Angel Sister (22 page)

Nadine’s face flushed hot as she stared down at the platform. Victor laughed, and Father Merritt pushed a snort of air out his nose. “You always did lack self-control.”

Victor’s eyes on his father were icy cold. “I spent months in the trenches practicing self-control. I ran into the face of enemy fire when I wanted to run the other way. Don’t tell me I lack self-control.” His voice softened. “But I lived and today I’m home with my beautiful wife here beside me. It’s time to celebrate being alive.”

“Very well. Do what you will.” His father reached into his coat pocket and pulled out two of the tickets. He handed them to Victor. “If they won’t trade them for tomorrow’s train, you’ll have to find your own way home.”

“We can do it,” Victor said.

“We can only hope so. For the Merritt name to live on.” Father Merritt turned away and then stopped and looked back at them. “Hattie says the baby Nadine lost was a boy. So that means the next one could be as well.”

“That’s good to know,” Victor said, but he didn’t sound as if he was thinking anything good.

“Yes. Yes, it is,” his father said before he turned and walked away without even once smiling at his son home from the war.

Victor felt stiff against her as they watched him walk across the platform without giving an inch to anyone he met. “I’m sorry,” Nadine said. “I should have come alone.”

“No, no. I’m glad he came with you.” Victor shook himself a little and laughed again. “But now I’m even gladder he’s gone.” He picked her up and swung her around. “You are the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. Let’s go see if Maudie has saved us a room so we can get started on making that Merritt heir Father wants so much.”

But they hadn’t ever made another boy after that first dear baby who had not lived in Nadine’s womb. Three beautiful girls. Enough for her and enough for Victor—he’d never shown the first hint of disappointment that she hadn’t had a boy child. But not enough for Father Merritt.

She had nearly died with childbirth fever after Victoria was born, and the doctor said she’d never have another baby. There would be no sons born to her and Victor. But oh, the beautiful daughters they had. Evangeline Estelle, Katherine Reece, and Victoria Gale. Nadine stared out the window and whispered another name. “And her name is Lorena Birdsong.” Her little angel daughter.

Surely Kate was right in that the Lord had sent the little girl to them. That was the only way they could have planted her in their hearts so quickly and so deeply. Without closing her eyes, Nadine sent up a fervent prayer for Lorena. But like Kate, she heard Lorena crying in her heart. If only she could hold the child in her lap and comfort her. If only she had someone to hold and comfort her.

______

The dreams tormented Victor. He’d given up years ago thinking they’d fade away. He’d always had bad dreams. Even before the war. His mother used to tell him to quit reading the far-fetched stories he loved, that reading all those fantastic and impossible imaginings planted strange seeds in his brain that took root and gave flower to scary monsters that jumped out at him when he went to sleep.

But he didn’t dream about men from Mars or three-headed monsters or one-eyed Cyclops. He dreamed about water swallowing him up. About dead eyes staring at him. About gray hands reaching for him to pull him into the world of the dead. And then came the war with hundreds more reasons for nightmares. The mud and the water mixed, pulled him down into a soupy muck he couldn’t escape.

His father told him he could—with self-control. Aunt Hattie told him he could—with prayer. Nadine told him he could—with love. And the love had worked for a while. He’d had the dreams, but he’d also had Nadine. Now he felt as if he were losing her. As if he wasn’t man enough to keep her. He couldn’t even be man enough to help a little child in need. Or his own daughter. He’d let the siren call of the alcohol lure him away from the ones who needed him to be strong for them.

His weakness disgusted him. Out in the barn, he’d stared at the bottle in his hand and hated it while at the same time wishing it held more whiskey. Enough to make him numb to the pain of his failings. He thought about using his belt to hang himself from one of the barn rafters. Had gone so far as to pull his belt off. He sat in the hayloft and stared at the leather belt a long time. The leather was worn white where the buckle hit.

Kate will find you.
The words whispered through his head. In his mind’s eye he could see Kate coming to the barn after the sun came up in the morning to tell him breakfast was ready. She would try to rescue him even though it would be hours too late. He’d pass the nightmares on to her. He couldn’t do that to Kate.

