Tomorrow's Dream (15 page)

25 

The Millers had held lunch
for her arrival. It was the most difficult meal Kyle had ever eaten, but not for the reason she would have expected. She was nervous, yes, and eager to sit down and speak with Mr. Miller. The entire train ride she had tried to concentrate on all the points she would make. How she could give the baby a good home. How she would make plans for him to get into the proper kindergarten and then the best private school in the nation. How he would lack for nothing. Of course, that was why Mr. Miller had asked to see her. He could see how important it was, and he would talk to Ruthie.

But the lunch was unsettling. The family was very friendly to her. She had expected to find some resistance, possibly even some hostility. After all, she was clearly so much better off than they were. She could see the effects of their hardship everywhere. The house and the outbuildings all desperately needed painting. The Miller family's clothing was worn and mended. The farmyard was strangely silent, as though there weren't many animals around. And the simple food on the table fed them all, but there were no offers of seconds.

And yet they were all so
happy
. The talk was cheerful, their greetings warm. They asked about everything—her life, her family, her husband. The only subject they did not mention was Ruthie and the child. She tried to bring it up on several occasions, but it was just brushed aside. Finally Kyle accepted that she would have to wait. But the lunch and the questions seemed to go on forever. She felt unsettled by their genuine interest in her. These kind people and their gentle questions seemed to pry at the seal she had set in place over her heart.

Time after time she found herself thinking back to the image she had seen in the mirror that morning. These people could not have been kinder, more caring, more thoughtful and concerned. Why did she keep remembering how she had looked, and the expression she had seen in her own eyes? Why did she feel so threatened? Was she afraid that she would not be able to keep everything in place, that they might expose what she was carefully keeping hidden inside?

After lunch Mr. Miller invited her to join him on the porch. Her heart hammered in her chest as she walked slowly behind the big graying man. His crutch thumped and the floor creaked as he crossed to the oversized padded chair in the porch's far corner. He smiled up at her. “Sit down, my child. Why do you stand?”

“Oh. I . . . thank you.”

“Choel, he made this seat for me with his own hands. And Ruthie, she sewed the cushions.” Joseph Miller beamed. “Such riches a man has, with a family like mine.”

That was her opening. Kyle leaned forward and said, “Thank you so much for seeing me today, Mr. Miller.”

“Ach, what is this Mr. Miller? I am Choseph to you. Still are we family. And always will we count you as one of us.”

“Thank you . . . Joseph. Actually, I wanted—”

“Patience is needed in speaking with the old,” Joseph said gently, the light in his eyes inviting her to calm down. “Something is needed to be spoken. Good it is that you are here. You will now give me patience and hear my words?”

“Of course,” Kyle said, forcing herself to settle back. She would wait. She had no choice.

“Sister of Choel, listen carefully. God is a good God. He is always faithful and chust. This means He does everything right, and He does everything in the right way. Yah, yah, I know. You have your reasons to think other thoughts. But these words, still they are true. Maybe there is blessing for one and suffering for another. Maybe life is hard, and we wonder, where is our God? Maybe even we think, how God has let this happen? Why does it happen again today? When will there be an answer to my need?”

A sermon. Just what she needed. Kyle tried to feel irritation, impatience. But instead, she felt frightened. Exposed. Somehow the words shook her as nothing had in, well, months and months. The tone was gentle. Joseph did not even look at her most of the time. Yet the power of his kindhearted talk reached deep into her and began to pry away her fiercely guarded barriers.

“I am a simple man. Reasons are not here for why we must suffer. I cannot explain the sadness of life. No. All I can say is that always will God be with us. Always. Yah, this I
know
. In the darkness, in the suffering. So long as we let Him into our hearts and receive His comfort. For receive it we must. Like a gift. I hold it out to you but you must take it.”

He demonstrated with his hand toward her, then he reached up and began to stroke the long gray beard. She found herself staring at the hand, unable to turn away. It was creased and hardened and scarred, that hand. The fingernails were stained and battered by years and years of hard work. But the action seemed so gentle, so thoughtful, just like the words.

