Timepiece (18 page)

His voice began to crack.

“She was so small and needed someone to protect her.” He raised a hand to his chest. “I was to protect her, Mary. Every instinct I was born with cries out that I must protect her!” His voice rose in an angry crescendo, then fell sharply in a despairing monotone. “And I failed. I have more than failed, I have caused her death.” A tear fell down his cheek. His lips quivered.

“Oh, what I would give to hold her just once more. To hear her forgive me for failing her.” He wiped his cheek, then lowered his head. MaryAnne walked across the room to him, then stopped abruptly. On the counter beside him lay two bullets. She
looked up for an explanation. David glanced at the bullets, then back up into her face.

“You were right. It is all that I have left of her. All my feelings and love for Andrea were in my heart—” he rubbed his eyes—“and hate kills the heart. Even broken ones.”

He took a deep breath, then, in anguish, dropped his head in his hands and began to weep. “I need you, Mary. I need you.”

MaryAnne took him in her arms, then pulled his head to her breast as he fell to his knees and, for the first time since Andrea's death, wept uncontrollably.

Five years later. Salt Lake City, 1918

“There are moments, it would seem, that were created in cosmic theater where we are given strange and fantastic tests. In these times, we do not show who we are
to God, for surely He must already know, but rather to ourselves.”

David Parkin's Diary. December 8, 1918

It was a chill night and the winter winds rolled in frozen gusts down the foothills of the Wasatch Range, drawing the valley in its crystalline breath. Two hours after the sun had fallen, a child, not suitably clad for such a December night, knocked on the front door of the Parkin home.

David was out of the state on business and as Catherine had been given leave for the evening, MaryAnne came to the foyer to greet the winter visitor. As she opened the door, a chill ran up her spine. MaryAnne recognized the girl right away. She was the daughter of Cal Barker.

“What brings you here, child?” MaryAnne asked softly.

The little girl timidly raised her head. Her face was gaunt and her clothes were dirty and ill fit.

“I would like some food, ma'am,” she replied humbly. Her breath froze before her.

MaryAnne stared for a moment, then slowly stepped away from the door. “Come in.”

The girl stepped into the house. Her eyes were filled with wonder at its richness and beauty. MaryAnne led her down the corridor, then into the dining room, where she pulled a chair away from the table.

“Sit down,” she said.

The girl obeyed, dwarfed by the ornate, high-backed chair. MaryAnne left the room, then returned a few moments later with a plate of bread and curd cheese, a sliced pear, and a small bowl of broth. She watched in silence as the girl devoured the meal. When she had finished eating, the child leaned back from the table and looked around the room. Her eyes focused on a small gold-framed photograph of Andrea,
clothed in a beautiful umber velvet dress with a lace-bibbed bodice. She smiled at MaryAnne.

“You have a little girl!”

MaryAnne stared at the child, then slowly shook her head. “No. Not anymore.”

“Where is she?” The girl's brown eyes blinked quizzically, partially covered by the long, dirty strands that fell over her face. “She would be lucky to live in this house.”

MaryAnne looked down at the Persian rug and blinked away the pooling tears. “She is gone. She had to go away.” She took a deep breath. “How old are you, child?”

“I am nine years.”

MaryAnne looked carefully into her face. She thought she appeared older than her nine years—aged as a child who has had the harsh realities of life thrust upon her. “What is your name?”

“Martha Ann Barker, ma'am.”

MaryAnne stood and walked over to the window. The snow outside fell in scattered showers and in the distance snaked across the paved street in snow-blown skiffs. “My little girl would be nine this winter,” MaryAnne said into the frosted windowpanes. She stared out into the black. “. . . This January.” She suddenly turned toward her small guest. “It is late for you to be out.”

“I was so hungry.”

“Haven't your parents any food?”

She shook her head. “My father was in the jail. No one lets him work.”

The child's directness surprised her. “Do you know why he was put in jail?”

She shook her head again. “The boys say that he killed a child. I asked my mama, but she just cries, mostly.”

MaryAnne nodded her head slowly. “Why did you come here? To this house.”

“I saw the fire from the street. It looked so warm and nice inside.”

“The fire . . .,” MaryAnne repeated softly. She sat down at the table next to her guest, contemplating the strange circumstance that had befallen her. She had been given a gift. A terrible, wonderful gift. The chance to see her own soul. She sat motionless, her hands joined in her lap, as her mind reeled with emotions. Then a single tear fell down her cheek. The girl observed it curiously. MaryAnne leaned close to the child and took her face in her hands.

“You must remember this night, Martha. You are loved here. You must know this for the rest of your life.”

The girl stared back blankly.

“You will understand someday.” MaryAnne stood up. “Just a moment, dear.” She left the room, then returned with a small bag of flour and a canister of salted bacon, as much as she thought the child could
carry. In a kerchief, stowed in the canister, MaryAnne had wrapped three gold coins.

