Raised By Wolves Volume four- Wolves (42 page)

perceive it as a place we had wished to go, or would we in later

perceive it as a place we had wished to go, or would we in later years onlyrecallthat we had beenforced to make the choice? I felt the same about myfather.
My matelot appeared preoccupied with weighty concerns of his own when he returned from seeing Rachel, but he did not speak of it until we at last retired to our room. “I do not know what we will do with Rachel,” he said. “She does not ail in the body, but in the mind. I found her womanly parts are healing and she no longer fevers. She will never bear another child, though. But that is not the problem. They say she wakes screaming and fearful; and they have drugged her every time after Theodore has found he could not quiet her. He reports she has been wild-eyed and confused. I would see this for myself. Hannah will stay with themin the hospital tonight. She will come and fetchme whenRachelwakes.”
“I have heard of women going mad over the loss of a child,” I said sympathetically. “And these circumstances were enough to make me fall—and the true horror of it was not contained inmybodyand I lost nothing.”
He nodded sadly. “Oui, I fear madness. Only the Gods can know how long it might last. I do not think keeping her in a stupor will solve it. She must be allowed to heal, but I feel that Theodore thinks she will heal in her sleep and simply arise as the woman he loves. He does not seem willing to countenance a prolonged mental convalescence. I do not think it is because he will love her any less, but because he will be overwrought at the sight ofher suffering. “
“Perhaps I should speak to him,” I said. I could clearly

envisionour friend doingas mymansuggested.

 

envisionour friend doingas mymansuggested.

Gaston kissed my cheek. “Try to heal him, my love; so that he can stand and hold their cart while she thrashes about tryingto find her feet again.”

I smiled. “I willteachhimabout carts, oui.”
“Teachhimabout madness,”Gastonsaid gently. “Non, carts, he will wish to have something he can hold

on to, not contemplate things that will ever seem to slip beyond his control.”

My man grinned. “See, I knew you would know what to do. Youare the healer ofminds.”
As always, there was a little voice inthe dark recesses of my heart that wished to refute him, but I stepped into the light where it was harder to hear.
Hannah woke us in the darkest hour before dawn. Knowing we had not woken from deep sleep to face battle, we did not become strained and alert. We threw on our clothes, took up our weapons, and stumbled downstairs with sleepy annoyance swaddled in resignation and duty. We found Theodore struggling with Rachel, and all traces of sleep vanished, yet we were stillthankfullycalm.
“Where is my baby?” Rachel sobbed as she fought her husband to exit the cot. “I want my baby.” And then she muttered things in Yiddish before repeating her request to her husband.
Theodore was wild-eyed and seemed incapable of saying anything other than his wife’s name over and over again: cajoling, comforting, imploring, chiding, scolding, and so on, in a continuous attempt to gainher attentionor compliance. continuous attempt to gainher attentionor compliance.
“Hannah, fetchElizabeth, please,”I said.
“Nay!” Theodore cried. “She cannot see her mother this way! And that is not the babe she is cryingfor.”
“Theodore,” I chided as I waved Hannah away to do as I bid. “Do not make things difficult by being foolish. The babe will likely calmher, and if it does not, then we will know without doubt whichchild she seeks. And as for Elizabeth, she is a baby. I do not remember what I saw at that age, do you? She will be fine.”
“Nay,” Theodore said. “Rachel is not well: the baby should not be around her while she ails.”
At my glance, Gaston sat beside Rachel and attempted to keep her on the cot while I grabbed Theodore and pulled him away. When I had him separate from his wife, I shook him a little. I saw anger and confusioninhis eyes.
“Listen to me,” I said firmly. “She does not ail in a manner that can sicken the child and you know it. Rachel ails in the mind. She has survived a horrible thing and it has driven her mad. We must do what we can to allow her heart and her mind to heal.”
“She cannot be mad,”he said desperately.
“Why? Would you not be if the same had occurred to you?”
“Oh Lord, Will,” he sighed and began to battle himself. “Of course I would, but she is… Rachel. She is a sensible woman. She is… sanitypersonified.”
I snorted and softened it with a gentle smile. “Sensibility has nothingto do with sanity, Theodore. It may even be said that has nothingto do with sanity, Theodore. It may even be said that those who are the most sensible, and who maintain the firmest holds on their hearts and heads, are the ones most prone to fall whenstruck bycalamity.
“She has suffered a wound to her heart. It needs to heal,” I continued in even kinder tones. “You must help her. She willrecover intime, as youhave seenGastondo.”
A new fear lit in his eyes and I regretted mentioning my matelot. “She will not be like Gaston,” I assured him. “He was born as he is, and his kind of madness was made worse by poor treatment such that he was wounded over and over again—and yet, despite that, he is now far saner than he ever has been. Rachel is different: by all accounts she was very healthy in her heart and mind before this. I amsure she will return to what she was. It maytake time, though.”
Hannah returned with a sleepy Elizabeth. Rachel had not been struggling with Gaston. My matelot had been whispering something to her and she had been weeping quietly and nodding. Now with her daughter in sight, Rachel’s face broke into an ebullient smile and she held out her arms. Hannah gave her the babyand Elizabethcuddled against her mother happily.
The sight of this drew the tension from Theodore’s shoulders, and he, too, smiled. “That is allit took?”he asked.
“Oh, nay, I think not,” I said reluctantly. “But we will

