Earth Angels (3 page)

Joseph had learned long ago that Nathaniel was visible only to him, a phenomenon that never ceased to amaze him, because Nathaniel seemed so very solid and robust whenever he appeared.

His hair was silver blonde, and his eyes, too, were silver, like shimmering, brilliant moonlight reflected on water. But the rest of him was rather ordinary, his nose a trifle big for the rest of his face, his shoulders narrow, his middle a little paunchy. It was the feeling of peace and quiet confidence he exuded that made him seem otherworldly.

Without a word, Nathaniel laid a large, work worn hand gently on Zeke’s tousled curls.

Between one shriek and the next, the boy relaxed and fell into a deep sleep.

Joseph immediately set to work, snipping lengths of sutures from a spool, dipping them into a carbolic bath. “Is there nerve damage?” he asked Nathaniel. “It was undoubtedly jolted in the trip here.” He’d worked with Nathaniel often and relied on his ability to diagnose conditions that were beyond modern medicine’s scope.

“None.” Nathaniel’s voice was deep and resonant. It always had a calming effect on Joseph, no matter how dire the emergency. “He’s weakening, however. We’ll just control the bleeding—“

Nathaniel extended his hand and held it, palm down, over the seeping wound. In a moment, the blood coagulated and Joseph was able to see the vessels that needed tied off.

For the next hour, Joseph sat on a high stool, meticulously cleansing the wound, scarifying the edges and suturing. Nathaniel made quiet suggestions and helped set the bones. When the arm was at last encased in bandages and wooden splints, Nathaniel aimed a blue violet light from the palm of his hand toward the injured limb.

Joseph, familiar with this powerful healing technique, nevertheless felt chills run up and down his spine. He watched in awed silence until the powerful, otherworldly light faded and then slowly disappeared.

“Zeke will heal quickly now,” Nathaniel said with a gentle smile. “Healing energy works best with children because they have no barriers. They still remember the other world, and the light. He’ll sleep long and deeply, and when he awakens, the worst of the pain will be over.”

Joseph drew a soft blanket over the sleeping child and tucked it in. Heaving a deep sigh, he flexed his aching shoulders and looked deep into his friend’s silver eyes. The joyful peace, love and reassurance there wiped away his own weariness and exhaustion.

“Thank you, Nathaniel,” he said with heartfelt gratitude. “As always, I could never have done it without you.”

Nathaniel smiled, punching Joseph lightly on the shoulder. “Of course you could have. We have to work on your self-confidence. What I do, you can do as well. All you need is faith in yourself.”

For some obscure reason, Emma Walsh’s beautiful, animated face appeared in Joseph’s mind, vivid and smiling.

Nathaniel laughed quietly. “In that part of your life as well, Joseph. All you need is confidence.”

Joseph flushed, always forgetting that Nathaniel could somehow see his very thoughts.

Nathaniel added, “Your life is incomplete without that type of love.”

Joseph scowled and swallowed hard. He might rely on Nathaniel and be grateful to him, but he didn’t always have to agree with him. “I hardly think there’s anything lacking in my---“

He stopped because he was aware that he was now alone in the room. “—my life,” he finished in a whisper. Nathaniel had the most annoying habit of disappearing before Joseph could disagree with him.

“Is—is my Zeke gonna be okay?”

Joseph hadn’t heard the connecting door open. Emil stood there, wringing his huge, gnarled farmer’s hands, his weathered face lined with fatigue and anxiety. “I got a washtub of water boiling, and I chopped a pile of wood out back. There’s a pot of coffee brewin’.”

Joseph removed his glasses, cleaned them on the corner of his shirt, and smiled at the man. “Zeke’s gonna be just fine. He needs to be real quiet for a while, until that arm has a chance to heal some, but there won’t be any complications. I’m going to keep him here tonight, and you can come for him about noon tomorrow.”

