Gift from the Sea (18 page)

Maggie judged the distance Frederick had yet to cover to reach the arbor. There was time. “We can make it to the boat. Just lean on me.” She couldn’t take the chance that Frederick and Jeanne could persuade the others, and she refused to put them in further danger.

In answer, Stefan pushed himself to his knees and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. He struggled to his feet and she turned toward the nearest opening, the one that led to the pier.

“This way,” she urged.

The wet, sandy path deadened their footsteps, and the sheer will to survive made Stefan move in limping strides
that Maggie could barely keep up with. “There’s a skiff,” she told him. “We can…”

Suddenly Stefan stopped and gripped her shoulders, forcing her to face him, listen to him. “No. You must go back.”

“You can’t manage alone—you’re too weak and…”

“No more,
liebchen.
It’s over,” he said and embraced her, his mouth finding hers. “I love you,” he said when he broke the kiss, and then before she could stop him, he turned and called out, “She is here with me, sir. She has convinced me to surrender.”

For an instant there was no sound, and then came a thrashing of the dried vegetation that formed the arbor as Frederick and Sean ran the length of it and Maggie could hear Jeanne calling, “They’ve found them!”

Stefan was still holding her close when the two men emerged and froze. They looked from Maggie to Stefan.

“Let her go,” Sean ordered.

“Now look, young man, it may seem that things are quite desperate at the moment, but the duchess and I can help. You see, Stefan, we are your contacts.” Frederick was speaking quietly even as he and Sean moved slowly toward Stefan.

“Stefan, listen to him,” Maggie pleaded. But suddenly she was standing alone because Stefan had crumpled to the ground.

Sean grabbed her arm and pulled her away as if she’d been in danger of being kidnapped and in need of rescue.

“Stop that,” she ordered and rushed to Stefan’s side. “He’s fainted. We have to get him back to the house.”

Both Sean and Frederick seemed rooted in the sand.

“Now,” she ordered.

Sean picked up Stefan by the armpits, while Frederick took his feet. “Hurry,” Maggie pleaded as she led the way back through the arbor and up the lawn to the inn.

Lucie, Jeanne and Sarah were waiting for them. “Through here,” Lucie instructed, indicating the parlor, where the sofa had been dragged closer to the fire.

Everyone began speaking at once.

“Get those socks and wet slippers off him.”

“He’s shivering. Add a log to the fire.”

“Here are more blankets.”

“I’ll phone for Dr. Williams.”

This last from Sarah caused everyone to pause.

“He’s been taken to the police station,” Jeanne reminded them, “with Gabe.”

As one they all turned to Maggie, and she realized that they were waiting for her to take charge.

M
aggie saw that Stefan was swimming back toward consciousness. He did not seem to be in pain and was actually smiling.

“Ah, the poor lad is dreaming of something good,” she heard Sarah whisper.

Something good. The taste of Stefan’s kiss lingered, warming Maggie to her core even as she told herself he was still not out of danger. She touched his forehead and cheek and then allowed the tips of her fingers to brush his lips. “You’re safe, Stefan. Everything will be all right,” she whispered before turning to face the others. “I’ll be back,” she announced.

“But, Maggie,” several others protested almost in unison.

“Keep him covered and calm,” she replied. “When he rouses, give him warm liquids. This is going to stop right now.”

As she hurried along the road that led from the inn to the church, Maggie regretted the confusion she had created by leaving the others to care for Stefan when she was
trained to do just that. But as she had considered all the many forces weighing down on Stefan’s future, on her future with him, she had seen only one option.

Jeanne had been unable to persuade the ambassador’s top assistant to interrupt his evening and bring him to the phone, so there was no help coming from that quarter. And even if there were, the ambassador was in New York—hours away. Normally Maggie would have looked to her father for guidance, but he had been taken away. Not only was he unavailable to offer the help and advice she needed, but he needed her help, as well.

And looming over it all was the presence of the men at the church. They would return. She had heard their plan to go to the church for some rest and hot coffee and start the search again as the sky lightened. If they found—
when
they found—Stefan, there was no telling what they might do. There were men in the group whose sons had died or returned with life-changing disabilities from the front. There were men, like her father, who regretted that they could not join the fight and would see capturing Stefan as the chance to do their part.

She understood all of that, but she knew that unless she could get them to listen to reason, all of their fears and frustrations would be focused on the one symbol of their hatred: the German. Stefan Witte might pay a terrible price for their zeal to be patriots.

When Maggie reached the church, the men had just donned their coats and gloves. The minister called for all to gather in a circle for prayer. Beyond them, wives and mothers who had answered the call of the church bells and prepared coffee and food to sustain the men of the congregation saw Maggie enter the church hall.

