Dinah could hardly believe such a thing, but both Matthew and the psalmist seemed to think so, and they were fairly reliable authorities.
Dinah flipped to the New Testament, where Paul told the Romans, “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
She’d never believed that, either. Now the words held a kind of limitless grandeur, a wonderful hope that picked up her worries and concerns in great big arms and gave her a place to put them.
Maybe it was so.
Dinah exhaled and relaxed into the depths of the comfortable chair, the baby warm and drowsy in the crook of her arm.
If it’s so, Lord, please forgive me. Help me to learn what you’re really like. Help me to love you. Help me to know you as you really are, because Lord, it’s a fact that I don’t know you at all.
Twilight fell, and she heard the crunch of gravel under Matthew’s feet as he walked up from the river and went around to the barn. She smiled at the thought of him feeling guilty about entertaining Schatzi in the evenings. She of all people knew the healing power of a chicken on a mind full of worries. He was lucky Schatzi liked him.
IT WAS FULLY dark when her mother came home. When she saw the lights of the car on the highway, Dinah carried the baby, worn out from a day of fussing, upstairs and put her to bed.
When she came down, Elsie was hanging up her coat in the closet next to the front door.
“I just put Tamsen down,” she reported.
“Good.” Her mother sounded a little distracted. Had the news that she was going to go the legal route to protect Tamsen disturbed her that much?
“How is everyone?” Dinah asked. “Did you have a good prayer meeting?”
Elsie stopped fussing with the scarf around the hanger and looked Dinah in the eye. “Have you been talking to Alma Woods lately?”
Dinah avoided talking to Alma Woods whenever possible. Between her and Linda Bell, gossip was a finely honed art in Hamilton Falls. If you told either of them anything at breakfast, it would be all over not just the town, but the entire state by lunchtime.
“No,” Dinah said. “I haven’t spoken to her other than to say ‘How are you?’ in weeks. Why?”
Elsie led the way into the kitchen. “I overheard her talking to Owen Blanchard. Something about it being no wonder there was no Deacon at the Gathering in our home. That you had turned down Derrick Wilkinson in favor of someone else. Are you seeing somebody, Dinah?”
Dinah stared at her. “Of course not. I don’t have time to see anybody, even if anyone were interested.”
“It sounds like Derrick is interested.”
“If he is, it’s only because he wants to be Deacon. With Julia McNeill out of the picture, I’m his only candidate.”
“Has he asked you out?”
“For lunch, a few weeks ago. I said no. I have more important things on my mind than having lunch with him.”
“You should think about the Kingdom, Dinah. If we’re to keep Gathering here, we’re going to need an Elder.”
“What happened to the subdivide and sell plan?”
Elsie made a motion with her head halfway between a nod and a shake that seemed to indicate she was undecided. “That’s an option. But no matter where we lived, we’d still be a favored family. Still need an Elder to preside at Gathering.”
“Mom, I’m not going to marry Derrick just so you can have an Elder.”
“You could apply your heart to it.”
Dinah snorted. “If I were going to apply my heart to anyone it would be—” She stopped, a second too late.
Elsie gave her a long look. “Who?”
“No one.”
“I’ve seen you and that Matthew together,” her mother said slowly. “I’ve seen the way he looks at you.”
He had already told her how he looked at her. Was it so visible? “There’s nothing going on, Mom.”
“He’s an Outsider, Dinah. He could endanger your soul.”
“If anything, he helped rescue it,” Dinah retorted, goaded into defending him. “If it weren’t for him, I’d have killed myself a month ago.”
Elsie drew in a quick breath, as if the words had hit her, and gripped the back of the nearest kitchen chair. “Don’t talk like that, Dinah.”
“It’s true. He pulled me out of the river the night Uncle John killed Sheba. I owe him more than I will ever owe the Elect.”
Her mother gazed at her, pain etching furrows in her forehead and at the sides of her cheeks. “You really tried to kill yourself?” she whispered. “Oh, Dinah.” She reached out, and before Dinah had time to react, wrapped her in a fierce hug. “Promise me you won’t do it again. I couldn’t bear it. Promise me.”
Dinah was so astonished that she felt herself hugging her mother back, as if there were some natural reflex in her arms.
“I promise.”
Displays of affection from Elsie came few and far between. There had been the time when she was twelve and had stood up in Summer Gathering, indicating that she wanted to be part of the Elect congregation and give her life to God. There had been the occasional pat and maybe a word or two of praise when she’d done well at school, but that was about it.
But Elsie was a changed woman. They both were. Maybe this was a good place to start changing the way they related to each other. Maybe she could learn to know her own mother the way she wanted to learn to know God.
Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature . . .
“I didn’t think you’d miss me,” she said into her mother’s gray hair.
“Don’t ever think that.” Elsie pulled away enough to look up into her face. “I’m down to half a family. I couldn’t bear to lose you, too.”
Dinah stepped back. “You miss Tammy, and yet you and Dad sent her away.”
