paper the day after we’d finished. In the photograph above the text, I saw the only picture
that had ever been taken of the two of us.
It seemed so long ago. I brought the article nearer to my face. As I stared, I
remembered the way I felt when I had seen her that night. Peering closely at her image, I
searched for any sign that she suspected what would come to pass. I knew she did, but her
expression that night betrayed none of it. Instead, I saw only a radiant happiness. In time I
sighed and set aside the clipping.
The Bible still lay open where I’d left off, and although Jamie was sleeping, I felt the
need to read some more. Eventually I came across another passage. This is what it said:
I am not commanding you, but I want to test the
sincerity of your love by comparing it to the earnestness
of others.
The words made me choke up again, and just as I was about to cry, the meaning of it
suddenly became clear.
God had finally answered me, and I suddenly knew what I had to do.
I couldn’t have made it to the church any faster, even if I’d had a car. I took every
shortcut I could, racing through people’s backyards, jumping fences, and in one case
cutting through someone’s garage and out the side door. Everything I’d learned about the
town growing up came into play, and although I was never a particularly good athlete, on
this day I was unstoppable, propelled by what I had to do.
I didn’t care how I looked when I arrived because I suspected Hegbert wouldn’t care,
either. When I finally entered the church, I slowed to a walk, trying to catch my breath as I
made my way to the back, toward his office.
Hegbert looked up when he saw me, and I knew why he was here. He didn’t invite
me in, he simply looked away, back toward the window again. At home he’d been dealing
with her illness by cleaning the house almost obsessively. Here, though, papers were
scattered across the desk, and books were strewn about the room as if no one had
straightened up for weeks. I knew that this was the place he thought about Jamie; this was
the place where Hegbert came to cry.
“Reverend?” I said softly.
He didn’t answer, but I went in anyway.
“I’d like to be alone,” he croaked.
He looked old and beaten, as weary as the Israelites described in David’s Psalms. His
face was drawn, and his hair had grown thinner since December. Even more than I,
perhaps, he had to keep up his spirits around Jamie, and the stress of doing so was wearing