A Purpose True
By Gail Kittleson
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Prelude
April 1976, a small Idaho town
Launching like a World War II V-2 rocket over the balcony of Faithful Shepherd Church was not in Kathryn’s cleaning plan. She wasn’t sure how she had slipped. She recalled the pews and organ appearing like dollhouse furniture from her high perch, and thinking she ought to haul in a ladder to dust all those niches and curves in the gorgeous hand-carved altar.
Had her hand slipped when she tackled some quarter-inch-thick dust in the neglected balcony, or was it her foot? Strange she couldn’t remember, since her sense of equilibrium had distinguished her during parachute training thirty years ago outside of London.
But now, she sailed through the serene sanctuary air as she had way back then, jumping into the Nazi-occupied Auvergne. For a moment, oating over the staid pews as though time had halted, Kathryn could almost feel the cool French air whoosh around her. Seemed like any second, her silk chute would release and ll.
e towering ornate organ pipes along the north wall struck her as more beautiful than ever. Some gentle slant-eyed woman must have painted those oriental designs with great care.
But then a solid thunk on the hard, oak oor of the sanctuary ushered Kathryn back to Idaho. All she could see was the wooden lip of a hymnal holder a few inches above her face. Pain ricocheted through her mouth.
Her silk slip hiked up, so she tried to reach down and straighten things, but her arm refused to budge. She tried her left leg, then
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A PurPose True
her right—no movement. Panic, like the volatile oor polish fumes, inundatedher.Afrantic“Help!”rentthequietspace.Ah,thatwould be Darlene.
Soon, a gravelly voice exuding meat-and-potatoes breath broke into Kathryn’s awareness. “Nothing appears broken. Amazing, but then, I’ve never known a stronger woman.”
She focused on the face, backed by embossed ceiling tiles swirling far away. e church board always chose the same color, as if the day-old biscuit hue were sacred.
Old Doc Randall’s a ectionate hazel eyes scrutinized her through lenses the thickness of her leaded bay window. “You all right?”
Kathryn’s arched tongue failed to reach her teeth. “Yeh ... dus bappa.” “Just dapper, eh?” Doc’s one-sided smirk reminded Kathryn he’d
served in France, too, but in the Great War. She attempted to speak, but to no avail. What was with her tongue, anyhow?
“Follow my nger with your eyes.” Right. Left. Down, up, and back to center. Doc pursed his lips. “Darlene’s gone for a cold cloth. You’ll need x-rays, so I’m calling an ambulance. Now, don’t ght me.”
His brusque manner failed to hide a note of concern.
e somber lines of his face incited a giggle that revealed the sorry state of Kathryn’s rib cage. A brief glance down revealed a mass burgeoning below her nose, a swelling blimp of a thing, and she
eased a tentative ngertip toward her mouth. Her arm still worked. Her ngertip seemed gigantic, otherworldly. Fiddling around with her tongue revealed the massive protrusion as her lip, already swelled to kingdom come. Mingling with the cleaning polish, the
copper tang of blood nauseated her.
“Lie still, Kathryn. Your life could depend on it.” Doc craned his
neck back to observe the balcony. “ at’s a mighty long way for a person to fall. You took a pretty hard hit on this pew.”
He pointed out a good-sized gouge in the golden oak, and an odd varnish taste registered in Kathryn’s mouth. She wanted to smack him when he pried her lips apart, but a bloodied wood chip the diam- eter of her wedding ring emerged between his thumb and fore nger.
“A mercy you didn’t swallow this ragged piece. Can you move your feet?”
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Prelude
Nothing but her arm cooperated. Darlene appeared, her eyes wild, and Doc exchanged places with her. His joints popped as he rose, and Darlene waddled closer on her knees. Unexpected coolness eased the pounding in Kathryn’s head.
“Oh, how could this have happened? And the men just left for the mountains with the sheep—how on earth will we ever get ahold of them?”
e rst question was intriguing, the second irrelevant. Everyone knew that once the herders left for the summer in their tidy portable wooden houses, reaching them was impossible.
