The Silver Suitcase

by Terrie Todd

  “Of course you’d say so, it was your boy what done it!” Cecil Black bellowed.

  “Hold it, gentlemen.” Ruth McKinnley pressed her palms together, then laced her fingers. “It’s no secret we have our share of conflict of interest on this board. It’s unavoidable in such a small community.” She gestured toward each person in the circle as she referred to them. “A child was the victim of an accident at the hands of Mr. Rogers’ son. The teacher is Miss Simpson’s niece. It seems everyone’s related to someone! If we can’t work within these boundaries, there won’t be anyone qualified to serve on the board.”

  Rupert Johnson spoke again. “I think we should give Miss Simpson the floor. The younger Miss Simpson, that is.”

  Cornelia took a deep breath and swallowed. She stood and moved to the side of the room where Mr. Black sat, then faced the board. “Thank you, Mr. Johnson. Everything Mr. Black said is true. I was inside the school when the accident occurred. I had dismissed the students and stayed behind a few minutes to organize their papers for the last class of the day. I was putting on my coat when Teeny Webber ran inside to tell me what happened.

  “I agree it is most unfortunate, and I will do everything in my power to learn from this situation and not let anything like it happen again.”

  “Well, I should hope not!” Mr. Black shouted.

  “I do believe I learned from it,” Cornelia continued. She addressed her next thoughts directly to Cecil Black. “Mr. Black, you are a caring and devoted parent. You would not serve on this board if that weren’t true. I appreciate your concern for your son and for the other students. May I ask you something?”

  Cecil Black grunted, and Cornelia took that as a go-ahead.

  “When your son Allan first learned to walk, did you and his mother praise and encourage him?”

  “Well, of course.”

  “And in his inexperience with walking, did he fall sometimes?”

  “Well, of course he did. What kind of question is that? Every child falls down. What are you getting at?”

  “Mr. Black,” Cornelia continued, “because you are a wise and kind parent, I assume when little Allan fell, you did not kick him or hit him or forbid him to walk again. Did you?”

  Cecil Black frowned at her, then looked around at the others, and finally back at Cornelia. “Well, what kind of fool would do that to a little child? Of course not!”

  “Mr. Black, I have been teaching for five months. I am responsible for the safety and the education of thirty-two children for seven hours a day, five days a week. By myself. I am still learning. Sometimes I fall. I humbly ask you to extend to me the same grace you would extend to your own child, even if that child were to stumble or make a mistake.”

  The room grew unexpectedly quiet. Aunt Miriam cleared her throat. Mr. Rogers shuffled papers. Finally, Cecil Black rose and went into the kitchen. The board members looked at one another. Mr. Johnson raised his eyebrows and Mrs. McKinnley responded with a shrug.

  Rather than return to her seat, Cornelia turned to study the family photos displayed on the mantel. She recognized several of little Allan Black, but another boy appeared in some of the pictures beside Allan. She turned her head when she heard the sound of the outside door slamming. A moment later, Mrs. Black stood in the doorway to the kitchen, holding a pot of tea.

  “Cecil said to tell you he went out to finish his evening chores,” she said, placing the pot on the coffee table. The board members looked around the room. No one seemed to know what to do next. Mrs. Black stood straight and finished delivering her message. “He also said he would like to retract the motion he laid on the table. I hope you know what that means, because I don’t see anything on the table but the cookies and tea.”

  That broke the ice, and some board members sighed while others chuckled softly. Mrs. Black moved over to where Cornelia stood at the mantel. She picked up a photo of her son Allan with the other boy and held it tenderly.

  “This is our oldest son, Freddy,” she said. “We lost him six years ago, just before we moved here. Drowning accident. Please forgive Cecil. He still blames hisself. He isn’t truly mean-spirited.” She replaced the picture and walked back to the kitchen without another word.

  Cornelia returned to her chair, and Aunt Miriam reached over to pat her knee.

  “Does anyone have anything else to offer?” Mr. Rogers asked. The board members shook their heads. “Then I move we adjourn this meeting. Good night, folks.”

