“No,” I said, conjuring up my weakest voice. “Not today.”
“You do look pale.” Mama stopped on her way to her bedroom and laid the back of her fingers against my brow. “No fever, though.”
“She looks well enough to me,” Papa said gruffly.
“Sometimes a girl likes to have a day of leisure,” Mama said. “To recover.”
She left me alone with Papa, and while I felt the hint of a cough at the top of my throat, I suppressed it, for fear it would sound too affected.
“Better get yourself upstairs, then,” Papa said. “Don’t want to hear about you being too sick to go to church tomorrow.”
“Yes, sir. Let me just say good-bye to Mama first.”
I went into their room and there she was, standing in front of the oval mirror hanging on one wall. She’d tidied her hair with a damp comb and was tying a pretty blue ribbon at her throat.
“Now, you just relax today,” she said, giving the loop a decisive tug. “If you feel like it, you can catch up on your studies. But if not, there’s always next week.”
The lie was so big in my throat I couldn’t speak.
“And Miss Joanna says she’ll have about a dozen straw bonnets. Plain, of course, but we can trim them up at home. Would you like one?”
I nodded and managed to say that a new bonnet would be nice this summer before Papa’s voice called from the yard.
Mama grasped my shoulders and, in a gesture usually reserved for very special occasions, kissed my cheek. Then, even more uncharacteristically, her lips moved to my forehead and lingered.
“No, no fever.” She held me at arm’s length, anchoring me not with her grip, but with the intensity of her pale blue eyes. “Camilla, is there something you want to tell me?”
I gave a brief shake of my head, but when she seemed still unsatisfied, I told her I was feeling a little weak. “Perhaps I should eat something?”
“Well, there’s not much in the kitchen, but I could—”
“Ruth!” Papa’s voice now boomed, and I suspect every woman named Ruth in the county took a step away from her stove and went to the door to see what beast summoned her.
“I’ll be fine, Mama.” I stepped into her embrace, wrapping my arms around her thickening waist and laying my head against her bosom. She smelled of butter and flour and barnyard and hay. She must have been up early that morning, helping Papa with the milking, doing my chores as I slept. I squeezed her tight until Papa bellowed once again. Then I let her go.
The minute the wagon disappeared from the yard, all thoughts of venturing out to meet Nathan vanished as my guilty conscience took over my planning for the day. I reached under the blue-checked towel and grabbed the cold biscuit, nibbling on it as I made my way into the parlor. I was still a day behind on my readings (a point Papa had taken pains to make the night before at dinner), so I curled up on the sofa with our Bible and opened to the fourth chapter of Samuel. I struggled through the verses. Wars and great shouts. “Woe unto us . . .” and “Fear not; for thou hast . . .” How different it was to read the Scriptures alone, without my mother at my side to answer questions. So many names—Philistines and Egyptians, Ebenezer, Hophni, and Phinehas. The words swam around meaninglessly, and I had no illness on which to blame my confusion. I considered abandoning my journal, but that would only mean having to read the chapter again under my father’s watchful eye, so I took another bite of biscuit and doubled over the page as the crumbs dissolved, salty, on my tongue. Finally, in frustration, I settled on the last verse of the chapter because it was the shortest. Mama would have scolded me, but she wasn’t there, and by the time she knew, it would be too late to change it.
When I opened my journal to record the verse, I saw for the first time my mother’s labored penmanship from the day before. Her letters had an odd squareness to them, nothing like the fluid script Mr. Teague insisted his students produce. In fact, if you didn’t know, you might be confused as to which verses were written by the mother and which by the child.
I turned over the page so as not to be distracted and wrote:
And she said, The glory is departed from Israel: for the ark of God is taken. 1 Samuel 4:22.
I knew I would face the two questions, so I prepared my answers, speaking them aloud into the empty parlor.
“This makes me a better Christian because it reminds me that I must remain close to God. It makes me a better woman because I should give my children meaningful names.”
