Stay a Little Longer (21 page)

“Then I best make it a good one.”

Before once again turning back to the window, Zachary took a cigar from its box, lit it, and drew deeply of the acrid smoke.
Staring out at the bustling street beneath him, he knew that he was stepping over the line; by sending Travis to encourage
them to sell, he was giving in to his desperation. But great men didn’t wait for opportunity to come to them, they seized
it by the throat and refused to let go.

And that is exactly what I will do!

R
ACHEL ENTERED THE ROOM
at the head of the stairs carrying a tray with Mason’s lunch and found him leaning back in bed, staring out the window. Sheets
of rain pounded against the glass, making it hard to see outside. The fall days had grown much cooler as October turned into
November, sending a wet chill down her spine every time she went outdoors. Browned leaves, cascading from the safety of their
branches, were carried along by the insistent winds. Soon there would be snow.

When Rachel placed Mason’s tray on the bedside table, he didn’t offer a word in reply. For the last two days, ever since he
had admitted his true identity to her, he had largely remained silent during her visits, offering little more than mumbled
thanks. With this day seeming to be no different, Rachel started to leave, only to be stopped before she could reach the hallway
door by the sound of Mason’s voice.

“The rain reminds me of France,” he said softly, his voice a whisper.

Turning around to face him, Rachel found Mason still staring blankly out the streaked window, his blue eyes fixed upon some
distant point. Simply hearing him speak gave her heart a start, and though she wanted to say something, anything, that might
keep him going, she feared that the sound of her voice would once again cause him to fall silent. So instead she waited, hoping
that Mason would find the strength to continue.

“It rained almost every day when I was in France,” Mason finally continued. “Gray clouds seemed to always cover the sky, sweeping
out to the farthest horizon, always full of rain. Nothing was ever dry—socks, books, ammunition—and the mud crept into every
crevice. You could get stuck with every step if you weren’t careful. Even when I woke up in the hospital, the sun shone only
once a week; but that was all right because the pounding of the rain helped quiet the other men’s screams and moans.

“When I was a boy, I used to love the coming of fall,” Mason continued as the faintest hint of a smile curled his lips. “I
always looked forward to the changing color of the leaves, the smell of fields being burned, and even the feel of cold rain
upon my face. No other season, even summer, could compare. It was so special that I insisted Alice and I be married in the
fall…”

Rachel nodded. “I remember.”

The afternoon that Mason and Alice had been married was as gorgeous a day as could have been hoped for. Without a single cloud
to mar the September sky, the sun had provided a perfect warmth. Standing outside the church in her best clothes, Rachel remembered
that every way she turned, the view was as pretty as any painting. Nearly the entire town turned out to rejoice in the wedding
of two of its very best, and the celebration had stretched long into the night.

“Nowadays I can’t stand the rain.” Mason frowned, finally turning to face her with wet eyes. “All it does is remind me of
that damned war and the treasured moments I’ve lost and can never get back. What in the hell did I have to come back to?”

“You have to go on with your life,” she soothed. “Once you’re better—”

“It will never be better!”

Watching Mason wallow in his own misery, allowing his many regrets and aching remorse to get the better of him, to simply
give up without a fight, made Rachel furious. Still, knowing all that the man had been through, she tamped down her anger;
she hoped that by letting him vent his rage, he might get better.

“Your life is waiting for you.”

“Which life are you talking about, Rachel?” he snapped. “The life I left behind in Carlson? Do you think I can just go back
to my father and all will be forgiven, the prodigal son finally returns, and that I’ll just be given back my position at the
bank? Can you even imagine the horror-struck look on my brother’s face if I were to walk in the door?”

The mention of Zachary Tucker sent a chill down Rachel’s spine. It had been two weeks since he had approached her about selling
the boardinghouse. She wondered which situation would have made him angrier: that his offer for their property had been rejected
or that his brother was still alive.

