Chapter 53 Claire
“Beth,” Claire croaked, her throat parched and rough. How could she be so thirsty when she was up to her neck in water? “Beth, we have to climb.”
Beth didn’t answer.
Beth’s body was limp against hers, her hand—clutched around the branch—as white as bone. She’d stopped shivering, and Claire knew that was a bad sign. Claire tried not to think of the baby. Beth couldn’t lose the baby, not after losing Dell.
Two more tremors had shaken the waters and sent waves crashing over them. Claire had pulled herself and Beth up another ten feet of tree, and the branches were thinning. Every muscle ached with the effort of holding on. Claire’s legs were numb with cold and heavy as lead.
Her thoughts were as numb as her body. She’d told Beth they had to keep hoping . . . but could Claire hope when everything inside her was slipping into the cold depths?
Jenny was gone. Frannie was gone.
She was losing Beth to the pull of the water.
No one knew they were there. No one was coming to save them.
Beth would have been better off with Iris and Pete. At least she and her baby would have lived. Beth would never get to Ennis now, never see her parents.
And Red. He would never see his wife or child again. Red, who had so much hope for them. If she hadn’t sold Marigold, would they be at home tonight—Jenny in her crib, Red playing solitaire and Claire listening to the radio—safe and warm in their sanctuary?
Bridget. Her sister and her best friend. Where was she? In Mammoth, not knowing that both her sisters were lost in the dark and devastation? If Claire and Frannie both . . . she couldn’t bear to think of Bridget’s sorrow. Of Dad’s broken heart.
I can’t hold on.
Claire’s arms were trembling and useless.
She couldn’t pull them to the next branch.
She couldn’t rouse Beth or make herself care that the water was lapping at her chin, wetting her lips.
Claire had stopped calling for help. Her cries were nothing but rasps in her parched throat, swallowed by the darkness.
She couldn’t even pray, with prayers she’d known since childhood just jumbled and meaningless words.
Beth sputtered and struggled.
Claire closed her eyes, tipped her head back, the hot tears escaping from the corners of her eyes and burning down her cold face.
She had to give up. She had to let go.
As despair swamped her, she opened her eyes one last time. And saw the stars.
Claire had seen the Montana sky at night a hundred times. The milky array of stars, the flood of brilliant points of light. But tonight, she saw them anew.
The beauty of them. The brilliance. So clear they seemed to pierce her heart.
For a moment, the cold and fear burned away, replaced with wonder. It makes you wonder, doesn’t it? Claire’s memory was as lucid as a film as she blinked into the night sky.
Red standing on the viewing platform of the Lower Falls, his russet hair glowing in the late afternoon sun. His calloused hand holding hers, his blue eyes taking her in like she was the marvel. What do you believe, Claire?
She could see the rainbows on the canyon walls, feel the sun on her shoulders.
She believed that beauty spoke of God. God is here, and he loves us.
He loves Claire Reilly. And he loves Red Wilder.
She saw Red’s Montana-sky eyes. The light of hope in them that he always carried for her. For them both.
Red. He loved her.
Red loved her, and he loved Jenny.
She hadn’t made a mistake—far from it. The day her father refused to walk her down the aisle she’d made the best decision of her life. Whatever had happened with Dell—whatever had driven Red to go to Libby, it had been because he loved them, she knew that now. And he would come back.
The cold crept back through her heavy limbs. The gritty water swirled around her neck. Her arms trembled with the strain of holding Beth, and the tree swayed. A veil of clouds moved over the sky like smoke, obscuring the moon.
The stars vanished, but the light of hope remained, as if one of the crystal stars had fallen from the sky and now burned brilliant and hot in her heart.
What do you believe, Claire? Did she only believe that God was to be found in a beautiful waterfall or a sunset or the love in Red’s eyes?
Or was he there even in the dark and devastation of the night?
He was with her now. In the water, in her fear and weakness.
He was still with her, like the stars behind the veil of clouds.
He never left her. And he had given her hope of her own.
“Beth,” Claire said, as that hope gave her strength to do the impossible. “We have to climb.” Claire pulled Beth upwards, out of the cold water. The tree swayed as they reached the uppermost branches.
Claire called out, over the water, pushing the air past her aching throat. Calling for help.
I won’t give up hope, Lord. I’ll keep holding on.