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He drove the wagon home again in a daze. The meal done, the ladies had shooed men and children, and even Melanie, out of the kitchen while they cleaned up. Relieved of their end of day chores for the evening, Nathaniel found himself swept up in the tide of children heading for their common room. Books were brought out, slates and chalk, paper and pencils, and soon busy youngsters surrounded him.
Jeb brought out his reader and when he struggled with his words, came to Nathaniel for help. They cozied side-by-side on an over-sized chair and worked together to read the story.
So much of the evening had happened to Nathaniel, rather than by his design, it made him wonder. As he turned into his drive, he realized most of his life lately had happened to him without any effort on his part. As though he were living a part in a play.
Perhaps the horrors of war he’d witnessed had encased him in a shell—a shell that shielded him from living life. Life, he knew all too well, could be gone in an instant. But it was an increasingly brittle shell, and he wondered what would happen when it finally shattered.
He hung his jacket on the peg behind the door and found his father sitting in a cushioned chair in front of the stove in the parlor. “You’re up,” he said, surprised.
“Joints eased up a bit. Emma helped me get to the chair. Only so much looking at the ceiling a man can take.”
“Emma got you all the way in here? How?”
William chuckled. “Girl’s strong. Don’t look it, but she’s strong. And when I ease up, I can help some, too. Leastways, stand up myself. How’d the repairs go?” he asked.
Nathaniel dropped down into a chair next to his father, rubbed his hands together to warm them, then gingerly felt his belly. “All in all, went good. Had a bit of a time getting off the roof. Scraped my belly some, but not bad. Melanie, Mrs. Treymont,” he corrected, “had to dig out a splinter, but it’s fine.” He could feel the heat rising in his cheeks at the memory of her arms around him.
When his father quirked an eyebrow at him, he knew he had not been successful in hiding that flush, but William made no comment. They sat in silence for a few moments when Nathaniel finally said, “A couple of the neighbor folks came by to help me.”
“That so? How’d they know you were there?”
And Nathaniel related his morning activities, and the donations he’d garnered and the unexpected arrival of Thomas, Henry and Edward and their wives. After a moment’s more silence, he said, “They just accepted me, no question. Like I belonged.”
“Why shouldn’t they? You do belong here.”
“The war, dad. I sent men into battle, watched them get killed. Hell,” he added, raking his fingers through his hair, “I could be the one responsible for making some of those kids orphans in the first place. But nobody’s said anything. Nobody’s blamed me. They didn’t send me away.”
“Of course not! You didn’t start the war, son.”
“That’s what Thomas said, too. Said as how I’d helped end it.”
“And he’s right. Think how many more boys would’ve died if it didn’t end yet. The country’s been torn apart for so long, it’s time to start mending it together again. Like a bad tooth needed taking out. Nobody likes doing it, nobody wants the hole that’s left and everybody knows it’s going to take time to heal up that hole. But they don’t blame the doc for doing what needed to be done.”
“But the doc can sleep nights,” Nathaniel whispered.
“And you will, too, boy. In time, you will.” At Nathaniel’s surprised look, William added, “I heard you gettin’ up in the night. Heard you cry out first, and wished I could get up those stairs, help you. Only a man with no conscience would be unaffected by what you did and saw. And I know you have a conscience.” He reached over, put his hand on Nathaniel’s arm. “Be patient with yourself, son. There are all kinds of war wounds, some you don’t see but feel all the same. Healing takes time.”
Nathaniel swallowed past the lump in his throat, felt that strange sensation in his chest again, as if something unfurled just a bit. As he climbed the stairs to his room, he wondered if it was his shell, beginning to crack.
*****
Finally, the last child was tucked in, and Melanie draped her dress over the chair in her room. She pulled a sweater from the armoire to put over her nightgown. The small grate in the room was stone-cold and would remain so, Melanie having long-since eschewed any coal for herself, instead nightly adding her portion to the stoves in the children’s rooms long after everyone was asleep. Woolen socks followed the sweater before she went to her bed.
Melanie lay staring at the ceiling. Thank God for Colonel Walker. Nathaniel. Everyone had frozen the night before, with only the oilskin covering the hole in the roof. That he had come back today, unbidden, had to be a gift from above.
She’d heard the noise when he’d slid down the roof. Knew what it meant, and her heart had been in her throat. She rushed outside and nearly fainted with relief to see him clamber down the ladder, apparently unscathed until she’d seen him wince and tenderly touch his middle.
With an iron will, she’d steadied her shaking hands as she removed the splinter from him, aware of just how lucky he’d been to escape with so minor an injury. Even his scraped skin was nothing compared to what it could have been. But then her hands had trembled from another reason. The hard bands of muscle she’d encountered as she wrapped him touched her woman’s senses as nothing had in a very long time. It had taken most of dinner for her to calm herself.
