“Very good.” Quan bowed his head and prayed softly, “Father God, you truly are the God of all grace! And we are so grateful for this day and for answered prayer. You are faithful, Lord! Your ways are past finding out.”
The God of grace! Kari’s ears perked up. Where have I heard that expression before? Oh! In Rose’s journal! She wrote of Minister Liáng always praying to the God of grace. I wonder what ‘grace’ means.
Quan added, “I thank you, Lord, for giving us direction in this matter. I thank you for the confidence we have to follow where you lead. Amen.”
As the prayer ended, people began making their goodbyes. Quan drew near and asked Kari for her hotel name and room number. “I will call you this evening, Ms. Hillyer, after I’ve made arrangements for you in RiverBend.”
“Are you sure I won’t be imposing?” Kari felt uncomfortable pushing herself on strangers. “I can get a hotel—I don’t want to be a burden.”
“I don’t believe RiverBend has any hotels, Ms. Hillyer. The railroad rerouted its tracks some years back, so no trains go through the town anymore. It was always a small town, and it is even smaller now. However, I can guarantee that the Thoresens living in RiverBend would be pleased to meet you and tell you more of Rose’s history.”
“But . . . where would I stay?”
“Will you allow me to make arrangements for you? I will make inquiries and I am sure things will sort themselves out by this evening.”
Kari thought a minute. “Well, all right. If you say so.”
“Very good. Can you stay in Denver tonight and tomorrow night? I will personally bring you driving directions tomorrow.”
The house emptied out leaving only Shan-Rose, Mixxie, Kari, and Alannah in the great room. Kari still clutched her handbag close, unwilling to even chance the loss of Rose’s journal.
“Ms. Hillyer,” Shan-Rose murmured, “I trust you and Alannah will enjoy yourselves while I rest? I give you the run of the house. Then Mixxie will prepare a nice lunch for the four of us and we can talk further.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Kari answered. She itched to explore the house. I will pretend that Rose is still here, perhaps just around a corner, she fantasized.
Mixxie went off with Shan-Rose to help her to bed so Kari turned to Alannah. “I don’t mind saying that was the strangest ‘meeting’ I’ve ever experienced, Alannah.”
“Goodness—I have no doubt! I love the Liáng family, though it may take a Westerner a minute to adjust to their conversational ‘style.’ I grew up with them, you see, so I forget how abrupt they can sometimes seem.”
“So Mei-Xing married Minister Liáng.” Kari shook her head. “That sounds just like the perfect ending, doesn’t it?”
“Minister Liáng and my grandfather, Isaac Carmichael, joined forces, so to speak, and had one of the largest ministries in Denver.” Alannah’s mouth curved as she remembered her happy childhood. “They grew a single church into thousands of believers in Christ—all colors and races. Mei-Xing and Breona were on the front lines with them, too, leading many women to Christ and standing against the vice that still grips this city today. Shan-Rose followed in their footsteps.”
“Are you involved as they were?” Kari asked.
Alannah chuckled. “I am, but from a different perspective, Kari. I’m a police detective. Vice Squad.”
Alannah watched Kari’s reaction closely; Kari seemed genuinely surprised, but Alannah sensed no guilt.
“You? Wow. I would never have guessed. I imagine it is difficult for you—as a woman?”
“It is, but I come from tough stock, people who cared very deeply for this city.” Alannah smiled and returned the conversation to her family. “I still recall the Liáng-Carmichael ministry partnership and how effective those two couples were, what love and fellowship they had for each other. Our families, the Liángs and Carmichaels, are entwined—like brothers, sisters, and cousins all wrapped into one.”
“That is amazing.” Kari was remembering Rose’s description of Calvary Temple when those from Palmer House began attending. “Rose couldn’t have written a better ending than for Mei-Xing to find happiness after all she’d been through.” Kari shook her head and grinned. “Just like a fairy tale.”
“I was very interested in your tale, Kari,” Alannah mentioned casually. “It seems like you’ve just had one of those storybook events. What? Inheriting a long-lost relative’s estate? How improbable is that?”