He stood up and put the belt back on. He needed to get it out of his hands. Away from his neck. He didn’t really want to die. He wanted to live. He just needed to figure out how.

He spotted the bottle there in the chaff of the hay beside him. It wasn’t completely empty. He could tip it all the way up and get that one last swallow his tongue could taste just looking at it. He picked the bottle up and threw it against the far wall. It shattered and fell into the hay. He’d have to pick up the pieces of glass tomorrow to keep the girls from getting cut. Victoria and Lorena liked to play with the kittens in the loft.

The thought made Victor sad. Lorena wouldn’t be there tomorrow to play. His father had decreed they couldn’t invite the child into their hearts. His father said she couldn’t be a Merritt. But then wasn’t that what his father had always said about him too? And wasn’t he a Merritt in spite of it?

His father was wrong about Lorena too. She was already snuggled down in their hearts. Nothing Preston Merritt did was going to change that now.

Victor stumbled to the house. Where else could he go? His home. His family. The door hadn’t been bolted against him as yet. The bedroom door perhaps, but not the door to the house.

He was relieved when Kate didn’t come out to help him. He sat down on the couch and thought about taking off his shoes, but what difference did it really make? He was tired. Bone weary. And tomorrow he had to shape more iron. Tomorrow he had to find a way to be strong.

The dream had come to mock him. To show him he wasn’t strong. That the mud and water were going to pull him down and under and he’d never be free of it. When he cried out, he half woke. At first he thought he was imagining the touch of Nadine’s hand on his head. As if he’d gone back in time to when things were easier between the two of them, to when she thought she could carry him past the dreams. When they both thought their love would be enough. Before hard times made him swallow his pride and ask his father for credit at the store. His girls had to eat.

He kept pushing his breath in and out slow and steady, as though he were still asleep, but every nerve in his body was awake to her touch. He wasn’t dreaming. She was there behind him. Her fragrance settled around him, and it was all he could do to keep from reaching up and taking her hand in his. He wanted to hold her, to feel her body against his, to know without a doubt that she loved him.

She lifted her hand away from his hair, and he heard the whisper of her bare feet against the floor as she went back into her bedroom. Their bedroom.

He opened his eyes and stared out at the dark air in front of him. He wanted to follow her. More than he wanted to breathe, he wanted to follow her, but he stayed on the couch. He was afraid. What if she slammed the door in his face and locked it for all time? Yet she had laid her hand on his hair. She had caressed his head. She didn’t want a drunken husband, but she did still want him. He saw that in her eyes, heard it in her voice. She wanted them to have the closeness they’d shared when the girls were young, before the years had worn away at him. Before he’d surrendered to the drink.

You can quit
. The words were there in his head.
For her, you can do anything. You smashed the bottle in the barn. You can smash the other bottles. Not just for her. For the girls.
For yourself.

He had planned to quit every week for months. But then the bottle would be before him, and his resolve would weaken. He couldn’t bear the pain without the booze. It would be too hard to live without the drink. He didn’t know how to quit. He was afraid.

Be strong and of good courage
. The voice was speaking in his head again. That was Scripture. He didn’t know the Bible the way Nadine did, but he did know that. Perhaps a psalm penned by King David as he remembered how the Lord had given him courage and strength against Goliath. Victor didn’t know where in the Bible the words were, but he knew they were words he needed. He could be strong and have courage. He’d proved that during the war. He’d been afraid but he’d beaten down the fear and fought the enemy.

He could do the same with this enemy that threatened to destroy him now. But he couldn’t do it alone. He needed help. He sat up on the couch and tried to pray. Every word that he pushed up toward the Lord felt weak and wrong. It was as if the ceiling above his head was a barrier bouncing his puny attempts at praying back at him.

Nadine knew how to pray. Hadn’t he depended on her prayers while he was in France? Didn’t he know she prayed for him still, even though he defied those prayers? Suddenly he knew it wasn’t the barrier over his head making his prayers weak. The barrier he needed to knock down was between him and Nadine.

Be strong and of good courage
. He stood up. For a minute he was frozen there in the grainy dark of the night. Maybe he should go wash the smell of liquor off him before he went to Nadine. But he was afraid that if he went out the back door, he wouldn’t find the courage to come back inside no matter how much the Scripture words echoed in his head.