And then, he stayed. The sight of him in the big, old stuffed chair, Jeb tucked into the corner of it, still warmed her. Jeb, who usually had to be forever reminded to attend to the task at hand, who couldn’t sit still for more than three minutes at a time, concentrated on his reading with Nathaniel with a single-mindedness she’d never seen from the boy before. The man seemingly was a miracle worker.
The joke she’d made asking Nathaniel if he needed a mother came drifting back to her. She felt anything but motherly toward him. Especially now.
But would he want her? She knew he carried something with him, something that tormented and tortured him. The burden of her own terrible secret was never far from her mind, rarely left her own sleep undisturbed. With the first glimmer of dawn would come her memory, one that would not let sleep return.
She’d slid down into the black hole of torment and had clawed her way out. And knew the road he had before him was long, hard, and lonely. But he wouldn’t have to do it alone, she thought. She could help.
Nobody should ever have to do it alone.
*****
Morning dawned warmer than usual for December. Warm enough that the children pestered her about going out to cut a Christmas tree for the common room. Melanie finally gave in to their pleas, but only, she said, after they completed their lessons and chores. Including the jobs they did for Mr. Walker.
Lessons went by quicker than she could have imagined, and even Mrs. Grinkov wondered if anyone had tasted their food at lunch, they’d bolted it so quickly. While she waited for them to get back from Mr. Walker, Melanie gazed out the window. What was Nathaniel doing today? She hadn’t seen him, but then she’d been busy with fourteen squirming, impatient children all morning.
She was somewhat impatient, herself. They had adopted the Grinkov’s custom of an evergreen in the house, and Melanie looked forward to the bustle of taking the sledge out to the woods, finding just the perfect tree, trundling it back home and decorating it with candles and strings of berries, paper stars and whatever other bits they could glean from their meager possessions. It gave a festive air to the house, and Lord knew, they needed all the festivity they could eke out of this Christmas.
The southerly breeze that blew this morning was warm enough to have melted all the snow, and the lot of them followed the sledge, trudging through the mud to the forest. As they neared the tree line, she saw Nathaniel at the edge of his farmland, his figure easier and easier to pick out from anyone else’s. He was cutting away dead branches from the trees near his fence, trying she knew, to keep the fence from being damaged by falling limbs.
“Colonel Walker!” she called, pausing and waving her arm. “Good morning!”
He turned at the sound of her voice, waved his own arm in greeting. Propping his saw against the pile of dead branches, he dusted off his hands as he tramped in their direction.
“Where are all of you headed to?” he asked. Then a frown creased his forehead, drawing his eyebrows close together. “You haven’t been evicted already, have you?”
“No. No. Nothing like that. Actually, we’re off to find the perfect Christmas tree. We were going to do that the other day, until the tree limb fell. Would you like to join us?”
He looked about to say no, when little Jeb jumped up and down. “Oh, yes, Colonel Walker. Come with us! It would be ever so much more fun if you’re with us. Please?”
Melanie waited as he looked at the boy, then at the eager faces of the other children, then at Mr. Grinkov looking old and tired this morning. She hoped she was keeping her own eagerness hidden.
He shrugged. “What the he—?” He coughed once. “Sure.”
He joined their gaggle, for that was what it felt like as he and Melanie led, the children falling in behind like so many ducklings in a row. Except for Jeb, who strode beside him, taking two or three steps to every one of his to keep up. Melanie brushed Nathaniel’s hand to get his attention and slowed their pace to accommodate the boy. With a heart-stopping smile at her, Nathaniel shortened his stride.
A cluster of evergreens stood off in the distance and the children talked excitedly of how big a tree they hoped to find. It seemed the prevailing desire was for one a hundred feet tall, which, Nathaniel pointed out laughing, would be difficult to get inside a house with only ten-foot tall ceilings.
Melanie glanced at his face when he laughed, caught by the utter transformation. Suddenly, the lines on his forehead and between his brows, disappeared, replaced by a fan of crinkles beside his eyes. Eyes that sparkled with fun and teasing. Her heart did a little flip at the sight of smile creases bracketing his mouth and she had the notion that he had not smiled much in a long time.
Reaching the trees, they all fanned out to search for just the right one. Melanie meandered, just absorbing the fresh air, warmer today than the last few, and letting the children run and laugh. They gushed over the impressive heights of the trees and argued over what was too big, too small, too fat, too skinny. She walked behind an enormous fir, and came face-to-face with Nathaniel.
“Where’s Jeb?” she asked.
He waved an arm indicating somewhere off to the right. “He went with Lorna when he realized I wasn’t going to sanction cutting down a fifty-foot tree. They’re looking at the ‘baby’ trees,” he said, wrinkling his nose in what she was sure was an imitation of Jeb.
