THE CAVERN OF DEEP HARMONY

PART FIFTY-THREE:

"Cranberries are at 11 o'clock," Luke informed Marshall, then leaned close, asking, "What does a best man wear?"

Marshall turned toward Eden. "Are we talking tuxes here?"

"Not that formal, I think," she replied. "What I like you in best, actually, is what you wore to dinner yesterday."

"Married in suede?"

She pressed her mouth to his ear so no one could hear. "It's the next best thing after a single daffodil."

He choked a little on his cranberry sauce and she patted his back. "Sorry," she giggled. "But that's the truth."

"What's the truth?" Connie asked, one eyebrow dramatically cocked.

Eden made a slight face at her cousin then ignored her. "Do you feel all right about wearing the tweed jacket?"

Marshall nodded, still clearing his throat from the sauce. "Do I wear tweed, too?" Luke piped in. "What's tweed?"

"It's the kind of jacket I wore yesterday evening, Luke," Marshall explained.

"I don't think I have anything like that," the boy said sadly.

"But I did when I was a boy," Ryan interjected. "Remember that suit you made me wear...um...I had...when I was about Luke's age, Mom? Isn't the box with those things still in the attic at the inn somewhere?"

Martha smiled. "I'd almost forgotten about that outfit. Yes, that was a chocolate and cream tweed. I'll look for it tomorrow."

"Is it ok to be a chocolate best man?" Luke wondered aloud.

"Yep," Marshall smiled. "I'm going to be a butterscotch groom."

"What about you, Eden?" Connie asked. "Do you have any idea of what you'd like to wear?"

"I saw a shop in Bellefont,"  she answered. "It had some lovely vintage dresses in it. I bet I could find something there."

"I know the one you mean," Marshall said, putting his hand on her arm. "My mother bought several dresses there. I like the idea of your marrying me in one of their gowns."

"Sounds like a female shopping day is in order this coming week," Edith smiled. She'd always rather hoped she'd be along when Eden picked out her wedding dress.

"And you, Mike," Martha asked, "what about that nice brown suit you have? A rust-colored tie would make that fit in just fine."

"I like that, Mike," Eden said, directing a large smile at him across the table.

Mike dipped his head again. "Ok," he replied. "Fine by me."

She studied his face. He'd been so withdrawn lately. Was it really fine with him that she'd asked this of him? He saw the serious, appraising look in her eyes and managed a reassuring smile.

"Who all do you want to invite?" Harold asked. "You got folks you want to come up from Pittsburgh?"

"I don't want it to get too big, I think," Eden replied thoughtfully. "I don't want the inn all stuffed with people, you know." She looked around the dining room. "Everyone here, that's who I want to be there. You, Marshall?"

"There's a couple of people from the hospital I'd like to invite, ones who were really special while I was recovering. Just two or three. We can have some sort of dinner back in Pittsburgh later for the ones who live there."  He lowered his voice. "But are you going to call your parents?"

"Tomorrow."  She looked across at Edith and Connie. Connie rolled her eyes slightly.

One of Stuart's daughter's had taken music lessons for years and there was a baby grand in a corner of the enormous living room. After dinner, everyone gathered there and sang again. Martha changed places with her niece and started the first few notes of Do You Hear What I Hear? "Come on, Marshall," she urged. "Will you do this one for us?"

Eden walked with him up next to the piano and he rested his right palm on its top edge. Luke and Wadsworth both pressed close to his legs. His voice rang out, true and mellow, and when he got to the do you see what I see? part, he put his left hand lightly atop Luke's hair but his face turned toward Eden as he sang "a star, a star, way up in the night, with a tail as big as a kite...."  She looked down at the ring he'd given her that morning. Had it just been that morning? Hadn't she worn it forever? Hadn't she been heading toward him all her life?  Lifting her eyes, she watched him standing there with the boy and the dog, his chin slightly tipped up as he sang.  And as she looked at him she felt as though she were standing at the rail of some weather-worn ship, gazing at the purple-blue ridge of the shore, with months of endless seas and storms behind her. "Land," she whispered to herself, knowing her soul had dropped anchor and was putting out in little boats for the harbor of him.

"Do you want to ride home in the car with us?" Harold offered as the evening wound down. "Bit cold for the sleigh."

"I'll be fine," Marshall smiled in his usual litany of reply. "And the sleigh is a marvelous way to travel on Christmas Day."

Harold shook his head. He just didn't understand how this stuff worked for Marshall, why he'd even care if he were in a car or in a sleigh if he couldn't see.  But it was obvious the man got some sort of pleasure out of things like that. Blindness was an entire mystery to Harold. The docs had said Luke would, in all probability, end up in that same dark place as Marshall. He wanted to believe it wasn't so bad and watching Marshall still enjoy things was, admittedly, a

bit of a comfort. But, God damn it, how he wished Luke didn't have to go there.

