Whispers from Yesterday (3 page)

“Don’t be silly. You’re my guest.” Sophia motioned toward the chair opposite her. “Sit down. Please.”

Karen didn’t know what else to do but oblige.

“I’ve asked Dusty to show you around the ranch this evening after it cools off. If you’re up to it. Do you ride?”

“Yes.” Lessons at boarding school had seen to that, she could have added.

“Good.” Sophia dropped two pieces of white bread into a four-slot toaster, then pushed down on the knob. “I think you’ll enjoy getting out once you’re rested.”

Getting out is exactly what I’d like to do. Out of here.

Her grandmother poured coffee into a china cup similar to the one on the table. “As soon as Ted and Noah finish their chores, you and I can sit in the parlor and get better acquainted.” To the boys, she said, “Hurry up, you two. Quit your dawdling.”

“Sure thing, Miss Sophie.”

“We ain’t dawdling.”

“Says who?” She swatted the shorter of the two boys on the backside with a dishtowel, smiling at him with affection. “And say hello to my granddaughter, Karen Butler.”

“Hi, Miss Butler. I’m Noah.”

She nodded. “Hello, Noah.”

“And I’m Ted Haney. Nice to have you here. Where you from?” “California. Los Angeles. And you?”

“From around here,” Ted answered with a shrug. Then he turned toward the sink and continued washing and rinsing while Noah dried and stacked.

What were these boys to Sophia? Karen wondered again. Relatives of some kind? Sophia’s great-grandchildren? Did Margaret Butler have a brother or sister she hadn’t bothered to tell Karen about?

Nothing would surprise her. It seemed there were a great many things her mother hadn’t bothered to tell her. “Karen?”

She glanced up to find Sophia standing directly across the table from her.

“Don’t be too hard on your mother.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Maybe not yet. But you will in time.”

“So how’s it going?” Grant Ludwig asked as he and Dusty followed the four boys up the draw.

The six of them were headed toward the foothills that formed the southern border of the ranch. It would be a long day, but it was the sort Dusty liked best. He enjoyed being on horseback. Gave a man time to think, to talk to God, to work things out. Surrounded by nature and little else, it was a good object lesson on a person’s dependence upon the Creator of the universe.

“Okay,” Dusty said in reply to Grant’s question. “They’ve settled in.”

Grant Ludwig worked part-time for the Golden T Youth Camp, his small stipend paid by the four area churches that helped support the camp. He’d volunteered his services nearly five years ago, right after Sophia gave Dusty the use of her ranch for his work.

“The four of them seem to be getting along with each other,” Grant commented.

Dusty shrugged. Both men knew that appearances could be deceiving. Boys were sent to the Golden T when options were running out. Usually by their parents, occasionally by a judge who believed in the work Dusty was doing. This was the place boys came, in the hopes they could be turned around before they got into serious trouble with the law.

Sometimes it worked. Sometimes it didn’t.

The times that it didn’t were the ones that kept Dusty awake at night, wondering what he might have done differently.

“Miss Sophie have company? Or did you get another car?”

“No. It’s her granddaughter’s.”

“Do tell?” Grant’s eyes widened in surprise. “I didn’t know she had any family left.”

“I don’t think Miss Butler’s here ‘cause she wants to be.”

“What do you mean?”

Dusty frowned. “I don’t know. Just a gut feeling. You’ll see for yourself when you meet her.” He gave his head a slight shake. “I’m afraid it’ll break Sophia’s heart when she leaves. You should’ve seen the way she looked last night. I swear, it took ten years off her, having Karen sleeping in Margaret’s old room.”

“Well, it isn’t like Sophia couldn’t use some help around the place. That’ll be nice for her.”

Dusty didn’t comment. From the looks of Karen Butler, he’d guess she hadn’t lifted a finger to do anything for herself from the moment she was born with that silver spoon in her mouth. From the tips of her manicured nails to the toes of her designer shoes, she had big money written all over her. The suitcases he’d brought in last night would have supported everybody on the ranch for a couple of months, minimum. Probably longer. The only thing that didn’t fit was the rattletrap car she was driving.

He bet that was killing her.

Are you judging her, My son?

With a nod, he acknowledged the gentle question spoken to his heart.

But he
still
believed Karen’s presence at the ranch could only mean disappointment for Sophia.

Karen looked at the framed photographs covering the top of the upright piano in the parlor. Photos of her mother when she was a girl. Photos of her mother’s father, Bradley Taylor. Photos of the three of them as a family.

“Do you play?” her grandmother asked from behind Karen.

She turned around. “Pardon?”

“Do you play the piano?”

“Yes.” More exclusive boarding-school lessons, she could have added.

“I taught your mother on that piano.”

“Really?” Another surprise. “I didn’t even know she could play.”

Sophia’s expression turned sorrowful as she sat down in the nearby chair. “Because of me, I suppose. She learned to hate anything I loved. Except for Bradley. We both loved her father.”

