Emma's Gift (32 page)

For the first time, I saw a little light in him, a hope trying to push through the doubt. “What if Albert throws us both off?”

“We'll figure something out.”

“You're serious! Dad-gum city boy! You think you can make anything work!”

“We have to, don't we? We have our children to think about.”

He shook his head, looking at me and mulling it over in his mind. “Yeah,” he finally said. “Yeah, we do.”

He took a deep breath, but I could scarcely breathe at all.
Lord, touch him.

“You really think we can make it?”

“Yes, George, I think we can. Emma did her best to give us both a decent chance, and she'd be expecting us to make the most of it. Remember how she used to say, ‘You've always got something, even when you've got nothing, 'cause that's what God hung the world on.'”

He shook his head but almost smiled. “Po-tential. Isn't that what she called it?”

“Faith.”

“Crazy lady. You ever think how crazy she was?”

“Crazy enough to love us, George. Not just the kids. You and me. She could see past folks thinking us a couple of failures. We're not failures. We don't have to be.”

“You believed her, then?”

“It was hard at first. Coming here with nothing, having nothing to give my wife and kids. For a while there, I felt like you're feeling, that they'd be better off without me. If I couldn't even put food on the table, what good was I?” He was still staring at me, and I was feeling a strange heat inside. “I had a friend back in Pennsylvania. When our plant shut down, we both lost our jobs and everything we'd invested. He jumped off a bridge. Left a wife and son. And for a while there, I used to think about doing the same thing.”

“Guess you musta decided again' it.”

“I realized Emma was right. We're put on this earth by a loving God. And he doesn't abandon us. We're more than our work or our money or lack of it. And our kids need their fathers. They need us to do our best and show them it's okay to need God. Just being with them, that's what they want.”

“I ever tell you you'd make a good preacher?”

“Yes.”

He was quiet for a moment. “I got a hard row to hoe, Sam, any way you look at it.”

“I'll help you. Your church'll help you. You know your boys will. They're all primed to do whatever it takes.”

He was quiet again, looking back toward Willard's tractor and that dangling rope. “I guess I owes it to 'em then, don't I? 'Least to give it a try a while.”

“I'd say so.”

He took two steps, picked his hat up off the floor, shook it off, and pressed it on to his head. Then he looked up at me for just a moment before turning to the doorway and stepping out into the blowing snow.

“Got chores waitin', Wortham. You gonna help me or what?”

TWENTY-FIVE

Julia

Samuel and George both being gone made me nervous. But not so much that as them not saying anything about it first. Joe and Sam and Robert brought water and took care of the rest of the chores, but I told them the men probably had chores well in hand at the other farm. Maybe seeing the snow they thought it best to take care of things themselves.

The children all seemed to accept that all right. For now. But I didn't believe it. Samuel would go outside in the middle of the night sometimes and think nothing of it. But it wasn't like him to leave the farm without saying something to me. Not unless he was in an awful hurry.

I did my best feeding everybody, oatmeal again because it was easy to make enough.

“It's Rorey's birthday,” Sarah reminded me for the third time.

“I know, dear.”

“Shouldn't we start on the cake? Mommy, shouldn't we?”

“Let me clean up from breakfast first,” I said with a sigh. Some of the Hammond children had definitely gotten their appetites back. They'd eaten a lot. And I found myself worrying.

Thank God for all the food we'd been given the last few days. But except for leftover turkey, it was nearly gone, and our winter supply was not as plentiful as I would've liked it to be. I'd done some figuring on that in November, and Emma had scolded me for it.

“Sure,” she admitted, “it don't look like 'nough for a long winter, there bein' four a' you. But the Lord'll provide.”

Four of us. With her, it would've been five. But even then she'd known she wouldn't be here long. And this morning we were thirteen for breakfast. Lord have mercy. He'd have to provide if this kept up, or we'd be out of food by the end of January.