“Thank the good Lord. And thank you, Doc.” Emil’s voice was thick with emotion. “Mary and me, we can’t thank you enough. Zeke’s our youngest, he’s Mary’s baby, and we was so scared….” His eyes filled with tears and he ducked his head and swiped at his eyes with the sleeve of his shirt.

“Let’s go have a cup of coffee, and I’ll fry us up some bacon and eggs. Bet you missed out on supper just like I did, Emil.”

At times like this, Joseph felt humble, embarrassed by the gratitude his patients heaped upon him. It was Nathaniel who deserved their thanks far more than he did, but how could one explain that an angel had assisted with their healing?

CHAPTER THREE

Emil had hitched his horse to his buggy and headed home long ago. Joseph sat by the fire, enjoying the taffy he’d bought and holding a mug of the truly horrible coffee Emil had brewed. He was pondering for the millionth time the presence of Nathaniel in his life.

He knew if he tried to explain about Nathaniel, the kind and simple folks of Demersville would shake their heads and whisper that poor Doc Gillespie was more than a mite touched in the head. And that would be the end of his medical practice. They wouldn’t trust him anymore.

But knowing how they’d react didn’t stop him from feeling guilty for taking credit for something he didn’t deserve. He’d discussed the problem with Nathaniel, and his angelic friend had bust into peals of laughter.

“Stop worrying about my ego, Joseph. I haven’t got one. You’re here on earth to learn lessons, and one of your big ones is about self worth. My task is to help you, nothing more, nothing less. I’m here for you whenever you call. I’m not going to get insulted and disappear because I feel I’m not getting my share of glory. I would leave only if you asked me to go.” He grinned in a decidedly mischievous way. “I get more than my share of Glory, Joseph. It’s unimaginably glorious where I come from.”

“Then why do you choose to come here?”

“It’s my job. I’m one of the earth angels, particularly assigned to work with healers.”

Joseph remembered now in vivid detail the first time he’d been aware of Nathaniel’s presence in his life. He was nearing the end of his difficult third year at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Exhausted by the prestigious medical school’s academic demands, drained by a lingering bout of influenza, and doubting his own abilities, he tried one night to study and couldn’t. His weary brain refused to absorb the complicated information that would be on tomorrow’s exam, and at last he gave up, despairing of ever passing his courses. More than anything else in the world, he wanted to become a doctor, but now that dream was shattered along with other, earlier dreams, and he lost all hope.

And then, for the first time, he’d felt Nathaniel’s presence. A loving, quiet voice in his mind assured him that everything would work out in spite of the difficulties, that he needed rest. The voice was so comforting Joseph wasn’t at all frightened.

He simply did as he was told, went to bed and slept soundly for several hours, and when he awoke again to study, the material seemed logical and crystal clear to him. He wrote the exam, feeling confident and calm, and attained a higher mark than ever before.

But later, facing final examinations, he once again fell into utter despair. Alone in his room, late at night, he tried to study for his most difficult course, pharmacology.

Hours passed, and the chemical symbols made less and less sense. Giving up at last, he threw his textbook to the floor. He’d never pass the examination, never attain his dream of becoming a doctor, and furthermore, he no longer cared. Having already written difficult examinations in anatomy, botany and chemistry, he was now certain he’d failed all of them.

Despondent, he began tossing his clothing into his trunk. There was no point in staying; he’d catch the early train home. But, he realized, Demersville was no longer home. He’d sold his parent’s farm to finance his education, so there was no home to return to. The girl he’d loved was dead. There wasn’t a living soul who cared if he lived or died. So maybe death was the answer. He began seriously contemplating ways and means.

At that moment, when he felt there was nothing left to live for, he felt someone reach over his shoulder and pluck the key to his trunk out of his hand.

He whirled, startled and shocked and not a little frightened, because the door to his room was bolted. There was a figure, standing a few feet away. Joseph could hardly breathe. The situation was terrifying.

“Who—who are you? How did you get in here?”

The man—at least he looked like a man—smiled at him, and Joseph was struck by his eyes, silver, but exuding such love and compassion as he’d never before encountered. Before he spoke a single word, Joseph felt an all-encompassing peace flow through him, a sense of absolute well being, the same feeling he’d experienced before.