“Believe me, I know. When I got the letter from the attorneys asking if I was Michael Granger’s daughter, I thought it was a scam and nearly threw it away.”
Alannah made a mental note: Michael Granger. I will need to do some digging.
“I know a few lawyers in New Orleans. Just on an off chance we know the same ones, what was the name of the law office that contacted you?”
“Brunell & Brunell. One of the senior partners, Clover Brunell, actually grew up with Daddy. He and his wife Lorene and their son, Oskar, have become dear friends.”
“No; I don’t know them. But he knew your father?” Alannah had to calm herself. This is too good to be true.
“Yes, he did. It has been so wonderful hearing him tell me about Daddy.”
And then Alannah glimpsed the loneliness that Kari lived with. If that’s not real pain, I’ll eat my badge.
“Shall we walk through the house now?” she suggested. “Feel free to ask questions as we go along.”
“Yes, let’s! I’m particularly interested in seeing Rose’s room.”
Alannah frowned a little. “You know she hasn’t lived in this house for many years, right, Kari? Decades.”
Kari sighed. “Yes. I figured as much, but I didn’t know for sure . . . how things ended up. So, what about the ministry of Palmer House—the outreach they had to rescue prostitutes? How did the house change from Palmer House to just being Shan-Rose’s house?”
“Ah. That I can tell you. Do you know how Palmer House started?”
“Yes; Martha Palmer heard Rose and Joy speak and gave them this house for their work. It was in Rose’s journal.”
“Right. So, they used Palmer House for their outreach to women for many years, even after Joy branched out.”
“Branched out? I don’t know about that.”
Alannah trod carefully. “Okay; taking a little side track but still answering your question, did Rose’s journal say anything about Joy’s husband, Grant?”
Kari sighed again. “She wrote how sick Grant was. His heart. They didn’t have the miracles of modern medicine we have today. I-I almost hate to ask what happened to him.”
“Yes; I understand it was very sad. He died in 1911. Not long after the journal you found ended.”
Kari mulled over Alannah’s words. “Poor Joy! How she must have grieved!”
Alannah looked back and remembered her grandmother repeating the story; remembered too, how every time she told it, tears would fill her eyes. “I’ve heard Joy grieved deeply. I’ve also heard how amazing her faith was. How she put her pain to work for The Lord.”
Kari found that she didn’t mind so much that Alannah was talking about God—just like Clover and Ruth and Owen seemed to do all the time. “Tell me?” she begged.
“A few years later, she and her husband—”
“Wait! Her husband? She remarried? Who?”
Alannah grinned. “Joy did remarry. She married Edmund O’Dell several years after Grant died. What a story that is! I can’t even go into all the details, but O’Dell—that’s what everyone in the family called him—was head of the Pinkerton office here in Denver for many years before he was promoted and they moved to Chicago.”
“They moved to Chicago? But what about Palmer House?” Things were going much too fast for Kari.
“That’s what I’m trying to get to. First Mei-Xing married and moved out; then Breona. When Joy and O’Dell married and Joy moved out of the house, Rose was left to carry most of the burden of it alone. Billy and Marit stayed on, of course, and S
ara became something of Rose’s right-hand. From what I’ve heard, The Lord seemed to bring the right people at the right time to help.
“Through Breona and Mei-Xing and their ministry on the streets of Denver, many fallen women came to Jesus. A large number of them lived at Palmer House where love, God’s word, and time healed their hearts and prepared them for independent lives.
“By the time the O’Dells moved to Chicago, the house had grown to be too much for Rose—she was, after all, getting on. I think she was in her seventies by then.
“So, The Lord raised up Sara and two other women to continue in Rose’s place, and Rose moved with Joy and her family to Chicago. It was during their time in Chicago that Joy expanded her ministry.”
“And Rose? I mean . . .” Kari didn’t want to ask; she didn’t want to hear of Rose’s death.
Alannah heard Kari’s sorrow as she alluded to Rose’s final days. “Later . . . much later, she wanted to go home . . . to RiverBend.”
I need to be careful of what I say, Alannah realized, for more than one reason. Kari seems to honestly have feelings about Rose. “Rose died in her sleep one night, at a good old age. Like the Bible says, she was gathered to her ancestors.”