All was silent except the voice of the minister as he
uttered the closing words of his prayer. The men raised their bowed heads and glanced at their wives and mothers, who were looking toward Maggie standing alone at the door. The minute they saw her, the men began pelting her with questions. Soon the women joined in as they closed the circle around her. And through it all Maggie stood her ground, her eyes on Reverend McAllister.

“Be at peace,” the minister said in his pulpit voice, and the crowd fell silent, yet they eyed Maggie with suspicion and censure. These people who had been her parents’ friends, their neighbors and her classmates stared at her with suspicion and wariness as if they had never really known her.

“I have something to say,” she began, once again focusing on the minister.

“Very well, sister,” the minister replied, and when some in the crowd would have protested, he held up one hand. “We will hear her out.”

“Stefan Witte is not what you think,” she began, and that set off an outcry that even Reverend McAllister had trouble quelling.

“Please,” he entreated. “Let her finish.”

“I have come to ask for your help and understanding. I have come to ask that you withhold judgment until you have heard his story….”

“Story indeed,” Gilbert Rowland spat out. “Lies—that’s the whole of it.”

Maggie faced the older man and met him toe-to-toe. “You have known my father all his life, Mr. Rowland. You know Dr. Williams and you know Sean Chadwick. Can you honestly believe that these three men would all be fooled by one lone German?”

It was Rowland who looked away.

“Furthermore,” Maggie said, turning to the others, “why would a man, any man, risk his life jumping ship in the middle of winter, clinging to ice floes, fighting his way back from frostbite and pneumonia if his mission was not one of utmost urgency?”

“He’s a spy,” someone called out from the back of the circle. “A German spy.”

Maggie swung round until she found the source. “I thought that at first. But if he is on business for his government, why would they risk putting him out so far from shore? And why on earth would they select Nantucket as the place to…”

“The man has blinded you, Maggie dear,” Mrs. Pritchard said as she pushed her way through the circle of men and attempted to pull Maggie to her bosom. “He has fought all right, fought to persuade you and your parents that he is an innocent. No doubt he learned of the loss of dear Michael—at the hands of his own people, let us not forget—and he knew you would be vulnerable. He has used the devil’s own tools to deceive you.”

There was a murmur of agreement, but Maggie only smiled as she pulled free of Mrs. Pritchard’s cloying embrace. “He is a man of deep and abiding faith, Mrs. Pritchard. And far from blinding me, he has opened my eyes. He has led me back to God.”

There was a communal gasp and all eyes turned to the minister, certain that he would protest such blasphemy.

But Maggie spoke first. “Reverend McAllister, just a few Sundays ago you extolled us all to find forgiveness. Does not forgiving mean opening ourselves to the possibility that there are those within our enemy’s borders who hate this war as much as we do? Who have suffered in ways
we can only imagine? Is it not possible that God has brought Stefan Witte to these shores?”

“You go too far, Maggie,” the minister said but his voice held no reprimand. Instead, Maggie heard a note of uncertainty. “My child, you cannot possibly—”

She pressed her case, speaking directly to the young minister. “The people of Nantucket have always been fair-minded and charitable. It is our nature to listen and make our own decisions, our own choices. My grandparents taught me to understand that living here on an island, removed from the mainland, was both a blessing and a responsibility.”

The room had grown so still that Maggie’s quiet, determined voice resonated in the hall. “A blessing because God has given us the position of being among the easternmost shores of American soil. A responsibility for that very same reason.” She turned slowly until she had looked into the eyes of every person in the room. “Won’t you let him speak? Won’t you listen with an open heart to what he has to say?”

A beat and then the minister’s quiet voice. “Where is he?”

Maggie could hardly believe that she might have persuaded the minister. She squeezed her eyes shut as images of these last weeks flashed through her brain. So much had changed. She felt tears burn the backs of her eyelids, and then the tears exploded in an explosion of grief and sobbing.

She covered her face with her hands as the sobs of weariness and defeat overwhelmed her. And then she felt the circle of church members close in on her, but it was not a move that she found threatening. The circle of fear and blame had changed to one of support and comfort.

She felt the minister’s hand on her shoulder as he spoke to the others. “Mr. Rowland will call Chief Anderson,
Maggie. Perhaps it would be possible to have Dr. Williams released temporarily to be sure the young man has not suffered further injury.”

“I should think we’d make better use of time to notify the military police so they can take this German into custody before he pulls any more escapes,” Rowland argued, and Maggie understood that forgiveness would come more easily to some than to others.

“Yes, Gilbert, we must attend to all of that,” Mrs. Pritchard boomed. “But for now you go call the chief. Meanwhile, Reverend, with your permission I’d like to bring a few of the ladies and accompany you back up to the inn. Surely a prayer circle would be in order.” She pursed her lips. “That is unless you truly believe the man to be a danger to others.”

“He’s no threat to anyone,” Maggie said.

