by Dean Hughes
Liz loved that about Will. The man could be impatient with his brothers, but when he knew that people were in need, he was the first to give them what he owned, or to offer his time and muscle to do work that had to be done.
As it turned out, he actually did come in before her pupils left. He brought in an armload of firewood, set it down by the fireplace, and then laughed with the children. He even sat down and helped one of the boys read from his primer.
What she saw in Will, however, was that he had something on his mind. He seemed nervous, a little distracted. When the children were finally gone, he talked about the firewood supply and about the fence he needed to repair before winter, but his eyes seemed adrift, as though he couldn’t concentrate on what he was saying. Finally, he said, “Liz, while I was down at the store, I had a chance to talk to President Smith.”
“That’s wonderful, Will. How is he?”
“He’s fine, I think. We didn’t talk much about that. He wanted to know how we were doing. I told him you were recovering well, but you still had a long way to go. Would you say that’s true?”
“I suppose. But I feel quite well. Every new mother is tired, no doubt, and I only have one little one to look after.”
“But you’ve never had to work so hard. You’re just learning to do that. I think you need me here this winter, don’t you?”
Liz understood instantly. She had picked up a stick of firewood and had been ready to place it on the coals left in the fireplace. But now she stopped. “What does he want you do to, Will?”
“He said I could decide—according to how you’re feeling, and whether you need me.”
“What is it? A mission?” She felt as though the blood were flowing away from her head. She had known this would come, but she hadn’t expected it now. She wanted Will for herself for a few months.
“Yes. He thought I could go to the Southern states—and come back in time for spring planting. But I told him this was not the right time. You need me this year. I can go next winter.”
But Liz didn’t want to be the reason that Will turned down the Prophet. So many other women had unselfishly let their husbands go. She thought of Wilford Woodruff, who had left for such a long time when his family had hardly been established in Nauvoo. “Will, you cannot tell him no,” she said. “We’ve been blessed, and now it’s time for us to make a sacrifice.”
“It’s up to me to look out for you, Liz. I told your father I would make certain you had a good life.”
“I don’t want to hear about that again. I’ll be fine. You said yourself, we have enough food and the house is tight and warm. You have no idea what to do with yourself all winter. Now you have your answer. And it’s only a few months. How could a mission be easier?”
“But you’ll be alone all winter with the baby and—”
“And with my pupils. I’ll have plenty to keep me busy.” But the truth was setting in now. Will would be gone all those dark months, and she would be here in the woods, waking up every morning without him. She would have to feed the animals, milk the cow, and haul wood—and all the while take care of little Jacob. It was overwhelming to think about, but she wasn’t going to let Will know that. She fought her tears away and added some sticks to the fire.
“Liz, I can’t do this. I just can’t leave you here like this.”
“The sisters will look after me, Will. And some of the men will help me with the firewood and the animals. I’m sure they will.”
“I already told him, I don’t see how I can possibly go.”
“It’s not Joseph who called you, Will. It’s the Lord. How can we turn Him down? You know what He’s done for us. We both came close to death, getting here, and each of us begged the Lord for mercy. Now He’s given us a little test—hardly any sacrifice at all—and we simply cannot say no.”
• • •
Will had come to the same conclusion out in the yard while chopping the wood. But he had only admitted it to his heart and not yet to his mind. Still, he had known exactly what Liz would say. And he knew she was right.
So the following morning he walked off the bluffs and down to the brick store again. Joseph was sitting in the same spot. “Brother Joseph,” he said. “I’ve decided to accept your call.”
“I know,” Joseph said. He didn’t even turn around.
“I suppose you do. You’re a prophet.”
Joseph stood then, and he turned to look at Will. A broad smile had spread across his face. “I suppose I did have a vision,” he said. “In my mind I saw Sister Lewis, and I heard you trying to explain to her that she was too weak to let you go. That’s when I saw her toss you head over heels out the door. Am I right? Is that how it happened?”
“More or less,” Will said, and he laughed. “She told me we’ve been blessed and we can’t turn down the Lord when He finally asks something of us.”
“I try to be a fair man, Will. But when I asked you to go home and talk to your wife, I knew very well how this would turn out. I put you at a terrible disadvantage.”
“I guess I knew how it would turn out too.”
“When can you go?”
“Soon. Give me a day or two and then I’ll set out.”
“Thank you, Brother Will. The Lord knows your heart. You’ll be a fine missionary.”
Will wondered. Beneath all his concern about Liz was also fear for himself. He wasn’t at all sure that he would have the courage to approach people, to teach, to face the skepticism that he knew he would meet.
Chapter 8
Abby was still spending almost all her time at the hospital in Quincy. Little William was almost three weeks old now, and he didn’t seem in immediate danger, but he wasn’t improving, either. Dr. Hunt said that his heart was only about the size of a walnut, and the tiny left ventricle might have expanded a bit, but it was hard to say for sure. Each day when the nurses took William’s oxygen away and tested his blood saturation levels, there was no sign of improvement, so his heart wasn’t functioning well enough for him to thrive and begin to grow. Dr. Hunt never said it, but Abby and Jeff remembered what he had told them in the beginning: if his heart didn’t start to improve soon—after a couple of weeks or so—it probably never would, and he would not survive. Now it was well past two weeks.
