Blessing (35 page)

MARCH 12, 1849

A little more than two weeks had passed since Tippy had fallen ill. Now Blessing lurked just inside Stoddard and Tippy’s parlor doorway. She was listening to the murmurs of Ramsay taking his leave of Stoddard at the bottom of the staircase.

Knowing Ramsay must pass this doorway as he left, she waited, hidden. She knew she should not be lingering here so she could say farewell to Ramsay. She tried to go deeper into the shadowy room, but she could not make herself obey this good sense.

Then he appeared before her, reaching for the front doorknob.

“Ramsay.”

He turned to her and they both froze. He broke free first.
“I didn’t know you were here. I was going to stop at your home and leave word that I had gone.”

Memory of the night he’d held her in his arms kept her mute, wrapping around her heart. She nodded. The premonition that he was leaving and would not return welled up within her, a fountain of pain.

“I wouldn’t be leaving if my mother weren’t so close to the end of her life,” he said. “And now Stoddard can manage without me.”

She nodded again, feeling like an idiot.

“I know you’ll watch over my cousin and his wife.”

She cleared her throat. “Of course,” she managed to say. “I’m sorry thee must face the loss of thy mother.”

“We seem to be mired in the dark valley this year.”

An understatement. She offered him her hand. “Godspeed.”

Gerard received it and held on to it, searching her face. “Keep safe, Widow Brightman.” He kissed her hand and then left swiftly.

In his wake, she remained in the parlor doorway, holding the hand he’d kissed to her cheek. A foolish gesture. In this moment, she confessed that the man from Boston mattered to her, and as much more than a friend. She’d let her heart be ensnared.

Closing her eyes, she prayed for strength. She’d already gone through the grief of losing her illusions about a husband and then losing the man himself in an awful event. Now she must endure similar circumstances again. She would sever this attachment before he returned—if he returned.
I will guard my heart more carefully in the future.
But that didn’t help her aching heart now.

MARCH 19, 1849

After the journey from Cincinnati, Gerard had spent the night in a modest New York City inn. He felt a bit guilty at not going immediately to his mother, but a telegram had reassured him that she was holding on. Now he stepped off an omnibus into the same neighborhood he’d visited in December. The early flowers—red tulips amid jonquils—were in bloom in the small yards, and the grass was greening up as if to spite his weltering confusion.

Different ploys bounced around in his head. How did one approach a complete stranger and ask about their relationship with someone? He kept reliving the moment he’d glimpsed his father walking into the house as if he lived there. How could that have happened?

Was the woman living here his father’s mistress? But this looked like a quiet, residential neighborhood, not the locale for a lovebirds’ nest. And the woman he’d seen in the garden looked like a respectable wife, not a mistress. Gerard’s speculations chased each other around in a circle.

As if of their own volition, his feet carried him straight to the door he’d seen his father enter. He knocked without pausing for thought. Suddenly he was chanting silently,
Don’t be home, please. Don’t be—

The door opened, and a pretty young girl of around seventeen stood before him. She had his father’s large, dark, heavy-lidded eyes. Shock rippled through him.

“Yes?” the girl asked politely.

Gerard strained to find his tongue. “Good day.” Words he’d considered but had initially rejected flowed from his
rebellious mouth. “My name is Ramsay, and I’m looking for a distant relative, Saul Ramsay.”

“Oh! Mother!” The girl turned. “Someone is here looking for Father.”

For a moment Gerard’s knees weakened. He grasped for his composure and caught the tag ends of it.

The same plump, middle-aged woman he’d seen last December bustled to the door.

“He says he’s a Ramsay too,” the girl reported.

“Well, come in, then!” the cheerful woman invited. “Are you related to my husband, Saul?”

“Yes,” Gerard said. “Yes, I am.”

Standing in her old bedroom at her parents’ house, Blessing was struck by the contrasts in life. She’d just spent weeks nursing Tippy, who was still too weak to get out of bed and who continued to mourn the miscarriage of her first child. A terrible loss. And now Blessing had traveled to her family’s home to attend yet another wedding, the marriage of Caleb and Rebecca, though she was still uncertain about this union. Was it a happy event?

She and Rebecca found themselves alone in the girls’ bedroom, Rebecca sitting on one of the three trundle beds and Blessing standing near the door. Everyone else was busy with preparations for the wedding later today and for the meal to celebrate it. Blessing listened to the mingling voices of her family and Joanna’s loved ones.

Rebecca had been too shy to go to the meetinghouse for the usual Quaker wedding, so aged Brother Ezekiel, Joanna’s
grandfather, had ridden with Blessing to her parents’ house. The wedding would be held with just family and immediate neighbors in attendance. Rebecca wore a new dress in a flattering shade of blue. Blessing’s youngest sisters, twins Patience and Faith, had plaited wild violets into a circlet for Rebecca’s hair—a lovely, simple adornment.

