Over the Waters Page 20

  "Did you see Phil?" Betty asked.

  "I did," Valerie said. "It's so good to see him up and about." She playfully scooted the petite woman away from the stove and took over stirring the sizzling potatoes. "You get out of here. Go sit with your husband."

  "I believe I'll just take you up on that offer, sweetheart."

  After breakfast, Valerie and a team of teenage girls spent the morning whitewashing the cinder block walls of the girls' dormitory.

  They took a break at noon for sandwiches and fruit, and started in painting again right after lunch. It was hard, hot work, but Valerie was thankful to have her thoughts occupied, especially since they kept returning to Max.

  While they worked, she and the girls filled their time singing praise songs in rounds and lush harmonies. When their vocal cords grew strained from singing, the word games began. The girls cheered Valerie when she remembered a complicated string of Creole words, and she felt as proud as if she'd won a Pulitzer.

  By the time the bells called them to afternoon chapel, the eastern wall of the dorm glowed in the canted sunlight.

  She hurried to freshen up in her room, combing the flecks of paint out of her hair and working it into a quick French braid. She changed into a clean blouse and exchanged her tennis shoes and socks for a pair of sandals.

  When she stepped into the sunny courtyard, she saw that the younger children had gathered on the playground. Out of the corner of her eye she saw a little girl playing alone in the shade of a courtyard wall. Squatting low to the ground, she scratched intently in the dirt with a stick. She was so tiny--surely not more than two or three years old. Valerie knew her name was Jacquette.

  She had asked Madame Phil about her the first time she saw her, wondering how such a beautiful child had ended up in a place like this. Madame Phil told her that Jacquette's mother had six other children she could scarcely feed or clothe. For a moment Valerie had to fight down the anger that rose in her again--the injustice that allowed this woman to have seven children while she had none. Now she remained at a distance, watching the little girl play. She seemed perfectly content to be by herself.

  Jacquette looked briefly in her direction and, without reason, Valerie felt drawn toward the child. As she drew closer she could hear the airy sound even above the laughter of the other children on the playground.

  Jacquette was singing--in the sweetest voice Valerie had ever heard. This must be the way angels sounded. The words the little girl crooned were Creole, but Valerie recognized the melody.

  "Mwen konnen Jezu renmenm', Se Bib la ki di mwen sa..." Jesus loves me, this I know...

  She smiled to herself, totally taken by this little ebony-faced beauty. She moved toward the child, slowly, drawn by a magnetic pull she seemed powerless to resist. When she was still some eight or nine feet away, Jacquette looked up. She caught Valerie's eye and smiled broadly.

  Holding Valerie's gaze, the child rose gracefully from lean haunches, her jet-black eyes sparkling. She held out the stick, an offering.

  Valerie reached out to take it, but as Jacquette toddled toward her into the sunlight, Valerie's heart lurched. Stunned, she sucked in a sharp breath, scarcely believing what her eyes saw. The dress...But no...It couldn't be!

  Afraid she might faint, she dropped to her knees in front of the little girl, accepting the flimsy stick from the small hands.

  Jacquette started to sway shyly, fingering the skirt of her dress--her lime-green, gingham-check dress with its white eyelet underskirt. The little girl touched a button on her bodice, tucking her chin down and puffing out her round belly, eyeing the button's bright yellow shape.

  Then she looked up, beaming at Valerie. "Sitron," she said proudly. The Creole word for lemon.

  It wasn't possible! Slowly, Valerie reached out to touch the white eyelet underskirt of the dress this round-cheeked, cornrowed darling modeled. Tears traced her cheeks. Sixteen years had passed since Valerie had put the last stitch in the hem of this garment. The dress with its lemons and limes and oranges for buttons. The one she'd sorrowfully shipped off to a rummage sale an ocean away just two months ago. How was it possible it had ended up here?

  She remembered her sister telling her that the baby clothes she'd donated had been one of the first things to go at the church sale. "An old woman came in and snapped them up--all of them," Beth had told her. "She said she was buying them for some charity."