“Or are you talking about the life that I have spent the last seven years living, traveling around in the darkness of a freight
car, occasionally fighting for my belongings if not my life, hiding from the police, and hardly managing to scrape up enough
money for food?”

“So instead you’re just going to give up,” she answered. “Do nothing?”

Mason remained silent, his jaw locked tight.

“Don’t you dare ignore me, Mason Tucker,” she warned, her voice allowing her anger to seep in. “Because I never had the luxury
of giving up. When my sister died, I couldn’t stay in bed all day, watching the world go by. I had a child to raise, your
child, a child who, as far as the world was concerned, had no parents, no one to watch out for her. So I took that responsibility
and it changed my life, whether I truly wanted it to or not.”

“It’s not the same,” Mason disagreed.

“The hell it’s not!”

“I had everything I ever loved taken away from me!”

“You act as if Alice’s death affected only you!” Rachel shouted in response. “I miss my sister just as much as you do! Living
in this house where the memories of her lurk around every corner, seeing the pity on people’s faces as I walk about town,
and even watching Charlotte say something or have an expression cross her face that reminds me of Alice… all of these things
are painful! But I have never quit, never walked away from the people who count on me to do what is expected, what is right.”

“Rachel, I—”

“Whether you want to admit it to yourself or not, you have a responsibility to Charlotte,” she barked; this time, she was
the one who would not allow him to answer. “It makes no difference that you haven’t been a part of her life for the last eight
years, you are still her father! Eventually, you are going to have to own up to that fact for her sake, every bit as much
as for your own. She needs to know that she has a father, that she’s not as alone in this world as she believes. While you
might worry that you’re not ready, it makes no difference when it comes to Charlotte’s life. None of these choices are going
to be easy, they will probably be painful, but you are going to make them, Mason! Of that you should have absolutely no doubt!”

Having said all that she thought Mason needed to hear, Rachel once again turned to the door. This time, when he spoke, she
pretended she didn’t hear him, slamming the door behind her.

*   *   *   

Carrying a wicker basket full of freshly folded laundry, Rachel entered her mother’s room still angry from her confrontation
with Mason. After leaving his room, she’d busied herself with washing clothes. With the rainy weather she’d had to dry everything
in the basement, but no matter how much she tried occupying her day, she couldn’t take her mind off the things he had said.

The booming rumble of thunder rolled across the sky as Rachel set the basket beside her mother’s dresser. Eliza stood in her
usual place, peering between the curtains as the world went by without her. She flinched as another flash of lightning lit
up the sky.

“I do hope you haven’t let Charlotte outside in this horrible weather!”

“She and Jasper are down near the stove; she’s drawing,” Rachel answered; it had been nearly as hard as pulling teeth to keep
Charlotte from pestering Mason. Nearly every chance the girl got, she wanted to be in the sick man’s room asking countless
questions.

“Oh, thank goodness,” Eliza exclaimed, clasping her hands to her chest in obvious relief. “Anyone caught outside in weather
like this is just asking for pneumonia or to be struck by lightning!”

With her bundle of clothes delivered, Rachel was ready to exit the room, to leave her mother to her many worries, but just
as she was about to open the door, she turned back, a question on her lips. “Mother,” she began, “what do you remember about
Mason?”

“Mason,” Eliza echoed, her attention pulled away from the chaotic weather, and her eyes focused on some far-distant place.
“What I will always remember about Mason Tucker is the first time Alice brought him home and introduced him to me.”

“The first time?”

“He actually took me by my hand and gave it a gentle kiss.” She smiled as warmly as the stove in the room below. “Well, Alice
turned a shade of red brighter than any beet! Of course, I was flattered, who wouldn’t be? When you are a midwife, even though
your work is important, it isn’t as if you’re often treated as a proper lady.”

“He was probably just trying to make a good impression.”

Eliza nodded. “And at that he succeeded. But it was more than that. He hadn’t acted in such a way to give false flattery,
but instead because he had the God-given ability to genuinely charm anyone. He’d already done it with Alice, so why not her
mother? How many other people felt exactly the same way when they first met?”

