by Gayle Roper
Leigh waved her hand. “I can’t blame a woman I never knew.”
“She was ninety-eight when she died, her mind still sharp as a tack.” Mr. Zelinski looked at her with the air of one about to spring a big surprise. “She made you her sole heir, Miss Spenser.”
“What?” Leigh looked in disbelief at Clay who grinned back.
“I am marrying an heiress.”
“To some extent, you are,” Mr. Zelinski agreed.
“What? Surely you aren’t serious,” Leigh said.
“Did you know that Harriet sent you money every month?” the lawyer asked.
“What?” It seemed to be the word coming out of her mouth most this afternoon. She shook her head.
“As long as your mother lived, the monthly checks for one thousand dollars went to her from Harriet’s trust fund.”
“Trust fund?” Leigh didn’t even know anyone with a trust fund.
“Your mother’s family is quite wealthy, Miss Spenser. That’s one reason why your mother’s marriage was such a tragedy to them.”
“A bigger tragedy to my mother,” Leigh said, thinking of the wounded look her mother wore so much of the time.
Mr. Zelinski nodded. “Candace was Harriet’s favorite niece, and the rift in the family caused by your mother’s ill-advised marriage hurt Harriet deeply. She had never married, and Candace was like her daughter. Years ago, Harriet came to our firm and asked us to set up a way for her to get money to Candace each month because she doubted your father could support you.”
Leigh nodded at the truth of that statement.
“When your mother died, Harriet came to us and asked that the amount be diminished to five hundred dollars a month. She said she didn’t want to support Johnny Spenser, just you, but the money should go through him because you were so little.”
“I never saw any of that money.”
“I never thought you would,” Mr. Zelinski said. “I tried to change Harriet’s mind, to get her to find another avenue of getting funds to you if she wanted to do that. But she was stubborn. Then you turned eighteen, and Johnny went to jail. We began making out the checks to you instead of your father and sending them to the bank in Seaside as always. The money continued to accumulate and has been doing so for the last eleven years.”
“But no one told me,” Leigh said, thinking of all those years of poverty and struggle in Glassboro.
“We realize that now, though telling you wasn’t our responsibility,” Mr. Zelinski said hurriedly. “It was your father’s or your aunt’s.”
“So you’re telling us,” Clay said, “that Leigh has eleven years worth of checks deposited in an account with her name on it.”
The lawyer nodded. “Five hundred dollars each month.”
“That’s sixty-six thousand dollars plus interest,” Clay computed.
Mr. Zelinski nodded.
Leigh was floored. “Sixty-six thousand dollars? I have sixty-six thousand dollars?”
Mr. Zelinski smiled at her amazement. “And there’s more.”
She felt dazed. “More?”
“Property.”
“Property?”
“I understand that your home stands in the middle of an undeveloped tract of land.”
Leigh nodded.
“Well, Harriet deeded the house to Candace when she married. Your grandfather almost had apoplexy, but she owned the house, a gift from her parents on her twenty-first birthday because she loved the shore marshes and shore birds so much. But she loved Candace more.”
Leigh clasped Clay’s hand. “I wish I had known her,” she whispered.
Mr. Zelinski smiled. “You would have liked her, and she would have loved you.”
She blinked back the tears that threatened. “I knew the house was mine. I have a copy of my father’s will.”
“More than the house is yours, Miss Spenser. You own the whole street that your home is on, both sides of it.”
“What?” That word again.
“It was part of Harriet’s gift from her parents. She did not pass that land on to your mother because she feared what your father would do with it. But she has left it all to you. Given property values at the shore, Miss Spenser, you are now a woman of considerable substance.”
Epilogue
Four Years Later
LEIGH LAY BACK on the couch. She didn’t have any choice. Clay wouldn’t let her do anything else, and two-year-old Candy kept saying, “Down, Mommy. Lie down,” as she pointed with her index finger. Just like she was Terror. It was all Leigh could do not to go, “Arf, arf.”
She supposed she should consider it a victory that she’d gotten out of the bedroom. She’d pleaded, begged, scrounged up a few strategic tears, and it had finally worked. Clay, who was taking time off from WCE, Wharton Computer Engineering, carried her downstairs, muttering the whole time about pregnant women and their unreasonable demands. She wrapped her arms around his neck and leaned against his chest, ignoring his grumps with the same skill she ignored the rampaging going on in her belly.
“Thank you, sweetheart,” she said and kissed his jaw. “I love you.”
He’d just grunted and put her on the couch. “It’s only because today’s our anniversary. Now stay put.”
She reached out an arm and gathered Candy close. “How’s Mommy’s girl?”
Candy grinned, her dark curls and dark eyes dancing. She was definitely her father’s child. She pointed to Leigh’s tummy. “Baby.”
“Baby is right. And he’s going to come visit us any minute. Give me a kiss, lovey.”
