The Braxtons of Miracle Springs

by Michael Phillips

  I wasn’t sure I liked the atmosphere of the place. It was dark despite the candles on all the tables, and the decor was too gaudy for my taste with red and black flocked wallpaper, big gold light fixtures, and two or three paintings of women on the walls whose expressions I didn’t much care for. The sorts of men scattered about at the tables didn’t look or sound like the kind you’d want to spend much time with. It wasn’t what you’d call a family restaurant, and I knew from his face that Christopher felt a little uneasy too. But by the time we sensed that perhaps we’d made a mistake, it was too late. The eight or ten tables about the large room had been mostly filled, and people were already being served the famous food we’d been hearing so much about.

  Despite the questionable atmosphere, the meal was absolutely delicious.

  We were served savory potatoes, pork roast with fruit compote and gravy, yeast rolls, and chard in a fried egg mixture. All the items on the menu were familiar enough, but each one had a distinctive and different taste. It was obvious Mammy Pleasant’s chef knew how to prepare things to enhance rather than diminish their natural flavors. The coffee served with the dessert, too, was strong and flavorful without being bitter. It was the best coffee I think I’d ever tasted.

  As we ate, we talked lightly amongst ourselves, but I think we all felt a little bit intimidated by the surroundings. All except Mr. Kemble, that is. He spotted several people with whom he was acquainted and walked over to chat. He was having a great time. He’d been trying his best to find a way inside the place again ever since his first visit!

  The rest of us, however, did more staring and watching and listening than we did conversing. I suppose we all felt like country folks around all those fancy-dressed city men. Suddenly I realized that Laughing Waters and Becky and I were the only women seated in the room, although there were fancy-dressed women among the servers.

  I didn’t know what I’d write about in an article. If I stuck to the food like some restaurant columns I’d read, the assignment wouldn’t be too hard, because in all honesty it was one of the best meals I’d ever eaten. I didn’t know if I’d be able to write very much about a dinner, though. How much time could you take describing something you’re just going to stab with your fork, chew up, and swallow?

  By the time dessert arrived, Christopher had grown more and more quiet. I could tell he was very uncomfortable.

  As we began to eat the apple cobbler, he suddenly stood and excused himself, saying he wasn’t feeling too well.

  “I just need some fresh air, Corrie,” he said to me. “I’m sorry. Please, all of you, go on ahead. I’ll be back in a minute or two.”

  Then he turned and left the room by the front door.

  I watched him go, knowing there was more to his departure than not feeling well. For Christopher to turn down apple cobbler was unheard of. And he’d been feeling perfectly fine all day.

  I tried to make conversation. I’m glad Mr. Kemble didn’t seem to notice, but the others knew something was wrong. The editor, however, was too busy relishing the cobbler.

  As my eyes followed Christopher, I unconsciously saw him pass someone on his way out the door. I was watching Christopher so intently I paid almost no attention to the man walking into the dining room as he left. It was only later, as I recalled the scene, that I realized there had been a faint hint of recognition even then.

  At the moment, however, I turned back to the table and the cobbler on the plate in front of me.

  About three minutes later, suddenly the limp conversation at our table was interrupted with the last voice I ever expected to hear. It had been years, but I knew it instantly.

  “Corrie Hollister . . . it is you!”

  I looked up speechless, my face pale. Mr. Kemble was already shaking the newcomer’s hand, while I struggled to find my tongue.

  “How’s it going, O’Flaridy?” he said. “I heard you were back in town.”

  “Just got back last month.”

  “Who you working for?”

  Robin smiled. “Let’s just say I haven’t settled down to any of my options yet.”

  “Still playing all the angles, eh, O’Flaridy?”

  Robin laughed. “I keep busy. I’ve got some sizable irons in the fire that will make me more money in a week than I made writing for you in two years.”

  “Maybe so, but confidence games can also get you put behind bars.”

  “It’s nothing so shady as that, Kemble.”