Rachel knew that her mother was correct; the first time she had laid eyes on Mason Tucker, as she carefully peeked through
the curtains and spied on her older sister and her new beau where they sat talking on the porch, she had been mesmerized by
both his good looks and personality. When she was introduced to him, she’d hoped beyond hope that she hadn’t flushed with
the excitement she had so clearly felt.

“But Mason was so much more than that,” Eliza continued. “In his job at the bank, he had the unfortunate duty of having to
speak to those families who couldn’t manage to pay their debts. He had to make difficult decisions, balancing what his father
expected of him with what was right. But in the end, he would never allow one of those men or women to give up hope. He kept
urging them to work hard, never to give up, and assuring them that everything would work itself out. Stories like Archie Grace’s
never happened in those days.”

Listening to her mother’s words, Rachel contrasted the Mason Eliza remembered with the man lying in the room down the hall.
In his former life he had never given up; now he struck her as a man no longer willing to fight for what he cared for or believed
in. In many ways, it appeared that the man who had left Carlson all those many years ago actually
had
died on the battlefields of France.

But there was another part of her that couldn’t help but wonder if her mother was also right. Maybe the optimism she remembered
in Mason, the refusal to surrender even when things seemed their gloomiest, was still inside the man. Maybe in the face of
the trauma he had experienced since returning to Carlson, he only needed time to find the strength he would need to carry
on. Briefly, she worried that maybe she had been too hard on him.

“Oh, how I wish he hadn’t died in that war,” Eliza continued. “As much for Charlotte’s sake as for Alice’s or my own. There
is no doubt in my mind that he would have made an excellent father.”

Rachel felt faint. Hearing Eliza speak about Mason as if he were dead made her realize just how great a secret she was keeping.
Heretofore unasked questions raced around in her mind.

What will be the reaction when everyone learns the truth?

Will my mother be angry?

When will be the right time to acknowledge that Mason is alive?

“Why did you ask about Mason?” her mother asked.

“No… no reason…” Rachel stammered. “It’s just that… I was remembering the day that he and Alice were married… and how different
the weather was compared to today.”

“It was a beautiful day,” Eliza agreed with a smile.

Back out in the hallway, the door to her mother’s room shut behind her, Rachel felt guilty about lying. Though at that moment
she had no choice but to keep Mason’s remarkable return a secret, she knew that the occasion would soon come where she would
no longer be able to hide the truth. For now, the consequences of her deceit would remain unknown.

Rachel also knew that she had to reconsider Mason’s plight. Her own memories of the man closely resembled those of her mother;
he had been kind, hardworking, and blessed with a charm few men possessed. While the years he spent away had hardened him,
she didn’t know if the man he had been still existed beneath the rough surface.

Only time would tell.

Mason sat silently watching the rain fall against his window. Lightning crashed and thunder roared as the storm gained in
intensity, the strength of the wind enough to drive the branches of a nearby elm tree against the glass. Suddenly, the door
to his room burst open and, as tempestuous as the outside weather, Charlotte came running in.

“Look what I did!” she shouted. “It took all afternoon, but look what I did for you!”

Rushing over to the side of the bed, with a smile that spread ear to ear, Charlotte thrust a sheet of paper into his hands.
The paper was covered with many drawings: a house, several trees, and a large sun sharing the sky with a pair of puffy clouds.
But what stood out was a gathering of people: a man lying in a bed, a woman at his side, a small girl with blonde braids,
and, right beside her, a big dog with its tongue hanging out the side of its mouth. The drawing was crude, clearly that of
a child, but there was no mistaking who everyone was supposed to be.

“That’s you in the bed,” Charlotte declared proudly. With one of her small fingers, she pointed out everyone else. “That’s
Rachel, and me, and that there’s Jasper… he woulda been mad if he wasn’t in it.”

“It’s lovely.” Mason smiled weakly.

“I made it for you to have.”