When We Were Saints (12 page)

Archie's face brightened. "A pilgrimage? Like a trip? When? Where would we go? Would we walk? What kind of pilgrimage?"

Clare brushed her hair back off her face. "There is a place," she said. "I will take, you there, but not yet, not now. You have to be ready for it."

Archie rose up on his knees, barely listening to her words. A pilgrimage was the answer to his prayers. He knew that many people went on pilgrimages to pray for healing and were healed. He would go and pray for his grandmother. "Yes!" he said. "This is brilliant! This is a brilliant idea!"

Clare laughed, and Archie grabbed her hands and pulled her up with him and spun her around. "Clare," he shouted, "you are perfection!"

W
HEN
A
RCHIE HAD NOT
been to see his grandmother in three days, Nattie Lynn called him and left a message that she wanted to see him to discuss a very serious matter Archie knew what the serious matter was and he didn't want to go and face Miss Nattie Lynn, but out of respect for her wishes, he went anyway. His hours spent up on the mountain every day had changed him. He felt a love for all things, and all people. He loved Miss Nattie Lynn, he realized, and he would go and talk to her and show her his love. He had convinced Clare that riding their bikes for transportation should be acceptable, at least until school let out, so Archie climbed on his bike and rode to Nattie Lynn's house.

As he rode he noticed patches of the sun's light striking the mountains in the distance, and closer the tiny wildflowers springing up on the sides of the road. He noticed all the colors of green in the leaves of the trees, and all the shades of brown in their trunks. He felt such love for the flowers and the trees and mountains and the sun that shone down upon them on the golden day that he had to stop several times so that he could take it all in. The love he felt pouring from him was overwhelming to him. His chest expanded with emotion; his eyes filled with tears. The world was so beautiful, he didn't know what to do.

A car passed behind him and Archie felt something hit his back. A teen's voice yelled from the car "Get out of the road, clown!" and sped past. Archie turned around and found the Coke can that had been thrown at him. He picked it up and examined the red-and-white design on the silver can. Even the can, with its crushed center looked beautiful to him. He climbed back on his bike and continued on to Nattie Lynn's with the can in his hand. When he arrived at the house and Miss Nattie Lynn answered the door he handed her the can and said, "I brought this for you."

Nattie Lynn took the can with a frown. "Are you wanting me to throw this away for you?" she asked.

Archie smiled and said, "It's yours. You can do whatever you want with it."

Nattie Lynn, still frowning and looking Archie up and down, opened the door wider and told him to come in. "You need a bath, young man," she said, leading him into her living room and setting the Coke can on a table in the hallway.

The house was dark, with oak woodwork everywhere, and it felt to Archie like a very masculine house, large and square, with heavy furnishings and dark, thick curtains drawn in all the windows. The only things feminine in the living room were Miss Nattie Lynn and the collection of antique dolls she had placed on the mantelpiece.

Nattie Lynn told Archie to have a seat, and he chose an oversized chair with lion paws carved in wood for armrests. She sat across from him, her plump body filling out the chair and picked up her knitting from the backpack that sat on the floor by her feet.

"I just wanted to tell you how much I appreciate you coming out to check on me every now and then," Archie said, beginning the conversation.

"Well, that's exactly what I wanted to talk to you about. We never actually see you anymore, do we?" Nattie Lynn replied, smiling and tilting her head as though she had said, "Won't you please have some candy?" "We see that note you tacked up on your door telling us you're up on the mountain, but it's the same old note every time. For all we know you've fallen and broken your leg, like you did that time with the Armory Mitchell boy. We leave you food and we come back a few days later and it's still there, and I can see for myself that you aren't eating much. Why, you're as thin as a prisoner;"

"I don't eat meat anymore, Miss Nattie Lynn," Archie said. "But as you can see, I'm alive and well, so next time you visit my grandmama, please tell her this."

Nattie Lynn worked quickly with her needles, not even bothering to look at her work. Instead she watched Archie. "What do you propose we do, Mr. Archibald? Do you want us to he? Because surely, if I told her you were well, I would be lying."