  Valerie knew Beth had thought it would make her feel good to hear that the clothes had sold so quickly, that they'd made a nice profit for the church and that they were going to help someone in need.

  But at the time she'd been angry. Furious, in fact. How dare they take the little dresses and nightgowns and playsuits she'd so lovingly created, and just toss them to some little snot-nosed brats who couldn't possibly appreciate what they were getting?

  Of course she didn't say that to Beth. And to her credit, she was over the whole thing before the sun went down that night. She realized her reaction had far more to do with the enormous disappointment she'd experienced with Will, than with the clothes themselves.

  She retraced her memory. Samantha had asked Henri to come for a load of clothes. Extras from a shipment they'd received from a church in the U.S. Could it be that the woman at the rummage sale had purchased them for Madame Duval's orphanage?

  But there were thousands of charities in the world, dozens of orphanages in Haiti alone. How could they have ended up here, in Brizjanti, of all places? And wasn't it even stranger that the clothes she had made would have been in the boxes of leftovers from Madame Duval's? She shuddered a sigh. It was too much. Yet, that had to be it. There was no other plausible explanation.

  The dining-room bell rang again, signaling time for chapel. Her mind still racing, she scooped Jacquette into her arms and went to help the older girls herd the little ones into the sanctuary.

  In a reverent stupor, she sang--or rather hummed--the Creole choruses with her eyes closed, soaking in the rich, heartfelt harmonies of this rapturous children's choir. Again and again, she turned over in her mind what had just taken place.

  Had she imagined it? It was a long time ago that she'd sewn the little dress. Maybe she'd forgotten what it looked like. Or maybe she'd copied a dress she'd seen in a store and just forgotten about that, too. It seemed too strange to be real.

  After choruses, it was time for devotions. The younger children were growing restless and she went to the back of the room to help quiet them.

  As Madame Phil made her way to the front, Valerie scooped Jacquette and another stray toddler up onto her lap. Resting her chin between their two dark heads, she looked around at the dozens of children wiggling in their seats in front of her.

  Two rows in front of her sat little John-Wesley, wearing a brown-and-green plaid shirt sewn from fabric left over from a jumper Valerie had made in tenth grade. Down the row from him, Marie-Andre wore a sleeveless shift of silky flocked magenta. She had ripped the seams in that dress more times than she cared to remember, trying in vain to keep the fabric from puckering.

  She let her gaze roam up and down the rows of benches. Everywhere she looked were little motherless Haitian children wearing the clothes she'd made for her babies!

  Madame Phil's voice droned pleasantly in the background, and the children squirmed in her lap. But suddenly it was as though the Lord and she were alone together in that room.

  His voice wasn't audible. Instead it was the still, small whisper she'd come to know so intimately over the past few weeks. Its resonance filled every corner of her heart.

  "Remember that request you put in for a dozen children?" He asked her now. And she was sure He was smiling.

  "Remember those babies you prayed for so faithfully when you were barely more than a little girl yourself?"

  She looked around that room and knew she was looking at her children, holding two of them on her lap. The babies she'd longed for and prayed for and waited not-so-patiently for over the past three decades.

&
nbsp; Her throat filled and she choked back tears of joy. And she knew in that moment--more clearly, more surely than she'd ever known anything in her life.

  She was home.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Valerie slept without waking once--or even dreaming, as far as she could recall. But now she lay on her back in the cot, listening to the roosters herald the morning, and watching a spider spin a web between the rafters of her room.

  Everything had seemed so clear yesterday during chapel. She'd felt certain that God had told her to remain in Haiti.

  But now, in the dim light of dawn, her resolve grew hazy. Even if she cashed in her meager 401K and sold everything she owned back in Kansas City, she wouldn't have more than a few thousand dollars to her name. She didn't have the vaguest idea what it would cost for her to remain at Hope House.

  And then there was the paperwork. She'd need a visa, wouldn't she? And there was everything involved in closing up her apartment and giving notice at her job.

