Pages of Promise, page 26
“It would be nicer if Stephen would come to the reunion.”
“I don’t think he will,” Leslie said quietly. “He was polite and nice about it, but he says he just can’t do it.”
“Why can’t he do it? What’s such a big deal about coming to his own family reunion?”
“You ought to know, Pete. He’s the only failure. He sees his sister who’s a successful movie star, he sees his cousins doing well in business, his uncles’ and aunts’ successes at what they do. And he’s ashamed of what he did to us and of being what he calls an ‘ex-con.’ That’s a lot to overcome.”
“That’s foolish!”
“It’s exactly,” she said sprightly, “the sort of thing you would do if you were in his place! He’s very like you in that respect.”
“Is he? Well, I wish he were more like you.” They stood in a half embrace, and Leslie said heavily, “He’s got to make his own decision, Pete. No one can make it for him. I just thank God that he is out of prison and doing better than he has been. That’s enough for me—for now.”
Jake had driven Rose and Lenora down from Chicago. Stephanie was in Germany. She had been in Lebanon covering the crisis there from July to October, had taken a brief vacation at home with Jake, then in November was sent to Berlin, where tensions were building with the Soviet Union. “I just got a letter. She’s starting with the Associated Press the first of the year,” he told Jerry as soon as they met at the Delight. “She’s thrilled because this is the first job she’s gotten on her own merit rather than on your dad’s influence. And,” he continued, smiling, “since the AP is based in New York, she and I will at least be on the same continent more often—I hope.”
Laurel and Richard and Johnny had come with Jake, too, and were staying on at the Vine until it was time to go back to school in January. Johnny, at eight, was growing like a weed. Richard had adopted him as soon as he and Laurel were married. When Johnny asked about his father, they told him he had died, but they discussed between themselves at what point they should tell him—if they should tell him—that his parents had not been married. Mona spoke of this to Adam, who sought out Richard.
“I don’t know if you’re aware that I was born out of wedlock,” Adam said. Richard was startled—it had never crossed his mind and he had never heard anyone in the family mention it. “I think the sooner your boy knows the truth the better. Otherwise when he does find out—and he will—he may feel lied to, even if you’ve just omitted a fact.”
“Yes,” said Richard, “we’ve pretty much decided we do have to tell him, but when is the time right? He’s not concerned about anything like that now.”
“I think maybe that’s the best time. He can sort of get used to the idea before it becomes important. I was older when I found out about my father, and I went into a tailspin for a while.” Richard didn’t comment—he didn’t want to pry and ask for details. Adam continued, “I was about Johnny’s age when my mother married my real father—your uncle Jesse.” Adam smiled. “I loved Jesse, and he loved me, but he never adopted me even though I called him Dad. Aside from all the Stuart pride, I think you’ve done a good thing for Johnny by giving him your name. You and Laurel have to decide what’s best to tell him, but I thought I’d give you my ideas as one who’s been through it.”
“Thanks, Adam. You’ve given me a lot to think about. And you’ve set me wondering—what other family secrets am I missing out on?”
“Well, you know your mother practically raised me, don’t you?”
“I always had the impression that she’d had a lot to do with you, that she met my dad while she was your nanny.”
“Yeah. I remember some of it. Your dad was sort of wild back then,” Adam said.
“I’ve heard that. What do you remember?”
“Maybe you should ask him about it.”
“Another family secret, I guess,” Richard said, smiling.
Bobby didn’t come to the reunion because he had a concert date. Jerry and Bonnie were deeply concerned about his lifestyle. But they had a lot to be happy about in Laurel and Richard. They had given them a wedding, “since,” Jerry told Bonnie, “we didn’t have to pay for a wedding for Stephanie.”
“Well, I finally get a grandchild out of it at least,” Bonnie sighed. “But they live so far away, it’s not fair—I hardly get to spoil Johnny at all. I suppose it’s a good thing I stopped counting on having my grandchildren around.” She had gone to work as a volunteer for the Salvation Army in Los Angeles, so she and Lenora had to compare notes about operations in their respective cities.
