by Janet Dean
Well, she wasn’t alone in that. What did she want? How would a ladies’ club give it to her? Where would her quest for freedom take her? His heart sank. No doubt farther away from him. Ted picked up his cup. “So what’s your plan for this ladies’ club?”
“Women need a tranquil place to enjoy one another’s company and exchange ideas, find ways to improve their minds, the town.”
“There’s quilting bees and church functions—”
“No, not merely what they can do but to explore who they are.” She laid a hand on his arm. “This isn’t about other women. Not really. I’m doing this for me.” She folded and refolded her napkin. “And for Robby.”
“How will a ladies’ club help Robby?”
“I have to figure out why Robby can’t adjust and how to help him. Anna has accepted him. Tippy follows him around. You’re good to him. Yet my brother’s miserable. Maybe he needs time with me. Like me, time to find his way.”
“I’ve tried everything I can think of—”
“I’m not blaming you. I’m not blaming anyone.” Her mouth tightened. “Except maybe my father for forcing us into a new life.”
Ted cringed. Elizabeth had been forced to marry him.
“Robby misses Papa and Martha, but he can’t go back to Chicago.” She sighed. “Maybe alone with me, Robby will speak freely. So…we’re moving out.”
A lump lodged in his throat. He set down his cup with a clink. “The children need you. I forbid it.”
Her chin jutted, her eyes narrowed, her mouth thinned.
He might as well have waved a red flag in front of a bull but he couldn’t stop himself. He didn’t want her to leave. And it wasn’t only the children who needed her. She’d brought life into the house. Into him. He cared about her. Yes, at times she rubbed him the wrong way, like rough sandpaper against his skin. But she also captivated him.
She rose. “You can’t stop me.”
He gave an imitation of a laugh, a scratchy sound. “Guess your escape from Chicago proves that.” He stood and stepped toward her. “Have you forgotten we’re married?”
“You’re the one who called our marriage a business deal.”
His fingers curved around her cheeks. “It’s no longer a business arrangement to me.” If he told her how much he’d grown to care for her, she’d get that haunted look in her eyes. Like a trapped animal facing execution. Why didn’t she know he’d never hurt her? “But if it were, by leaving, you’re breaking the contract.”
“Robby and I need this. I won’t give it up.” She pushed his hands away. “I’m sorry.”
“Have you prayed about this?”
She gave a gentle smile. “I have. I know it’s not what you want, but in my heart, I believe I’m doing the right thing.”
A part of him wanted to beg her to stay, but the other part understood the need to examine whether the path you’d chosen was the right one. Or if you had what it took to change course.
But why did he keep feeling God’s Call to ministry when a pastor’s wife didn’t solve problems by leaving her family? He’d have to trust Elizabeth enough to let go, to let her find her way and help her brother find his. “I don’t like it but I’m trying to understand.”
She walked past him. “Tomorrow morning Rebecca will drop me off at the shop after she takes the children to school.”
“Sounds like you’ve got it all worked out.”
He heard the bitterness in his tone. Well, why not? Hadn’t she wormed her way into all their hearts and now would be leaving a hole as big as Gibraltar? He slowed his breathing. Tried to get a handle on his resentment. Keep that even keel he prided himself on.
Numbers 35:6 popped into his mind. “This ladies’club may be your city of refuge. For a time.”
She gave him a beautiful, happy smile. “Thank you, Ted, for understanding how I feel.”
Lord, how can I show her I care?
“Elizabeth?” She raised her gaze to his. “I’ll ask Hubert to open an account for you and credit it with the egg money. For food or whatever you need. I wish I had more.”
“You’d do that for me?” she said softly. “Help me when I’m leaving?”
I’d do a lot more if you’d let me. Instead he said, “I’m sorry for trying to make you stay. I was wrong.” He took her hand. “You need to do this.”
He understood how tired she must be of feeling forced into things. Of not getting to choose what she wanted. Not her path, not her husband. The only way she’d know if she’d made the right choice was to leave.
