Serendipity

by Cathy Marie Hake

  “Band it,” he supplied. “What do you recommend?”

  “Removable collars and cuffs make it easy to freshen a shirt and make it last longer.”

  Cutting butter into flour to make a pie dough, Maggie said, “It never ceases to amaze me how we are all so different. Like those preferences for a shirt. What makes one person happy displeases another. Todd is very easy to please. But he has taken a special liking to my peach jam and dried-peach pie.”

  “Now if you’ll pardon me, Mr. Toomel . . .” Linette measured the length of his sleeve, trying to act casual.

  “What about you, Mr. Toomel? What kind of pie is your favorite?”

  “Maggie, I have yet to eat a thing here that isn’t great. But the thing I recall enjoying the most is that apple pie Miss Richardson made.”

  “Mmm-hmm!” Dusting the table with more flour so she could roll out the dough, Maggie said, “Linette, you have a way with spicing things just right.”

  “Thank you. Oh my. Twenty-nine across the shoulders!” Scribbling down the measurement, she said, “Daddy likes his shirttails extra long so they stay tucked in better when he rides.”

  “If you could do that and work in a little give around the arm, I’d appreciate it.”

  “John!” Todd shouted from outside. “John, I need to talk with you for a second.”

  Irked, Maggie pushed the rolling pin so hard it spun around and around when she lifted it. She wasn’t going to let Todd ruin Linette’s chance for happiness. Determined to get the information from John she’d promised, she had to keep him there. “What about the collar?”

  John had to lean down for Linette to measure his neck. His eyeglasses reflected Linette, proving he was staring at her. She measured him with trembling fingers.

  Maggie took pity. “I’m still learning Todd’s favorites. Like the dog he’d like to get, or flower. I’ve seen your dogs. Do you have a favorite flower?”

  “John . . .” Todd called again from outside.

  John jerked upright, away from Linette. “I . . . um . . . flower? I didn’t know there was anything other than Best.” With Todd bellowing for him, he left.

  Linette wilted into a chair. “Best?”

  Maggie stared down at the table in utter disbelief. There, in a white powdery cloud, sat a bag emblazoned BEST.

  Holding up the flour sack, she sighed. “Linette, they’re hopeless.”

  Eighteen

  The small oven box limited how many cookies she could bake at a time. Since Todd and Ma adored pfeffernuesse, Maggie took most of the morning to make a batch. She developed a rhythm – heating the iron while she spooned the next pan of cookies to bake, ironing while the cookies baked, and repeating the cycle. By the end of the morning, she’d finished her ironing and had a big tin full of cookies.

  Ma set aside her crewel work and swiped another cookie. “Todd’s fit to be tied over you playing Cupid. That whole shirt-measuring scheme from yesterday rubbed him the wrong way.”

  “Something special is blossoming between Linette and John.” If only Todd looked at me the way John gazes at her . . . “I wish my roses were coming along as nicely.” I wish my own marriage was going as well. Our romance is as dry and barren as the rose garden.

  “You’re wasting your time – on the matchmaking and on the flowers.”

  Maggie needed to go tend the roses – because they needed the attention and because she didn’t want to hear Ma’s grousing. Wrapping cookies in a tea towel, she said, “Todd loves pfeffernuesse hot from the oven.” She brushed a kiss on Ma’s cheek and headed out to surprise her husband. It felt good to be outside . . . until she looked around.

  “No!” The word tore from her chest as she raced to her rose bed. Falling to her knees, she scooped away everything at the first rose’s base. Desperately, she crawled down the row. Thorns raked her flesh, but she had no time to put on gloves. It was probably too late already.

  Todd pulled her to her feet. “Maggie?”

  “My roses! They’re burnt. It’s killing them.” She jerked away and fell to her knees again. “Help me.”

  Shoveling off the mixture of manure and fertilizer, Todd moved with blinding speed. “They weren’t growing. I tried to help.”

  They worked furiously, but it was too late. Maggie looked at the yellowed and brittle stems and leaves – damaged. More than damaged. This would kill her beloved roses.

