My Old True Love (30 page)

I
HAVE HEARD FOLKS
say that the biggest calm comes right before a storm. As I look back down through all these years that have made up my long life, I will have to say that this is the way it is sometimes. We’ll be going right along and have no notion that things are fixing to change for us and then we’ll get blindsided, and our life will just go hind end over apple cart. They was no warning a’tall that spring and summer. And I will even go so far as to say they was indeed a time of calm right before Preacher Daniel set things in motion that would change all the rest of our days.

Zeke and Larkin had gone off that spring and fetched back some tobacco seeds and we had all throwed in to grow it together. See, they was the promise of real money in ’baccer, and Lord knows we had need of that. My boys and Luke and Hack Jr. would hit them fields and work like dogs without Zeke or Larkin either one having to stay after them. And Larkin seemed more like himself than he had since he’d come from the war.

I reckon that’s why it was so hard on us when it all come to pass.

R
OXYANN WAS A BIG
girl that summer and I remember she tended to all the young’uns while the rest of us was in the field. In
that way she reminded me of myself. Seems like she was born with her hip stuck out to set a young’un on and she was always tending to and nussing young’uns. That was the first summer I really noticed what a fine voice she had. I was coming from the ’baccer field all sticky and hot and heard her singing to one of the young’uns and it was some of the best singing I’d heard in a long time. I made a note in my mind to learn her some of the old love songs and put Carolina on her as well.

See, that is what I mean about it being a peaceful time, which is not to say I don’t go to singing when times is tough. Hell, sometimes that’s all a body can do is sing, but it is better when the times is good.

Well, that summer went streaking by and they is several things that makes it stand out for me. I was forty years old and in June I found myself breeding again. This would be Arty’s last lap-budding, and he come a big old pretty boy that would be the joy of my old age. We named him Joe Larkin. The “Larkin” ought to warn you that I was in a big way of missing my biggest boy. So here is the story of what and all happened that summer right before Larkin was set to have his thirty-second birthday.

M
ARY HAD ALREADY TOLD
me that he was not sleeping and that he had took to wandering around and about the place in the dark. Now I knowed that meant he was fighting with something that he did not want to share with nobody, but I am sorry to have to say here that the didoes he’d cut back before he got so sick had made me not want to trust him much. I was watching him awful close. He started to fall off and his clothes got too big for him. Zeke allowed as how they was not standing around up in them fields, they was all working real hard with that ’baccer, and that this might be a good
time for me to just mind my own business. That flew all over me as how I always prided myself on staying out of other people’s business. I told him that sometimes I thought men was blind as bats and it was an amazement to me how they managed to find their own hind ends. So after he looked at me and shook his head and went off mumbling down into the front of his shirt, that is the last he mentioned it. I guess he knowed I was not feeling too good, and that he’d had a big part in why that was so. He pretty much left me alone over that summer. And it is probably just as well that he did.

It was not even daylight when Roxyann come running into the yard that Sunday morning. She said her mommie had sent her to fetch me. Rosalie was sick and her daddy was not home. I went with a heavy heart, scared sick thinking that awful squatting thing had somehow found its way back down the path to my biggest boy.

Mary met me at the door and her face was all pinched up. I went off the end of the porch meaning to find Larkin Stanton if I had to hunt all blessed day. That was not to be the case. I found him right off, as he had gone no further than the spring.

I didn’t see him at first as the pearly light of that summer dawn had not found its way in under them big trees that stuck out over the water. I had turned to leave when he called out to me. “Amma?”

“Lord have mercy, you done about scared me to death.”

“I didn’t mean to scare you. You’ve got that chin stuck out and I know better than to mess with you now.” He squatted beside me and smiled.

I looked at the sheen of dew on his clothes and his hair was wet with it. “What are you doing?”

“Just been out here woolgathering.” He scooped a handful of water and wet his face. His eyes was red and he looked so tired.

“How long you been out here?”

His mouth give a little quirk. “Awhile.”

I looked at him a long time without saying nothing.

Of a sudden he give me a big grin. “You aiming to paint a picture of me?”

Though he was trying awfully hard to be sweet, I did not even try to take the sharp edges off my voice. I was not going to put up with the foolishness I’d let roll over my head before. “Mary sent Roxyann for me before daylight. Rosalie is sick, Larkin, and you’d laid out all night.” I know my chin was way out and I let her stay there.