Such thoughts soon had me scolding myself. Why couldn't I be more faith-filled, the way Emma had been? I had been like that once, coming out here for the first time, picking the wild things that grew hither and yon just to put things on the table. I'd been the one assuring Samuel and the children that everything was just fine. What had happened to me? I couldn't seem to muster the same confidence now.

“To every thing there is a season.”
There came that same Scripture occupying my head again. And there was not one mention of a time to doubt.

I started in earnest mixing batter for Rorey's cake. It was to have a special frosting that was more like sweet cream and cherry sauce poured rich over the top. Lizbeth was carefully telling me how.

“Did your mother make cake for everybody's birthday?” I dared ask her.

“Nope. Pie sometimes,” she said, not looking up from the potatoes she was peeling. “Let's make a turkey pie of the leftovers, Mrs. Wortham. Mama done that when she got the chance. Got carrots?”

“A few.”

“They's good in it. You want me jus' to make it? I knows how all right.”

“I'd appreciate that, Lizbeth. Very much.”

I didn't expect her to say anything else. She wasn't much for talking most of the time, but this morning she seemed to need to. When Sarah ran off to play with Rorey again, we were alone in the kitchen, at least for a while.

“You seen what Pa give me. Now things ain't ever gonna be like they was. I don't know, honest, if we'll see him again.”

“Oh, Lizbeth! Surely they just went to do the chores—”

“Your husband, maybe, Mrs. Wortham. That's prob'ly so. But Pa weren't minded to come back. I knows it.”

I didn't know what to say. I marveled that she could stand there so steady, so strong, and tell me that.

“I can't show Sammy the watch he give me, Mrs. Wortham, 'cause he'd go off lookin' right now, an' I don't want him out in the snow again so long. Is that wrong a' me?”

“The weather doesn't look fit for anyone to be out,” I said. I agreed with that much. “But they had to get over there to see to your stock. It'll just take them longer getting back.”

She smiled. “You're awful much tryin' to be nice about this. An' I hope Mr. Wortham don't get lost or nothin', if he's out lookin' for—”

“Lizbeth—”

“I come used to the idea that things is gonna be different, Mrs. Wortham. I wish you'd think some more on all a' us stayin' here. Anythin' else is gonna be hard on the youngest ones after all this.”

There she was, asking me again. “You can stay as long as you need to, like I already said, but that surely won't be too—”

“We'll just have to see, that's all.”

What if Lizbeth was right? What if George just took off, and Samuel went after him? Should I send the boys to see? We'd know something was wrong if those chores weren't done.

They'd had plenty of time to get over there and back by now, considering how early they'd left. The snow was just slowing them down. Surely they'd come in any minute, more than ready for some hearty breakfast. But I'd gone and put everything away, as if I weren't expecting them.

Harry walked into the kitchen, eating a string of stale popcorn he must've pulled from the tree. “Can we make cookies again?”

“Goodness! I'm making cake! And we still have some left.”

“I'm hungry. Can I haves one?”

I got him down a cookie, though he'd plainly helped himself to a snack already. And he'd just eaten. Suddenly there were three more boys underfoot, as though the cookies had brought them out of the woodwork. I put some on a plate and told them to pass it around.

“But only one apiece,” I cautioned. “That's enough till after dinner.”

“You're good, Mom,” Harry suddenly announced.

His words twisted around in my insides, choking me silent. He hadn't called me Mama, but Mom, the way Robert always did. He almost seemed to be accepting me the way Lizbeth was, and I very nearly panicked. I hadn't bargained for this. I kept thinking how Willy had said he didn't want to go home. What were we to do? George had already been too distant for too long, and here he was gone again.

Rorey came in and watched me put her cake in the oven, but she didn't say a word. Twisting one wayward strand of hair around her pointer finger, she turned to where Lizbeth was stripping the turkey off the bone and swiped a chunk of the meat.

Emma Grace was suddenly wailing from the other room.

“Joey'll get her,” Lizbeth told me. “He knows we got our hands full in here.”

