Angie of the Garden

Chapter Twelve-5

"He's at peace now," she replied.
"We'll all be with him real soon if we don't find some grub."

Angie suddenly noticed how frail her friend had become. His sunken eyes ached with the ravages of hunger. She knew that her own appearance must have also been deteriorating rapidly as well. Yet her determination to see Tom again would not allow Angie to despair for long.

"You can't lose hope, Jake. I don't know how we'll get out of this, but we will." The increasing intensity of the wind finally drove the two back inside the cabin. "I'm going to try to find some food," Ed informed them. "We're never going to last until spring unless we get something to eat."
"But you said the snow is too deep for hunting," Angie reminded him.
"It is, but there ain't no choice. If I don't come back, you'll have to try too. It's the only way, ma'am."
He opened the door before turning to face them once more.

"I'm sorry about your friend," he said.
Ed struggled to reach the end of the canyon.

The others watched him from the porch. Though they believed he was doomed, no one would express their opinion aloud. After he disappeared they went back inside to stand in front of the fire. Wood and water were the only things they still had left. The original occupant of the cabin had left behind more firewood than was required. The snow provided all the water they could drink. That would not prevent the three settlers from starving to death, however.

"You can make it," Jake said to Angie one morning a week after Black had left them.

She looked at him and knew he would soon be gone. Jake could no longer manage to stand up. His emaciated body barely had the strength left to take another breath. Angie put her head down to hide her tears.

"You've got to make it to San Francisco. Use me when I'm gone, do what you have to do. Tom is waiting for you Angie."

She knelt down, taking his head in her hands. Jake managed to raise one of his bony appendages and let it rest on her shoulder.
"Do what you have to do," he said with his last breath.

Tim held her as she cried. Then the two struggled to drag his emaciated body onto the porch. Though Angie and Tim were barely alive, they could not bring themselves to take advantage of Jake's offer. She watched over the next two days as her last companion approached his final hours. On the third morning he motioned for her to come over to his bed.

"I'm sorry for what I did in the saloon," Tim said as tears slid down his cheeks. "I'm not a bad man."
"It was the whiskey, Tim, not you. Try to hang on. The spring is almost here." "You can make it," he said before dying.

For two days she sat in the cabin reliving her life. Angie thought about her father, bitterly castigating him when she thought about Tom's leaving Boston because, as he said, they'll hang me for sure and your father will provide the rope. Then, in the next instant, his starving daughter regretted leaving Boston without saying goodbye to him. This bereft woman could no longer find fault with those she had loved. Angie Barton could hear Cassia's laughter as she danced a jig with one of the men in an Ann Street saloon. Angie was dancing next to her, in the strong arms of the Nantucket whaler.

"I've given up everything for you," she said aloud to no one. "I have to see my love."
Angie took out her knife just as death was about to take her. She had purchased it after a drunken Tim Nash almost violated her dignity. The woman from Boston used it now to commit an act that defiled her soul. Angie availed herself of Nash's remains.

Hollis suddenly let out a groan. He held onto his stomach and bent over. Angie looked at him with understanding.

"I don't blame you. You know now why I couldn't face Tom. I don't blame you for being sickened by my conduct."
"It has nothing to do with you," Hollis assured her. "I've been very ill since yesterday. I understand why you did it, Angie. It was the only way you could survive."
"Understand!" she exclaimed bitterly. "Then tell me, was it for my life or my revenge! I don't even know anymore."
"You told me that you forgave Nash," Hollis pointed out.

A bolt of lightening suddenly crackled across the sky. Hollis managed to sit upright once more. His patient was in a very agitated state.

"I was a child of God!" Angie exclaimed as the heavens erupted above her. The specter's long, elegant fingers were intertwined as she wrung her hands in despair. Another bolt of lightening illuminated the tortured spirit against the dark silhouette of the grand old man. The thunder that followed shook the ground around them, just as it had over 100 years ago on the plains. Hollis tried to speak, but his voice was hoarse and could not be heard above the wind.
"I ate human flesh!" the specter shouted in anguish. "I'm no better than one of the wolves on the trail! How could I ever face the man I love, or anyone I had known again? I walked out of the canyon when spring came. Another party going to San Francisco was kind enough to take me with them. I sailed to New York and worked on the Ellsworth Estate because no one knew me there. They would never suspect that I had lost my soul."

Hollis watched as her eyes welled up with tears. He wanted to console Angie by pointing out that a person in her condition no longer possesses the ability to make moral judgments. Yet he could not, because at that moment Hollis began to feel dizzy. As the drenching rain began to fall, the psychiatrist sat down heavily on the rock.

"How could anyone love me again?" Angie questioned him while frantically grasping her long black locks. For a moment Hollis thought she would pull out her hair. "Could you love me?"
"Yes,' Hollis weakly replied. "And so could your friends. I'm sure Tom never stopped loving you either."

The last image Hollis remembered was of Angie standing in the rain, though it could not touch her. She found kindness in the sincere eyes of Hollis Simms, though they were clouded with fever. While still haunted by her past, Angie now seemed to believe she had managed to retain her soul. The tranquility in the specter's sparkling green eyes communicated this to Hollis. She would know peace once more. The objective of his sessions with Angie Barton had been put at rest. A warm feeling permeated through him as Hollis observed the relief evident on her lovely face. The psychiatrist knew his patient had experienced a catharsis.
Then Hollis fell to the ground.
I'm the first one she's told about this he thought to himself before losing consciousness. She'll be all right now.
Sebastian happened by some time later and found Hollis lying there. Angie was gone, and so was the diary.