“Tell me about Mother when she was young.” Karen glanced over her shoulder again. “I never saw any photos of her as a child. I assumed you hadn’t taken any.”

“Oh, we took lots of photographs. She was beautiful, our Maggie. She was very much like her father.”

Karen leaned closer to the piano, squinting at one snapshot of father and daughter together. “Do you think so? It looks to me like my grandfather had dark hair and eyes. Nothing at all like Mother.”

Sophia remained silent.

“No,” Karen continued as she perused more of the photos, “it doesn’t seem like Mother resembled either one of you.”

“She was devoted to Bradley. If he’d lived, perhaps the rift would have healed between her and me, given enough time. He was the peacemaker in our family.”

Karen faced the older woman a second time. “What happened between you and Mother?” She settled onto the piano bench. “I’d like to understand.”

“It was never just one thing.” Sophia looked beyond Karen, beyond the piano, beyond the present, and into the past. “She and I were like oil and water, almost from the very beginning.”

“Why didn’t you love her?” She hadn’t meant to sound so harsh, but that was the way the words came out.

“That’s what she thought—that I didn’t love her. But it wasn’t true. I loved Maggie more than I could express. So much more.” Her eyes refocused on Karen. “Our relationship was complicated, your mother’s and mine. I caused her great hurt. It was because of my inability to overcome feelings from my past, things she’d had no part in. But I
did
love Maggie. From the first moment I laid eyes on her, I thought the sun rose and set with her.”

“Then I guess it runs in the family.”

“What does?”

“The inability to show love even when one feels it.” Karen was immediately sorry that she’d spoken. Her words revealed too much, far more than she wanted her grandmother to know.

“I’m sorry.” Sophia’s eyes fluttered closed and her voice dropped to a whisper. “The sins of the fathers are visited upon the next generation and the next. Forgive me, Lord. I’m so sorry I couldn’t learn that lesson in time.”

Karen felt like an eavesdropper. Was the woman actually praying?

Sophia opened her eyes. “Whatever else might be said, Maggie did raise a beautiful daughter.”

“Mother didn’t raise me.” Karen stood up, suddenly restless.

“That was left to paid employees and the staff at fancy boarding schools.” She headed for the door. “I need some air. I’m going for a walk.”

As the door swung closed behind Karen, Sophia closed her eyes a second time.

O Father, now I know what is still undone. Use me as You will, but heal this girl’s heart. Don’t let her go through life, as Maggie did, believing herself unloved.

She released a sigh as her thoughts began to drift, back to the day Margaret Rose had arrived. It had been in the spring of 1946. The war in Europe had been over nearly a year by the time the four-year-old girl stepped off the train in Nampa, Idaho, clutching the rag doll Esther had made. Sophia would never forget the way her heart had twisted in her chest, torn in two directions from the first moment she laid eyes on her sister’s orphaned child.

Her sister’s child …

And Mikkel’s child.

So many regrets, Lord. So many regrets.

I will make up to you for the years that the swarming locust has eaten. You shall praise the name of the Lord your god, who has dealt wondrously with you.

The words brought immediate comfort, for she knew the Scriptures were true. Sophia couldn’t change the past, but God, in His mercy, could make up for the years her anger, resentment, and jealousy—her personal swarming locust—had eaten.

“Well then,” she said aloud. “How do we begin, Jesus?”

And the answer came:
Give her Esther’s diaries.

Give them away? But, Lord, they brought me to You. They’re all I have left of—

Esther’s diaries.

It took a few moments, but then she understood. The diaries would tell Karen the truth. The truth about Esther, Karen’s real grandmother. The truth about Karen’s heritage of faith. The truth about love.

And it would be better if she learned all of this from Esther. In her own words.

Sophia sighed. “I’m a stubborn old woman, Father. Stubborn as the day is long.” She pushed herself up from the chair. “But I’m trying to overcome it, because I want more than anything to do Your will.”

Then she walked toward her bedroom at the rear of the house.

Sunday, July 19, 1936

Dear Diary,

The most incredible thing has happened. Our little church has a new minister. Pastor Mikkel Christiansen is his name. Christiansen. What a perfect name for a pastor. Don’t you think so?

He is not at all what I expected. Nor what the congregation expected either. He is much younger than our previous pastor. Papa thinks no more than 25 or 26. (I suppose I would seem a mere child to him, being only 17.) He is ever so handsome. Tall as an oak with hair the color of straw and eyes a piercing blue. God forgive me, I did not hear a word of his sermon, for all I was looking at was him.

Sophia was no better than me. I could tell by the expression on her face. And she blushed three shades of red when she shook his hand at the end of service. Tonight, she pulled out the dress patterns. She wants to have something new to wear to church next Sunday.

But something tells me (maybe only wishful thinking) that it was me whom he noticed. My heart nearly stopped beating when he shook my hand. Such a strong grip and yet so gentle at the same time. He looked directly into my eyes, and it was like he could see straight through to my heart. No one has ever made me feel that way before.