As the sermon concluded, Brother Baker gripped the sides of the pulpit, bowing his head for a moment as he always did, to give his message time to sink in. The silence was more powerful than the volume of the sermon.
The pause was uncustomarily short. Brother Baker took a deep breath but didn’t look at us, and spoke almost in a whisper. “This week a young father came to me, confused about his role in the family. He was wondering what his duties were to his child and how he would know if he was fulfilling them. I can’t tell you all that he said to me or exactly what I said in reply. I can tell you that he reminded me of myself when I was a young man. There were so many nights when I was busy with my ministry, or away on missions. My children grew up while I was doing other things, all of which seemed very important at the time.” He paused, letting out a long sigh, then slowly raised his head and looked at us, his blue eyes glittering.
“I won’t be with you this afternoon or next Sunday. My son, John, and my grandson, Caleb, have been put in the hospital after a car accident this morning. John will be going in for surgery this afternoon, and I ask that all of you remember him in prayer. I also ask that this afternoon you spend time with your own families. Young parents, hold your children a little longer today. Kiss them when you put them into bed tonight, say their prayers with them, sit by them while they fall asleep. Your children are the greatest gift God will give to you, and their souls the heaviest responsibility He will place in your hands. Take time with them, teach them to have faith in God. Be a person in whom they can have faith. When you are old, nothing else you’ve done will have mattered as much.”
Tears clouded my eyes as he came forward to kneel with the church elders and pray. No one moved. We sat together and prayed.
When the service concluded, we walked forward to congratulate the children who had performed in the manger scene and to give Brother Baker our best wishes.
The line finally dwindled, and Ben walked Brother Baker to the side door. My mind drifted to the end of the sermon. Your children are the greatest gift God will give to you, and their souls the heaviest responsibility He will place in your hands. When you are old, nothing else you’ve done will have mattered . . .
I wondered if Ben had been listening, if the words would mean anything to him or make any difference. It seemed that he had come to like and respect Brother Baker. . . .
A breeze blew suddenly from the open door, lifting the papers on the pulpit. I glanced over just in time to see Brother Baker take Ben’s face in his hands and lean his forehead into Ben’s. In that instant, I knew Ben was the young father who had sought counsel.
The fears and doubts in my heart were lifted like the papers from the pulpit and gently cast away.
After the service, Uncle Robert treated everyone to lunch at the cafe. The mood there was subdued because of the tragedy in Brother Baker’s family. People dining around us spoke quietly about how terrible it was for such a thing to happen at Christmas, and how it made you realize how fortunate you were to have all of your family together and healthy. Grandma said that sometimes the Lord showed us the suffering of others so that we might be thankful for our own blessings.
She looked at me when she said it, and I nodded with a lump in my throat. I looked at my husband and my son, at my family around me, and I was thankful.
During the drive home, Grandma discovered that Dell’s home had no Christmas tree, and that became her immediate source of concern. When we got to the farm, she insisted that we change clothes immediately and drive the old flatbed truck to the pasture, so that Dell could select a small cedar tree to take home with her.
The old flatbed truck hadn’t been used since the last time Grandma’s yardman hauled away limbs and trash, so Ben and Uncle Robert spent the better part of an hour getting it going. In the meantime, the rest of us sorted through the leftover Christmas decorations and lights so that Dell would have some to hang on her tree.
When we finally heard the truck rumble to life outside, Grandma had just brought out an ancient can of paint to show all of us how to make angels from fabric scraps and pecan shells, as she had done when she was a child.
“Well, it sounds like the truck is started and you’d better go,” Grandma told Dell. Sitting at the kitchen table, she looked pale and tired, but well pleased. “The rest of you go on too. Aunt Jeane and I can stay here and finish these.” She smiled at Dell, who smiled shyly in return. “We’ll have them all ready to go home with you when you get back with your tree.” Raising a finger sternly, she tapped Dell on the end of the nose. “Now don’t select one too large. Children always make the mistake of picking a tree that is too large. It must fit in the house.”
Dell giggled and nodded; then we hurried away as the truck horn honked outside.
Ben and Uncle Robert were waiting in the cab, looking happy with themselves. Dell and I climbed in the back, and we drove out to find a tree as the coming twilight put a chill in the air.
Darkness had descended by the time we returned with the perfect small cedar tree. Dell hurried to the house for her box of decorations, then climbed into the cab of the truck with Ben and Uncle Robert to take her tree home.
When I entered the kitchen, Grandma was looking out the window with an expression of satisfaction as she tried to wash the gold paint off her hands. “That will be a fine tree,” she said. “Christmas trees are best when cut from the pasture and filled with handmade decorations.”
“You’re probably right, Grandma.” I kissed her on the cheek, then stood beside her, washing the cedar sap from my hands. “Dell enjoyed that. It was nice of you to think of getting a tree for her.”
Grandma let out a humph, as if the compliment offended her. “Every child should have a tree. No matter how poor we were, my father always made sure we had a tree and a kettle of homemade hot cider for Christmas guests.” She sighed as the truck disappeared from view. “I wonder when your father will get here.”
