Sufficient Grace

by Jessica Greyson

  “Would something suit me better?” he asked looking down at her curiously.

  “Sheriff sounds all right I think,” said Grace after a thoughtful moment.

  Mitch smiled. “Well since it is your party. I think maybe we should return indoors. What do you say?”

  “I think so. Hopefully, I didn’t ruin my dress by sitting on the porch instead of a chair.”

  “Let me give you a hand,” he offered her his hands, but she stood up without his help and glanced at the back of her dress. “Well, it doesn’t look any worse for the wear.”

  ~~~~~

  And you don’t either, thought Mitch. But what is going on inside your little head? Those words stung. They stung all of us.

  ~~~~~

  Grace had a beautiful evening despite the fact that Jane was still on the hunt for a husband. At last, the banker’s son walked Jane home. Grace found herself saying goodbye to everyone with Milly at the door.

  “Can I help you clean up anything?” asked Grace.

  “No, the help will do that in the morning. Let me go get Pappa to walk you home. I hope he isn’t asleep in the study.”

  “Actually, I was wondering if I could have that honor.”

  “Mitch, where did you come from?” asked Milly giving a start.

  “I thought you left early,” said Grace trying to figure out if she was annoyed or pleased.

  “I was called away, but I am back. You still haven’t answered my question, Grace.”

  “Of course she will be delighted,” said Milly elbowing her friend gently in the ribs.

  “There you have it. Now that you have offered, her father will certainly be sound asleep in the study,” she said with a daggered look at Milly.

  “Oh, just go.”

  Grace tossed her head with a laugh.

  Mitch looked at Grace. “It really is up to you Grace. I will go wake up Mr. Cunningham if you would prefer him as an escort.”

  Grace softened. “If you wouldn’t mind please.”

  He turned to go wake Milly’s father.

  “Being my escort?” she finished half under her breath.

  He turned back around. “I wouldn’t mind it at all. Do you have a wrap? It’s cold outside.”

  “I left it in Milly’s room. I’ll go get it.”

  She went upstairs and left the pearls she had borrowed on Milly’s dresser before grabbing her wrap and coming back down.

  “Goodnight Grace,” said Milly with a smile.

  “Goodnight Milly,” Grace hugged her friend and whispered in her ear “I know that look on your face, and my saying yes has nothing to do with it.”

  Milly looked at her archly, trying to hide the mischievous smile. “If you say so, Grace.”

  They walked off the porch side by side. “Would you rather walk or ride?” he said motioning to Danny who stood patiently waiting for Mitch.

  “Walk if you don’t mind.” There is no way I am going to ride behind Mitch ever again if I can help it. Why on earth did I actually consent to let him walk me home anyhow? I mean really for someone I don’t like I really spend too much time with him.

  Mitch untied Danny’s reins, and they walked down the road silently for a long time.

  “Grace.” Mitch broke the silence.

  “Yes.” Answered Grace absent-mindedly.

  “Do you remember that I wanted to tell you something tonight?” he asked gently letting his hand gently close around her wrist, then slip down, so he softly held her hand.

  Gingerly, she pulled away, and Mitch let her go. “I remember,” Grace said looking up at him, “What was it that you wanted thirty seconds to say?”

  “I won’t betray you. Ever. What you have told me is between you and me alone. I won’t ever use what you have told me as leverage or means, to hurt or hinder, you and your family. I promise you, Grace.”

  Grace smiled, “Thank you, Mitch.”

  For a reply, he only looked into her eyes. It was an earnest look, Grace found it going to her heart and she turned away. Just because he knows my secrets and I have said he can help me, doesn’t mean I have to let him. They are only fair promises right now. How do I know I can really count on him? How? She found her heart aching. Tonight was lovely. But oh, how it makes the rest of my life pale and ache in comparison. They are so different it hurts. Tomorrow will be a trial. Father and mother will find some way to feel neglected. Was all of that frivolity really worth it? She found her thoughts whirling back over what had happened. Grace had heard Mitch’s words as she left. “If you are going to insult my friends, I wish you would do it in English.” involuntarily she smiled. He included me in his friends, so maybe I am not a pain to him like I am to everybody else?

