Martyrs' Manse,
Kingsport,
January, 1936
We got one last Christmas. It was a grand Christmas, a Bolingbrook affair that would have done old Hetta Gordon proud. Ruthie always was the child that could pull off an occasion with style.
There was a tree in the old style with tinsel and pine-cones and baubles. The grandchildren made popcorn strings. Evie ate most of hers, and Phil helped her. Jake's boys lit the tree on fire in the name of tradition. I think Phil encouraged them to do it; She did love mischief. Creating it, being at the centre of it, watching it...
She's dead. I cannot believe I will never see that side of her again. I cannot believe I will never see her again. I know you thought it was a bad case, Gil – know when you finally examined her, you said it would happen soon – but she rallied. She was magnificent in Bolingbroke. If you'd seen her, you'd have said she was her old self. The girl from Patty's Place. The one from the summer resort that courted me. I thought…I thought I would know. I knew when we met that I wanted to marry her; I knew when I held our children that I loved them, always would, always had. I knew I would go to the ends of the earth for her, for any of them. Our Andrew was killed and I tried to because Phil was such a shadow of herself. I knew I was right to be worried; I was glad when she wasn't. If Phil wasn't worried then it wasn't real, could be laughed away…I knew so many things. I thought I would know this one, too. Instead, I woke up at some ungodly hour and Phil was still and cold and gone.
Now, I'm rattling around the house, still with its watermarks and mould we never quite defeated. We fixed the boiler though; Your boys, and mine were instrumental in that. I suppose I should be glad that at the end, my bird-boned Phil wasn't cold. Only she was, and that's the worst of it. I knew because finally she was cold all over and still that I was never getting her back.
Do you remember me before Phil? I don't. I think I must have done something – seminary and mission efforts, but I can't think what the something was. All the stories I ever told the children, told their children, painted her at my side, my right hand, my best self, my reason for daring to choose earth over Heaven, however briefly. It's terrible theology, I know that. Not the way to the Resurrected Christ. But if nothing we do here matters, then how can anything else? Phil made it matter. Now there is only me, and the house, our collective imperfections, and a lifetime told in objects I can't bear to part with. Everything reminds me of Phil. The chipped tile over the stove from when our first kettle boiled dry. Her grandmother's wooden bowl, whose two halves I reunited after Ruthie was born, and both of them so ill. There's a silver cross I gave her as soon as I could afford something really good for her, that Phil never took off. I'll never see it again, because I can't take it from her now.
There are memories at every turn – I am drowning in them. How you ever weathered your crosses and losses with such grace I cannot understand. I thought I did, but that was before I woke up in a black pre-dawn and found myself alone, all raw edges and fragments.
I haven't half done her justice here: Forgive me. There are people to tell. The children. Parishioners. Faith, Bruce and Alice will all want to know. They did so much, and still it wasn't enough. That's not their fault. It's not yours, either, Gil. You did more for Phil at the end than any of us.
Tell John for me. I can't do this again. Then apologize on my behalf for not writing myself. The air is thick with ghosts of what was, and I have yet to learn what it is to be without them.
Jo
New Manse,
Glen St Mary,
January, 1936
Jo,
I'm so very sorry. Naomi told us; We knew even before your letter reached Ingleside. She appeared at the manse late the other day, a grey-white ghost in the night, gloved but hatless.
'Mum's died,' she said.
For the next two minutes she fussed over the buttons on her gloves until Rosemary intervened and did them for her. She put them on an end table and then put the kettle on; I guided Naomi into one of our good chairs. The paisley with its origin at the Old West House.
'Not dead,' said Naomi from it's depths. Then, in a piece of Presbyterian theology Cornelia would have lauded, 'With Christ, I mean. That's the Resurrection, isn't it? In the Resurrection…they are as angels in Heaven?'
Naomi and I haven't had a good theological debate in ages, and we've missed it, but neither of us wanted this. Another day, we'd have debated the point academically, but not with your call lingering in her eyes. Rosemary brought out tea and poured out without a murmur.
'Cambric tea,' said Naomi, sipping from the Victoria Rose in her hands, and looking every bit as fragile as its enscrolled handle. 'I haven't had that in years.'
'Good for children,' said Rosemary, 'and for shock. The sweetness, I think.'
There was nothing meaningful to say; There never is. I could still remember how it felt to be ensconced in memories, half-suffocated, believing I would never come up for air. So could Rosemary. Eventually, I reached for the mantelpiece bible, turned past the day's lectionary, and came up with Revelation. I clung to it when Cecilia died; I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen.
