A Bride in Store (36 page)

Chapter 22

The Hampdens’ store was dark, but the doorknob turned without difficulty. Will expected the sounds of mourning or chaos, but a stillness blanketed the air.

A child talking in hushed tones grew louder as he threaded his way to the back room.

Amongst crates, merchandise, and other inventory clutter, Gretchen stacked blocks and Junior played with a carved horse. Eliza sat beside them on the floor, her arms wrapped around her knees, her face tense, eyes red and glistening.

She looked up. “Will?”

“Yes . . .” How it would hurt to converse with the woman he loved but now knew he’d never marry. To see her hurting but not hold her in his arms.

He cut his eyes toward the back stairwell but could hear nothing from the apartment above. “I assume their parents are upstairs?”

She nodded, her throat muscles struggling to swallow.

Squatting beside her, he ruffled Junior’s hair, then smiled at Gretchen until they resumed playing. “It’s that bad?” he whispered, taking in the lines surrounding the eyes she wouldn’t turn toward him.

She nodded again. “They want me to take the children to the boardinghouse, but Junior doesn’t want to go until they can kiss the baby . . . good-night.” Her voice trailed off, her lip quivered. “We’ll go eat soon and come back to say good-bye.” A solitary tear escaped and ran down Eliza’s face.

His heart ached to pull her against him, but he had to go upstairs. “Will you be all right?”

“Don’t worry about me.” She tucked a stray hair behind her ear, attempting a surreptitious wipe at the tear struggling down her cheek. “You need to help Kathleen.”

“I don’t know how much help I’ll be, considering how I failed Mrs. Lightfoot.”

“Don’t.” She shook her head fiercely. “It’s not your medical knowledge or lack thereof they need.” She hastily swiped at her eyelids, then ran her tongue across her lips as if to unseal them. “It’s the peace that comes with you, Will. The other doctors leave when their weaknesses are exposed, but you know you’re weak and seek God’s help. And He’s the only one able to do anything good right now.”

“Then Kathleen doesn’t need me, but rather God—”

“You won’t abandon her like Dr. Forsythe or Dr. Benning did when they realized their inability.” Eliza’s intense whisper made Junior stop playing with his toy horse, but she overlooked the boy’s troubled expression. “That’s why she needs you.”

“But Carl—”

“He needs you too.” She rubbed at her nose and sniffed.

“Are you hurt, Liza?” Junior frowned as he pushed up off his stomach.

“No, child. My nose is just running.” She turned wounded eyes toward Will. “I can’t talk anymore, but I’ll be praying. When we return, I’ll see if it’s all right to bring the children up.” She gripped his arm. Was she trying to find strength or encourage him with a squeeze? Maybe both?

He reached over and smoothed the hair near her temple, refraining from placing a kiss against her hairline lest the gesture loose the tears rising in her eyes.

She turned away and scooped up a fallen block. “Let me help you, Gretchen.” She cleared her throat—probably to rid her voice of its warble—and handed the baby the red rectangle. “We should go eat now.” She hoisted Gretchen and held out her hand for Junior.

Will pulled in a steadying breath. He waved to the children as they left the storage room with Eliza, then forced himself toward the stairs.

He knocked on the three-room apartment at the top of the landing and announced himself. Nobody responded, so he opened the door a crack.

Carl sat in a chair, staring out a window that faced the brick wall across the alley. The waning afternoon light slanted into the room but didn’t chase away the deep shadows or the heavy weight of sorrow infusing the apartment.

“Carl?” Will stepped inside.

The man limply turned his head, his eyes empty. He shrugged and returned his vacant gaze to the window.

“I’m here to see your wife and baby.” He closed the door gently behind himself.

Carl nodded once but said nothing.

“Can I do anything for you?”

The man blinked, completely dry-eyed.

Without knowing what was wrong, how could he talk Carl through whatever grief had struck him dumb?

Will padded across wooden planks to the inner room where he’d delivered Gretchen, leaving his friend wrapped in the silence he seemed to want. The door stood slightly ajar, the low hum of a woman’s voice filtering through. He gripped the doorknob, widening the crack a little. “May I come in?”

No answer but the low notes of “Brahms’ Lullaby,” though the tune was stilted and slightly off-key.

