Marta's Legacy Collection (75 page)

“Have you ever gone back?”

“Once, when I was eighty-four. Rikka went with me and made drawings of the old Lutheran church, the schoolhouse where I went, Thun Castle. I was offered a job there once.”

“In a castle?” Dawn was impressed.

Oma snorted derisively. “As a maid who’d’ve been paid a pittance for the honor of working there.” She snorted again. “I said no.”

“I never knew any of this. You should write all this down.”

Oma pushed herself to her feet, took an old leather journal from a kitchen drawer, and tossed it on the table in front of Dawn. “Rosie gave that to me as a going-away present before I left for Bern. She told me to fill it with adventures.” Oma chuckled. “I didn’t expect to have any. So I filled it with bits and pieces of useful information, things I thought would get me where I wanted to go. And eventually, I suppose some of my ‘adventures’ made it into the pages too.”

Dawn opened the journal. Oma’s German script was as small and perfect as the Declaration of Independence, and she had made the most of every page. “Can you read some of it to me?”

Oma put her hands on her hips. “
Ivanhoe
will be a lot more interesting, especially for a girl with romantic inclinations. Jason, is it? He’s the one you want to marry?”

Dawn blushed. “I can hope.” Covering her embarrassment, she gave Oma a smug smile. “I finished
Ivanhoe
last night.”

“Did you now? Well, aren’t you the smart little cookie?” Oma looked pleased. “Go ahead and read my journal. It’s only the first section that’s in German. I started practicing my English as soon as I could. If nothing else, it’ll help put you to sleep.”

Dawn flipped through pages. “Any recipes for love potions or advice on how to win a boy’s heart?”

Oma laughed. “You’re on your own there, my girl. I only went out with one man and ended up marrying him. But there’s advice on how to mend fences and build bridges. Not that I’ve ever been good at either.”

31

That night, after Mom and Oma had gone to bed, Dawn stayed up reading the worn journal. The first pages, in German, looked like lists and maybe recipes. The journal switched to English beginning with a heading, “Tea Service for Lady Daisy.” A recipe for spicy chicken sandwiches was followed by advice on how to wash linens, polish silver, and clean wood floors. Sometimes a line would be written that wouldn’t fit in among the rest.

Another year and I will forget why I came to England. Do I want to be as hopeless as Miss Millicent?

She’d filled one page with information on crop rotation and how to prune almond trees and grapevines.

I bought a car today. Niclas is not happy. I am!

More menus followed, along with a list of “Summer Bedlam Activities.” Oma had filled the last two pages with Scripture.

Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths. Proverbs 3:5-6

Oma had made a vine and grape border around this Scripture. The second stood alone with more space around it than anything she had written on the other pages.

When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a (wo) man, I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. And now abideth faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinthians 13:11-13

Dawn turned the last page.

I have lived out my mother’s hope and pray I have given wings to my daughters’ dreams.

Leaving space, she wrote again.

A coddled child grows up crippled.

The last entry put an ending to the journal.

I lived and loved the best way I knew how, trusting God to keep His promise never to lose one of His own. I hold fast to what Mama taught me. In Him, we live and breathe. In Him, we will one day find one another again. In Him, we are one. In this life, we will not love perfectly. In the next, God promises we will. I hold to that hope. I cling to that dream.

On the way home to Alexander Valley, Mom fell into her habitual silence. It didn’t bother Dawn as much this time, not after a week with Oma. “Can I go back with you next summer?”

Mom smiled, eyes straight ahead. “So you enjoyed yourself.”

“Very much.” She didn’t want to be left out or left behind again. “Christopher and I could camp outside on Oma’s lawn.”

“He’d like that.”

Well, her mother hadn’t said she couldn’t come. “Oma knows more than anyone I’ve ever met.” She gave her mother a teasing smile. “Even Mitch.”

Mom let out a soft laugh. “She’s lived decades longer.”

Dawn enjoyed the new rapport between them. “Could we go to a stationer’s on the way home? I’d like to get a thank-you gift for Oma.”

“What do you have in mind?”

“A diploma.”

They stopped on the way through Santa Rosa. “I want something that looks like a real diploma. It has to look authentic. This one.” She pointed. “‘This certifies that Marta Waltert has graduated magna cum laude from the University of Hard Knocks.’”

Mom laughed. “She’s going to love it!”