I stepped back and pretended to be busy drying my hands. “He hasn’t returned my message yet. He must be gone on a trip somewhere.” Setting down the towel, I turned to leave the kitchen. I was afraid that if she saw my face, she would know the truth. I was convinced that Dad wasn’t coming. “I’m sure he’ll call soon.”
I left her there, staring out the window, because I didn’t know what else to do. In the living room, I reminded Aunt Jeane in a low voice that my father still hadn’t called, and perhaps she should call him. She looked up from the old photo album in her lap and told me she had already tried. Like my messages, hers had gone unreturned. She was certain he was away on a consulting job and would call soon.
I realized suddenly that Joshua was not in the room with her. “Where’s Josh?” I asked, experiencing an instant of panic. Aunt Jeane nodded toward the stairs, the slightest smile curving her lips. “Upstairs,” she said quietly. “He was one tired little fellow.”
“Thanks for watching him,” I whispered, as I sat beside her on the couch to look at the old photo album. Aunt Jeane flipped to the start of the book, and slowly we began turning the pages, laughing at old cars and old clothes as she told me stories about relatives who had died before I was born, ancient farm machinery, and the last team of horses on the farm.
“My daddy hung on to those horses for a long time after we had tractors.” She sounded just like Grandma. In the amber light from the fire, she looked like Grandma Rose in the pictures.
“It nearly killed Grandpa to see those horses go,” Grandma added as she came into the room. She sat on the other side of Aunt Jeane and touched the picture with trembling fingertips. “He kept horses for years after all the other farmers around here had given them up. Oh . . . and, Kate, your father wanted so badly to get rid of those animals. He was all for the newest machinery. Said it wasn’t efficient to have those horses standing here eating when they weren’t any use anymore. But Grandpa hung on. When the tractors would get stuck in the mud, he would smile at your father and tell him to go hook up the team, and here
those horses would come, prancing across the field, so happy to have something to do. Grandpa would hook them on the tractor, and there they would throw themselves into the harness and pull the tractor right out. Grandpa would smile at your dad and throw his hands into the air and say how there were still some ways that horses were better than that new machinery.” Throwing her head back, she laughed, her eyes cloudy with the mist of memories.
Aunt Jeane laughed with her. “My goodness, Mother. I had forgotten all about that.” She shook her head, touching the edge of the picture. “Why did Daddy finally get rid of the horses?”
Grandma sighed and looked into the dying flames of the fire, her smile fading. “Your brother and I talked him into it. There was a man down the road with a small farm and not enough money for a tractor. He offered a good price for the horses and the horse-drawn implements. I could see where we needed that money, and I suppose your brother could see that he wouldn’t have to take care of those horses anymore, and we just badgered your father until he gave in and let the man buy the horses.
“He was so sad about it, he wouldn’t even stay here and take the man’s money. He just went off into the field, and your brother and I harnessed the horses and hooked them to a cultivator. The man gave us his money and drove the horses away.” Looking at the picture again, she shook her head, then turned the page. “I don’t even remember what we did with that money, but I remember the look in your daddy’s eye when those horses were gone. It just broke his heart, and he was never the same after.” She looked slowly at me, and then at Aunt Jeane, her eyes filled with meaning. “Those horses may not have mattered to us, but they were his heart and soul, and he wasn’t himself without them. Sometimes we forget what things are important to other people. I was never as sorry about anything I did in my life.”
I swallowed hard and looked at Aunt Jeane, because I knew Grandma was talking about herself and the farm. I wondered if Aunt Jeane understood.
The baby monitor caught my attention, and I listened as Joshua let out a sudden cry, then quieted to a whimper. Finally I heard the hushed rustling of sheets.
“I’d better go check,” I said quietly, and left the room hoping Grandma would find a way to explain her feelings to Aunt Jeane. I could hear them talking in low tones as I climbed the stairs.
As I stepped into the doorway of Joshua’s room, the sight of the empty crib brought me up short, and I stopped in the doorway, scanning the room. The squeak of the rocking chair caught my attention, and I saw Ben rocking, head tipped back and eyes closed. Joshua was bundled on his chest, eyelashes dark against his cheeks and cupid’s lips parted in sound sleep.
Leaning against the doorway, I hugged my arms around myself and watched in the dim window light, capturing details in my mind like an artist painting a portrait—the curve of Josh’s hand gripping Ben’s, the dark tan of Ben’s skin, the pale pink of Josh’s, the way Josh’s feet were crossed under Ben’s arm, the slow rise and fall of Ben’s chest. I imagined I could hear their hearts beating close together—one slow, one quick, like a sparrow’s.
It was a moment I knew would live with me forever.
I stood watching for a long time, then finally turned and left them to make up for lost time. I wondered, as I walked down the hall, if my mother had sat sleeping with me in that very chair, and if she’d known the sound of my heartbeat.
That night I went to sleep knowing that Ben and I and Joshua would not repeat old patterns. Curled with Ben in the bed, I imagined that I could feel the warm spot on his chest where Joshua had been, where their hearts had touched, and they had finally fallen in love.
