While Addie was an expert tree climber, she would never have considered using those skills to sneak around town. Spying on folks wasn’t right. As Charlie said, though, “When you’re a child, no one tells you anything, so you need to eavesdrop sometimes, to know what’s going on.” They’d tried listening in on the town meetings through the chimney, but it didn’t really work. So they mostly just climbed up here to get a better view of anything taking place in the village square.
Like bringing a boy back to life.
Bringing Charlie back to life.
She crawled across the roof carefully, slipping a little as she went but always catching herself in time. Below, she could hear Preacher asking someone if they’d seen Addie. They hadn’t. No one had.
If Addie went down there, she wasn’t sure that Preacher would stop her from watching. He probably wouldn’t. He and Sophia really were teachers, right down to their bones. They’d explain why she ought not to watch, but if she insisted, they’d let her, believing it was always best to see a thing for yourself. To learn a lesson for yourself.
She didn’t care. She wasn’t going to watch this with them standing beside her, suffocating under the weight of their disapproval. Even recalling their expressions when she told them made her want to scream. Made her want to charge back home, grab her belongings, leave, and never come back.
They’d betrayed her. That’s what she felt, and it hurt worse than any of her dead father’s beatings. Eleazar had promised to bring Charlie back, and they wouldn’t even consider that he might be able to work miracles. Sophia and Preacher—the very people who’d taught her about God.
She took a deep breath and calmed herself as she crept to the front. She stretched out there, then inched forward until she could peer down.
Below was Charlie’s coffin. Still closed. Eleazar knelt beside it. Addie couldn’t see the old man—Rene. He must have stayed inside, where it was warm.
Mayor Browning stood at the foot of the coffin. Dobbs and Doc Adams flanked him. All three stared at the coffin as if mesmerized. The other spectators milled about, peering over and then whispering to themselves, as if wondering what the fuss was about. They hadn’t been told. Good. If people knew, they’d all come running and they’d crowd around and Addie wouldn’t see the miracle. Wouldn’t see Charlie rise.
If she listened closely, she could hear Eleazar talking. She couldn’t understand what he was saying, though. It wasn’t English.
Because Christ didn’t speak English. That’s what Sophia told her when she’d asked why the Bibles were translated. Jesus spoke another language and so did the people who wrote the Bible. Hearing Eleazar speaking in a foreign tongue proved he was no fraud.
He finished the words, and then he reached for the coffin lid. Addie held her breath, her heart beating so hard it hurt.
What if Preacher and Sophia were right?
When were they ever wrong? When had they been cruel to her? Misled her?
“No,” she breathed. “Theyarewrong. They must be.”
As Eleazar opened the wooden lid, Addie squeezed her eyes shut, prayed as hard as she could.
Please, God, let him live. I know you didn’t listen before. I know why?—
Addie’s heart clenched, and she couldn’t hold her breath any longer, panting for air as pain filled her.
I know why you didn’t listen. I was evil. I was wicked. I…I…
She couldn’t even form the words in her head. What she had done. The sin for which God had punished her.
I deserve that punishment. But Charlie doesn’t. Please let him come back.
She heard a gasp from below and her eyes flew open.He’s alive. He’s really…
Addie stared down. Charlie’s coffin was almost exactly under her perch, and when she opened her eyes, she saw his face. His pale, dead face. His sunken, closed eyelids.
No, he is alive. That’s why they gasped.
Only it wasn’t. She looked at the faces of the villagers, the women shrinking back, and she knew the sound came from them, a simple reaction to seeing the poor dead boy. She had but to see Mayor Browning’s expressionless face to know Charlie did not live.
Yet the mayor’s facewasexpressionless. It did not crumple with grief and disappointment. He stood there, resolute. Waiting.
Eleazar bent over the coffin. He lifted his fingers to Charlie’s face and traced them over his pale forehead. When he pulled them back, there were three red lines left there.
“Is that blood?” someone whispered.
“Of course not,” another hissed back.