  “I heard about the trouble you got mixed up in down in Nashville.”

  “I tell you, I’m strictly on the up and up. But I didn’t come here to talk to you; I can see you anytime—Corrie,” he said, sitting down in Christopher’s chair and turning toward me, “what brings you to San Francisco . . . and who are these four friends of yours?”

  “Uh . . . this is . . . my sister, and my . . . uh, these are my brothers, and our friend Laughing Waters.”

  “I’m pleased to meet you all,” said Robin in his smoothest and most polished tone. “My name is Robert T. O’Flaridy. Your sister and I are old and very close friends.” He shook their hands, and I didn’t at all like the way his eyes lingered longer than they should have on Becky.

  “Robin, there is something . . .” I began, but the moment I hesitated, he turned toward me again and started up himself.

  “It is wonderful to see you again, Corrie,” he said, more softly, taking my hand in his. “You look very beautiful tonight. Your brothers and sister appear old enough to take care of themselves in the city for one night. I’d like you to spend the evening with me. We’ll go dancing, and I’ll take you places you never even dreamed existed.”

  “Robin, I . . . I can’t. I—”

  “Come now, Corrie. I know you were just a confused kid before. But you’re a grown woman now. It won’t take long for you to realize that I’m the kind of man you could easily fall in love with. I’ve loved you for a long time; I’ve just been waiting for you to—”

  That did it! At last I found my tongue.

  “Robin O’Flaridy, don’t you dare talk to me like that!” I said, pulling my hand out from his.

  “Surely you don’t deny that you found me interesting and attractive.”

  “I found you interesting, but certainly not attractive!”

  Out of the corner of my eye I noticed Mr. Kemble sitting there, silently enjoying the drama. I wished he would step in to help me, but he seemed to be enjoying watching Robin make a fool of himself too much to interfere. Tad and Zack looked nervously at one another.

  By now I was furious. Robin had always been presumptuous, but this took the cake!

  “You could love me, Corrie, if you only give yourself the chance.”

  Again he took my hand. Once more I yanked it back, more forcefully this time.

  “I have no intention of spending a minute more with you than I have to, Robin O’Flaridy!”

  “Then, perhaps your sister—” he added, turning toward Becky with a smile I didn’t like, “perhaps she would enjoy a night out in San Francisco with one who knows all the—”

  Finally Zack jumped up in defense of his two sisters. If Christopher hadn’t come back a minute later when he did, I’m afraid Zack would have clobbered poor Robin right in his face and bloodied his nose all over Mammy Pleasant’s carpet!

  “Both my sisters will be with me,” Zack said, “and neither of them will spend a minute of it alone with the likes of you!”

  “Perhaps you should let your sister answer for herself,” rejoined Robin, with the trace of bite in his tone, eying Zack with caution, yet hardly able to keep himself from accepting the challenge.

  I was so absorbed, I hadn’t even noticed Christopher returning from outside and walking toward our table. All at once, Robin became aware of someone standing behind his right shoulder. He glanced around.

  “Ah, this must be your chair,” he said to Christopher, rising.

  Then he turned back to me. “Corrie, you never told me you had an older brot
her.”

  “This is my husband!” I blurted out. If there wasn’t smoke coming out my ears, I would be surprised.

  Suddenly realizing his error, Robin stepped back so that Christopher could take his seat again. Christopher, however, continued to stand, not sure what to make of what he had seen upon reentering the dining room—a perfect stranger sitting in his seat, trying to take his wife’s hand, and speaking to her in the confidential tones of a lover.

  As Zack watched, still on his feet, the two men shook hands, stiffly on Christopher’s part, while Robin not-so-subtly excused himself, trying to put the best face on the scene that he could under the circumstances.

  “Oh . . . well—how are you doing? O’Flaridy’s the name, Robert O’Flaridy.”

  “Christopher Braxton.”