With no one to tell me differently, I deemed my answers perfectly adequate and closed my journal and put the Bible back on its little table. Then, perhaps feeling guilty about my careless study, I clutched my journal close to me and bowed my head.
“Heavenly Father . . . ,” I began, but no other words would come. So I just sat, very quiet and very still, waiting.
Lord, I prayed, the words coming from within, forgive me if I seem disrespectful of your Word. It’s difficult sometimes for me to understand just what you’re trying to say. I get lost in the stories, and sometimes they all sound alike. And the names are strange. And it just seems so . . .
I opened my eyes and stopped myself from calling the Word of the Lord dull.
“Thank you for letting me feel better. For my healing.” And then again, silence. Because I hardly knew how to pray about what was most pressing on my heart. Should I ask God to keep Nathan away? Should I pray for Nathan to come to my door so I could tell him to go away? In the end it seemed best not to pray about Nathan at all. I asked the Lord to give Mama and Papa a good day at the market before saying amen and taking my journal upstairs.
I spent the next half hour doing anything I could to keep myself occupied. I brushed and brushed and brushed my hair until it crackled in the air; then I plaited it into two thick braids, which I wrapped around my head and secured with pins pilfered from Mama’s little glass jar. A much more grown-up style than I usually wore, but one easily taken down the minute Papa’s wagon turned in to our yard. I pulled off my shoes and opened my mother’s armoire, where I found her treasured pair of silk brocade slippers. I truly believed they were princess shoes, and Mama agreed, as long as I understood the princess who wore them was just a farmer’s daughter at a city hall Christmas dance. Slipping them on, I wriggled my toes in the luxury of them, then took a turn around the room with a graceful, gliding step. I hadn’t done this since I was a very small child—and it had been just as long since I’d seen Mama herself wear them. Impractical, she said, living on a farm. And I had to agree, although it did give me the slightest thrill to see how well they fit my feet.
I prowled through the kitchen looking for something to eat. True to Mama’s prediction, however, there was little. Nothing, really, save a few strips of dried beef and a few soft potatoes at the bottom of the bin. Hopefully Mama and Papa were negotiating with some farmers right now for some of the fruits of their gardens. Certainly something good could be harvested this time of year. Something that didn’t come from a cow or a pickling jar or even one of those new tin cans.
The little round clock ticked on its shelf, and I’d been home alone for nearly an hour. It felt like an eternity. I never remembered a day in my life so full of emptiness. And that was the very thought tumbling through my head as I climbed the stairs to my room that morning. Empty, empty as my feet moved silently across the floor. To the window. Of course I couldn’t see clear to the place where the path turned, but I could see as far as my father’s wall.
And there he was.
I wanted to believe I wasn’t hoping he’d be there, but that was long before I’d learned to lie to myself. In an instant he’d seen me, and even from this distance his smile filled all the corners of that empty house. I could have leaped through the window—even without the outer stairs to carry me down. His eyes would hold me, reaching across the yard and safely guarding me until my feet touched the ground. But though I was wearing my mother’s princess slippers, this, after all, was no fairy tale. In an instant I jumped through t
he hole in my floor, ran to my parents’ room, and found my own shoes where I’d left them carelessly by the bed. With steadier fingers than I’d had just a short time ago, I laced my own brown, sensible leather boots and tucked Mama’s slippers safely away.
Any moment, I thought I’d hear a knock at the door, but none came. I paused briefly at the mirror and considered my reflection. I couldn’t tell if I looked more or less like a little girl with my braids pinned up. Surely my eyes looked bigger and wider—like my face was being pulled—and my neck seemed long and elegant. I thought about taking the style down, lest Nathan think I pinned my hair up just for him, but even as my fingers hovered over a pin, I stopped.
“This isn’t me,” I said to the glass, and the image inside confirmed it.
Forcing myself to breathe, I took slow, measured steps to the front door and waited. Wanting him to knock. Hoping to be called on—like a beautiful girl with an eager beau. Finally, though, I simply opened it, only to find our porch empty. And our yard empty. Nothing but his voice in the distance, calling from the uncertain pile of stones.
