Kris (15 page)

My heart beat with anticipation as Gerda and I at last approached the lane leading to the carpentry.

Immediately I knew something was wrong. My mind raced back through images of sporadic clusters of homes as we approached the
village. And there it was. One of the homes on my journey toward the village had not lit its window candles for the night. This could have been in error, but for some reason I doubted it. People were vigilant about those candles. They told the world that all were healthy inside and that none need fear contact with the inhabitants. No one wanted the stigma of that mistaken message.

I lit my lantern and held it out in front of me as I drove the sleigh toward the rear of the carpentry. It was then I witnessed Noel throwing stones at the dark windows of Josef and Gabriella's house.

“Stay inside and rot,” Noel yelled as he launched a stone into the night sky. True to its purpose, the stone found its mark and shattered the window high on the side of the wall.

“Take it!” Noel shouted at Jonas as he pushed a large rock into Jonas's hand and encouraged him to throw it.

“Noel!” I yelled at him, seeking some explanation for his hostile behavior. “What are you doing?”

“Look! Jelly belly has come back!” Noel yelled. And he threw another large rock, which landed with a loud thud against the side of the building.

I jumped off the sleigh and started toward Noel in an effort to stop him from damaging my home any further.

“Did you come to see him die?” Noel shouted, taunting me. “Or, maybe you wanted some more food from the filthy fat woman!”

I was distracted for a moment, as Markus now moved through the shadows near the carpentry. And, while I looked in Markus's direction, Noel hit me with a large stone that glanced across the side of my head, and I went down. The lantern hit the ground, spilling its liquid flaming content across the snow. Dazed, I had enough awareness to roll away from the fire. Then hazily I watched Noel bend down to pick up a thick
branch and heft it like a club, wrapping both hands around the end for greatest power. He began swinging it at the air with great fury as he shouted, “I'll bet you have it too! Get inside, fatty.”

Noel charged. And he laughed. He knew he had me. Though stronger, I could never outrun Noel. Stunned, I tried to shake the cloud from my thoughts in preparation for the impending attack. I struggled to my feet, desperate to master my unbalanced equilibrium; then the world faded and tilted as I fell to the earth in failure. My vision cleared a little, just enough to see Noel rear back on the branch, barreling down on me in his final assault.

“Go rot with them!” he screamed.

Then a blur from his left took him out at the knees. Markus tackled Noel and sent him sprawling to the ground with a large thud.

Markus and Noel continued to struggle as I tried to make sense of what was happening, and I looked about to see what other damage might have been done.

Noel shouted at Markus, “What are you doing?”

And Markus pushed him to the ground.

“What's the matter with you, Markus?” Noel asked in his angry confusion. “Are you siding with piggy now?”

“Go home, Noel!” Markus shouted.

“What?”

“I said, get up and go home,” Markus yelled even more forcefully. “You're not wanted here!”

“Why are you getting into this?” Noel demanded of Markus. “He's trying to get in to see that dirty—”

And Markus hit Noel as he shouted, grabbed him by the collar, lifted him into the air and threw him to the ground once more. I wasn't the only one who had grown stronger over the year.

“I'll say it again, Noel,” Markus shouted fiercely. “Get out of here. Go home to your mother.”

Noel backed away in defeat but cursed both Markus and me as he retreated from us. “I hope you burn with them, Markus! You and that fat, piggy friend of yours. When you have caught it, too, we will burn you all!”

Markus took a threatening step in Noel's direction, and Noel ran off into the night.

I was bewildered by what had come over Noel and Markus and also fearful of what I might learn now that Noel's assault had ended.

Markus anticipated my concern, but decided to challenge me in other ways. “Where were you?” he asked, in an accusing fashion.

“I had work to do. I was looking for someone,” I said defensively. I was still confused and unsure about what had transpired here in my absence. The rock hadn't done much more damage than a momentary stunning, but I was still getting my bearings.

I looked to Markus to see what he might tell me and noticed Jonas as he moved forward from the shadows where he was hiding.

“What happened here?” I asked.

But they did not answer me. It didn't matter. Jonas's eyes always told the truth.

“Tell me!” I yelled at them, not wanting to acknowledge the reality I already understood better than I should.

“Don't go inside,” Markus said solemnly. “It's too late. You can't do anything to help them.” And he began to walk away from the carpentry.

“Markus!” I called to him.

But Markus ignored me and said to Jonas, “Come on. It's time for us to go.” And he continued to walk off into the smothering night.

Jonas gave me a gentle wave as if to say, “I am sorry. Kris.” And he ran to catch up with Markus.

By now, of course, I knew that plague had come to the carpentry shop. Desperate remembered anxieties threatened to seize my body, first squeezing my heart and then capturing my ability to breathe. Slowly I took back my body. I fought back the destroyer, fear. I must go inside. Despite the warnings of Markus and the ones ringing in my own head, I had to find Gabriella and Josef. With a snort I shook off the debilitating grip that held my life hostage and headed for the side door to the carpentry.

As I entered the kitchen, I saw the broken shards of glass littering the floor, and furniture broken and tossed in disarray. Gabriella startled me as she entered from another room carrying a tray of medicine and damp rags.

“Gabriella, what has happened?” I blurted out to her. “Did Noel do all this damage?”

Gabriella looked up at me in shock and terror.

“You need to leave here,” she entreated.

“Where is he?” I asked.

“You can't see him now,” Gabriella weakly commanded. “Go, Kris. Please go. You must go.”