“I’m sorry if he coerced you into coming. I know you’re not getting done what you set out to do.”
He shrugged. “Not like those dead limbs are going anywhere. They’ve been there all this time. Another day won’t hurt anything.
“How about you?” he asked. “You’re not getting in your lessons today.”
It was her turn to shrug. “They badgered and badgered. We weren’t going to get anything serious done. And with this possibly their last Christmas together...” She trailed off, not wanting to put into words what she was feeling.
“I know.” He put a comforting hand on her arm. “There must be something to do. Someone must be able to help.”
She gave a sad laugh. “If there is anyone, they’re doing a damn good job of hiding. I’m sorry,” she added quickly, apologizing for the profanity. “It just makes me so...angry and sad and...I’ve failed them.”
He put both hands on her arms and turned her to face him. “The last thing you’ve done is fail,” he said adamantly. “They have a place to live, food and clothing.”
When she shook her head, he went on. “Maybe not warehouses full, but enough. And they have the most important things—each other and someone who cares for them. Who loves them.”
Melanie fought back the tears of frustration. “But, it’s not enough. Soon they won’t have a place to live. They may not have each other, either. And I won’t be able to be with every one of them.”
“But you’ll never stop loving them.”
“No.” She gave a little sniff.
“And they know that. They know you’ll always love them. They know they’ll always have that.”
She looked up and met his grey eyes, eyes so earnest and caring, and despite her best efforts, a single tear fell. “Thank you,” she whispered and quickly swiped away the wetness.
“Mis Mellie! We found it! Me an’ Lorna, we found the perfect tree!”
Melanie laughed. “Only Jeb talks in nothing but exclamatory sentences.” She turned to see the youngster rounding the tree at full tilt.
Nathaniel quickly stepped in front of her to take the brunt of the oncoming collision. “Whoa, boy!” He caught him on the fly as he careened around him, scooping the lad up sideways against his hip. “You looking to bowl over Miss Melanie?”
“No.” Jeb was instantly remorseful. “I would never hurt her.”
“Glad to hear it. But you’ve got to slow down some, son.”
“I know. But I can’t help it.”
Jeb looked about to cry and Melanie stepped up, brushed his hair from off his forehead. “I know you can’t, dear,” she said softly. “It’s all right. I know.”
Nathaniel set the boy down on his feet. “Now, how about you show us this ‘perfect’ tree?”
Jeb took off at a run, skidded to a halt and called back over his shoulder, “Well? You coming?”
*****
In the end, they’d only had to cut about a foot off the tree to make it fit. They set it in a bucket filled with dirt and put it in front of the window in the common room. Melanie had invited Nathaniel to stay for dinner again, but he declined as gracefully as he could. He didn’t feel right leaving his father alone again for the evening.
He walked back and retrieved his saw, gathered up the limbs he’d cut, and wondered what his father wanted with them. William had instructed him to specifically look for straight limbs, some about an inch in diameter, some a bit larger.
After Emma had served their dinner and gone, Nathaniel found out why his father wanted the dead wood. He watched in growing amazement as William stripped bark from branches he’d had Nathaniel cut to about twelve-inch lengths. With his whittling knife, William smoothed over the knots and then carefully reamed the insides out. It took some time, especially since he had to keep taking breaks to flex and stretch his swollen fingers, but eventually he made a wooden flute. He kept at it slowly, painfully Nathaniel was sure, and a while later, he had a slide whistle, and after that, a pan flute.
“Where did you learn to do that?” Nathaniel asked.
William shrugged. “Just kinda figured it out. Needed something to do the pass the time while you were gone.”
While there was no censure in the statement, Nathaniel couldn’t help but feel his choice to come home tonight rather than stay at the orphanage for dinner had been the right one.
Under his father’s tutelage, Nathaniel, his fingers a bit more nimble than his father’s, helped do some of the finer finishing work on the pieces. As they worked, he told William about their foray into the woods for the Christmas tree.
“She’s a good woman,” William had said. “It’s a shame Stevenson is selling the property to the steel company instead of to her.”
“Where are they going to go? She says they have no money to buy another place. Can’t the folks around here help? Take up a collection?” Even as he said it, Nathaniel knew everyone in the area was as bad off as Melanie and the children. The war had stripped all but the barest essentials from every household.
“We can only hope for some kind of gift from heaven.” William tested the slide on the whistle he’d just finished, took a breath and blew.
The shrill sound made Nathaniel wince. “Damn.”
William chuckled. “Yeah. But the youngsters seem to like it. And when they get going with them outside, you never have to wonder where they are.”
“Probably scared off every critter in the county at the same time,” Nathaniel muttered, digging a finger into his ear to stop the ringing.
