Children of the Promise

by Dean Hughes

  “The band was playing, ‘I Get Along Without You Very Well.’”

  “So you remember that?”

  “I’ve thought about it a thousand times. That was the same night you took me up to the Country Club, and we stole those golf balls out of the pond.”

  “And I kissed you.” But he knew he shouldn’t have said that, and so he forced himself to laugh again, and he said, “That’s also when you told me that you didn’t want me to do that ever again.”

  “But you did.”

  “Well . . . yes.”

  There was a silence for a time, and then Lorraine said, “You were kind of a dangerous guy then. Or at least I thought so.”

  “You told me that I’d never get my feet on the ground—never make anything of myself.”

  “I know. That was cruel.” She set her hand on the seat, as though she were reaching halfway to him. He glanced down at her long fingers, thought of the times they had walked together, holding hands.

  “Hey, you were right. Dead right. I was heading nowhere. Maybe I still am.”

  “No. You’ll do great now. I’m so happy for you, the way things are turning out.”

  “Well, I hope things go all right. It sounds like everything is working out just right for you.”

  “I think so. I learned a lot during the war—in different ways from you, of course, but I did some growing up myself.”

  “How are you different?”

  “I gained a lot of confidence. In my job, I had to make decisions. I had to lead people—both men and women—and trust in myself. It was exciting. And satisfying. The best thing that could have happened to me. But now I’m ready for a quieter life.”

  Wally was turning, heading up to Thirteenth East, where Lorraine lived. He wanted to take a longer drive, but he didn’t know what she would think if he took her any way but straight home. “Are you sure you won’t miss all the excitement?”

  “I don’t think so. I’m starting to feel like an old woman. I want to get a family started before I get any older.”

  “You’re just as beautiful as you always were, Lorraine. Even more.”

  Wally knew that he had gone a little too far. The words were not exactly inappropriate, but he heard the fondness in his voice, and clearly, so did she. “Thank you,” she said, softly, formally, and then not another word.

  When Wally stopped the car in front of Lorraine’s house, he didn’t turn the engine off. He tried to lighten his voice when he said, “It’s been great to see you. I hope you get your wish—and have those babies right away. I’d like to meet your fiancé one of these days.”

  “He wants to meet you, too. He told me that.”

  “Well . . . good.” But then he couldn’t resist telling her what he was thinking. “This reminds me of the last time I saw you—that day I told you I was going into the Air Corps.” He laughed. “I wanted you to beg me not to go—and you wouldn’t do it.”

  Her hand was on the handle, but she didn’t open the door. “Wally, I know I hurt you that day. But it was hard for me, too. I went to my bedroom and cried until I thought my heart was going to break. But I really did think I was doing the right thing.”

  “Lorraine, there’s no question about it. It was the right thing.”

  She had been looking down at the seat, but her eyes came up now, engaged his. “Is that really how you feel?” she asked.

  He didn’t know what she was asking, but his chest suddenly stiffened. What did he dare say? “Well . . . I’m just saying that you were right about me. It was the right decision, at the time.”

  She was still looking at him, not speaking, but he couldn’t tell what she was thinking.

  “You stood on the porch that day, and the sun was setting, so everything was sort of yellow and hazy. You said, ‘I love you too, Wally, but it would never work.’”

  She nodded.

  “Then you walked into the house, and the screen door sort of stuck when you tried to pull it open the first time. Then, inside, I could see you through the screen, walking down the hallway. You were wearing a blue dress, with white polka-dots. That’s what I remembered all the years I’ve been gone—you in that golden light, saying you loved me, then walking away. I’ve seen the whole thing in my mind so many times it’s still like it happened yesterday.”

  “Wally, I don’t want you to take this wrong. I shouldn’t even say anything like this. But I just want you to know that I’ve thought about that day over and over, too—all these years. It still hurts me, too, even now. But I guess, in life, we all have memories like that. It hurt me when I sent John, my fiancé, back to sea this last time, too. Maybe bittersweet memories like that make life more meaningful, and hard choices make us grow. Do you know what I mean?”