  “It was yesterday’s love token. I traded for fertilizer.”

  Maggie gave him a tragic look. “They won’t make it. They’re dead or burning.”

  The sizzle of fried eggs was the only sound at breakfast the next morning. Todd’s five filled the skillet. Soon as they were done, she slid them onto his plate. She and Ma ate two apiece – the second round. The idea of eating turned Maggie’s stomach, but she’d force herself. Wasn’t she the one who always told her uncles back home that an empty stomach stayed sick and one with a little something in it calmed down? But it wasn’t her body ailing – it was her aching heart.

  Now without the refuge of her roses, she’d plunge back into ceaseless hours of Ma’s advice. Learning a new recipe or how to account for the dishes you took to someone else’s house at harvest rapidly trapped her into listening about any and every opinion Ma held. Only Ma didn’t have opinions; she believed she had the truth.

  “Charity . . . beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things.” No matter how much she chanted that verse, Maggie didn’t think she could bear much more of this, and she didn’t believe more than half of what Ma said. If only God would send Linette or Hope – or anyone – to come rescue her.

  Outside the woodicocks clattered and the windmill whirred. Everything else about her remained the same – but she’d lost her legacy and sacrificed that bequest for her daughters and granddaughters. Future generations would hear the stories, but they’d mean so much less. The hours and days of two or three generations working together, talking about what it meant to love, to sacrifice, to face the worst with courage . . . Gathering petals, smelling the fragrance, and helping press out the essential oil . . . the fragrance brought back hundreds of memories. The tenderness of a mother dabbing the tiniest dot of perfume on her little girl’s wrist . . . lost. All of that lost.

  Maggie’s chest ached – some from crying, but mostly from the crushing feeling each heartbeat made.

  “Go water the vegetable garden.” Ma sounded as if she’d been dosed with a vile-tasting curative. “The important matters in life – those are what you must work on.”

  Anguish welled up. “My roses are – were – important!”

  “Sewing warm quilts is important. Putting up food is vital. Helping my son in the fields is essential. These are the things that count most.”

  “I’ve sewn curtains to warm the cabin. I’m tending a large vegetable garden to have food to preserve, and there’s not another woman in all of Texas who helped her man with every row of sod he broke.”

  “Basic things a wife ought to do. No one’s going to lavish praises on you like those hillbilly geezers. Children crave praise; wives do the work with a willing heart and know labor is its own reward.”

  The eggs she fried earlier hadn’t sizzled half as hot as the thoughts in Maggie’s head. Careful to put a cup of water in Ma’s reach, she finally said, “Chores are waiting. Before I go, though, I’ve something important to tell you: Mama taught me, ‘If you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything at all.’ Aunt Maude taught me the importance of respecting others. And the importance of gratitude. They were fine, God-fearing women who passed on those common courtesies and eleven generations’ worth of wisdom that is twined with my special roses.

  “Our beds are warm with my quilts and meals are ready on time. But those quilts will be threadbare in a generation, and a meal is eaten and gone. Twelve generations from now, whatever I salvage of my roses will have multiplied. Those roses and the lessons that belong with them will still survive. Families will be sweeter, lives touched, h
earts softened by the legacy. And someday, the women whose faith blossomed, who lived and learned those lessons, will reap one last sweet reward by meeting at the Savior’s feet.

  “But in the meantime, the fine gentlemen you’re calling ‘hillbilly geezers’ are my family. You will speak well of them, or you won’t speak at all of them.”

  Ma looked a little thunderstruck.

  “As I said, I’ve got chores waiting.” Maggie stepped outside.

  Scanning the farm, Maggie couldn’t find Todd. A few nights ago, John mentioned he could use some help. Of all days, her husband could have been here today when she’d see if a single one of her rosebushes survived. Deep in her heart, she hoped a few might have escaped the chemical burns. The minute she noticed what her husband had done, she’d cleared away as much of the mess as possible – but after a whole night and most of a day, the newly transplanted roses took a lethal dose. Row by row, she saw the truth. This place had ruined them. Just like it’s ruining me.