“How can you say that? You know how your father was. He wasn’t such an angry man when we were married, you know, but it certainly all came out when I told him I was pregnant with you.” She paused. “You know what? When he was diagnosed with the cancer, he told me he was glad to die. That living with the three of us was more than any man should have to bear.”
“Dad said that?”
Elsie nodded, and stepped away to straighten a dish towel hanging from the oven door handle. “I tried to be a good wife, under the circumstances. I did everything he wanted me to do, hoping I could make up for—for—”
“Me,” Dinah said flatly.
“No, not for you. For deceiving him. I could have said no when he proposed, and he could have married Alma Woods.”
“Good grief. He should have been thankful.”
Elsie smiled, with a glint of impish humor. “Alma says she’s forgiven me, but I know perfectly well she hasn’t.” The glint faded, and the pain flowed back in. “I could have let her have him, but I just didn’t have the courage. It would have meant being Silenced for fornication. I took the easy way out, and we all suffered.”
“Yes. We did. But the thing is we don’t have to now. We can make our own way, do things differently. I mean, this house is a completely different place.” She waved an arm at the living room, with its slipcovers and cheery lamps. “It’s a place to start. We can work outward from here.”
Elsie gazed at her, the fondness she seemed to be finally allowing herself to feel in her eyes. “When did you learn to be so positive, young lady?”
“Matthew taught me,” Dinah said simply.
“So there is something going on.”
“Yes.” Dinah thought of his kind eyes and ragged cuffs and the chicken manure on his shoes. And of the strength in his arms when he held her. And of his unshakable faith in the God he loved. “I just don’t know what it is, yet.”
Chapter 19
THE ATTORNEY IN Pitchford, in Dinah’s opinion, didn’t look old enough to drive, much le
ss represent Tamsen’s interests in court. But Matthew seemed to think he could do the job, and Dinah certainly didn’t want to go to the law firm in Hamilton Falls where Derrick Wilkinson was a paralegal. All she needed would be for Derrick to have access to the papers she was filing on Tamsen’s behalf. The less anyone at home knew about her business, the better.
The brass plate on his desk said William Chang, and the framed diploma behind him said he’d received his juris doctor from the University of Washington five years before.
“Your research is correct,” Chang told Matthew. “Adoption isn’t a good route to take right now, since both parents are alive and well, and you’d have to terminate their parental rights. Either of them could contest it, and then where would you be?”
“They’re not going to contest it,” Dinah said. On her lap, Tamsen gazed curiously around the office, especially at the way the sun hit the brass desk set and made it sparkle.
“We don’t know that. So as Mr. Nicholas suggested, I’m going to go for a petition for nonparental custody. This way you just have to serve notice on the natural parents that you’re filing the petition. Since we don’t know where the mother is, we’ll put a notice in the county paper. And since you do know where the father is, we can serve him personally.”
“We?” Dinah didn’t want to be anywhere near Phinehas when he was served with the papers. Who knew what he would do?
“We as in our case. A representative of the court would do it, or I can do it, if you like.”
Dinah nodded. “Then what?”
“Then we have what’s called a guardian ad litem appear on Tamsen’s behalf and recommend custody. With your sister’s letter and the clear case of sexual abuse, I can’t see any guardian doing anything but awarding custody of Tamsen to you.” Chang paused. “What you choose to do about the abuser is, of course, your business. I recommend filing charges, of course.”
“Yes, I know,” Dinah mumbled.
“One other thing you should know,” Chang went on.
“Yes?” Matthew said.
“This nonparental custody action doesn’t terminate the father’s parental rights; it just limits them as severely as the guardian believes is in the best interests of the child. You would have the right to recover child support from him.”
This was such unexpected information that Dinah laughed. In her arms, Tamsen smiled and grabbed for her face. “Child support? He’s an unpaid missionary. How could I get child support?”
“Unpaid?”
“It’s a long story,” Dinah said. “But the ministers in our church live off charity. The provision of God, in other words.”
Clearly this was way outside the realm of Chang’s experience. “O-o-kay. But I just wanted you to know you had that option.”
“I’ll keep it in mind.”
Chang said he would file the notice with the paper and the petition with the court that week. They gave him Tamara’s letter and the birth certificate, as well as the Blanchards’ address in Hamilton Falls. As they left the office, a woman came in pushing a stroller. Matthew held the door for her while Dinah glanced down at the baby.
“How old is your baby?” she asked the woman while she put Tamsen’s little coat back on.
The woman took off the blanket covering her child. “Nine weeks tomorrow.”
Dinah blinked. The baby wore a pair of apple-green rompers with a white frill around the neck. “Where did you get that outfit?” she blurted.
“I ordered it online,” the woman replied. “Isn’t it darling?”
“Where online?”
“It’s a Web site, but I can’t remember the name. Something to do with fruit.”
“Dinah?” Matthew was still holding the door.
“Coming.” She thanked the woman and carried Tamsen outside. How strange. Maybe Elsie had seen the rompers somewhere and decided to make a copy for Tamsen. Goodness knows they were cute enough.
She dismissed the woman from her mind and got back to more immediate problems. “I know this is necessary,” she said as she buckled Tamsen into the car seat, “but I can’t help feeling I’ve started something I’m not going to be able to stop.”
