'The letter'....

            a tale by Stanley Swan

Hazel was getting on in years now….how fast the last four decades had passed.  Now in her 80’s, her eye sight failing along with most of her joints, it was a daily chore for Hazel to get down the two front steps to check her mail box. Her neighbor had offered to move the box up to her door step, but Hazel refused…. the box was one of the last things her husband Henry had done at the house before he went off to war.  It was only

a few months after that task had been completed that Henry had been lost in the war….

missing in action they said.  She remembers the day the army car with the minister came

to her front door, bearing the bad news, a day she relived every day at 2:30 when the

old clock on the wall struck it’s chime.  Forty years later, and no news had ever come

about Henry’s whereabouts….it was such a hard pill to swallow. 

From time to time Hazel would go to her writing desk that she shared with Henry and

look over his glorious stamp collection. He was so fond of it. He had started collecting

as a youngster, and had amassed a collection of hundreds of first editions, which he

had proudly put in little folders and labeled with their acquisition dates.  His fondest

stamps were of the Curtiss Jenny, a two wing airplane that had made history when he

was just a teenager. He had ten of those stamps, and he said he would never part with

them.  Hazel smiled sweetly every time she thumbed through Henry’s collection, feeling

a closeness to him, even though he had been gone just shy of four decades now.

It was late in the morning, and Hazel had enjoyed her usual cup of tea while waiting for

Mr. Billings the mailman to arrive on his daily rounds. As Hazel dusted around her

modest possessions and thought about what she might cook for supper later in the

day, she was startled by the sharp alarm of the door bell.  Very few called upon her

and she moved as quickly as she could toward the front door…her eyes trying to pierce

the screen door in an attempt to recognize who might be calling.

“Oh it’s you Mr. Billings, please come in” Hazel said as the older gentleman tipped his

hat and acknowledged her invitation. “What can I help you with Mr. Billings?”

“Well Ma’am I wanted to come by and give you this letter and apologize on behalf

of the postal service… it seems that this letter somehow has been lost or misplaced

for a very very long time….and I….”   His speech suddenly halted as he extended the

envelope to Hazel, she reaching with a frail left arm to accept it.

“Good day Ma’am” said Billings, he turned and very quietly let himself out the front

door. 

Hazel walked softly to the writing desk, lowered the desk top front and sat down to

examine the piece. It was old, very old, and faded.

The envelope was now brown and dark, wrinkled and warped. Her breath was taken

away when she looked closely at the handwriting…… it was handwriting that she had seen

so many times and was most familiar.… the script had been written by her beloved Henry.

She wanted to rip it open and read it immediately, but just savoring the script was enough

for right now….opening would come in time. Hazel tried to examine the cancellation date, but

the ink was all faded, un-readable, but the stamp looked out of place….it looked almost new,

in sharp contrast to the envelope which held it in place.  Maybe the post office put a new

stamp on to make it ‘right’ for her after such a delay. 

But looking closer, Hazel recognized this stamp….it was the Curtiss Jenny… that stamp that

Henry loved so much.  Her mind raced quickly, remembering the ten Curtiss Jenny’s that

Henry had in his collection. 

Hazel pulled out Henry’s stamp book… flipped thru those wonderful pages until she

found his Curtiss Jenny’s.  But upon counting closely from left to right, Hazel only

found nine, not ten.  The spot for number ten was bare…… but number ten was

not lost in the folder, or anywhere in the desk… it was now affixed to this last piece

of mail which Hazel now clutched next to her heart. As tears streamed down her face,

she thanked God for her Henry, and this last delivery that was so so special indeed.

Hazel decided that tonight after supper, she would open the envelope and re-discover

the man she had loved, lost, and now just found.