So, how did she manage to fall? e last she remembered, the splendid stained-glass depiction of Jesus and the children had attract- ed her attention. She rarely noticed this highest window set behind the balcony pews, but with Darlene helping out today, the obscure niche came front and center.
Tackling the thick dust made her feel better, especially with her recent hard news about her dearest friend Addie. Somehow, tack- ling this long-delinquent dust lightened her heart. And then, Jesus caught Kathryn’s eye. Blazing July sun radiated through his tawny hair and he welcomed several children with open arms.
A wave of something besides worry swept Kathryn. “Is that me there in your arms?” Her question hung like dust mites in sunlight, and a brief parade of all the times she’d experienced deliverance passed before her. Moments passed before the sensation coalesced... no matter what, a vast love held her close.
She closed her eyes for a second to contemplate, but her practical nature resisted sinking down on a pew. Instead, she thrust her dust rag at a lmy gray layer on the clock’s far edge, highlighted by a narrow beam of sunshine—oh the richness of those rays nding an entrance to this shadowy corner!
“Kate.” A voice from the top of the balcony stairs stopped her short. She breathed in her childhood name—years had passed since anyone called her that, and twisted toward the sound. But silence reigned.
Down below, Darlene swished her rag steadily over the pews—no, it wouldn’t do to dawdle. Mara, Kathryn’s rst grandchild, would be coming over after school, since Gabby had a late meeting today.
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A PurPose True
On Kathryn’s second swipe at the clock, an even brighter shaft of sunlight hit—wonderful rays that bespoke the high-country beauty just beyond this building. She shook o that voice calling her Kate— surely her imagination.
But was that a slight shu e over near the stairs? She turned to look, and the next second, propelled headlong over the railing. en that excruciating thunk, and now, a draft of air as the main sanctuary doors swished open. Timeworn oorboards vibrated toward her in a regular rhythm.
Darlene had slipped o somewhere, but something warned Kath- ryn to pretend sleep. e rhythm halted inches away. A painful slit in her eyelids revealed nubby brown wool tweed slouched over scu ed oxfords, and the headline of a folded Chronicle under a slender man’s arm: First Flight of Concorde Supersonic Jet—a month behind the times.
e intruder leaned close. “I never meant to ...” His whisper left an unforgettable odor—Gauloise cigarettes. Short, wide, and un ltered, their intense aroma instantly transported her to Turkey or Syria—or back to the South of France, where Resistance partisans smoked Gauloise as a matter of patriotism.
Scru y and starving, they cried, “Liberté toujours! ey’ve killed nearly a thousand at the Fort in Paris, and that butcher in Lyon executes even more, but we ght for freedom forever!” Prior to D-Day, that objective had infused Kathryn’s every move.
e tweed man departed in silence. Moments later, Darlene squeezed Kathryn’s ngers. “Stay with me now.”
Watch out for Mara, she wanted to say. Stop at Gabby’s o ce and let her know about this. Hopefully her eyes communicated what her tongue could not.
Darlene scrunched up her nose. “Oohf—where did that awful smell come from?”
Kathryn faded again, but a familiar tender tone replayed inwardly, the same almost unbearable divine love that had burned the backs of her eyes up in the balcony when she’d stared at Jesus and the children.
“Yes, it’s you here in my arms, always. And remember, you can never really lose a friend like Addie.”
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Prelude
Kathryn’s unintentional groan deepened Darlene’s puzzled look. “Oh, I wish there were something I could do. But you’ll be all right,
hon. I’m sure you will.”
People surrounded them then, and someone took Darlene’s place.
“Careful now—her neck may be broken. One ... two ... three.” Canvas supported her, then a harder substance, like wood. A warm spring breeze touched Kathryn’s cheeks, followed by an antiseptic
smell. Narrow walls closed in, but just before the doors clicked shut, a small gust of air grazed Kathryn’s ear, along with that same strong tobacco scent.
“Never forget Barbie—do you hear me?”
Her gut clenched, but something jostled her left shoulder, and
searing pain engulfed her. Her cry emerged only as a whimper. Klaus Barbie, the Butcher of Lyon. How could she forget?