by Dean Hughes
But Wally said, “She’s thought a lot about this. I really think it’s the right thing for her.” He sat down next to LaRue.
“It’s hard for me,” Bea said. “We’re finally together, and now some are leaving already.”
“Well, that’s how life is,” Alex said, and he meant a lot of things. But he feared for Peter, and especially for LaRue. There were so many dangers she didn’t understand yet.
***
Later that evening, after the sun had finally gone down, people began to head home. The Stoltzes left first, and then Lorraine and Wally, Richard and Bobbi. As the house quieted, little Gene had crawled up on his Grandpa’s lap, and Al had read him a couple of storybooks. But somewhere in the middle of the second one, Al heard steady breathing, and he looked down to see Gene’s long eyelashes resting shut. Al closed the book, tucked Gene a little closer to him, and simply sat there holding him.
When Anna came in to get him, Al held his finger to his lips and said softly, “I’ll carry him out to the car. You get your things together.”
“No, no. Alex can carry him. You sit there until we’re ready.” Anna went off, and then Bea walked into the living room. She smiled down at Al. “That’s a precious picture,” she said. “I’d like to have a snapshot of you two.”
But Al had some things on his mind by then. “Bea, we’ve been blessed,” he said. But he didn’t know how, exactly, to tell her what he was feeling.
“I know, Al,” Bea said. “I’ve been thinking the same thing all day.”
“We’re going to be fine,” he said. “This next generation is going to do all right.”
“Even LaRue?”
“I think so.”
“I think so, too. Or at least I hope so. It just seems like there will always be things to worry about.”
“Well, sure. There will be.”
Bea was still looking down at him, as though she understood that he had something else to say.
“Bea, I’ve been thinking a lot about the new house. When it gets right down to it, I’m not sure I want to leave this place.”
“Well . . . you know how I feel about that.”
“Maybe, when the house is finished, we could just go ahead and sell it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, I am. I want to stay here. This is home. The kids all say the same thing. They want to have this place to come back to.”
“Thank you, Al,” Bea said, and she bent and kissed him, and she kissed little Gene, too. “It’s funny, but I’ve been feeling blue all day about that very thing. I just couldn’t think of Christmas or Easter, or the next Twenty-Fourth, in some other place.”
Al nodded, but he was surprised at how easy the decision had been. What he knew was that it had come to him that morning, up there at the new monument.
“Let me help Anna gather up her things,” Bea said, and she walked back to the kitchen.
Al leaned back and shut his eyes. He felt sleepy after such a long day. But he thought again of the ceremony that morning, of how much it had meant to him. He wondered what Brigham Young would think of everything now, if he could see what had been made of this valley that he and his little group had settled a hundred years before. Maybe Brigham would be surprised to see all the growth, to see what the Saints had become, but probably not. He’d probably known it all, even then, and known that some of that growth would bring disappointment. Surely he would have foreseen the mistakes, the sins, even the wars. The thing about life was to learn from it. Brigham had always known that.
Al thought too, as he often did, of his Grandpa Thomas, out on the plains, continuing on when his heart was broken. That was the beginning of this family trek.
In a few minutes he heard the front door open—that sticky front door. For just a moment he thought of how much he had wanted to get out of this old house and have something new. But he was content with the decision he and Bea had made. He even remembered exactly when he had reached his own decision. Father Hunt, the Catholic bishop, up at the ceremony, had talked about the victory of the “spiritual over the material.” He had said that people in the Salt Lake Valley needed to “restore pioneer virtues.” That had sounded so much like some of his own sermons, and suddenly the new house had not seemed right to him. There were things to keep, and there were things to let go. The house didn’t matter so much, but the life he and Bea and the kids had shared there did. He had suddenly wondered whether that big new house might not change them in some way, cut them off from who they had always been. He didn’t want to take that chance, and he had known all along that Bea didn’t either.
So Al was content with all that. But what he wished was that he could have a few more minutes with Gene, that he could just sit there and hold him a little longer. Still, he wasn’t about to complain. It had been long day for everyone. But it had been a good one.