"No, ma'am, I don't." Archie paused and considered what he should say. "What if I make out a new note for you each day to let you know where I am? And if you want to bring me food, which I do appreciate, then if you would bring me vegetables and bread, things like that, I will most gladly eat it. That way you'll know I'm all right and you can give my grandmama a good report. You see, until she's well, I don't think I should visit because my presence upsets her."

Nattie Lynn stopped knitting. "Sounds like you've got it all figured out now, don't you?"

"Yes, ma'am," Archie said, believing he was behaving like Clare, the way he spoke to her and shone his loving eyes on her.

But Nattie Lynn leaned forward in her seat and with a glaring expression said, "Well, I don't like it. I don't like it one bit. Give your grandmama 'a good report'? Based on what? A few scraps of food left in the garbage, a fresh note tacked on the door? You must think I'm some kind of fool, but I can assure you, I'm not."

Archie held up his hand. "Wait a minute. It's not what you think. I'm not up to anything." As he looked at her Archie tried to hold on to the loving feelings he had felt for all man- and womankind up on the mountain. He smiled a syrupy smile.

Nattie Lynn scowled at him. "Archibald, you must think I just fell off the turnip truck this morning. Of course you're up to something. And telling me that it would be better if you didn't see your grandmama! What kind of fool notion is that? If you want her to stop worrying, you'll put on some clean clothes, pack your bags, and get yourself on down here. Then you will go visit your grandmama every single day, like a good and decent grandson should."

Archie tried another tack. "Miss Nattie Lynn, you remember what my granddaddy said before he died?"

"Of course I do; I was right there with him. Heard it with my own ears."

"Well, I believe he meant it. It was a prophecy. And now, I must be about my Father's business."

Nattie Lynn drew in a deep breath, and with her lips pinched tight and her finger pointing at Archie she said, "Don't you be quoting Jesus at me, young man. 'About my Father's business,' indeed! What, may I ask, might that 'business' be?"

"Prayer mostly."

Nattie Lynn raised her hands, then thrust her knitting down on her lap. "'Prayer'? Good gracious, boy, you can do that anytime, anywhere. You can certainly do that in this house if you've a mind to it."

Archie squirmed back into his seat and looked at the dolls staring at him from the mantelpiece above Nattie Lynn's head. "Truth is, I'm planning on going on a pilgrimage."

"A pilgrimage? To Jerusalem? Lord have mercy, what put that idea in your head?"

"Not Jerusalem, someplace closer Clare says going on a pilgrimage is a way of deepening and proving our faith. She says it can be a life-changing experience."

"You want 'a life-changing experience'? If your grandmama doesn't make it, you'll have yourself a life-changing experience, all right!"

Archie felt as if the room had just tilted. He grabbed the armrests and blinked several times and told himself that his grandmama would be just fine. Just fine! He stood up. He didn't want to listen to anything more. "Excuse me, Miss Nattie Lynn, but I think I had better be going now."

Nattie Lynn stood up, too, leaving her knitting on the seat of her chair. "You leaving on that pilgrimage right this minute, are you?"

"No, ma'am," Archie said, backing out into the hallway and trying to remain calm.

Nattie Lynn followed him. "And do you plan to just leave your grandmama in the hospital, in her serious condition, while you're on that pilgrimage of yours?"

Archie stopped. He clenched his fists. "The pilgrimage will be for her too. People have been healed on pilgrimages. I will be praying for her all the time."

"Archibald Caswell, I hate to say it, but I'm ashamed of you. Your grandmama needs you there at the hospital, and she needs to know you're all right."

"Miss Nattie Lynn, don't you believe in the power of prayer?"

"Indeed I do, but nothing shows off the power of prayer better than the power of love, and showing that love by being there when your grandmama needs you."

Archie turned and walked toward the front door. He didn't want to argue with her anymore. Her words were pulling him away from God. As much as he tried to feel only love for Nattie Lynn, he had felt an ugliness creeping up inside him, especially when she had tried threatening him by using his grandmother's illness. He wanted to get home and climb his mountain, where he knew God waited for him. There his mind and heart could rest in God, but in town, with Nattie Lynn and his grandmother he felt angry and upset and unholy. The visit had made him realize that he should not be around people who did not understand his mission. He decided he would not ride into town again. He would not ride his bike anywhere ever again. If he needed to get somewhere, he would walk. That was the way a true pilgrim of God would get around.

