by Murray Pura
What do you want to do?
Drop into a spin. Do loops. Dive. Try three barrel rolls in a row. I don’t know. Go fast. Oh, yes, please—go as fast as you can.
It will be twice as fast as you’ve ever flown before.
I don’t care. Open her up, as you like to say. And never mind if you hear me screaming. It means I’m happy.
So, imagining Lyyndaya shrieking with delight beside him, her golden hair streaming behind her in the wind, Jude threw the plane about the sky as if it were a brand-new toy he couldn’t keep his hands from. He dove down to eight thousand feet and opened the throttle, watching the speed dart forward from 100 to 110 to 125 to 137 miles per hour. Then he climbed as quickly as a skylark. Dove. Barrel-rolled. Straightened out and loop-de-looped. Dove again. Climbed. Fell into a spin so that the ground hurtled at him in faster and tighter circles of green and brown. Waited till the last minute and then pulled up, the engine howling and, Jude was sure, an imaginary Lyyndaya howling right along with it.
Watching their squadron leader from a distance as they took off and rose toward him in their SPADs, Zed and Billy Skipp—as well as a recruit everyone called Tex for reasons that became obvious once he opened his mouth—were amazed by the stunts and maneuvers Jude was pulling off at high speed in front of their eyes. They had never known he had those kinds of acrobatics in him—though Billy and Zed had seen him twist about in the air like a flying corkscrew often enough during aerial combat. Not able to match him turn for turn, all three nevertheless decided to join in, spiraling and diving and climbing as if thousands of people below had paid good money to see the four of them at their very best.
“The greatest show on earth!” shouted Tex in his distinctive drawl, but no one could hear him as they ripped past one another, heading in every possible direction on the face of the compass. Yet every moment they played they still kept flicking their eyes up and down, glancing over their shoulders, squinting up at the sun, scanning the sky for enemy planes. But none appeared.
Finally they ran low on fuel and headed back toward Nancy and the field.
Exhilarated, the whole gang sat down to lunch at the aerodrome and devoured chicken and green beans and ice cream as if they hadn’t touched food all week. Zed summed it up for them when he said, “Remember why you fell in love with flying in the first place? Eh? Remember what made your heart go faster and how the sky and sun filled you to the top with strength? That’s what we had today. That last hour was better than all the others we’ve had since they brought us to France.”
Billy, the ace, nodded. “Combat flying is pretty exciting stuff. But doing the stunts, the flips, the rolls—that’s what I love. Do you think, after the war, there’ll be air shows, that they’ll let us do all kinds of wild things in the sky for paying customers at state fairs and exhibitions and things?”
“I’d bet on it,” responded Zed.
“At rodeos?” asked Tex hopefully.
“Why not?”
“Well—it’d spook the horses and rodeo stock.”
Zed shrugged and sat back, poking a toothpick about in his mouth. “Just use a field far enough away. And don’t buzz the stadium.”
Billy ran his hands through his red hair and grinned. “Won’t those be fine times? Just have to get there first. In one piece.”
Jude sipped at his coffee. “Just have to end the war. Just have to finish the job.”
He wasn’t thinking of fairs or rodeos or July Fourth celebrations. For a moment, he wasn’t even thinking of getting back to Paradise and to Lyyndaya. Only one thing was on his mind, only one plane, only one man. When Lyyndaya returned to his thoughts, smiling, full of life and God, her hair shining in the Pennsylvania sun, he whispered, I’m sorry. I pray the day will come when you can understand.
Zed was standing over the Squadron Bible. He marked Sharples’ page with a thumb and then turned the tall pages slowly and carefully until he found what he wanted.
“Frank opened to this psalm the day Jack Zatt was killed,” he told them without looking up. “But he didn’t get to one part. So this is for us. This is for now—today, tomorrow, and the day after—all the days after.” He read the words out loud with a certain measured cadence no one else used, as if they were seated in a cathedral for a time of worship. When he was done he turned back to Frank’s last reading from Isaiah. Then he walked from the room. The others got up, but Jude remained sitting until he was by himself, turning an empty coffee cup over in his hands.
Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.
He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.
Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor the arrow that flieth by day;
nor for the pestilence that walketh in darkness;
Nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday.
A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee.
Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked.
Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the most High, thy habitation;
There shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling.
For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.
They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.
Thou shall tread upon the lion and adder: the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under feet.
Because he hath set his love upon me, therefore will I deliver him: I will set him on high, because he hath known my name.
He shall call upon me, and I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble; I will deliver him, and honour him.
With long life will I satisfy him, and shew him my salvation.
TWENTY
From the window of the Zooks’ house, Lyyndy watched the buggies move like shadows in the soft rain. Three or four turned up the drive. The bishop stepped down from the first and then walked around it and took his wife’s hand. The pastors emerged from the other buggies and came up to the couple. Dr. Morgan strode firmly to the porch from the final carriage.
“Are they back from the funeral?” came a faint voice from behind Lyyndaya.