Joey got the baby all right, and young Sam helped Harry on with his coat and boots and took him outside a while. I was just starting the cherry frosting when I heard a dreadful thump followed by Berty's tearful bellow. Without thinking I ran into the next room.

Berty was lying on the landing of the stairs, crying his little eyes out. Kirk was beside him already, but the little boy didn't want anything to do with him. “Lizbeth!” he called pathetically.

But when he saw me, he reached out his little hand. “Mommy! Mommy!”

No! I wanted to run back to the kitchen and tell Lizbeth to go and tend to her brother. But the little tike was up and limping in my direction, and it was too late.

“I falled!” he wailed. “I falled on them steps ober dere!”

I knelt to his level, feeling suddenly very heavy. “Well, you look like you're doing all right, considering, Bert. Can you show me where it hurts?”

He pointed quickly to both knees and one elbow. Then he held both of his hands to his little head and begged, “Hold me!”

Oh, George! Why aren't you here for this?

That little boy's big tears compelled me, and I picked him up despite the turmoil in my heart. Sarah had said I would have to cover the ground that Wilametta couldn't. And I hadn't wanted to. I hadn't wanted to let these kids into my heart quite that deeply, even though Emma had and I'd admired her for it. I wanted to love mine, sure. But all these? Oh, Lord! I just wanted them to be able to go home.

But Berty gently took hold of a fistful of my hair to rub up against his little cheek, and then he leaned his head against my shoulder, soft as anything. He sniffed a couple of times, but then he was quiet, just clinging to me. I sat in the nearest chair.

“He okay?” Sarah asked, suddenly beside me.

“Sure. He will be. He needs a little comfort for a minute is all.”

“He's just a little kid,” she said. “He needs to be helded more than us big kids.”

“Maybe so.”

Berty closed his eyes, and I could feel him relaxing against me. Three years old. He was little all right, far too little to understand everything going on around him. But if it was confusing to be here with me, he didn't show it. He just held my hair close to his cheek and looked for all the world to be sleeping. My eyes filled with tears. He was so cute, in a way I hadn't noticed before. And so dependent. And trusting.

“We're kinda like one family now,” Sarah said.

“Almost seems that way today.” I sighed.

“If they go home, they're gonna miss you
and
their mama.”

I looked up to see Willy watching us, and Franky too, over by the fire. Neither of them said a word, but Franky hugged his knees up to his chest and wiped his nose with one shirtsleeve.

She might, oh, she might be right. And what about me? I'd wonder every day how they were, if they were eating good and if George was being decent to them or shoving them away.
Lord, help me! Surely you never meant for us to get so attached! Of course, we're supposed to love, we're supposed to care, but we just can't stay involved forever. Can we?

We were two families, so different. And Sam and I shouldn't have to do George's job. I knew I should give Berty to Kirk or call Lizbeth from the kitchen or just set him down and tell him he was all right now. But Sarah had one hand on his back and one on my arm, content with things the way they were. And it felt so strangely good, with his warm little body snuggled against me and my little princess standing there giving us both her support.

I put my hand on Berty's head and ignored the single tear drifting down my cheek.
To everything there is a season,
I thought.
To love. To love more. To love all these, and even George, for their sakes.

I knew in my heart we couldn't just send them home and have that be the end of it. It was never the end of it for Emma when she'd gone over and brought another Hammond baby into the world. She was there for them always. And she would want us to be too. She'd left us that, just as surely as she'd intended to leave us this farm. But without Wila's passing, without that, I would never have let it be so.

TWENTY-SIX

Samuel

The snow was stopping, and I was grateful. Two of the goats had gotten out, and instead of just standing by the barn, like I might've expected, they took to frolicking in the drifts. It took a little while getting them in again.

“I'm tellin' you,” George said, “nothin' beats goats for wantin' to play. It seem warmer to you?”

“Not really.”

“Well, they're sure kickin' up their heels.”