“I have felt much confusion and little joy,” Jessamine admitted. “And now I fear this letter will confuse me even more.”
“Read it, my sister.” Sister Sophrena reached over and touched her arm softly. “You are not the bewildered child you were when you came among us. You will be able to determine the truth or untruth of the words in the letter. I will pray it so while you read and I will also pray your current confusion clears like the sky after a storm.”
A storm. That was what Jessamine felt like she was in. A storm of contradictory feelings. She loved her sisters, but she wanted to know a different love. She perhaps held in her hand the answers to questions that had long bedeviled her, yet she hesitated to read those answers. Why had she suddenly latched onto a spirit of fear? She had always before run after answers. She wanted to find out about each new thing she stumbled over. But those had been simple things. Like parasols. Or bullfrogs. Nothing to do with forbidden love or words that might turn the prince who loved her mother into a man like any other.
Sister Sophrena turned away from her and knelt by the chair behind the small writing desk. Jessamine stared at the letter as beads of sweat rolled down her side beneath the loose folds of her dress. The small room felt too warm even though the window behind Sister Sophrena had been lifted to allow the air to circulate. Jessamine drew in a deep breath. It was time to take courage in hand and pull free the letter. Already she had delayed too long. Sister Edna and the garden seeds awaited.
She unfolded the yellowed paper carefully. The page was filled with the same elegant script as her name on the outside of the inner envelope.
My dearest Jessamine, my beautiful baby girl, I love you. I do so desire those words to be the first that you ever read written by my hand. I do love you more than you can possibly imagine. More than even I could imagine before I held you in my arms. As much as your dear mother loved you from the first moment she knew you were growing inside her. She would have died for you at that moment without a single glance back. She did die for you, a complication of birthing you, but there were regretful glances back, for she mourned the years she would not be able to hold you and love you here on earth. I have not the slightest doubt she looks down on you with much love from her angelic perch in heaven, but she wished more time here with you. As did I. More time for her and more time for me.
You may not be able to understand why I could not give you that time. Time that by rights and nature should be yours. I look into your sweet, innocent face and wonder the same. Yet, I know I have no way to care for a tiny infant. I must follow my muse and write my stories. They torment my soul and demand my mind. So I have given you to your granny. She is also my granny, but my time with her when I was a child was very short. My father did not like the wilderness and saw no need in us finding our way back to the wild place where Granny has ever lived. While I did have my mother long enough to enduringly store her kind face and voice in my memory, she, like your own, died and left me to the harshness of the world much too soon. I want to spare that for you. You will have nothing but love from Granny and freedom for your imagination to take wing. She knows stories and if you turn out to follow our footsteps into a world of story making, then these early years with her will be a gift beyond price.
But today you are twelve and today Granny will tell you about me and give you this letter. Then if you so desire or perhaps I should say when you might so desire, I will return and you can come with me as I travel my writing path. By then, I can only hope my stories will be well received and there will be sufficient funds to supply your needs and that of our granny too if she decides to come with us. That I cannot imagine happening, for she loves her solitude there in her trees. But it could be she will love you more. And me. Enough to agree to journey with us at least for a little while.
Happy birthday, my beautiful Jessamine. I can hardly imagine you as a young girl with long legs and freckles across your baby nose. I can already see that you will have your mother’s amazingly blue eyes, but your hair is yet a mystery. Perhaps it will grow in dark and wavy like mine or light as the sunlight like your mother’s. She was the most beautiful woman I ever saw or ever hope to see. But you, my sweet little girl child, are every bit as beautiful in your baby way.
You are lying on a blanket here on the bed beside me while I pen these words. You have discovered your hands and look at them with great wonder. So many discoveries are ahead of you. So many wonders. My heart, already full of sadness at the loss of your mother, grows even heavier at the thought of leaving you behind. But what must be done must be done. I will finish these words and fold this page and put it inside the envelope for your eyes in twelve years. Then I will pick you up and hold you close to my heart and breathe in your precious baby scent to carry away with me. Tears will trace paths down my cheeks as I ride away. Our granny will pray for me and for you. And someday I will return.
Your loving and devoted father,
Sheldon Brady
Jessamine read the letter all the way through without stopping, her eyes gobbling up the words as if they were candied plums. Then hardly aware of Sister Sophrena still on her knees praying beside the writing desk, she started at the beginning again. But this time she lingered over some of the words. The words of love that were like fresh-drawn water from the well to a parched throat.
The prince who loved her mother also loved her. She had not realized how much she needed those words until they were settling in her mind. Her father of the world had not deserted her completely. He had planned to return for her. Perhaps he had returned for her, but found the cabin deserted and the old preacher dead and no one to ask what became of his baby girl. What became of her.
She stared at the words on the page until the ink ran together in a dark blur. She didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. To shout or fall on her knees in silent prayer. She considered raising her hands and singing a praise song. Something joyful. Something that might make her feet spin. But Sister Sophrena was praying. It didn’t seem right to spin while she was kneeling so solemnly. So instead Jessamine read through the words again. Her father of the world thought their imagination a gift, a blessing. Her father of the world had planned to show Jessamine that world. His world.