She climbed into the passenger side and Matthew backed the car out of the lot. “Why would you want to stop it?” he asked. “You’re doing this for Tamsen.”
“Oh, I don’t want to stop the custody thing. That’s necessary. In fact, it’s the only thing I can do under the circumstances.” She looked out the window, where the houses and businesses of Pitchford were giving way to the rolling, grassy ranch land that would soon become the foothills surrounding Hamilton Falls. “It’s what will happen with Phinehas that scares me. I know he’s going to do something awful when he’s served with those papers.”
“But he won’t take Tamsen away from you. You heard what Mr. Chang said. There’s no reason the guardian would allow that. So hang onto that thought. We don’t want to borrow trouble quite yet.”
It seemed to Dinah that trouble had been on loan to her for so long that she’d never need to borrow it again. Maybe Matthew was right, though. She had to stay positive.
“I wish I could pray for stuff like this,” she said, startling herself. She never talked about spiritual things in public.
“Why shouldn’t you?”
“Matthew, God doesn’t have time for things like custody and serving people with papers. He’s busy running the universe.”
“I’ve found him to be intimately involved with every aspect of my life,” Matthew said mildly. “He knows everything about me. Why would we not pray about something like this? Go on. Give it a try.”
“What, now?” Dinah looked around, as if the fields and trees on either side would eavesdrop. At the very least, she couldn’t pray in front of someone. Not sitting in a car in broad daylight. It was too personal.
“Certainly.” With his eyes fixed on the highway and both hands firmly on the wheel, he said, “Dear Father, thank you for guiding us to William Chang, and for giving us the means to protect Tamsen and keep her safe. Give us wisdom, Father, and courage to deal with whatever is ahead. We know it’s part of your plan for our lives, and whatever it is, help us to accept it with the love in which it’s given.” He glanced at her. “Anything to add?”
His simple faith humbled her. If only she could have an attitude of love and appeal like that. “Thank you for Matthew, Lord,” she whispered to the grassy expanse outside the window. “And help me to trust you.”
“Amen,” Matthew said softly. “Amen.”
OVER THE NEXT week, while they waited for William Chang to call and tell them he’d filed the petition, and for the notice to Tamara to come out in the county paper, Dinah began to wonder if somehow the news of what she’d done had leaked out. No one in the history of the Elect had ever brought a Shepherd’s name into court. Many wouldn’t recognize the name Philip Leslie anyway, but some of the old-timers might. She didn’t want to think about what would happen once the word got out. No matter how discreet Chang was, this was the Elect they were talking about. The harder you tried to keep something quiet, the faster people would find out about it.
Except for Phinehas and what he had done to her family. That had been kept quiet because they were all too afraid to fight for each other. Well, that was going to change. No one had stood in the breach for her, but she was going to do it for Tamsen, no matter what the consequences.
She tried to remind herself of that after Gathering on Sunday. She’d half expected Derrick to approach her again, but after catching her eye during the second hymn, he ducked his head and—she turned her head to look more closely—blushed.
What did he have to blush about?
People shook her hand more as a formality than because they were glad to see her, but Dinah had become used to that. But the best news of all was that Claire was back. She touched the other girl on the elbow as she was talking to Tracy, the second of Linda Bell’s daughters.
“Dinah! Oh good, I’ve been meaning
to call you. Come on, let’s go outside.”
On the lawn, some of the younger kids were playing tag while their mothers tried to round them up and get them into their cars. Claire pulled her over to where her parents’ car was parked.
“How was your class?” Dinah asked. “Did all the junior tellers go?”
“There were about twenty-five of us, from all over the state. Charlene Fox from Richmond said to say hello.”
Dinah smiled, pleased. She and Charlene had gone to a training class together back when Dinah had first started at the bank.
“But who cares about work?” Claire hurried on. “Guess who else says hello.”
“Who?” Dinah couldn’t imagine there was anyone else at the bank who would remember her.
“Julia Malcolm says there’s room enough in Rebecca’s suite for you and me to room together, and if you don’t say yes, she’s going to send Ross’s partner down here to convince you.” Claire laughed. “And believe me, you don’t want that to happen.”
“Who is Ross’s partner?”
“His name is Ray Harper. He came over for dinner one night when I was there.”
“I knew it! I knew you’d go over there. Good for you. How are they?”
“Happy,” Claire said simply.
“What’s it like, being with them when she’s Out? I wouldn’t know what to say. What to talk about.”
“I just remembered to put our friendship first, and everything seemed to follow from there,” Claire said. “There was no awkwardness at all. She’s just the same, only happier. More at peace somehow. You know, inside.”
“How can that be?” Dinah couldn’t imagine being Out. Her world was so circumscribed by structure and rules and expectations that going outside and having to make the right choices among a bewildering array of possibilities was at once tempting and frightening. In the Elect, choices were easy. They had been made thousands of times before by everyone around you, and the results either measured up to expectations or they didn’t. You could see right away how good your decisions were by people’s behavior.
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