Kari nodded very slowly, taking in the details of what she already knew to be certain.
Alannah watched Kari closely to see if what she spoke of was already known to her. “Did you know that prior to running the Denver Pinkerton office, O’Dell had specialized in finding kidnapped children?”
Kari nodded again, thoughtful. “Yes, but not just children, right? That is why he was so effective when Mei-Xing disappeared.”
“God had his hand all over that, Kari. Edmund O’Dell would have been the first one to tell you that if God hadn’t intervened, they would never have found Mei-Xing. It almost broke Grandma’s heart when her dearest friend disappeared.”
Kari was drowning in information, and just then she realized who Alannah’s grandmother was. She stared at Alannah with fresh eyes. Noting Alannah’s raven hair and eyes, she blurted, “Breona was your grandmother! You get your black hair and eyes from Breona?”
“Ah! Yes, but not just from Grandma. Our family—my siblings and I—were handed a double dose of the ‘Black Irish.’”
“What do you mean?”
Alannah laughed. “Ready to get even more confused? Joy and Edmund O’Dell had four children: Matthew, Jacob, Luke, and Roseanne. What I mean by ‘double dose’ is that while my father was a Carmichael, my mother was an O’Dell—Joy and Edmund O’Dell’s daughter, Roseanne. Their youngest.
“Mom didn’t inherit Joy’s brilliant blue eyes, though.” She slanted a look at Kari. “Only one of Joy’s children did. Mom got her dark hair and eyes from Edmund O’Dell. And I? I got the double dose.”
“Oh, wow.” Kari clapped her hand over her mouth. “I know I’ve said ‘wow’ about ten times, but wow!”
Kari and Alannah laughed together, comfortable in each other’s company. They were finally walking up the staircase to the upstairs, and Kari had reached her saturation point. “Wait. I’m sorry—this is all so confusing. Rose said in her journal that Joy and Grant’s son, Edmund, had Jan and Joy’s blue eyes. So Edmund O’Dell . . . he adopted Baby Edmund?”
Alannah cast a sharp look Kari’s way but saw nothing to indicate guile. In fact, as they emerged on the second floor, Kari was engrossed, taking in every room and every detail.
Alannah stalled and then said, “Um . . . O’Dell promised Grant that he would raise Edmund as his own.” That’s not a lie, Lord, she added silently.
“So you were going to tell me what ministry Joy started.” Kari, unwittingly, brought the conversation back around, but not necessarily onto a safer track.
“Her ministry is, uh, actually more of a movement. It’s called Lost Are Found. Dedicated to finding missing children. It dovetailed very nicely with the work of helping women and girls escape human trafficking.”
“Lost Are Found. Like pictures on the back of milk cartons back in the 1980s?”
“Like that.”
“I saw the Lost Are Found sign out front and I knew those words sounded familiar. But human trafficking? I haven’t heard it called that before.”
“As it turns out, many children who go missing end up in the hands of human traffickers—those who sell children into the sex trade. That made Lost Are Found a very real sister ministry to Palmer House.”
Kari felt her stomach lurch. “Children? No. That’s sickening!”
“Yes,” Alannah murmured, “I know. It is what I deal with on a regular basis.”
She turned the conversation back to Joy and O’Dell. “Joy and Edmund O’Dell were instrumental in reuniting many parents with their lost children. They led a number of these families to Christ. I am proud that they were my grandparents.”
Alannah kept glancing at Kari, evaluating her responses. I’ve been a detective for a decade, Alannah thought, and I know how to read faces. Nothing. Kari knows nothing about . . . She shook her head. The more I listen to her, the more I think that her story has to be on the up-and-up.
They didn’t talk much as Kari wandered through the second floor. Alannah got the impression that Kari just wanted to be left alone to look and think . . . which was exactly right.
Kari opened the door into the bedroom that had once been Breona’s and Mei-Xing’s. She saw the evidence of it not being occupied for some time. The two twin beds in the room were stripped, their mattresses removed. The décor was pure 1970s: Boldly flowered wall paper, curtains, and shag carpeting in oranges and yellows, brightly painted dressers, and a single desk. The room contained no personal items and smelled stale and musty.