William guffawed at that one and it warmed Nathaniel to see his father laugh so, even as he joined him for a moment.
“They need help, Dad,” Nathaniel said quietly. “And I don’t know what to do.”
“Money’s what they need,” William answered.
Nathaniel gave a harsh laugh. “Might as well be asking for the moon. Where do you get money nowadays?”
“Millionaires,” came the flat reply. “Some of ‘em have good hearts. There’s a fella in Pittsburgh. Carney or Carneg...”
“Carnegie?” Nathaniel offered.
William slapped his fingers on the armrest of his chair. “Carnegie! That’s it. Hear tell he gives to charities. Got a magic touch, they say. Most whatever he invests in turns to money, and he gives back a lot. Even still, he has more’n he can spend in his life already. And he’s still pretty young. Maybe you should go find him.”
“And beg?” Nathaniel couldn’t keep the scorn out of his voice.
“It’s for the children, isn’t it? Isn’t that what she’s been doing?” William eyed his son. “Got too much pride to beg for them?”
Nathaniel shifted uncomfortably on his chair. It wasn’t pride. It was that he wasn’t good enough for them. For Christ sakes, he’s probably the one who made them orphans in the first place!
So then, whispered his heart, shouldn’t he be the one to care for them? Fix things for them as best he could? Isn’t that why he was left alive to come home again? To redeem his soul and beg...for money. For forgiveness.
It wasn’t long after that that Nathaniel helped his father into bed and went upstairs to his own. And in the blackest part of night, when restless spirits roam and the wind carries their moans to the clouds, Nathaniel dreamed his nightmare yet again. He awoke trembling and bathed in cold sweat, still hearing the cries of his men and smelling the scent of death. His shoulders shook with silent tears and his soul begged for forgiveness.
*****
He’d spent two long days hiking the perimeter of the property, sawing, bundling and dragging dead tree limbs. They began to pile up behind the barn, and every evening, Nathaniel would bring in another couple of pieces and watch in fascination as his father transformed them into musical instruments, ducks, toy wagons and birds. With little talent and less patience for working on the small toys, Nathaniel himself began to craft small boxes. He didn’t know for what, or for whom, but he found the work relaxing. Perhaps he and his father would start a small woodworking business and sell their creations.
With that thought in mind, he started keeping an eye out for different trees in the forest, started to consciously vary the woods he picked up. At night, he would experiment, placing different woods next to each other, making simple designs out of maple, ash, willow, oak, and pine.
*****
It was a week after their foray to get a Christmas tree for the orphanage. A warm breeze played from the south and buffeted a wall of ominous black clouds hanging in the west as Nathaniel scoured the forest for more timber that he and William could use. They were fast using up what he found lying on the ground or hanging half-off trees too old or damaged to survive much longer. He was loathe to cut down any. He’d seen what stripping the land bare could do and refused to give in to the temptation.
Emma still came each night to make their dinner, excited and full of descriptions of the decorations that the children had made for their Christmas tree. She told of the small candles Mrs. Grinkov had dipped to put on the tree and of how they had wound evergreen boughs around the banisters and over the doorways. She giggled and blushed when she told of the mistletoe they had found and brought home, and of how the children caught Mr. and Mrs. Grinkov stealing a kiss under it.
This night when she left, Nathaniel tested one design after another, looking for just that special one he would use for the cover of a box he would make for her.
And perhaps he’d make one for Melanie as well.
What would she have to put in it, he wondered. Ribbons for her hair? He hadn’t seen her wear any. Combs? Jewelry? He hadn’t seen any of that either. And that led him to wondering where she kept her wedding ring after her husband’s death. Did she wear it on a chain around her neck as many widows did? Keeping it still close to her heart? Or did it rest in a drawer, waiting for her own child to be born, grow and wed?
He helped his father to bed, a task he’d taken over from a grateful Benjamin and Bernard. The boys still came every night to care for the animals, but without the addition of William’s care, they went home earlier than usual. Nathaniel climbed into his own bed, hoping his physical exhaustion would extend itself to his mind and he would sleep peacefully. Praying for it to be so as he drifted off.
*****
Nathaniel bolted upright, his gaze searching the room. He didn’t remember dreaming, but the noise of cannon jolted him awake. At least, he thought it was cannon. But it couldn’t be.
Passing his hand over his face, he swung his legs over the side of the bed, walked to the window. Snow was falling heavily, recoating the fields and trees. Off in the distance he thought he glimpsed a flash of light. He waited for the rumble that didn’t come.
But the light came again. Not lightning. Lightning sparked, flared, and crackled. This light wavered in and out, like a flame caught in a draft. The snow billowed up, caught on an upward thrust of wind.
A flame in the wind...