Mona and Tom, too, were staying at the Vine instead of the crowded hotel. Mona was excited to see how Stephen had improved in health and how his whole attitude had changed. She whispered to Tom, “There’s something about this place. It makes people different.”
“It’s not just this place,” Tom said. “Have you seen the way he looks at Carmen?”
“Yes. You noticed that, did you?”
“I’m a sensitive writer. We notice things like that,” he said solemnly. Stephen was sitting beside a table cracking walnuts with Carmen, who picked them out with a pick and agile fingers. Granny was there also, and she was telling the children a story about how to cure snake bite.
Without preamble, Mona went over and stood before Stephen. “Won’t you please come to the reunion?” she said. “Everyone wants you to be there.”
Stephen shifted uneasily. “Maybe next year, Sis. It’s too soon.”
Mona said, “It’s your decision, Stephen. You know they’ll all come over here to see you, anyway.”
“I’ll think about it.”
As soon as the door closed, Stephen said to Granny, “I wish they wouldn’t keep bugging me about the reunion.”
“You orta go. You’re just stubborn,” Granny said firmly. She put the cup of nuts down on the table, gave him a withering look, then stomped out.
Her behavior irritated Stephen, and he got up and walked around the room several times nervously. Truthfully, he wanted to go to the reunion, but he could not face the looks of pity he was sure they’d all give him. He could not stand pity.
“Stephen?” Carmen came into the room. She said quietly, “You ought to go to the reunion.”
Staring at her with an expression of disbelief, Stephen said angrily, “Don’t you start on me, Carmen! I’m not going!”
“No one can make you go, but you talk to me about how I need to face up to things. Well, what about you?”
“It wouldn’t prove anything if I went.”
“It wouldn’t prove they love you—you already know that. But it would prove that you are a man who has some toughness in him.” He stared at her, and she saw anger and frustration in his eyes. “You’re a Stuart, and you ought to be proud of that. If I had a family like you do, you wouldn’t catch me running away from them, no matter what I’d done.”
“You don’t understand, Carmen. They’ll feel sorry for me.”
“What’s wrong with that? When Enrique knocked all the hide off his knee, didn’t you feel sorry for him?”
“That’s–that’s different!”
“It’s not different at all. When we hurt ourselves or do something foolish or stupid, you don’t think it’s good for others to feel pity and compassion?” She argued without anger, and there was a gentleness in her voice that wore him down. He had been staring out the window trying to ignore her, but she touched his arm and said, “Please, will you do it for me, Stephen?”
He turned and saw that her lips were trembling. “Why does it mean so much to you?” he asked quietly.
“Because—I don’t want to see you hurt. I want to see you be the man that you can be.”
Stephen looked into her face and found an answer that he had been searching for. He took a deep breath, then said, “If I go, will you go with me—and bring the kids?”
Her answer was all ready for him. She knew she would be frightened to be thrust into a setting where she was the only outsider, but she lifted her chin and said, “Yes, we will all go. Now go get ready. I’ll get the children ready.
Jerry finally came across Gavin, in the lobby of the hotel. “Man, what a fertile bunch we Stuarts are!” said Gavin.
“Guess we’re in on the postwar baby boom, all right,” Jerry chuckled, “though you couldn’t tell it in my branch of the family.”
“Well, give it time, Nephew. Say, Phil’s boys went to one of Bobby’s concerts. They were hoping he’d be here. They tell me he’s as good as Elvis!”
“We’ll see if Elvis’s popularity outlasts his stint in the army.”
They filled each other in on family news. Gavin said, “I didn’t think Nolan was ever going to finish medical school. I keep trying to get him interested in flying just so I’ll have something to talk to him about.”
Jerry laughed with him, then said, “Speaking of flying, Gavin, I’ve gotten involved with something an old flyboy like you might be interested in. Have you ever heard of Wycliffe Bible Translators?”