  Chapter 23

  It was the first day Grace could get out of the house after the party. Her father had forgotten the list of supplies they needed, again. If she was going to make dinner tonight, she needed certain things. Off in a thoughtful world of her own, she found her elbow hooked into someone else’s.

  “Hello, Grace.”

  “Oh, hi Ruby, how are you?”

  “I am well, and you?”

  “Good.”

  “We missed seeing you on Sunday.”

  “My mother was feeling ill. I couldn’t really leave her.”

  Grace felt her elbow squeezed in a friendly manner. “You seem like you are an extraordinary girl, you know that?”

  “What?”

  “You seem extraordinary.”

  “How is that possible?”

  “If I were left at home as much as you are, I would complain, I think. No, I know I would. But you, you never say a thing.”

  Grace didn’t know what to say.

  “I couldn’t believe what Jane did at your party. Someone so arrogant should…I hope she doesn’t last. No one really likes her teaching style. You should hear the stories my younger siblings come home with, and he has only been teaching them for two days.” Ruby shook her head.

  “I thought I would like teaching. I wanted to stay at finishing school to be a teacher’s assistant, but my parents needed me here.”

  “Is it hard for you to be in the west?” asked Ruby looking at Grace with concern.

  Grace laughed. That question is too complicated and heavy. I love it here but some of the people, even the ones I live with, are just…difficult. “I love the west, I was born and raised here until I was twelve. I love that there is not too much fuss and feathers, no pomp. You don’t have to be a somebody out here to become a somebody if you know what I mean.”

  Ruby nodded.

  “There is nothing I really miss from the east, maybe the green, but not too much.”

  “Oh, I am stopping here, Mother asked me to pick up something for Chris’s cough, do you need anything for your mother?”

  “The doctor delivered her medication last week, and I really need to head on to the Cunningham’s store.”

  “Hopefully, I will see you there then.”

  “Yes. You will.”

  “See you in a bit Grace.”

  A few steps later Grace was on her back. Miss Jane Vanholt lying beside her, tears streaming down her face.

  “What is the matter? You came running out of nowhere,” said Grace picking herself up and offering Jane, a hand.

  “I hate children! I hate school! I hate the west! And I hate your little town!”

  “What happened?”

  “Those—those children!” Jane burst into tears and fled across the street to the hotel.

  Grace turned in haste down the alley shortcut, from which Jane had emerged, making her way to the school house. The schoolyard was in chaos, children were running in all directions, some were screaming, some crying, but all making a ruckus.

  Grace leaped up on the little porch and rang the bell. The children stopped to look at her in surprise.

  “Children, I want you all to come in here single file, we have some things to talk about.”

  Awed by the authority in her voice, they o
beyed, mutely and filed in.

  Grace took roll call to make sure each child was present, and surprisingly all were accounted for.

  “All right. Why did I just see your teacher in tears?”

  The children looked at her with a worried expression on their faces.

  “Children, I am not mad; I just want to get to the bottom of this. The last thing we want is for Esperanza Springs to be marked as a town that is nasty to their teachers.”

  The room was mute with silence.

  “All right. Did someone put something in her desk drawer?”

  A little girl giggled in nervousness.

  Grace walked behind the desk and laid her hand on a drawer.

  “Don’t open it,” said a boy standing up.

  It was too late. Grace had already opened the drawer. I small green snake lay on a neat pile of books, flicking its little tongue in and out. Grace’s veins chilled. Just pick it up behind the head like Ryan used to. It wasn’t scary when he let you hold them. You can do this.

  Grace gingerly grabbed the snake with two fingers and emptying a small box of various sundry articles, placing the wriggling creature in, she slapped on the lid.

