by C F Dunn
Days on, as I surveyed her colourless face, I admitted I had been wrong. “Ellie, I am sorry about what happened to Guy, but I think you ought to know the truth.”
Her eyes focused on my face. “Matthew said it was an accident,” she whispered.
“Yes, it was, but I didn’t want him to tell you everything, so please don’t blame him.”
I told her about my grandfather, about Guy’s relentless pursuit of his grudge because I supplanted him, of his own wilful conceit that had led him here. I even told her that his desire for revenge was such that he had taken my job and destroyed my career, and would – if he could – have destroyed my marriage. I told her he knew that Matthew was long-lived and how close he came to exploiting it for his own profit. But I didn’t tell her about the journal, nor how her great-grandfather’s fate was bound between its pages. I didn’t tell her how close I came to killing Guy and how – had it not been for the accident – I might still have done so.
I spent restless nights with the thought gnawing at me. What madness had I been driven to, what senseless disregard for life? How could I have suspended my conscience long enough to contemplate murder, and knowing that I did so, find peace? Finding me awake, Matthew had pressed me until I spilled my guilt before him.
“I’ve tried to pray, but…” I lifted my shoulders, avoiding the gentle prompting of my triptych. Matthew sat next to me on our bed.
“Would you like me to pray with you?”
I picked at my torn nail. “I… don’t think I can.” I felt his disappointment. “What did you do when you’d killed someone? How did you cope?”
He took moments to answer. “I didn’t very well, not at first. I had nightmares, felt beleaguered by it and, like you, couldn’t find the words to express my regret, and part of me didn’t want to.”
“Why?”
“I suppose because it would have meant facing what I’d done, accepting my culpability – and letting go.” He looked at me. “That’s the hardest part, isn’t it? Letting go.”
I nodded, words stuck behind the walls holding me together.
“There is nothing that is not seen, nothing that unconditional love cannot heal. No more is asked of you than you can give. Let yourself be healed. Let go.”
Heat scalded my eyes. “I don’t know how.”
“Then begin by doing what you can for others and let God work through you.”
“As you do? I haven’t anything like that to offer.”
“You have yourself. God is in the little things, Emma, the small acts of kindness, the everyday.”
I had nothing left to resist, nor the strength to do so. I nodded. Yes, I could manage the small things; I could do that. Even I, in this shrunken form, could do that.
Ellie listened, dark-eyed, without interruption. When I finished, she said nothing but rolled onto her other side with her back to me. I put my hand on her shoulder; it shook slightly.
“I’m sorry, Ellie,” I said for the umpteenth time, “but you had to know. I couldn’t let you live a lie; it would have eaten you from inside – believe me, I know.”
She looked over her shoulder and I was shaken to see the vehemence in her eyes. “I could have lived with the lie, Emma, but now that I know the truth, what do I tell my baby?”
The fact that Guy had come so close to revealing Matthew’s identity sent a surge of disquiet around the family, but this latest news shook them to the core, like having a cuckoo in the nest.
Joel was livid. “How could you have been so stupid, sis? You’re a doctor – you know what can happen if you have unprotected sex. Geesh, you’ve really screwed up big time.”
Folding his arms, Henry settled on the arm of the sofa. “This is not helping, Joel; you’re supposed to be supporting your sister, not telling her what she already knows.”
“But it had to be with that son-of-a-…” Joel swung on his heel and continued pacing the room in short, angry steps. “Have you any idea how close he came to destroying everything we have? Have you?” He stuck his face up close to his sister. “If it weren’t for Emma we would have had to take extreme measures to deal with him.”
“If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t have needed to,” I pointed out.
Ellie darted me a look of seething resentment. She held me fully responsible for Guy’s death because, whether about to expose the family or not, he was no longer around to defend himself. She turned her face from me and glared at her brother. Dan stepped rapidly between them.
“Back off, son – what’s done is done.”
“Yeah, and we’re left to pick up the pieces.”
Hands linked behind his back, Matthew now turned from the window where he had followed the course of the sun as he listened to the arguments being played out behind him. “That’s what families do, Joel – they stick together no matter what. Guy Hilliard caused enough dissension when he was alive, and we’ll not let him continue his game now he’s dead. Ellie, what do you want to do?”
