The Spirit of Grace

by Terry Lynn Thomas

  I was a dilettante who sketched for the pure fun of it.

  I had just gotten situated on the top of my bed, with my sketch pad propped up on my knees, charcoal pencil in hand, when a flash of lightning tore through the sky, followed by a boom of thunder so violent that my bedroom windows shook.

  The sky opened up and the rain fell in a solid sheet of water. Outside my window, the black thunderclouds hung so low over the ocean, they seemed to touch the water. I tried the lamp by the side of my bed. Nothing. Not surprising, as the electricity often went out during bad weather. I lit the lone candle in the silver holder that sat next to my bed. With my sketch pad propped up on my knees, I got busy with the box of charcoals. Once the sooty black cylinder rested in my hand, everything fell by the wayside.

  ***

  I dozed. When I woke up, I discovered the sketch pad had fallen to the floor. The charcoal I had used for sketching had also rolled off my bed, leaving a trail of black behind it. The candle had died out long ago, its wick burnt away to nothing. I pushed myself up, rubbing the circulation back into my arm, which was numb from having slept on it. My stomach growled. It had been hours since I’d eaten. Outside my window, the rain had stopped, and the sun reflected off the puddles in the driveway like so many diamonds. I swung my feet to the floor, but when I saw my sketch pad lying open at my feet, I stopped short. Heart pounding, I bent over and picked it up, holding my breath as I laid it out on the bed before me. I had drawn a perfect portrait of Mrs. Kensington, my mysterious friend. My charcoal had captured her personality in the sketch, had committed the emotion, the look of pain and longing in her eyes to paper. It was the best sketch I had ever done and reflected a skill level that I would never possess. Worse than that, I had no recollection of sketching this woman.

  I tore the portrait out of the sketch pad, folded it in half, and placed it in the copy of my father’s book that lay on the table next to my bed. I tucked the book under my arm, thinking that I would toss the portrait in the first lit fireplace I came across, after which I would start my father’s book and read while I ate lunch. Downstairs, the house was quiet. My father hadn’t returned from his meeting and there was no sign of my stepmother or Anca. I made myself a sandwich, poured a glass of milk, and went into the library. The doors to my father’s office stood open. Zeke sat at his desk and, by the light of an oil lamp, he made notes in the leather calendar that lay open before him. He had a typewriter set up on the desk and, before too long, started typing away, pecking at the machine with his index fingers. I sat in front of the fire and ate, trying not to disturb Zeke while he worked, glad to have him near.

  I was about to carry my dirty dishes back in the kitchen when the phone rang, breaking the silence that had settled over the house. Zeke answered. He spoke in such a soft murmur it took me a minute to realize that he wasn’t speaking English. At first his voice sounded agitated. He said something, paused, and listened. When he next spoke, his voice was more subdued, but I could hear enough to recognize that he spoke in German with the fluency of a native. Without thinking, I stepped into the room, curious about what I heard, curious about Zeke.

  He sat on the corner of my father’s desk with his back to the door. He turned toward me, his eyes wide at the shock of seeing me there, of knowing that I overheard his conversation. He recovered his poise quickly, then said in English, “Thanks for calling. I’ll get back to you.” He then hung up the phone. “Well, hello.”

  I couldn’t speak. I stood there like a fool, clenching my book to my chest.

  “Sarah, I don’t know what you heard,” Zeke said. He stood up and came toward me. The look on my face must have deterred him, for he changed course, walked back to his desk, and perched on the corner of it. “I saw you in the hotel lobby today.” He smiled as he spoke. “Next time, at least come over and speak to me.”

  I attempted to back out of the room, as if I could turn back the clock and erase all that I just heard. Instead, I tripped on an ottoman that had been moved away from its usual spot against the wall. My father’s book, which I had clutched to my chest, went flying. When it hit the floor, the portrait I had drawn came loose. It floated down, coming to rest face-up at my feet.