  “Corrie and I go way back,” he added, already recovering his suave demeanor. “Old newspaper cronies, you know. We haven’t seen each other in years. Well . . . nice meeting you all,” he added, sweeping his gaze quickly around the silent table. “And it’s been wonderful seeing you again, Corrie.”

  I didn’t say a word. I was calming down now that Christopher was back.

  Finally Robin turned to Mr. Kemble.

  “I’ll see you later, Kemble,” he said, with a significant tone, as if it had been the editor’s design to set the whole thing up from the beginning so that he would wind up with egg on his face.

  Mr. Kemble nodded, still chuckling over the incident. I certainly didn’t think it was funny. Christopher remained silent. Zack, Tad, Becky, and Laughing Waters just sat there, hardly knowing what to think.

  Robin turned and was gone as quickly as he had appeared, striding across the room to the table where the two men he had come in with were being served the first course of their dinner. I don’t know why they were eating here, unless they were staying in the boardinghouse. By then I didn’t care to know!

  “I’d say it’s time for us to leave,” said Christopher, still serious.

  I was on my feet in a second.

  “I’m sorry we must leave so abruptly, Mr. Kemble,” Christopher said to the editor. “If you would like to remain, we will be perfectly able to find our way back. We very much appreciate the evening, but I do think I ought to take my wife and her family back to the hotel.”

  “Yes . . . yes, of course, Braxton,” said Mr. Kemble, getting up out of his chair somewhat awkwardly and shaking the hand Christopher had offered him.

  “I hope you understand.”

  “Of course. Perhaps I, uh . . . perhaps I will remain a few minutes more and finish my cobbler, perhaps have a glass of port. You’re certain you can find your way?”

  Christopher nodded.

  I thanked Mr. Kemble and told him I would be in touch with him about the article. Then we all made our way out of the room and back outside. I couldn’t help glancing again in Robin’s direction, but he was looking away and wasn’t about to pay the slightest attention to our leaving. I was glad Mammy Pleasant was in another room at the time, so we didn’t have to talk to anyone.

  In another minute we were out on the street. A thick fog was just rolling in from off the bay, and it felt good to breathe the moist, salty air.

  Christopher and I sighed deeply, relieved to be out of the noisy, smoky, boisterous atmosphere. The six of us walked slowly down the street in silence.

  Finally Christopher spoke.

  “What do you say we walk back to the hotel?” he said. “I think the exercise will help us shake off the dust from that place.”

  We all agreed. Christopher asked who in the world Robin O’Flaridy was, and as we went I told him the whole story.1

  1. For those of you who may not be familiar with Corrie’s first meeting with Robin O’Flaridy, it is found in the two books Daughter of Grace and On the Trail of the Truth, books two and three in The Journals of Corrie Belle Hollister.

  Chapter 12

  A Long Talk

  It was probably seven-thirty or eight when we arrived back at the boardinghouse where we were staying. Robin O’Flaridy would probably be out on the town for another several hours. But we had had a long day and a good time. Now we were ready to put it behind us and think about going home the next morning. As we climbed the stairs, Christopher lingered behind.

  “We need to talk,” he whispered to me.

  I nodded.

  As soon as Tad and Zack were in their room and Becky and Laughing Waters and I in ours, I told the other two girls that Christopher and I were going to go back for a walk.

  He was already waiting for me downstairs, and together we stepped back out into the quiet, chilly evening. Christopher let out a long sigh as soon as we were alone. We walked down the street in the opposite direction from which we had just come for several minutes.

  “I am sorry,” he said at length, “for putting you in that awkward position with O’Flaridy.”

  “You didn’t put me in it,” I said.

  “Maybe not directly, but indirectly I have to take responsibility for it.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I am your husband, and so I am responsible for you. And then I got up and deserted you just before he came around.”

  “You didn’t desert me.”

  “Well, I shouldn’t have left, and I am sorry. But I just had to get alone for a minute to try to clear my thoughts and ask the Lord what to do.”

  “You couldn’t have known Robin was going to show up.”