  “You did fine, Corrie,” Aunt Miriam said as she dropped Cornelia off at home twenty minutes later. “You missed a golden opportunity, though. I’ve been pushing to have a telephone installed at that school ever since they elected me to the board. Maybe next time.”

  Cornelia raised her eyebrows as high as they would go and glared at her aunt through the darkness. “Next time?”

  But Miriam just laughed, shooed Cornelia out of the car, and drove away.

  CHAPTER 45

  September 2007

  Benita couldn’t believe what she’d just heard. She followed her mother into the kitchen.

  “Mom. Didn’t you hear what I said? It was all in Gram’s diary. She even named her little girl—”

  “No. She would have told me. You’re mistaken.”

  “Believe it or not, I can read, Mother. It was in the diary.”

  Grace placed the cups in the sink and turned around to face Benita. “It was probably just the romantic notions of a young drama queen with a boring life.”

  Benita raised her face to the ceiling, as if looking for answers elsewhere. “Why would Gram make that all up?”

  “Why would you?” her mother accused. “I don’t know what your plan is, honey, but now you’ve gone and lost the diaries—probably forever—and all I have is what you’re saying.” She put a sugar bowl back in the cupboard. “For all I know, you dreamed it. Did Ken read them? Did anyone?”

  “No.” Benita shook her head slowly and sank into the nearest chair. “Just me. Gram wrote it, Mom. I’m not making this up, and neither did she.” Benita tried to stay calm, though her mother’s words stung.

  Grace joined her at the kitchen table. “Well, why didn’t you tell me this when you first read about it, then? Why didn’t you show me the diaries right away?”

  “I intended to, Mom. I wanted to get all the way through them first. I don’t know why . . . maybe I wanted to have something special, some connection to Gram all to myself for a little while. I don’t know.”

  “Well . . . you and Gram were pretty close. But that doesn’t explain why you’re telling me this now.”

  Benita sighed. “I got a visitor today.”

  She explained to her mother about Ramona’s visit and quest to meet her blood relatives.

  “She’s anxious to meet you, Mom. I guess everybody wants to understand about their roots.”

  Grace sat silently for a long time. Perhaps her mother just needed time for it all to sink in, Benita thought. She would probably come around in a few days. Benita finally decided to call it a night.

  But as she picked up her purse to head out the door, her mother surprised her.

  “She looked for us once before.”

  “What, Mom?” Benita took a step back toward Grace’s chair. She had spoken very softly. Benita knelt beside her and looked up into her mother’s face.

  “I said she looked for us before. Years ago.” Grace sighed. “I still lived at home at the time—it was a summer between college semesters, so I must have been around twenty. The phone rang one day when I was home alone, and the caller was a young woman looking for a Cornelia Simpson. She said that was the name of her biological mother, and I told her she had the wrong person. I believed it, too. Until now.”

  “Did you tell Gram about the call?” Benita asked.

  “No. I never breathed a word. I guess, deep down . . . I don’t know. I wa
s afraid it might be true and I didn’t want it to be, so I made myself forget. I never told anyone.”

  Benita rose from her knees and sat in the chair again. “Would it have been so horrible if it were true?”

  Grace considered this. “I suppose not, looking back on it now. It’s just . . . I don’t know, when you’re that age, and you think you know who your parents are and that they’d never do anything deceitful . . . somehow the idea felt like a threat. Like I would lose something important. Maybe it’s silly, but it would have been painful to think my mother kept such a big secret from me.”

  “Do you think Gram ever tried to find Mary Sarah . . . er, Ramona?”

  “I don’t know. Is that what she named her? Mary Sarah?”

  “Yes.”

  “After her own mother, then.”

  Benita waited quietly, allowing Grace to process the information.

  “Mother always told me my name had special significance, too.” Grace turned to gaze out the window where the leaves were beginning to turn yellow. “She said I was God’s special gift of grace to her. She was a good mother. She should have had lots of children. I had her all to myself.”