  Zeke swooped down in one graceful movement and picked it up. “Did you draw this?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is amazing.” He studied the picture. “Who is she?”

  “Her name is Mrs. Kensington.”

  “How do you know her? Is she a friend?”

  “Not really. I met her at the--” I stopped myself before I told Zeke why I had been away and where I had been. “--at the place where I stayed while I was away.”

  He gave me back the picture. “You have real talent.” He picked up the car keys from the brass dish on my father’s desk, along with a pile of outgoing letters. “I need to take these to the post office.”

  After the front door closed, I remained standing in the doorway between my father’s office and the library. The room was cloaked in an unnatural hush, the only sound the tick-tock-tick-tock of the old grandfather clock.

  I walked over to my father’s desk and sat down in his chair. The top drawer wasn’t pushed in all the way. I pulled it out, reached into the back of the drawer, and took the brass key out of its hiding place. We referred to the big drawer on the left side of my father’s desk as the family vault. It contained our family financial information, check books, banking ledgers, birth certificates, passports, property deeds, and anything else of value.

  The smell of the musty documents assaulted my senses. I sneezed, but continued to pull the fusty papers out of the drawer. At the bottom, underneath the pile, lay a knife with a wooden handle painted in bright purple, red, orange, yellow, and green. The thin blade looked rapier sharp. I took it out of the drawer and laid it on the desk next to the pile of paperwork that I had pulled out. I rifled through the documents until I found the statements from my own account, which contained the inheritance from my mother. I had planned on going to college, perhaps becoming a teacher, but my mother’s sudden and traumatic death, and my reaction to it, put the kibosh on all my plans.

  I took the piles of papers out and laid them on the desk. Clipped together were a batch of bills, the bulk of them marked “Past Due.” I thumbed through the letters. Many were from the bank and had never been opened. A letter from New York Life caught my eye. I opened it and scanned it.

  My father had taken out life insurance on Grace, me, and Gran. He had also bought a policy on his own life, naming Gran, Grace, and me as the beneficiaries. I noticed that the policies had been purchased after my father’s marriage.

  The rain had started again and came down in a torrent. It beat upon the window panes. For a brief moment, the past came rushing back to me. Every sense in my body, including that niggling intuitive sense that had always gotten me in hot water, invoked the time when my mother was alive. The tears sprang involuntarily. The sob wracked my body and the grief that should have come after my mother’s death bubbled to the surface now.

  I lay my head down on the desk, cradled it in my arm, and let the tears flow. I didn’t stop until a gentle hand squeezed my shoulder, and my father said in the soft voice he had always used to comfort me, “Sarah Jane, don’t cry.”

  His kindness made things worse. My sobbing continued. All the while he stood behind me, patting my back.

  When my tears were spent, I lifted my head and took the handkerchief that he offered me.

  “Thank you.” I wiped my eyes and blew my nose.

  “Did you remember something about the night of your mother’s--”

  “No. It’s still a foggy blur. I’ve been in her room. I’ve sat down in the spot where you found me that night, trying to remember something. The harder I try to bring back what happened, the farther away the memory seems.”

  “I’m here if you want to talk, if you remember something,” he said.

  “I just want to remember,” I said. “It seems as though I know something imp
ortant, but it’s just out of reach.”

  “Where did you find that?” He indicated the knife that lay on the desk. “I haven’t seen that thing in years.”

  I picked up the knife and held it out to my father, but he didn’t take it from me. “I found it in the bottom of the drawer.”

  “It must be ancient. Would you put it back for me?”

  “Sure,” I put it, along with the papers I had taken out, back where I had found them. “Is it true that the bankers are concerned about your overdraft?”

  “I suppose Anca told you,” he said.

  “She’s very worried about it,” I said, “and I saw the notices in the drawer. What’s going on?”

  “I made some bad investments,” he said. “But there’s no need to worry. My book is doing well. I’ll have it all sorted out in a week or two. Hamish loaned me enough to keep the bankers happy.”

