White Wind Blew by James Markert Page B

so many people. The paddle wheel spinning that water like foam. And with all the steam coming out, I thought it was on fire.”
    Mr. Jenkins smiled. “Nothing like the river noises. At night we’d sit around the campfire. We could hear the water crashing from the falls in the distance. I’d go to sleep to my father playing the harmonica.”
    Wolfgang thought of his own father and how he’d play the violin and piano at night and how their living room was full of musical instruments. And how his father, despite all his faults and eccentricities, had been taken from him too early.
    Mr. Jenkins’s hands shook noticeably. That was why he was clutching and releasing the bed sheets. To give his hands a job. To keep them from shaking. Wolfgang opened Mr. Jenkins’s left hand, pushed the harmonica into his palm, and closed his fingers around the small instrument. The old man’s hands stopped shaking. All the lines in his face seemed to soften.
    Wolfgang started to get up.
    Mr. Jenkins touched Wolfgang’s arm. “I’m not a Catholic.”
    “And I’m not technically a priest yet,” Wolfgang said.
    “Well, can you hear my sins?”
    Wolfgang sat back down. “Of course.”
    “I’ve never been to any kind of confession.”
    “Contrition is the beginning of forgiveness,” said Dr. Pike. “I can see the sorrow in your eyes. You must regret your sins, resolve not to repeat them, and then turn back to God.”
    He looked Wolfgang in the eyes. “I used to drink a lot.” He moved the harmonica inside his grip. “I hit my wife one night when I was drunk. She has forgiven me, but my daughter never will. We don’t speak. She won’t see me.” He sighed, still watching Wolfgang. “I can’t go to my grave without the forgiveness of my little girl.”
    Wolfgang extended his right hand toward the elderly man’s head. “I absolve you from your sin in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” Wolfgang lowered his hand. “The absolution may take away the sin, Mr. Jenkins, but it does not fix all that the sin has caused. You must—”
    “There’s a box in my room,” he said. “On a shelf above the bed. I write to her every day. Her name is Amy. And in the box…are letters.”
    “You don’t send them?”
    He shook his head. “Can you see that she gets them?”
    “Of course.” Wolfgang placed his hand on Mr. Jenkins’s frail shoulder.
    “Will I be forgiven, you know, when I’m gone?”
    “The Lord has freed you from your sins. Go now in peace.”
    “Am I supposed to say something here?”
    “Most would now say, ‘Thanks be to God.’”
    “Thanks be to God, then.” He wrinkled his brow. “What about some kind of penance?”
    “Those letters you’ve written to your daughter are penance enough, Mr. Jenkins. I’ll see that she gets them. Your heart is pure.”
    Mr. Jenkins made the sign of the cross, more than likely because he’d seen Wolfgang do it at the beginning of the confession. His eyes were wet. He closed them. Without another word Wolfgang stood and walked away.
    In the hallway, Susannah stepped out of the shadows. “Wolf?”
    Wolfgang jumped back.
    “Sorry. Didn’t mean to startle you.”
    A little boy stood by Susannah’s side, a brown-haired, ten-year-old patient named Abel Jones. Abel with the dimples. Wolfgang gave him a wink. “How’s it going, Abel?”
    “Swell.” He licked on a lollipop.
    The three of them walked along the second-floor solarium. With each bed Wolfgang passed, his mind wandered back to the brick crashing through his window. Could any of these men have been the culprit?
    Abel walked near the edge of the porch, looking down toward the front lawn below and the woods beyond. Like many of the children, he’d shown improvement since his arrival at Waverly.
    “Wolf,” Susannah whispered as they passed a male patient who was snoring loudly. The noise coming from his clogged nostrils sounded like a whistle. Susannah covered Abel’s mouth to keep the