“Come on! Let’s go meet my family!”
And I ran.
* * *
He held my hand the entire way, chattering the whole time about the wonders I was about to see. The friendliness of the people, the richness of the fellowship, the commitment everybody had to creating this new city.
“Because that’s what we’re doing, you know.” Breathless, he carted me along. Sometimes beside him, until my feet couldn’t keep up with his pace. Then I’d be dragged behind. He said nothing about my hair, asked nothing about my health, and cared nothing that I was with him under deceptive circumstances. “There’s nothing here—nothing in your life that can compare to it. These people saved me, Camilla. I can’t tell you how empty my life was before I met them.”
I wanted to tell him I didn’t need my life changed, that I was just going along to taste the chicken stew, but as I tripped along that narrow path, I couldn’t help feeling I was on some sort of an adventure, too.
My father’s property bordered a brushy forest, nearly half a mile’s worth, separating us from the river. Nathan pulled me right through it, taking me along what barely constituted a path. At one step I was swallowed in green, and the next I walked into a wide clearing, like something out of a story. Fire pits dotted the cleared land, with fallen logs stationed around them as makeshift parlor furniture. Small, neat tents made a semicircle on either side, and if we kept walking straight, we’d come to a place where trees had been cut down to make a wide opening out to the river.
For weeks I’d been listening to the sounds coming from these people at night, their songs rising on the night air. Perhaps it was the thin quality of darkness that carried the music. The thickness of the midmorning muted everything. I held my breath as I watched them—so ordinary-looking. Just men and women and children. They milled about the clearing with a unique sense of purpose. Every sound they made blended to a single pleasant hum. No outbursts of laughter or anger. No harshness at all. Just a peaceful dignity. Oh, how very full their lives looked, even in that first moment.
Perhaps I can’t be trusted to give a faithful account from this point. It could be that all of my remembrances of the time before I left are seen through a justifying lens. Maybe my father wasn’t as harsh and boorish as I render him, nor my mother as weak. My own loneliness and longing certainly exaggerates the instant admiration of the Mormon families in the clearing. Only my portrayal of Nathan Fox can be trusted. As we stood together, hand in hand, our feet still planted in the forest, we gazed on the scene before us with a single heart. I don’t know if he loved me yet, but I loved him, and I knew he wasn’t just showing me his family; he wanted to give it to me as well. He’d sought me out, somehow. And my only answer was that the Lord himself had brought him to me. Answered my prayer the way he answered Hannah’s. Not with a son, but with a companion, somebody to walk along the road with. So much more than that, as I discovered the night before.
Now as we stood at the edge of the clearing, he squeezed my fingers and turned me to face him. He took my other hand and brought them both up to his lips and pressed them there—not exactly a kiss, but a claim. There was none of the breathless thrill like had come with the moonlight. Our eyes met over our joined hands, and that simple gaze carried a promise. I would step into that clearing with him. And somehow, I would stay.
The shouts of children interrupted our reverie.
“Nate! It’s Nate!” Suddenly we were surrounded, hemmed in with boys and girls on every side, all surprisingly neat and clean given their living conditions. They peppered him with excited questions: Did he know they finished building the last wagon? Did he see the new team of oxen? Did he hear about the new letter from the prophet? A steady chorus of “Who is she? Who is she? Who is she?” underscored everything.
Nathan had dropped my hand at their arrival, and he crouched down now, taking each question in turn and answering with such loving patience, he could have been each one’s own father. No waving hand was ignored, no question repeated too frequently to warrant a harsh, impatient response. As to the question of who I was, that was left to the very end when he once again took my hand and said, “Children, this is my very good friend Camilla Deardon.” Then, to me, he introduced each child by name, no small feat given that there were nearly fourteen coming from ten different families. He also managed to mention the infant siblings too young to attend this little gathering.
I greeted each one with a smile, knowing full well I’d never remember any of their names. I shook one little hand after another, saying “Thank you” to the girls who thought my hair looked pretty.
