Till You Hear From Me: A Novel (35 page)

“You all right?” Miss Iona said finally, touching his arm gently.

Mr. Eddie nodded slowly. “I’m sorry, Ida B. There are no better words to say it, or none I can come up with. I’m just truly sorry and I do apologize for my son.”

“You don’t have to do that,” I said. “You don’t ever have to apologize to anybody for anything.”

“Thank you for that,” Mr. Eddie said.

“Should we call the police?” Miss Iona said.

“They haven’t done anything yet,” Mr. Eddie said. “Police don’t care about you thinkin’ something. You gotta do it.”

“When are we going to tell the Rev?” I said. “Me and Miss Iona can’t convince him, but he’ll believe you.”

Mr. Eddie picked up his now cold coffee and put it back down. “The Rev has to come to things in his own time,” he said. “Let him bring the word tomorrow morning. Then we’ll tell him what we know.”

“Well, if you’re not going to call the police, and we’re not going to call the Rev, what are we going to do?” Miss Iona said.

Mr. Eddie looked at her.

“I’m just saying,” she said. “We need a plan, don’t we?”

“I’ve got one,” he said. “When you all go over to Rock of Faith tomorrow morning, I’ll tell Wes I’m not feeling good and stay at home.”

“Are you sure Wes is going?”

“He promised the Rev. He’ll have to go so it won’t look suspicious if he doesn’t.”

“That’s why they got that man’s child all up in it,” Miss Iona said. “Little Miss Thing can’t do it all by herself and Wes has got to be over at the church cheesing at the Rev to make sure they got a cover story.”

I hoped her description of Wes didn’t hurt Mr. Eddie’s feelings, but if it did, he didn’t register it on his face. You would have thought we were talking about plans for any other Sunday morning.

“Go on,” I said.

“Once Wes is out, I’ll head over to the house and stand guard over those damn cards. Until we get it all sorted out, nobody’s takin’ them anywhere.”

That made sense to me, but Miss Iona was still frowning. “You don’t think they’ll try to push past you and come on in anyway, do you?”

Mr. Eddie stood up. “Now you hurtin’ my feelings.”

“Oh, sit down,” Miss Iona said. “I just wish my Charlie was here.”

“What’s he gonna do?” he said, sitting down as ordered and taking Miss Iona’s hand. “Iona?”

“What?”

“Do you trust me to look out for the Rev?”

“Of course I do.”

“How about you?” he said, turning to me.

“Always.”

“Then both of you get up in the morning and go to church and let me do my job.”

I’m sure my mother would have pointed out that there was more than a whiff of patriarchy in his assumption of the leadership role of our little group, but at that moment I trusted Mr. Eddie to do the right thing. I think this is what politics always comes down to anyway, a willingness on the part of the good guys to stop the bad guys from going too far. Even when they’re family.

FIFTY-TWO

W
HEN
W
ES CAME DOWNSTAIRS FOR BREAKFAST ON
S
UNDAY MORNING
, he had already spoken to Toni twice. She assured him that everything was ready to go. She and Estes’s son were parked in the van a few blocks away near West End Park, waiting for the appointed hour. Toni had even had a couple of T-shirts and baseball caps made over at the mall so that from a distance, they looked like two neatly dressed young deliverymen, out on a mission of mercy.

Of course there would be some immediate fallout about who took the cards and why, but Wes already had his rap on that.
Why do you think I wanted to get them moved someplace secure? I’m just sorry we got here too late
, he’d say, outraged. He’d suggest to the Rev that he keep the theft on the down low to avoid spooking potential tour sponsors who hated any kind of political infighting and then give him the number of a discreet private investigator. That should keep him busy long enough to copy the cards, pass the disk on to Estes, tell the PI where he could find them in the Dumpster behind the offices of the Georgia Democratic Party, and get the hell back to New
York. Plus, even if the Rev suspected something, Wes knew he’d never tell. It would break his best friend’s heart and at the Rev’s age, good friends are hard to find.

He was surprised to find his father sitting at the kitchen table, still wearing his bathrobe and a pair of black leather house shoes Wes had given him last Christmas.

“We better get a move on,” he said, not wanting to be late. They had to pass the Rev’s house on the way to Rock of Faith and he wasn’t going to take a chance on his father spotting the van in the driveway and stopping to investigate. “You know they’re holding seats for us down front, but after ten thirty, I wouldn’t count on it.”

“I’m not going,” Mr. Eddie said. “You go ahead.”

Oh, shit
, Wes thought.
Now what?