Sister Sophrena looked up at Jessamine then and slowly rose to her feet. “The words of the letter have put joy on your face, Sister Jessamine.”
“Yea. They were written by my natural father while I was yet a baby. Before he left me with Granny. He loved me.”
“Yet he did leave you and not return.”
The sister’s words wormed into Jessamine’s joy, spoiling its completeness. “He planned to come back for me. When I was twelve.”
“Yea,” Sister Sophrena said thoughtfully. “I suppose the reason for the age requirement written by the preacher who brought you to us.”
“My granny promised to answer all my questions when I was twelve,” Jessamine said.
“All your questions?” Sister Sophrena’s voice sounded stiff, as if displeased with Jessamine. “Only the Eternal Father can answer all questions.”
“Yea, Sister Sophrena, I spoke without proper thought as I often do.” Jessamine lowered her eyes from Sister Sophrena’s face. She did not want to disappoint her sister, but at the same time surely there could be truth between them. “I meant questions about my parents of the world. Do you not think it natural for a child to wonder about her beginnings?”
An uneasy silence fell over the small room as Jessamine stared at the floor and waited for Sister Sophrena to answer. Seconds, then minutes dragged by. The hallway outside the room was silent. All the other sisters and brethren had left for their duties. From deep within the house, the clatter of pans rose to her ears as those on duty in the kitchen prepared the midday meal. Jessamine wondered if she would still be standing in the small room awaiting Sister Sophrena’s answer when the bell sounded to signal the time of eating. It had not seemed such a difficult question.
At last Sister Sophrena spoke. “L
ook at me, Sister Jessamine. Reveal your eyes and hide not your spirit. You know the eyes are windows into our souls.”
“Yea.” Jessamine raised her head with some trepidation, for although she heard no anger in Sister Sophrena’s voice, it was not natural for her to stay silent for so long. Her question must have in some ways angered her sister. But Sister Sophrena did not look angry, only weary as though she were having to labor to come up with a proper answer.
Sister Sophrena settled her eyes on Jessamine’s face. Jessamine saw no condemnation in her eyes, only concern. A sad smile settled on her lips as she said, “Your spirit has been pummeled with temptations in these last days, my sister. Perhaps the spirits are testing you to see your strength, to harden your convictions so that you will know what you believe. Satan may have his hand in this, for it pleases Old Scratch greatly to lead our young people away from us toward the temptations of the world.”
“I will war against such evil thinking.” Jessamine said the expected words.
Again Sister Sophrena was silent for a long moment, but Jessamine kept her eyes up. She didn’t want her beloved sister to think she was hiding anything from her. Sister Sophrena’s face grew even sadder and she shut her eyes for a long moment as though it was necessary to contain her emotions. When at last she opened her eyes again, she said, “Yea, it is good to war against those things that you realize are evil. The recognition of such is what one must learn.”
Jessamine started to say something, but Sister Sophrena waved away her words. “The question you ask, the one about whether your curiosity about your beginnings is a natural one, that question is a worldly question. One that should not trouble a Believer. Your worldly mother and father should not matter so much to you. It is your spiritual father and mother you need let your mind dwell upon.”
“But . . .”
Sister Sophrena held her palm out toward Jessamine and did not let her speak. Every line of her face drooped with sadness. “I have ever known your curiosity for the world, but until the last week, I thought it only a passing fancy of youth. Now I worry that I am wrong. I worry that the draw of the world is pulling you away from us.”
“Nay,” Jessamine said quickly. “Nay, Sister Sophrena. You are my family.”
“But your mind reaches toward the world. You imagine the pleasures thereof and think not of the dangers for one such as yourself.”
Jessamine’s face bloomed red, but she could not deny the words.
Sister Sophrena went on gently. “You have ever been tempted by your imagination.”
“But is it not good to have an imagination to wonder about things? To come up with new and better ways? To welcome the spirits in meeting? Is not such a gift as good and true as the gift of song or industrious fingers?”
“Properly constrained, such ability to imagine can be a gift, but I fear you have no desire for such constraints. You want no rules over what is proper to imagine. And now you are imagining much about the world outside our borders.”
“Yea, you speak truth. I like to imagine freely as though I am clinging to the tail feathers of a giant bird and flying through wondrous worlds. I want to see everything, to know how things came to be, to understand about the love my granny told me my father had for my mother.” Jessamine held up the letter. “The love that is in this letter. Did you know such love before you became a Believer?”
“The love of the world betrayed me, left me broken. The love here among the Believers, that love is the pure love. The love that will never destroy your spirit or cause you sorrow.”
“But I feel sorrow now,” Jessamine said softly.
Sister Sophrena let out a weary sigh. “Yea, I know it is so, my sister. Some quandaries cannot be easily solved. You must make your own choices. It is not one I can make for you, but if you can bear the constant supervision yet a little longer, I feel confident your peace will return and you will once more see your path clearly here in our village.”
“I am praying that it will be so, Sister,” Jessamine said with meekness. “I will try to stoically bear my punishment for my wayward thinking.”