  “Whose snake is this?”

  Once again the children looked at her with wide mute eyes in wonderment.

  “Boys?” her eyes passed enquiringly over them. One didn’t meet her gaze.

  “Jake. Is the snake yours?”

  The boy slumped a little further down in his chair.

  “Yes, ma’am?”

  “Well, I hope you will never bring snakes to school ever again.”

  “I only meant it as a joke…”

  “Well, a good rule for having fun or playing a joke is knowing if that person will actually like the joke. Because if you aren’t all having a good time, no one is having fun. All right? It is the simple golden rule. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Now, you wouldn’t mind finding a green snake in your drawer, but you would mind finding a rattler, wouldn’t you?”

  The boy nodded.

  “Miss Jane probably doesn’t know the difference between a rattler and a green snake. So now, do you understand why it is important that we don’t play tricks, all of you.” She let her gaze sweep the classroom.

  The children nodded gravely.

  “Very good. Now, what lessons were you working on? I suggest you go back to working on those. Just maybe, Miss Jane will return, and we can offer our apologies.”

  Quietly the children set to work.

  In a few minutes, Mitch and Sheriff Coates were coming up the school house steps. Grace was helping a first grader with her math figures.

  “What are you doing here?” asked Sheriff Coates sharply.

  “Miss Jane ran past me on the sidewalk, I thought I would come by, and see what I could do. There was a green snake in the drawer, if one of you could take care of this?” she said offering them the box. “I already know which one put it in the drawer, and I am pretty sure it won’t happen again.”

  Mitch took the box with the little innocent culprit.

  Sheriff Coates stepped to the front of the room. “Well, well, children; I must say you did a pretty good job at getting rid of your teacher. That is if you wanted to make your parents unhappy that is. Is that what your parents wanted? No teacher?”

  The children shook and hung their heads.

  “You are all residents of Esperanza Springs, and as responsible citizens, it is important that you give this town a good name. Because your good name goes along with it. Somewhere in the Bible, it says a good name is rather to be chosen that great riches. Now…I know all of us can’t be rich, but we can make a good reputation. That follows you everywhere and travels before you do…there was once a man.”

  Grace stood and watched as her father launched into a moral story; she had heard so often in her childhood. Father can’t you HEAR yourself! You know. You know and yet you still! How can you live such a double life? People love you because you know how to sound so good. You can sell anything you want to be, to these people, they love you. You blind them with your talk. But on the inside... Father do something. Save your own name for once! Fight. Fight for me, for Mother, pick yourself up and stop running from the truth. Stand up and take it like a man! Stop changing your name to hide your past!

  She pulled a mask over her feelings and laughed along with the children at the funny part, but when Mitch caught her gaze, she struggled to smile at him.

  ~~~~~

  He caught a passing broken glance, she tried to smile. They were filled with pain; like someone was slowly twisting her in half.

  Oh, Grace! Don’t let your heart break.

  ~~~~~

  “Well, all right, now finish your lessons children and then go home. Grace, will you stay here and watch them?”

  Grace nodded, not daring to trust her voice. She wanted to open her mouth. To tell him the pain that racked her heart—to let him hear the anger that she had been storing up…but if she did—the consequences that would follow.

  “Mitch, I am going to go see how Miss Jane is doing. Hopefully, she has recovered at all. Why don’t you get rid of that snake.”

  “Do you have to get rid of him?” piped up Jake. “Lancelot is my pet…”

  “Come to the sheriff’s office after school, and you can have him,” said Mitch holding back a smile.

  Three hours later Grace released the children for home, and Jake Slater made a beeline for the sheriff’s office.

  Grace started to put the room in order after the slightly chaotic day. After a little while, boots were heard coming up the small porch, and into the school house.

  “Jake came and collected his snake. I thought I would come and see if you were still here.”

  “Well, I am,” she answered with shortness in her voice.