  Never mind telling Beth. She could just imagine her sister's shocked protests when she gave her the news. "Why don't you find a way to help needy children here in the United States?" Beth would say. Or "You're just having a delayed reaction to the whole thing with Will."

  Maybe that was true. Maybe she needed to slow down and think about what had happened yesterday. Or what she thought had happened. She had no doubt God had whispered in her ear in that chapel service. But maybe she'd mis-interpreted what He said.

  Sighing, she swung her legs over the edge of the cot. She put her face in her hands and rubbed her eyes. It had seemed so simple then, sitting there with two precious babies on her lap. God had answered her prayers. She felt sure that was true. But what would it require of her?

  She considered what would happen if she just let everything go. Just stayed here. There were only a few things in her apartment that she even cared about. She'd never thought of herself as materialistic, but even so, her short time in Haiti had changed her perspective on possessions. Things--they only took time and energy. And she'd discovered that she could get by--no, not just get by--she could thrive on almost nothing as long as she had satisfying work to do and children who needed her. And the Lord, of course.

  She slipped to her knees and poured out her heart to Him. When she struggled to her feet half an hour later she was no more sure of how it would all be accomplished than she'd been when she knelt.

  But she knew she'd been called. She knew for certain that Brizjanti, Haiti, was as close to home as she would ever be this side of heaven.

  But she needed to talk it all over with someone wiser than she.

  "Valerie!" Betty Greene flung the door open and beckoned her inside. "Come in, come in. I feel like I've ignored you something awful these last few days."

  "Oh, please...You've had far more important things on your mind." Valerie glanced toward the hallway that led to the bedroom. "How is he?"

  Betty Greene laughed and pointed to Valerie's left. "See for yourself."

  Valerie's eyes adjusted to the dim light and she saw the outline of a figure seated in the easy chair in the corner of the room. Pastor Phil gave her a feeble wave.

  "Hey! You're looking good."

  "Same to you, Miss Valerie."

  Valerie followed Betty to the tiny sitting area. The Greene's cottage was stifling, yet Pastor Phil wore a thin sweater, and had a light afghan draped over his knees. Still, it was good to see him sitting up and with a little color in his face.

  Betty motioned for her to have a seat and they made small talk for a few minutes before Betty turned to look her hard in the eye.

  "What brings you here, Miss Valerie? You look like you have something on your mind."

  Did she wear her emotions so plainly on her face? But it was the opening she'd been waiting for. "Something happened yesterday," she said, "and I think maybe it was God's way of telling me that...well, maybe I'm supposed to stay here. In Haiti...at Hope House."

  Betty Greene waited, her expression concealing her thoughts as surely as Valerie's must have revealed her own.

  "I think maybe God is calling me here. But...how do you ever know for sure if it's God or if it's just your own desires?"

  The older woman smoothed her skirt before folding her hands in her lap. "Why don't you tell us what happened."

  She let her story spill out--about the clothes she'd made and about seeing Jacquette and the children at Hope House wearing them yesterday in the chapel. "It...it just seemed too much to be a coincidence."

  "Oh, Valerie. What a wonderful thing to happen. Amazing, really." Betty's eyes shone.

  Pastor Phil nodded his agreement, and swiped at a wrinkled cheek dampened by tears.

  Valerie was touched. "But do you really think it means anything? Am I stretching things to think that it is God's way of telling me to stay?"

  "Do you mean for the long term? Indefinitely?"

  Valerie shrugged. "Maybe..."

  Betty thought for a minute, then glanced in her husband's direction before turning back to Valerie. "Phil will have something more profound than I to say about that, I trust, but I think very often God does speak to us in just such ways--arranging circumstances to guide our lives."

  Again, the pastor nodded his agreement.

  "Could I stay? I mean, would you even have a place for me here. What would it take? I don't have a lot of money. I--"

  "Oh, my dear, money is the least of concerns. If God has truly called you, that will take care of itself."