  Against all logic or sanity, she still watered each one before she watered the vegetables. The full buckets weren’t as heavy as her heart.

  Todd rode up, dismounted, and walked over to her. Eyes and voice somber, he held out a gunnysack. “For you.”

  He couldn’t find pink, so he’d settled for something kind of orange. That lone rosebush didn’t lie amongst the graveyard of Maggie’s dead plants. She planted it with the vegetables. Nothing could replace what she’d lost, but he’d wanted her to have something similar. Brokenhearted, she cried as she opened the gunnysack and the whole time she planted the bush. But each time she passed by, she’d caressed the leaves.

  Roses – they did odd things to a woman. Ever since he’d given her that entire rose garden, Margaret had changed. She no longer skipped over to him with a greeting on her lips and a hug. Instead, she had rarely left the stove. At the supper table, the Magpie had been less talkative with him – even though she’d liven up and be the belle of the ball if anyone came by. They’d plotted out barters and prayed together – and in those times, she had seemed almost herself – but the rest of the time, she’d taken on an odd reserve.

  A wife ought to treat her husband differently. Ja, she should. And she did – but in the wrong way. She had stopped seeking him out. He had to go to her. But she was fairly easy to find since every spare moment had been spent among her flowers. She’d smiled plenty – but it qualified more as a mysterious one, like on her cameos.

  Now that he had killed her precious legacy, though, Todd wondered if she’d ever smile again. But wanting to do something, he gave her that one silly rosebush. She’d given him a hug.

  Nailing shingles to a twister would be simple compared to understanding his wife.

  Maggie.

  Her uncle – all of her “uncles” – were right. She was a magpie of a woman. She couldn’t be around people without chattering or trading. Those days on the train, she’d been bubbly. The first week on the farm, she’d done her best to settle in and help Ma adjust. Singing and chattering all the time, she made a point of staying cheerful for Ma. Goodness only knew how hard that was.

  Now each morning Maggie walked along the rows of ruined roses. Every so often, she’d bend down and inspect one, but whenever she did, her shoulders slumped as she straightened up.

  “Baffles me why Maggie tends those dead thorns.” John’s voice pulled him from his thoughts.

  Todd let out a heavy gust of a breath. “It’s a family legacy. The women use them to pass down stories that teach their daughters, and they make rose lotions and soaps from the petals.”

  “Those women must have been saints to inspire devotion and instill the patience Maggie shows your mother.”

  “Ja. Ma was a bad patient, yet my Maggie graciously cared for her.” He shot John a wry grin. “I couldn’t do it. I’d sort rattlesnakes before I’d take on Ma as a patient. But she has gotten better.”

  Hunkering down, John gave him an odd look, then plucked a weed. “Is Linette coming this afternoon?”

  “I never know. Sorry I can’t warn you since Maggie roped you into – ”

  “I don’t mind.” John rose. “Miss Richardson is an interesting young woman.”

  “So Maggie says. Be careful, though, that she doesn’t mistake your friendship for – ”

  “Courting? That’s exactly what I want. Confound it, now that I’m noticing things about her, she couldn’t care less about keeping company with me.”

  Maggie and Linette had lively conversations at the supper table – about everything from their friends’ new babies to Chicago World’s Fair. The friendship between them had grown strong. They were two women so thirsty for a friend that everything else paled in comparison. Once an awkward, man-hungry gossip, Linette had changed. John’s comment knocked Todd into taking a fresh look across the supper table.

  “Your cantaloupe is so juicy! Ours didn’t do well this year.” Linette ate another bite. “Everyone has tomatoes, but something must have been wrong with the okra seeds. Nobody’s got much to harvest or trade.”

  “It might not be the seeds. It can be something else,” Ma opined. “Some things won’t grow here. Like roses.”

  “Roses most certainly do grow here!” Linette nearly shouted.