“Perhaps then, Maggie dear, you will join our prayer circle?”

“Excellent idea,” Reverend McAllister replied as he led Maggie to the door and the women followed. “And if it be God’s will to heal this man, then we will hear what he has to tell us with open hearts and open minds.”

Maggie realized that this was not a suggestion. The minister was looking directly at the doubters in the room.

But those who had not been persuaded by either her or Reverend McAllister turned away, finding some task that needed attention. Maggie understood. For several of them there had been terrible losses because of the war—because of the Germans. She knew from her own experience that sometimes it was far easier to hate and blame the forces of evil than to try and find God’s will in such madness.

By the time they reached the inn, Maggie had managed
to compose herself. She had even found the grace to thank the young minister for his support and willingness to hear Stefan’s story.

“I don’t wish to give you false hope, Maggie,” he said over the low murmur of the women behind them as they hummed “In the Sweet By and By.” “You and your family, as well as the Chadwicks, have taken matters into your own hands that you had no right to decide. Your father and the doctor are in grave danger of losing everything they have spent a lifetime building on this island. I will admit to you that I cannot understand that, and I cannot see God’s will in any of this. I believe you and your loved ones to be good and caring people—but misguided.”

“I understand,” Maggie said and she did. Hadn’t the minister’s opinion of Stefan been exactly her own just a few weeks earlier?

The minister thanked Sarah for taking his coat and went straight to the parlor, his eyes immediately on Stefan who was half sitting now as Jeanne knelt by his side and fed him broth. Stefan was smiling at something Jeanne had just said as the little band of do-gooders entered the room.

“Well, it appears there has been a speedy recovery,” Reverend McAllister said with a smile that seemed forced. The women of the prayer group looked down on Stefan with obvious disapproval, then back at the minister, awaiting his next direction. “Clearly there is no need for your prayers, ladies, at least for the prisoner’s recovery. You may wish to entreat God’s mercy.”

Maggie’s emotions swung like the pendulum on the grandfather clock in the lobby. From relief that Stefan was so much better to delight as his eyes filled with love and then back to fearing the danger he was now in because these
good people believed him to be a spy and a con man.
Prisoner,
Reverend McAllister had called him.

Maggie was about to speak out when her mother moved forward to take the minister’s hand in both of hers. “It is so good of you to come, Reverend,” she said. “Circumstances beyond his control have denied our guest the comfort of his faith brought by his own clergyman for far too long.” She continued to hold the minister’s hand as she led him closer to the sofa. “Stefan Witte, this is Reverend McAllister.”

Taking her cue from Mama, Maggie went to stand beside Stefan, one hand resting lightly on his shoulder. The sound of Mrs. Pritchard and the other ladies sucking in shocked breaths made Jeanne smile as she handed the bowl of broth to Sarah and stood next to Maggie. The three women formed a solid front that dared anyone to try and penetrate their line of defense.

“Thank you for coming, Reverend,” Stefan said, knowing full well that not an hour earlier, the minister had been at the forefront of the hunt. “Forgive me for not showing the proper respect by rising in your presence and that of the ladies.”

“Let us all pray for this man’s salvation,” Reverend McAllister intoned.

“But first,” Maggie interrupted before heads could be bowed, “the reverend has agreed to hear the whole story of how you came to us, why you risked everything to reach these shores. Are you up to this, Stefan?” She handed Stefan the envelope she’d retrieved on her way from the cupola and placed her hand more possessively on his shoulder.

“Perhaps it would be best if we all sat down,” Frederick suggested, drawing side chairs closer to the fire for the
church women, who tittered at his courtly attentions. Frederick then indicated that the minister should take Gabe’s usual place in the club chair and led Jeanne and Lucie to the love seat. “Would anyone care for coffee or tea?” he asked when everyone was seated except for Maggie and himself.

“This is hardly a social occasion,” the minister reminded him tersely.

“Ah, yes. I do tend to forget that you Americans like to keep business separate from socializing.” He shrugged and smiled as he leaned against the mantel. “Maggie, why don’t you begin? Stefan and the duchess can fill in when needed and so he might reserve his strength.”

Maggie cleared her throat, then focused for a moment on the gold cross around Stefan’s throat. “To understand Stefan and his mission, you must first know his sister, Uma,” she began. For the next hour she gave them every detail that she could recall—the Christmas truce, the deaths of Uma and Klaus, the contacts Stefan had had with the resistance. The details rolled from her tongue as if she herself had lived them. Her passion for the doomed Uma and Klaus brought out the handkerchiefs of the church women. Her description of men on the front from opposite sides coming together on Christmas Eve clearly moved the minister. By the time she unfolded the intricate details of how Stefan had been led to America, how he had jumped ship because it was his only opportunity, how he had placed his fate and the fate of his information in God’s hands, her audience was hanging on her every word.