Candy complied, then kissed Leigh’s tummy. “Kiss baby.”
“Here, love.” Clay handed Leigh a glass of sweetened tea. He eyed her huge belly. “I’d ask you to move over and make room for me to sit with you, but I don’t think you can.”
“Sure I can,” she said as she lifted her head and shoulders. “You sit here, and I’ll just rest against you.”
“Sounds good to me.” Clay sat, and she leaned against him. He rubbed a hand gently over her aching back.
She loved his tender treatment. It made her feel beautiful even in this extreme situation when she was anything but. She knew she looked like an elephant. Her ankles were the size and shape of watermelons, and she had to go to the bathroom every five minutes. The pregnancy had been a difficult one, the last two weeks spent mostly on her back, and she knew she looked as exhausted and bored as she felt.
“I feel so grungy,” she said. “I haven’t had a shower in three days!”
Clay ran his hand over her hair. “Cleanliness may be next to godliness,” he said, “but the baby is more important at the moment.” He placed his hand gently over her tummy and was kicked for his efforts.
“Hmm.” She rubbed her aching side. “It seems Theodore is making a statement of some kind.”
Candy laid her head on Leigh. “My baby.”
“Hey, Candy Cane,” Bill said as he entered the room, drumsticks in hand. To his great disgust, at fourteen he looked much as he had at ten, just a tad taller. The only thing that kept him from despair was the memory of Grandpa Will’s height and the constant sight of his father’s. “You’ve got to share the baby with me,” he said as he stuffed the drumsticks in his back pocket.
“Bill!” The little girl shrieked in delight and threw herself at her big brother. He lifted her over his head and gave her a raspberry on her tummy. She giggled and demanded, “Again.”
“Anybody home?” came a call from the kitchen.
“Grandma Jule,” yelled Candy. “Come here.”
Clay smiled at his cherub of a daughter. “Little dictator,” he said proudly. “Just like her mother.”
Leigh gave him the evil eye as she held out her empty glass to him. He took it with a wink and set it on the end table next to the silver chest with the glorious flowers. There was a large dent in one side of the chest where it had struck one of the great jetty rocks when Bill threw it away from Ernie Molino. Neither Clay nor Leigh wanted the imper
fection pounded out. It was a constant reminder of God’s grace during that season of miracles—the reconciliation of the brothers, the acknowledgment of Bill’s paternity, and the declaration of their love. Leigh had only to look at it, and her eyes misted. Clay had only to look at it and he remembered going into the cold, cold water at low tide to retrieve it.
Julia and David walked into the living room of the house that had once been Julia’s home. They were holding hands.
“Clay,” Julia had said when she and David married a month after the Molino fiasco, “if you and Leigh want this house, it’s yours. David and I want a house that’s ours, not mine or his. This would have been yours someday anyway. I’m just offering it a bit early.”
Now Julia and David lived three blocks away. Julia smiled and bent to smother Candy in kisses. “How’s Grandma’s sweetheart?”
“Did you bring cake?” Candy asked.
“She’s got you pegged,” David said, laughing. He bent to Candy. “How does angel food sound, my little angel?”
“Wif strawberries and whip cream?”
At David’s nod, she ran for the kitchen to see for herself. “We gots angel food, Daddy,” she cried as she raced back to the living room. David bent and captured her as she raced by. He lifted her, and she wrapped her little arms around his neck. “I love you, Grampa David,” she said. “Thank you for the angel food.”
Leigh could see him melt.
“How are you feeling, Leigh?” Julia asked.
“Fat.” Leigh smiled at her mother-in-law. The baby would be good for Julia. Another Ted. She knew Julia still had times of deep grieving over Ted, and it was soon to be the fourth anniversary of his death. They had had Ted in relatively good health for three months after the Good Friday miracle. He and Clay reestablished their friendship during that time, and he had been able to stand as Clay’s best man when Clay and Leigh married in June at the close of the school year.
“You know,” he said to Clay one night at dinner just before the wedding, “if you can admit to me that you were wrong, I guess I can admit the same thing. Out loud, I mean. I admitted it to God back at Easter. I know what God asked of me, and I know what I did in defiance of Him. I was wrong.” He smiled crookedly. “What with the examples of Dad, Matt, and you, how can I possibly hold on to my excuses?”
Then his decline had been swift and inevitable. When they returned from their honeymoon, he was barely alive.
“You should have called us,” Clay told his mother and David.
“I wouldn’t let them,” Ted whispered. “But I hung on to tell you two that I love you.”
Two days later he slipped into a coma. Two days after that, he was gone.
From her position on the sofa, Leigh looked at Candy and Bill, felt Baby Ted kicking about inside. She couldn’t begin to imagine the never ending pain of losing a child. If Baby Ted could help assuage Julia’s pain in any way, it was worth the discomfort and uncertainty of the past few months.
