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Pieces of the Whole

Ben leaned back into his chair and took a sip from his coffee cup. He watched Hop Sing as he retreated to the kitchen and noted the man's gait had not changed, but the speed surely had. He barely held back a sigh as he considered that his own speed had noticeably dropped in recent years too. It was a good thing that Joe had taken on the bulk of the ranch's responsibilities although Ben wasn't quite sure when that transition had come about.

The scent of pine needles filled the air as the huge pine tree his sons had selected had been cut down and brought in before Joe and Candy had left for Carson City. It wasn't an ideal time of year for travel, but it couldn't be helped. Ben knew that it was grating on Cassie every day that Joe was away from her and he was glad she had so readily agreed to come and stay with him and Jamie until Joe returned.

He took another sip of coffee and looked across to where Cassie sat with her sewing strewn across the table. He smiled to himself as he watched her trying to piece something together. She had her bottom lip clenched between her teeth as she concentrated on what she was doing.

"I have a hole where I should have a barn," she muttered to herself.

It was a few moments before she looked up and she smiled to see Ben watching her.

"Mama always made this look so easy! She could make the pieces do just what she wanted them to do."

Cassie tugged at a couple of pins and stuck the ends in her mouth as she worked on the fabric again.

"This is one of her patterns that she loved. She called it, Hole in the Barn Door, but I just have a hole and no barn at all in this square here." Cassie stabbed another pin into the fabric and glared at it before a sigh slipped out. " I hoped I would have this finished before Joe got back, but I'm not sure that's going to happen."

Frustration was beginning to win and Ben could see why. The pieces just weren't behaving themselves and he had no idea how to help.

"Well, Joe and Candy aren't due for another couple of days so you still have plenty of time."

Ben lurched forward in his chair as Cassie dropped the half-tacked quilt onto her lap and promptly burst into tears. He pushed the coffee cup onto the table and quickly moved to sit beside her on the settee. It wasn't the first time she had dissolved into tears in the last week. He wished his son would come home sooner rather than later as he felt he was a poor substitute for his daughter-in-law in her present condition. He slipped an arm around her shoulder and drew her closer as Cassie tried to bring her emotions under control.

"I wanted to surprise him. Show him that I had finished the baby's quilt while he was away."

Ben lifted the fabric out of her hands and laid it across the table.

"I wish … I wish I'd paid more attention."

"To what?"

"To Mama when she tried to teach me these things. I miss her so much!"

Fresh tears flowed down her cheeks and Ben reached to pull a handkerchief from his pocket. As he dabbed at her face, Cassie tried to pull herself together once more.

"She would have loved this baby so very much." Cassie rubbed at her swollen belly as she spoke and she finally looked up and smiled wanly at the man she had come to call Pa.

"She would have loved Joe." Cassie laughed as she thought about the diminutive woman who had been taken from her far too soon. "He would have charmed her and she would have let him get away with blue murder."

Ben chuckled at the comment as he knew his son could charm the socks off almost anybody when he set his mind to it.

"He got that charm from his mother. And if it makes you feel any better, she struggled with piecing a quilt too."

"Really?"

"Oh, yes." Ben nodded as he explained how his impatient wife once threatened to throw the whole thing into the fire.

Cassie giggled as she tried to imagine the scene he was describing.

"Tell me about her. Joe doesn't … he hasn't …" Her voice trailed away as she thought on how reticent Joe was to talk about his mother or anyone else he had loved and lost - including his first wife and child. It was a tender point that she hoped would one day heal somehow. Perhaps her own child could help heal that wound in his heart.

"Marie was like nobody else I had ever met. She was passionate … and fiercely loyal and determined … well … sometimes bull-headed."

"Sounds just like somebody that I married." Cassie giggled again as Ben laughed at her.

"Yes, he is most definitely just like her. I'm afraid he inherited her temper too." Ben smiled at his daughter-in-law as he knew she had not ever seen the temper his son had struggled with in his youth.

"Would you tell me …" Cassie paused, knowing she was stepping on sensitive ground.

"Tell you what?"

"Would you tell me about Hoss and Adam's mothers too? I don't know anything about them. Not really."

The request caught Ben by surprise and he hesitated before answering. Finally, he reached forward and snagged the quilt from the table.

"Inger loved to make things. She could pull something out of nothing, or so it seemed."