His face got all worried and on the inside I give a big sigh of relief. Maybe me and God did not have so big a fight on our hands as I’d been getting my pigs set for. We headed back toward the house and he never said a word. And I never neither. I left him going in the house and I went on home. This was a preaching Sunday and I had my own herd to get ready.

P
REACHER
D
ANIEL WAS ALREADY
in the chair behind the altar by the time we got there. All that running about before daylight had caused me to run late, and my bunch was as grumpy and sulled up as a bunch of possums. Hack Jr. and Luke was setting at the back when we went in, but Larkin and Roxyann was up next to the front and had saved us a seat. I asked Roxy where her mommie was and she whispered she’d stayed at home with Rosalee. I hushed then because the preacher stood up and smoothed back his thinning hair and walked to the altar. He laid his worn Bible gently on the stand, and looked out at us and everybody seemed to set up a little straighter and leaned toward him. He managed to keep my mind from wandering, which in my estimation made him a very fine preacher.

“Welcome, brothers and sisters!” His big strong voice boomed out into the room, and he motioned his hand toward the open windows. “It is a glorious day God has provided us with to come together to worship in his holy name. Amen?”

A bunch of people hollered “amen” back at him.

“Then I say let’s raise our voices up to Him in song. Just like David told us to do. Let’s sing ‘Ninety-fifth.’ “ He held his Bible up and raised it above his head. He laughed delightedly. “And like the song says, ‘When I can read my title clear to mansions in the skies, I bid farewell to every fear, and wipe my weeping eyes!’”

The congregation broke into full-voiced singing of the old hymn.

When I can read my title clear to mansions in the skies
I bid farewell to ev’ry fear and wipe my weeping eyes.

Would earth against my soul engage, and fiery darts be hurl’d,
Then I can smile at Satan’s rage and face a frowning world.

Let cares like a wild deluge come, let storms of sorrow fall,
So I but safely reach my home, my God, my heav’n, my all.

There I shall bathe my weary soul in seas of heav’nly rest,
And not a wave of trouble roll across my peaceful breast.

Preacher Daniel had a look of pure-D rapture on his face and he rared back and hollered, “So I but safely reach my home, my God, my heaven, my all! Hallaleuer! Glory be to His blessed, blessed name! Amen! And amen!” He took out his handkerchief and wiped his brow and then his mouth. “As I was riding here yesterday I was a worried man. I usually am led by strong conviction. I
know
what I’ll be preaching on before I ever get on that old horse tied out yonder!

The Lord puts them thoughts in my heart and the words come pouring out like He wants ’em to.”

Preacher Daniel looked down at us and his face wore a wreath of sorrow. “But not a word come into my heart yesterday, ner last night, ner even this morning as I was coming here. But when I heard that song, that old wonderful song, I knowed what God wanted me to talk about here today. Listen to hit again: ‘So I but safely reach my home . . .’ No sweeter thought, brothers and sisters, than to know I’m going home one of these days. I’m going home!” He quit talking and looked back and forth at us all. “Do you know whether you’re going home one of these glorious days? Can ye say, in the darkest part of the night, to yeself, ‘Yessir! One of these days me and old Preacher Dan’l will stroll arm in arm over heaven together’?”

Throughout the room several folks closed their eyes and started rocking back and forth, and a few of them went to shouting.

“Some of ye can say, ‘Yes, Preacher! I
will
see ye up yonder!’” He pointed his finger toward the ceiling, then set in to pointing at different people in the crowd. “Sister Ethel! I know, praise the Lord, that me and you will celebrate one of these days around the throne! And you, Brother Carl!” The preacher began to laugh. “Ever single time that door back yonder opens, Brother Carl is pawing the ground to git in. And them little babies, if they went right now, in the blink of an eye, why they’d be rocking in the arms of angels!” He wiped his face and opened his Bible up. “Some of ye knows what hit takes to git into heaven, praise God. You’ve lived it! Amen! But there’s them amongst you that ain’t guaranteed your place in Glory. Hit’s them that God wants me to talk to today.” He lowered his eyes and began to read, “Luke, chapter fifteen, verse seven. ‘I say unto you that likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth more than
over ninety-nine just persons, which need no repentance.’” He looked at us and his countenance was sad. “Them’s Jesus’ words folks. More joy over one sinner that seeks redemption than ninety-nine folks that needs none.”

