by BJ Hoff
“But why would he do such a thing?” Bethany frowned in disbelief. “Does Michael really understand Maylee’s condition, that she’s going to require more and more care eventually, and that she won’t ever be well?”
“I assure you, Michael understands. I made certain of that. As to why he’s willing to do this, why he wants to do it”—he smiled a little—“all he would say was that God had put it on his heart. He’s quite resolved.”
“How amazing!”
Andrew slowed the horses and turned in toward the lake. “Let’s watch the skaters for a bit, shall we? Or are you too cold?”
“No, I’m fine,” Bethany said, distracted. “Does Maylee know about this?”
“Not yet. I thought you’d want to be with me when I tell her. Perhaps we can go and see her tomorrow.”
He paused. “This will be a good thing for her, Bethany. There’s certainly room for her at Bantry Hill, and Michael says she’ll have plenty of attention and care. In addition to Susanna and the Dempseys, he’s employed a new man and his family from Ireland. They’re already living there, on the premises. There’s a wife and a grown daughter, and they’ve agreed to help with Maylee.”
“He’s thought this through, then? You’re quite certain?”
Andrew leaned back against the seat of the sleigh. “He seems to have considered everything very carefully,” he said. “He’s already broached the subject with the MacGoverns—that’s the family he recently hired on. And as I said, he’s discussed it with Susanna and by now, I’m sure, with Caterina, too. Actually, he makes it sound as if the lot of them are looking forward to having Maylee there.” He paused. “This means she’ll have a real home, Bethany. She won’t have to spend what’s left of her life in an institution.”
According to Andrew, Maylee’s parents had abandoned her when she was still a toddler. Once they realized they had a desperately ill child on their hands, they had deposited her at a church door and fled. The cruelty of that abandonment never ceased to anger Bethany.
She suspected that Andrew had been praying about Maylee’s situation for some time now. As a matter of fact, so had she, although God hardly needed her prayers when He had Andrew’s.
She scanned their surroundings for a moment. The park looked like one of those lithographs by Mr. Currier and Mr. Ives: the skaters on the lake, the trees, some of which had grown quite tall, the rustic, snow-covered arbors, and in the distance the graceful Bow Bridge. Were it not for the crowds of people everywhere, they could have been in the country instead of a city park.
Bethany knew that Andrew came here sometimes, when he wanted to get away by himself, just to sit and think…or perhaps to pray. There had been a time when keeping company with such a godly man, a man given to speaking of God and prayer and spiritual things as easily as others spoke of politics or banking might have intimidated Bethany. But no longer. Andrew might be a man of faith, but he was thoroughly down to earth.
She respected him as she had no other man except for her grandfather, but she was no longer quite so daunted by his faith as she had once been. Actually, Andrew himself was the one who had helped her realize that she needn’t be some sort of a spiritual giant to prove herself a Christian, that it was enough to love God, to trust Him, and be obedient to His will.
“I’m no more important to God than you are,” he continued to impress upon her. “And my prayers carry no more weight with the Almighty than do yours.”
Abruptly, Bethany turned to him. “How do you pray for Maylee, Andrew? If you don’t mind my asking, that is.”
“Of course, I don’t mind,” he said quietly. “Well, naturally I continue to pray for her healing. But mostly I’ve prayed for comfort for her—for a place where she’ll be truly wanted and loved. I’ve often wished I could take care of her myself, but I’m so seldom at home—”
Bethany nodded. “Don’t think the idea hasn’t occurred to me, too. But neither of us is in a position to give her full-time care.”
Her mind was racing. “Monitoring her care will be an ongoing need. That will mean frequent trips upriver.”
“We can manage that, don’t you think?”
“Traveling to Bantry Hill would hardly be a burden. You know I love going there. I still can’t comprehend Michael doing this,” Bethany went on. “And for a child he’s only just met.”
“I don’t know that we can ever understand someone like Michael.” Andrew flexed the fingers of one gloved hand, then the other, as if to ease the stiffness. “I do know he’s a man of genuine compassion—a kind of compassion so rare that surely it can’t be anything but a gift. A God gift. I must say I admire him tremendously.”
They were sitting very close together now. Bethany looked into his face—the strong features, the boyish shock of hair falling over his forehead, the faint web of lines at the corners of his eyes. Something tugged at her heart. When had he become so much more than a colleague? More than a friend?
When had he come to mean more to her than she was comfortable admitting, even to herself?
On impulse, she closed the small distance between them, touching her lips to his lean, clean-shaven cheek. “And I admire you, Andrew Carmichael.”
He turned an endearing shade of pink. “For what?”
“For caring so much about a lonely little girl. And for being—” She paused. “Just…for being yourself.”
His gaze fell upon her, intense with unspoken questions. Then without warning, this man—her partner in medicine, her closest friend, her only confidant—slowly removed his hat and lowered his face to hers.
He kissed her with uncommon gentleness, one corner of her mouth, then the other. Slowly, she touched his cheek, and he turned into her touch, then took her face between his hands and kissed her again.