When they picked up the framed diploma, Dawn wrote a note and put it in the box before sending it by Federal Express to Merced.

Dear Oma,

I learned more from you in one week than I’ve learned in ten years of school. I hope to visit again soon.

Love, Dawn

Ten days later, a package arrived Priority Mail from Oma. Dawn opened it at the kitchen table with Mom watching. “A leather journal! Just like the one her friend Rosie gave her.” Dawn ran her hand over the beautifully etched tan cover. When she opened it, a note fluttered to the floor. Mom picked it up and handed it to her.

If you learned more from me in one week than you learned in ten years of school, you weren’t paying attention! Open those lovely blue eyes and look at the world around you! Open those cute shell-shaped ears and listen! Get busy on going after your dream. Thank you for my diploma. I have it hanging on my bedroom wall where I can admire it every night and pray for the blessed child who sent it.

Love, Oma

Dear Rosie,

Carolyn brought May Flower Dawn with her this year. I had given up hope of ever getting to know my great-granddaughter. She was such an obnoxious child, so full of herself, so spoiled by Hildemara and critical of Carolyn—not that it was entirely her fault. Christopher usually comes with Carolyn, but Dawn asked to come this time. I see that as a miracle. I didn’t think she liked me.

Dawn has a “crush” on a young man who barely knows she exists. I doubt that. The girl is a beauty—long blonde hair, blue eyes, nicely proportioned. I was taken aback. She is the mirror image of Elise. Thankfully, she is very different in temperament. May Flower Dawn and I had several very nice, long conversations. I was surprised to discover she has a teachable spirit. I am quite taken with her. She may very well turn out to have the best of Hildemara Rose and Carolyn in her, and perhaps a little of me as well. Not too much, I hope.

Dawn sent a gift. According to the diploma she had made, I graduated magna cum laude from the University of Hard Knocks. I laughed and wept when I saw it, and I wept more when I read her sweet note. May Flower Dawn wants to come again. I am filled with joy! Dare I hope she might be the one to bring my daughter home to me? Oh, how I would love to sit and serve Hildemara, Carolyn, and May Flower Dawn tea on my patio. Think of it, Rosie! Four generations of women together at last. We could drink in the scent of summer roses and talk. Oh, how I would love that. . . .

32

Three weeks later, Granny called. When Oma didn’t answer her telephone, her neighbor had gone over to check on her. She found Oma sitting in her recliner. She’d died peacefully, Alexis de Tocqueville’s
Democracy in America
open on her lap.

The memorial service took place in a Methodist church in Merced, the front two rows packed with relatives and the rest packed with friends. No air-conditioning and late August heat made the sanctuary almost unbearable. Uncle Bernie and Aunt Elizabeth; Ed; Granny and Papa; Aunt Cloe and her producer husband, Ted; and Aunt Rikki and an old friend and widower named Melvin were all there. Dawn sat beside Mom in the pew behind Granny and Papa. Mitch sat on the other side of Mom, his arm wrapped around her as though holding her together. Christopher sat on the other side of Mitch, leaning against him.

Dawn had never lost anyone, and she felt more regret than grief. She’d liked Oma immensely and wished she’d spent more time with her. But the depth of her mother’s grief frightened her. Mom had cried for three days after Granny called with the news. She hadn’t eaten in a week. Now, she sat ashen-faced, tears streaming down her cheeks as the minister spoke of heaven and the hope God gave everyone who believed in the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord.

Granny glanced back at Mom, her expression pained, almost angry. Dawn had overheard her speaking to Mom in the pastor’s office before the service. “Are you going to be all right, Carolyn?” She had sounded impatient.

“She’ll be fine, Hildie.” Papa put his arm around Granny’s waist. “Come on. We need to go in and sit down.”

“No.” Granny stepped away from him and kept staring at Mom. “If you can’t hold yourself together better than this, Carolyn, maybe you should stay in here and cry your heart out.”

Mom gasped as though struck.

Mitch’s face darkened. Dawn had never seen him so angry. “There’s no shame in grieving over someone she loves!”

“No shame at all.” Papa took Granny firmly by the arm. Granny’s face crumpled before she turned away.

Mitch looked chagrined and muttered the first foul word Dawn had ever heard him say. He folded Mom in his arms and whispered to her. Christopher looked confused and distressed. Dawn put her arm around him and told him everything would be okay, though she wondered if it would.