see.” I perched on the other side of the cot and touched

Rachel’s hand. She looked to me quite pleasantly until she recognized me, and then fear gripped her such that even little Elizabethsensed it and beganto struggle and cry.
“Rachel?”I queried withconcern.
She said something in Yiddish and then pleaded in

English. “Nay, nay, please do not take this baby. I have been a good mother. Please, I cannot live ifI lose themboth. She is only a girl, please let me keep her even if I am not allowed to have

boys.”As I sensed what course her words were taking, I

reached for Gaston and was gratified by his leaping off the cot and going to Theodore. I heard the struggle as my matelot dragged her husband awayto whisper fiercelywithhim.

I had not taken my eyes fromhers. I knew two things: I was not Will to her at this moment; and the last she had seen me she had beenquite drugged onlaudanum, inpain, and I had been digging a dead child from her belly. I guessed at a path and set foot onit withhope and temerity.

“Hush, hush,” I whispered. “I will not take this child.

Youhave suffered enough. Youmaykeep the girl.”
“Thank you, thank you,” she murmured and bowed her
head low above her baby and began to avert her eyes from

mine. “Rachel, who amI?”I asked.

 

“An angel,”she said; her gaze stillon the blanket and not

 

myface.“Whydid God send anangelto take your child?”

She said another thing in Yiddish, and when I did not respond, she switched to English. “I know I have broken the Covenant. I should not have married a gentile. I have pretended to be a gentile to receive things I wanted. I was arrogant. I was foolish. I deserve this punishment.”

I took a long breath and held it, fighting the urge to sigh. We did not need me here, we needed a rabbi; but thenI realized that might be no better thana priest:a rabbimight agree withher. Truly, I did not know enough of Jewish dogma and philosophy to even guess what a rabbi would say. I did not know anyone who did—save Rachel, of course. And even she might be as misguided as Henrietta was about matters of religion. I had known a number of Jews throughout my travels, though; and they had lived in a similar fashion no matter where they were. And in what I had seen oftheir lives, though the particulars might be different, in all they were not so very different than men of other faiths who took their religionquite seriouslyand made it the center oftheir lives.

Thus I understood. In her moment of need she had reached for her faith as I had done that night. Unfortunately, the faith she had found had been the one she had been born with, not the one she had adopted. She had turned her face to her God and felt He would no longer find favor with her because she had turned away before. I could not speak for her God, or more precisely, the version of her God she understood. I surmised I could do nothing except appease her fantasy for the time being and thendealwithTheodore.

I looked to the facts, with or without God’s involvement —or truly perhaps because of it—she would have no more children. She had one healthy child who needed her as a mother. She had a husband who needed her almost as much as the child. This was her life, and she must be helped to be at peace withit.

“You will have no more children,” I said with assurance and the somber tones I imagined an angel might use. “That is the price ofthe pathyouhave chosen. But that is the onlyprice. You are married: a good woman finds peace and fulfillment in her marriage and in pleasing her husband—whoever he might be. And you have a healthy child: a good mother finds peace and fulfillment incaringfor whatever childrenGod has givenher.”