  Turning the color of a wisp of smoke, Maggie said, “They do. Old Mrs. Whittsley has lovely bushes. They’re already budding. And – ”

  “I meant here. On our farm.” Ma directed her comment to Maggie. “Rose was your maiden name, and you can’t stop talking about your past and how wonderful everything was back home. I’ll bet the barn is filled to the rafters of trinkets those old men gave you.”

  “Halt!” Todd boomed.

  Ma kept right on. “God destroyed those roses to teach you a lesson.”

  In cold fury, he bit out, “It is my fault, not God’s. I burned them. Apologize to my wife. Now.”

  Ma didn’t make a sound.

  Maggie stared at her. “God isn’t a despoiler of beauty; He’s the Creator and Author. Things that go wrong . . .” Her voice trembled. “They aren’t to be dumped at God’s feet and the blame heaped upon Him. The rain falls on the just and on the unjust.”

  “By your logic, Mrs. Crewel,” John said, “when one farmer’s crop thrives and another’s fields fail, it’s a spiritual punishment. You’re condemning every farmer, because we all have good and bad years. Especially this year – we are all suffering.”

  Ma argued with great feeling. “You made my point. You are suffering. So am I. God struck down my first husband and then my second. Now He’s stricken me.”

  “All are staggering losses,” Linette said, “but you just proved what Maggie said. Good things happen to terrible people just as bad happens to the good.”

  John leaned forward. “Ma’am, if you can’t accept that theology, then you’re saying God won’t extend grace to you.”

  Todd let them speak. A man controlled his temper, and he could scarcely hold his in. Let them handle the theology now. He had to address the other issue. He’d not let anyone revile or wound his wife.

  “I’m older. Wiser. Much I have seen. God is the God of wrath as surely as He is a God of love. He’s every bit as much the God of Revelation as He is of Genesis.”

  “Husband,” Maggie said in a strained voice, “where do you stand?”

  Between a wife who will praise God no matter the circumstance, and a mother who – like Job’s friend – felt cursing God and dying was the only option. “We are responsible for many of the problems in our lives – through sloth or greed, lying or lust. There are consequences to sin. But in sending His Son, God proved His mercy is far greater than His wrath. He forgives and forgets our sins when we confess them. Children of God are still rained upon, but we have the umbrella of His grace.”

  “Amen!” John stood and started gathering dishes.

  Maggie hopped up. “I’ll get that!”

  “It won’t hurt me to do the dishes. I’d gladly wash and dry every last one of them f
or a meal you and Miss Richardson cook.”

  Maggie’s lids lowered. “Someone else once said that to me.” Forcing a smile, she added, “Only Linette wasn’t cooking with me at the time.”

  I’m the one who told her that. In the holler, the men always did the dishes. Here, I haven’t once. Not a single time. Maggie does them three times a day. And much of the time, they weren’t the ones she dreamed of, but Ma’s.

  “The two of you don’t have much leisure time all to yourselves.” Linette made a shooing motion. “Go take a walk. We’ll do the dishes.”

  “Thank you!” Though his towering rage would defy the coldest of nights, Todd grabbed Maggie’s plaid and yanked her outside before wrapping her up. “We’re going to the barn.”

  She dipped her head and shook it. “Nay, Todd. I’m not – ”

  “When are you finally going to learn to trust me?” He tugged on her arm.

  Digging in her heels, she jerked back. “Trust is earned.”

  He did the expedient thing. It had worked once before. Tilting her over his shoulders, he crossed the yard and entered the barn.

  Nineteen

  Blood rushed to Maggie’s head, making her dizzy. “Put me down!” She pinched his back. “I said, put me down!” It still didn’t work, so she fought just as dirty. Strong as an ox and twice as stubborn, her husband had one weakness. He was ticklish. Seizing his sides, she tickled and shouted, “Put me down!” The minute he obliged, she stepped away.

  Todd gave her an icy look. “How am I to learn of you, to love you, when you refuse to trust me?”

  Thoroughly incensed, she shot back, “I came to Texas. How much more trust is there?”

  “There is the trust that you can come to me with anything – everything. Such trust demands complete truth.” Arms akimbo, he demanded, “Have you withheld truth from me?”