Chapter Ninety: A Christmas Carol
"You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling. "Tell me why?"
"I wear the chain I forged in life," replied the Ghost. "I made it link by link, and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it."
The words pieced themselves together in Jarrod's laudanum-laced mind and swollen brain. He felt like he was dreaming partially and simultaneously like he was leaving his body.
Several times he watched himself from the corner of the room—like a bystander. He could hear voices but couldn't move his tongue.
The Christmas Carol reading he attended with Elisabeth when they were engaged came back bit by bit.
But it wasn't the narrator's voice he recalled. He squinted and racked his brain for memory. It made his head throb but his soul pressed for an answer.
"Father?" it came to him finally.
"Yes, son. It's me. Been watching since the surgery—-the young surgeon did his best. But sometimes our best isn't the best for us. Destiny and all. I am here for ya, son. Seems like the clock isn't wound up anymore."
"Am I dying?"
"Yep, we are dying until we die."
His father's words confused him.
"I heard this Dickens reading of A Christmas Carol in San Francisco with Elisabeth."
"My favorite line is "You may be an undigested bit of beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a fragment of underdone potato. There's more of gravy than of grave about you, whatever you are!" Tom guffawed.
"Father, please my head. Throbs."
"Not for much longer, son. Wanta talk?"
"You talk, I will listen."
"Guess you wanta know about the past? Like the play? Leah, I assume."
"Not my place to judge you."
"Right about that. It's Vic's. She still stews sometimes about it. Never loved a woman like your mother. Still miss her. It's not her time yet. Damnable railroad made it mine. Or was it my pride riding out like that—"
"Heath looks like you," Jarrod found himself responding without forethought.
"Stubborn too. Leah raised him up good. Sorry I didn't know he was in the picture or I woulda taken care of them. Her filthy relatives wouldn't have touched them. Lord put old Hannah and Rachel there to do his will. Appreciated how you saw the truth first. Always could count on you."
"Did you love her, Father?" he asked again without thinking. He didn't want to know the answer and couldn't understand why he asked.
"Well, ain't you got the questions now you bout to cross over. Never would have thought you would ask me that."
Jarrod moaned.
"Yes, I loved her. Would have stayed i'ffn I didn't love your mother more. Wanted to come home to you and Nick and Vic. Wasn't a good time in my marriage and Leah was a warm touch and she didn't hold me accountable like Vic does. Was a cowardly way out. She and others along the way."
Jarrod flinched, "Others?"
"I was a sinful man. You boys are all better men than me. Cause of Vic. I liked the attention and was pretty spoiled for getting my way. Took it for what it was worth along the way. You boys ain't feckless like me, Victoria—-she raised you well."
"But I gave up all that after a while.'Conscience kicked up a storm every time I touched your Mother."
Jarrod shook his head, "Surely I am not having this conversation with my father."
"Think what you will Jarrod."
"It is always the person not in the predicament who knows what ought to have been done in it, and would unquestionably have done it too," Tom quoted Dickens.
He tried to clear his mind and end the dream. It went silent in his mind for a few minutes then Tom interrupted again.
"That first wife of yours said she found her house without a roof."
A throb of pain hit his head, "I never told anyone she said that."
"No you didn't," Tom answered simply.
"Do you know Beth?"
"Nah. She is not in my neck of the woods. Ain't a poet."
"Oh," Jarrod responded with confusion, "Frances?"
"Ah yeah. She was a good wife to ya. Purty and proper. She has been fretting over JT too. Proud of how you raising him."
"That can't be, I failed."
"Nah, up here we see experiences making you into who you needs to be. He's gonna be a better man now. Frances sees that. William is calmer sort and little Frances is just a peach. That woman misses ya much and pines for you. She's glad you found her friend Elisabeth and her two daughters. They needed a Pappy. She watches you all."
"That's uncomfortable, Father."
"Most things are. That's why man needs whiskey."
Jarrod chuckled in his sleep.
"Or in your case scotch."
He laughed again but it made his head throb.
"Your baby girl Elisabeth. She's here."
"I know. Can't wait to get my hands on her."
"I don't really know if you will or not but your words helped her get past the worst of the pain. Got Victoria's black hair like you and Nick."
"So does Benjamin. He's a hellion." as another thought just popped from his subconscious.
"Yep, he is. Don't spoil him, Jarrod. Hellions turn out to be great men if they learn they can't run roughshod over people."
"Good advice Father."
"I know a lot about hellions. But son, Jarrod. I don't know the whole future, only the Lord does. But I am privy to bits and pieces of the future. Something you need to know. Listen now."
"First give up the tobacco. Not another cigar or rolled one. It will hasten the inevitable. I would tell ya to give the scotch a rest too—but you won't."
"And now about the boy—"
"About Benjamin?"
"Yep. Don't let Elisabeth mollycoddle him. He's got a destiny. When he is called to war, let him go. He has to go—Men are depending on his bravery."
"Will he die?" He was afraid to ask but it came out.
"All men die. Not all men live."
"I don't understand. I don't want to lose my son."
"No father does."
"Father?" Jarrod tried to reach for him.
Dickens's words came back in cadence from the book in the actor's voice. Tom was gone.
"Men's courses will foreshadow certain ends, to which, if persevered in, they must lead," said Scrooge. "But if the courses be departed from, the ends will change."
Jarrod fell back into a peaceful sleep and his heart began to beat in rhythm.