Abby didn’t really need to be at the hospital all the time, but the worst thought of all for her was that her baby would die and she wouldn’t be with him. So she stayed all day, every day. She spent most of her time reading, but a kind of torpor had set in, her body exhausted and her mind almost numb. She told herself she needed to feel more connection to the Lord, more spirituality, needed her prayers to have more meaning, so she kept her scriptures close and read at least an hour in the Book of Mormon each day. Sometimes that helped, but as she reached the book of Alma, she didn’t like all the wars and the evil of the Gadianton robbers. She skipped over to 3 Nephi and read about Christ teaching the people, blessing the children. She followed that by reading the Gospel of Matthew in the New Testament. She loved to read of Christ’s tenderness with the people who came to Him—and the miracles He performed.
But the scriptures raised questions for her, too. She believed in all those miracles, but she would sit next to William and watch him, and he always seemed the same. She just wanted the Lord to touch him with His finger and make him well. How could she pray over and over, all day, and yet see no change? Still, she had stopped pressuring Jeff to step in and change things, and she was trying not to be critical of him, even in her own mind.
The fact was, she was tired of asking questions, tired of worrying, tired of waiting. Sometimes she read the magazines Kayla brought her, or she read bestsellers other friends had lent her. Now and then she even walked out to the waiting room and watched silly daytime television shows. It was a strange existence, all the days seeming long. Jeff would usually arrive late in the day, would always ask about cha
nges, and she would have to tell him that nothing had happened—again.
One morning, after a fitful night of sleep on the pull-out bed, she got up and looked at William, then asked a nurse how the night had gone. “Just the same,” the woman had said. “No change.”
She was a nice woman—all the nurses had been very kind to her—but she sounded unconcerned. “Shouldn’t there be a change by now?” Abby asked. “If he’s going to ... live, shouldn’t we start seeing better numbers on his oxygen tests?”
The nurse, a gray-skinned woman named Louise, was older than most of the nurses in the unit. Surely she had had a tedious night, but she answered laconically, “I don’t know, Abby. Ask the doc.”
Somehow the words were just too unfeeling for Abby. She wanted to shout at the woman to care. But she said nothing; she only walked away. She tried to read her scriptures but soon gave up. She sat and stared, and something within her said, “It’s over. I’ve sat here as long as I can stand it.” She got up, grabbed her coat, and walked down the hall, and then she walked out to Broadway Street in front of the building. She didn’t know where she was going, but she needed to move, to do something besides wait.
It was very cold outside, clouds scudding toward her, a storm building up. She headed west, walking fast, and soon put several blocks behind her. By then, she knew she wanted to hike all the way down to the Mississippi River where two big bridges linked Illinois to Missouri. She had been in the little park on the river between the bridges, seen the stone monument to the Mormons who had crossed the river into Quincy and then received help from the local people. She remembered what she had felt when she had stood in that spot, and she wanted those feelings back.
By the time she had descended the hill, crossed the railroad tracks, and made her way down to the river, she was warmed somewhat by the walk, but she felt the wind, even stronger, coming off the water. She thought of those early Saints fleeing from the “extermination order” in Missouri, making their way across the state in cold, wet conditions and then crossing the river any way they could. Emma Smith had crossed in February when the ice had still been solid, and she had walked with two children huddled next to her and two more in her arms. Jeff had told Abby about Emma sewing the manuscripts of Joseph’s translation of the Bible into her skirts.
What Abby also knew was that Joseph had been in the Liberty Jail at the time. Emma had surely prayed that he would be released, but it hadn’t happened, and she had trudged across the ice with her children, not knowing what would come of her prayers. She had simply done what she had to do.
There was a painting of all this. Abby had seen it in a book that Jeff had shown her. In the picture, Emma was about to step onto the riverbank, and according to the inscription on the monument, that would have been about where Abby was now standing. She tried to picture it: this woman of faith accepting her lot in life, continuing on for the sake of her children, not knowing whether she would ever see her husband again. Abby didn’t know whether she resented Emma for her tenacity or loved her. She had heard way too much about the noble pioneers being better than modern women. But what she was picturing in front of her, she realized, was what she had walked all the way down here to experience. She wanted to feel the cold, and think about the ice, and she wanted to feel, as she had the first time she had stood here, that a strong woman didn’t have to mope about and pity herself. She didn’t have to lie down and give up. She could accept the Lord’s will and move forward.
“Lord, I accept,” she said out loud. “Thy will be done.”
She thought she had said it in anger, but the words had turned into a whisper. She felt a change in her mind and emotions. She was the one who was clinging to William. Everyone else seemed to understand that sometimes babies died, and there was only so much that human beings could do about that. She had to face reality. More than anything, she didn’t want to watch the poor little thing lie there, hardly alive, while technology kept his heart beating. In any other era in history, he would have returned to his Father in Heaven by now. It was only the people of this age who had made up their minds to overrule nature’s decisions, and maybe even defy God’s will.
