In the Shadow of His Wings (19 page)

Gerhard turned to Laura with a large gift in his arms. Laura was surprised. She didn’t expect, or want, anything from him. She couldn’t imagine what he would get for her. All she really wanted was to leave, and she knew he wasn’t about to give her that.

She stood up to take the large gift and murmured a small thank you as she sat down to open it. It was a large picture frame that looked like a window frame. It came with several outdoor pictures that could be put in the back of the frame. There were pictures of scenery from the four different seasons. Some scenes had animals in them, like deer or horses. Some scenes were of gardens, others of mountains or lakes. Gerhard explained excitedly,

“You could hang it in your room. It could be like a window. When you get tired of the view, you just change it!”

He was clearly thrilled with the thoughtfulness of his gift and expected her to be as well. He waited for her joyous reaction. Laura sat there looking at all the pictures, stalling for time.
Lord help me here!
She could easily sense Gerhard’s mood and knew what he expected of her. Her first gut reaction, what she truly wanted to do, was to pick up the picture and smash it against the wall. She wanted to scream at him that this hardly substituted for the outdoors! She wanted to yell that she needed to
breathe
the fresh air, not
see
pictures of it. She wanted to take each picture and rip them into shreds. She couldn’t believe that he expected her to be thrilled with this gift.
I am chained in the
basement for goodness sake! Are you blind? Do you honestly expect me to thank you for
pictures when you are holding me prisoner against my will?
However at that moment she felt that God gave her a small window into Gerhard’s heart. She was able to see that he truly meant this as a loving gesture. She knew that her kidnapping was done in an act of love, however misguided, for his mother, that this gift was a gesture of kindness for her. He obviously put a lot of thought into it and went to a lot of trouble to get a large collection of attractive scenery. Laura had tears in her eyes, out of frustration, but she hoped Gerhard would think they were of gratitude, when she looked up at him and thanked him as sincerely as she could for the beautiful frame and pictures.

Gerhard seemed quite pleased with her response and he surprised Laura by pulling out several more packages for her. Some were clothes. He knew her sizes well by now and since she only picked the simplest outfits for herself he took the liberty of selecting some nicer outfits for Laura. Laura noticed right away that all of them had the familiar alterations done to the sleeves. She had learned that Gerhard took all the clothes he bought for her to a seamstress who specialized in clothing for the handicapped. She thanked him politely for the clothes but the altered sleeves, just like the fake window, were a cruel reminder of her captivity. She took no pleasure in the gifts.

Gerhard had bought Laura some imported chocolates as well, ordinarily something like that would have been a real delight to Laura. She knew it was something that her and Lacey would have loved digging into together and fighting playfully over who got to eat which ones. Laura sat on the couch looking at her gifts. She thanked Gerhard for them even though she really didn’t care if he were to take them all away and throw them in the trash. It bothered her that Hilda didn’t thank him at all and she felt that the man should get at least something. Neither one of the women had a gift for him.

Gerhard didn’t seem to notice that there were no gifts for him that day. Laura thought he must be used to it. Since Hilda never left the house, she probably hadn’t bought her son anything for many years. In a small way, Laura felt sorry for Gerhard. She was angry at the man for kidnapping her. Terrified of the way he threatened her daughter, but he was quite pathetic really. He was so much under Hilda’s control that he was like a puppet with her pulling all the strings just as Christine had said she felt in one of her journals.

In spite of all her controlling ways Laura wasn’t able to hate Hilda either. The woman was obviously very lonely. In all the time that Laura had been with her, not once had Hilda mentioned the name of a friend. Laura didn’t think that Hilda had anyone in her life at all besides Gerhard and herself. Laura and Hilda had spent many hours together talking. Laura encouraged Hilda to talk about herself and since the woman was quite self centered, it wasn’t hard. Hilda told Laura all about her life before she met Gerhard’s father. She talked about life on the farm and how difficult it had been. She spoke very little of her parents and seemed to be uncomfortable about discussing them.

