Nazareth's Song (23 page)

The bank door opened. Winona stepped out, fresh as spring. She smiled and sounded surprised to see him. “Reverend Jeb, I can’t believe it’s you. It’s good you came back after Reverend Gracie’s illness. How do those kids like living back with their family?”

“They’re still living with me. I couldn’t leave Angel in Little Rock.”

She hesitated and then said, “That sounds like you. Always looking out for others. I hope you can tell us Reverend Gracie’s getting better.”

“It’s hard to say. He’s still bent on getting up to Cincinnati to see some doctor, but I think the hospital in Hot Springs is helping him mend for now. Sure put a scare into those kids of his.”

“So you’ll be stepping into his shoes now?”

“I can’t promise I’ll fit into Gracie’s shoes. But I’ll be assuming his duties as pastor of Church in the Dell. He seems to think I’m up to the task.”

“You are, of that I have no doubt.” She tapped Jeb with her pointer finger right against his shoulder bone. “Let me buy you lunch today, Reverend. I have something I need to tell you. But it has to be in complete confidence, even though I think it’s something you’ll be glad to hear.”

Jeb hesitated.

She seemed to try to read his hesitation and said, “This has to do with your ministry, Reverend. You’ll want to hear it.”

Jeb said, “Beulah’s around noon, then.” Winona looked exceptionally fine in the color blue, he decided. He stuck the paper fan in her hand. “Here, you can put this to better use than I can.”

She took Bryce’s campaign fan and laughed. Then she wafted away, leaving nothing behind but the better women’s way of marking their trail in the breeze—something as sweet as bluebells. Her scent matched her dress. She pulled a fur coat around her frame and dropped the fan into a newspaper boy’s open hand.

Horace had left his office door open to allow in the heat from the bank’s potbellied stove. Jeb shook off the chill and warmed beside the fire. He could hear Mills’s chuckle all the way out into the lobby. When Mills’s secretary, Mona, saw Jeb, she greeted him and asked if he had an appointment with her boss.

“I’d like one, if possible,” said Jeb.

“Come on in, Reverend. Good to have you back. You must bring with you news of all kinds on this November day.” Mills walked a customer out of his office. “What would you like to tell us?”

“I didn’t leave Angel in Little Rock, for one thing. I think Gracie’s ready to retire, at least for a time, so that he can mend. That’s the news from Nubey.”

“How fortunate Gracie has you to take his place. Man like you will do well, in my opinion.” He invited Jeb into his office and closed the door behind him.

Jeb took his seat across from Mills.

“I have some news of my own. Those Hoppers are leaving town. Looks like Asa’s going to be sent to the work farm down at the penitentiary to do some time. Best news we’ve gotten in a long time here in Nazareth. I never seen this place so jittery since that riot broke out. Best to put things like that behind us and move ahead to better tomorrows, if you know what I mean.” Horace had a relaxed demeanor, more jovial than Jeb had ever seen him. “We owe it all to your intervention.”

“Telulah Hopper’s leaving too? I was hoping she’d have the chance to stay and keep her roots here. Maybe somehow get at least part of her land back. Is there no way she can keep her house?”

“That woman’s packing as fast as she can. Don’t know where she’ll go. Between you and me, I don’t care. I don’t mean to sound unchristian, but she needs to start somewhere new, in a town where no one knows her name.”

“She’s a good woman, Mr. Mills. With her husband being sent off to prison, couldn’t our town come together to help her out? She’s not to blame for what Asa did. If he hadn’t gotten so drunk, I don’t know that he would have done what he did.”

“It’s your job to be sympathetic, Reverend. But my job is to make the hard decisions.”

Jeb said, “What will happen to the Hopper land?”

“Timber. Those investors you met have cut a deal with Uncle Sam to plant thousands of trees on that place. It will rejuvenate the lumbermill in Nazareth, put a lot of good men back to work.”

“At least Mrs. Hopper has a nest egg to take with her.”

Jeb excused himself. He thought it best not to let Mills know right off how the news about the Hoppers sickened him. Gracie would most likely tell him to hold his tongue, weigh the matter a bit before spilling his opinions out all over the bank.

He would pay Telulah a visit after lunch and express his sadness over the loss of her land. If she was going to lose the land anyway, she might be glad to see Jeb after all, since he had helped her connect with the land offer her husband had so adamantly refused to acknowledge.