And then she told herself the truth: “I’m thinking of myself, not William.” How could she know what the Lord had in store for this little spirit? How could she presume to know better than God?
“If it’s the right thing, please take him,” she whispered out loud. “But please, do it soon.” She waited to see how that idea felt, and she knew she was all right with it. “I want to keep him, Father, but it’s not for me to decide. You love him too. Please do what’s best for him.”
She spun around quickly and turned her back to the wind. She felt relieved, but now the cold seemed to penetrate her more deeply than before. She walked all the way back to the hospital, striding even faster than she had on her way down. And she fully expected that when she returned, Louise would say to her, “I’m sorry. He’s gone.”
But it wasn’t so. The monitors were still reading out numbers, the IV still dripping, the feeding tube still in his mouth, and William was lying still, rarely moving. Nothing had changed.
• • •
Jeff had gone to work early that morning, so he managed to get away at three that afternoon. He stopped at home for only a few minutes and then continued on to Quincy.
There were times when he loved the Illinois countryside in winter. There was something dramatic in the bigness of the land, all the beige and gray in the lifeless stubble in the fields, and the black of the empty, gnarly tree limbs. The farmhouses stood amid those leafless trees as starkly as the landscape in the American Gothic painting. The fences and barns and oversized hay bales were the only intrusions in the seeming barrenness. All the green would return in the spring, he knew, but right now the land looked as stolid and resolute as the people he met at Duck’s Market in Nauvoo. It was like the beauty of the desert, in a way, but it also spoke of regeneration, as though the land had to breathe awhile before it could produce such vibrant life all over again. There was no sign of any of that rebirth today, however. The landscape felt austere. Bulging clouds had progressed across the sky all day, west to east, and now light snow was blowing about. He suspected that the storm would intensify before he headed back that night, but he had learned that big snowstorms were rare in this river valley. Rain could dump inches in minutes, but snow rarely piled up very deep.
Jeff had had a bad feeling all day. Abby had called him before noon and said that nothing had changed. But something had changed in her. He heard the quiet sadness of her voice. He had asked her about that, but she had only said she had something she wanted to talk to him about when he reached the hospital. She had been so hopeful at first, so full of faith, that she had carried him along, but lately she had been discouraged, and today she sounded as though she were giving up. Of course, Jeff knew why. Too much time had passed with no sign of improvement. He suspected that his son’s heart had come to earth just too deformed to keep his little body going.
When Jeff reached the hospital that afternoon, he washed up and entered the NICU that he knew so well. He found Abby sitting where she usually did, next to William. She was sitting straight, gazing toward him, but seemingly lost in thought.
Jeff knew better than to ask her whether anything had changed. “Are you okay?” he asked instead.
“Yeah. I am.”
He stood next to her and touched his hand to the back on her neck. She reached up and took hold of his hand. “Have you eaten anything?” he asked her.
“A little. I got a bag of potato chips out of a machine.”
“So what’s happened to the health-food queen? Fall off the wagon?”
“I guess so,” she said.
“Abby, let’s not ...” But he didn’t know what to say.
“Jeff, there’s something I’ve been thinking about today. We need to talk about it. Come with me.” She took his
hand and led him out to the waiting room. No one was in the room now, but they still went to a far corner, to one of the ugly orange couches.
Abby sat down and then pulled Jeff down next to her. She held his hand in both of hers. “I love you,” she said. “I’m sorry I’ve been so hard to live with.”
“You’ve been fine. This is stuff we never imagined ourselves going through.”
“I know. But it’s time to deal with it. You told me once that prayer is finding out the Lord’s will—not changing it. I think we have to accept whatever it is the Lord has in mind for William.”
“I know. But there’s no reason—yet—to assume the Lord is going to take him.”
She looked over at him. She didn’t seem frantic or discouraged; her eyes looked calm. “They said two weeks, Jeff. In two weeks they should know how he was going to do.”
“I think he said, ‘at least two weeks,’ or something like that. It wasn’t exactly two weeks.”
“Well, it’s almost three now.”
“I know.”
“When I ask Dr. Hunt, he starts into all his left-ventricle-and-aortic-arch talk, and when I finally try to pin him down, he comes up with his usual, ‘Let’s give it some more time.’”
Jeff nodded. Dr. Hunt had said something similar to him. “But what would it take for him to finally say, ‘This just isn’t working’?”
“I don’t know, Jeff. I asked him that, almost in those words, and he just hemmed and hawed and cleared his throat. I think he’s losing hope and doesn’t want to tell us.”
Jeff thought so too, but he knew he had to be careful. He had seen Abby pass through a lot of moods in the last few weeks. He didn’t know whether this calm acceptance was only a mask for her frailty. Maybe she was about to fall apart.
“I walked down to the river today,” Abby said.
“That’s a long walk.”
