Her eyes rolled back in her sockets and she began to moan. He squeezed her hand and said her name repeatedly, panicking, but he could not snap her out of her fit. After what seemed like an eternity, her breathing steadied and she was able to focus on him again with glassy eyes.
“Paul. I want to see my baby. Bring him to me. Bring me my little George.”
He swallowed hard and wiped his eyes. “I can’t, Kathryn. Don’t you remember?” After Paul’s mother died, and Kathryn and his brother, Hector, began to show symptoms, Henry had ordered Paul’s sister, Penny, and remaining brother, Martin, to take baby George to Chesterfield. They had broken quarantine. “Don’t worry. Martin returned last night with the news. George is safe; my sister will care for him at Uncle’s house.”
She wailed with such anguish that he thought his heart would rip in two. It was the forlorn sound of a mother who just realized she would never see her child again. He stroked her sweaty, matted hair until she calmed. She sat quietly for a few minutes and then fixed her worried gaze on him.
“Where is my son? I want to hold my baby, Paul. I want to see my baby,” she begged.
He looked into her eyes. She was delirious. It was pointless to explain again. “I know you do, sweetheart. I know. Soon. I promise.”
Two hours later, her fever returned and she shook so violently that he was afraid her bones would rattle loose from the sockets. He piled every blanket and piece of clothing they owned on top of her until the tremors subsided.
“Open the shutters, please,” she asked him.
He did as she requested and a golden beam of sunshine emblazoned the room. She smiled.
“Paul, I don’t want to die here.”
“I know, sweetheart. I don’t want you to die either.”
“No,” she coughed. “I don’t want to die here.”
“Then where do you want to go?”
“Take me to Cucklett Delf. To our spot under the old elm tree.”
“When the time comes, I will. I promise.”
“Take me there now, Paul.”
Paul lifted his dying wife gingerly out of the open-air carriage, and carried her in his arms across the meadow of Cucklett Delf. He did not stop to rest until they reached the shade of the majestic English elm. Gently, he lowered her to the ground and helped her recline, with her back resting against his chest, and his back propped against the trunk of the tree. They sat in silence, together as one, listening to the birds and breeze. They watched the sun inch closer to the horizon. He kissed the top of her head again and again, telling her how much he loved her each time. At sunset, he picked a wildflower and stripped the leaves off. He bent the stem into a loop, and wove the remainder around itself. At the top of the impromptu ring sat a violet flower. Then, taking his wife’s trembling hand, he slipped the wildflower ring onto her ring finger, just as he had done nearly a year before.
In silence, and in peace, they watched the fire-red sun retire below the horizon, and he held her in his arms until the eternal night claimed her.
CHAPTER 9
Paul Foster chased his six-year-old son through the knee-high summer grass of Cucklett Delf. George howled with delight every time his father caught him by the waist, swept him off his feet, and spun him around. As soon as Paul set George on the ground, the boy would scamper away, and the game would begin anew. When Paul was winded, he beseeched his son to join him for a rest under the shade of the English elm on the hill. George whined in protest until at last he took a seat next to his father.
“What are you doing?” George asked.
“I’m making a ring.”
“A ring of flowers?”
“Yes.”
“Who are you making it for? Auntie Penny?”
“No. I’m making this for your mother.”
“But Father, Mama is in heaven. How are you going to give it to her?”
Paul smiled. “I’m going to leave it here, at our special place. Then, after we leave, she can come get it.”
George nodded. It was an entirely satisfactory plan to his six-year-old mind.
“What was Mama like?”
Paul turned to his son, surprised. It was the first time George had asked this question. Paul smiled and retrieved Kathryn’s leather-bound diary from his back pocket. It was time.
“Your mother was a beautiful person, not only on the outside, but especially on the inside.”
George liked this answer and hugged his father’s arm. He watched intently as his father paged through the diary.
“This was your mother’s diary. Before she went to heaven, she gave it to me, as a present.”
“Will you give it to me as a present?” “Yes. Someday, a long time from now, when it’s time for me to go to heaven, then I will.”
George nodded.
Finding the right spot in the diary, Paul draped the silk bookmark into the crease between pages. “George, would you like me to read the letter that your mother wrote to you, just before she went to heaven?”
The boy looked at his father with wonder. “Mama wrote me a letter?”
“Yes, a very special letter. Do you want me to read it?”
“Oh, yes,” George exclaimed, with high-pitched bravado.
August 14, 1666
To my dearest son,
It will be many years before you are old enough to read this, but when the day comes, I pray that you have room in your heart enough to love a mother you have never known. For my heart is so full of love, and swollen with pride, to have birthed a son as strong and fair as you. The three months since your birth have passed so quickly, and I am left aching for more time. My tears flow at the melancholy idea. But know this, I have cherished every moment with you, and you will occupy my every thought till my last waking breath.
From the first moment I felt you growing inside me, I have pondered your future. What nature of man will you be? Will you be caring and passionate like your father? Will you be proud and obstinate like your grandfather Henry, or will you be congenial and temperate like your grandmother Alice? Will you be strong like the Fosters or softer like the Vicars clan? Will you be devoted and humble like my father, your namesake, or will you be carefree and enchanting like my mother, Mary? No doubt you will possess little pieces of all the people I love, which brings me peace. I am left only wondering now what traits you will have received from me.
It is an impossible task to write in verse all the lessons of love and happiness that a mother would share with her only son, over the days, months, and years of a lifetime. So instead, I will pen only the most important:
Patience. Be patient with others, but especially with yourself. Life will try to rush you, but do not let it. An extra minute spent to watch the sun set, or to play with a rain drop as it trickles down the windowpane, or to hug your father before you’re off on your next adventure, is the very minute that makes life worth living.
Laughter. Laugh everyday, and as much as you can. Never at the expense of others, but rather, in communion with them. Life should never become so serious and dreadful that you cannot find it in your heart to laugh and to smile. Good people laugh. Loving people laugh. Happy people laugh.
Kindness. Be kind. Kindness seems an effort because it is in our nature sometimes to be lazy. So I beseech you my son, don’t be lazy and don’t discriminate when it comes to kindness. What is kindness? Kindness is please and thank you. Kindness is offering a hand when another cannot carry a burden. Kindness is never being cruel to animals. Kindness is unsolicited encouragement. Kindness is paying a compliment when you know someone needs it. Kindness is giving hope instead of advice.