At the Scent of Water (8 page)

She thought of what Kirby had said when she had told him she would probably be leaving. Kirby, her editor, and the closest thing she had to a friend. He included her in Christmas and Thanksgiving celebrations, but then again, he also included half the newspaper staff. Shirley was a friend. Mrs. Larsen, Adrienne. They were friends. After a fashion. But these were loose ties, easily made and easily unraveled. She had no fast tethers here. Kirby understood, of course.

“I never thought we could keep you forever,” he had said. “I just hope you know what you want. Are you headed in the right direction?” he had pressed.

She had murmured something and darted her eyes away, but she still felt the surge of emotion his question had provoked.
Are you headed in the right direction?
It echoed again, still unanswered.

She set the telephone back in its cradle. She went to the front door and took in the paper. Her story about the school in the homeless shelter ran on page one of the local section. She sipped her coffee and read it, her critical eye seeing where she could have done better, seeing again the children’s musty clothes, their matted hair, but every now and then a flash of humor, a glimpse of wit, a flicker of the rocky endurance that kept them alive.

She put the paper away, washed her coffee cup. She showered and dressed, putting on jeans and a cotton sweater, and for lack of anything else to do, she took out her knitting. She sat down and began, but she felt the lonely chill again and thought of the warmth of Essie’s shop. So she put her needles and yarn in her bag and left, locking the door carefully behind her.

She liked sitting in the corner of the yarn shop, talking to the other women, especially in winter. She liked their company, the comforting sound of their voices. She liked the patter of the rain on the plate-glass window, the spicy smell of the orange spice tea Essie bought from the Pike Place Market and served, a hot, oily concoction that burned the tongue and cleared the sinuses.

She walked to her car, drove to Essie’s shop, found a place to park on the narrow street. She got out and walked toward it. She turned the handle on the glass-fronted door and heard the bell jingle. Inside it smelled of cloves and cinnamon, and a murmur of women’s voices sang softly.

“Hello, doll!” Essie greeted her, as always.

“Hello, Essie,” she answered back and smiled. It wasn’t hard to do. She was a kind woman, Essie was, and beautiful with her calm brown eyes, rounded face and dimples, dark hair with a dramatic streak of gray, swept up into a bun. Annie had asked her once what her full name was. “Estella,” she had answered. “It means star,” and Annie thought that was a good and right name for her.

She took a moment and looked around her. The walls were covered with shelves and cubbyholes, each one stuffed with jewel-toned balls and skeins, twisted hanks of wool, cotton, linen, and silk. There were hand-painted brilliant twists that looked like rainbows brought to earth. There were nubby knobs of chunky wool that looked as if they’d been shorn straight from the sheep, then spun and wound and delivered. They were rough and raw, smooth and sparkly, colors of every sort. Plums with whispers of dark blue, teals that hinted at secret green, deep reds that held echoes of shady corals, braided skeins of midnight tinged with amethyst. She drank them in like wine, and her mind was filled with their infinite combinations and possibilities.

They could startle or comfort, bring a chuckle or a whisper of awe. They could be crocheted or knitted or woven, colors mingled and twisted in and around to form a pattern. Her stepmother had taught her to weave and knit and spin, and she still remembered sitting in the huge front room of her father’s house, the wheel bigger than she was, pushing the treadle up and down with a gentle rhythm. Her wheel was back in North Carolina, her loom warped and ready in that place from which she had left so long ago. They were gone from her, but she had two needles, and she could still make something that hadn’t been there before. It comforted her when she did. It felt ancient and connected her to things she had no other tie to.

“Come in and sit down,” Essie invited and gestured toward the women sitting around the low table, sipping and knitting and chatting. A few looked up and greeted her. She answered them back and gave them brief smiles. They were all shapes and sizes, these women, and all ages. Two were college girls, two were very old, and two were probably near her own age. Their fingers flew. She took a seat in the corner and pulled out her work, a pair of thick nubby socks for Shirley to wear under her Birkenstocks next fall.

She stayed most of the day. The others packed up and left one by one. Around two the rain began, a soft patter on the window. She finished the socks and chose a soft plum-colored merino wool for a scarf for Mrs. Larsen. She set it on the counter and waited while Essie rang up her purchase.

Annie noticed Essie’s necklace. She wore a mustard seed, and Annie remembered that she herself had owned one at one time. Papa had given it to her on her thirteenth birthday. She stared at it, that miniscule fragment of faith encased in glass. Rather than reminding her of truth and hope, it seemed a cold picture of her own heart, and she felt a moment of longing. She had not always been like this.