“This is the young lady who gave us the cheese and butter,” Nathan said, and this revelation started a new round of excited chatter. How humbling to see all those little faces alight with sincere joy and gratitude, and in the midst of it, their names came clear: Josiah, Rebecca, Daniel, Sarah. Whatever grudge I might have held at Nathan’s theft disappeared as I graciously accepted credit for the act of charity.
We walked together into the camp, though he’d long since dropped my hand, and the children hovered behind and around us making me feel like I was leading a sort of swarm. Soon, more interesting pursuits presented themselves, and the children peeled away to recommence their games of tag and chase. Or they were summoned to finish whatever chore they’d abandoned. I tried not to bristle at the unabashed suspicion in the women’s eyes as they drew their children close to them. Not entirely unfriendly, but definitely guarded, although their mouths greeted me with broad smiles and words of welcome.
“So, this is the one, is she?”
The voice came from behind, and its slicing honey sweetness chilled my spine. I stayed still and would have remained so if Nathan hadn’t put his hand on my shoulder and physically urged me to turn around.
“Hey there, Rachel. Yes, this is Camilla.”
She was, without a doubt, the most beautiful girl I had ever seen. Easily as tall as Nathan, her thick blonde hair was pulled away from her face, but without giving that pinched, taut look that plagued so many women. Instead, her hair seemed to have floated back of its own accord, leaving soft, wavy furrows in its wake. My first thought was to reach out and touch it, to see whether it was real or some molded plaster of perfection. I squelched this impulse, of course, but I did hold out my hand.
“Nice to meet you.” I was the first to extend the greeting. She said nothing, but gave me such a perusal I felt I’d been turned inside out on the spot. Her pretty mouth twisted into a quirky smile, and when she finished her inspection with the second appraisal of my pinned-up braids, she looked not at me but at Nathan.
“She’s nothing like what I expected, Nate.”
“Few things in life ever are, Rache.” His smile matched hers.
I looked from one to the other. There couldn’t have been a stronger bond between them if they’d been chained together at the neck. “This must be your s
ister.”
He left my side then and wrapped a protective arm around her shoulders. “It is indeed. The lovely Mrs. . . . What’s the name again?”
She made a face. “Crane.”
“Ah, yes. How could I forget. Married to Tillman Crane, Esquire.”
“You could forget because you’re just too hateful to remember, even if you did practically bribe the man to marry me.”
Their tone was easy, teasing, and playful. She seemed far too young to be anybody’s wife. Caught up in the spirit of banter, I said so out loud.
“Nonsense,” Rachel said, her expression not quite drawing me into their game. “I’m nineteen. Some would say I’m nearly an old maid.”
“I’d never say that, Sis.”
“Brother, you’d shout it from the mountaintop.” She leaned closer to me and cupped her hand around her mouth, prepared to convey a secret. “Wouldn’t want me to miss out on my chance at eternity, now would he?”
But there was no whispering to her words. Behind her, Nathan swallowed, and his eyes took on a serious glint.
“It’s because I love you, Rachel. I want you to have a better future than what we came from. And I want you to have that forever.”
Rachel dropped her hand and turned, giving Nathan a hug and a kiss on his cheek. “I know, Nate. And I love you, too. Now, let’s go break Evangeline’s heart.”
As she led me away, I glanced back to see Nathan putting up a weak protest before turning his back and walking in the opposite direction.
“Where’s he going?”
“We’re leaving in three days. Lots of work to do.” I had no choice but to allow this to suffice as an answer. She walked me across the clearing to a cook fire being tended by a girl who, from the back at least, appeared to be about my age. Few people can claim to have a striking feature from the back, but this girl defied any sort of anonymity. Straight down her back, barely submitted into one thick braid, was the brightest, reddest hair I’d ever seen. Red, in fact, might not be the best color to name it, as further inspection revealed it to be almost orange. Where Rachel’s hair lay thick and smooth around her head, this hair sprung out in curling wires in every direction, dancing in the breeze like coppery unattached spiderwebbing.
For Time and Eternity Page 5