“My name is Nathanial.” The man’s voice reverberated in every nerve in Joseph’s body. “I’ve come to help you. I’m your friend, Joseph, your soul’s companion. I’ve been with you always, I will be with you always.”

“What—what do you mean? Where did you come from? How did you get in here?”

“I came from Home. It’s where you came from, too. Usually you’re not aware of me, but your need is great just now, and I couldn’t reach you any other way.” He smiled again, a joyous, light-hearted smile. “You’re a hard-headed fellow, Joseph.” He leaned over and retrieved a paper Joseph had balled up and tossed in the wastebasket, then picked up the textbook from the floor.

“Let’s see what we can do with this list of symbols, shall we? You have a great future ahead of you as a healer, so let me help you with this last small obstacle.”

For some reason, Joseph acquiesced. He was too exhausted, too depleted to even argue or question. And somehow, with Nathaniel’s help, he easily mastered the material. Before Nathaniel disappeared that first night, however, Joseph needed answers to the things that were now bothering him.

“You’re not really a man, are you?”

“No, Joseph. I only appear to you as a man, because that is the way you can most easily accept my presence.”

“Are—are you an, an--angel?” Joseph felt ridiculous even saying the words. He was a scientist, schooled in facts and proof and reason. He certainly didn’t believe in angels.

Nathanial laughed. “That is the name most often associated with my kind. We are spirit, our purpose is to help you if you will allow it.” His voice became soft and infinitely caring. “You are my responsibility, now and always. My greatest pleasure is helping you.”

“But—but I don’t even believe in angels. There’s no concrete scientific proof they exist.”

Nathaniel shook his head. “You don’t have to believe in me, Joseph. I believe in you.”

“But—but why would you help me when I don’t even believe you’re—you’re real?”

Nathaniel shrugged, and there was a teasing note to his voice. “Do you always do things with the thought of a reward?”

“Of course not. When there’s a need, and if I can help—“

“Exactly.”

“But why me?”

“Why not you?”

And between one breath and the next, Joseph was alone.

He not only passed his examinations, he placed third in his entire class. And ever since then, Nathaniel had always been there for Joseph, just as he’d been tonight with Zeke. And until tonight, Joseph had assumed that Nathaniel was concerned only with the medical problems they tended to together.

“Your life is incomplete without that type of love……”

Nathaniel’s gentle reprimand echoed in Joseph’s head, and again the image of lovely Emma Walsh flashed into his mind.

Flirtatious, his head warned.

Warm, his heart answered.

Frivolous, his brain insisted.

Desirable, his body responded.

Out of the question, he told himself firmly. However attractive, Emma was a coquette who toyed with every man in sight. He’s witnessed it on numerous occasions in the store.

Against his will, he remembered the only other time he’d felt so attracted to a woman. Ruth Montgomery would never have dreamed of flirting the way Emma did.

But Ruth was dead.

In one jerky movement, he got to his feet, slopping cold coffee over his trousers.

Chalk and cheese, his mother used to say when two things were obviously opposite and not meant to be put together. Well, he and Emma Walsh were chalk and cheese.

Old Granny Simon, the ancient midwife who’d delivered half the town before she finally retired, came hobbling into the store early the next Monday, leaning on her cane.

Emma was glad the store was empty. She adored serving Granny, and she knew the old woman enjoyed the pots of tea and the biscuits Emma always served, business permitting.

The eccentric old woman was a living library reference when it came to facts about Demersville’s inhabitants.

For instance, Granny had told Emma that pompous, impossible to please Mrs. Buckley had once been the poorest little girl in town. She’d been forced to wear hand me down’s from the church bin, and children teased her for wearing their old discarded clothing. So now when she sailed into Walsh’s and treated Emma like a serving maid, all Emma had to do was imagine Mrs. Buckley as that miserable, hungry little girl, and it became the easiest thing in the world to smile cheerfully at her nastiness.