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Authors: Catherine Palmer

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BOOK: Prairie Storm
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“That's my hymnbook,” he said. “I can't carry a tune in a bucket, but I know every song by heart.”

The old woman turned through the worn pages one by one. Her son, Ben, leaned over and examined the book with his mother. Elijah pushed back in his chair, hooked one boot over the other, and locked his hands behind his head. He could see Lily Nolan three chairs down on the porch, rocking the baby and humming some little tune. Maybe this was going to work out all right after all, though he never would have believed it.

That woman sure brought out the worst in him. She seemed to know exactly how to pull the anger right up out of his chest. Before he could stop himself he had been hollering at her, shouting in her face, and scaring the living daylights out of her. He'd never felt such shame in his life as when he saw her cowering in the grass, her arms over her head and her body sheltering the baby. As though he would hit her!

Sure, in his old saloon days, Elijah had been a rough and rowdy fellow, but he'd never touched a woman with a harsh hand. Now that he was walking in Christ's footsteps, he'd surrendered his old notion of “an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.” He was working hard on turning the other cheek.

“This songbook ought to go to somebody who can use it right,” Mother Margaret said. “Here, Miss Lily, you take it.”

Elijah sat up straight. Lily stopped rocking the baby. Everyone in the gathering turned to the preacher as if awaiting his response. Ben Hanks, a strapping man with arms like tree limbs, gazed at him with soulful brown eyes. His wife, Eva, looked up from her darning. Mother Margaret just grinned as she held out the precious hymnbook.

“Miss Lily,” she said, “you have the voice of an angel. Take this book, and keep it. You sing the baby every song in there, and he'll grow up right.”

“Mother Margaret,” Lily said, “the hymnbook belongs to the preacher.”

“He don't need it. Can't carry a tune in a bucket; he said so himself. Take it, girl. And sing us somethin', would you? Sing the first song in the book. What's it called? You know, I can't read worth beans. Can't even sign my name.”

Lily took the hymnbook and opened it. Elijah swallowed. That was his
mother's
book, his only memento of her. He didn't want some no-account actress—he caught himself and took a deep breath.

“Holy, holy, holy!” Lily began to sing.

“Lord God Almighty!

Early in the morning our song shall rise to Thee;

Holy, holy, holy! merciful and mighty!

God in three Persons, blessed Trinity!”

“Mmm,” Mother Margaret said. “Ain't that the prettiest voice you ever heard, Ben?”

“Yes'm,” her son agreed.

“Sounded like a funeral dirge to me,” put in his wife.

“Eva!”

“Well, it did. Miss Lily, sing the verse about the darkness. Here we are out under the stars, and I can just feel the presence of the Lord. Sing it, Miss Lily. Sing it with joy.”

Elijah studied the young woman as she gripped the hymnbook. Her fingers skeletal, Lily seemed mesmerized by the book. She swallowed twice, as though the words must be forced out of her throat.

“Holy, holy, holy!”

Her voice began slowly, and then grew stronger as she sang. High, clear, perfect—each word formed on her tongue. Every note sounded like the ringing of a single crystal bell.

“Though the darkness hide Thee,

Though the eye of sinful man Thy glory may not see;

Only Thou art holy—there is none beside Thee,

Perfect in pow'r, in love and purity.”

“Thank you, Jesus!” Mother Margaret exclaimed. “Love and purity. Yes, sir, that about says it all. The Lord of love is in my heart— holy, holy, holy. And he is pure! Amen!”

“Amen,” chorused Ben and Eva.

Elijah eyed his mother's hymnbook, his chest tight and his heart dark. He didn't want Lily Nolan to have the book. It wasn't hers. A woman like her didn't deserve such a gift.

“Oh, Miss Lily, you have a voice that can rival the tongues of angels,” Mother Margaret said. “You need that book. Take it with you, and sing to everybody far and wide. Sing to that baby God gave you. Sing to the preacher. Sing to God hisself!”