He didn’t knock on the bedroom door. It wasn’t closed, so he just stepped through into the room. He stood inside the door and breathed in her fragrance. His heart was doing a funny skip inside his chest, and his hands felt sweaty. He thought about trying to pray again, but he had no words. Perhaps the Scripture running through his head would be prayer enough.

She wasn’t in the bed. Instead she sat by the window, her head in her arms on the windowsill. Her white nightgown and the scarf she used to tie back her hair while she slept showed up plainly in the dim light drifting through the window. For a moment he thought she might be asleep, but then she sat up. She didn’t turn to look at him, but she knew he was there.

He made himself move across the floor even though he sensed no welcome in the air. He went right over to stand behind her and put his hands gently on her shoulders. Her body felt stiff under his touch. “Nadine,” he said. “I need your help.”

“Oh?” Her voice was only a whisper in the dark. “You mean to get Kate to bed? I told her she could sleep on the porch.”

“No, not Kate. Me. I need you to help me.” It was hard for him to say the words. To admit he was weak, even though he knew he was. A man was supposed to be strong for his wife.

Her shoulders stayed stiff as she stared out the window. Her silence beat against his eardrums. His hands turned to rock on her shoulders. He shouldn’t have come in here. He’d made a mistake. He had in fact surely been dreaming when he’d felt her hand stroking his head. And now they would no longer be able to pretend that things might someday get better. The barrier that had built up between them was too thick to penetrate.

He moistened his lips and pushed out the words. “I’m sorry. I had no right to ask for your help. I don’t deserve your help or prayers after the way I’ve let you down. Let everybody down.” Sorrow mashed down on him and made it hard to breathe as he lifted his hands off her shoulders and turned away.

“Wait,” she said.

He stopped. His heart started pounding as if he’d just had to back a fractious horse into the corner of the fence to nail his shoes on. It took all his strength to stand there and wait for her next words.

“Do you love me?” She turned half around in her chair to look toward him.

Her face was only a shadow in the dark, but he heard her heart’s longing in her words. And her fear. He knelt beside her and found her hands in her lap. He grasped them and peered at her face. “I told you once that I loved you more than life itself and that if I lost my life, my love would live on in your heart forever. Nothing has changed. Nothing could ever change that. I do love you, Nadine Reece Merritt. With my whole heart, with every fiber in my being.”

“Then why do you drink?” Her voice was stiff, but she didn’t try to pull her hands away from him.

“Because the demons chase me and I am weak.” He hesitated for a moment but made himself go on and say it all. “Because I fear you no longer love me.”

“Oh, Victor, I could never stop loving you. You are my life. You and our girls.” She did pull a hand free then, to lay against his cheek. “And you aren’t weak. You are the strength of my heart. Even when you’re drinking.”

“No one could love me then. Not even the Lord.”

“That’s not true.” Her voice was gentle, yet sure of what she was saying. “The Lord always loves us no matter what we do. He’ll help you. You just have to ask.”

“I tried to pray, but I couldn’t come up with the right words. I thought if you prayed for me—”

She jumped in front of his words. “I do pray for you, Victor.”

“Your prayers haven’t kept me from drinking.”

“No, but they always brought you home.”

“I’m home now,” Victor said. “I want to stay here. Pray that I won’t fail you again, Nadine.”

“All right. If you will pray the same for me, for I have surely failed you as often as you have me.”

“No,” he started to protest, but she put her finger over his lips.

Then she put both hands on his head. “Here we are, Lord, two sinners standing in the need of prayer. Help us. Amen.”

So simple, but he felt the prayer rise up out of her heart and his. “Amen,” he echoed.

For a few minutes they stayed motionless in the dark of the night. She in her chair, with him still on his knees beside her. No lightning bolts flashed in the dark. No trumpets sounded, but somehow Victor felt different. It took him a minute to understand why. He felt loved. By Nadine. By the Lord.

Nadine stood up and took his hand to pull him up beside her. “The night has cooled. Let’s go to bed.”

Victor felt all atremble, the way he had years ago when he’d been a young man following Nadine up the stairs to Maudie McElroy’s attic room.