“How do you keep hold of your faith, Essie? When the curtain tears.” The sound of her own voice blurting out that question shocked her. She felt her face grow warm with embarrassment, but Essie didn’t seem put out in the least. She calmly put the receipt in the sack, handed it to Annie, then considered for a moment.

“The curtain . . . ?”

Annie shrugged and tried to explain. “I used to never see evil and pain. It was hidden away from me.”

“But then the curtain tore,” Essie murmured softly, and Annie nodded, her throat tight.

“Your question joins two realms that don’t shake hands,” Essie said, and Annie frowned, trying to understand.

“You asked how you keep your faith when the curtain tears. The curtain tearing is seeing, isn’t it? Seeing the pain and the ugliness of living in this fallen world.”

“Yes. That’s what it is.” Annie answered her quietly.

“But you see, you’ll never make sight and faith agree. Not in this world.”

Essie was talking that familiar timeworn gibberish, and Annie wanted to say so. But it was her own fault for asking. Why had she thought that question would engender any new information? She kept her mouth closed, forced it so, and her lips felt tight with the effort of keeping in her protests.

Essie looked at her with tenderness and paused before she answered. “Long ago I decided that He was enough,” she said, and Annie knew exactly who
He
was. “You may never have the answers to your questions in this life,” she said gently, “but when He speaks peace to you, your questions will ease.”

Annie shook her head. She wished she had not asked the question. She had known, somehow, that this would be the unsatisfactory answer.

“I don’t know you well, Annie,” Essie said.

Something about that admission stabbed Annie, shook her out of her silent protest.
Oh yes, you do,
she wanted to argue.
You know me
. She said nothing, just gave a slight nod and waited for Essie to go on.

“But I’ve prayed for you time and time again, and to be honest, I prayed for you today. When you came in I could sense the heaviness in your spirit.”

Annie nodded, not surprised. Had she not known this was a safe place to come? A place of comfort and compassion?

“You know Him, don’t you?” Essie asked, her brown eyes probing and insistent.

Annie nodded. How could she deny it?

“Trust Him, then. That’s where peace and freedom is.”

She stared at Essie and wondered at how little people really knew of one another and how easy the answers seemed before the realities were known. Oh, how simple it sounded. How free and easy. But it was not. She gave her head a small shake. The doorbell jingled, and two women came in, chattering and laughing. The moment was over.

“Thank you,” she said to Essie, taking the bag from the counter.

Essie covered her hand with one of her own. “I’ll keep praying,” she said. “Come again.”

Annie nodded, turned away, and stepped back out into the fog.

****

Her apartment was silent, cold, and dark. She turned on a few lamps, made herself a sandwich, but she ate little, for she had promised herself she would do it today, and today was nearly gone. Her stomach gave a twist. It was time. She felt a surge of fear, and she remembered a quote she had read in a book.
Every great mistake has a halfway moment, a split second when it can be recalled and perhaps remedied
. She had an unsteady feeling, as if she were teetering on the brink, balancing in one of those halfway moments.

She shook her head and put away those thoughts, then quickly, before she could think or change her mind, she picked up the telephone. She dialed Max Kroll, and after a few pleasantries she accepted his offer of the job at the
Los Angeles Times
.

“We’re pleased to have you,” he said heartily. “I’ll have Jason call you on Monday to discuss your actual starting date.” Jason, the light and golden one.

She thanked him, disconnected, then dialed again, without hesitation, the number of the attorney whose card she had carried in her purse for a year.

She waited for him to come to the telephone, her heart thumping out a rhythm, her mouth dry. “It’s Annie Dalton, Mr. Carson,” she said after his greeting. “I’ve decided it’s time.”

They talked. Details were cemented; plans were set in motion to end her marriage. She would come in next week, and the papers would be prepared. He would file them. There would be a mandatory ninety-day waiting period. She would need to fly back to Seattle and appear in court on the day the divorce was granted. She thanked him, said good-bye, and pushed the button to end the call.

She crossed to the window of the apartment and looked outside again, the telephone still cradled in her hand. She played the saved message one last time and heard Sam’s deep mellow voice. Instead of the Jiffy Lube and the doughnut shop and the dry line of shrubbery across the edge of the parking lot, she imagined she saw a tall line of pines, black cherry, and mountain locusts, and the misty blue mountains behind them. She blinked her eyes, and they were gone. Then quickly, before she could change her mind, she erased his message. She dropped the curtain and turned back to the empty room, her heart feeling like a vast windy desert.