Now, as the service wore on, she studied her mother’s worn face and wanted to weep. She took her hand and found it cold. While the minister droned on, Dawn remembered things Granny had said. “Your mother was always going off by herself, even as a little girl. She liked being on her own in her dream world. She’d play outside with the dog for hours.”

Dawn thought that meant her mother hadn’t cared deeply about anyone but herself, that she didn’t need anyone. Clearly, she cared deeply about Oma.

Mitch decided they would leave Merced shortly after the reception started. “She’s taken all she can take,” he told Papa.

“We have to stay,” Papa said. “The lawyer will be going over the will tomorrow morning. Apparently, Oma managed to make some good investments.”

Mom stared out the front passenger window on the drive home. Tears streamed down her white cheeks. Mitch looked worried. Christopher put his head in Dawn’s lap and slept most of the way. Dawn didn’t know what else to do but pray.
God . . . God . . .
Even then, words wouldn’t come.

During the last two weeks before school started, Mom went about her daily chores like an automaton. Even Christopher couldn’t lift her spirits with his cheerful inane chatter and repertoire of new puns and knock-knock jokes. When Granny called, Dawn escaped to Jenner by the Sea. Papa asked how her mom was doing, and Granny jumped in.

“You know very well how she’s doing, Trip. I told you I called a few days ago and Mitch said she wasn’t up to talking to me.”

“Maybe she’s feeling better now.”

“She won’t even speak to me!”

“She isn’t talking to anyone, Granny.” Fighting tears, Dawn went into the blue bedroom off the kitchen and closed the wooden folding doors. She could hear her grandparents talking in low voices at the table. Papa raised his voice.

“You’re madder at Carolyn for grieving than you’re sad over your mother dying.”

Dawn heard Granny crying and then quick footsteps retreating to the back bedroom. Opening the door slowly, Dawn peered out and saw Papa still sitting at the kitchen table, staring out at the Russian River. When she sat with him, he gave her a pained smile and quipped, “Women. You can’t live with them, and you can’t live without them.” He let out his breath. “Things wouldn’t be nearly so bad if everything had been sorted out between your granny and Oma years ago.”

“What wasn’t?”

He scratched his balding head. “Nothing that’s ever going to get fixed now.”

Home again, Dawn left Mom alone and went out to wander through the garden and vineyard alone. Mitch had started building a new tasting room last spring, and now he pitched in with the carpenters. Maybe he just wanted to be out of the house so Mom could grieve in private.

Hot and tired, Dawn came back inside and found her mother sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of steaming hot tea. Dawn sat with her. “Is there anything I can do for you, Mom?” She’d already finished the laundry and folding. She wouldn’t need to start dinner for another three hours.

“It’ll just take time.” Mom put her hands around the cup. “I wish you’d known her better.”

“So do I. It’s my fault I didn’t.” Dawn hurt for her mother. She hurt for Granny, too. They should be comforting one another. Instead, they didn’t even speak. “Do you want to talk about Oma? Would that help?”

Mom raised her head and offered a sad, rueful smile. “Maybe you should think about being a shrink.”

Dawn gave a soft laugh and started to cry. Angry with herself, she covered her face. “I’m sorry. I just wish I could make things easier on you and Granny. She cried all weekend.”

“Did she?”

Dawn wiped the tears from her cheeks. “She’d smile and pretend everything was fine, and then she’d disappear into the garage and cry.”

Mom rubbed her temples. “You’ll be a great comfort to her.”

“What about you, Mom?” Dawn could see the effort it took for her to sit at the table. Her mother leaned forward, heels of her hands pressed hard against her eyes. Was she trying to stop another onslaught of tears?

“I won’t run away to Haight-Ashbury,” she half whispered hoarsely. “I won’t run . . .”

It seemed such an odd thing to say, but Dawn didn’t want to make things worse by asking what she meant. “Christopher needs you, Mom.” Maybe that would be enough to shake her out of despair.

Her mother raised her head with an effort, eyes bleak. “And you don’t.”

Dawn felt impelled to admit what she never had before. “Yes, I do.” She slid her hand across the table, lifting her fingers in invitation, hoping her mother would understand. Silent, pale, her mother stared. Dawn waited, counting the seconds. Just when she’d almost given up hope, her mother slid her hand across the table and wove her fingers into Dawn’s. The first spark of life came back into her mother’s eyes as they held tight to each other.