Heart of the Wilderness (32 page)

Nonie looked frightened by Kendra’s bold words. Would the girl call down the wrath of angry spirits?

But Kendra went on with confidence. “There is only
one
God— and He loves us. He is so filled with love for us that we never have to live in fear. We can love Him in return. You see, He made us.”

“White man’s god,” said Nonie.

“No. No—
not
the white man’s God.
Everyone’s
God. He made all mankind. He placed them in a beautiful garden and told them not to eat of the tree that was planted there. But they did not listen. They deliberately—” Kendra stopped. What was a word that Nonie might understand? “They set their hearts to disobey,” went on Kendra, her voice intense with emotion. “They would not listen to His voice. They shut their ears. Turned their faces.”

Nonie stirred on her pallet.

“But God still loved them. He had said that the punishment for sin—for not obeying His word—would be death. Mankind would die—apart from God. They could not go to the new home—new forest He made for them. They would need to go to a terrible place—where all was pain and deep sorrow.

“God could not go back on His word. He had given His pledge— extended His hand. But because He still loved the people He had made—He had a plan. He sent His own Son—His only Son—and
He
died in place of the whole human race—white people
and
Indians.

Took the—the curse on himself.” She paused for a moment and took the old woman’s face in her hands.

“It’s true, Nonie. It’s all in the Bible—the big Book. We can know this God. This
only
God. We never need to be afraid of all the evil spirits. God is greater. He is—His medicine is stronger. Much stronger. All we need to do is to believe in Him. To accept His great plan for us and ask Him to take away all the—the evil from our hearts. Oh, Nonie”—Kendra was in tears—“don’t you see? A religion without a Savior is just not good enough. Jesus is the Savior—the only Savior— for us all. We can’t do anything about our sinful hearts by ourselves—no matter how hard we try. But He can—and He will.”

The woman had quietly listened to all that Kendra said. Her eyes gazed into emptiness. Kendra put one arm again around the frail body, the fingers of her other hand brushing lightly against Nonie’s cheek.

“It’s true, Nonie,” Kendra said again, unmindful of the tears that ran down her cheeks.

Nonie shook her head slowly. Sadness seemed to pour from her very soul.

“White man’s god,” she said again.

“No, Nonie.
Your
God.
Everyone’s
God,” insisted Kendra.

“Too late,” said Nonie, and she lifted weary and frail shoulders in a slight shrug.

“No. It’s
not
too late. It’s not. You can ask Him to forgive you right now. You can believe, right now. It’s
not
too late.”

Nonie shifted her slight weight. Kendra eased back gently and Nonie seemed to sink deeper into the furs that formed her bed.

“Too late,” said Nonie again with resignation. “I live with Indian gods. I die with Indian gods. Too late.”

“But, Nonie, you—”

“You go now,” spoke the feeble lips. “Come tomorrow.”

Kendra hated to leave. She knew the old woman had very little strength left. How much longer might she be with them? Would she listen to Kendra’s plea on another day?

Kendra knelt in silence.

“You go now,” Nonie repeated.

Tears again squeezed from Kendra’s eyes and rolled slowly down her cheeks.

“You’ll—you’ll think about what I have said?” she asked the elderly woman, patting her hand.

Silence.

“Will you?” persisted Kendra.

“Make Amo-chika happy?”

“Yes—yes, it will make me
very
happy if you’ll just think about it. Think carefully about what I have said.”

Nonie nodded.

“Then, I think,” she said solemnly.

It was the best Kendra could do. She slowly rose to her feet and left the cabin, Indian fashion, without a backward glance.

An Indian boy brought the news the next morning. Nonie had died sometime during the night.

George and Kendra would not be expected to attend the burial. The Indians would conduct the ceremony in their own way. Kendra mourned alone by her beloved stream. In the distance she could hear the beating of the funeral drums, too far away to hear the accompanying dirge that would be the death chant. Kendra wept bitterly. She had failed. She had come home too late. In the short time, she had not been able to make Nonie understand. She had been unable to effectively share her faith with the two people she loved the most. Nonie was gone. Her grandfather had forbidden her to speak. She might just as well have stayed in the city. She might just as well have encouraged the courtship of Reynard. For the first time since she had wept on the graves of her parents as a frightened and lonely child, she cried until she had no more tears.

George knew the death of Nonie was hard on his Kendra. He watched her as she moved about the cabin or tended the small vegetable garden or took her basket and headed for the woods, Oscar at her heels.

