The Wedding Dress(74)

“Some folks on the front row snickered.” Thomas shook his head.

“Yet he didn’t let it bother him or break his concentration,” Mary Grace said. “Time ticked on. Thomas didn’t move, and nothing happened.”

“The sweat under my shirt started soaking through. I’d just put my entire reputation and ministry on the line with that crazy request.”

“So, what’d he do? He requested it again.” Mary Grace popped the air with her lightly fisted hand. A don’t-you-just-know gesture.

“Just in case the folks in the back wanted to snicker too.” Thomas and Mary Grace told their story like a well-danced waltz.

“‘Lord,’ he said, ‘Master of the wind and the waves, Creator of all things, Lover of our souls—’”

“If you’re going to go down, go down praising His good name.” Thomas raised his hand, waving toward heaven.

“‘Send us a cool, gentle rain,’” Mary Grace finished.

“The chairs were creaking,” Thomas said. “Men were clearing their voices, tugging on their sweaty collars. Babies cried and mamas tried to cool themselves by waving fans.”

“It was the longest minute of our lives, waiting to see what Thomas, or God, would do. Then . . .” Mary Grace paused, eyes sparking. Charlotte leaned toward her, hand gripping her water cup. Hillary hovered close. “Then the tent shook a bit.”

“The air stirred.”

“And the sweetest cool breeze rushed right under the tent, around our chairs. Through people’s hair. You could see the ends flutter.”

“It smelled like new mown grass. Folks rose to their feet, started praising. Just when their voices hit a crescendo, the softest rain pitter-pattered on the top of the tent. It rained the rest of the night and all the next day.” Thomas sat back, a smile on his lined face, his coffee cup shimmering in his hand.

“I tell you,” Mary Grace said. “There were no atheists in the crowd that night. We had a ton of folk who gave their hearts to the Lord. Even had a couple of healings. Remember the boy with polio, Tommy?” Her dark eyes sparkled. “Threw down his crutches, snapped off his brace, and ran around the tent like a freed man. His daddy finally caught him and let a doctor in attendance examine him. He determined the boy had a whole new leg.”

“A boy was healed of polio?” Hillary set her coffee down with a snort. “Just like that.” She snapped her fingers. “I’ve been a nurse for almost forty years. I’ve never seen anyone healed of anything like polio.”

“I see. So your faith is based on your experience? What you’ve seen? Won’t get you very far.” Thomas was no longer an old man. He spoke with authority. “Without faith it’s impossible to please God.”

“Thomas, please.” Mary Grace squeezed his fingers, gentling her way into his sentence. “It was a bona fide miracle, medically proven. Now, darlings, what was it you wanted to know from us?”

Yes, back to the dress. Charlotte cleared her throat and smoothed her hand over her Malone & Co. skirt.

“Mary Grace, Hillary found this picture in a box of her parents’ things.” Charlotte indicated Hillary should pass over the picture of the Talbots with her parents.

“On the back it has a date,” she said. “The day my parents bought the house from you.”

“Oh my.” Mary Grace pressed her small, spotted hand to her chest. “That was so many years ago.”

Thomas put on his glasses and leaned in to see the photograph. “Who’s the young, beautiful lady I’m standing next to?”

Mary Grace chortled. “I was in my late thirties and dreading turning forty, thinking it was so old.”

“Bet you’d trade now if you could, wouldn’t you, love?” Thomas said.

“In a gnat’s breath.”

Maybe they’d want to trade with Charlotte or Hillary, but Charlotte wanted to trade with them. Even for a moment. To know what it felt like to love for seventy-two years. To tell a story in perfect harmony. To still hear she was the prettiest bride in Birmingham.

“You’re with my parents. Lindell and Arlene Saltonstall.” Hillary moved over to Thomas, who held the picture. “They bought the house from you in ’57. I was ten. I had an older brother. We called him Shoop.”

“Hillary, you were the young girl I left the dress for.” Mary Grace sat back, sighing, and closed her eyes. “Tell me, were you any relation to the Saltonstalls who owned the mines? My father worked their mines for thirty years.”

“My great grandfather was one of the brothers. But my grandfather, Paul Saltonstall, didn’t want anything to do with the family mines. He went in another direction. Wanted to be in engineering.”

As Hillary spoke, Mary Grace tipped her head back. Her eyes fluttered closed.

“Mrs. Talbot?” Charlotte started to get up. Was the woman all right? Thomas didn’t seem alarmed. Or very awake himself.

“Dear, call me Mary Grace.” She opened her eyes. “I was just remembering my father. So, Hillary, tell me, did you wear the gown?”

Hillary flowed with the stilted conversation. “Yes, yes, I did.”

Charlotte could hear Hillary’s heartbeat in her words.

“I married my first husband in that dress. Six months later he was killed in Viet Nam.”