Tears flowed down her cheeks. “No one has willingly let me decide anything. Ever. Thank you.” She rose on her toes and kissed his cheek.
Though Elizabeth pointed to Robby, he suspected the main reason for her departure came down to their marriage of convenience. He should’ve seen this coming. She’d married him to give her brother security, a happy home. That plan had failed.
Would their marriage also fail? Divorce wasn’t the only way for a marriage to die.
Ted’s pulse kicked up a notch. By giving her money, he’d made her flight easier. She might not miss him, but he counted on her missing his children. So much she’d come back. Soon.
Watching his wife retreat into the bedroom, he hoped their marriage would survive this test.
In his entire life, he’d never taken a bigger gamble.
Elizabeth slipped her and Robby’s clothes and toiletries into the satchel while Robby slept curled up in the bed, unaware that tomorrow they’d move to town.
By leaving, she was adding to Ted’s troubles. But she had to go. Or one morning she feared she’d wake up hating him.
He’d said she had a glow about her. The exact words Rebecca had said earlier when Elizabeth had dropped off Jason from school.
Only, Rebecca had asked if she was pregnant—the biggest irony of all. She and Ted had no real marriage. Her leaving was merely an inconvenience for Ted, maybe an embarrassment. But with Lily and Richard still in town, he’d find a way to keep his life on that even keel he prized.
Elizabeth slipped out of her clothes and into her nightgown, and then crawled into the double bed beside her brother. Bunching up her pillow, she buried her face in it, her thoughts on Ted. She’d miss him. If only he’d court her, make her feel that he hadn’t bought her with the price of a train ticket. She was so confused. If only—
No, what mattered was Robby’s happiness. With God’s help, she’d teach him to trust God, to build a foundation that would help him cope. Yet at the back of her mind a niggling suspicion plagued her. Her motives for leaving might not be as selfless as she pretended.
She and Ted were getting close.
A ragged breath heaved out of her. She had to leave before she got even more entangled with this man and his children.
Heaving a sigh of relief that Lydia hadn’t questioned him about Elizabeth’s whereabouts, Ted thanked Jacob’s wife. Though he suspected that she and half the town probably already knew his wife slept at the ladies’ club. What kind of a picture did that paint of their marriage?
At the open study door, Jacob looked up, a broad smile on his face. “Just the man I want to see.”
“Guess that means you’ve heard my wife and her brother moved to the ladies’ club.”
“I heard, but I don’t think things are as dire as you look.” He grinned, motioning to the chair across from his desk.
Ted took the seat, trying to gather his thoughts to explain, not that he understood his wife. “I’m trying to give her time.…”
“Have you told her about your past?”
“No.”
“You know you have to.”
Ted studied his hands. “If I do, she’s gone for good.”
“You’re underestimating Elizabeth.”
“I don’t know why, but she hates gambling. I suspect gambling is behind the reason she married me.”
“Ted, I don’t believe in coincidence in the lives of believers. You prayed for a wife and God brought yo
u two together. You are a perfect complement for each other.”
He chuffed. “How do you figure that?”
“If she was hurt in some way by gambling, you’ve both taken action to start a new life. But, Ted, you’ve got to be honest with her.” He rose and put a hand on Ted’s shoulder. “I watch Elizabeth while I preach. She’s softening to the Lord. I can see it.”
“She’s grown in her understanding of God, of His love, but something’s holding her back. If I knew what to do—”
“Change yourself before you try to change Elizabeth.”
Ted wobbled back in the chair. Jacob’s words packed quite a wallop.
“She’s got to sense you’re hiding something. It’s time to live what you believe. Trust God. He demands obedience. If you obey, He’ll walk you through the consequences.”
Ted met his pastor’s gaze. “Now’s not the time. Elizabeth has enough to handle.”
“Don’t wait too long,” Jacob said, his words a warning.