“Let’s eat in here,” Clay suggested. “Then Leigh won’t be left out.” He moved to get up.
“Stay,” Leigh said, putting a hand on his chest. “Stay with me.”
As Bill and David set up TV trays and Julia took Candy to the kitchen to “help” unpack the meal she’d brought with her, Clay looked at his wife. The love in his eyes brought tears to Leigh’s.
“I’ll stay with you, love,” he whispered as he dropped a kiss on her forehead. “I’ll stay with you always and forever.”
Dear Reader,
Over the last thirty years as I’ve spoken to women’s groups all across the country, I have often talked with women touched in some way by AIDS.
“My husband has AIDS,” one told me tearfully, “and I can’t tell anyone I know. Even though he contracted it by transfusion, he—we—would be ostracized in our community and our church if people knew. We’ve carried this information alone since he first learned he was HIV positive. I’m talking to you because I’ll never see you again, and I just have to talk to someone.”
In contrast was the pastor’s wife who said, “My brother is dying of AIDS back on the East Coast. Our little congregation has been so supportive. It’s like he’s our church project. They pray for him and my family all the time, and they’ve flown me back to spend time with him twice already. They’re gathering funds for a third trip next month.”
One of my junior girls’ novels, The Secret of the Poison Pen, was based on the true experience of friends who took in a foster baby with HIV. Someone in the congregation wrote anonymous notes saying, “Get that kid out of our church!” Our friends persevered, the nursery workers learned universal care procedures, and that baby is now a bright and charming ten-year-old girl who still hasn’t contracted AIDS, and most important, has trusted Christ as her Savior.
There is no denying that AIDS is a terrible condition, all the more scary because it is contagious. However as believers we have a higher calling than avoiding illness and those who might infect us (though they shouldn’t with proper care taken). We have a call to bind up the wounds of the world, to offer Christ to the lost, to urge repentance on the fallen. I find it terribly sad that committed health-care professionals and social workers often do a better job at the first responsibility than the church of Christ. And the church is the only organization to offer the spiritual relief of the latter two. If we fail here, eternity feels the impact.
Surely not all of us will be called to foster HIV babies or to care for AIDS patients, but all of us can have a godly mind-set that allows us to hurt for the victims, their pain, their spiritual needs. We must remember that any life cut short is a thing of sorrow. A life cut short while still at enmity with God is truly tragic.
Discussion Questions
What happens when culture and the Bible disagree? As Christians, where and how should we take our stand? Read Psalm 119:9–11, 24, 89; Luke 18:9–14; Colossians 3:5, 12, 14; and 2 Timothy 3:16–17.
When we’re called to confront sin, how can we exemplify the Christlike balance of grace and truth mentioned in John 1:14, and avoid being self-righteous and judgmental? Read Matthew 22:37–39 and Ephesians 4:15.
We tend to grade sins, saying some are worse than others, much as Clay did Ted’s. Certainly some have graver consequences. How does God view sin? Read Proverbs 6:16–19; Matthew 12:31; Romans 3:23; and Ephesians 5:3. How does God deal with sin? Read Romans 5:8 and Ephesians 2:1–5.
Leigh needs to forgive Clay for all those lonely years of struggle. Have you needed to offer forgiveness to someone who hurt you deeply? What does forgiving mean? Read Psalm 103:8–12. How permanent is God’s forgiveness?
Read 1 Corinthians 6:18–19. Discuss the practical ramifications of these truths using Clay, Ted, and Leigh as your examples.
When Julia and Will discover Ted’s lifestyle, they make an important decision regarding their reactions to him. In chapter 3, Will delineates what will be their ultimate aim, making a statement similar to Paul’s in 1 Corinthians 11:1. How does this principle apply to us?
In chapter 21, Leigh compares Clay and Ted to the biblical twins Jacob and Esau (Genesis 25:19ff.), likening Clay to the wronged twin Esau. In Genesis 33, we read the story of the meeting of the two, after years of separation brought on by Jacob’s deceit. What actions of Esau does Leigh use to challenge Clay, and how does this challenge apply to us today?
Read Habakkuk 3:17–19. The phrase in verse 19: “He will … bring me safely over the mountains” (NLT) speaks powerfully to Clay’s heart in chapter 26. What does it mean to Clay? What does it mean to you?
The women in Spring Rain are strong characters and strong in character. What lessons, practical as well as spiritual, can we learn from Leigh and Julia? Read 2 Corinthians 5:17; Galatians 6:9–10; and Colossians 4:5–6.
Clay, Ted, and David all have issues and failures they need to confront. Discuss their choices as they confront these problem areas. For Clay read 1 Corinthians 13:1–4. For Ted read Romans 8:38–39 and James 4:17. For David
read Psalm 118:5–7.