She was in deep mourning, and he did not know how to help her—what to say. He didn’t know if he should draw out her feelings or let her deal with them in her own way, in her own time.

At last he could stand the sorrow-filled eyes no longer. She was sitting on the small bench at the front of the cabin where she often spent her evenings listening to the sounds of the closing day and drinking in the peace that seemed to seep from the twilight. George sat down beside her and spoke of Nonie’s death for the first time.

“I know it has been terribly hard on you to lose Nonie,” he began.

Kendra could not answer. Her tears were falling again.

“I’m—I’m sorry,” he continued. “Truly sorry that you—that you have to face another sorrow. Another death.”

“It wasn’t just her death,” Kendra said in a trembling voice.

“Not her death?”

“Not really. It was—it was just that she—she wasn’t ready to die.”

The words tore again at Kendra’s heart.

“I—don’t think I understand,” said her grandfather.

“I—I went to see Nonie. To tell her about God. To tell her that she could—could have her sins forgiven—could know God as her— Savior,” sobbed Kendra. She was sobbing openly now.

“You wanted to change her religion?” he asked softly, but there was a hint of accusation in his words.

Kendra’s head came up. “I wanted to share with her the Truth,” she said frankly, and he could see the fervor in her eyes. She really believed in what she had embraced.

There was silence. George shifted a bit. At last he spoke again.

“She didn’t want to listen?”

“Oh—she listened. She let me say—say it all—but then she said— she said He is the white man’s God. I couldn’t make her—understand that He isn’t. That He made all mankind. That He loves us all.”

“I see,” said George.

There was silence.

“Did she send you away?”

“She was very weak—and tired. She said for me to go and come again the next day.”

“So she wasn’t angry with you?”

“I—I don’t think so. She called me—Amo-chika—just like she did when I was little. Remember? She said—she’d—she’d think about what I said if it would make me happy.”

“She said that?”

Kendra nodded.

They sat in silence, each deep in thought. George spoke first.

“Then, she did that,” he said simply.

Kendra looked up at her grandfather, not understanding his words.

“If Nonie gave her word, she also fulfilled it,” said George.

“You mean—?”

George hesitated, then said, “If she was still able to—to think— straight—then Nonie pondered your words. Now I don’t know if—if she believed them. But she thought about them.”

“Oh, God.” The words escaped from Kendra’s lips without her being aware of them. It was a prayer. It was an earnest plea. It was a bit of heartfelt praise. Just two simple words, but her whole heart was wrapped up in them.

What if Nonie had thought on her words? What if she had actually understood them?
What if she had believed?
“Father, I leave Nonie’s soul in your hands,” she whispered.

At least in some measure, things returned to a normal summer routine. George went about his daily tasks and Kendra quickly seemed to slip back into the role she had left when she went away to university. But there was a difference somehow. Kendra’s faith set her apart. She had a confidence, a peace, even as she moved about the cabin. George often heard her humming little snatches of song, and he had the feeling that she was in her room reading her Bible or praying in the early mornings or late evenings. He didn’t know how he knew—he didn’t actually see her—but he felt it.

Another fall came and went and soon winter was with them again, wrapping them in its chilling arms with falling snow. Kendra harnessed the dogs and put out her traps. She did not take pleasure in the death of the animals, but she and her grandfather were trappers and they had to make a living.

After the long winter, Kendra was glad to see another spring breathe through. As Easter drew near her thoughts were more and more on the wonder of it all—God’s creation, His redemption for that creation. It was a joyous time. She recalled the previous Easter and her time spent with the Preston family. In spite of the happiness within her soul, she felt a tug of sorrow—of loneliness. Things might have been so different had she not been needed by her grandfather— by Nonie.

But Kendra breathed a little prayer, leaving her life and her future in the hands of the God she had learned to trust. He knew what was best. She could trust Him.

“Where is he?” Kendra said aloud for the umpteenth time.

She paced the floor again and looked out the window. It was already getting dark. Her grandfather should have been home from the woods long ago. He always came home long before sundown from logging out firewood.

Kendra went to the door and stood listening to the sounds of the approaching night. In the distance a wolf howled, and Kendra saw the hackles on Oscar’s neck rise in response. She placed a hand on the dog’s head without thinking, her eyes still hopefully straining to make out an approaching form in the darkness.