Elizabeth opened the door of Agnes’s Café, then hustled Robby outside. Their meal had been interrupted several times by friends coming over to say hello. Ducking his head, Robby appeared shy, uncertain, but his sweet smile won everyone’s heart. Elizabeth hid her insecurity under flippant words and a spirited demeanor—far more like Anna than her brother.
Taking his hand, they walked to the nearby park not far from town, something they’d done every evening after dinner since they’d arrived four days ago. They sat on the swings and pumped toward the heavens, laughing as they sailed through the air.
Here Robby came alive, behaved like the boy she knew in Chicago, not the hesitant, downcast child he’d become at the farm. Why hadn’t he adjusted when he’d practically begged her to live on a farm? Why hadn’t the life met his expectations?
Later, sitting on a bench, the two of them leaned against the back. The sun, a bright orange ball, lowered in the sky. If she’d been on the farm, Elizabeth would’ve spent part of the day working under that glare. Hanging laundry. Picking lettuce or weeding the garden.
Ted, undoubtedly, tended the fields, the animals, all of them needing constant care, a wheel he could never stop turning.
She should be there.
Guilt panged in her chest. An impossible choice—her brother or her duties as Ted’s wife. But to see Robby now, smiling, laughing, she’d made the right one.
“I like this park.”
“Me, too.” She sighed. They couldn’t stay in New Harmony forever. She’d made a promise to Ted, to his children, to God, and she had to honor that promise. “Robby, we need to go back to the farm.”
“I like it here.” His face wrinkled up. “I don’t want…Why can’t we just stay here, Lizzie? Just you and me?”
“Ted needs me. I’m married to him, Robby. We’re a family.”
“I want our family to be just us.” He swung his legs, scuffing the grass beneath the bench.
“You have Anna, and Henry will be fun to play with when he’s older. And Ted will teach you lots, if you’ll let him.”
“Anna doesn’t like it.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Her eyes are sad when Ted’s nice to me.”
“Well, Anna’s been through a hard time. Losing her mother hurts. You and I know how much. She doesn’t like to share her father and her brother. But she’ll get over it. And if you give the farm a chance, it will—”
“No. I want to stay here.”
Elizabeth pivoted toward him. “Why? You’ve always loved being outdoors. The farm’s a perfect place for a boy like you.”
He bit his lip and shook his head. Mute.
“Tell me. What’s bothering you?”
Robby said nothing. Elizabeth waited, sensing he needed time. Space. He kept scuffing lines in the grass, watching the blades flatten beneath his shoes. “What if…what if Ted loses all the money and the farm’s all gone?”
In that instant, Elizabeth realized why Robby had refused to connect with Ted, Anna or Henry. Why he hadn’t fallen in love with the land, the livestock, the dog. He’d learned in his short life how quickly those things could disappear. In the flick of a card, the flip of a coin.
“Oh, Robby.” Elizabeth drew her brother near, until she could smell the soft-scented soap blended with the little-boy scent on his skin. “That won’t happen. Ted isn’t that kind of man. Everything will be there. Tomorrow and the next day, and the day after that.”
He lifted his face to hers, tears filling his blue eyes. “Even…even the dog?”
She smiled, and her vision blurred. “Yes, even Tippy.”
He burrowed closer to her, and she could almost feel the weight lifting off his shoulders. “Lizzie?”
“What?”
“Can we go home?” When he turned his face to hers again, the setting sun kissed his cheeks. “I wanna see the chickens go to sleep.”
Elizabeth nodded for a moment, her heart too full to speak. “Tomorrow, Robby, after the first meeting of the ladies’ club. We’ll go home tomorrow.”
Chapter Eighteen
Ted had given Elizabeth five days to come to her senses, but she and Robby hadn’t returned. He’d handled his household himself. To ask his in-laws’ help would expose his wife’s defection and give Lily another excuse to harp about raising his children, as if he couldn’t handle the job.
He dropped Anna and Henry at Rebecca’s on his way in to town, hoping she’d give them a decent meal while he dealt with his wife. Elizabeth shouldn’t play socialite while he worked himself into an early grave. And, while she was at it, make him the laughingstock of the whole town.