He stopped at the door and said to Nattie Lynn, "I want to thank you for what you have said to me. I feel even more strongly that what I'm doing is right." Then he remembered something Clare had told him and added, "It says in the Bible that we must seek
first
the Kingdom of Heaven, then everything else will follow. That's what I'm doing. Putting God first."

"Child, don't you start preaching to me about the Bible. I know full well what's in that book. Maybe instead of reading and preaching from it, you ought to try to understand it better"

"Yes, ma'am, that's exactly what I am going to do and what I hope my pilgrimage will help me with. So, if you'll excuse me, I'd better be going."

Archie didn't wait for her to open the door He pulled it open himself and bounded down the steps toward his bike. He popped his helmet on his head, hopped on the bike, and raced down the drive, not even bothering to fasten his helmet strap until he had ridden far away from Nattie Lynn's house.

A
RCHIE HAD SET OUT
for home, but then, realizing that it had to be close to time for Clare to get out of school, he decided to meet her there. He needed to see her. He knew that she could make him feel better again. He turned his bike around and rode back toward town.

There were more tourists arriving in town every day. The large flower baskets had been hung on hooks from the antique lampposts that were set every twelve feet along the edge of the brick walkway in front of the shops on Main Street, signaling the early beginning of the tourist season. Archie barely noticed them, or the shoppers milling about, wandering in and out of the stores and eating corn dogs and ice-cream cones. His mind was still on his conversation with Nattie Lynn, thinking of all the things he should have said to her;

How dare Nattie Lynn try to scare me by telling me Grandmama might die,
he thought.
What's wrong with the woman, anyway? And how dare she tell me she's ashamed of me.

Archie couldn't pedal to the school fast enough. He wanted to see Clare's smile and the light in her eyes when she looked at him. He wanted her to touch him, hug him, even, and tell him that everything was okay; his grandmother would be all right. He tried to quiet his mind and feel God's presence, God's assurance that all was well and he was doing the right thing by staying up on his mountain and praying, but he couldn't do it. He felt too upset. Then he got angry at himself.
It's stupid,
he thought.
It's stupid to be this upset. They were just words, that's all. Grandmama's going to be fine. I'm too emotional about everything all of a sudden. Some saint I am. I stink!

Archie turned onto the long, steep road that led to the school, shifted into high gear and kept pedaling, his thoughts keeping pace with his spinning legs.

I need to get away. I can't be a saint with people bugging me all the time. Phone calls. Notes. Visits. I can't wait any longer. I need that pilgrimage. I need Clare. She makes me feel ... She'll lead me to God. As long as I'm with Clare.

Archie came to the bottom of the hill and turned onto School Street. He saw that the buses were pulling out and leaving. He dismounted and walked his bike onto the grass and watched the buses. Faces stared out at him as the buses passed, and some of them Archie recognized from church and baseball and other activities he had been involved with over the years. He turned away and walked his bike toward the school. It was a modern-looking building, long and flat on top. The land that surrounded the school was once a farm owned by a good friend of Archie's grandfather's. When the owner had died, his widow had sold the property to the town and the school was built. Before then children from the town had to travel twenty miles or more to attend the county school.

From the start Archie's grandfather had predicted doom for the new building. He didn't believe in public education and he didn't like all the "foreigners," as he liked to call the newcomers, moving in and turning a quiet mountain village into a "rich man's playground with all of its fancy-shmancy shops." "If they want a city, why don't they go back to where they came from?" he said.

The first school did burn down, and Silas Caswell cried out to all who would listen, "I told you so!" The fire marshal and the police never could find enough evidence to pin the blame for the fire on him, but everybody believed he'd done it, anyway, and Archie had always felt guilty by association.

Archie wheeled his bicycle over to the bike racks, where a girl was crouching down and sorting through a pile of papers. She glanced up at him and then did a double take, looking him over. She stood up and backed away a little. "You looking for someone?" she asked.