“Yes. The doctor is on his way in to see you.”
Emma Zook smiled as much as she could. “I feel better.”
“You look better.”
“But such a sad day.”
“Yes,” agreed Lyyndaya.
“Except they are with Jesus.”
Lyyndaya walked over to the bed where Emma had the covers pulled up to her neck and held one of her pale hands gently. “You’re right, sister.”
There was a knock on the door. She crossed the room and opened it.
“Dr. Morgan,” she greeted the tall, broad-shouldered physician.
He took off his black hat and raindrops fell on the carpet. The hat had less of a brim and a different crown than the Amish men’s hats. Lyyndaya took it and helped him off with his long dark overcoat. He went immediately to the bed.
“How is my Emma?” he asked, lifting her wrist and checking her pulse.
“I think I’m stronger. I walked around the room twice—with Lyyndy’s help.”
“Did you?” He warmed the end of his stethoscope in his hand and then placed it on her chest. “Take a deep breath for me and hold it. Now let it out slowly. Good. Once more. And cough. Again.” He smiled at her. “No crackling. No congestion. I believe you’ve turned the corner, young lady.” He glanced over at Lyyndaya. “Thanks in no small part to your friend here.”
“I know,” said Emma. “She’s been wonderful.”
Lyyndaya had draped the doctor’s coat over a chair and was holding on to his hat for him. “Feeding her broth? Mopping her brow? That hardly amounts to a cure.”
“Day and night,” the doctor said, putting his stethosco
pe back in his bag. “You stood on the line between life and death. If I had a nurse like you for every patient, we’d stop this biblical plague.”
Lyyndaya dropped her eyes. “Thank you.”
There was another knock on the door and it opened a crack. Emma’s father peered in.
“May we?” he asked.
“Of course,” Dr. Morgan replied. “I’ll just take her temperature.”
Emma’s mother and father stepped into the room, bringing with them the scent of rain on grass. Her mother sat on the edge of the bed and smoothed back her daughter’s long dark hair that was spread over the pillow.
“You have some color,” she said.
“How was the funeral, Mother?”
“It went very well. Hosea and little Annie and John are not suffering anymore. Heaven is their home now. Your father and I thank God. They were in so much pain, Emma. You know how it was. They could not…they could not…” Her mother struggled with her voice and to control her tears, “…even get a breath at the end.”
Emma placed one thin hand on her mother’s. “Yes, but now—they breathe freely.”
Her mother nodded, her eyes glistening.
Dr. Morgan gestured to Lyyndaya. “Let’s step into the room across the hall. I must be sure you have no symptoms. Excuse us, please.”
The room across the hall had been Annie’s. It was neatly made up and seemed to be waiting for her as if she was expected back from a trip at any moment. Dr. Morgan placed his stethoscope on Lyyndaya’s back and chest and listened carefully.
“Do you feel feverish at all?”
“No.”
“Are there any chills that come and go?”
“None.”
“Do you feel up to doing some more nursing for me?”
She caught his eyes. “Why? Who is sick now?”
“I’m not sure what I’m dealing with. But I would feel better if someone like you, who is experienced with how the disease manifests itself, could spend some time at their side.”
“Of course.”
“I don’t want you to get upset when I tell you their name—”
Her green eyes widened and she caught his arm. “Doctor—is it my family?”
“Yes. It’s Ruth.”
“Ruth!”
“Calm yourself. I do not see all the symptoms, but—”
“We must go now, then!”
“Yes, yes. Emma’s parents can see to her needs now. Gather up your things.”
Lyyndaya flew from the room. She didn’t wish to disturb the three surviving members of the Zook family as they spent a few quiet moments together, but most of her items were in Emma’s room. She hesitated at the door and suddenly heard the three begin to sing a hymn, deep and slow, yet somehow with a strength that sent a quick chill up her spine. Feeling compelled to pray, she bowed her head a moment. Then, as they continued to sing, she recalled that her long coat and an extra pair of boots were in a closet near the front door, and she made her way downstairs.
The pastors were sitting at the table in the parlor off the hallway. All of them murmured their greetings as she passed by the doorway and opened the closet. When she turned around, coat and boots in hand, Pastor King was standing in the hall waiting for her.
“We wish to thank you for all the work you did for our bishop’s family,” he said.
Lyyndaya felt flustered, wanting to go back upstairs and fetch her clothing, anxious to join Dr. Morgan who had already come down the stairs and was out in the buggy, beginning to feel a slight panic about what was happening to her sister. But she forced herself to slow down.
“It was something I believe the Lord wanted me to do,” she replied.
“They tell us Hosea and John passed away in less than two days.”
She nodded.
“And the little girl?”
Lyyndaya did not want to say. “Didn’t Dr. Morgan mention this to the church leadership?”
“No, but we wish to hear it from you.”
“From the time of the first symptoms that Mrs. Zook noticed after lunch on Sunday, to the time of Annie’s death—it was not three hours.”
The color in the pastor’s eyes seemed to pale as she spoke.