She nodded even as she sobbed anew. “I will not do wrongbythem. I willbe a good gentile to honor them.”
I saw a problemthere, perhaps the crux. “Nay, you will honor God by not lying to God. You will honor God and the commitments you have made by being a good Jewish woman who is married to a gentile.”
Fear and confusion twisted her face. “But how am I to do that, ohAngel?”
I was concerned. I was not sure if there was some scripture-driven prohibition against such a thing that an angel should not gainsay. I could but hope there was not; and if there was, pray her current delusion was strong enough to overcome it.
Inthe end allI had was myfaithto impart—fair or not.
“It is the challenge set before you,” I pronounced. “You have chosen to walk this path, and now God would see you finishit:without lyingto God or others.
She nodded solemnly. “I willdo this.”
“Good,”I intoned.
I could not very well stand and carry on a conversation with the others where she could hear. I stood, took the lamp, and left, leavingthemto follow me iftheywere wise.
The four of us soon stood in the atrium. Gaston released the iron grip he had maintained on Theodore—including a hand across his mouth—and our friend sat heavily on a bench and regarded the pavingstones withconfusion.
Hannah took the lamp from me. “I will watch over them,” she said quietly. She paused on her way to the door and turned back to me. “I think that was the right thing. I do not understand your religions, but I do know she has always been troubled byno longer beingas she was born.”
“Thank you,”I said.
I looked to Gaston after she left. He nodded enthusiastically, and then pointed at Theodore and gave a worried frown. I moved to sit on the ground in front of our friend. He reluctantlyraised his gaze to mine.
“She is in the grips of madness now, but people speak truth fromthat place,” I said gently. “She is speaking the truth of her soul. She feels she has wronged God by converting, and that is whyshe is beingpunished withthe dead babies.”
“I did this to her,” he said. “I convinced her to marry me.”
I shook my head. “Theodore, truly, you could not have forced her to attempt to convert to Christianity and marry you. Did you put a pistol to her head? Nay, she made the decisions. She wished to be your wife. It has troubled her, though. That does not necessarily mean she regrets being your wife. It means she regrets turningawayfromthe faithofher birth.”
“But what ifGod is punishingus? The ChristianGod,”he

added.“Because you married a Jew? Because she did not

convert fully to Christianity in her heart?” I asked with exasperation.
He nodded quite earnestly.
“Then He does not deserve your praise or worship. Pettydeities have no damnright to rule the universe.”
“Will!”Theodore exclaimed.
I grabbed his collar and pulled his face to mine. “How much of what you know of your God truly comes from your God? Have you spoken to Him? Or have you spent your life relying on the words of others? Listen to the part of your faith that resides inyour heart. That is God’s voice!
“You love that woman, and she you. It is misfortune that she cannot bear another child. Perhaps that fortune was delivered upon you by the Divine. I cannot believe it was delivered because you are bad people. There could be a thousand other reasons. Perhaps some other evil would have befallen those children, and God is sparing them by calling them to Heaven. Perhaps they were never meant to be born and God has given you this test to strengthen your marriage or your persons. We cannot truly comprehend the workings of the Divine, but we can listen with our hearts to the… melodies They

play. “Do you truly believe your God—any God—hates you

 

or her?”I demanded.

 

He took a deep breath, his high brow smooth with concentration. “Nay,”he whispered.

 

I released him.

I released him.
He nodded and continued. “I feel I ama good man, and I feel as you often say, that God looks upon our deeds with an eye for our intentions. I have never feared Hell because I have always done as I felt was right and good.
“But I was afraid when I married Rachel that… Nay, I know not whether I thought it or believed it, but I knew I argued with it in my soul. I felt God might be angry because I had married a woman who had not accepted Christ—even after she became a Christian, because I could not view it as being that easy. It is not a matter ofprofessingit and sayingthe words. And then I worried that perhaps God would be angry because she was supposed to remain a Jew; and that there was a reason that Jews kept themselves separate. Perhaps they were not to have salvation by God’s hand.” He met my gaze and chided, “Do not think that I view the Jewish God as being different from the Christian God. You should even agree they are one and the same.”
“I know that, but I do not feel all Christians truly understand that,”I said witha smile.
“Well, I do,” he said. “I have always believed that God was angry with the Jews for not accepting his Son—for being stubborn. I thought I was saving Rachel from the sins of her people.”
“That is a bit of hubris,” I chided gently, “but I can see where youcould think that.”
He frowned withshame. “I know. And now…”
“God gives you both a beautiful baby girl and then