“I sit here and I think. It is an old man's way, to think on things. I think, yah, my life has been hard. It has cost much, this life. I think about the days before, and sometimes a glimmer comes. A tiny ray, like the sun just rising on a summer day. I think of Peter, the apostle who stumbled like me. Once he turns to the Lord and asks about his end. The Lord tells him because Peter, he is the Lord's friend. A simple man with many faults, yah, but still a friend. So Peter, he points to another man and says, What about this man here, how will his end be? And you know what the Lord says? You know this part of your Bible?”

Kyle realized with a pang of guilt that she had not opened her Bible for many days. And how much longer had it been since she had really absorbed the words? Kyle licked dry lips. “No,” she acknowledged.

“Ach, it is a small passage. But spoke to me it did, that passage. I ask that so often, you know. Why me and not that man? I ask. But the Lord, He said to Peter, If this is what I will, what is that to you? The Lord, He was saying, think you only of your own fate, not that of another. Think you of your own faith. Think you of your own salvation. Think of God's purpose for you.”

The chair creaked as Joseph Miller shifted to draw it closer to her. His eyes glowed as he looked at her, seeming to examine far below the surface, deep into the areas that she had tried so hard to hide away forever. “So careful must we be, careful always when we look at the victories and the defeats of life. Careful to hold room for the
mystery
of God. The power of our Lord to turn defeat and pain and suffering into good—He is good for each of us.”

She wanted to come back with something bitter. Something drawn from the well that he was exposing, the pain and the distress and the unwanted memories. But she could not speak. For there alongside all the agony was something else. A peace and a healing touch so gentle she could not fight it. Could not force it away, even as it threatened her efforts to hold everything in place.

Joseph Miller seemed to understand her turmoil. He nodded slowly, his gaze piercing now, the light in them almost blinding. But his voice remained gentle as he quietly said, “You are angry with God that He took your baby.” She opened her mouth to protest, but he said, “You think God makes a mistake. But you do not want to say that, even to yourself. So, instead, you hide your heart away, far away from your family who loves you. And you hide your heart away from God.”

Kyle's eyes dropped to her hands twisting in her lap. But his voice compelled her to look at him again as he said, “When we face failure in our life, hold we must to God. When we weep, it is on God's shoulder that we cry. When we suffer, it is with Him there beside us. Why? Because then will He
heal
us. Then will He
make whole again
.

“And when life pushes and tugs and tries to pull us away from God, this must we remember: The symbol of our King is the Cross. The Father lost His Son, too. Lost to separate us from our sins, the whole world's sin. Lost to death, He was. Tragic, painful death.” He waited a long moment, his gaze reaching as deep as his words, then finished quietly, “The Lord God, our Father knows, my daughter. He
knows
.”

26 

Kyle hurriend up the long drive
to the Rothmore estate, her face set by the panic she had heard in Abigail's voice. She did not want to be here at all, and most especially she did not want to be here today. Even so, she could not have denied Abigail's plea that she come out. She had never heard the woman's voice so—what? So broken. On top of her visit to the Millers' farm, Kyle felt as though her own world was being shaken to its very core.

When the large stone mansion came into view, she had a moment's pang over all the past and all the memories. It had been over a year since her last visit to her childhood home. Kyle climbed the stairs, relieved that the faces from her childhood were not there with expressions of their concern. Old Jim, the former gardener, now had a small apartment in Baltimore near his daughter. Maggie and Bertrand, the housekeepers, had retired to the Maryland coast. Even so, they all seemed very close just then, and Kyle felt a twinge at the thought of all of Maggie's unopened letters gathering dust in her top drawer. She had felt she just couldn't face the truth they would contain.

Kyle unlocked the door and pushed it open. The maid who had been with her through those first dark weeks came rushing up. “Miss Kyle, thank the good Lord you've come.”

