With Love from Bliss (Saskatchewan Saga Book #2) (2 page)

“Yes, yes, Sister, we all remember, and how splendidly you answered him. And then what did she say?”

“She said,” Sister Claude mimicked warningly,
“
‘And Sister, you better watch out when the Lord rises!
’
”

Numerous gasps were heard as needles paused, heads were shaken, and voices raised in perplexity, dismay, or amazement.

This child! Didn’t she beat all!

“When I asked her—rather crossly, I’m afraid, for I was quite put out by this time—if she also memorized Scripture references, she said ‘Psalm 12, verse 5’ quick as a wink.”

“Psalm 12 . . . hmmm,” several voices repeated as the information was stored away for possible confirmation or further study.

Sister Evangeline, who had unpacked the child’s meager belongings, spoke next. “She has a Bible. King James, of course—they’re Protestants—and it’s old and dilapidated, much used by somebody. The name Esther Morley is written on the flyleaf. Does anyone here know if that was her mother, and if so, what happened to her? Dead, I suppose, or we wouldn’t be searching out this obscure aunt.”

“Not obscure, Sister! Certainly not obscure,” Sister Bernadine corrected. “Not by any stretch of the imagination. Definitely not obscure. No one can belong to the Maxwell family,
particularly the
Sebastian
Maxwell family, and be obscure. I thought everyone knew that.”

Sister Evangeline could have pointed out that she had chosen a life of retreat and self-denial and that she didn’t engage her faculties, as a rule, in worldly matters, but she was too sweet-tempered to do so. But for one wild moment, until she drew rein on her emotions, she almost blurted out, much as the child herself might have,
Not minding high things, but consenting to the humble!
Immediate contrition for such retaliatory thoughts kept her on her knees scrubbing the steps most of the afternoon.

Sister Bernadine was placidly continuing, “Yes, the mother of the child is indeed deceased. Esther Morley—now there’s an obscure name for you. Being married to that rapscallion didn’t elevate her reputation any, I’m sorry to say.”

“He wasn’t always so dissolute—Avery Ferne, I mean,” someone supplied. “It’s possible that his wife’s death marked a turning point—a downward turning point. It wouldn’t be easy to be left alone with the care of a small child.”

“It happens all the time,” Sister Bernadine responded, “and it doesn’t turn men into ne’er-do-wells. It’s fortunate indeed, for little Kerry’s sake, that the landlady had knowledge of the Maxwell connection, or the child might have ended up on the street among the hordes of children tossed aside to survive or perish as they will. Goodness knows we do our best to rescue them. Or do we? Sometimes I wonder if we are selfless enough . . .”

“Well, the Maxwells are known for their charitable works. Kerry Ferne has fallen on her feet, I’d say.”

“Lucky child!”

“Fortunate child, fortunate and blessed.” Sister Bernadine folded her mending and slipped away to other tasks, as did her companions, several of them in search of a Bible, only to find the Douay version silent on the subject of puffing.

W
hen the child was presentable—washed and combed and straightened—still there was a delay in meeting the important guest. Sister Bernadine thought it wise to collect her charge’s possessions and take them down at the same time she presented the child. She couldn’t imagine that Mrs. Sebastian Maxwell would spend valuable time in the small receiving room while her niece’s baggage was being assembled—especially these particular ragtag items—and be happy about it.

She was right. When at last Sister Bernadine entered the room, with Kerry lagging behind, it was to find Charlotte Maxwell tight-lipped. The reason was plain: Sister Vivian was fumbling, scarlet-faced, at the task of mopping tea from the woman’s skirt, which was the handsomest mourning costume imaginable, clearly expensive, made of silk moire, and fittingly black in color.

“You may go, Sister,” Sister Bernadine said quietly, and Sister Vivian, with another anguished glance at the guest’s stony eyes and flared nostrils—which seemed remarkably at home in
the long, handsome face—made her escape, an empty cup tipping in her shaking hand.