“And what are these symptoms, Miss Kurtz?”
“But you have been told, haven’t you? It can look like ague. Or a person feels the usual things a person with flu feels—headaches, pain in their shoulders and elbows and knees—there’s a fever, they grow very tired and have no energy.”
“I have heard that sometimes…a patient…can turn blue—”
“That did not happen here. But Dr. Morgan told me it has happened in Boston.”
“Will it spread?” he asked her abruptly.
“The doctor had this house quarantined all week,” she responded quickly, “but Emma is better now.”
“No, but will it spread?”
Lyyndaya wanted to say she didn’t know. But she felt that would be a lie. “Yes, Pastor King, it will spread.”
His gaze was steady, but troubled. “The doctor tells us we shouldn’t gather for worship until this is past. And that we should consider wearing masks as they do in the city.”
“It might be something for the leadership to discuss, something that might be done for a month or two,” Lyyndaya said, trying to be careful not to speak out of turn. This was, after all, more fitting if it came from Dr. Morgan.
“A month? Two months?” Pastor King grew agitated and his dark eyes gleamed. “How will people be encouraged if they cannot meet together for prayer and worship? If they cannot break bread together? Who will shepherd them?”
“Lyyndaya.” Bishop Zook was coming down the hall from the staircase with her black overnight bag. “These are your things. I think my wife found all of your items. If there is something missing, please let us know.”
“Thank you.”
“No, no, I thank you,” he said, putting the bag in her hands. “And I thank God for his mercy in leaving us one of our children to bless us.”
Lyyndaya saw his struggle to control himself and a dampness came to her own eyes as she saw his pain. “It is a great mercy. And for myself also, for Emma is a friend and—like a sister—” She stopped, thinking of Ruth and how swiftly the illness could affect someone. “I must leave. The doctor is waiting.”
The bishop gently took her by arm. “Is there someone else?”
Lyyndaya looked away. “There may be, I don’t know.”
“Who?”
“In my own house…Ruth…”
“I am so sorry. We will pray. Perhaps it is something else.” He didn’t let go of her arm. “Of course you are in a hurry to get out the door. I do not wish to detain you any further, only…” Lyyndaya watched him try to form the words he wanted several times. Eventually he blurted, “Hosea said some things before he went to be with the Lord. Some things I need to tell you. I do not understand completely. But I shall come by your house.”
Despite her urge to rush out the door and into the buggy, Lyyndaya held back. “What things? What did Hosea tell you?”
The bishop shook his head. “It is not easily said. I shall come by your house.” He released her arm. “Please go to your family. It was not my wish to upset you further. I promise you we will talk. Go to your family now—and may Christ be with you.”
Lyyndaya was torn. Something told her that Hosea’s words had been important and that she needed to know them, but right now the image of Ruth perhaps hovering between life and death compelled her to leave.
Dr. Morgan drove his two-horse team and carriage almost at a gallop through the rain that was now coming down heavily and beating against the roof. His carriage wasn’t built after the Amish style—it was brown in color with brass accents and could travel much faster. As they neared the Kurtz home, lightning tore at the sky a few miles south, followed by a sharp crack of thunder.
Minutes later Lyyndaya’s father and mother were waiting at the door as she and the doctor hurried up the step
s. Her mother was crying.
“Has something happened?” asked Lyyndaya. “Is she in her room?”
Mrs. Kurtz waved her hand, unable to speak. Dr. Morgan looked at Lyyndaya’s father. “What is it?”
Lyyndaya’s father cleared his throat and tried to speak twice before he found his voice. “She is…coughing so much, so violently…and there is now a blue color…in her face and on her…” But he could not finish and looked away.
Lyyndaya and Dr. Morgan were quickly up the staircase and into Ruth’s room. She was sitting in bed, leaning back against pillows piled against the headboard. Lyyndaya put her hand to her sister’s forehead while Dr. Morgan pulled his stethoscope out of his bag.
“She’s burning up!” Lyyndaya said.
Ruth opened her mouth and whispered, “So we have not spoken all week—not since we quarreled—and that is the first thing you say to me?”
The doctor was warming his stethoscope in his hand. “Your parents said you had been coughing.”
“Not for…the last half hour.” She opened her hand and showed them a bloody cloth. “I am glad because…it hurt my stomach…so much…”
The blue on her face and arms was unmistakable, but not as dark as Lyyndaya had feared. There was a basin and wet cloth on the bedside table, and she began to gently touch the cloth to Ruth’s face and throat.
“That feels so good—thank you—I just didn’t have the strength to lift my arm anymore.”
Dr. Morgan held up a finger for quiet while he listened to Ruth’s chest. Lyyndaya mouthed the words Ich liebe dich in German and Ruth smiled slightly and mouthed I love you back in English.
The doctor straightened. “There are some beneficial teas I will have your mother brew. Lyyndaya, as you know well, it is important your sister drink as much as possible. And a mustard plaster for the chest. You remember the ingredients we used with Emma?”