Propped against an iron headboard and pillows, Kathleen tore her eyes off the overly large bundle she clutched to her chest. Her face mirrored Eliza’s. Eyes red and wet, lips pursed and trembling—yet she didn’t stop humming the wooden notes except for a sharp intake of breath to start the refrain again.

Will slid inside, gripping the handle of his medical box tighter. “Is the baby already . . . gone?”

She shook her head. Her humming cut off abruptly. She laid the thick wad of bunting on her knees. Surely all those layers were overheating the babe. The room was positively stifling.

He cautiously sat on the edge of the bed. “Would you like to talk, have me examine the child, or . . . ?” He took a quick glance at the babe’s face. Angel-like in sleep, deep red lips pressed firmly shut, a fall of dark lashes across healthy, fat cheeks. Beautiful for a newborn.

With shaky hands, she untangled the mess of blankets wrapped about the infant. “I suppose you should see him.” She unlayered her son as if jostling him would disturb his slumber.

When the last swaddling sheet still lay tucked loosely about him, she stopped and sucked in a breath. “The doctors said they don’t know what’s wrong.” Her hopeless gaze held more sadness than he’d ever seen. “Is there any way you might?”

“Probably not.” He laid a hand atop hers.

She snatched her hand away. The baby whimpered at the sudden movement, but quickly quieted. “He hasn’t nursed since last night, and he hasn’t cried since Dr. Forsythe forced a syringe of something into him about two hours ago, but he must be hungry.” Her crimson-rimmed eyes welled with unshed tears. She picked up the baby and held him out in front of her. “Be careful with him. I’m the reason he has a big sore on his back. I tried rubbing him to wake him enough to eat, but I didn’t know.” A sob escaped, which she quickly stifled. “I didn’t know.”

Will wrapped his large hands lightly around the baby and set the boy on his lap though the flannel swaddling was wet through. A perfect face belied everything they were telling him. He peeled away the light blue blanket, the child resting between his legs.

Beginning at the boy’s upper thighs, massive red sores ran down to his ankles. His lower legs hardly had enough skin to cover the bone. Several blisters bubbled on top of large areas of his skin. The baby’s little hands were balled up and shiny red. Will turned the baby gently over to assess the damage Kathleen assumed she’d caused. A small section of his skin had sheared off below his ribcage.

However, the worst thing seemed to be the fever and other signs of infection. How could he possibly keep a child with so many wounds free from contagion?

“Dr. Benning said he’d once seen a girl who had sores and blisters on her hands and face and other places—but not quite like this. Said she died when she was three.” Kathleen’s voice sounded hollow.

Rolling the infant over carefully, Will examined the boy’s cherry red mouth. He coaxed the baby’s lips apart with the soft pad of his finger. The interior of his lips was redder than the outside and quite puffy. Will tickled the corner of the babe’s mouth for a few seconds, but the boy wasn’t tempted to root.

“He’s tried to eat, but the last time he cried I could see—” Kathleen pressed her lips together hard, which pushed up more tears—“that his mouth was . . . full of sores.” She wadded a discarded blanket against her eyes and wiped harshly. A heartrending sob wrestled its way out of her chest, making it impossible for Will to keep his own eyes dry.

With such a fragile bundle in his lap he couldn’t gather Kathleen to him. Why wasn’t Carl in here? Will laid a hand on her shoulder until her tears subsided enough that he could shift his attention back to the baby.

He gently removed the soiled blanket from under the boy’s chapped body and exchanged it for the one his mother had chris
tened with tears. Though certain the child breathed, Will brought the boy’s chest to his ear, the sluggish heartbeat and shallow breaths barely discernible over his mother’s repressed weeping.

Dr. Forsythe must have administered some pain medication with the syringe Kathleen mentioned. Whatever he’d given the boy must account for his slumbering so peacefully.

With outstretched arms, Kathleen took her son back.

“Don’t wrap him so warmly. I’ll get something for his fever and open the windows and get some cool water on him. Wash his wounds.” He roamed about the room getting things ready, but infection, wounds both internal and external, and a baby refusing to eat . . . no wonder Dr. Forsythe had given up.