Shepherding the small girl forward, Sister Bernadine introduced herself to the woman seated before her, adding, “And this, of course,” indicating the child, “is Kerry,” and lest there be any question about the woman’s responsibility, “the daughter of Avery Ferne, your brother.”

With two fingers of one be-ringed hand Charlotte Maxwell held the damaged skirt away from her knee; with the other she blotted the wet spot with a serviette. Long moments passed before she turned her attention to the waiting pair. A mere dip of the flowered, winged, gathered lace and straw creation that seemed to reign supreme on the iron-gray head was the only acknowledgment she accorded Sister. Her gaze was fixed on the small face at Sister Bernadine’s elbow.

“So you are Kerry.”

“I’m Keren,” the child said, and only Sister caught the attempt at bravery in the two words. But Kerry was not through. “Spelled with two e’s. K-e-r-e-n.”

The sentence hung in the air between them like a protective shield on a field of battle.

To the astonished Sister, it seemed that the child was making a startling effort to keep her identity from being lost in that of the woman, doing it the only way she knew and doing it instinctively. Sister had a momentary vision of a swimmer clinging to a capsized boat, desperately resisting the tug of the current. She clasped with a firm grip the small hand that had somehow made its way into hers.

“K-
e,
K-
a,
” the aunt said briskly. “What could it possibly matter? It sounds the same no matter how it’s spelled. It has a foreign ring to it,” she continued quenchingly, “that certainly isn’t Scottish.” The Ferne family, into which Charlotte had been born, was Scotch through and through, and though brother Avery had not graced the name, still it should have its honorable recognition, especially by this upstart child, or so it seemed to be implied from the speaker’s tone. Keren with an
e
indeed! Charlotte Maxwell hoped that the annoying
e
would not pop into her mind every time she spoke the name.

Kerry was doggedly pursuing the subject. “It’s from the Bible, you see. Job had seven sons and three daughters—that was
after
the first set of seven and three died when a great wind came from the wilderness and smote the four corners of the house where they were eating and drinking.” Kerry finished the sentence in one breath.

“I always thought it was amazing that the number should be the same the second time around. Don’t you, Aunt? Only God could do that, don’t you think? He wanted Job to have exactly seven sons and three daughters, I guess. I heard that the number seven is supposed to be lucky. It wasn’t lucky for Job though, was it?”

Kerry finally paused, looking at her aunt, who was opening and closing her mouth in a most surprising way. After a gasp or two, Mrs. Maxwell prepared to give some sort of answer to this conversation, which had gotten so quickly out of hand.

But once again Kerry was prepared, and she continued. “Well, anyway, in case you wonder what this has to do with my name and the way it’s spelled, the last three daughters were called Jemima, Kezia, and Keren-happuch. I’ve always been grateful I wasn’t named Kezia. There’s no way to make Kezia sound soft and pretty is there? It’s that
zzzz
in there. My papa always said it sounded like a buzz saw. That’s when I said I didn’t like the happuch part of my name. Papa said it reminded him of ‘happy,’ and his little Kerry made him happy.”

The child’s eyes were enormous and almost purple in color in the late afternoon light. Her face, already pale, was white, and the look of strain on it was frightening.

Sister Bernadine jiggled the hand she held, and said, when the child’s face turned up to her, “And he was so right. I’m sure little girls are made to make people happy. So, Keren-happuch, shall we gather your things together so you may start on the first leg of a new adventure?”

The purple-black eyes turned slowly toward Charlotte Maxwell, whose pale eyes blinked, and who couldn’t seem to collect herself enough to speak coherently. Her niece spoke again.

“So that’s why I’m called Keren with two e’s. It’s all on account of Job, you see.”

Her audience didn’t look as though she “saw” at all.

“Poor Job,” Kerry continued, as though she were a watch wound tightly and not about to run down, “to lose all those loved ones at one time. I feel ever so grateful that I have only lost one person—two, actually, though my mama died a long time ago. But sometimes it’s hard to be grateful, isn’t it?”