In that moment Bethany’s complacency with the order of her life, the fullness and satisfaction and independence she’d been so certain her career would bring, seemed to lift away like a mist rising over the frozen lake. She felt herself take a sharp turn and step onto a new pathway. Her present began to fade and recede until the only thing she could see was a future with Andrew.
22
NO MORE SECRETS
To think, the fullness my yearning heart has long been seeking was here then, and still abides, in your safekeeping.
ANONYMOUS
Frank had almost changed his mind about approaching them, had actually started to move the horse slowly down the snow-covered hill. But he drew to a sharp halt when he saw what they were about, saw Doc remove his hat, draw her close, and dip his head toward hers.
Something tightened in his chest, and a taste as bitter as salt water burned his mouth as he watched them. He hadn’t meant to spy, but for a moment he couldn’t look away, even though his pulse was beating in his ears like a drumroll.
He had known jealousy only once before in his life, but it had been nothing like this scalding, squeezing sense of being pushed away, an impotent outsider. The awareness of what was happening to him took him completely off guard, and, shaken, he struggled to rein in his treacherous feelings.
In truth, he was envious of both of them: Doc, because he had obviously claimed for himself the heart of a woman Frank could only admire…and desire… at a distance; and Bethany Cole, because she now wielded even more influence with the only man Frank Donovan had ever called a friend.
Slammed by a wall of emotions he couldn’t begin to understand—didn’t want to understand—he hauled his mount around and took off in a fury, throwing snow before and behind him as he charged up the hill.
Andrew drew back. “We need to talk,” he said, his voice unsteady. “But not at the risk of your freezing to death. Let’s find a coffee shop.”
Bethany hesitated, then looked around. “Over there,” she said, pointing to a snow-hooded arbor, ringed by benches beneath its canopy.
“Aren’t you cold?”
“No, I’m fine. It’s so beautiful here, I’d rather stay outside.”
They l
eft the sleigh, stopping to buy a bag of hot roasted chestnuts before claiming one of the benches that faced the bridge. Gas lamps and carriage lanterns cast their soft glow into the night, dappling the riding paths and hillsides with light and shadow.
They were secluded, surrounded by dense vines, trees, and shrubbery frosted with snow. It seemed that everyone else in the park was either on the ice or circling the lake in a sleigh.
Bethany bit into a chestnut, mindful of Andrew’s eyes on her. She felt uncommonly nervous. The chestnut seemed to lodge in her throat. She glanced at Andrew to see that he wasn’t eating at all, just watching her. For some reason, she couldn’t quite face him yet.
In a matter of moments, everything had changed.
The problem was, she wasn’t sure she wanted things to change. Nevertheless, one of them probably needed to say something.
“Bethany, I’ve never told you exactly how I feel about you, but I expect by now you know.”
Andrew cringed. His voice sounded as if it were coming from someone else. It was too loud, his tone too formal. His words spilled out too quickly, as though he were desperate to say everything at once and get it over with. He knew his face must be crimson, and not from the cold.
“You’ve…probably known for some time,” he repeated lamely. “Certainly before tonight.”
Bethany turned to look at him, her eyes wide and searching. “You’ve become very important to me, Bethany. I care for you. Deeply. You already know that. But I haven’t wanted to bring this up until I was…until I knew—”
“If I care for you?” she finished for him.
He nodded, holding his breath. “That, too, but there’s more—”
“Andrew, of course, I care for you. Surely, you’ve realized that.” Her lips curved in just the faintest hint of a smile, and she lifted her hand as if she might touch him, but instead dropped it back to her lap.
“I had…hoped.”
He moved to tuck a stray lock of hair back under her hat, then traced one side of her face with the back of his hand. “You are so incredibly lovely,” he said, nearly strangling on the words. “I never get enough of just…looking at you.”
“Now you’re embarrassing me,” she said, but Andrew thought she looked pleased. And she moved closer to him.
He caught her hand and held it. “Bethany, there are things I need to tell you. Now, before we talk about anything else. I’ve been meaning to tell you for some time, but I keep putting it off, afraid—”
“Andrew, I’m just not sure—”
He put up a hand to interrupt her. “I think I know what you’re going to say, Bethany, and I understand.”
Frank Donovan’s warning echoed in his mind. “If it’s settlin’ down to home and hearth fire you’re wanting, I confess I don’t quite see that happening with your Dr. Cole…Can you honestly see the woman with a passel of young’uns hangin’ on to her skirts while she stirs the soup?”
Before she could say anything more, he hurried to reassure her. “I wouldn’t ask you to give up…anything, Bethany.”
She frowned. “What are you talking about?”
“I wouldn’t expect you to give up medicine,” he said, the words pouring out in a rush. “Surely you know I would never ask that of you! If we were to…if we were married…I wouldn’t for a minute expect you to stop practicing.”
“Andrew—are you asking me to marry you?”
“I…well, not yet. I mean, yes. Yes, I am, but there’s something else I want to tell you before—”
“I should think so.”
“What?”