“Where's Mother?”

“She's upstairs, Miss Kyle, and she's fit to be tied.”

Evelyn. That was the woman's name. Kyle felt yet another twinge over the way she had treated her. Kyle tried to shake it off as she headed for the stairway, but the feeling of guilt following her could not be dispatched so easily. Kyle ran up the stairs and down the long upstairs hall, stopping outside her mother's door. She had a fleeting impression of another door, one hidden deep within herself, that gradually was being cracked open, and the first whispers were emerging.

She shook her head against the thought, knocked on the door, and called, “Mother?”

“Oh, Kyle. Thank goodness.” There was the sound of footsteps hurrying across the floor, then the door flew back, and a woman she knew but did not know pulled her into a frantic embrace. “I've been so afraid and so alone.”

Kyle could not keep the panic from her own voice. “Tell me what's the matter!”

Abigail grasped her hand tightly, pulled her inside, pushed the door closed, and led her across to the chairs by the window. “I went to the doctor's yesterday.”

“What did he say? Tell me!”

“Nothing.” Abigail almost fell into her chair, picked the crumpled hankie off the narrow table, and waved it in the air. “That's not important.”

“Mother, it most certainly is!” Kyle remained standing, fighting off the urge to take her mother's shoulders and shake them. “Tell me what he said!”

“He said it's nothing—I'm fine.” But instead of looking pleased, fresh tears seeped out from the corners of Abigail's eyes. “Don't you understand? I'm fine
now
.”

“No.” All the strength in Kyle's body drained away. If the chair had not been right there, she might have fallen to the floor. Kyle slumped down into the seat. “No, Mother. I don't understand at all.”

“There was a woman leaving as I arrived.” Abigail's distracted manner was most unusual and out of character. Kyle searched her face as Abigail continued. “That's what started me off, I suppose. Or maybe it was the look in Kenneth's eyes that day at church, or something from our conversation. . . . Oh, I don't know. It doesn't matter. I saw that woman at the doctor's office, Kyle, and it was devastating. She was looking death straight in the face. And right then I knew.”

Kyle felt more than confusion. She felt as though every carefully constructed wall of defense, everything which had seen her through the past months, was crumbling. She did not know why seeing her mother so distressed would have that effect on her. But it did. “Knew what, Mother?” she begged.

“That I'm not ready to die.” The words ripped away what control Abigail had left. “No matter that it's not coming today or tomorrow. Then and there I knew it was
coming
, and I'm not
ready
.” She buried her face in her hands, and the muffled words emerged, “All my life has been a lie.”

“Mother, I'm not . . . you're . . .”

Abigail lifted her tear-streaked face. “Oh, Kyle, I've been so awful to you and to everyone. I've manipulated and I've schemed and I've demanded until I'm blue in the face. I've never had any true friends. Even when I started going to church, it was all a lie. I knew if I didn't go, I'd risk losing you. But I never really gave my heart to God. I suppose I never understood that until the moment in the doctor's office when I saw just how alone I truly was. Alone in this life, and alone in the next. No friends, Kyle. And what I do have is this terrible emptiness inside. . . .”

Kyle started at the familiar-sounding description coming from Abigail. With great effort, she reached across the chasm separating them and placed one hand upon Abigail's arm. “You have me, Mother. I'm your friend.”

“I know I don't deserve you. Not after everything . . .” Abigail had difficulty forcing the words around her sobs. “But I had to call, you see. You are the only one who can help me.”

The air seemed to compress around her, forming a myriad of gentle hands reaching down to brush aside all the remaining defenses. All the wounds and fears and longings and pains, all exposed and naked to the light of day. Kyle worked her mouth, but no sound came out. She swallowed and managed to whisper, “Help you how, Mother?”

“Learn how to pray.” One hand scrunched the hankie to her temple, while the other reached up to grasp Kyle's arm. “Do you think it's too late? Do you think God still wants me?”