  She stood up and walked over to the window, turning her back to her daughter. “I miss her, Benita. I really, really miss her.”

  Grace’s shoulders began to shake as the tears came in earnest. Benita crossed the distance between them and wrapped her arms around her mother. She gently rubbed Grace’s back until the sobs subsided and Grace had a chance to blow her nose and regain her composure.

  “Mom, Ramona’s come all the way from Toronto. I’d like to tell her she can meet all of us. But I won’t if you don’t want her to. But please don’t decide tonight. Get some sleep, and let’s talk some more tomorrow.”

  Grace nodded, and they said good night.

  On the drive home, Benita wondered whether she would ever sleep again. But exhaustion took over and she fell asleep with a minimum of tossing. That night she dreamed of Gram. In her dream, Gram wore a fuzzy blue bathrobe and sang while she rocked Katie-Lynn on her lap.

  Something woke Benita suddenly and when she looked at the clock on the dresser it read 3:16. She felt a desperate need to remember the song Gram had been singing in her dream. But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t.

  When she finally fell back to sleep, she slept soundly until the alarm clock rang.

  CHAPTER 46

  July 1942

  Dear Diary,

  Life has been such a whirlwind, I haven’t had time to catch my breath, let alone record the events of the last many months. But summer is finally upon us and the wedding behind us. Yes, the wedding!

  On February 14, Roseburg held its annual Valentines dance. Although so many boys from the community are away, the Committee felt it an important display of optimism to hold the event as usual. Stuart and I were seeing each other two or three times a week by then. He came to our home for supper and stayed for the evening. Some nights we sat together at the kitchen table, marking students’ papers. Other times, the four of us held checkers tournaments. Some evenings we listened to the radio. Stuart and I regularly stayed up talking after Daddy and Jimmy went to bed. Daddy always left his bedroom door part-way open. Stuart usually managed to collect a good-night kiss at the door, though.

  Of course, I fully expected Stuart to ask me to the dance. But Valentine’s Day approached and he hadn’t mentioned it. I wondered if it would be another evening at home. Surely he hadn’t asked someone else.

  I even prayed about it. “Lord,” I said. “I don’t know what your plans are for Stuart and me. It seems he cares about me a lot, and I like him too. But if this is going nowhere, it would be just as well if we ended it now. I can’t go through any more loss. Not yet. Not for a long time, I hope. Please show me what to do.”

  School dragged that week. The brutally cold weather made my students tired of being cooped up. I would send them out for extremely brief breaks, and then only after checking each child for mittens, hats, and scarves. I couldn’t wait for the end of each school day.

  When Stuart came for supper Tuesday evening, I thought for sure he’d mention the dance. On Wednesday, he didn’t come. On Thursday, the weather warmed and the atmosphere at school brightened. In art class, the children made valentines out of items brought from home. I worked on some as well—one for Stuart, one for Daddy, and one for Jim.

  That evening, Stuart came for supper. By seven or eight o’clock, I felt my throat getting scratchy and my eyes were watery. Stuart left early without a word about the dance and I went to bed with a hot water bottle.

  By Friday, my symptoms had worked themselves into a full-blown cold. Daddy, bless his heart, drove to the Blacks’ and arranged for Mrs. Black to take school for the day. He and Jimmy even rustled up some homemade chicken soup for me. I haven’t felt that miserable for a long time.

  Saturday proved no better. Not only was I sick, I felt completely blue. Valentine’s Day. No date, no dance, no Stuart, no friends. I tried desperately to think of something to be thankful for, and finally came up with one thing. I no longer lived at Mrs. Marshall’s boarding house/restaurant. What a dark time. So alone, waiting on tables, still trying to keep my secret from customers, studying in my freezing room, and crying myself to sleep at night over what lay ahead.

  Now, thankfully, that is all behind me. I may have felt rotten that Saturday, but at least I had a warm home and loving family around me.

