Tiger Lillie (26 page)
Authors: Lisa Samson
Tags: #Fiction, #Contemporary Women, #Family Life, #Christian, #General
25
“They’re dead,” I tell the officer the next morning. I relate the entire story, leaving out no detail, ending with, “I suppose I’m going to be charged with kidnapping, reckless endangerment, and manslaughter, aren’t I?”
“Her mother handed her to you, Miss Bauer.” He shakes his head. “Your niece was in bad shape. But thanks to the doctors…and you…”
I don’t know what will become of Hannah. But for now, she’s alive. Thank You, God, she’s alive.
Gordon slips an arm around my waist.
“Don’t worry ma’am. I don’t see how there will be any charges made against you. I’ve already talked with your brother-in-law’s mother, and she says you did the right thing. Tried to do it herself on numerous occasions.”
Relief trickles into me. I picture the funeral in several days. Closed casket and no one from The Temperance Church of the Apostles in attendance, if I have anything to do with it.
I gaze out the window of the hospital room. Hannah sleeps, breathing with the help of a ventilator, but breathing. They vacuumed out her lungs and some IV is pumping medication into that tiny, fragile arm.
The officer excuses himself.
The clock says two p.m. Over twelve hours have passed since I left the house. Seems like twenty-four. Seems like two.
“Well, we missed our own wedding, Gordon.”
“Well worth it. Look how pink she is.”
“Yeah.” I take her hand, petting the delicate fingers. “Yeah.” And a torrent of tears sweeps me away as I weep for my sister over her little child. My poor Tacy. I think of her as she is right now, finally free to be God’s glorious creation. Maybe she shares a cup of heavenly wine with Grandma. Maybe they know the end from the beginning and, as part of that great cloud of witnesses, watch and approve. I can only hope I will not disappoint them. I will try my best not to.
Mom and Dad seek one another in their agony. At five o’clock the family will descend on Gordon’s and we will weep, we will grieve, we will remember. And we will ingest paprika and sour cream as the Bajnoks have always done. We will go on from here. Somehow. Because deep inside of us, we know that God has willed us to carry on. And He will provide the strength.
The Temperance Church of the Apostles disbanded. When we went through Rawlins and Tacy’s effects we were enlightened far more than any of us wanted to be. Alban Cole was nothing more than a con man, raised in a religious home, who knew the Bible, knew the lingo, knew how to grind people to dust beneath his heel.
He extorted millions of dollars from his congregation, much of it from Rawlins. He disappeared, but Nathan Dovey is on the job, courtesy of Stan and Gordon Remington. When he’s found, I can only pray to God I’m not there. Over a hundred letters from Almighty Alban threatening hellfire, damnation, and sacrifice were found in hollow books in the library at the farmhouse. Rawlins was in so much debt, it’s a good thing he’s dead.
Daddy was relieved Cole wasn’t really a minister, but I said, “Daddy, what does that matter? There are plenty of pastors who do the same thing to their congregations. It’s just not for money.” The lust for power is just as perverting.
I found a couple of beautiful canvases in Tacy’s studio. They hang in our dining room, so when the family gathers together, as I know we will, Tacy will in some way be present.
But today, we pay tribute to Grandma Erszèbet.
“For someone with one leg, you sure did a good job digging that hole, Gordon.”
His wedding band glints on the hand that holds the shovel. “Oh, I’m handy all right.”
After two weeks of marriage, a hasty solemn ceremony by the water, just me and him, the family, and the Extremely Odd gang, I know just what a handy fellow he is. I always suspected artists’ hands would know just what to do. It was so worth the wait.
“I can’t believe you found the Nightmare at the landfill.”
And only after about seven phone calls to try and see who had hauled the mammoth bush away. It’s barely alive, but I’m confident Gordon can coax it back to life. He has a way with living things.
“It deserves to be here. Hey, the spirit of Grandma E lives on in you, sweetheart.”
For the first time in my life, I know that’s true.
The August sun shines hot on our heads. “I need to get Hannah a hat.” I heft her up on my hip. Ten months old and doing just fine now. Skinny, but completely on the mend.
“Just one more second while I put the root ball in. I want you to shovel in the first spade of dirt. It’s symbolic, you know.”
He lifts the massive bush and sets it in the hole. “Ready?”
“I am. I really am.”
I lean down and set her on my lap and I shovel in the dirt, and more and more. I want to do it all. And I pat it down with my skeleton hand. Hannah reaches out and pats it too, a tiny little skeleton growing inside of her. I’ll do my best to make sure she comes to terms with that sooner than I did.
About the Author
Lisa Samson lives in Maryland with her husband, Will, and their three children. As of this writing, three book-selling college boys live in the spare bedroom, and their conversation brightens up the ten p.m. hush. Her husband has recently completed his master’s degree, and Lisa is still recovering, but she’s not complaining, remembering how much political capital she’s banked over the past year. She is busy procrastinating over her next book.
O
THER
B
OOKS
BY
L
ISA
S
AMSON
The Living End
Songbird
Women’s Intuition
The Church Ladies
Indigo Waters
Fields of Gold
Crimson Skies
T
IGER
L
ILLIE
P
UBLISHED BY
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ATER
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ROOK
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RESS
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All Scripture quotations are taken from the
Holy Bible, New International Version
®. NIV®.
Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House. All rights reserved.
The characters and events in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to actual persons or events is coincidental.
Copyright © 2004 by Lisa E. Samson
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
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ATER
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Samson, Lisa, 1964-
Tiger Lillie/Lisa Samson.—1st ed.
p. cm.
1. Weddings—Planning—Fiction. 2. Married women—Fiction. 3. Abused wives—Fiction. 4. Sisters—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3569.A46673T54 2004
813′.54—dc22
2004009583
eISBN: 978-0-307-55178-8
v3.0
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