Martha saw that Marshall looked a bit tired by now and spoke quietly to Ryan. "Don't gallivant all over the countryside with them tonight, ok, son. He needs to get home and rest. You and Connie want to go for a longer ride, you do that after you drop them off."

Ryan, who was getting Bess back in harness, smiled at his mother. "What makes you think Connie and I want to go for a longer ride?"

"Well, you do, don't you?"

"You've got me," he grinned. He only had another week here before going back to Cleveland and wanted every moment he could get with Connie.

Martha stepped back, watching fondly as the two couples rode off. She stood there until they disappeared around the curve that led into the woods by the lake. The jingling of the bells grew fainter and she finally turned and went back inside to help with the last of the cleaning up.
She noticed Mike was stacking firewood in the corner of the living room for Stuart and went up to him. "I just want to be sure you know, Mike, dear, how very important you are to all of us, how much you matter to us."

He paused, three logs still in his arms. "Thanks, Martha," he said quietly, then turned to lay the logs carefully on the stack.

Martha sighed and walked toward the kitchen. Luke was asleep on the couch, waiting for his parents to gather him up and drive back to the inn. He always tugged at her heart strings and she stood a moment, just looking at him with great tenderness, remembering how Marshall had spoken to him this evening.

Eden cuddled against Marshall's right side in the sleigh. The snow had stopped and silver-edged mounds of clouds moved across the sky rather quickly, diminishing in size so that the spaces between them grew steadily wider. "The stars are coming out," she breathed contentedly, "and there's a nice moon starting to peek through."  It was nearly midnight and yet the world was bright all around them. She thought of the old lines, "...the moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow, gave the luster of mid-day to objects below."  It was like that. You didn't need lights provided by mankind. Nature, all by itself, had lit the night and reflected it on the snow so that the shadows of trees were etched as clearly on the white ground as if a spotlight were shining on them.  She was trying to find words to describe it properly for Marshall, but how did you explain what a shadow was?

Connie and Ryan were cuddled, too, and whispering together as he guided the sleigh. She said something that made him laugh and he let the sleigh get too close to the edge of the road. The right-hand runner hit a large rock completely buried under the snow and rode up over it, causing the sleigh to tip sharply and suddenly. With its load of four adults, the sleigh was more easily over balanced and and continued to angle up and over so the people in it were thrown out to the left on the lane.

Marshall felt the sleigh heave up, heard Ryan's shouted expletive, knew Eden was falling. There was only one thing completely filling his mind in that split second. She must not be allowed to impact the road.  He grabbed for her, his right arm locking firmly about her waist, pulling her so that her body was atop his. He curved his left arm up, putting his hand behind her head as the two of them arced in what seemed like slow motion out of the sleigh. He came down flat on his back with a thud that reverberated completely through him. Less than a second later, she landed fully atop him and the inner explosion of the first thud rising up met the second blasting down.

Connie came down near Eden, her right ankle twisting painfully under her. Ryan landed on hands and knees in a bit of a snowdrift, shaken to his core. Eden lay atop Marshall, trying to gather her scattered senses. His hand was still protectively behind her head. Finally she gasped and sat up, rolling to the side off him and onto her knees. Connie was moaning and clutching her ankle as Ryan crawled the short distance to her. The sleigh had righted itself and come to a stop just down the road, Bess unhurt and still in harness.

Eden's eyes took in that fact and the thought flitted through her mind that she was glad the horse was ok. Wadsworth, who had been running just behind the sleigh, was poking his nose at Marshall's left ear. Eden turned to thank Marshall for padding her fall. He lay on his back, his arms now that she had sat up, fallen out away from his sides.

"Marshall? Darling?"  She scrambled as close as she could get to him.   She'd seen him unconscious, semi-conscious, and sleeping. Something was different now. His lids were only half-closed and his jaw was quite slack. She crouched, staring at him in the bright moonlight, her hands on his chest.

"Marshall?"  Something long and icy made its way through her being, stabbing, ripping, shredding as it moved inexorably. No, she said to herself. No. This can't be. This cannot be. And she took the hands of her soul and tried to yank the icy thing out, but it only settled in more deeply, more utterly coldly.

Shaking, her hands moved to his neck, feeling for his pulse. Nothing. Frantic, she pulled off her gloves, feeling again where Miles had showed her. There was no answering rhythm of blood being pumped. There was nothing. Sitting back on her heels, she stared at his face. He wasn't there. Oh, God...he'd gone. He was lying on his back, on his back in the snow, and he'd left her.  The realization of it mowed her down like a scythe and a piercing, primal scream ripped out of her throat before she crumpled to the side in the snow.

ON TO PART 54

BACK TO LIBRISCROWE

BACK TO PART 52

BACK TO INDEX