“If ever there was a man who could take the reins after the departure of our dear Reverend Gracie, it’s you.” Winona spouted on about Jeb so much, it seemed she had more invested in his pastorate than even he.

“I still can’t believe it myself.”

“What’s it feel like?”

“Not too many years ago, I remember breaking my back over another man’s field and hating it—I’m talking about picking cotton. I always thought if I could get a little piece of that land myself, I’d not mind the work if it was for the sake of my own land. Church in the Dell’s been Gracie’s field. But now it’s mine to look after. So taking it over for him is like getting my own little piece of land—an honor I don’t take for granted.” Jeb did not tell her that his faith in himself ebbed and flowed by the hour. “That doesn’t mean I think it will be an easy pulpit.”

“Your character will prove itself. Everybody’ll see. I’ve already heard the gab around town about you. The women all think you’re the best thing to come along since bobbed hair. They like the fact you were a sort of gangster. They think it’s kind of exciting having a John Dillinger in the pulpit.”

“They do?”

“I think you’ll be surprised at the girls who show up on Sunday. But all that aside, you know how soon Gracie will be leaving?”

“I told him that I was in no hurry to move into the parsonage. Most likely, he’d appreciate it if some of the ladies helped him pack up, and then the men can help load his belongings. You can bet his oldest girl, Emily, will manage it all for him.”

“I still can’t help but think if we can help you find a good home for those Welby children, that will be one less worry. Don’t you sometimes think that as you take over the parsonage, it would be best to be free and clear of kids that aren’t yours? Church in the Dell’s a handful for any man, but managing a brood of chicks that belong in another person’s pen, if you catch my drift, has got to be a load.”

“I’m not complaining about the Welbys, Winona.” Her habit of bringing up the subject of the Welbys leaving was starting to annoy him.

“Don’t get me wrong. I don’t mean to sound insensitive. I pity those poor babies. What I mean to say is that I did some checking and if you want, there is a family in Pine Bluff that takes in children put out by their families. Good Christian people, from what I hear.”

“I don’t remember asking you to find a home for the Welbys.”

“Reverend, you know I wouldn’t do that without your asking me. I have friends who live all over. I happened to mention your precious charges to a friend, and she knew of someone who knew this family in Pine Bluff. That is all. See, until now, I hadn’t mentioned it to you. If you don’t want to know about a place that will take these kids off your hands, nothing could drag it from my lips.”

“Beulah, wrap my food in wax paper, please. I need to take it with me,” said Jeb.

Winona nearly lifted off the booth. “I’ve made you angry with me. See, my mother tells me that even when I’m not meddling I come across as though I am. Please forgive me.” She clasped both of Jeb’s hands. “I’d hate myself if I thought I’d made you angry with me.”

Jeb was surprised at the way her eyes teared. He had not seen this side of Winona. “You’re forgiven.” He sat back down. “I’m sorry if I sound testy. I feel like I’ve been driving back and forth from here to Hot Springs and beyond for days on end. A little rest tonight and I’ll be better company in the morning.”

“You’ve every right to be testy. And I owe you more respect. You are, after all, our new minister.”

“I’m still plain old Jeb.”

“But that’s what makes you different from other preachers. Other men, for that matter.”

Jeb had to admit Winona had her likable ways.

“But promise me you’ll not tell those kids I brought up this Pine Bluff family. I’d be like Public Enemy Number One in the eyes of that Angel. I really do like her. She’s a peach.”

“I won’t tell her. She tends to jump to conclusions, truth be told.”

He assured her that the matter was dropped. He’d decided not to tell Angel about the Hoppers moving away, either. She was much too fiery a girl to understand such things. As a matter of fact, it was best that all the business of the church and any matter she might misconstrue in her confused state be concealed from her inquisitive nature. She could not be counted on to be reasonable. He decided that somehow he would help her rise to such ripeness of judgment over time. He was, after all, a minister.

“Winona, you really wear the color blue better than any woman I know. May I walk you to your automobile?” he said.

She took to the idea like jelly on bread. With the banker’s daughter on his arm, Jeb felt a sense of destiny rising inside him. By morning, the pastorate would be his new frontier, a land of milk and sweetest honey. He would savor it with the highest measure of dignity a man of his standing could muster.