Lily lifted Samuel to her shoulder and began to pat his back. “I know plenty of songs by heart,” she said. “I don't need Mr. Book's hymnal.”

“It did belong to my mother,” Elijah said, leaning forward.

“Belong?” the old woman said. “Nothing belongs to nobody but God. Everything we got is here on loan from the Almighty. This house, that songbook, even that young'un over there. You better start listenin' to the Spirit of the Lord, Brother Elijah. Don't act on your own will, now. You listen. Listen good.”

Elijah stared at his mother's hymnbook and tried to listen to the Holy Spirit. But all he could think about was the afternoon he had discovered the book in a trunk and had realized that his own mother's hands had touched its pages. She had died when Eli was only four or five years old, and he mourned her to this day. She had sung to him out of the book, held him in her arms and sung hymn after hymn….

He lifted his focus to the young woman cradling baby Samuel.
Nothing belongs to nobody but God
, Mother Margaret had said. She was right. The child had been given to him by God. Even this woman had been sent to him by God. He had to believe that. Hard and bitter as she was, Lily Nolan needed the words in that hymnbook more than Elijah needed a physical memento of his mother.

“You keep it,” he said to Lily. “Sing to Samuel.”

“That's right,” Mother Margaret intoned.

“Well,” he said, standing, “I reckon I'd better get going.”

Eli settled his Stetson on his head and picked up his Bible. After thanking the Hanks family for their welcome, he walked toward the rocking chair. Lily Nolan was a vision out of a fine oil painting. Her golden hair glowed like a halo of holiness around her head. Her pale blue gown swept to her feet, and her slender arms enfolded the sleeping baby. With skin the color of fresh milk and eyes like a pair of bright bluebonnets, she could warm the heart of any man.

Lord, why does she have to be an actress in a traveling show?
Elijah prayed silently as he approached her.
Why does she have a sharp tongue and a stiff spine? Why can't she be the kind of woman I asked you to send into my life?
Elijah longed for the gentle touch of a righteous woman whose eyes and heart were committed to the Lord. He envisioned someone sweet and pure. Why couldn't God have sent someone like that to tend Samuel?

“Mrs. Nolan,” he said, “I'll be over at the church, in case the baby needs anything. You could send Ben Hanks to fetch me.”

She gave the baby a pat. “You'll be preparing sermons, I guess. Make them good. I need the money.”

He recoiled from the cynicism in her words. “Maybe you'd like to suggest a subject?”

“Hellfire and damnation, I should think. Isn't that what you preachers like to talk about the most? How about the thirty-second chapter of Deuteronomy as a text? ‘For a fire is kindled in mine anger, and shall burn unto the lowest hell, and shall consume the earth with her increase, and set on fire the foundations of the mountains—'”

“Mrs. Nolan—”

“Or maybe something from Psalms? How about this, from Psalm 55?” She lifted her chin, narrowed her eyes, and recited in a venomous voice, “‘Let death seize upon them, and let them go down quick into hell: for wickedness is in their dwellings, and among them.'”

Elijah shook his head in confusion. The woman knew the Scriptures better than he did. And yet her pain and anger were overwhelming. How could someone who had taken the Word of the Lord into her heart be so empty of his holy presence?

“I guess I could preach about hell,” he said. “But I'd rather preach on the love and forgiveness of the God who sent his own Son to die for us.”

“Hell is much more effective.” She gave him a frigid smile. “If you haven't learned this lesson yet, Preacher-man, you soon will: fear is a great motivator. Humiliate, shame, and terrify a person if you really want to get something from him.”

“Not if you want his love. Or hers.” Eli bent down and ran his fingertips over the baby's velvety forehead. “Good night, Samuel. Good night, Mrs. Nolan.”

He turned to leave, but her words stopped him cold.

“Love?” she said. “What would you know about love? You didn't even kiss your baby good night.”

Eli squeezed his fists together in anger at her taunting words. Kiss a baby? What for? He was a man, and Sam was just a little pup—asleep, at that. Who would know the difference? Eli's own father had never kissed him. Not once.

