The Lake of Dreams - Kim Edwards [38]
“In the 1930s or ’40s, maybe.”
She straightened, thoughtful. “Really? Yet the imagery seems very contemporary. The imagery and the use of that quote.”
“I wondered about the quote,” I said.
She nodded without taking her gaze from the window. “I’d have to look it up to give you the exact chapter and verse, but it’s from the book of Wisdom, praising Wisdom’s many virtues. Some traditions call her Sophia, which of course is the Greek word for Wisdom. According to the Scriptures, Wisdom was present at creation. No, I’ll amend that—she was not just present, Wisdom was actively involved in creation. Delighting in it. She’s described as an all-powerful, all-seeing, vivifying force. I imagine that’s what this wind weaving through the scene is all about. Wisdom is associated with the Holy Spirit, too; and spirit is a word that also has feminine roots—ruah in Hebrew, meaning breath. Present in all things, renewing all things.” She turned to Keegan. “This was made in the 1930s—are you sure?”
“I’m almost certain.”
“Well, that’s remarkable. In recent years there’s been so much interest in recognizing the female imagery and metaphors woven all through Scripture, which have been largely ignored. It wasn’t so common in the 1930s or ’40s, though. I wouldn’t have expected to see it in the artwork of that time. So I’m very curious about this window. It’s just so fascinating.”
She laughed at herself then and stepped back from the window. “Okay—fascinating to me, as a priest and a scholar. Maybe not so fascinating to either of you.”
“Well, it is,” I said. “Though to be honest, for different reasons.” I pointed out the border motif, and told her about the fabric and the papers I’d found stuffed away in the cupola. “I’m startled to find this pattern here, and I’m walking blind, really. I don’t know anything about this person, except that whoever she was, she must have been connected to the family.”
“And to the church as well, I would guess.”
“Right, that’s exactly right. So I was wondering if the church has any records of these windows? Any documents about the original gift?”
Suzi held up her hands. “I really don’t know. That’s a good question. All I know for certain is that the chapel on the land that eventually became the depot was established as an extension of this church sometime in the 1930s. So the dates fit, don’t they? Still, that’s all I can offer. I’m relatively new here. But why not ask Joanna—she’s the church secretary.” Suzi slipped a cell phone from her pocket and checked the time. “She won’t have left for lunch yet. Joanna is very good, and she’s been here several years—if there’s something to be found, she’ll find it.”
We stepped into the hall, which was lined with windows on one side and the framed black-and-white photos of the rectors, going back to 1835, on the other.
“I’ll see you next week, Rev, when the window is ready,” Keegan said. “Tuesday sound right?”
“It does.” She smiled then, standing in the doorway. “You know, Keegan—you’re welcome on Sunday. You, too, Lucy.”
I didn’t answer—the long line of rectors gazing down from the wall made me nervous—but Keegan laughed, as if this were a familiar and comfortable exchange between them. “Thanks, but I don’t like organized religion. No offense. I prefer to pray my own way.”
She smiled. “Let me ask—how is that?”
He grinned. “Well, I take my boat out. I sit on the water and think about the things in my life that haven’t gone so well, and how I could have done some of them differently. And then I think about good things in my life, one by one. I feel thankful.”
The Reverend Dr. Suzi Wells laughed. “Well, I’m not going to argue with that,” she said. “Still, come sometime. I think you’d be surprised.”
Still smiling, she stepped back into the vestment room. Keegan offered to show me the office, but I told him I knew where it was.
“Thanks, though—and for bringing me here.”
He smiled, and held me in his gaze for a moment, and I had the strange sense that time was falling away, that this moment was connected quite directly to the days when we’d been so