Laura strongly suspected something was very wrong in that household. Perhaps there was even abuse. She couldn’t be sure of course, but Hilda was very evasive and obviously uncomfortable when Laura asked questions about her childhood. Hilda told her how badly she wanted to leave Manitoba and how excited she was to meet Harold Bloone and find out he and his family were moving to Ontario. How exciting that must have been for a young Hilda. To meet a man who wanted to marry her and take her to a new province, to begin a new life, a fresh start with hopes of a much brighter future.

Laura noticed that when Hilda talked of Harold and of their marriage there was no mention of ‘falling in love’, only of the arrangements and of their plans.

Hilda talked about the two miscarriages in an off hand manner. This was something she obviously had accepted and dealt with a long time ago. When she mentioned the death of her baby Elizabeth, it was clear this opened new wounds. She told Laura how cute Elizabeth had been and how she was just getting to that adorable age when you only had to look at her and her entire face would burst forth in a huge smile.

The kind of smile that lights up every part of the face, in that special way babies have. It was clear Elizabeth’s death was something Hilda had never accepted. Laura tried to talk to Hilda about Heaven and how she knew that Elizabeth was there, but this was another of those times when Hilda was still not ready to listen. Laura wondered how long it would take before Hilda’s heart would soften and she would be willing to accept Christ.

Over the months the two women had grown close, in spite of their differences. Hilda wasn’t as hard on Laura as she had been at first. She still insisted that the basement be kept spotless. Laura was doing a good job of it without her nagging so that wasn’t an issue. Laura never complained about the shows Hilda wanted to watch, which surprised Hilda at first. When she was a teenager Christine used to complain a great deal until Gerhard bought her her own TV. These days she didn’t seem to care and never asked to have her own TV in her room. Hilda loved having her daughter Christine back home again. Hilda knew that Christine was there against her will and she didn’t doubt for a minute, if she had the key to her handcuff she would be out the door in a heart beat without even looking back. The rational part of her mind knew it was wrong to keep her here, but she couldn’t help it. She was lonely, desperately lonely, and Christine filled a void for her that had been empty for a very long time.

Gerhard had disappeared up the stairs after the gifts had all been handed out and left the two women alone to enjoy their presents. He was soon back and coming down the stairs carrying an enormous cage.

“What on earth!?” Hilda exclaimed.

Laura stood up, also wondering what Gerhard could possibly be bringing down the stairs. She gasped when she saw what was in the cage. It was a dove. A beautiful, pure white dove.

“One more gift.” Gerhard announced, “This one is for the both of you together.

He’s an albino dove and I’m told his name is Angel, although you can change it if you want to.”

“His name is perfect” Laura whispered as she went closer to take a look at the bird. He was a beautiful bird, no doubt terrified and unsure of where he was. Oh how she could relate! She wanted desperately to open the cage door and release him.

Releasing him into the basement wouldn’t be doing the bird any favors. He was better off safe in his cage.

“A bird?” questioned Hilda, “What did you buy us a bird for?” With a great deal of effort she got up from her chair and went to take a closer look. Laura actually smiled a little to herself and she thought how Hilda could act like she thought it was a dumb idea, but if it actually got her up from her chair then it showed she was interested.

“I thought he might be a little distraction for the two of you down here. Once he gets used to you both, and the basement, you can even let him out once in awhile. I bought you all the supplies you will need to take care of him including a book that explains all you need to know.” Gerhard went up the stairs to get the rest of the things he bought to go with the bird.

Hilda shouted up the stairs after him,

“Well you just give those supplies to Christine. She can be the one in charge of taking care of it. It probably carries some kind of disease or something. I’m not going to touch it.”

After Hilda finished yelling out her orders, she bent down to look at the bird and had to admit, it was a pretty one. Laura couldn’t take her eyes off the bird. He was beautiful, and so peaceful looking.
This is from You, isn’t it God? This is another
reminder that You are with me. You have covered me with Your wings. I haven’t
forgotten although I confess I do need to be reminded now and then. Thank You Father
and thank You for the dove, I promise to take good care of him.
Laura actually smiled as she looked at the beautiful bird. She had to admit to herself that it felt good to smile.