  “Miss Jane isn’t staying. She wanted to leave tonight, but we were able to persuade her against that. Riding a horse to the next town just to get out of here…well, it’s just a little too desperate.”

  “She was that badly shook up?”

  “Apparently, she has never taught school before. She was a governess to one angelic child before this. Not the best preparation for a school room of children.”

  “Poor thing.”

  “How are you doing Grace?”

  “I’ll be all right I guess. I always am.”

  “Grace.”

  She could tell by Mitch’s voice that he wanted her to turn around, and look him in the eye. I can’t do that. Not now. I will cry, and I can’t cry right now. I still have to show my face at Cunningham’s. Grace took a special interest in cleaning off the blackboard.

  Mitch moved closer and leaned against the desk. He sat silent, waiting, he was just there.

  Grace wanted to be annoyed with him, but yet she couldn’t help appreciate him at the same time. Why can’t I ever make up my mind about you? I want to hate you, and I want to like you, but I don’t know which is stronger. You are solid, and I desperately want to lean on that strength. But that means knowing that I am weak, and can’t stand on my own two feet. I can, I must. Someday you will be gone, and I will be alone. You will abandon me like everyone else has and I will…have to be strong all by myself. Go away Mitch! I can’t let you help me. I really can’t. There must be some way to put distance between us. Oh, God help me get rid of him.

  Unconsciously she leaned her head against the blackboard.

  “Grace what is the matter?”

  “Just go away, Mitch. Go away. I don’t need you right now.”

  “You don’t want me right now, or you don’t need me?”

  Why does he have to make a distinct difference? I need him, but I don’t want him at all! Grace turned on him. “I said leave.” You know all my secrets. You see me in pain. I can’t take it, I won’t take it.

  It felt as if his eyes stung her heart, they just seemed to see so deep.

  ~~~~~

  Mitch sat there looking at Grace, his gaze held no an
ger, no reproach. God, she needs someone right now; I know if I leave it will just prove that I will walk out on her. If I stay, she is probably going to hate me for it. God, what should I do?

  “Stop it! You aren’t helping.”

  “Then tell me how I can help you, Grace. Tell me.”

  “You can’t help me. I want out! OUT!”

  “Out of what, Grace? What do you want to get out of?”

  Grace turned and looked out the window.

  “You had a fight with your father last night didn’t you?”

  Her face fell; her gaze dropped to the ground.

  “Grace? Did he?” he asked, touching her cheek.

  “No, not this time.”

  “Would you tell me if he had?”

  Grace looked him in the eyes. There was no spite, just pleading honesty. “Yes,” she barely whispered, but he heard.

  “Come on, let’s go for a walk,” Mitch said loosely taking her hand.

  Grace mutely obeyed. For a long time, they just walked out into the prairie.

  ~~~~~

  Why doesn’t he speak? Of all times to be silent, why now? Don’t lean on him too hard Grace, you have to be strong. You hear me? You have to be strong!

  At last, he stopped and turned towards her, his eyes gently penetrating toward her heart. She threw up a wall of defense. Why has it taken him this long?

  “You were saying Grace?” he asked.

  She swallowed the lump in her throat and looked at the grass brushing it with her foot. I said too much in the school. I can’t tell him. Not that part. It hurts too much.

  Circling her he stepped into the sweep of her foot. She bumped him once; annoyed with him. He didn’t move. She swished back and forth, barely tapping him. Still, he stood there. Grace swept her foot and hit his boot hard. She wanted to fight him but how? He just stood there! She let her foot fly full force against his boot. His other foot moved, suddenly her foot was trapped between his boots.

  “Grace,” the voice was so gentle.

  There was a part of Grace that wanted to allow herself to crumple in his arms and cry; the other part wanted to throw up a wall of solid ice against her heart, locking him out. She looked hesitantly up into his face. He wasn’t annoyed with her, he wasn’t playing, this was serious business, and they both knew it.