Kari walked to the windows. They overlooked the front yard of the house, the iron gated fence, the sidewalk, and the street. She tried to imagine Breona standing at this very window and seeing O’Dell below—bringing home Mei-Xing, rescued and restored to those who loved her by the miraculous hand of God.
Are you there, God? Kari wondered. I have come to believe that you were here, at Palmer House, at one time. Do you still reveal yourself to people like you revealed yourself to Rose?
She and Alannah walked the halls of the second floor in silence, looking into every room except the one Kari knew had been Rose’s.
I will save it until last, she decided.
Alannah let Kari wander freely and did not interrupt her introspection. After a bit they climbed the stairs to the third floor together, to the rooms built into the towers and turrets. The rooms were largely the same as those on the second floor—a mish-mash of dated furniture and décor.
While the main floor of the house was cared for and warm with human presence, the neglect and abandonment that pervaded the second and third floors wore on Kari, distressing her. The rooms and halls smelled of age and disuse; their emptiness echoed the aching loneliness in Kari’s breast.
When they returned to the second floor and Kari reached the bedroom she knew had been Rose’s, she stopped at the closed door. She didn’t open it; she merely placed her hand on it and shut her eyes.
Sensing the tender import of the moment, Alannah backed away and said nothing. She watched the play of emotions washing Kari’s face.
Oh, Rose, Kari mourned. Oh, how I wish you were still here—that I could know you personally. That I could talk to you. I think that is what I long for and why I came all this way. I have so much I want to ask!
Kari gulped as her throat tightened and tears formed. I guess what I really wish is that I could ask you about your Jesus. How did you learn to know him so well? Is knowing him what made your heart so loving, so compassionate toward the plight of others?
She squeezed her eyes even tighter. Will I ever know your God as you knew him, Rose? Yes—I admit it! I was wrong! If he was here for you, he must exist! And if he was here for you, then I must—somehow—find him! But this house is so empty now!
Kari’s fingers traced the design on the door, finding that the intersec
ting rails formed a cross on the door’s face. She opened her eyes and stared at the wood grain in front of her. The symbolism gripped her, and a solitary tear streaked its way down her cheek.
I won’t open this door, she vowed. I won’t open it and be disillusioned by how the room looks and smells inside, all these years later. I want to just remember standing here, as though she were on the other side, waiting for me. Waiting to tell me everything I long to know. Waiting to hold me as though I were one of her lost girls!
Rose! I wanted you to hold me like that!
She covered her eyes with her hands and sobbed her heart into the wood of the door. Her tears flowed, unchecked, soaking her face, leaking through her fingers.
Until something startled her out of her grieving.
Kari blinked. A sacred Presence seemed to reach out for her, touching her gently, sweetly.
From behind the door—but also from around her—a Voice whispered. You were wishing for Rose to be here and speak of Me, but I am already here, Kari. I have always been . . . here . . . where you are . . . waiting for you.
I Am.
Kari froze, terrified. Astounded. But the Presence flowed like peaceful water, all around her. She closed her eyes and let it wash over her.
In a manner of speaking, I am on the other side of this door—and more, Kari. I am on the other side of the vast gulf that separates us. And I am knocking.
Kari’s lips parted. Are you Jesus? Am I just imagining you—or are you really him?
The Voice swelled. I am the One who is called Faithful and True, the One who reigns and rules as The Lion of the Tribe of Judah. I sit forever upon the throne of David. And I am here: Behold, I stand at the door and knock. Only you can open the door. Open and find me.
The strength in Kari’s legs gave out and, before an amazed Alannah, she crumpled, more or less onto her knees. Something constrained Alannah from going to Kari’s aid. God’s very attendance restrained her and urged her to pray. She dropped to her own knees.
“O Jesus,” Kari wept. “Oh, please! Yes! I want you to come in! I want you to come in!”
O Lord! Alannah breathed. What marvelous thing are you doing here? Please bring Kari into your Kingdom this day, I pray!
Lost Are Found (A Prairie Heritage, Book 6) Page 20