  “It’s more than that, Corrie. Don’t you see? As the oldest among us, not just between you and me but all six of us, the moment I sensed something amiss in the situation, I should have taken us right out of there. It wasn’t the kind of place we should have been. It felt more like a tavern than a restaurant. Surely you felt it?”

  “Of course,” I nodded. “But it was awkward, being there with Mr. Kemble, and with him so excited about having gotten us an invitation. I don’t know what else we could have done, Christopher.”

  “That’s hardly a reason not to do the right thing.”

  Again he sighed. I could tell he was taking it very seriously and very personally.

  “What would Jesus think,” he went on after a minute, “if he had walked in, and there we all were, six of his people? Corrie, don’t you understand? I had the distinct feeling that the atmosphere of the place was more that of a bordello than a restaurant.”

  “I know,” I said, now sighing myself.

  “I have no wish to pass judgment on Mammy Pleasant, or anyone else, for that matter. I just didn’t feel comfortable there. I sensed a wrong spirit, and it was all the worse knowing the rest of you were there as well.”

  “I don’t see what else we could have done, Christopher,” I repeated.

  This time he was quiet a long time. He had his hands clasped by the fingers behind the back of his head, and he was staring up toward the sky as we walked along.

  “If we had been alone,” Christopher said finally, now dropping his hands and gesturing with them as he spoke, “the moment we walked in I would have turned right around and left and taken us someplace else. But with your editor there, having arranged it all and clearly enthusiastic about the whole affair, I thought perhaps it would turn out all right. As we ate our dinner, however, I felt more and more that I’d done the wrong thing, that I had compromised what I’d known to be right because I was too embarrassed to make a scene.”

  “I knew you were uncomfortable,” I said.

  “I didn’t want to hurt your editor’s feelings or make it difficult for you later on. How can a man like that, without spiritual convictions so far as I know—do you know if he’s a Christian?”

  I shook my head. “I’ve never spoken with him about the Lord,” I said.

  “So how could a man like that understand if we had gotten up and left halfway through dinner, and then if I had later tried to explain that I felt God’s Spirit telling me there was an atmosphere of darkness about the place and that I needed to get my wife and her family out o
f there? He would think I was insane! There’s nothing people hate more than a religious fanatic. I don’t know, Corrie—how do you take a stand for what you believe when people are bound to misunderstand and misreact? What kind of a witness is that for the Lord?”

  “Is that why you finally left?” I asked.

  “I had to find someplace alone to talk to the Lord about it. I was becoming more and more convicted as the evening went along that we shouldn’t be there, and yet I didn’t have the backbone to do anything about it for fear of Mr. Kemble’s reaction.”

  Christopher’s voice sounded almost despairing. I’d never seen him like this.

  “Over and over the verse kept going through my head—Whoever causes one of these little ones of mine to stumble, it would be better for him that a giant millstone were hung about his neck. And there were Tad and Becky sitting there, and Laughing Waters especially—don’t you see, Corrie? I was the one responsible!”

  “Aren’t you taking it perhaps too seriously?” I suggested.

  “That is precisely the reason there is so much unbelief in the world today,” Christopher said with anger starting to sound in his voice, “because God’s people don’t take their faith seriously enough in the small, everyday things. They compromise in the little things, settling in to the flow and pattern of the rest of the world, until there’s not much left to distinguish the people of God from the people who don’t know him. How are people going to know the gospel is true if God’s people don’t take it seriously enough to do it, to stand up and be counted.”

  I nodded. How could I expect Christopher not to take it so seriously? It was just this passion about his beliefs that made me love him and think so highly of him.

  “Please, don’t think I’m upset with you or the others. I don’t mean to point the finger at anyone else for not taking faith seriously,” he continued, “for I am as guilty as anyone. But I want our lives to count for something, Corrie—I want them to count for the spreading of the Gospel. And how else can that happen unless we walk differently . . . visibly distinct from the world? Who in that place tonight will have seen the Lord Jesus more clearly as he truly is because we were there?”