Nancy could get the next words out.

  “Not you, Miss Claire. She doesn’t want you.” Nancy crimsoned. “Doctor was most specific that Lady Langford is the only one to be allowed in the room now.”

  The blood drained from Claire’s face.

  “I’m sorry, miss.” Nancy sounded as sorry as David looked shocked.

  “Surely she wants to see Claire. Claire found her. She—”

  “No, sir. The doctor said to tell you there will be time for that tomorrow or when she recovers, that Aimee’s had a terrible shock and is suffering from hypo—hypoth—”

  “Hypothermia,” David offered.

  “Yes, sir. That’s it, sir. He said we should do just as he says for the child.”

  Miranda squeezed Claire’s arm as she followed Nancy from the room. “I’m sure she’ll be asking for you soon. I know she will.”

  Claire swallowed and stepped back, allowing her aunt to pass. She couldn’t look at David. This was too much, too agonizing and too humiliating. Yet Claire knew she’d brought it on herself. Each time Aimee had reached out to her, she’d turned away, held the little girl at arm’s length. She’d told herself, told Aunt Miranda and Mrs. Newsome, even Dr. MacDonald, that she wasn’t Aimee’s mother, that she didn’t know anything about children.

  But that wasn’t true. She knew just what it was to be a child forgotten and pushed aside. Claire hadn’t been an orphan, hadn’t been ripped from her mother’s arms, but her mother had pushed her as far away as she could, so often lost in the stupor of her drink.

  Life in New Jersey had been filled with nannies when she was very young, then before- and after-school care, classes of every imaginable sort to keep her busy through the evenings, camps so she would be out of town during the summer holidays. Twice Claire remembered spending Christmas with neighbors and once with the Beach family as her mother had trotted the globe or visited friends for skiing trips, anything to keep her from home and Claire.

  And Claire had done much the same to Aimee. She’d not sent her away physically, but she’d emotionally distanced herself. Why? Because Aimee wanted me and I wanted to hurt her as my mother hurt me? Claire knew that was not true. As quick as she was to berate herself, she was not sadistic. Because that’s all I know, all I’ve experienced. I don’t know how to love her.

  Claire dug the heels of her hands into her eyes. Pain! That’s all I know and all I give! How does a person love?

  And then something she’d read in David’s book, something C. S. Lewis had written, played through her mind. . . . Something about God using pain for a purpose.

  “Are you all right?” David was by her side.

  She hadn’t even noticed him cross the room. “Yes.” She tried to smile, though she couldn’t keep the tears pooled at the corners of her eyes from leaking down her face.

  He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her. She fumbled, trying to unfold it. He took it back, unfolded it, and tenderly wiped her cheeks, dabbed at her eyes, and tweaked her nose. His kindness, his sympathy, unleashed a faucet, and Claire found herself sobbing in his arms.

  Dr. MacDonald didn’t know if he should step backward out the library door and knock, or if he should discreetly cough. Neither David nor Claire seemed the least aware of his presence, and he wasn’t entirely sure what the embrace he witnessed meant. Two friends in need? Lovers? He couldn’t simply leave, not without saying what he’d come to say. He coughed, twice, and closed the door, louder than his wont.

  Claire and David split apart as if someone had shot them. Both looked a mite guilty and surprised by that realization at the same time. It was all Dr. MacDonald could do not to smile.

  David spoke first, while Claire wiped the last tear from her cheek. “How is she, Doctor?”

  “She’ll mend. It will take a wee bit . . . she’ll be a week or so on the puny side, I wager. She survived some fearful moments out there in the dark. The cold and rain did her no good. Ach, but she’s a spry little thing and I’ve no doubt she’ll pull through.”

  “Thank God,” Claire whispered.

  “Aye, thank God, and you, Claire Stewart . . . and you, David Campbell. I’d not have found her in time. That lightning hitting the tree scared her half to death. It’s a wonder she didn’t tumble down the crag then and there. You reached her before she tried to run again. You likely saved her life.”

  “I think that credit goes to you, Doctor. Thank you for searching for her, for being there . . . for being here.” Claire spoke but looked as if she wanted to hide beneath the carpet. “Did she say anything . . . about why she ran away?”

  “She’s fair out of her head, poor mite. Going on about talking animals and fairy caravans and taking a boat home to Paris. She’ll come round, but she’s got some sorting out to do. You can help her with that. Help her see that there’s a difference between reality and imagination. She’s young, but she needs to draw those lines. ’Tis all too easy for the mind to slip under the pressures of war. I’ve seen it in adults. It can happen to children just as well.”

  “Yes, yes, I’ll do anything I can . . . anything she’ll let me.” Claire meant it, the doctor was certain. What she’d be able to do, he didn’t know.

  “There’s something I needs must say to ye, lass.” The doctor’s brogue came thicker than usual.

