“I did this for my mother,” Sarah whispered. “She . . . had the same disease.”
“You never told me.”
“I did not tell you many things, Lola. Until our last meeting.”
Lola lifted claw-like fingers and placed them on Sarah’s gowned arm. “I have thought often about that afternoon when you told me about . . . about . . .”
“About being a prostitute?”
Lola’s eyes filled with tears. “I cannot bear to think of you that way, to think of you beaten. Violated. Suffering.”
Sarah nodded. “The abuse, from childhood on, warped my soul. It has been a long, difficult journey to healing, to freedom. If not for Jesus? I do not know where I would be.”
“You would be with me.”
Sarah sighed and shook her head. “No, I think I would be dead, Lola. I often considered killing myself when I lived in Corinth.”
Lola hissed. “No! I would never have let you do that!”
“You do not understand, Lola. You and I? We would not have met before I ended my life. You see, in my own eyes, I was vile and dirty, good only for the most abhorrent uses. Even when Rose and Joy opened Palmer House and I moved there with them? I was filled with rage and hate—hate for most everyone, but I reserved the greatest of it for myself.”
Lola again tried to protest but her agitation only set off more violent coughing. Sarah lifted her up and helped her as before, but Lola had difficulty catching her breath. She gasped and panted but seemed unable to draw air.
Before Sarah’s eyes, Lola’s face reddened as she tried, desperately, to inhale. She reddened further as she whooped in dire need—and then her complexion darkened and turned blue.
“O God!” Sarah cried. “Please help Lola! Please!”
Lola’s frail, convulsing body went slack in Sarah’s arms. Terrified that Lola had died, Sarah shook her.
“Lola! Lola! No, Lord Jesus! She is not ready to meet you—please! Please help her!”
Lola jerked, stiffened . . . and eventually breathed.
Sarah laid Lola’s unconscious body on the cot and sobbed.
LATER, THROUGH THE door, she heard Croft ask, “Is she resting?”
Resting? Sarah watched the slight rise and fall of Lola’s chest.
Thank you, Lord. I know you sent me here to bring Lola to you. Please grant me the time and opportunity I need!
“Yes, she is resting.”
“Come out and eat something.”
Sarah slipped through the door and, under Croft’s watchful eye, stripped off her gloves, gown, and mask. She stuffed them into the bin near the door as he indicated.
“As an added precaution, please go into an exam room and wash your hands and your face, Miss Ellinger, then join me in my office. I have brought you some dinner.”
Sarah did as he ordered. After she had washed, she wandered to his office and sank into a chair.
He had prepared a tray for her and placed it in her lap. When he saw her white face and stillness, he said, “Eat, Miss Ellinger. I can tell you need nourishment.”
Sarah stared at the food. She was not hungry; what she felt was a burning in her throat.
“I-I am thirsty.”
Croft leapt to his feet and filled a tumbler from a pitcher. “Here. Drink.”
Sarah downed the glass. He set another before her and she drank it, too.
“You are in shock. What happened while I was gone?”
“I thought she had died. She could not catch her breath—she convulsed, and her color turned.”
He resumed his seat. “It sometimes happens that they pass suddenly like that. More times, they lose consciousness and pass gently.”
“She was dying. It is possible that she did die for a moment, but I-I prayed over her. I begged the Lord to give me more time to win her to Jesus. I believe the Lord heard me and brought breath back to her body.”
“That is your purpose? That is why you came?” Again, he seemed to be looking for something deeper than his question asked.
“It is.”
He nodded, more to himself than in response to her. “I am glad of it, and I shall pray with you for Miss Pritchard’s soul.” He put his elbows on his desk, folded his hands, and dropped his forehead onto his hands.
Sarah blinked. The shock was wearing away; the water had restored her. She glanced at Croft—and saw he had not muttered mere platitudes—he had straightway gone to prayer for Lola.