  By mid-afternoon, Stuart arrived. I didn’t particularly want him seeing me with my awful red nose and all. But it beat being alone. It annoyed me, though, when he spent more time with Jimmy than he did with me. The two of them stayed outside for the longest time. When they came in, they banged around in the kitchen for another couple of hours and every time I tried to see what they were up to, they’d shoo me back to the living room, where I had set up camp on the sofa.

  Then I got the surprise of my life.

  Daddy and Jimmy left for the evening. They claimed they had promised to help at the dance. Finally, Stuart allowed me into the kitchen, where I discovered an impressively set table for two and a dinner of fried perch. If it hadn’t been for my cold, I definitely would have smelled that fish stinking up the house.

  Stuart and I enjoyed a lovely meal, in spite of my cold, and then he excused himself to go out. I assumed he needed the outhouse, and began clearing the dishes. When he came back inside, he said, “Leave the dishes for now, Corrie. I want to show you something.”

  Taking my hand, he led me to the dark living room and then to the picture window. Earlier in the week, that window had been so covered in frost, you couldn’t see a thing out of it. Now, though, the frost congregated around the edges like a beautiful, lacy picture frame. When I looked out, I discovered Stuart and Jimmy’s secret. There, upright in the snow, stood dozens of candles placed in the shape of a heart and burning brightly.

  I don’t remember exactly what I said, something like “Oh, Stuart! It’s beautiful!” I couldn’t believe he’d got them all burning at once, or that he’d done this for me.

  I definitely remember what he said, though.

  “Happy Valentine’s Day, Corrie.” He turned me toward him. “I love you. And I want you to marry me. Will you?”

  My face started scrunching up and I’m sure Stuart thought I would cry. But instead I let out a massive sneeze! The moment every girl dreams of, and I sneezed! Stuart valiantly offered me a hanky and together we watched the candles flickering outside, the snow sparkling all around. It really did feel magical.

  “I suppose Daddy and Jimmy were both in on this?” I asked.

  “I spoke with your father a couple of weeks ago, Corrie. He said he’d be happy to see me join the family and that I could help with the farming around my school schedule.”

  I laughed. That sounded like Daddy, all right. The two of them had even discussed
a spot on the property to build a house for us. Once again, I had the vague feeling my life was being planned on my behalf. But was that really so awful? Stuart was a good man. I had not told him everything about my past, but then, neither had he shared his. I hadn’t met any of his family. I knew he had a brother overseas, but it seemed Stuart’s family was disconnected in a way I couldn’t comprehend.

  Gradually, the candles went out and I hadn’t yet given Stuart an answer to his question. My heart pounded. One thing I did know: No matter how long this war lasted, Stuart would not be going off to fight. In that moment it seemed like the most foolish thing in the world to refuse his proposal.

  “Corrie?” he said when the last flame died. “Are you going to make me ask twice?”

  “I’m sorry,” I teased. “I was so distracted by the blaze outside my window I didn’t catch what you said. Could you repeat the question?”

  “With pleasure,” Stuart said without hesitation. “I love you, Corrie Simpson. Will you be my wife?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  We set the date for Saturday, July 11. The remainder of the school year, it took every ounce of concentration to stay focused on my classes. The distraction of school and the busyness of wedding planning made the time go by very quickly. In March, I signed a contract for my second year at Rocky Creek School. And on June 24, we celebrated the last day of school with a field day and picnic.

  July 11 started out rainy, but just as we left for the wedding, the sun came out and turned it into a gorgeous day. Pastor Johnson married us at the Roseburg Community Church, with all our students, friends, and my family there to celebrate with us. Jim served as Stuart’s best man and Agnes was my matron of honor. I wore a light blue summer suit Aunt Nonie helped me select on a trip to Winnipeg in early May and carried a bouquet of white daisies from Mother’s garden.

  Stuart looked very handsome in his double-breasted, gray suit. The girls in my school filled the church with flowers. Everything looked and smelled heavenly. When we stepped out onto the church steps after the ceremony, a sparrow landed on the railing and stayed there as long as we did.