  Wally couldn’t think of it that way, not now, but he said he did, and then he added, “We had that time together, those years we were such good friends. We’ll never lose that. We just have to see what’s coming next—what other good things life has for us.”

  “You’re going to find someone wonderful, Wally. I know that. She’ll be a lucky girl.”

  Wally tried to laugh, but he was struggling now. “I hope so. Right now, I’m still afraid to ask a girl out on a date. That’s one step I haven’t taken yet.”

  “You will, Wally. Don’t worry, the girls are going to be after you—by the dozens. You’re a catch now. You’ve got everything going for you.”

  “I’ll take your word for it.” He grinned.

  She opened the door and got out. Then she bent back down to say, “Thanks, Wally. It really was great to see you.”

  But Wally was crushed by how much this felt like the last time they had said good-bye, and he hated the idea that he had to go through this again. So he said the only thing that seemed to leave a door open. “Will I see you again?”

  “Well, who knows? Maybe somewhere.” And then she made herself clear. “I’m getting married here in Salt Lake. I’ll send you an invitation. But after that, it’s hard to say where we’ll live. Probably lots of different places.”

  “Yeah, I’m sure that’s right. Well . . . good luck, Lorraine. God bless you.”

  “You too, Wally. Good-bye.” She shut the door.

  Wally drove home, numb. He had wanted to see her and yet feared it, had sensed that he might feel this way, and now he had left himself wide open for another round of torment. He told himself what he had been saying for five years: that he would find someone else he could love as much. His only problem was, he couldn’t imagine that actually happening, at least not at the moment.

  When he parked the car at home and walked inside, Dad was in the living room, sitting in his chair. “Did it take you that long to get out of there?” he asked.

  “Sort of. I ran into Lorraine Gardner. We talked for a few minutes, and then I gave her a lift home.”

  “So what’s going on with her?”

  Wally tried to sound off-handed as he told his dad about the impending wedding, but his mother heard him from the kitchen and stepped out. “You gave her a ride home?” she asked.

  “Sure. I didn’t want to hold her parents up, and it was kind of fun to talk to her for a few minutes.”

  “She’s as pretty as ever, isn’t she?”

  “She’s beautiful.”

  But Wally hadn’t handled the word as well as he wanted, and his parents seemed to hear that. “This is hard for you, isn’t it, son?” Dad said.

  “Well . . . yes. A little harder than I expected. But I’ve been through some harder things. I’ll manage this one all right.”

  “You’ll meet someone, Wally,” Mom said. “You have to start asking some girls out—right away. If you don’t, I’ll start arranging dates for you.”

  “I might have to let you do that. I’m scared to death to try it myself.”

  “These days, the girls just might ask you,” Dad said. “They’re getting bolder all the time, and you fellows are in short supply.”

  Wally nodded and tried to smile. H
e took a step toward the stairs and then stopped. “Say, Dad, I wanted to tell you, I don’t think you need to regret anything about your time as stake president. You really shouldn’t.”

  “Now that’s funny. I seem to remember you saying something about the length of the talks I used to give.”

  Wally reached under his suit coat and stuck his hands into his trouser pockets. He shook his head and laughed. “Well, some of them were a little long,” he said. But then he added, seriously, “I hate to hear you questioning yourself about asking too much of people or being too hard. There’s nothing hard about you. I was just too young to understand that back then.”

  Dad nodded. “Thanks,” he said quietly. “Your saying that means more to me than you probably realize.”

  Wally thought about walking over to his dad and embracing him, but he had already done that a few times since he had come home, and it usually ended up embarrassing both of them. So Wally hugged his mother instead, and he said, “In the camps, you could tell the guys who had good families. They had more to live for. More of them made it through. And I had the best.”

  Mom said, “And now it’s time for you to have a family of your own. That would be the best thing in the world for you.”

  “Maybe you’d better fix me up with a date, then,” he said, and he laughed. “I can’t marry a girl unless I take her out a time or two. At least I think that’s how it works.”