He sat down across from his father. “Are you sick?”

“No, son, I’m just tired.”

“Too tired to be with the Rev on his big day?” Wes said, smiling encouragingly at his father like you would to cajole a reluctant toddler into potty training.

“It’s not the first time I let him do one on his own.” Mr. Eddie smiled back and crossed his legs. “I might stop over there later just to share some fellowship.”

Damn
, Wes thought,
what the hell does that mean?
What kind of window of time was his father talking about? An hour? Two hours? Time for Toni and the kid to get in and get out with no complications? Why was everything so hard when he had to deal with these old muthafuckas, his father included. They change their minds on a whim but once they dig in their heels, that’s it. First, the Rev thinks one old lady can do a job that requires twenty or thirty young ones. Then his father flakes out on one of West End’s major Black History happenings and decides not to go see his best friend do his thing, which leaves him wandering around the neighborhood, poking his nose in where it doesn’t belong.

“Come on, Pop,” Wes said. “I’ll drive.”

Mr. Eddie was looking at him strangely. “Do you know who Fannie Lou Hamer was, son?”

“What?” Wes wondered if his father was having a stroke.

“Mrs. Hamer. From Mississippi.”

“Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, right?”

His father nodded, then stood up and took his cup over to the sink slowly. He didn’t look so good. Wes wondered if his railroad pension would pay for long-term care if Mr. Eddie needed it. “She almost got beat to death just trying to register to vote.”

What was he supposed to say to that? “I remember you talking about her when I was a kid, but what’s she got to do with getting ready for church, Pop?”

There was that funny look again. “It hasn’t been that long ago, son, that we can take it for granted. There’s still blood on those ballots.”

Jesus!
There wasn’t time for all this. If he didn’t call Toni, she was going to head over to the Rev’s, thinking he was handling things on his end, but here he was getting a private black history tutorial. Maybe she was right. Maybe they ought to stick to barbeque pork rinds and leave the politics alone.

“I understand, Pop, but we’re going to be late if we don’t get going.”

“You go, son,” Mr. Eddie said again. “I’m going to lie down for a while and rest my eyes. They’re taking the Rev for brunch at Paschal’s after service. I’ll catch up with you over there.”

“You sure?” The Paschal’s gathering wasn’t even scheduled to start until two. There would be plenty of time to get everything done before his father ventured out.

Mr. Eddie nodded. “Go on, now. The Rev will understand me not coming, but you’ll have some explaining to do.”

“I’ll have my cell on vibrate, so call me if you need me, okay?” Wes picked up his keys.

“Son?”

“Yes?”

“Is there anything you want to tell me?”

Something in his father’s voice made Wes wonder where the hell that question was coming from. “Not that I can think of.”

His father’s expression never changed. “I love you, son.”

“I love you, too, Pop.”

After Wes left, Mr. Eddie went upstairs, took a shower, shaved, and picked out his suit. Then he stood in front of the mirror to tie his tie and wondered how he ever got so old.

FIFTY-THREE

“I
THOUGHT
E
D WOULD TAKE IT HARDER
,” M
ISS
I
ONA SAID AS WE SAT
in a front pew at Rock of Faith and watched the sanctuary fill up with the Rev’s
other
family. The usher who said his name was Julius promised to come back and get me when it was time for me to play my part so I could enjoy the rest of the service out front. The Rev was in the tiny pastor’s holding room where he always prayed alone before services.

“Well, the Rev’s taking it hard enough for both of them,” I said. “He hardly said two words to me this morning. I kept waiting for him to tell me he’d asked somebody else to introduce him.”

She shook her head. “He’d never do that. Your name is in the bulletin.”

That was as good a reason as any, I guess. The truth was, I was half hoping he would give me a way out. I didn’t relish the idea of standing in front of the Rev and singing his praises when we were hardly speaking to each other. Plus, I was worried about Mr. Eddie. He had called me right after Wes left, heading this way, and said he
would give them fifteen minutes and head over to the house to catch them in the act. I kept imagining Toni and Cornell showing up, armed and dangerous, even though we had no reason to think they would be. I would never forgive myself if anything happened to Mr. Eddie.

“Did you write something special?” Miss Iona said.

“No,” I said. “I’m just going to read what’s on the back of the bulletin.”

She looked surprised. “And waste this opportunity to tell him how you really feel?”

Of all people, I thought Miss Iona would understand. “What do you think I’ve been trying to do ever since I got here?” And it was deeper than that. “What do you think I’ve been trying to do my whole life?”