  “I think I know everything you’ll say, Doctor, and you’re right. I haven’t done right by Aimee.”

  “I think you’ve said everything to Claire on that subject that needs to be said, don’t you, Doctor?” David stood ready to defend her.

  “A gallant knight you’ve got there,” Dr. MacDonald chided gently. “But I’m not here to dress you down, Claire Stewart. I’m here to apologize. I’d no right to say the things I did. You can’t help that you’re not something you weren’t born to be.”

  Claire paled. He could see her swallow, but she didn’t speak.

  “That’s all I’ve come to say, and now I’ve said it, I’ll check on the bairn one last time before I leave. I’ll stop by tomorrow.” He turned to go, then stopped. “Oh, I’ve told Nancy that someone’s to stay the night with the child, keeping watch. I don’t expect a problem, but it would be best
if someone was there. Call me if anything’s amiss. Trouble is, Nancy’s that dead on her feet, so I’m wonderin’ if you might spell her sometime in the night.”

  Claire’s wary eyes met his. “Nancy said Aimee doesn’t want me.”

  “When she first opened her eyes, she wanted only Mrs. Newsome. I convinced her to let Miranda come in, for I knew Miranda needed that. The child’s terrified—of being alone in the storm, of being punished, of never seeing her mother and father, of everything imaginable. I’ve given her a sedative. She’ll not know who’s there through the night. Watch over the bairn.” That was all he had to say. He nodded to them both and was gone.

  Claire sent Nancy to bed directly and sat by Aimee’s side until dawn, refusing every offer to spell her, including David’s. Nothing could pry her from the child’s side.

  Claire had never believed in prayer or that there was anyone there to listen, let alone answer. But a miracle had happened on the fells that night and Someone was responsible; Claire couldn’t let it pass. When she felt certain everyone had gone, Claire knelt beside Aimee’s bed, the child’s tiny hand clasped in both of hers.

  I still don’t know if You’re there, God. I was always so certain You weren’t real, that You were a crutch, a fantasy like Aimee’s talking animals and fairies. But I asked for Your help tonight and something happened. We found Aimee on that crag, just in time. What Dr. MacDonald said was true: she could have fallen and injured herself terribly, could have been killed. I couldn’t live with that. I couldn’t live knowing I’d . . .

  I’m so sorry for the way I’ve treated Aimee, for the way I’ve pushed them all away. I don’t understand why I’m like I am.

  Dr. MacDonald sees I’m no good at mothering and he’s right. I’m just so afraid, so . . . Oh, help me, God. If You’re there, help me. Help Aimee to forgive me and let me have another chance. I promise to do better. I don’t know how, exactly . . . but I’ll learn to love her, if You’ll teach me.

  Claire stopped praying. It was as if Someone jogged her memory. At last she brushed the hair from Aimee’s forehead and slipped from the room, retrieving The Problem of Pain from beneath her mattress. Lewis had written about how God uses pain in people’s lives. Claire felt as if she’d earned a PhD in the school of pain. If only that pain could be used to help Aimee in some way, perhaps it had merit. She needed to find the passage. She knelt once more by Aimee’s bedside and flipped through the pages by torchlight, reading softly aloud, “‘Pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.’

  “You have my attention! You’ve roused me. . . . Now what?

  “I don’t want to hurt Aimee—I don’t want to hurt anyone by what I do or by my neglect! But caring—loving—must mean more than caring for bodily needs . . . more than I know to do. Please, God, show me how.”

  A footstep near the door caused Claire to look up. David. She brushed the tears from her eyes, frustrated that he’d caught her like this and upset that he’d likely heard her pleas.

  “You’re hard on yourself. This is not your fault.”

  “Yes, it is. I know you mean well, but it is my fault. Aimee would never have run away if I’d given her the attention or love she craved.” Even now Claire wasn’t certain what that meant. There was no point in pretending she had a plan. She sat back on the floor. “I’ve no idea how to give her what she needs from me.”

  David said nothing. Claire didn’t know if he was shocked or disappointed, but she didn’t care. Even his opinion didn’t matter compared to Aimee’s need. “I never had siblings. My mother didn’t have time for me. I know what I missed, but not how to give it.”

  “Then give what you are, what you know.”

  There was that urging—a question—again, the one Claire had no answer for. She all but grunted. “I’m nothing. I know nothing. Do you have siblings? Do you know what to do?”

  But David only asked, “What do you love?”

  “I—I love Arnaud; you know that.” It was the only thing Claire could think to say, the only thing that came to mind. Even as she said it, she knew that might be a fantasy too.

  “I didn’t say whom; I said what. What do you love, Claire?”

  She pushed the disheveled hair from her eyes. “I was reasonably good at sports. I did well in most subjects . . . Art was my weakest class.”

  “You’re not hearing me. Tell me what it is that gives you joy.”