Six

Elijah Walker sat in the kitchen of his sister’s brownstone row house and felt he would go mad with pure, plain boredom. The clock ticked. The cat licked its paw. His sister pursed her lips and turned the page of the catalog she was perusing. She circled something, then turned the page again. He gazed out the window, but even outside the world seemed curiously still, for this was one of Pittsburgh’s old neighborhoods, full of old people, and old well-worn cars lined both sides of the narrow street. There were no children here clambering on and off school buses, no gangs of boys playing basketball, no clumps of girls walking together, their heads close, sharing secrets.

He had stared out this window every day for nearly three months now, and he knew exactly what would happen and when. Around ten each morning Mrs. Pettibone from across the way would take her toy Chihuahua for a walk. Peppy. He was a scrawny, pathetic excuse for a dog according to Elijah’s thinking, but he kept his opinions to himself. The two of them made their shaking progress down the street, stopped for Peppy to do his business, then turned around and headed back. Around noon, old Mr. Swanson next door would go out for his daily walk. He tottered down to the other end of the block, turned around at the streetlight, and came back. The high point of the day occurred around two, just minutes from now, in fact, when the neighborhood erupted in a frenzy of activity. That was when the mailman came. At the sound of his step each door would open, residents would step out onto the stoops, and sometimes, if it wasn’t raining, a greeting would be exchanged. “How are you today?” “Arthritis bothering me.” “Diverticulitis acting up.” “Cataract surgery next week.”

He closed his eyes for a moment. Oh, what he would give for clean, honest work to do. A tree to cut down. A room to paint. A fence post to dig. Anything except this incessant sitting and watching. The teakettle boiled, giving out its shrill whistle, and Elijah felt a palpable relief as it sliced through the dense blanket of silence.

His sister got up and went to the stove. He watched as she took down two mugs.

“None for me, thank you, Frances. I’m going for a walk.”

She turned toward him, her face concerned. “Should you be doing all this exercising?” she asked. “It’s only been two and a half months.”

Since they had split him open, done the coronary bypass surgery, and put him back together again. “It’ll be fine,” he said, giving her a brief smile. “I’m supposed to exercise. It’s part of my rehabilitation.”

She still looked doubtful, but he rose up without continuing to argue. She was his oldest sister and had always been motherish. Old man or not, he would always be her baby brother.

He went to his room, changed into his sweats and T-shirt, hung the stopwatch around his neck. He set out at a brisk walk until he was past the house, not breaking into a jog until he reached the park. He did one lap, rested a little. There was no pain, so he did another lap. By the time he had done five miles, resting in between and taking his pulse, nearly forty-five minutes had passed.

He walked another lap to cool off. Besides, he enjoyed the bustle here. A group of young women pushed strollers ahead of him. A gaggle of teenagers in track shorts and jerseys jogged past him. Four kids shot baskets at the basketball courts, and a couple volleyed tennis balls back and forth. He finished his circuit and started back toward home, but for just a second he wondered what he meant by that word. The Pittsburgh row house was certainly not his home. That much he knew for certain, but neither of the other two images that arrived with that word fit any better. Not the vast sky and sand of the place he had spent most of his life, nor the other home, the gentle hills and hollows of his boyhood and youth, tucked away in his memory.

His sister’s world was not a bad place, he admitted. She had moved here with her husband shortly after their marriage fifty-five years ago, had raised her son in that tall thin house, and had stayed on after her husband died and Roger grew up and moved away. Pittsburgh was a perfectly fine city, he allowed, as far as cities went, and Frances had given him nothing but gracious help and acceptance. He had nothing to complain about, he realized, remembering how she coddled and cosseted him. And he supposed he had needed that help when he had first arrived, sick and alone. But he was better now. Completely recovered, and it was time for him to
do
something before he lost his mind.

He supposed he could find something to do here. He had noticed a homeless shelter on one of his bus rides to the hospital. And the church his sister attended, although feeling cold and austere to him, did run a food and clothing bank. He could find something to do at one of those places, but the prospect left him feeling bland and apathetic.

In fact, he felt a vague dissatisfaction at the thought of staying here at all. It didn’t seem right, somehow, and he remembered those high mountains, green coves, and splashing rivers of home. He remembered people, one person in particular, and he tried to recall that dear face, to imagine what it would look like now with so many years worn over it.