“No, can’t say I have. They fly?”
“Well,” said Jerry, “they’re missionaries and they need pilots to fly them in and out of remote places—bush pilots.”
Gavin looked interested. “You think they’d want old duffers like us?”
“Bonnie and I are going to South America for three months. She’s going to work in one of their offices, and I’m going to fly missionaries and supplies in and out of the jungle. You and Heather want to come?”
“Sure,” Gavin said. “At least I do. I don’t know about Heather and the jungle.” He looked thoughtful. “Do they take decent care of the planes, or are they crashes waiting to happen?”
“No. You’d be impressed. They’re very professional.”
Jerry saw a gleam of excitement in Gavin’s eyes that hadn’t been there in a long time. “Maybe Phil would be interested, too—but his kids are still too young to have their old man risk his life, like those young men who got killed in Ecuador a couple years ago,” Gavin said. “Come on. Let’s go talk to Heather and see what she thinks about it. Let’s get Bonnie to talk to her, too. Would you and me get to work together? Wouldn’t that be like old times!”
Lylah had flown in to Fort Smith with Adam and Maris and Suzanne and Samuel. “I don’t know if it was easier when I was younger or when they were!” she told Lenora. Lylah’s health had bounced back some. “I work less, have made some new friends—old ladies like me. We gossip and eat and talk about our grandkids. But we’ve been talking about finding some sort of project to work on. I bet you’d have some ideas about that?”
Lenora smiled. “I think I might be able to make some suggestions. How about visiting folks in the hospital or in the old folks’ home? Or maybe some juvenile delinquents need grannies? Or you could work with Bonnie at the army’s home for unwed mothers. Is that enough, or should I keep going?”
“I think that’s enough to think about. Do you think I’d have to tell them I was an unwed mother? But maybe they’d like to know it isn’t the end of their lives. And Bonnie and I haven’t spent much time together in years. That would be nice. But do you know she and Jerry are going to be what they call short-term missionaries, in South America?”
“No. Really? That’s wonderful! I hadn’t heard that. It must have something to do with airplanes if Jerry is going. Tell me about it.”
The big meal was ready, and the family gathered in the large dining room of the Delight. Tourists had discovered the Ozarks, and Merle had had six rooms added on the previous spring and had moved a wall to enlarge the dining room. “Still,” he told Arlene, “there are so many Stuarts this year that next time we might have to prop the dining room doors open and run tables out into the lobby!”
Jerry sat in the place at the table that had always been Amos’s. Last year they’d left that chair empty, but Rose told her son it was time that he took it. Johnny sat next to his grandma Bonnie and enjoyed all the attention. Jake sat next to Richard and talked about Stephanie. “She says being a woman in this line of work has some advantages. Sometimes she can get stories from people because she doesn’t seem as threatening as a man might. But I think it’s because men like to talk to pretty women.”
Logan had invited Granny to come and they sat with Violet and Dent and Clint and Carol and all their kids, Logan’s beloved grandchildren. “I’m sure glad Richard and Laurel will be here a while,” he said. “I’ve missed ’em.”
“I don’t know how you could miss anybody with a mess of relations like this!” Granny chuckled.
Owen rose, and as he did everyone in the dining room thought the same thing, that Amos was missing. Always it had been Amos, the oldest, who stood and made the opening remarks and called for Owen to ask the blessing. The mantle had fallen on Owen, who said, “We all still miss Amos, don’t we? I know I do. But I’m proud of our family, as he was. Our family has worked to bring about good for our country, some in the military, some in various kinds of ministry, some—” He stopped abruptly and straightened, his eyes open wide with a mild shock.
Everyone turned, and it was Leslie who whispered, “Stephen!”
Stephen came through the entryway. His right arm was holding Carmen, and his left hand clutched Consuela’s hand. Enrique stood beside his mother smiling, looking not at all frightened.
A quiet fell over the dining room for just a second, and then Stephen said, “We’d like to join you—if we could.”