“I believe it’s common to at least mention the word ‘love’ before proposing marriage.”
Andrew reared back. “Well, of course, I love you! I’ve already admitted that—”
“No, as a matter of fact, you haven’t.”
Andrew felt his face flame. “I…must have thought about saying it so often that I just assumed I had.”
She shook her head, her lips pressed together.
“Well, now I have.”
“So you have.” Her eyes glinted with humor.
“I realize I’m no prize, Bethany. Believe me, it’s taken every shred of nerve I have simply to get to this point. But I’d be—”
“Andrew—”
He stopped, waiting.
“Let’s both admit that I’m not exactly any prize either. At least not for a man who wants a more…traditional marriage. I couldn’t give up medicine, Andrew. I simply couldn’t. I’ve worked too long, too hard—”
“I know you have, and you’re an excellent doctor,” he interrupted. “You love medicine—”
“Yes, I do—”
“And I love you too much to ask you to give up anything that means so much to you—”
“And what if we should have children?”
That set him back. Still, it was a perfectly legitimate question. “I’d like children, of course—eventually—but it would mean your taking time off from the practice—”
“But not necessarily giving it up altogether.”
“Oh, no. Of course not. We’d…work it out.”
She said nothing for a moment, but he could tell she was thinking. As much as he hated to give her anything else to think about, he knew he must.
“Bethany, there’s the matter of my health—”
She tried to preserve a calm front, but inside she was churning. She should have known he would raise the issue himself, wouldn’t leave it to her. And ever since Frank Donovan had drilled her with his cynical diatribe that day in the police wagon, she had played this very question over and over in her mind. But now that she knew that he loved her—and that she loved him—she could no more give him up because of his poor health than she could have struck him and left him to die.
“Your health isn’t an issue with me, Andrew.”
“Perhaps it should be. It will most likely get worse, Bethany. We both know that.”
She nodded. “I won’t lie to you, Andrew. Of course your health worries me. But it worries me because I care for you, and because I hate the idea of your being in pain. But this illness is a part of you. And if I’m to be a part of your life, then we’ll face everything together. Including the arthritis.”
It struck her then that she wasn’t simply reassuring him or trying to convince herself. What she was saying was true—as true as her love for Andrew. Frank Donovan had been wrong.
Very wrong.
“Think about this, Andrew: if it were turned around, if I were to be afflicted with an ongoing illness, would you want me any less? Would you reject me?”
“Of course not!”
“Well, then?”
He nodded, his gaze never leaving hers. “Point taken. And I won’t deny it’s a huge relief to me. But there’s something else, Bethany. Something I should have told you long ago, and certainly before I asked you to marry me.”
Bethany laughed. “My goodness, Andrew, you certainly are taking a long time getting around to proposing to me.”
But he didn’t share her laughter. He looked pale, the shadow of his beard darker than before. His eyes smoldered with pain. For a moment Bethany wondered if the arthritis had flared, but she sensed that this was a different kind of pain—and that whatever he was about to say might be of a far more devastating nature than the issue of his health.
When he began to speak, he looked…and sounded…weak. Weak and miserable. In spite of the cold, perspiration lined his forehead and upper lip, and his hands were trembling visibly.
“You can’t imagine how I hate telling you this. I’d give anything if I didn’t have to, but then I wouldn’t be able to live with myself.”
He stared out across the park in the direction of the bridge. “I need you to know that when I’ve finished, I will completely understand if you want nothing more to do with me. Perhaps you won’t even want to practice with me. No matter what else has happened between us, no matter what’s been said tonight, you owe me nothing. No commitment.�
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“Andrew, nothing could be so bad that I’d walk away from you.” Bethany spoke the words, but his bleak stare sent a chill coursing through her. He hadn’t replaced his hat, and he began to run it around and around between his fingers.
“Do you remember the day we talked about your grandfather? I told you I’d read some of his papers on narcotics addiction?”
Bethany nodded.
“In truth, I’d read everything I could get my hands on about the subject, not just your grandfather’s research. But medical curiosity wasn’t my reason for studying your grandfather’s publications.”
Bethany watched him, a cold knot forming deep inside her as he went on.
“I was an addict, Bethany. I was addicted to opium.”
His tone was as wooden as before, but his eyes were heavy with shame. They sat staring at each other for one long, terrible moment as Bethany fought to hold on to her composure.
“How?”
“Are you quite sure you want to hear this?” Andrew’s voice was still flat, but his features were sculpted in anguish.
“Whether I want to hear it is beside the point. I think I must hear it.”
His eyes went over her face, and then slowly, he nodded.
“It began when I was still in medical college. One of the faculty physicians—well-intentioned, I’m sure, but careless, now that I look back on it—started me on small doses of opium, to help me manage the pain. This was at the outset of the arthritis, when the symptoms were absolutely brutal, and he’d seen that I was having a bad time of it. But I was determined not to give up my training, and so, meaning to help, he saw to it that I could get however much of the drug I needed, to see me through. As I said, he no doubt meant well, even though he had to know the risk. Before I knew what was happening—”