  “Is there anything I can do?”

  “No, and there’s no need for you to worry, really.”

  “Am I interrupting something?” Grace came in the room and kissed my father’s cheek.

  “No,” my father and I both spoke at the same time. We smiled at each other.

  “When will the electricity be fixed? This house is so dark and gloomy.” Grace shivered and rubbed her arms as she spoke.

  “It might be a while. The only electrician in Bennett Cove is off fighting the war. I’ve found someone to come from San Rafael, but he won’t make it out here for at least a week. We’ll have to make do with candles and oil lamps.”

  “Well, I’m going up for a bath. I’ll see you both later,” Grace said.

  After she left, my father looked at me. “Join me for a drink before you go up to dress?”

  “Sure,” I said, surprised at the invitation.

  My father walked over to the cabinet that had been situated in the corner of his office for as long as I could remember. He lifted the heavy crystal decanter and poured us each a finger of single malt Scotch. He had never included me in this ritual. I wondered why he chose to do so now.

  He sat down behind his desk. I took one of the empty chairs across from him, sipping the amber liquid. It burned my mouth for a second, the sensation turning to numbness as I swallowed. Soon the white heat filled my belly and spread through the rest of my body. I liked the feeling. I sipped again.

  “This is pretty good.”

  My father smiled. “Ladies are supposed to drink sherry.”

  “Well, we both know I’m not much of a lady.”

  My father swirled his drink. “How’s your hand coming along?” He nodded at my bandage.

  “Much better,” I said. “I hope to be in a simple bandage by tomorrow. I wish I could explain why this happened. I swear to you that I didn’t do this to myself.”

  My father refilled his glass, holding the decanter to me. I shook my head and placed the empty glass on the desk.

  “You believe me, don’t you?” I needed to know where I stood with him.

  “I think that you believe you didn’t harm yourself.” He sipped his Scotch. “Some things are not meant to be understood, Sarah. You know we are all concerned about you.” His eyes rested on my bandaged hand. “You’ll tell me if you remember something, won’t you? I would like to know how my wife died.”

  “You’ll be the first person I come to,” I promised.

  We both sat silent for a moment, all the unanswered questions hanging between us, until the ring of the telephone brought us out of our reverie.

  My father picked up the telephone receiver and listened.

  “Tonight? Atherton? I think I can make that. Excuse me one second.” He covered the mouthpiece of the phone and whispered to me, “It’s the Mills Club in Atherton, last minute speaking engagement tonight.”

  I stood up and made my way out of the room. My father’s cheery voice echoing behind me.

  Chapter 6

  By the time I made it up to my room, the hard driving rain had turned into a gentle shower which I hoped would lull me to sleep. It didn’t. I lay on my bed, craving a nap and expecting sleep to come without effort. Instead, the burn on my hand throbbed. I tossed and turned and couldn’t get comfortable. I gave up and trudged back downstairs for the book I had left in the office, and the daily paper, which I found on Zeke’s desk, folded open to Text of the Day’s Communiqué on the Fighting in Various War Zones--an unemotional tally of the victories and losses.

  Zeke and Anca clung to every bit of news about the fighting that raged in Europe, keeping score as if that would change things. They could often be found in the kitchen, huddled together before the radio, listening to the grim news.

  The news of the fighting depressed me--the bombings, the displaced people, not to mention the poor Jewish people who were suffering at the hands of Hitler. The grim reports trickled in through the press and caused Anca to worry about family members she was unable to contact. My father tried to pacify her. He took the time to talk her through her anguish and assure her that he would do anything he could to help her, and that communication during war is always difficult. Although she wanted to believe him, she was frightened and worried. The German Army was ruthless in the occupied countries. We read in the papers every day how innocent people were taken into custody by Hitler’s Gestapo for no reason and never heard from again.