Thank you, Lord, for hearing my cry! Thank you for the opportunity to share Jesus with Lola.
While Croft prayed, Sarah picked up a fork and tasted the food before her. Before she knew it, she had wolfed down everything on the plate.
“You have eaten. Good.”
“I appreciate you for bringing it to me. I did not realize I was hungry. Thank you, too, for praying for Lola.”
“Lola?”
“Short for Lorraine.”
“You knew her well?”
He seemed to be hedging, which Sarah found curious. “She and I were once . . . acquainted. I was a believer in Christ, but she was not, and our friendship became a snare to me. I had to sever our relationship. I have not seen her in two years.”
Sarah had been intentionally vague, but he did not appear scandalized or affronted at her explanation as she had anticipated. Rather, something akin to relief smoothed his expression.
“This fallen world overwhelms and defeats all of us in some way, Miss Ellinger. Few of us escape unscathed. I did not.”
“Pastor Carmichael said something very similar to me. He said, ‘We are all—every person who has ever lived—broken in some manner or fashion.’”
“Then he is wiser than many men of the cloth I have met.”
Sarah licked her lips and dared to ask the question for which she wanted an answer. “In what way . . . did the world break you, Dr. Croft?”
He sighed. “The war, Miss Ellinger.”
“Ah. I remember now that you served in the war.”
“Nearly eighteen months of the closest thing to hell possible on this earth.”
“I am sorry.”
As if he had not heard her, he whispered, “So many soldiers I could not save on the battlefield. My arms soaked in their lifeblood, standing in pools of it, and yet I could not save many of those young men. I saw things I cannot forget—such things as haunt my nights. I tended boys whose deaths were, in the end, a blessing.”
The depth of his pain struck Sarah forcibly. She could only repeat, “I-I am so sorry, Dr. Croft.”
“No, it is I who should apologize. It was ungentlemanly to raise such an unpleasant specter to you, Miss Ellinger. I apologize.”
They were quiet for a time, listening together to the ticking of the clock on his wall, before Sarah said, “I have come to understand that we cannot escape some measure of hurt in this fallen world. Our dear friend, Tabitha Carpenter, was a nurse in the war. She left in July 1915 to volunteer with the British Nursing Service. She served three and a half years, the last year in France during the influenza.”
Croft grew agitated. “Dear God! What she must have seen! What she had to have witnessed and endured!”
“She does not talk of it often, but she and her husband brought home two orphans when they returned.”
“The Lord bless her and her husband for that. I saw far too many children without parents . . . parents without children . . . and children without hands, arms, or legs. And the burns! Some so fearfully disfigured that . . .”
He could not go on, and Sarah had to look away from the horror she glimpsed behind his eyes—horror, she realized, he lived with daily, even though he was many miles and days removed from what he had experienced.
Croft stared into the distance. “All the blood and agony and loss of the war? I was not prepared for it, and we were continually short-staffed and overworked. We lost so many boys and young men simply because we could not help them all in a timely manner.”
His mouth twisted into a grimace. “I al
lowed what I saw and experienced in the war to grieve me too deeply. I suppose you could say that I had something of a breakdown.”
Sarah stilled, wondering why he was baring his soul to her.
“While I was recovering, instead of giving my anguish to the Lord, I looked to blame—to castigate—someone. Anyone! I fed upon that blame until my soul became a dark, angry pit. When I returned to the States, George came alongside me. I stayed with him for months before joining Dr. Murphy’s practice.
“George is a faithful friend; he helped me surrender my anger to the Lord. He also seemed to understand that I had a need to be of use to those in real need. He provided some of the funds to move my practice here. With this work, I have begun to heal.”
Sarah blinked, at first troubled—and then oddly touched—that he would share such details of his life. “May I offer an observation, Dr. Croft? A personal one?”
He nodded, but he remained pensive, distracted by his reflections on the war.
