Mother grunts, which means the conversation is over, so Ruth settles back into her seat. She turns and catches Elaine’s eye. Elaine winks and gives a small nod of approval to the shiny pink lipstick she painted on Ruth’s lips before church. Ruth, returning the smile, touches the corner of her mouth. When she looks back, Mother is frowning. Ruth lowers her eyes, slides forward onto the kneeling bench and with her forearms resting on the pew in front of them, she bows her head.
From this perspective, where she feels safe, she can see the two seats where Ray and she used to sit every Sunday morning. Ray always donated enough, barely enough, to keep their place in the third pew. Now, because Julianne is gone, the pew is empty except for Mary and Orville. Mary is thin, her shoulders frail and rounded, and Orville’s hair has gone white.
Ruth has known Mary all of her life, but she didn’t meet Orville until her thirteenth birthday. That was the day Orville stepped off a westbound train and walked into the Stockland Café. The café was crowded because dark clouds were rolling in from the south, the kind of dark clouds that meant rain. Every other dark cloud, for years it seemed, had been dust rolling in from Nebraska or maybe Oklahoma. Folks were tired of shoveling it from their homes and draping their babies with damp dish towels. The day Orville Robison arrived, folks were set to celebrate because those dark clouds meant rain. Finally, rain.
Wearing a tattered, old straw cowboy hat with a small red feather stuck in the black band, Orville walked into the café, carrying with him two leather suitcases. He had dark hair, almost black, and skin that made folks think he probably had some Indian blood in him. Sitting together at the booth nearest the front door, Eve, Ruth and Mary were sipping unsweetened tea, and the moment Orville Robison set down his suitcases, Mary smoothed her hair, bit into a lemon and said she liked that red feather. She said it meant good luck, said that feather was what brought the rain clouds. She said she’d marry any man with a feather like that tucked in his hat.
By the time Orville finished his first cup of coffee, he had noticed the three girls, just like they had noticed him. Leaning on the café counter with one elbow while a young Isabelle Burris dropped two cubes of sugar in his coffee, Orville Robison tipped the brim of his hat toward the girls’ table. Even at thirteen, Ruth could see that he noticed Eve most of all. She had the kind of beauty that made people stop to stare at her as if they might never see such a thing again. Orville was no different from most folks who saw Eve for the first time. He looked at her once, at all of them sitting around the table, glanced away, and as if surprised, as if unable to trust his own eyes, he looked again. The second time, he looked only at Eve. But Eve was barely fifteen, so within the amount of time it took Orville Robison to finish that cup of coffee, he settled on Mary, the oldest of the three-nearly nineteen. Six months later, Mary Purcell became Mary Robison. Together, the three girls hand-stitched Mary’s wedding gown and she wore a red feather tucked in her garter.
Lowering her eyes and pressing her hands together, Ruth prays that Julianne will come home to Mary and Orville soon. So many years, the two of them went without a child, but then, like the rain that came after so many years of dust, Julianne was finally born. Even after Mary’s hair had started to gray and her friends were counting grandchildren, Julianne was born. Ruth finishes her prayer for Julianne with a silent “Amen,” makes the sign of the cross to bless the Robison family in God’s name, opens her eyes and there is Ray, sitting in the third pew.
Celia reaches across Elaine and Evie and touches Ruth’s forearm. Her face is pale again, like that first day she slid out of Ray’s truck, a strawberry pie cradled in her hands. Ray nods in their direction. His eyes, even the bad one, rest on Ruth. With the tiniest motion, no more than raising one eyelid, he calls Ruth to him. Placing a hand on the back of the pew in front of them, Ruth turns toward Celia again. Celia squeezes Ruth’s arm until she can feel the small, tender bone through her wool overcoat. Ruth lowers her head and scoots forward on the wooden bench.
“I can’t believe he would sit right there next to Mary and Orville,” Celia whispers and shakes her head. “You stay put, Ruth.” And then to Arthur, she says, “Tell Ruth to stay put.”
It seems that all through the church, in the pews in front of Ray and behind, people begin to scoot in whichever direction will take them farther away from the man they all think took Julianne Robison. Ever since the men from the state came to help Floyd search for Julianne, people have become more convinced than ever that Ray took the child and that he killed Eve all those years ago. Getting their first glimpse of him since he came back home, they raise their hands to their mouths so they can whisper unseen. They take sideways glances. They turn away if Ray catches their eye. Some of them even give Ruth a fleeting look, just long enough to pucker their lips at the sour taste of it all and shake their heads, but Mary and Orville Robison seem to take no notice. Instead, they stare at the empty spot where Father Flannery will soon stand, without even a glance toward Ray.
“Arthur,” Celia whispers again. “Tell Ruth to stay put.”
Arthur tips his head in greeting to Ray, and with the smallest nod, he motions Ruth to go.
Celia sucks in a mouthful of air, and with Daniel caught between them, she hisses at Arthur. “What? What are you doing?”
Arthur, his eyes forward, says, “The man needs his pride.”
Celia reaches across her girls, grabs Ruth’s coat sleeve before she can stand, and says, “I do not care about his pride. How can you do this?”
Still staring straight ahead, as if he’s not really talking to his wife, Arthur says, “He can’t do her any harm here. It’s only for the service.”
Ruth places her hand over Celia’s. “It’s okay,” she whispers, then smiles at Evie, kisses her on the cheek, and says, “See you after.”
Evie reaches out to hug Ruth. “We’ll make brownies still?”
“Yes, sweet pea.”
Celia, now gripping only the very edge of Ruth’s sleeve between two fingers, says, “Arthur, please.”
Arthur says nothing else, and without even having to look at Ruth, he motions again for her to go.
Sitting with a rigid back, Celia turns away from Arthur. Ruth gives her a wink, stands and slips past Reesa. Once outside the pew, she wraps her frail arms around her waist, cinching her long coat closed, hiding her belly. All through the sanctuary, heads perk up. People shift in their seats, look from Ray to Ruth and back again as Ruth shuffles down the center aisle, her head lowered, her shoulders slouched forward. At the third pew from the front, she makes the sign of the cross and slips past Ray into her seat. As if she had been waiting for Ruth to be seated, the organist begins the hymn, calling them all to prayer. Ray drapes his right arm over the back of the pew and around Ruth’s tiny shoulders.
After the organ plays its final note and the congregation closes and puts away their hymnals, Father Flannery steps to the pulpit. “The Lord be with you,” he says.
“And also with you,” the congregation responds in unison.
Several rows up, Ray is speaking the words along with the rest of the congregation, loudly, probably so that everyone can hear.
“My brothers and sisters,” Father Flannery says. “To prepare ourselves to celebrate the sacred mysteries, let us call to mind our sins.”
Celia doesn’t look at Arthur, but listens for his voice. She hears every breath he takes, but he doesn’t respond along with the others. “Lord have mercy,” they all say.
Arthur is silent.
“Christ have mercy.”