His children had capsized his even-keel boat. Henry tested his patience. Anna opposed his authority. Only by the power of prayer had he met the challenge. Each day left him exhausted. His respect for mothers multiplied. Especially for Elizabeth, who’d managed his children and his household without the benefit of experience or the connection of blood.
When she’d married him, she’d taken on a momentous task. And now she’d run away, leaving him to handle it alone.
He’d planted the rest of the garden—taking on her chores as if he didn’t have enough to do—and attended to his children, feeding them…something. Each day things had gotten worse around the house, more disorderly and chaotic.
Now standing outside the parsonage waiting for Jacob to join him, hands hung limp at his sides, he faced the truth.
He missed Elizabeth the way Adam must’ve missed his rib. Something essential had been ripped from him, draining him of vitality. Every word out of his mouth took supreme effort. If he’d thought he had trouble sleeping with Elizabeth at home, he’d found it impossible now that she’d gone. His decision to act, to enlist Jacob’s help, wasn’t just about his children.
Jacob opened the door, plopped his hat on his head and strolled toward him, his gaze somber. “Not sure Elizabeth is going to appreciate my interference.”
“Probably not, but I’m hoping your presence will carry some weight.”
“Have you forgotten she insisted I add try to the obey vow?”
“Hardly.” He sighed. “I must’ve misunderstood God’s call. How can I pastor a church when I can’t handle my wife?”
Jacob laid a hand on Ted’s back. “All in God’s timing.”
“I hope God’s timing includes my wife’s return. Today.”
Jacob chuckled. “You and Elizabeth are an exact match for the other.”
“Match? Maybe as in struck and in flames. A man can get burned.”
“I suspect this situation with Elizabeth is providing something you need to learn before you lead a congregation.”
“Well, her absence is teaching me plenty.” He stopped in his tracks. “You won’t believe this. The gossip must’ve reached Agnes. She drove to the farm yesterday, bringing my favorite cherry pie and offering her condolences on my broken marriage.”
Ted would’ve liked to refuse the pie but it meant something edible for supper. Besides,
he couldn’t blame this disaster with his wife on Agnes.
Jacob shook his head. “Shame on Agnes for trying to tempt a man when he’s down.”
“Worse, Henry toddles around the house, looking for Elizabeth, calling ‘Mama.’ Anna cries at the slightest provocation. Even Rose’s hanky no longer consoles her.”
Well, he wouldn’t let his children continue to suffer. He strode down the street, itching to settle things with his wife.
“Don’t look so grim, Ted. You’re attracting attention.”
Sure enough, a flock of neighbors were converging on them. Why hadn’t Ted remembered today was Saturday and the streets would be crowded? He lengthened his strides, eating up the ground on Main Street, trying to outrun them.
“If you expect me to help get your wife back home,” Jacob said, panting, “you’ll have to slow down.”
“Sorry.” Ted shortened his steps, moaning when the others caught up faster than a pack of starving wolves.
Jim Johnson skipped backward in front of them. “Where you going in such a hurry, Preacher? Did Mrs. Mitchell pass?”
“No.”
“Where, then?” Jim persisted.
Jacob shot Ted a look of apology. “We’re on our way to the ladies’ club to try to convince Ted’s wife to come home.”
Ted gaped at Jacob. When a man shared a confidence, shouldn’t he expect his pastor to keep it private? But no, Jacob had blabbed Ted’s personal life to this mob. Not that any of these men had overlooked the fact his wife would rather sleep on a cot in one tiny room than stay home where she belonged.
Orville Radcliff whooped. “Yes sir. The mare leaped the fence and moved on to greener pasture.”
Will Wyatt guffawed, clutching at his belly. “Can’t handle your woman, Ted, without bringing in the clergy?”
“Appears she’s got a new man in her life.”
Ted stopped in the middle of the street. He and Elizabeth might have their problems but she’d never get involved with another man. He shot a glare at Orville.
Jim scratched his head. “Who’d that be, Orville?”
