Page 120 of Always to Remember
“Clay! You’ve never run away from anything in your life! Don’t run away from me now! Don’t run away from our love!”
He came to a dead halt in the middle of the road and hung his head.
“I won’t have you running after a coward,” her father growled, tightening his grip on her arm, and giving her a small shake as though he could shake some good sense into her.
The voices and words swarmed around Meg as people surrounded her, blocking her view.
“He wouldn’t fight—”
“Coward’s what he is—”
“Why’s she chasing him?”
“Yellow streak a mile long—”
“Didn’t enlist—”
“Coward—”
Through the ragged gaps left between elbows and shoulders, she saw Clay raise his hand, and although his back was to her, she knew he’d slipped his fingers between the buttons on his shirt and was rubbing the “D” they’d burned into his chest.
“I love you!” she cried over the reminders of his cowardice that people continued to throw at her.
He spun around. His voice, deep with pain, carried his words across the churchyard even though he didn’t yell. “I have nothing to offer you, Meg, but loneliness, and I love you too much to give you that.”
His words effectively parted the crowd, and Meg had a clear view of him standing in the road. She wanted desperately to be at his side. “I’d rather spend my life with one man surrounded by love than the ignorance and hatred surrounding me now.”
Slowly, he shook his head. “You can’t imagine how much it hurts to be ignored by people … you respect. You don’t know how loud the silence is or how deeply it cuts. It’s bad enough watching the hatred touch my brothers. I’d rather die than see it touch you.”
Thunder rolled in the distance. People turned their attention toward the sound. Standing in the wagon, Daniel urged the horses through the water-logged road toward Clay.
“Daniel, no!” Meg screamed as she jerked free of her father’s grasp only to be caught by someone else.
For a brief moment, indecision crossed Clay’s face, and then he began running toward the barreling wagon, toward Helen’s daughter, Melissa, as she played in the muddy road, oblivious to the approaching danger.
Meg heard a scream and didn’t know if it was hers or someone else’s. Clay flung himself over the child as the wagon neared.
She heard other screams and wails as Clay and Melissa disappeared beneath the hooves of the horses and the wheels of the wagon. When the wagon passed, all she could see was Clay lying facedown in the mud.
Fear gave her the strength to break free of the man holding her.
Fear drove her to rush to Clay’s side and drop into the mud beside him.
“Don’t move him!” Dr. Martin cried as he threaded his way through the silent crowd easing to the center of the road.
Helen knelt beside Meg. “Oh, God, my baby.”
Dr. Martin worked his way to the ground. Gingerly, he rolled Clay over to reveal Melissa’s tiny mud-covered body. She started blinking her eyes and turned her mouth down before she released her first wail. Helen lifted her from the mud and pressed her against her breast, rocking and cooing to her daughter.
Using her skirt, Meg gently wiped the mud from Clay’s face. “He’s bleeding,” she whispered as she watched the blood mingle with the mud.
“Looks like the mud shielded him somewhat so nothing’s broken, but he took a blow to the head,” Dr. Martin said, his hands busily looking for signs of injury.
“How bad?” Meg asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Did I kill him?” Daniel yelled as he ran toward the crowd. “Did I kill the yellow-bellied—”
