Once Upon a Christmas
Page 9
“I’m afraid she’s fainted,” Jackson said.
“Here. Put her on the settee.”
Jackson lowered her gently onto the settee and swept her hair from her face. “Do you have a wet cloth?” he asked.
“I’ll get one,” Grandma said, turning.
Jackson knelt on the floor and adjusted her feet hidden by mounds of pale green cotton. He located a small pillow which he gently placed beneath her head.
Grandma returned with a cool, damp cloth. Jackson ran it along her pale cheeks, across her forehead. Dark lashes lay against her soft skin.
Something shifted in his heart and he knew in that moment that he was lost, but in not the way she indicated. His heart was lost to her.
And he had brought her the most awful news of her life. Not only had the war claimed the life of her grandfather and her father, but that of her brother as well.
“Is she going to be alright?” Grandma asked.
Jackson turned to the other woman straining to see them. And now he had to tell this woman that her grandson had died in his arms.
There was no God when such grief had to be bestowed upon such pure, heavenly creatures.
“Yes,” he answered. “She’ll come around in a moment.”
“I’ve only known her to faint one other time…” Grandma’s voice drifted in mid-thought.
She studied him. He wasn’t sure how well she could see at this point. But he had a feeling she could see well enough.
“You’re a soldier,” she stated.
“Yes ma’am.”
“You’ve come to give us news of Stephen,” she said, lowering herself to the chair.
Such tragedy that these women expected the worst. Such tragedy that they were correct.
“Yes ma’am,” he said, again.
“He won’t be coming home,” she said, sitting back in the chair and closing her eyes.
Jackson wasn’t sure what to say, “I’m sorry,” he said simply, resuming his ministrations of the cool cloth against Leah’s skin.
She stirred.
He sat back on his heels and her eyes fluttered open.
Perhaps I made the wrong choice in coming here. Even as the thought crossed his mind, he knew that it had not been a choice. It had been a promise.
Leah’s facial expression shifted from confusion to memory to sadness. Slowly she sat up. Shifted her gaze to her grandmother. “Grandma?” she said, alarm evident in her voice. She stood up to go to her grandmother. Her balance unsteady. Jackson automatically reached out to take her arm to steady her.
She sat on the arm of her grandmother’s chair. Maria opened her eyes, took her granddaughter’s hands. He watched as the two women clung to each other.
“Is it true?” Grandma asked Leah.
Leah turned and looked at Jackson, her eyes filled with unshed tears.
“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have come here like this.”
Leah shook her head. “On the contrary. “You were very kind to come to us. And brave,” she added.
“I should go,” he said.
“No,” Leah said, standing up. “Please don’t go. Please tell us what you know.”
Jackson stood up, removed his hat as an afterthought, and glanced toward the front door.
“Please,” she said, nodding toward the settee. “Sit.”
Jackson glanced down at his uniform, still dirty from battle. He would have changed clothes, but he had nothing else to wear. He’d washed the blood off, but it had left a stain. He should not have come here with Stephan’s blood on his uniform. “I don’t dare,” he said.
Leah shifted into action. “I’ll get you something else to change into. You can clean up while I make you something to eat. You must be starved.”
She left in a whirlwind, leaving him with Grandma.
“Tell me your name,” she said.
“Jackson Holcomb.”
“Did you know my grandson well?”
“Yes ma’am.”
“You fought together, then?”
“For three years.”
“He never wrote,” she murmured.
“He wanted to,” Jackson said. “He read all your letters - over and over.”
Her face brightened - even if just a little.
“He kept them,” Jackson said, pulling the haversack from his shoulder.
“You read them,” she said.
“He read some of them to me,” He said. I read every one of them – over and over.
Leah rescued him then, coming back into the room with a stack of folded clothing in her hands. “I’ll show you where to wash up,” she said, “and you can wear these. They were Stephen’s. You look to be about the same size.”
“You’re most kind,” he said, then turned back to Grandma. “Will you excuse me?” he asked.
“Of course,” Maria said. “We’ll talk later.”
Leah led him down into the hallway and up the stairs.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry to come here like this. To intrude.”
“If you hadn’t come, how would we have known?” she asked, leading him into a bedroom with clean water in a basin on a washstand. “You can come back downstairs when you’ve cleaned up and changed,” she said. “I’ll make you something to eat.”
“Thank you.”
She closed the door behind her. Had this been Stephan’s room? Without the war, he could have come here with his friend. Met his family. Fell in love with Stephen’s sister and, perhaps, if he hadn’t brought her such bad news, she could have fallen in love with him, too. And they could have spent a life together.
He shook his head. The war had addled his mind.
He took his pistol from his belt and, looking around, tucked the gun beneath the pillow on the bed. Using a cloth next to the basin, he wiped the blood and grime from his skin, then put on the clothes that had belonged to his best friend - brown cotton pants and a white cotton button-down shirt. A perfect fit.
I’m sorry, my friend. I wish you were here with me.
Want to keep reading? Grab your copy here:
Love Always
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