Cassie waited patiently as Ben seemed lost in a memory.

"She would trade scraps of fabric with the other women in the wagon train as well as any other groups we came across. She made a quilt much like this one before Hoss was born."

Cassie smiled at the thought that the giant man her husband had described had once been a newborn baby. Ben glanced up and pointed to the line of stockings hanging across the mantle.

"She managed to make those too from scraps she had squirrelled away. I have no idea how she kept them hidden, but she made them while we travelled and hung them across the roof of the wagon on Christmas Eve."

Ben stared at the faded stocking that bore his eldest son's name. Adam had no idea what a stocking was even for and Inger had explained it to him with great delight. His eldest son had missed out on so much that he and Elizabeth had dreamed of before his birth.

"Pa?"

"Hmmm. Oh, sorry. I was just remembering."

"No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to be so intrusive."

Ben reached for her hand and grasped it between both his hands. "You are not intruding. It's just been many years since I remembered some of these things. I never imagined I would travel across the country with a small child and no wife by my side. It was something Elizabeth and I dreamed of doing together. Coming out here and beginning something new."

"Sometimes dreams die."

Ben caught the whispered words and turned to catch the frown on his daughter-in-law's face. He reached a hand towards her and lifted her chin to make her look at him as tears welled in her eyes once more.

"What is it?"

"Joe."

"What about Joe?"

"He loved Alice and they were planning a future together. A family. His dream was taken from him."

Ben felt his chest constrict as he struggled for the right words to say.

"Yes, he loved her … just as he loves you. Never doubt that."

Ben reached forward and tugged at the quilt and a handful of pieces of fabric that lay to one side.

"Life is just like this. Pieces that we put together. Pieces that get discarded. Pieces that wear out and new pieces that are put in their place. In the end, it all makes something beautiful. Something meaningful."

Cassie reached a hand to lay it on top of Ben's. "And sometimes it's so hard to piece it all together."

"Yes, but the true value of the quilt is in the love that goes into making it."

Cassie leaned her head on Ben's shoulder and smiled. The baby chose that moment to stretch and she began to absently massage her belly. A tiny foot pushed against her hand and she laughed.

"I think this one is getting restless."

"I think you both need to get some sleep."

Cassie kissed him on the cheek and nodded. Long after she had ascended the stairs, Ben found himself staring at the pieces of the quilt. Life had a way of making its own design. He never could have imagined all those years ago in Boston that he would love and lose three women. He would have given his right arm to spare his son the same heartache and yet life had brought them to this point. Memories welled up from within him as he allowed himself to remember other Christmases long past.

Adam sitting in the wagon with a chubby little boy bundled up in his lap.

Inger's sweet voice as she sang a song from her homeland while spinning stories of foreign traditions.

Elizabeth's laughter as he did his best imitation of a snaggle-toothed octopus.

Marie's delicate fingers that may have struggled with quilting, but produced the finest embroidery so Joe's stocking hung across the mantle along with his brothers'.

The smell of cinnamon and other spices as Hop Sing baked Jamie his first Christmas cookies.

Joe's silent withdrawal that first Christmas after he tracked down the men who took his wife and child from him. His son had paced the house like a caged animal as the winter snows had closed in on him.

Ben scrubbed a tired hand across his face as he recalled the days where he thought he may have lost his son as well as his daughter-in-law.

And yet, in time, God in his mercy had granted another chance and a fresh start. Ben glanced up the stairs where he knew Cassie would be sleeping. He looked again at the rough-hewn pine logs that he had shaped himself. The house had seen great joy and great pain. Laughter and tears. Life and death.

Ben fiddled with the pieces of cloth on the table before him and he smiled. His family's quilt had indeed been sewn in love and he felt a deep sense of gratitude for all of the colours – both the light and the dark because they all produced the final picture.

Suddenly Ben heard footsteps on the porch and the door flung open to reveal a bitterly cold draft of air. Two men hurried across the room towards the fire and he stood up to grasp his son by the shoulders. Joe looked exhausted, but he managed to muster up a grin from somewhere.

"Hey, Pa, you've taken up needlework?"

Ben laughed as he noted a matching grin on Candy's face and shook his head.

"No."

The rest of the explanation stuck in his throat. How could he possibly explain where a few scraps of fabric had taken him for the past few hours?