“You don’t think I should be marrying your cousin.” Rebecca’s voice was thin and apologetic.

“That’s not true.” Blessing sought the right words. “I just want to be certain that thee is marrying him for more than protection.”

Rebecca gazed out the small window at the green spring grass. “Caleb
will
protect me. That’s true. And your family is so good to me. I had forgotten good people.” She looked to Blessing. “I don’t care that he can’t hear. I think it has given him a tender heart.”

“But does thee love him?”

“How does a girl know if she’s in love with a man?”

The question was an arrow straight into Blessing’s heart. She thought she’d been in love with Richard, but it had truly been an infatuation with a man who turned out not to exist. The dashing Richard had changed into a man who, when in his cups . . . She turned away from the memories. And ran straight into her confusion over Gerard Ramsay. Fortunately Rebecca was still speaking.

“When I’m with Caleb,” Rebecca said haltingly, “I feel special. He is so gentle and kind. I trust him and want to be with him. That’s all I know.”

The girl’s simple, honest words touched Blessing, convinced her that this marriage could be for the good. She
walked to the girl and took her small hand. “That is what I wanted to understand.” She realized her own sad marriage and her fear of falling in love unwisely a second time had tainted her perception of Rebecca and Caleb’s relationship.

And she didn’t trust herself, particularly when she was affected by her feelings for Gerard. “I’m happy for thee, and I know thee will be a good wife to my cousin.”

“I’ve promised him I will begin to attend meeting with the family after we are wed.” Rebecca looked into Blessing’s eyes. “I’ll feel clean then. Caleb’s love will wash away my shame.”

The girl’s words pierced Blessing’s heart deeper. She knew how shame and guilt could cling. But she claimed Rebecca’s shoulders and spoke the truth the girl needed to hear, the truth Blessing herself needed to hear. “Only Christ can wash away thy sins.”

“I know that. But the shame is just what’s left over.”

Again Rebecca’s words went directly into the dark wound in Blessing’s heart. She, too, suffered from what was left over. It had nothing to do with disbelieving God’s forgiveness. She knew that somewhere deep in her heart, she had wished her husband dead so she could be free. And hadn’t Christ declared that thinking a sin incurred the same guilt as doing it? She couldn’t forgive herself for that. And Richard’s decision to bequeath all his wealth to her had deepened her load of guilt.

Rebecca studied her. “I thought maybe the man who helped me that night you rescued me would come to the wedding. The one who stopped the slave catchers. That Mr. Ramsay.”

Blessing pulled Rebecca close, not wanting the girl to see the pain in her own eyes. “His mother is dying. He had to go home to Boston to be with her.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry.”

I am too. I am too.

She hoped Gerard Ramsay would come back soon but knew it might be best if he was away awhile longer. She could not trust her heart again.

As the woman led Gerard into the modest Manhattan house, he tried to appear calm and normal while his emotions rioted inside. He was shown to a chair in the simply furnished, homey parlor.

“Now, how is it you know my husband?” the woman asked.

“I am a distant relation, and while I’m visiting in the east, I thought I’d try to find some family. I had this address. I am from Cincinnati.” He was too frazzled to make up any complicated lies.

“Oh, you’ve missed him. He’s away on business again.”

Gerard could only thank God he had missed his father. He couldn’t endure a confrontation in all his confusion.

“Forgive me.” The older woman offered him her hand. “I don’t know where my head is some days. I forgot to introduce myself. I’m Bella Ramsay, Saul’s wife, and this is our daughter, Lucille. Our son, Jeremy, is at college in Philadelphia. His father insisted he go there.”

Gerard’s head swam at this further revelation. Of course Saul would send his other son to a school far from Harvard, both Saul’s and Gerard’s alma mater.
I have a half brother. A half sister.
“I’m Gerard Ramsay.” He shook the hands the ladies proffered, Bella’s, then Lucille’s. “My family moved to Cincinnati when I was younger.”
Please, no questions.

“I’m so sorry Saul’s not at home. He’s a salesman for a Boston firm and travels a great deal.”

I’ll bet he does.

Gerard clung to his self-control as Bella and Lucille insisted he partake of refreshments and listen to fond stories of Saul and his second family. He managed to eat the refreshments without gagging and to answer their innocent inquiries with vagueness and finesse.

He finally succeeded in escaping his newfound relatives, who urged him to come back anytime. He wondered what his father would say when they mentioned that Gerard Ramsay, a relative from Cincinnati, had visited here.

Outside, he hailed an oncoming omnibus. The most difficult thing to accept was the way Bella and Lucille had spoken of Saul Ramsay. Gerard was left with the unpleasant realization that his father had been a real father to this family, who obviously held him in respect and affection. How could he reconcile that with the cold way Saul Ramsay treated his bona fide wife and son? None of it made sense.
What am I going to do about this?