Rosemary poured fresh tea as I read, and Naomi burrowed, cat-like into the paisley armchair, once of the Old West House, the Victorian Rose in her hands. Sometimes she remembered her tea and drank it, the cup chinking against the saucer as she replaced it.
I don't know how much time passed like that before I saw her off with a prayer and a kiss. We sat some more yesterday, and will tomorrow. Di's been over, too. It's the furthest she's crutched yet, but she does it once a day and dares anyone to stop her. Fred drives her home afterwards. Nurse Caldicote keeps everyone at the Old Bryant House in strong, sweet tea. Good for shock and children. Susan, Rosemary and Anne bring home-cooking and Cornelia shop-bought. Susan doesn't even raise an eyebrow at the Douglas and Flagg label when she sees it, just pops the dish in the oven. Joanie's the solemnest I've ever seen her, and poor Fred does his best to console his family, but you can see he misses Phil, too. We all do.
Gil's Abby has been wonderful. She's ventured the farthest she has in years to sit with Joanie and the boys. She's always hugging them, and they let her – even Pip, who avers he's too old for hugs and maternal kisses.
We'll come for the service. Of course we will. If there's anything we can do, however small, consider it done.
Be well, do good work and keep in touch as best you can,
J.M.
Martyrs' Manse,
Kingsport,
January, 1936
John,
I cannot think without Phil. I'm not sure I ever had to before. The Bundle Kirk, unable to shake old habits, floods the house with well wishes and food they can't spare. I have even less appetite than Phil did as she died, but I can't do the parishioners the injustice of wasting their goodwill. So, I divide it between Sam's family, your children, and Fox Corner. Ellie begged me to stop when I brought the last batch round; Sam and the girls aren't hungry either, and the parishioners are as good to them as to me. Their new refrigerator is hideously overworked accommodating so much charity.
The grandchildren are disconsolate. They can no more remember a world without Phil than I can. Neither can their parents. Jake says the boys won't cry, and he wishes they would, because their awful stoicism reminds him of the war. My granddaughters make up the difference. At least they have yours and Gil's grandchildren for kindred spirits. Helen Blythe's joined the army of Women Who Bake, and I owe Gil's Miss Abby a thank-you note. She sent me a solemn sympathy letter, complete with a black border she pencilled in herself. Apparently, she didn't like to use Anne's stock.
I read that childish scrawl, and thought of all those promises we made our children's children. How little death we intended them to witness. But it keeps mounting. First the polio, and now Phil. They must know more of death at their age than I did at twenty.
Ellie offered to come and sort through Phil's things for me, but I put her off. It's hard enough without Phil; Already the smell of her, starch, lye, and lavender-water, is fading from her workroom. To have no trace of her at all would be impossible.
What I wanted to say – where I meant to start, was with a thank-you. Phil used to say Naomi was far more my child than hers – that from the first we spoke a language she couldn't translate. She meant the theology, which was nonsense, because anyone with more heart and charity than Phil I cannot think of. (Phil is all I can think of.) But be that as it may, I wasn't there. Couldn't be there. Should have been.
When I called to tell her what happened, I got as far as, 'I'm so sorry…'
Then I fell to pieces and left reassembly to my daughter. I didn't mean to, but that was how it happened. I'm glad you and Rosemary were there. Someone needed to comfort my child, and – God forgive me – I couldn't. I could never have talked with grace or knowledge of the Resurrection and Election. A terrible admission for any man. A worse one for a minister. Thank you for Revelation. I've been reading it ever since.
See you shortly. I'm sorry about the circumstances.
Be well, do good work, and keep in touch. Only, you may have to do some of my portion too; I'm not sure I'm up to good work for the foreseeable future. Selfish, but true.
Jo
Ingleside,
Glen St Mary,
January, 1936
Jo,
No one expects utility from the grieving. I have a theory that's what inspired the great Casserole Intervention Movement of women the world over. There's always at least one delivered after a death. Feeding the hungry and all that. You see? Some of my Golden Verses stuck, after all.
Less facetiously, your lessons on love and community stuck. You have walked with us too often through the valley of the shadow; The least we can do to balance those scales is reciprocate the favour. I'm a poor theologian, but I remember how immeasurably helpful was your unwavering support in times of trial. Let me do that much in return.
The world has lost some of its lustre and light without Phil; How could it not? Her brightness, sparkle and laughter were infectious. If she learned practicality with time, she ever knew how to laugh at herself. It was one of the greatest lessons in humility I ever witnessed, her willingness to denigrate one of her failed culinary creations, or acknowledge an incorrect maths proof. I'd never seen anything like that before; I shall remember it always.
See you soon, Jo. We'll stay as long as you want. Weeks, days, not at all – you have only to ask.
Love ever,
Gil