  “Don’t worry; I have girls in mind already.”

  “Good.”

  “Do you want a date this week?”

  “No. Not quite yet.”

  “When?”

  “Soon. I’ll tell you when.”

  “Will you really?”

  “Yes. I promise.”

  Wally went upstairs to his old room, the one that he and Gene had once shared. He sat down on his bed. He really did need to start dating right away. That would be the best thing for him. But what he found was that a new image was in his head, a replacement of an old one: the car door shutting—firmly, solidly—and then Lorraine retreating up the same sidewalk and into the same house where she had disappeared from his life the last time. This time her dress was green, but her walk was the same, that lovely way she moved.

  Chapter 9

  Anna went shopping for groceries on Monday morning while Gene napped. When she got back, she stepped into the kitchen where her mother and father were sitting at the table across from each other. Anna saw immediately that something had happened. Frieda Stoltz had been crying, her eyelids rubbed red, but she looked bright, enlivened. Heinrich Stoltz was sitting up straight, his eyes keen. And then Anna knew what it had to be. “Have you heard from Peter?”

  “Yes. Yes,” her mother said. She stood up and grabbed Anna in her arms. “We got a telegram from Alex. Peter showed up in Frankfurt. He’s fine. He’s healthy and well.”

  Anna had to put her net full of groceries down. She felt a little dizzy. For the past few weeks she had resigned herself to Peter’s loss—and now he was alive again. “Oh, Mama,” she said. Her father was coming to her now, and she turned and clasped him tight.

  Her mother leaned her head against Anna’s shoulder at the same time, and Anna felt her tremble with new tears, heard her father whisper, “It’s so good. It’s such a relief.”

  “Where has he been all this time?” Anna asked.

  “We don’t know,” Brother Stoltz said. “Alex only told us that Peter had found him at church, in Frankfurt. He says that a letter is also on its way. I’m sure he’ll tell us more in that.”

  “But Peter is healthy? Is that the word he used?”

  Sister Stoltz stepped away and pulled the telegram from her apron pocket. “Yes. Healthy.”

  Anna took the telegram and read it. She was almost frightened that somehow her parents had misread the words, that it wasn’t really true. But there it was: “He’s healthy and doing fine. I will arrange to have him travel to London.”

  It was all so wonderful and yet baffling. Where had he been? Why hadn’t he made his way to Frankfurt sooner? “I wonder—how soon will he come?” Anna asked.

  “It shouldn’t take long,” Brother Stoltz said. “I would think he could be here for Christmas.”

  “Oh, Papa, what a gift. I can’t believe it yet.”

  She took him into her arms again, and for the first time, he began to cry. “It’s more than I deserve,” he said. “I was afraid that my mistakes had killed him, and I would have to live out my life knowing that.”

  “You made no mistakes, Papa. It all worked out all right. And we’ll be back together again. Just think what it will be like to have him here for Christmas.”

  “We have no Christmas gift for him,” Sister Stoltz said. “We need to go shopping so we’ll have something under the . . .” She stopped and laughed. “We have no tree either.”

  “Still, we need a gift for him,” Anna said.

  “Let’s go now,” Brother Stoltz said. “It will be a little outing for us. We need to celebrate.”

  “You two go,” Mother said. “Gene is still sleeping. I’ll stay with him. And when you get back, I’ll have a nice meal ready. Like Sunday dinner.”

  “No, no, Mama,” Anna said. “Gene will be awake before long. We’ll wrap him up and take him with us. He’ll like the air.”

  Sister Stoltz laughed. “Peter will love Gene so much,” she said. “Can you think how he will pamper him?”

  What came to Anna’s mind was a picture of Peter—young Peter—kneeling on the floor with little Benjamin Rosenbaum. Peter had been such a kindly boy. But she had to wonder, what would he be now? What had the war done to him? And

  what had Alex meant by “healthy”? Was Peter really all right?