“Bless him, Lord!” screamed out Ethel from right behind me. I swear that scared me so much that my hind end come plumb off that bench.

“That’s a big old word, ain’t it? Redemption. But that’s what hit’s all about, friends. Redemption. What did the prodigal son receive from his daddy? Even after he’d took his daddy’s gold and squandered it? Even after he’d broke his old daddy’s heart? When he come back dragging his tail end behind him, what did his father do? He forgive him. Took him in his old arms and loved him. He give him redemption. And that’s what God does fer us. When we beg, and I mean
beg.
” He pointed his finger at Carl. “Ain’t that right, Brother Carl?”

“That’s right, Preacher.” Carl answered.

“Amen! And amen!” the preacher shouted. “And when we beg long enough and hard enough, long enough to where”—he laughed and patted his knees—“till they’s scabs and calluses on these old kneecaps, then we receive redemption. And we’re forgived of all the sins, all the pain of this old life is lifted off us, and we are pure again. Pure as any of these little babes laying in their mommies’ arms. All them black spots that sin marks our souls with are gone!”

He smiled. “The Lord’s moving in this little church today!” He gazed out at the congregation and paused. “I feel it so strong I want to sing about it. Let’s all sing the old song ‘Redemption.’”

Come all ye young people of ev’ry relation, come listen a while and to you I will tell

How I was first called to seek for salvation, redemption in Jesus, who saved me from hell.

I was not yet sixteen when Jesus first call’d me, to think of my soul and the state I was in;

I saw myself standing a distance from Jesus, between me and him was a mountain of sin.

The devil perceived that I was convinced, he strove to persuade me that I was too young, That I would get weary before my ascension, and wish that I had not so early begun.

Sometimes he’d persuade me that Jesus was partial, when he was setting poor sinners free

That I was forsaken and quite reprobated, and there was no mercy at all for poor me.

The preacher looked out at us and waved his Bible. “It’s all right here. The word and the way. You’ll find everything you need right here.” He tapped the cover with a gentle hand. “There is mercy and salvation for us all. All we need do is confess our sins, beg forgiveness. And then we have it. It’s ours.” He smiled. “Redemption.”

I
T IS FUNNY HOW
words can be treated different by folks. I felt it was a pretty decent service and I told the preacher as much as I was leaving that day. And it’s funny as I have often said what we recall from days when our life takes a turn from the way it seemed destined to go. I mean, for all the world I thought we was all in good shape—me, Zeke, Mary, Larkin, and all our young’uns. We was doing good with the ’baccer, and money would soon be rolling in. We stood out in front of the church house that day and talked with Larkin about what and all needed doing in the next few days. He never so much as let on that something had settled down right next to his very soul and was taking great big bites out of it. And I am sorry to say that I did not catch it, though I stood right up in his face yapping away about ’baccer and the topping of it. The last I seed of him was his big broad back going off down the road with his young’uns.

It would be almost two years before I’d see him again.

I
HONESTLY DON’T KNOW
what I’d have done if it had not been for Zeke, God bless him. I was big as a cow with Joe Larkin that fall and though I was not sick one bit in the body, my heart was absolutely
broke. Every time Aunt Susan come by the house on her mule carrying the mail I would go rushing out to ask, “Is they anything a’tall for me?” and she would look at me with a world of sadness and say “No, honey, they ain’t a thing.” You will just have to imagine how it was for me because they is no words to tell you of how I suffered.

When Larkin went walking off with his young’uns that day he’d got about halfway home and then had told Roxy to tell Mary he had to do something and would be on in a bit. Then it was like he’d fell off the face of the earth. All the next day they hunted for him and come up with nothing, and they kept on hunting for a solid week. As you might figure, Mary was perfectly wild. When Zeke made the call to stop looking, she was fit to be tied and I was too. I went up to the cave and they was no sign of him. I stood there in it and looked around at what was there and felt all done in. They was still some of Hackley’s things and I don’t know, it just made me feel so lonesome and hurt. Zeke finally said, “Arty, you’re going to have to let this go.” And though I knowed he was speaking the truth, it was hard for me to do. That was one of the few times in my life that all I could do was pray. But as with lots of them times, I did not know if God had Arty on the top of his list and sometimes I felt I might as well be praying to the wind for all the good it done.