He shook himself back to attention and picked up his pace. Now that he was back in shape, or very nearly so, he could return to the work he had left. For the last twenty of his forty-five years in Africa, he had been in the Sudan, and his work in the war-torn region had been demanding of both body and spirit. When he had left, his health had been so poor he had been resigned to retirement. But he was better now. In fact, it was time he wrote to the mission board and requested reinstatement. He brushed away the slight shadow that fell over his spirit. It was his illness and being in this strange place that was making him feel odd. He would be right when he returned to work.

He had prayed about what to do, of course, but the results were confusing. He couldn’t seem to hear the Lord’s voice clearly here. The drone of the traffic and television seemed to drown it out, and he longed for open spaces and . . . what? He longed for people, he realized. People who were in the thick of life. Who needed someone. Who needed him.

His sister was folding clothes when he came back in. She inspected him anxiously, as she did each time he left and returned. He smiled in reassurance. He glanced at the television. Frances was watching that talk show where the psychologist hollered and shamed people into behaving. “How’s that working for you?” he demanded now, and the man he was addressing shrugged and flushed, casting a baleful glance at the woman beside him. Frances watched a lot of television. Read a lot of books and magazines. Filled out every sweepstake and junk mail advertisement that came through the mail slot. He supposed she was lonely. Her husband had died four years ago, and her only son lived in New York. She would like him to stay, he knew.

“Supper will be ready soon,” she said. “Pot roast and vegetables.”

“Sounds good.” He smiled pleasantly, but he was thinking with grim dread of the long empty evening that stretched out ahead of him.

****

It was after supper that he made up his mind. Frances was watching some police show, and he went to his room, not wanting to watch it any longer. He had seen plenty of killing, and heaven knows he wasn’t squeamish about blood and gore. It was the whole idea of depravity as entertainment that rubbed him the wrong way. He sat down and opened his Bible, prayed, and began reading. Second Samuel. The last words of David:

Is not my house right with God?
He felt a pang as he applied them to himself, for he had no house. No legacy, however stained or tattered.

Has he not made with me an everlasting covenant, arranged and secured in every part?
He had, Elijah assured himself. The Lord had promised him that he would lack for no good thing, and he held that promise firm now against his doubts and the emptiness his life had become.

Will he not bring to fruition my salvation
 . . . ? Of course He would. But what did that mean, really? To him? Today?

And grant me my every desire?
Those last words ran through him like a sharpened arrow, for he had put aside his desires many years ago. That ship had sailed, he told himself firmly, and he put away the feeling of loss at that realization.

He set his Bible aside and sat thinking and praying. He didn’t know how long, but after a while, he took out the lined tablet he kept in the dresser drawer, found an envelope and stamps. He composed a letter to the mission board, requesting reinstatement, addressed it, and carried it downstairs.

“I’m going to the post office,” he said, reaching for the doorknob.

“It’s dark,” Frances said, looking up from the news. “Shouldn’t you wait until morning?”

“I’ll be fine,” he said and steeled himself against her certain protests.

He was surprised that she offered none.

He made the short trip but without the sense of settled satisfaction he had expected upon making the decision. Perhaps they would not have him back. Then, just as quickly, he felt a jolt of unease at the thought that they might accept him. He shook his head and took himself in hand. He had heard from the Lord, had he not? The Lord had invited him to pursue his desire. This was his desire, for he could think of nothing else, but just as the envelope slipped from his fingers, doubt became so strong he reached to pull it back. It was too late. It was gone, down the dark hole. On its way, as good as delivered, though it had not yet left the box. He shook his head and shook off his odd feelings. He had been unsettled and quirky ever since his surgery. He would be fine when he got back to work, and his heart and mind brightened at that thought.

When he arrived back home he made himself and Frances each a cup of tea and carried them into the living room. She smiled with pleasure, but when she saw his face, he supposed she knew.

“You’re leaving, aren’t you?” she asked.

He nodded and smiled gently.

“When?”

“Whenever they assign me,” he said. “But, you know, I think I’d like to go home for a while first.”

Her face lit with a mixture of fondness and wistful desire.

“You could come, too,” he offered.

She shook her head, and he knew why.

“I know there’s probably nothing left there for me,” he said, and he knew he had struck truth when her pitying eyes turned toward him. “But I suppose I just need to go and see the old place one more time.”

She nodded, and for just a moment she was the sister he remembered. The strong, independent girl, not this idle old woman she had become. “I was wondering when you’d come to that,” she said, and he smiled at her wisdom. They chatted awhile longer and sipped their tea. The cat got up, stretched, then curled into a ball again. The news ended. The clock chimed, and suddenly Elijah could not wait to be on his way.