The rifle barrel aimed out the front door of the Hopper house confused Jeb. His feet both frozen in the cold, barren Hopper soil, he faced Clark Hopper’s assault with a sort of blind paralysis. “Clark, it’s me, Reverend Nubey!”

“You lyin’ polecat of a preacher! Ain’t no one sorrier than you ever walked the earth, not since Lucifer hisself. You never told my momma the truth about them papers. I’m goin’ to kill you dead and bury your sorry hide under all them trees that Mills intends to plant on our land.” The way he said “our land” was thrown out like a kind of indictment against Jeb.

“Clark, I’m a little mixed up about things. What do you mean by the ‘truth’ about the papers she signed?”

The gun barrel disappeared, and Telulah appeared in its place. “Don’t matter what he did, Clark. You take that gun out of the preacher’s face or I’ll bean you with it myself. Just because he done wrong, don’t mean we’ll make it right with two wrongs.”

Jeb dropped his hands at his sides. “Mrs. Hopper, I heard you were leaving town.”

She laughed, her lips drawing up like a dried-out apple. “You havin’ sport with us, Reverend?”

Cautiously, he approached the front porch, stepping over the two dogs that were too lazy to stir from their warm place in the sun.

Telulah took a seat on the last stick of furniture on the place, the front porch rocker. “Clark, you better go and fetch your brother from town. They’s still a bit of gas. I don’t want him walking all that way in the cold.” She said to Jeb, “H’it takes him pert near to dark to walk all the way home from town when he goes off of an afternoon. They’s been a hard frost on the ground the last week. He’d catch his death, and I can’t pay no doctor.”

“Mrs. Hopper, I don’t think I must have known all the particulars about this bank deal.” Jeb found a warm spot on the cold porch next to the hounds. He remembered how many pages long the contract had been. He had only skimmed the first page.

“You mean you brought those bank papers all the way out here without knowin’ what was in them? Reverend, I thought you had read them through, or I wouldn’t have signed. I told you I’m not the best reader, and God knows my boys can’t help me with such things.”

Jeb buried his face in his hands. “I was only the delivery boy, Mrs. Hopper.”

“But you’re the preacher, too. That’s what made me sign it.”

“What did they give you in return?” Jeb lifted his face to look at her.

“The bank took all our land, that’s what. They paid off the past few months’ note, the back taxes, but they took all hundred and eleven acres. All they give us was the boot. That, and fifty dollars to help us get out of town and out of their way. You look pale as Solomon’s ghost, Reverend.” Her face softened around the eyes. “You really didn’t know, did you? Banker Mills took you like he took me and Asa.”

“I thought since he said he was giving you at least half of what the land was worth, you could at least keep a plot of land with your house, a spot for your garden.”

“And here all along I thought you was helping Mills so you could be rid of my boy, Beck. I know he’s caused you grief. All of my boys run on the wild side. If I could, I’d make them better men. But Asa, he’s not much for knowing about such things. His daddy weren’t no good, and his momma died young. I was hopin’ you’d help him find the way out of his troubles.”

“You thought I was trying to get rid of Beck?”

“Beck’s sweet on that Angel of yourn. Blamed fool got it in his head that he could run off and marry a girl as young as her. Many a kid is doin’ that kind of thing, I know. But when you came after your girl like that, it made an impression on him. He came home that night and said he wished his daddy would be that hard on him and his brothers.”

“I’ve made a fool mistake,” said Jeb. “But it wasn’t aimed at you or Beck or Asa. No wonder your boy wanted to bury me out in the woods.”

“Don’t be so hard on yourself, Reverend. You’re a young preacher. People like Mills, they don’t think nothing of using a good man like you to get what they want.” She rose from the rocker as though it took her last ounce of strength. “Clark, run and fetch your sisters, load up this h’yere chair and me with it. I reckon I’m done with this place. We may as well all go into town and pick up Beck. When this town wakes up in the mornin’, I’d just as soon not be here to see it.”

She turned and saw several sets of initials scratched in the porch railing. She bent and kissed each one, saying good-bye to the ancestors who had sweated to pay for the land she was now leaving.

Jeb walked her to the old Hopper truck.