Faithlful

Something in her voice, something in her stumbling walk made Mrs. Strickland shiver.

When Jenny walked out the front door, leaving it standing open behind her, and drifted listlessly up the street, the few blocks toward the factory, Mrs. Strickland began pounding on Mark's door, screaming at him to get up.

If Mark had been slower, or Jenny had been faster, or more prepared, he wouldn't have made it.

Jenny tried to open the giant industrial cord winder, but the cage door protecting it was locked -- more in the unlikely event of sabotage than for safety's sake. When that failed, she stared at it blankly for a minute, then, unblinking, she'd walked weaving to the bathroom, gripping one of the hundreds of cord cutters from the factory floor, locked herself in and - as the other girls screamed and pounded on the door - she began to saw awkwardly, but steadily at her wrist.

Mark hadn't actually run since he was four, but the terror in Mrs. Strickland's voice lent him speed.

When Mark's ungainly sprint brought him out onto the floor, the terrified workers watched, pale and sick, as he barreled forward.

Mark was no little guy, and a door that could stop him would have to be far stronger than the one he slammed into.

He tackled my blood-spattered Jenny, knocking the bloody cord cutter from her hand and dragged her back to the boardinghouse, then back to the farm.

He stayed with her, watching over her there as I asked.

Mark split his time between the factory and the farm, sometimes almost 20 hours a day. Taking care of my child. Taking care of my widow. He tried to sleep in town, but eventually moved to the couch, then our spare bedroom.

It was almost a year before Jenny sought physical comfort in his arms and bed. Fragile and damaged, she needed some kind of human touch, some reality to ground herself in. And while it wasn't what we'd had, it was enough to keep her level, keep her there for Tommy. And when Gracie was born, it was another affirmation that Jenny wasn't poison, wasn't worthless. Wasn't just another Maitland girl.

She told Mark that she could never marry him, saying that she couldn't do that to me. She'd rather take the imperious stares of the old women in town.

Before she let me go on, Mrs. Strickland sent someone on ahead to the farm to tell them I was on the way.

When I walked up the path to my house, I had more questions than answers.

Jenny's stricken look terrified me, making me think for a moment that maybe it was too late for us.

Just the thought of getting back to her had carried me through the jungle war. The thought that I'd lost her almost seemed too much to bear.

But there was no hesitation at all when she handed Gracie to Mark and threw herself at me.

"John, I... I"

"Shhhh. I'm here now, I'm back."

I ended up carrying her inside while she tried to apologize and explain.

Sorting it out wasn't as difficult as I'd feared. We stayed up nearly all that night, and many more besides, talking -- and, in Jenny's case, crying. The stark scars on Jenny wrist were glaring reminders of what could have happened. Those scars squelched any anger over Mark, over Gracie.

There simply was no crime, no guilt, and no penance to be demanded. Without Mark, Jenny wouldn't have survived, the farm would have been lost and who knows what would have happened to Tommy?

She told me that once they'd gotten my telegram, they'd immediately moved into separate rooms. They loved and supported each other but not as Jenny and I had. I had no reason to doubt her, no reason to question her truthfulness.

I could see it in her eyes. Mark had kept her breathing, but she really came alive for me.

Jenny feared the worst, but over her apologies, I told her she'd kept her vows -- after all, they'd been "till death do us part" and I'd been dead for three years.

Were there worries on my part? At times, but Jenny and Mark worked hard to make sure I had no chance for real concerns.

Mark even offered to move away, but I couldn't separate him from Gracie. Instead, I helped Mark build a house on the other side of the property, far enough for some privacy and close enough that he could help with Gracie. When Mark finally did meet the right girl, we had a time explaining things.

As to Jenny, she's proof that even Maitland girl can be faithful till death.

Post Production Notes: This one is a mostly true story. This really happened, and I occasionally pass by these farms and houses. "Jenny" told me this story several years ago before she died. "John" and "Mark" had long passed away. Obviously I've changed the names, locations, and a few identifying details. Still this is her story, my words. She whispered her story to me, so that her granddaughter wouldn't have to hear her past. But she wanted somebody to remember, to carry her story forward, so somebody would know what kind of man her husband had been. Even at 88, nearly 20 years after his death, she said the hardest thing she did every day was to keep living without him.