“It is only that I find that most men . . . the men I have known, do not readily admit to having struggles. They seem bent on preserving an outward appearance of strength and of competence, of self-sufficiency. However, you . . . have confided your turmoil to me, and I confess, I do not understand why.”
He stared at the floor, fatigue written on the sharp planes of his face. “I suppose it must seem peculiar to you. When we met, you and I were instantly at odds. We quarreled and argued—and quite vociferously at that. I cannot explain why, then, I am now comfortable in your presence, comfortable revealing my inmost struggles.”
A moment later, he added, “Perhaps it is because I have come to understand that you were as broken as I was.”
Sarah looked away. “You must have asked Mr. O’Dell about Palmer House as I . . . suggested.”
“I did. When he told me? I could not but think what a fool I was to have patronized you as I did. I am so very sorry.”
Sarah whispered, “I . . . forgive you, Dr. Croft. Actually, I forgave you some time ago. It is of no matter now.”
He did not respond for so long, that Sarah decided he had not heard her.
But he had.
“I have something else to confess to you, Miss Ellinger.”
“You-you do? I do not understand.”
“I have determined to make a clean breast of it and ask your forgiveness. Yes,” he mused, “it is the only way forward.”
Sarah’s confusion only grew.
He took a deep breath. “I know of your . . . former relationship with Miss Pritchard. What it was.”
Sarah was speechless. She pulled her top lip between her teeth as shame washed her neck and face.
“Please do not be dismayed. It is the reason I took Miss Pritchard into my clinic.”
Sarah shook her head. “I-I do not take your meaning.”
Croft faced her. “I must ask your forgiveness, Miss Ellinger. It was I—I was the one who saw you in the park on Thanksgiving afternoon, two years past. I saw you in a . . . compromising state with Miss Pritchard. I was the one who spoke to Mrs. Thoresen of what I had seen.”
Sarah’s breath hitched as his words sank in.
Someone witnessed you with Lola, exhibiting what was described as ‘an unnatural affection. Someone who, I assure you, cares very much for your wellbeing. They came to me and only me, no one else.
“At the time, Miss Ellinger, I felt it was the right thing to do. I promise you that I meant it for your good, not your ill, but I know I caused you great pain. I-I am asking if you could find it in your heart to forgive me?”
Sarah lifted her chin. She studied Croft’s weary, pain-filled eyes; she delved into what she saw there. “You meant it for my good?”
“Yes. Truly, I did.”
Sarah nodded. “I choose to believe you, Dr. Croft, and I forgive you.”
“I am sorry that I wounded you.”
“No, you should not be. You obeyed God, and the Lord used your obedience to bring about my repentance and, eventually, my freedom. Breaking free of this bondage was by far the most painful ordeal of my life; however, it was necessary. I am free of it now. Jesus has made me free.”
“Thank you for forgiving me, Miss Ellinger.”
“Of course.”
They were again quiet, lost in their own reflections, until Croft mused. “It is ironic, is it not? When we met, we began badly, at cross-purposes. It would seem that we were both in need of healing and freedom.”
Sarah nodded. “So it would seem.”
DR. CROFT GESTURED to the cot in his office. “I have spread clean sheets atop my own. As I am accustomed to staying up late, will you sleep for a while? I shall wake you when I need you to take over for me.”
It was an odd, unconventional arrangement, but Sarah was fatigued, so she laid down on the cot and fell asleep straightaway. She had slept four or five hours when someone shook her gently.
“Miss Ellinger?”
Sarah opened her eyes to lamplight. “Yes? What time is it? Is it my turn to watch?”
“Half past midnight. Miss Pritchard is alert at present; it seemed the opportune time for you to speak with her.”
Sarah got up; Croft removed her sheets, folded them, and laid them aside.
“Our doctors often shared cots while working shifts around the clock in the war—and with considerably less concern for hygiene, I can tell you. Can you gown yourself without my assistance?”
“I believe so.”