Just after dawn, I heard the sound of Grandma moving in the kitchen. I could tell that no one else was up, so I got out of bed and went to check on her. The coffee had been made, but the kitchen was empty. Glancing out the window, I saw Grandma shuffling back to the little house carrying a platter of coffee cups. I wondered if, for some reason, she and Aunt Jeane were up early and having coffee out there.
Watching deer graze at the edge of the lawn, I poured myself a cup of coffee and reached for the sugar bowl, but it was gone. Looking around the kitchen, I spotted it on Grandma’s Hoosier cabinet next to two loaves of homemade bread rising in milk-glass pans. Propped between them and the blue batter bowl was the wildflower book.
I glanced toward Grandma Rose’s house before picking it up. I wondered how she knew I would find it there.
As before, the old story was removed and a new one written.
Broken Bread, it said.
I glanced out the window before reading the story.
I came to my marriage ill prepared to be the keeper of a fine house and a fine man. My husband did not know my shortcomings, and I was too proud to tell him of them. It was for this reason that he dismissed the woman who had for many years kept his home and cooked his meals. He assumed I would take on her duties. I was loath to tell him that I had no skill in caring for expensive linens, or cooking elegant meals, or baking bread. I did not want him to know the sort of existence from which I had come. I was afraid he would think me not worthy of being his wife.
Left in the house alone, I fretted and cried hour upon hour over cooking and housekeeping. At times, I set out platters of food even the farm dogs refused, and in tears, I washed the pans and began again to prepare a meal before my husband came in from the field. He was angry and critical when his meals were late, thinking that I wasted my day rather than tending to my work. He was angrier still that there was only fried bread on the table, not the fine yeast bread he was accustomed to. I was bitter and resentful to be treated so harshly when my body was weary from trying to please. Having no womenfolk around and no recipe to go by, I did not know how I was to learn to bake bread.
When he left in the mornings, I thought many times of taking my belongings and running away. Instead, I brought in the flour sack and struggled each day to create bread. Time after time, I threw my creations in the garbage and served fried bread with our meal. The flour sack, which should have lasted several months, dwindled in less than one. When I asked for more, he chastised me for being wasteful. How, he asked, could a woman who did not bake bread use fifty pounds of flour in a month’s time?
I resented his censure so terribly that I could hardly look at him across the table and I dreaded going to his bed. I prayed that God would set me free from his domination.
When the next sack of flour came, God’s answer came with it. Sewn into the binding was a paper with the ingredients and measures for bread.
Looking back these many years, I have often laughed at my youthful stubbornness. I suppose, had God not answered my prayer, I would have gone on being angry with my husband and he being angry with me, and our lives would have been wasted, as was that first sack of flour. What foolishness that was, I say to myself now! How wrong I was to resent my husband when I would not admit my feelings to him. How many hours and tears I could have saved if I had not been ruled by pride. Pride and resentment do not create bread that will rise. Bread, like a good life, can only be created by honest measure, patience, warmth, and time.
Closing the book, I propped it against the earthen batter bowl, smiling at the sweetness of the story. I wondered at its meaning and why Grandma had chosen to leave it for me now.
The sound of a familiar voice outside the door caught my ear, and suddenly I knew why Grandma was writing to me of patience and forgiveness.
My father had finally come.
Chapter 11
MY stomach turned over as I heard my father’s and Grandma’s voices outside the door. Stepping to the center of the room, I stood near the table, my thoughts racing. What should I say? How should I act? What would he look like after six years? Would he be alone or would there be a woman with him? Would he be glad to see me? What would he say? Would we be father and daughter, acquaintances, strangers?
The door opened, and we stood staring at each other for a moment. He looked older than I remembered, his hair almost completely silver no
w, his face etched with deep lines around his mouth that made him seem sad. In spite of that, his air of dignity remained—the neatly combed head of hair, the carefully pressed sport shirt and cotton slacks, the polished brown leather shoes, the expensive gold-rimmed eyeglasses.
It was hard to believe he had ever lived in Hindsville and easy to see why he seldom found a reason to come back.
“Hello, Kate.” His greeting was the same as I remembered—stiff, almost a reprimand, as if he were making a mental catalog of everything about me that was not up to his standards.
I swallowed hard, gripping the back of a chair to keep myself steady. “Hi, Dad.” Beyond that, I didn’t know what to say. “I didn’t know you were coming today.” It sounded bad, so I added, “I didn’t have a chance to get things ready for you.”
“That’s all right.” His lips gave a hint of a smile that did not touch his eyes. “I didn’t know I was coming myself. I had a consultation in Houston yesterday. I finished up late last night and decided to come here instead of flying home.”
I nodded, wondering if he had gotten my messages and if they had anything to do with his coming. If they did, I knew he wouldn’t admit it. “I didn’t know you were still working much.” It was the sort of thing you would say to an acquaintance.
He gave that emotionless smile again. “Retirement was too dull for me, I guess. I decided to take in consulting work from time to time. It gives me a chance to travel and keeps me from being idle.”
“That’s good.” It stung me that he was bored at home, yet couldn’t find time to come to Chicago to visit Ben and me, or to go to California to see Karen, or to visit Hindsville to keep Grandma company. Why could he find time to work, yet no time for us? Why should things be different now than they used to be?
Tending Roses Page 17