“Can you carry this?”

Martha shook her head. “Yes, ma'am. I am strong.”

MaryAnne nodded sadly. “I can see that. Now you run home and take this to your mama.” She escorted Martha back out to the foyer and opened the door. A chill wind swept into the house. “Remember, Martha. You are always welcome. You are loved here.”

The little girl stepped out the door, walked a few paces, then turned back. “Thank you, ma'am.”

“You are welcome, child.”

She looked at the woman gratefully. “Don't be sad. Your little girl will come home.” The girl smiled innocently, then turned quickly and disappeared into the winter night. MaryAnne shut the door and fell against it weeping.

The next morning, the first sheaths of dawn illuminated the windows of the downstairs parlor in iridescent brilliance, meeting MaryAnne, where it had daily for the past five years, before a fireplace reading her Bible. The Bible David had brought back with a wooden box, a porcelain music box, and an oversized dress that would never be worn. The book bore witness of her devotion to the daily ritual, marred with teardrops and wrinkled pages. MaryAnne had followed the routine every morning since she had lost Andrea, holding to the words as one who is drowning seizes a life ring.

At the conclusion of her reading, MaryAnne wiped her eyes, then replaced the Gothic book on the elaborately carved rosewood bookshelf. She donned her coat and scarf and started outside on her daily trek to the angel statue.

The winter air was damp and heavy, carrying moisture pilfered from the Great Salt Lake, which salt-saturated consistency kept it from freezing even in the severest of winters.

In the distance, MaryAnne could see the angel at the top of a knoll, its head and wings capped in a new-fallen shroud of snow. She walked solemnly, her head bowed. She need not look to find her way, she could have followed the trail without sight.

She suddenly stopped.

In the freshly fallen snow were tracks leading to the angel. Heavy tracks, clumsy, large-bodied footprints that had come, and departed, falling back on themselves, but leaving evidence of the visitor at the base of the grave. MaryAnne approached pensively. Someone, that very morning, had knelt at the foot of the angel.

As she neared, she could see that the snow had been wiped from the stone
pedestal. On its surface, she saw a small parcel, a white flour sack bundle bound with jute. She looked around her. The morning sun illuminated the grounds and the snow sparkled in a virgin, crystalline blanket. All was still and quiet and alone.

Noiselessly, she stooped down and lifted the offering. As she pulled back the cloth, the contents cast a gold reflection on the surrounding coarse material—a soft radiance from the treasure that lay within. There, without a note, on the marble step of the monument, had been laid a rose-gold timepiece.

 

Salt Lake City, 1967

I stood outside Jenna's room holding the velveteen case in my hands. My throat was dry as I slid the box into my trouser pocket and knocked gently on the door. A soft voice answered.

“Come in.”

I stepped into the room. Jenna sat on her bed writing in her diary. A bridal gown, sheathed in a transparent garment bag, hung from the closet door above a new pair of boxed white satin pumps.

“Hi, sweetheart.”

Her face wore the unique blend of melancholy and excitement given rise on such an occasion. I sat down on the bed next to her.

“Are you ready for tomorrow?”

Jenna shrugged. “I don't think I will ever be ready.”

“I was just thinking the same about myself,” I said. “I once read a poem about the pain of a father sending his daughter to another village to be married. It was written four thousand years ago in China. Maybe things never really change.”

Jenna bowed her head.

“I just remind myself that this is what I've always hoped for you. All I have ever wanted for you is to be happy.”

She leaned over and hugged me.

“I have something I need to give you.” I brought the box from my pocket and set it in her hands. Her eyes shone with delight as she opened the case.

“It's beautiful.” She lifted the delicate
timepiece from the case, dangling it admiringly from one end. “Thank you.”

“It's not from me,” I said. “But it is from someone who loved you very much.” Jenna looked at me quizzically.

“It's from MaryAnne.”

My words sounded strange even to me—a name on a grave near the stone angel we visited every Christmas, now resurrected in a single act of giving.

“MaryAnne,” she repeated. She looked up into my eyes. “I don't really remember her,” Jenna said sadly. “Not really. I remember her once holding me in a chair and reading to me. How good I felt around her.”

“Then you remember her, Jenna. She loved you as if you were her own. In some ways, you were.”

Jenna looked back down at the timepiece.

“Nineteen years ago, MaryAnne asked me to give this to you the night before your
wedding. It was her most prized possession.”

Jenna shook her head in astonishment. “She wanted me to have it?”

I nodded. “MaryAnne was a good giver of gifts,” I said.

She draped the gold watch back in its case, set it on her nightstand, then sighed. “So are you, Dad.”

I smiled.

“Dad?”