Not a Sparrow Falls (20 page)

“What is it?” Lorna asked. Her eyes were trained on Bridie’s, and her face showed concern.

“Nothing,” Bridie assured her, putting on a bright smile. Dr. Calvin came down just then and spared her further explanation.

“He’s not well,” he admitted, in what Bridie thought was the understatement of the century. Every time she’d checked on the reverend today he had been glassy eyed and out of it. Reminding her of Jonah when he was high, except for the paranoia, which was mercifully absent. “His fever is high,” Calvin went on. “I’m hearing some congestion in his lungs. However, he is taking fluids. I’ve given him an injection as well as the oral antibiotics.” He sighed deeply, seeming to weigh his options. He gave a little nod when he reached his conclusion. “I’ll give him tonight, but if he’s not better tomorrow, I’m going to admit him.”

Lorna looked worried. Bridie nodded. “Is there anything I should do?”

“Force fluids. He should drink half a cup at least every hour.”

Lorna murmured. “You’ll be up all night.”

“Would you rather I admitted him now?” Calvin asked.

One more trauma for Samantha, and in her state of mind she’d probably blame herself. Bridie shook her head. “No,” she answered. “I’ll take care of him.”

“I can come tomorrow straight after work,” Lorna promised. Bridie nodded again. Calvin left.

She and Lorna bedded down the twins and then made
themselves a cup of tea. Samantha was engrossed in the movie of the week.

“Shall we take it in the living room?” Lorna asked, cocking her head toward the blaring TV.

“Sure,” Bridie answered, and followed Lorna down the hall.

That living room. She looked around her at the moldering opulence. In her mind there were two choices. Clean everything out—beat the carpets, vacuum the drapes, polish the silver and brass, wind the clocks—or haul the whole mess upstairs to the attic.

She began talking, filling Lorna in on her conversation with Samantha about school, the doctor’s evaluation of Cameron’s speech problems. Lorna listened intently, her kind face drawn with concern.

“And about things around here,” Bridie said, “I have a few ideas I wanted to run by you.”

Lorna nodded.

She told her.

Lorna’s eyes widened as she spoke. When Bridie had finished, Lorna nodded resolutely and took a sip of her tea. When she’d replaced the china cup on the saucer, she looked up and met Bridie’s gaze squarely.

“I think those are very good suggestions,” she said, and Bridie heard only a hint of what this stand would cost her. Years of battling those overbearing sisters flashed through her imagination. “As I said before,” Lorna continued, “you’re in charge. Act as if this is your home, as if these are your children. Do as you see fit.”

“Are you sure?” Bridie asked, giving her one more chance to back out.

Lorna nodded and gulped down the rest of her tea. “I’ll explain things to Winifred and Fiona,” she said, replacing the cup in the saucer. Bridie could see the artery on her neck pulse. She could only imagine that conversation.

“We’ll have a few weeks before they show up again,” Lorna said, mostly to herself. She nodded and seemed a little
comforted. “Well, I guess I’d better go,” she said, sounding regretful. “I work at the photo factory tonight. Thank you again,” Lorna said, her eyes intent on Bridie’s. “You can’t know how much this means.”

Bridie smiled and patted Lorna’s shoulder, then took her teacup and saw her to the door. She wondered what kind of train wreck had left her holding down two jobs at a time when she should be reaping the rewards of her life, but it was not her place to ask. She hugged Lorna good-night, got Samantha off to bed, then went into the kitchen and debated what kind of liquid to take to the reverend. The reverend. She couldn’t very well go on calling him that, though Alasdair seemed too intimate. It didn’t much matter what she called him, the state he was in. She selected a Pepsi from the refrigerator. It had sugar, which couldn’t hurt, since he hadn’t eaten in at least a day, and it would settle his stomach. She poured it into a glass and, using a fork, whipped out some of the carbonation in case his throat was sore. She took it to him. He roused enough to drink it down but barely opened his eyes, and as soon as he finished, he was out again.

She closed his door quietly and decided she would set her alarm for every hour and doze in between. But first she went through the house performing the same ritual as the night before. She locked the doors, doused the lights, pausing to look out the front window to Fairfax Street. A light snow was falling. She could see the thin, whispery flakes in the light of the streetlamp.