Kerry at last fell silent, perhaps because Sister Bernadine’s hand was, now, pressing her shoulder. She watched her aunt’s flaring nostrils with fascination. Sister Bernadine had the fleeting thought that those nostrils and that flare might be a meaningful signal across the years, if Kerry but knew it.

Apparently the taut silence was more than the child could stand. “I find it hard,” she said, taking a deep breath, “that though I have her name, I don’t look like Keren-happuch. You see,” she went on, “in all the land no women were found as fair as the daughters of Job. Wouldn’t you just love to be the fairest in all the land, Aunt? I certainly would.

“Do you think
fair
means light complected?” she asked. “I hope it doesn’t, ’cause I’m dark. When I asked Mrs. Peabody, our landlady, about it, she didn’t know. That’s a funny word, isn’t it—landlady? Mrs. Peabody was always saying ‘My lands!’ and she did own the land and the house. But Miss Perley, who had the room next to ours, always said ‘My heavens,’ and she didn’t own any of the heavens, did she? When I talked to Papa about it, he laughed and said Miss Perley
was
a heavenly body—”

Sister appeared to be tongue-tied; Charlotte Maxwell was mopping her brow with the tea-stained serviette. Kerry took a breath and continued.

“I think fair means beautiful, and of course I’m not the fairest in the land, even though Papa said—”

“That’s all very interesting, I’m sure,” Charlotte Maxwell was finally able to interject. “I trust we are not to be subjected to the patriarch Job’s history on a continuing basis.”

“But it’s a story with a happy ending—I do so love happy endings, don’t you? Job ended up with twice as much as he had before, did you know that? Except it was the same amount of sons and daughters . . . well who would want fourteen sons, anyway?”

“Well, Keren with an e—excuse me,
two
e’s—we won’t dally any longer over names and spelling and fair maidens, be they dark or light complexioned. Stories with happy endings, indeed! It’s not a storybook world, my girl.” Thus spoke the woman of high degree, with her rings on her fingers, her furs around her shoulders, her carriage at the door, and a mansion full of treasures awaiting her return home.

“Now then,” the aunt said, indicating the boxes and bags clumped at her feet, “are these your . . . things?”

For a moment Kerry was downcast. But not for long. Her eyes brightened, she drew in a full breath of air, and responded in true Kerry fashion: “It’s a good thing that man’s life consisteth not in the abundance of things which he possesseth, isn’t it, Aunt?”

Aunt Charlotte’s face, to the watching Sister, was a study in aggravation and curiosity.

“Consisteth . . . possesseth?” With some of the abundance of her possessions on full display—modish ensemble, jewels in her ears and on her fingers—Charlotte Maxwell murmured the question faintly.

“She’s quoting the Bible,” Sister Bernadine supplied quickly. “She seems to know a good portion of it by heart. We’ve been, er, privileged to hear some of it.” No one had ever accused Sister Bernadine of a sense of humor, but one would have wondered now, noting a certain mischievous gleam in her eye and the upward tug of the corner of one lip.

“Gracious me,” Charlotte Maxwell murmured and caught herself immediately lest her niece, whose eyes had indeed
brightened at the small expletive, should feel led to rate her aunt along with the utterers of “My land” and “My heavens.” If truth were told, Charlotte Maxwell wasn’t feeling all that gracious at the moment.

This was rectified, however, a little later when she placed a generous check in the hands of Sister Bernadine as the ill-matched pair—small, shabby girl and elegantly gowned woman—made their departure, the carriage driver having been summoned to carry out Kerry’s meager possessions.

Sister Bernadine closed the door behind them and turned to find nuns creeping from hiding places, with inquiring faces.

“There goes the most unusual child I’ve come across in a long time, perhaps ever,” Sister commented, and her opinion was confirmed by a dozen nodding heads. Nodding, or shaking, in wordless wonder.

“But—has she met her match in Mrs. Sebastian Maxwell, not to mention the formidable Maxwell clan? Or as Kerry might say, is it possible that a little child shall lead them?”

“Either that,” Sister Claude said with a shake of her head, “or they’ll hang a millstone about her neck and drown her.”