There weren’t many occasions to smile in her basement prison, she appreciated the way the smile felt on her face that day. She thought for a moment of Jim, Lacey and Josh and wondered what their Christmas day was like.
Please give them a hug for me God, I miss
them so much!

Chapter 18

January and February dragged by at a snails pace and some days Laura thought she would go insane. It was only by the grace of God that she was able to keep from going out of her mind. She had gotten quite used to Hilda’s company by now. The simple boredom of being confined in the basement day after day was wearing her down.

She had put the picture frame up that Gerhard gave her for Christmas and changed the picture every few days in a lame attempt at easing the monotony. It was mid March now and Laura knew that outside the winter days would gradually be coming to an end. Soon spring would be moving in. She didn’t waste much time pining over that fact, she had spent so much time feeling sorry for herself that she had come to accept this way of life.

She felt like she was a lot like the dove in the cage, most of the time she just sat there and accepted it. Other times she longed to spread out her wings and fly away. Fly away where though? She hadn’t seen the sky in several months.

Laura stuffed her dirty laundry into a cloth bag and put it over by the stairs for Hilda to check before Gerhard took it away. This was part of their weekly routine. Every Saturday Gerhard took their dirty clothes out to a professional laundry to be cleaned.

Laura had thought of slipping an S.O.S. note into her bag. That thought had occurred to Gerhard as well and he had his mother go through Laura’s bag thoroughly before he took them away. Laura had watched Hilda each week performing this task, hoping with the passage of time the woman would become lazy and careless and Laura could take advantage of that, but she never did. She checked each item of clothing like a detective looking for clues, making sure that Laura didn’t try to pull anything.

Laura wasn’t sure she would have the nerve to try anything anyway. Whenever she thought of taking any sort of risk, she would pull out the picture of Lacey, thoughts of Gerhard’s threats would come to her mind and she would loose her nerve. She knew her chances for escape were next to none. Gerhard had been very thorough in setting up this basement. He was too smart and cautious to let her presence here be known to anyone outside the house. Even the food he brought home from the restaurant wasn’t in portions for three, it was simply in very large amounts for two and he then divided it out for the three of them. As Laura thought about the entire situation she realized that Gerhard had no intentions of ever letting her leave here alive. How could he? When he first brought her here he talked about how one day after Hilda passed away she would be free to go live where she wanted to. Laura knew that was a ridiculous promise. Gerhard would know that the minute Laura was free she would talk to the police and they would want to know where she had been and who had kidnapped her. He would go to prison for a long time for what he had done. Therefore he would never be able to let her go. Laura then had an awful thought. What would Gerhard do with her when and if his mother did pass away? Hilda was not a healthy woman. Even in the time that Laura had been in the Bloone house she had seen the woman grow progressively worse. She wasn’t sure but she thought the woman’s weight had increased. She seemed to tire so easily and fell asleep in her chair far more often than she used to. She broke into a sweat at the slightest amount of exertion. So what happens when Hilda dies?
What would he do with me then?

He couldn’t just let her go, that much was obvious. Would he keep her here indefinitely?

Forever chained in the basement watching her grow old, year after year, bringing her Christmas presents? Laura shuddered at the thought. Would she then become a sick sort of substitute for his mother? He would never be able to marry or have anyone else come live in the house with him, but would he care? Would he be happy to continue living just the way he is now? The other alternative was just as awful. Would he kill her? If he can’t let her go, and he decided not to keep her, then the only alternative would be to kill her.

Strangely enough Laura felt very calm when she thought about the fact that Gerhard might have plans to kill her at some point in the future. She already knew, without a doubt that God was with her, and she trusted Him. She didn’t fear death; she knew where she was going when she died, so death held no terror for her. It was upsetting to think of how her death would affect her family. She knew it would be very difficult for them to deal with, with her being gone so long they probably thought she was dead by now. Laura wondered what they were doing and hoped that they had gotten past her disappearance and moved on with their lives. She went to her dresser and got out the picture of Lacey, grateful the picture wasn’t worn thin by now from the many times she had looked at it. Laura wiped a tear from her eye as she thought of how much she missed her daughter. She would be finishing high school soon and preparing for university.