“My hobbit house,” Maddie said.
She nodded.
“It didn’t take long before I heard sirens. And voices. Lots of people must have showed up to put it out. I was so afraid they’d find me and be mad at me . . . but, worst of all, I never got to save my father’s portrait.”
Maddie held her hand and tried to soothe her. Then she looked at Rafe and nodded toward the guest room.
It took only seconds for Rafe to leave the group, then return, the portrait of Isaac Thurston under his arm.
“Here it is, Grandma,” Rafe said, and no one corrected him by saying that, technically, Nancy was his great-grandmother. “Joe found it. It isn’t damaged; it’s as good as new.”
And Grandma Nancy cried.
Once her crying eased, Rafe said that the fire hadn’t been her fault.
Joe told her not to worry, that it obviously was not intentional.
Stephen tried to reassure her that the damage to the cottage was contained to the kitchen and only part of the living room and that it could be fixed, good as new.
Maddie wasn’t going to tell her grandmother that she could have died if someone hadn’t seen the smoke as early as they had. Nancy no doubt already knew that.
They talked in low, comforting voices. Soon, however, it was obvious that Nancy was weary from her ordeal, and Maddie ached all over, and they decided it was naptime.
Maddie’s father left for Evelyn’s, and Joe and Rafe cleaned up the kitchen. Then they hugged both of the women, and left for Joe’s house. Maddie knew that Rafe would love being on tribal land.
Then Nancy followed Maddie into the guest room. She said that, even with one arm, she wanted to tuck her granddaughter in; Maddie didn’t say she could do it alone. Then once Maddie was under the covers, Grandma Nancy leaned down and softly whispered, “Cowàmmaunsh.”
Maddie was startled. “That’s the word! I remember it. Does it mean ‘good night’?”
Her grandmother smiled. “No, Madelyn. It is how a Wampanoag says, ‘I love you.’” She kissed her fingertips and placed them on Maddie’s forehead. Then she whisperedcowàmmaunshagain and tiptoed from the room.
Epilogue
Maddie decided they should have a surprise celebration of her grandmother’s life while the woman was still alive to witness it. In the morning, as Grandma Nancy still slept, Maddie went out to the porch, sat down, and called Evelyn.
“What a marvelous idea,” Evelyn said. “Of course I’ll help you plan it. A real celebration will be much more fun than a memorial service.”
“You’re sure you won’t be too busy planning the wedding?”
A sigh of discontent fluttered down the line. “My son is still angry with me for encouraging your grandmother’s ‘little stunt,’ as he calls it. He implied that he and Jeremy might get married in Boston, after all.”
“Maybe if he sees how happy we all are, he’ll change his mind.”
“Good idea. You are smart. Your mother was smart, too. And she was desperate to see the rest of the world. So when your father came along, and she fell in love . . .”
“I know,” Maddie said. “And I understand.”
“But what you don’t know is that the last summer you were here with her, she told me she was going to tell you everything that Christmas. She had it all planned—she had asked Nancy and Joe to spend the holiday in Green Hills; she said she wanted to help you become comfortable with both sides of your heritage.”
So Evelyn confirmed that Maddie would have learned about her Wampanoag blood that Christmas. She wondered if her life would have taken a different course; if she still would have married Owen. But if she hadn’t, she would not have her precious son.
“I guess life turns out the way nature wants,” Maddie said.
To which Evelyn replied, “I believe most Wampanoags would agree.”
* * *
After she and Evelyn talked, Maddie sat for a while, peacefully rocking, gazing at the wooded land that Joe had said was sacred to the tribe: “Like the earth and its creatures,” he’d said, “plants and trees are living beings, too.”