Author’s Note
This is the last book in the Children of the Promise series. What a strange feeling it is for me to say that. I’ve worked for seven years on these books and honestly never worked harder in my life. The research has been fun but time-consuming, and the writing and rewriting process has seemed endless. For five of those years, every time I finished a novel I immediately started the next one. So why am I feeling such a sense of loss? I suppose, in part, because I will miss the Thomases. I know that they exist only when I put words in their mouths or invent their actions, but it doesn’t seem so to me. They seem like friends—or family—with all the complexities of real human beings. I may come back to the Thomases in some way, write about them in another era or from a different angle, but I believe this stopping place—July 24, 1947—is the right one for this series.
Writing these novels has deepened my respect for the generation that sent its sons and daughters off to set things right, who put aside personal goals “for the duration,” who suffered immeasurable worry and loss. At the same time, I am disturbed by the romanticized version of the war that continues to be presented in movies and even in some of our patriotic messages. My greatest worry is that future generations will not understand the horror that was unleashed on the world during World War II. I hope my series has found a balance between the respect I feel for the soldiers and the distaste I feel for war.
I have worked hard to be accurate in my historical accounts, but to create fictional characters and give them life in history, I did alter some minor facts. The branch in Frankfurt, for example, actually met at the relatively undamaged mission home after the war. I needed a branch for the fictional President Meis, so I had his members meet in a Gasthaus. Many branches in Germany met in those or similar circumstances, so I felt that was representative, not misleading.
I want to clarify also that the words of Elder Ezra Taft Benson in his speech to the members in Frankfurt were actually delivered in Hannover. I would assume, however, that he said similar things in Frankfurt. Of course, the conversation Elder Benson had with Alex is also fictional, but I did not invent his sentiments. He actually expressed them to me. In 1965, when I was about to return from the South German Mission, President Benson (then president of the European Mission) interviewed me. I asked him whether he had any advice for a returning missionary. He surprised me by telling me not to plan too far into the future. Then he gave me the same advice that I had him give to Alex.
For this volume, the one “must read” book for those interested in LDS history is Frederick W. Babbel’s On Wings of Faith (Bookcraft, 1972). This is the record of Brother Babbel’s travels with Elder Benson throughout Europe in 1946.
I want to thank the people who have helped me so much in creating these novels. Sheri Dew was instrumental in conceiving and designing the series. Jack Lyon has been my editor. Jay Parry, Emily Watts, and Timothy Robinson have also read the manuscripts and given me excellent artistic and editorial advice. Ron Millett, president and CEO of Deseret Book Company, has amazingly made time in his demanding schedule to read them as well, and he has always been supportive. Members of the
board of directors at Deseret Book have taken unusual interest in the project; most of them have expressed their enthusiasm to me. A number of friends and family members have read the manuscripts and given me responses: my son Tom and his wife Kristen; my daughter Amy Russell and her husband Brad; my son Rob; my friends David and Shauna Weight, Sharon and Richard Jeppesen, Kathy Luke, Carolyn Rasmus, Pam Russell, and Cathryn Manning.
Of special help has been Horst A. Reschke, a native German who now lives in Utah. He wrote to me after the second book was published, complimented me for my overall accuracy, and then, with kindness and German directness, pointed out some mistakes. Since then, he has been willing to read the manuscripts and check my German language and history. He was in Hannover on the day in 1946 when Elder Benson spoke, and he allowed me to use a copy of that text along with other materials he has collected. He grew up in Germany during the war years and was able to give me insight into the challenges LDS families faced.
I dedicated the first book to my wife, Kathy, but that doesn’t begin to express the thankfulness I feel for her assistance. She brainstormed with me all along the way and is responsible for the ideas behind some of the best scenes and plot lines. She’s a busy woman (in Provo I’m known as “Kathy’s husband”), but she has taken the time to read the manuscripts over and over, draft after draft. She has always made me feel that I was doing something wonderful even as she was raising hard questions and pointing out serious problems.
This last book is dedicated to my son Rob. He is a careful, intelligent reader, and he has read the drafts of all five novels. He catches my typos and writing errors, but he also raises wise questions about the content and artistry of the fiction. He, with the rest of my family, has enjoyed making suggestions for plot elements as the series has progressed. That is one of the losses I will feel the most: the fun of having the Thomas family as part of our family.
I hope I have given readers an enjoyable and memorable reading experience, for they certainly deserve one. Their responses have been touching, and while the demand for the “next one” has kept me breathless at times, I’ve been moved by the interest and the expressions of appreciation. This has not been an easy time in my life, but I will always remember it as blessed. And for that, I thank you.