  The good news--if one could call it that--were the 1,000 rescued Jewish children who were coming to America from France. I wondered why all the displaced couldn’t come to the United States. Why weren’t all refugees brought here for safety until Hitler was captured and dealt with? It wasn’t like the United States wasn’t big enough. We were a country of vast open spaces. We had plenty of room and plenty of resources. I didn’t understand it. I never would.

  When it came time to dress for dinner, I said a silent prayer of gratitude that our water heater was gas powered, so hot water was available, even if only for a few hours. In an effort to conserve fuel, we lit the pilot light in the afternoon so everyone could bathe. I languished in the tub until the water turned cold and the skin on my fingers and toes wrinkled.

  I emerged, wrapped in my thick dressing gown, a towel around my head. In my room, a fire burned in my fireplace.

  Anca had laid another dress and a skirt on the counterpane, which had replaced the chenille bedspread. She had brought an oil lamp with her and had also lit the candles on the table by the side of my bed.

  “Ah, good. I need to fit you for these.”

  Anca had her sewing box open on the floor and a pin cushion in her hand. She eyed the garments on the bed as she continued to remove the pins from a skirt that she had finished altering.

  I sat before the fire, toweling my hair dry in its warmth. Tonight I would wear the black silk dress.

  Grace barged into my room without knocking, shattering the equanimity that had settled around Anca and me. She was dressed in a bathrobe as well, but where mine was fuzzy and comfortable, hers was made of silk and trimmed with feathers. Her face, devoid of makeup, had hardened into an alabaster mask.

  Her pale mouth, pinched and puckered in anger, just accentuated the hot fury in her eyes. “You haven’t pulled the curtains to,” she snapped at Anca. “We can’t light the lamps until the curtains are shut. Surely you don’t expect Jack and me to do your job for you. How do you expect us to function in the dark?”

  “I cannot do everything, madam.”

  “Of course you can’t do everything,” Grace said. “But I have asked you repeatedly to shut the curtains at five o’clock, sharp.”

  I stood up and moved between Grace and Anca. “You can close a curtain or two, Grace. Anca’s doing the work of four people all by herself.”

  “Anca is neglecting her duties to care for you. I find myself doing more around this house than both of you put together. All I’m asking for is a little help.”

  I almost apologized to Grace and let Anca go and do her mistress’s bidding, but I had grown tired of the way Grace treated Anca and couldn’t ke
ep quiet any longer. “Caring for me is Anca’s duty. She is my maid. You can check with my father if you don’t believe me.” I cringed at my choice of words. I had never referred to Anca as a servant or a maid. To me she was family.

  Grace didn’t know what to say to that. She opened her mouth to speak, thought better of it, and didn’t say anything. Her eyes traveled to the garments on my bed. “What are those?” She reached to pick up the black wool skirt that Anca had just finished hemming.

  I swooped in ahead of her, picked up the skirt, and draped it over my arm. “Those are my clothes.”

  Grace scrutinized the dresses and skirts laid out on the bed. “I don’t remember packing up these things.” Her words didn’t hide the implication that clothes this fine would have wound up in her closet.

  “I packed Sarah’s things away myself.” Anca stood up straight as she addressed Grace. She threw her proud Roma shoulders back. “I care for Miss Sarah’s finest clothes.”

  “Do you think I might wear my mother’s pearls?” I asked. “I noticed you had them. I assume you’ve been keeping them for me, and I’d like to wear them tonight.”

  Grace didn’t argue. She looked at me with surprise, not quite sure which tone to strike. Finally, she forced a smile. “Of course, you can have them. If Anca will come with me, I will give them to her.”

  “No need. Anca has other things to do. I’ll come with you and get them now.”

  “As you wish.”

  I followed Grace into the hall.

  “I hope you don’t think that Zeke is innocent just because he managed to get out of jail.”

  We had reached the door to her bedroom. I was surprised when she pulled a key out of the pocket of her robe and unlocked the door.

  “He’s not a spy, Grace. Just leave it alone, will you?”