  In the next few minutes everyone got ready, and Anna picked up Gene, who was beginning to stir anyway. He woke up for a moment but then settled in and slept in her arms as she and her parents walked to the Baker Street Station and then rode the Underground train to Oxford Street. They ended up in Selfridge’s department store, wandering about, looking at clothing and “Men’s furnishings,” hardly knowing what might be appropriate. “I have no idea what size shirt he would wear, or coat. He probably needs everything,” Sister Stoltz said. “But we’ll have to wait until he gets here to know what to get.”

  They considered warm mufflers, stockings, underwear, but all of it seemed so ordinary and uninteresting. Finally Brother Stoltz said, “When I was in Germany, and alone, what I wanted most was a Book of Mormon. The branch president in Karlsruhe lent me one, and that was the nicest gift I could have received.”

  “But he doesn’t know much English, Heinrich,” Sister Stoltz said. “Where could we find German scriptures?”

  Brother Stoltz had stopped by a display of suitcases, all leather and very expensive. Anna had looked at the prices and realized they were more than the family could think about spending. But she liked the idea of the scriptures. “We should buy them in English for him,” she said. “He needs to learn. We can read with him and help him translate. It’s a good way to help him.”

  “Yes,” Brother Stoltz said. “I think this is so. I’ll give him English lessons—and help him study other books, but we could all read the scriptures together.”

  “They won’t have a Book of Mormon here.”

  “No. We can get that at the church. But we could buy him a nice Bible, leather bound.”

  “Can we afford it, Heinrich?”

  “Yes. We can do that much. Let’s walk down the street. I know where there’s a bookstore.”

  And so they went back out into the cold. Little Gene was awake and looking about by then, and Oxford Street

  was charming. Christmas decorations, for the first time in many years, had returned to store fronts and light poles. And all the lights were on again, everywhere. Gene seemed to wonder at it all. He gazed about, turning his head this way and that, and Anna kept telling him, “See the pretty bells. See the Christmas tree.” She wished so much that Alex could be here t
o share all this, to be with Gene on his first Christmas.

  At the bookstore, the Stoltzes found a host of Bibles and chose one that was especially well bound. “This one will last him for a lifetime,” Brother Stoltz told Anna and his wife. “It could be his family Bible.”

  Sister Stoltz took hold of his arm. “Oh, Heinrich,” she said. “I just keep thinking, we have everything back. Peter can marry and have grandchildren for us. He can be with us as we grow old. We won’t have to spend the rest of our lives missing him.”

  “It’s what I’ve been thinking too,” Brother Stoltz said.

  “I had given up on all those things—without even knowing I had done it.”

  The three were crying now, there in the bookstore. Anna held Gene close, and Brother Stoltz took his wife into his arms. “It’s over,” she whispered. “It’s finally over.”

  And Anna, of course, knew what her mother meant. The family had first gone on the run in 1941. Four and a half years had passed, and every day had been full of worry. Now, for the first time, the Stoltzes had much to be thankful for and little to fear. Anna certainly wondered whether Peter was really all right. She worried about Alex at times, and wondered about the future, but all that was nothing compared to the terror they had known—hiding in Berlin and then making their escape from Germany—or the constant anxiety since the day that Peter had been separated from them at the French border. All of that was finally over, and life could go on. The idea was hard to accept, the change too sudden.

  What also struck Anna was that her family could now take the Thomases up on their offer. President Thomas had written to the Stoltzes about emigrating. He had said that not only could he sponsor them, so they could gain permission, but he could also offer work to Anna’s father. Brother Stoltz hadn’t wanted to go until he was sure about Peter, but now the family would be free to move ahead with the plan. And maybe, before too much longer, Alex would be discharged from the army, and the whole family could be together in Salt Lake City. Anna tried to think what it would be like to be in Utah, where so many people believed in the Church, and where Gene could have two sets of grandparents, uncles and aunts, and in time, cousins to play with. Alex’s brother Wally was home now, and Bobbi would be released before long. It was all what she had dreamed of for so long, and now it really could happen.