  No one had ever asked her that. “Books.” She sighed. “I’ve always loved stories. I’ve lived through stories, imagined myself in stories, succeeded in stories. That’s part of the problem, I guess. I see life as if it’s a story.”

  “And you’re the heroine?” He grinned.

  “Sometimes.” But she couldn’t smile in return. It was a painful confession. “Tonight I feel the villain. I suppose you think that’s all silly.”

  “Not silly at all. Give them that.”

  Claire closed her eyes and counted to five. She stood and straightened her skirt, then took a seat in the rocker beside Aimee’s bed. “You heard Dr. MacDonald. Aimee doesn’t need more fantasies; she needs to understand real life, to learn to cope with life as it is.”

  “But stories have helped you do that. That’s what stories are for.” David threw out his arms. “If characters can succeed in a story, if they can overcome their dilemma, then it stands to reason that the reader can too. Stories give us a way to make sense of the world. Understanding that, demonstrating that, would be an incredible gift to these children.”

  Claire stared at him, skeptical.

  “Life has dealt them a terrible blow. They need ways and means to cope modeled for them. You and your aunt can’t model everything. Let stories help.”

  “What stories?” Claire challenged, though a tiny recognition of the truth he spoke, a minuscule hope, struggled to life within her, alongside a vague memory of rallying the children through the example of Peter Pan.

  “Give them the stories you love; they will love them too.” He grinned. “If I don’t miss my guess, you’re probably quite a hand at voices.”

  “I can do all the voices.” Now she couldn’t help but smile. It was something few people knew about her.

  David nodded. “They’ll see that time, that investment, is made just for them. You wouldn’t do it if you didn’t love them. That love is what they’ll take away.” He hesitated. “As long as you’re all in, as long as you don’t hold back.”

  Chapter Twenty

  “IT WAS DAVID’S IDEA, really,” Claire said as she and Aunt Miranda entered the library, “but it makes sense to me. He said it will help them pass the evenings—that even if the news is bad, at least this will be something they can count on.”

  “That’s true. Still . . .” Her aunt hesitated.

  Claire well understood her aunt’s reservations—that sharing something so personal, so precious as the stories of their hearts, knowing the children would not stay, was anything but easy.

  “I don’t know how that man got to be so wise.” Aunt Miranda sighed. “He’s young. He’s not married. I don’t even think he has siblings.”

  Claire wondered the same thing.

  Morning sun poured through the far end of the library, illuminating the fairy-tale figures Jeanine and Ingrid had drawn and pasted—outlined in crosshatched tape to prevent flying glass in case of a bombing. The most creative windows in the village, Claire was certain.

  “This hand-woven carpet, this rounded room of the turret, with all its windows, was Christopher’s favorite spot to play as a child. We pretended it was a magic carpet that would ‘take us lands away,’ just as Emily Dickinson said about the ship.” Aunt Miranda began the recitation. By the second line, Claire joined in:

  “There is no frigate like a book

  To take us lands away,

  Nor any coursers like a page

  Of prancing poetry.

  This tr
averse may the poorest take

  Without oppress of toll;

  How frugal is the chariot

  That bears the human soul.”

  Claire and her aunt smiled in unison, a rare comradely smile.

  “As long as we kept the room warm enough, we spent hours here, reading, talking. And then I’d sing to him. He’d fall asleep in my arms . . . in this rocker.” Miranda faltered. “I know it doesn’t go with the other furniture at all. I’d always meant to replace it, but now . . . now I never will.”

  Claire reached her hand nearly to her aunt’s arm in sympathy but pulled back, self-conscious. Love is what they’ll take away, as long as you don’t hold back. Surely David’s words applied to her aunt, too. She reached again.

  Aunt Miranda started, clearly surprised by Claire’s touch. She smiled tentatively and placed her hand over her niece’s. Claire’s heart fluttered. How did David know? Again she had no clue.

  Aunt Miranda pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and wiped her eyes. “Well—” she forcibly brightened, leading Claire to the lower children’s shelves—“what would you like to start with? It will be a challenge to find something appropriate for all ages.”

  “The Secret Garden.” Claire had thought of nothing else all morning.

  Aunt Miranda stiffened.

  “The book, by Frances Hodgson Burnett,” Claire added quietly. “I thought that might be a good one, especially for this time of year . . . seeing everything come alive in the gardens and on our walks through the woods and over the fell.” Claire worded her statement carefully. She would not violate another of her aunt’s memories. “I think, perhaps, Aimee feels a bit like an orphan, like Mary Lennox when she came to Misselthwaite Manor, before she found the garden.”

  “Yes.” Aunt Miranda’s voice came strained. “I’m sure you’re right.”

  “I read it when I was Ingrid’s age and have never forgotten. I’ve always longed for a garden of my own.”

  “‘Might I have a bit of earth?’” Aunt Miranda quoted, her expression far away.