The baby roused enough to cry nonstop while he rinsed his delicate body. Then Will ladled enough willow-bark tincture down the baby’s sore throat to hopefully ease the boy’s pain. He returned the baby to Kathleen, who held a cool cloth to his head and shushed him.

Once the baby fell back asleep—after only nursing for a few short minutes as Will cleaned up—Kathleen stared at his little face, caressing his eyebrow with her fingertip, tears silently rolling off her cheeks in quick succession.

Will sat down to take in the baby’s face, so precious, so fragile, nothing more than a vapor that would linger for a little while and then vanish before they even knew him.

Kathleen let out a heavy sigh, harsh with the sound of tears clogging her throat. “What did I do wrong?”

How could he let the same question that haunted him for years trouble her any longer? “If he’d had brown eyes instead of blue, you’d not blame yourself for producing the wrong colors. And if he were blind or lame, you’d not be at fault. Jesus once told the disciples a blind man was not born blind because of his parents’ sin or his own.”

“But why my baby?” Her voice was barely intelligible.

Will stared at the sleeping bundle, the face almost pristine enough to pretend nothing was wrong, then he turned to look out the small alley-side window.

Do you have
any answer for me to give her?

A flicker of golden light raced across the windowsill before another cloud covered the sun. Nothing but the moan of relentless wind and Kathleen’s shudders filled his ears.

“I don’t know, Kathleen.”

She stared at the boy in her arms. “How long does he have?”

“I don’t know that either.” No wonder Dr. Forsythe and Dr. Benning had left. How hard to have no answers. Absolutely none whatsoever. “But you should mother him every day he has left.”

Though tears still coursed down her cheeks, she restarted her strangled lullaby.

His presence unneeded for a while, Will rose and placed his medical box on the dresser. “I’m going to see Carl.” The man ought to be in here sitting beside his wife, spending time with his short-lived son.

The suffocating dread that had shrouded him upon entering the apartment weighed heavier with each step he took toward his friend.

Will sat in the rocker beside him and fiddled with his hands between his knees. Surely Dr. Forsythe had briefed him about the baby’s prognosis—and none too gently.

Carl sighed. “You don’t have to say anything.”

“I think I do. You ought to be in there with them.”

“Just to watch my son die?”

“No, to love him every second he has left. To support your wife.” Will stared out the window like Carl, afraid to look at his friend in case either of them turned teary-eyed. “You’ll regret not staring into his perfect face for however long you have him. He’s a fine-looking boy.”

Carl only licked his lips and sniffed.

“I’m not going anywhere, Carl. I’ll stay and pray and work
to rid him of infection. If I can manage that, then maybe . . .” Maybe what? Will pressed his lips together before promising anything. He’d never seen a baby missing skin; surely that wasn’t curable. “When he gets fussy, I’ll give him something to help him endure.”

Carl ran his thumb along the lower lid of his suddenly wet eye. After a minute of sniffing and swiping at a few traitorous tears, he stood and marched to the bedroom door.

Once he disappeared, Will leaned back in his chair and blinked his hot eyelids, readying himself for a long night, and hours—or maybe days—of prayer ahead of him.

First Mrs. Lightfoot, now this baby. As soon as his time with Carl and Kathleen ended, he’d start devouring every medical text he could get his hands on. No matter how long it took him to read each page. No matter how much the words and letters refused to cooperate. Perhaps one day he’d have enough information crammed in his head to diagnose and treat people before they died—to give hope to a family instead of affirming their despair.

For a long time, I’ve known you wanted me to focus on caring
for the sick, but I just couldn’t trust you’d help me with everything else. I’ve been focusing
on providing for myself instead of relying on you to
get me the education I need, and look what distrust
has gotten me.

In love with a woman he couldn’t have, drowning in a business he couldn’t manage, taken advantage of by a crook, and failing at medicine.

He let out a sad half laugh. He’d done well looking out for himself, all right.

But had he enough faith to put his insecurities aside and trust God to help him learn medicine? He ought to get over his pride and learn from whatever doctor was willing or just plain study more and trust God to give him enough to live on.

He glanced at the room where Kathleen’s strangled lullaby
continued, now accompanied by a grown man’s sobs, which escalated with gut-wrenching intensity.

Deep down, was he simply afraid God would require more from him than he was willing to surrender?