A blood-soaked handkerchief fell from Gabriella's tray and plummeted to the floor. She bent to pick it up and tried to place it in her pocket, but the tray slipped from her hands and crashed to the ground.

I ran to her and led her to a chair by the fire. “You must sit and rest a moment,” I said to her gently. “I'll take care of it. I'm here.”

She crumpled into the chair behind her that rested against the wall. I collected the spilled and broken items from the floor. I could hear Gabriella softly weeping and my heart filled with great sorrow for what she had undergone.

I crossed to her and wiped her tears with my handkerchief. I knew the depth of her pain and the suffering she would endure ever more, as I would, when Josef finally was lost to us.

Gabriella at last caught her breath. I placed my hand upon her shoulder, and she reached up slowly and placed her hand upon mine. I stood with her in that way for some time to share my deepest sympathy for her suffering and sorrow.

Then I said to her, “I will go to see him now. You stay here and rest. I will look in on him and try to make him comfortable.”

And Gabriella quietly nodded as she began again to weep.

I left her there to rest and release her stream of despair, and I quietly walked through the house until I arrived at the bedroom where Josef was sleeping. I listened at the door for a moment, but it was quiet inside. Though I did not want to disturb his needed sleep or impose myself upon his time of suffering, I knew I must enter, no matter what I might find there, and help him as I could.

I opened the door slightly and pushed upon it gently so its hinges would not creak and so I would not startle Josef by bursting in upon him.

An oil lamp burned on his bedside table, emitting black smoke. It gave the room a hazy patina that washed over Josef and the objects in the room, making them appear more distant and otherworldly. The dimly lit haze flowed to the corners of the room and blended with the
darkness of the shadows that lurked there unmolested. In the weak light, it seemed as if the darkness itself was watching and waiting, preparing to creep in on Josef to consume him. He had wasted away quickly in my absence, only the shell of the man he had been weeks ago. He was lying in the bed with an expression of agony on his face. It was a look I knew too well, seared into my memory and the weakened walls of my heart so many times over.

I moved to the fireplace and laid a fresh log upon the fire. It instantly brightened the room and generated greater warmth.

“You should not be here,” Josef said from behind me. Then a wet cough rumbled deeply from his chest and continued to roll until he was required to pull in breath.

“I have nowhere else,” I told him. Then I stoked the fire with a poker until the flames surged again.

Josef watched me from his bed, and I realized that my life was now modeled on his. He had cut me away from the rotting bark which had once covered me, trimmed my coarse edges, sanded me to a greater smoothness, and shaped me into one of his works by providing balance and strength, then clever design and a carefully layered finish that changed my rawness to something of greater value.

As I watched him, our eyes locked in silent understanding of the certainties we now faced. It hurt me so to see him dying in this way. But I also knew his spirit would not be lost because I now carried it inside me.

I pulled a chair to his bedside, and together we stared into the fire and sat in the comfortable silence of old friends who didn't need words to share in each other's company.

When he finally spoke, his words were low and gravelly, allowing himself just enough energy to convey his thoughts.

“I've always loved wood, working and shaping it in my hands. When I was a young man, I was to be a fisherman,” he said. “Have you ever watched the fish along the mountain rivers?”

“No,” I answered simply. But as I looked into his eyes, I knew there was more he wished to say.

“My father's fish. I would often watch them,” Josef said. “In leaps they cut the air, fighting the current, moving against the stream.”

He looked at me as he spoke, but his gaze passed through me, and traveled deep into the past and the days of his youth.

“As a young man I thought their triumph was their struggle. But I was wrong. It is in their acts of helplessness that they triumph,” he said.

“What is an act of helplessness?”

“It is a choice when there are no choices. It is to laugh in a moment of despair, to walk when there is nowhere to go. It is to make toys you will never play with for brothers and sisters you will never know.”

Josef stunned me with these words that revealed just how well he knew the secrets of my heart. “You should just rest,” I said. “You will breathe easier if you are not trying so hard to talk.”

But, he ignored me and continued as I wiped the sweat from his forehead with a soft cloth. “Those fish were going home, Kris. To that place of connection,” he said, struggling. “That's the gift you give. Not the toys. It's the connection.

“Your gifts tell them they are not alone,” Josef whispered hoarsely. Then he shuddered and hacked uncontrollably, and his breathing became more forced and painful.

“What can I do?” I asked. “How can I help you?” I wanted to calm him and let him know I would do whatever he asked of me, if it would improve his circumstances or remove his suffering in any way.

“Pack up the shop. Everything. Take care with the tools. They are irreplaceable.”

“And what should I do when I have packed them all?” I asked. I looked at him in my silent desperation, for I did not know how else to respond.

“Go deep into the Northlands,” he continued. “They say people live forever up there.”

“You will get better,” I told him.

“Listen to me!” Josef said forcefully. “Do not stay here. Do not return to the mountains where you came from.”

“Sarah told you,” I said to him.

“No Kris. You wore it in your eyes when I first saw you.”

“I could have brought this sickness into your house. This is my fault.”

“Sha! Carriers do not live. They die quickly like those who are consumed. We have been well a year over. You are no carrier. This did not come from you. But others will fear you. The villages nearby are no safer. People will hear of your story. They may say this disease has followed you. They will blame you in their ignorance. They will hurt you if you do not go.”

He watched me quietly, for a moment as the significance of his words registered with me.

“Sickness is not the ugliest of killers,” Josef continued. “Fear is.”