Shoulders slumped, Ellie twisted the remains of her hankie into a knot resembling her strained mouth. Jeannie stroked the hair out of her eyes.
“Ellie, think about your career. You can have other children later when you’re ready. Put yourself first. We can arrange a termination and you’ll be back to normal in no time, as if nothing’s happened.”
Harry rolled his eyes and threw his hands in the air. “Mom!”
“I’m with Mom on this one.” Joel folded his arms, looking just like his grandfather.
Harry raised a caustic eyebrow. “That’s a first. I’m not in favour of abortions – you know that. I’ll look after you, El, but I won’t condone a termination.”
I secretly suspected Pat looked forward to being a great-grandmother and her next comment confirmed it. “We’ll all look after you and the baby, sweetie. It’ll be lovely to have a baby in the house again.”
Voices rose in a chorus of dissent. With his head bowed and his arms crossed on his chest with just his thumbs sticking out, Matthew’s stillness set him apart. His voice rolled quietly over the others. “It’s Ellie’s decision; let her make it.” He looked at his great-granddaughter. “Whatever you decide, we will abide by it.”
“But her career…” Jeannie began, but faltered under his direct gaze.
“Whatever you decide,” he reiterated.
“What do you think I should do, Matthew?”
He crouched in front of her, taking her two small hands in his and looking earnestly into her drawn face. “I think you should do whatever your heart tells you, and that will be the right thing.” He smiled, and in that instant her face cleared.
“Then I know what I want,” she declared, eyes shining. “I want to keep my baby.”
Matthew squeezed her hands. “Then so be it,” he said. “So be it.”
“This will make me a great-great-grandfather,” he mused, with his hands behind his neck as he stared up at the ceiling where several moths cavorted. “It makes me sound old, but I don’t feel it.”
He didn’t appear too put out by the prospect. I finished my last mouthful of omelette without enthusiasm, took the plate to the sink, and slowly washed it, watching the suds foam and gather around the plug before disappearing into the vortex. Matthew took a clean tea towel from the drawer, and waited for me to finish. “Emma, it’s not the baby’s fault who fathered him.”
I handed him the plate. “I know.” I took my time washing the fork. Matthew waited, sensing my internal struggle. “I don’t know how I feel about having his child in the house. I mean…” What did I mean? I took a deep breath. “I mean I don’t know what I’ll say to it – how I’ll be – knowing I killed its father, knowing who its father was.”
Putting the tea towel down and taking the fork from my hands, he turned me to face him. “This baby – not it, Emma, but he or she – will not be Guy Hilliard. This baby will be accepted and loved, and in doing so, will accept and love us back. The sins of the father died with him; don’t let them taint how you
feel about the child. You’ve so much love in you, Emma Lynes; let the baby have some, and, in years to come – and it will be years from now – we will decide how to tell him about his father. We don’t have to decide that now, do we. Do we?”
“I suppose not,” I acknowledged, “but it’s going to take me time to get used to the idea. In the meantime, what do we do about the journal?”
“Well now, I’ve been thinking. We have several choices. We can return it to the libr… no, no – all right. I didn’t think that would be a prime option.” I settled down again. “We can destroy it…” He waited for me to react, but continued when I didn’t, “Or, we can keep it.”
I weighed up the choices. “If we kept it, where would it be safe?”
In answer, he took my hand and led me through to the study. The journal had been given a temporary hiding place behind some books where it could dry out without being seen. It had survived remarkably undamaged, as it had done through the long centuries of its existence. He pressed a section of bookshelf, revealing the hiding place. Taking out the obvious papers, he released the catches on the deeper safe and removed the battered metal box. The mechanism whirred and clicked and finally the lid stood open.
“We will keep it in here,” he said, and stood back to let me reverently lay the book and its bag in its resting place.
“It’s where it belongs,” I reflected as he closed the lid upon it, and the locks engaged.
“Yes,” he said, resting his hand on the lid as if sealing a promise, “and here it will remain.”
Coming September 2016
Fearful Symmetry
In the final book in The Secret of the Journal series, how can Emma and Matthew escape when the past is only one step behind them, and the enemy unknown?
When history catches up and past and present collide, where is there left to go but the future?