Lily's voice was more gentle when she spoke again. “Please come and kiss your baby, Reverend Book.”

Eli turned and walked back to her side. His father had never kissed him—and Eli had never felt his father's love. In fact, he hadn't understood what love was until Christ came into his life. If the woman Christ had sent was instructing him to kiss Samuel, then he'd do it.

Hunkering down on one knee, Eli set one hand on each arm of the rocking chair and bent over. He gave the baby a swift peck on the forehead and then drew back. “There,” he said. “Done.”

“Very good, Reverend Book. A truly loving gesture.”

He frowned at her. “You kiss him then.”

“All right,” she said. As she gazed at the sleeping baby, her face transformed. Her blue eyes grew soft, her lips tilted into a smile, and her voice gentled. “Sweet Samuel,” she whispered, “precious baby. Sleep softly, little one. Rest in comfort and hope. I love you, Samuel. I love you so much.”

A tear slid from her eye as she pressed her lips to the baby's cheek. Then she kissed his little forehead. And then each of his eyes.

Elijah could hardly breathe. As though blinders had been stripped from his eyes, he saw Lily Nolan for the first time. This
was
the kind of woman he had begged God to send him. She was so soft, so tender, so perfect. He could hardly keep from taking her in his arms and holding her.

It wasn't the baby he longed to kiss. It was the woman.

Her spirit seemed to beckon him. She was fragile and vulnerable, so wounded she had built walls of bitterness around her gentle heart. He absorbed her trembling pink lips and tearstained cheeks. How could he break down those walls? How could he reach the soul inside? Had God sent her to him for this reason?
Lord, help me know what to do!

“You'd better go on back to your church now, Preacher-man,” Lily said, her walls rising stronger and higher as she faced him. “And take your baby with you. My place is in the traveling show, and I'll sleep in my own wagon tonight. I'll find Sam in the morning and feed him.”

When Eli didn't move, she held out the tiny bundle. “Go on now,” she said. “And here's your hymnbook.”

Uncomfortable as ever at the notion of holding the fragile baby, Elijah tucked his Bible under one arm. Though Lily's voice had grown cold, he felt the warmth of her hands as he lifted Samuel from her. “You keep that hymnal,” he murmured. “You sing better than any gal I ever heard.”

Before she could cut him again, Eli pressed the baby against his chest and set off across the prairie. The moment the child felt the movement of the man's footsteps, he jerked awake and began to whimper.

“Aw, Sam, don't start that now,” Eli mumbled as the baby let out a howl that could rival a coyote's. “We're not going to get a wink of sleep, and I have to come up with a sermon good enough to change the heart of Mrs. Lily Nolan.”

“I've been consulting the cards,” Beatrice said as she handed Lily a bowl of hot oatmeal made from the last crumbs in their storage bin. “I was up half the night, Lil, and I just couldn't get over how powerfully the cards spoke to me. It was a deeply spiritual experience, and I can't wait to tell you what I learned.”

Lily stifled a yawn as she lifted a spoonful of oatmeal. She had been up half the night, too, and her wakefulness had nothing to do with consulting the spirits. Even from inside the church, Samuel's screaming, fussing, whimpering, and sobbing had been audible for hours. It had been all she could do to keep from crawling out of the wagon and racing to get him. When she dozed at all, she dreamed of Abigail crying out for her mother.

“The cards have told me there's a great future in store for us,” Beatrice was saying. “Even though it seems impossible to believe, the deaths of Jakov and Ted are a part of the great plan. You see, you and I couldn't go forward on the path we're to take if we had continued in the shackles of those men. This is
our
time, Lily. Our destiny!”

Lily set the empty bowl aside and began folding the diapers she had just washed. Who could think about destiny? Who could see a path ahead? For Lily there was only this moment. She had to live through this day, surviving each hour, enduring each minute without Abigail.

BOOK: Prairie Storm
11.83Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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