  Pastor Phil shifted in his chair and folded back one corner of the afghan. "The question is: why do you want to come?"

  His question grabbed her by the heart. She struggled to put her reply into words. "It...it's just that I feel like here, I have something to offer. Back home, I don't know if I do."

  "I'm not sure that's the reason I wanted to hear," Pastor Phil said. "True, there is work to be done here. I won't be around forever and I want Betty to be able to have some...options when I'm gone."

  Betty Greene chastised him with little clicks of her tongue. But she reached out and put a hand gently on his arm. "Phil."

  The way she spoke her husband's name filled Valerie with the same longing she'd felt on that first visit to the couple, when Pastor Phil had gazed at his wife with such love in his eyes. Again she wondered if she would ever be privileged to know that kind of love in her life.

  Immediately she censured the thought. Hadn't God just granted her the desire she'd held so long in her heart for children? Would she throw it back in His face now, longing for the husband as well? She was hopeless.

  Philip Greene pushed himself up from the chair and rose on wobbly legs. Valerie was glad to see him up, and yet when she remembered the man who had jogged along the streets of Brizjanti with them not two weeks ago, the difference was startling. She stood with him.

  He put a firm hand on her shoulder. "Valerie, your flight is scheduled to take you back to the States on Saturday, is that right?"

  She nodded.

  He closed his eyes briefly as though what he intended to say pained him. But when he spoke, he held her eyes. "You go on back, as you planned. You spend some time in prayer, seek the Lord about what He desires for you. If you come back to Brizjanti, we need to know that it is because God's undeniable call is on your life and that this place is His divine appointment for you."

  "Thank you," she said, her voice as unsteady as the pastor's legs. "I'll come and...say goodbye before I go to the airport Saturday."

  "We'll be praying for you, my dear," Betty said.

  She could only nod.

  Betty walked her to the door.

  "It's so good to see Pastor Phil up and around," Valerie whispered, when they reached the door.

  "That medicine Dr. Jordan sent seems to be working wonders."

  "Oh? Max had the prescription Pastor Phil needed?"

  "It's something a little different than we've tried before. He consulted one of his colleagues in the States and had him a
irmail it in. I was afraid even to ask how much it cost to do that, but he wouldn't hear of letting us pay for it anyway. He's a good man. Max picked it up at the airport--the same day he got your bags."

  "That was awfully thoughtful of him." Max hadn't said a word. Even when she'd commented after church on how much better Phil Greene seemed to be doing. Max Jordan climbed another notch in her estimation.

  "It was thoughtful," Betty Greene said. "Very. Unfortunately, Dr. Jordan says he can't be on this particular drug for very long. At least not without special testing. Phil needs to see a heart specialist."

  "Maybe Max--Dr. Jordan--can arrange something? Maybe he could fly him to the States to see the specialist he got the pills from?"

  Betty Greene was shaking her head in denial before Valerie could finish her sentence.

  "But why not? I...I don't think money is an issue for Dr. Jordan, Betty."

  Betty wagged her head harder. "It's not that. Phil can't go back to the States."

  "But why not? You could go with him. I could stay here and help with the children." Excitement built in her as she thought of the possibility. "Maybe that's one of the reasons God called me to stay, Betty! If you teach me what I need to know to keep things running while you're gone--"

  Madame Phil put a hand on Valerie's arm and squeezed gently. "No, Valerie. I can't explain, but it is not a possibility for my husband to return to the United States."

  Valerie was confused. Why would Betty allow him to be refused necessary health care?

  Betty's tone was subdued now, her shoulders slumped as if in defeat. "We'll see how he gets along on this medicine. Maybe that will take care of his problem. Maybe he won't have the side effects Dr. Jordan was worried about."

  "That's what I'll pray for then." Valerie impulsively leaned to give Betty Greene a hug.

  She was rewarded with the woman's lovely smile. "You are a dear, Valerie. Thank you for coming. I feel better already."

  Oh, if only curing a failing heart were so easy.