“And what of the letter?” Sister Sophrena said.
Jessamine looked down at the page full of words in her hand. “I am treasuring these words in my heart. It is good to know my father and mother of the world loved me so completely and that they considered me a gift.” She paused and felt a moment of sadness. “But the letter is almost twenty years old. There is no hint of where my father might be now or even if he still lives. It changes nothing about my home being here at Harmony Hill.”
Sister Sophrena smiled and touched Jessamine’s cheek. “That is good to hear, my sister. I will pray for your continued strength as you attempt to pick up your cross and carry it among us. Now the sun is rising high in the sky. It is time we both went out to our duties.”
Jessamine thought to slip the letter under her apron in hopes Sister Sophrena would forget she held it, but she did not. She could not. She had to abide by the rules. “Should I carry the letter in the pocket of my apron?” she asked while a prayer flew up inside her that this would be allowed.
A prayer that was not answered. “Nay, my sister.” Sister Sophrena held out her hand for the letter. “I think it better if you allow me to hold it for you. At least while you are struggling with worldly thoughts and working to get back into proper harmony with your fellow believers.”
Jessamine did her best to hide her reluctance as she surrendered the letter to Sister Sophrena. She told herself it didn’t matter. The words were engraved on her heart and she would be able to bring them up into her mind whenever she wanted while she worked beside Sister Edna through the day. But her eyes longed to trace the lines of the letters her father had formed with his own hand. She wanted to imagine his hand writing the words and then stroking her baby cheek.
She pulled up the image as she went out of the Gathering Family House to the garden plot where Sister Edna awaited with much frowning and many questions. What was the letter? Who had written her? Had she no awareness of worldly sin? Did she need to confess wrong thinking? Why was she so quiet?
Jessamine answered each question with as few words as possible while she let the words of her father’s letter run through her mind like the repeating choruses of a Shaker song. Over and over. The prince who loved her mother also loved her, and while she did not have his dark wavy hair, she had been gifted with imagination to match his. An imagination that for him led to stories he wrote down just as he had written the letter. Oh, how she hungered to see one of those books with his name on the front. Written by Sheldon Brady. Could there be a more wonderful gift than the ability to take pen to paper?
So she planted the beans and she dreamed. She answered Sister Edna’s demands and she dreamed. She ate her evening meal in silence and kept dreaming. They went up into the upper room and practiced laboring the dances. She counted her steps and dreamed of what might have been if her granny had not died.
She stretched out on her narrow Shaker bed and shut her eyes to sleep and wished the dreams to follow her into the night. At first, she was not sure she wasn’t still dreaming when she heard her name whispered in her ear.
“Jessamine. Sister Jessamine, wake up.”
The whispered voice was insistent and finally pulled Jessamine away from her dreams. She opened her eyes, expecting to see the morning dawning, but the night was still heavy on them. She started to speak an answer, but a hand clamped over her mouth.
“Shh! You’ll wake the sister witch.”
Jessamine came awake then and knew it was Sister Abigail stooped beside her bed, whispering into her ear. She nodded a little and Sister Abigail removed her hand. It wasn’t the first time Sister Abigail had whispered her awake in the deep of the night. Those other times, before Jessamine was being watched, they had sneaked out on the front steps in the moonlight to talk of forbidden things of the world.
Jessamine rose up a little off her pillow to peer over toward Sister Edna. She was a
sound sleeper and even now she was snoring as she enjoyed the deserved rest of the faithful Shaker. Jessamine’s eyes began adjusting to the night and she could see Sister Abigail was not wearing a night shift but instead her Shaker dress without the white collar or apron.
“What are you doing, Sister Abigail?” Jessamine whispered.
“Leaving.” Determination was plain in Sister Abigail’s softly whispered word. “I had my hand on the door when I felt compelled to come back to your bed. You should come with me. The world calls to you.”
“Nay, I cannot leave my family.” Jessamine whispered the words quickly, even as a finger of temptation poked her. She could leave. She could go in search of her father. Her path might cross that of the man from the world again. She might find Tristan Cooper.
“This family has no love for you. Not the way they’ve tied you to evil Edna. They merely want to make us into slaves to do their bidding.”
“Beloved sisters, not slaves,” Jessamine insisted.
“You are fooling yourself, Jessamine. We are no more than hands and feet and broad backs to do their labor. Come away with me and experience the freedom of the world.”
“Nay, I cannot.”
Sister Edna’s snore cut off as she shifted in her bed. Jessamine held her breath as Abigail sank down lower beside the bed. But the woman did not awaken as she began to snore evenly once more.
“I must go.” Abigail silently stood. Then she leaned back down toward Jessamine. “You will regret not coming with me, but I will pray for your escape.”
She slipped like a shadow away from Jessamine toward the door. She looked back once before she silently pulled the door shut behind her.
“And I will pray for you.” Jessamine mouthed the words without making a whisper of noise. Then she stared into the dark of the night and tried to keep her feet still. They itched with the desire to follow Abigail out the door. The regret the young sister had promised began rising dark within Jessamine.
The Gifted Page 22