With no further instructions, he stretched himself out on the cot and became still. Sarah watched his recumbent form and listened, amazed at how quickly his breath slowed into the rhythm of slumber.
Remembering that Lola was awake and aware, Sarah wiped the last traces of sleep from her face and sped to the surgery to gown herself. She had some difficulties with the ties, but finally managed. When she was ready, she entered the sick room.
Lola was waiting for her.
“Sarah.”
“I am here, Lola.”
Lola labored to breathe and speak at the same time, staggering her words between shallow, inadequate breaths. “I have missed you so, but it grieves me to have you see me like this.”
Sarah nodded. “It grieves me also.”
“You have been well?”
“Yes. Thank you for asking.”
Sarah did not know what to say next, but Lola filled in the awkward silence.
“We took The Pythia to Europe for a few months.”
“Did you? It must have been sad to see all the destruction from the war.”
“It was. Still, it was a good trip until I realized I was suffering from more than a chronic cough. But we had to come home early anyway.”
“Oh? How are . . . Meg and Dannie?”
Lola did not answer immediately. When she did, Sarah glimpsed sorrow behind her words. “Dannie always drank too much, could not control herself. Meg had enough at last. It was the end of them and the end of our band, too.”
“I-I am sorry, Lola.”
“Dannie . . . when Meg left her, she killed herself.”
Sarah’s face twisted. “Oh, no!”
“I know how Dannie felt, Sarah. When you left me, I tried to find someone else. I tried so hard, but nothing worked. What I saw in you, I could not find in another woman.”
Sarah closed her eyes against the onslaught of emotions she anticipated—but instead found . . . the Lord comforting her, surrounding her, protecting her. Keeping her safe.
Separate.
Unbidden, the lines of Psalm 125 rose within her.
They that trust in the Lord
shall be as mount Zion,
which cannot be removed,
but abideth forever.
As the mountains are
round about Jerusalem,
so the Lord is
round about his people
from henceforth even forever.
Ah, my Jesus! How I love you.
Lola’s ragged words pulled her back. “It br
oke my heart when you told me you had been a-a prostitute, Sarah. To me you were so good, so pure and unsullied.”
“Could it be that it was not me that drew you, Lola? That it was not me you saw, but the One who lives in me?”
“Do you mean God?”
“I do. You know now that I am not the pure and unsullied woman you thought me to be, but something did draw you . . . to me.”
Lola shifted with discomfort, then asked, her voice rough, “Could it not have been that we were fated to meet? That ours was a love destined to be?”
“I cannot believe so, Lola. I trust in and credit neither ‘fate’ nor ‘destiny,’ for my Lord is the creator of all things—and it is his purposes that will prevail. I believe you saw him in me—and you longed for him without knowing it was him you craved and needed.”
“You think I longed for God? That I craved him—and not you?”
“In your deepest being, yes; I believe that.”
Lola closed her eyes, exhausted by their conversation. Nonetheless, Sarah hoped Lola was thinking on their exchange. Soon, Lola drifted off to sleep, leaving Sarah sitting quietly, patient and waiting, for Lola’s next lucid moments.
WHEN MORNING CAME, Croft went out and brought back coffee and pastries for breakfast. Before the clinic opened, he moved the cot and one of his office chairs into the sick room.
“I shall be about the business of the clinic until lunchtime, Miss Ellinger. If you need to rest, do not use the cot. Instead, sleep sitting up in the chair. I would not have you inadvertently rub a contaminated gloved hand over your mouth or nose; you would be more inclined to do so if you are lying down.”
He checked Lola’s condition and reviewed Sarah’s ministrations to the patient through the night.
“You are doing well, Miss Ellinger, but she requires less care now. Her bodily functions are shutting down.”
“I-I understand.”
THE HOURS PASSED SLOWLY. Sarah read from her Bible. She paced and prayed; she stood over Lola’s unmoving form, pleading with God for Lola’s soul.
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