She stood still for a moment, listening for the old house’s groans and creaks. It did not disappoint. With everyone gone, the feeling of shadowed secrets returned, but not with as much force as the night before. She wondered if she’d simply grown used to the atmosphere, as they all seemed to have. She climbed the stairs, still feeling like a character in a gothic romance.

The bedroom doors were closed, the hallway dim. Her imagination, always overactive, conjured up a wraithlike
figure. It was so real, Bridie could almost swear she saw rather than imagined it. The ghost was slim and graceful, with Samantha’s face. She hovered outside the children’s rooms, her hands pressed against their doors, powerless to enter in and help them.

Fourteen

Bridie opened her eyes and shut off the radio alarm. It was one o’clock and time to check on Reverend MacPherson. She got up, pulled on her robe, and went to his room. She pushed open the door and walked softly to his bedside. His face was red and hot again. So hot it frightened her, but she managed to get two aspirins down him. Then, after filling a basin with water, she sponged his face and hair, trying to cool him off. She threw the blankets off the bed and pulled the sheet down to his waist, gently wrestled him out of the T-shirt he wore, then dampened his chest. She was rinsing the washrag in the pan of cool water when he cried out.

“Oh!” His voice was loud and fervent, his gaze fixed on her with hot intensity. “Oh!” he cried again.

She dropped the cloth and leaned over him, jumbled thoughts of heart attacks and exploding arteries competing for her attention.

“What is it, Alasdair?” She used his name without intending to. “Alasdair, what’s wrong?”

His expression became radiant. His eyes were dark polished sapphires, shining with fever and whatever hallucination was bringing him such joy. “You’ve come back,” he said in an awed whisper.

“I’m here,” she soothed and took his outstretched hand.

“You’ve come back.” He murmured the words this time, but with such intensity and passion that Bridie felt embarrassed. He kissed her open palm, then pressed it against his heart. She felt the mat of hair on his chest, the heat of his skin, could even feel the thumping of his racing pulse. She felt a rush of strong emotion, confused with the knowledge that she was playacting, standing in for some character from his dreams or his past. He reached the other hand toward her
and caught a handful of her hair. “You’ll give me another chance, won’t you?”

Another chance. Someone else wanted another chance and wanted it so desperately she could feel his breathless pain pierce her own heart. Her eyes filled. She nodded, only part of her remembering she was nothing more than a substitute, a figure in a poignant dream.

His face darkened and filled with pain. “Can you ever forgive me?” He sat up and reached the other arm toward her.

“Yes, I forgive you. Of course,” she soothed, taking both his arms and lowering him back onto the bed. “Lie down, now.”

“You won’t leave?”

“No. I won’t leave. Now you lie down.” She gently lowered his arms to his sides. “Here, drink.” She held the glass to his mouth and wiped away the dribbles when he was finished. He allowed it, and that particular dream must have passed, for the next time he opened his eyes, they were without the profound joy. He was going on about budgets now. Later it was mowing the lawn. He had accidentally mown down Mother’s daisies, and on and on it went, all night long. She sat beside him in the chair, dozing in between offering him sips of water or soda and sponging him off.

In the darkest part of the night, between three and four, she was awakened by the sound of crying. He was weeping. Deep, racking, dry sobs. His fever had robbed him of tears.

Bridie tried to soothe him. “Alasdair, come on now,” she said. “It’s all right. Everything’s all right.” She patted his face, held his hands, but now it was as if he was oblivious to her presence. She sat back down beside him, helpless, and in desperation she thought about calling the paramedics. He was a very big man and strong. What if he became violent? What would she do then? She felt like crying herself. Why had she come here to this terrible, sad place?

If she believed that God would answer her, she would have prayed over him. Perhaps that would have comforted him. That’s what Grandma would have done. And Mama. She
thought of nights when she’d been sick or frightened and her mother had sat beside her and calmed her. And she remembered how she had done it.