Pete was already on his feet. “I’ve got a place saved for you over here—all of you. Come over here, Son.” As the four made their way to Pete’s table, every Stuart, every in-law, cousin, uncle, aunt, all had to go shake Stephen’s hand and pound him on the back. Most of them managed to kiss Car-men and shake hands with Enrique and wheedle a kiss out of Consuela. There was a hubbub of laughter and talking, and when Stephen looked around at Carmen he saw tears running down her cheeks. His own eyes felt misty, and he said huskily, “Well, they’ll get tired of this pawing at us sooner or later.”
Carmen held his arm tightly. “I don’t mind,” she whispered, diamonds in her eyes.
When order was restored and people had been persuaded to get back to their places, Stephen said, “There’s something I want you all to know. Carmen and I have both given our lives to Jesus Christ, and we want to serve him the rest of our lives.”
Owen looked at them fondly. He closed his eyes and began to thank God not only for the food, but for the family. As Owen prayed, Stephen found Carmen’s hand. He squeezed it, and she squeezed back fiercely.
Peter and Leslie made no pretense of bowing their heads. They were both staring at their son, and Leslie whispered in a voice trembling with emotion, “He’s going to be all right, Pete!”
Pete put his arm around his wife and said, “Yes, the circle is unbroken.”
EPILOGUE: THE LEGACY
The events of the fifties shaped the events of following decades. That’s how history works.
Stalin died in 1953. The colorful Nikita Khrushchev eventually gained the ascendency over his rivals. Krushchev’s anti-Stalin rhetoric was blamed for encouraging Soviet satellites to revolt. One of the lasting images of the fifties is that of Soviet tanks rolling through the city streets of Eastern Europe—Berlin in 1953, Poland and Hungary in 1956—putting down civilian uprisings against Communist regimes. By the late fifties, like a gushing wound, as many as twenty thousand refugees a day were fleeing from East to West Berlin. This flow was dramatically stopped when Soviet-controlled East Berlin erected the Berlin Wall in 1961.
The “space race” and the “arms race” lasted until the end of the Cold War. Sputnik I and II , the first earth-orbiting satellites, were launched in 1957 by the Soviets and created a sense of national crisis—the U.S. seemed to be falling behind its adversary. The psychological impact was enormous. Sputnik drastically changed American plans in politics, budget-making, education, military buildup. Fear that the Russians had the capability to launch a nuclear attack on the United States was growing, evidenced by more elaborate plans for civil defense developed in the late fifties.
The Civil Rights movement continued gaining ground. The fights over desegregation in the fifties continued into the sixties, from the nonviolence promoted by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., student sit-ins at lunch counters, and growing black pride, to the rioting in Watts, Newark, and Detroit in the mid-1960s and the assassinations of black leaders like Malcom X and King.
Television had begun to make its mark. It was Joseph McCarthy’s televised investigations of the army in 1954 that shined public light on his tactics and brought about the downfall of this man who through beguiling fabrications had driven people from their jobs, had aroused public condemnation against them, and had destroyed their reputations.
Some of the fifties fads endured—American Bandstand, Silly Putty, Slinky. The Barbie doll appeared late in the decade to become an icon selling in the millions, and clothing manufacturers could hardly keep up with the demand.
And the Stuarts endured. Their legacy was the adequacy of Jesus Christ in all times, whether of war or of peace, joy or sorrow. Some of the family found their peace through community, like Richard and Stephen, some through solitude, like Mona. They came by varied routes to personal acceptance of the family’s fundamental creed: Christ is the answer.
IN THE NEWS
Five Missionaries Slain in Ecuador
by S. Stuart Taylor QUITO, ECUADOR
10 January 1956 (INS)
Five American missionaries were killed on January 8 by members of a tribe of Auca Indians they were trying to evangelize. The information so far is that the missionaries had made contact several times with the Auca, at the Curaray River in northeastern Ecuador, but on this occasion something went terribly wrong, and five young men are dead, leaving behind widows and young children.