“Have mercy on me, O God, have mercy on me,” she quoted from that long-ago Sunday school project, raising her voice so it could be heard above his crying. “For in you my soul takes refuge. I will take refuge in the shadow of your wings until the disaster has passed.”

It might have been wishful thinking, but it seemed as if his sobs lessened in intensity. She wiped his face with the damp cloth and quoted another psalm before he could start in again.

“I call to God and the Lord saves me. Evening, morning and noon I cry out in distress, and he hears my voice. He ransoms me unharmed from the battle waged against me.”

He turned his gleaming eyes on her, and they calmed a little; their burning light drew down. When he tried to moisten his cracked lips, she offered a drink and another verse.

“Cast your cares on the Lord, and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous fall.” Her voice was soft and soothing now.

Alasdair lay still. She went on.

“He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.’ ”

He closed his eyes. She sat back down in her chair.

“The Lord is compassionate and gracious,” she recited, the words coming from someplace deep inside her now, “slow to anger, abounding in love. He will not always accuse, nor will he harbor his anger forever; he does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities.”

His face relaxed.

“For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him; as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us.”

Alasdair’s breathing became deep and regular. He was asleep, but she went on just the same. On and on throughout
the rest of the night, she recited the hundred verses. Every time Alasdair stirred in his sleep, he seemed to hear her voice affirming the ancient promises, and he would rest again, comforted.

It must be true that God didn’t give you more than you could bear because the babies slept through until seven o’clock. She must have dozed off herself, for she was startled awake by their cries. She sat up in the chair she’d pulled close to the bed and carefully disentangled her hand from Alasdair MacPherson’s. He was pale but cool, and sleeping peacefully. She looked at him for a moment, wondering if he would remember this night, then pulled the blanket over his bare shoulders and crept out to see to his children.

Fifteen

Bridie swung open the heavy front door of the parsonage and couldn’t help smiling. Carmen, hair apouf and dressed in a black leather miniskirt and jacket, was leaning back against the porch railing, taking one last, long drag on her cigarette. She ground out the butt in the potted Norfolk pine.

“Well, if it isn’t Mary Poppins,” she said.

Bridie’s smile spread even wider, and impulsively she opened her arms for a hug. Carmen grinned back and walked into them. Bridie’s nose tickled from the feather of sprayed hair that brushed it.

“The old Bag and Save’s been pretty dull without you,” Carmen said, giving her a squeeze and releasing her. “And so has home.”

Bridie felt a moment of uneasiness. She hadn’t been back to the apartment since she’d taken the job over a week ago. “I have the money for this month’s rent in the kitchen,” she said quickly.

“Save it.” Carmen waved her away, then looked a little awkward herself. “Newlee’s been staying over since you’ve been gone. He’s helping out.”

Bridie nodded. She’d been replaced. She supposed she should have seen it coming, but still. Carmen seemed to read her mind.

“Your room’s still yours as long as you want it,” she assured her.

Bridie nodded. She tried not to think any farther ahead than her nose these days. “Thank you. I’ll be here at the parsonage more often than not until the reverend gets on his feet, though. And after that he’s off to Boston for a week. He’s speaking at a
theological conference,
” she said, giving the words the emphasis they deserved.

“Woo-hoo-hoo.” Carmen raised an eyebrow. “Look who’s hanging out with the hoity-toity.”

Bridie grinned. “It’s good to see you,” she said, and was surprised to find how deeply she meant it. “Thanks for helping me out with the children.”

“Are you kidding? I wouldn’t miss this for the world.” Carmen stepped all the way into the foyer, draped her jacket over the stair railing, and slung her purse into the corner. “This setup reminds me of that movie where the governess comes and this guy’s got his crazy wife locked up in the attic.”

“
Jane Eyre?
” Bridie supplied.

Carmen snapped her fingers and pointed at Bridie. “That’s the one.” She craned her neck up the stairs as if she were listening for insane laughter, then headed toward the sitting room, gawking every step of the way. Bridie, shaking her head, followed after.

“This place is a real piece of work. Who’s that? The first wife?” Carmen pointed to the oil portrait of Alasdair and Lorna’s stern-faced mother hanging in the hallway.