Pa made nice Frenchy noises at Miss and Mrs. Toussaint, and then took off lickety-split with Señor, gabbling in Spanish. Ma’am sat down next to Mrs. Toussaint and they leaned together, speaking softly. “What did you think of the Wandering Bishop?” Easter asked Soubrette. “Did you care for the sermon?”
“Well…” Soubrette dabbed a fingerful of biscuit in some gravy pooled on Easter’s plate. “He had a beautiful way of preaching, sure enough.” Soubrette looked right and left at the nearby grown-ups, then glanced meaningfully at Easter—who leaned in close enough for whispers.
Señor, the Macks, and the Toussaints always sat on the same pew at church, had dinner back and forth at one another’s houses, and generally just hung together as thick as thieves. Scandal clung to them both, one family said to work roots and who knew what all kind of devilment. And the other family… well, back east Mrs. Toussaint had done some kind of work in La Nouvelle-Orléans, and Easter knew only that rumor of it made the good church ladies purse their lips, take their husbands’ elbows, and hustle the men right along—no lingering near Mrs. Toussaint. These were the times Easter felt the missing spot in the Mack family worst. There was no one to ask, “What’s a ‘hussycat’?” The question, she felt, would hurt Soubrette, earn a slap from Ma’am, and make Pa say, shocked, “Aw, Easter—what you asking that for? Let it alone!” His disappointment was always somehow worse than a slap.
Brother, she knew, would have just told her.
The youngest Crombie boy, William, came walking by slowly, carrying his grandmother’s plate while she clutched his shoulder. The old lady shrieked.
“Ha’ mercy,” cried Old Mrs. Crombie. “The sweet blessèd Jesus!” She let go of her grandson’s shoulder, to flap a hand in the air. “Ain’t nothing but a witch over here! I ain’t smelt devilry this bad since slavery days, at that root-working Bob Allow’s dirty cabin. Them old Africa demons just nasty in the air. Who is it?” Old Mrs. Crombie peered around with cloudy blue eyes as if a witch’s wickedness could be seen even by the sightless. “Somebody right here been chatting with Ole Crook Foot, and I know it like I know my own name. Who?”
Easter about peed herself she was that scared. Rude and bossy, as she’d never spoken to the angels before, she whispered, “Y’all get,” and the four or five hovering scattered away. Ma’am heard that whisper, though, and looked sharply at Easter.
“Who there, Willie?” Old Mrs. Crombie asked her grandson. “Is it them dadburn Macks?”
“Yes’m,” said the boy. “But, Granny, don’t you want your supper—?”
“Hush up!” Old Mrs. Crombie blindly pointed a finger at the Macks and Toussaints—catching Easter dead in its sights. “All Saturday long these Macks wanna dance with the Devil, and then come set up in the Lord’s house on Sunday. Well, no! Might got the rest of you around here too scared to speak up, but me, I’ma go ahead say it. ‘Be vigilant,’ says the Book! ‘For your adversary walks about like a roaring lion.’ The King of Babylon! The Father of Lies!”
And what were they supposed to do? Knock an old lady down in front of everybody? Get up and run in their Sunday clothes, saying excuse me, excuse me, all the way to edge of the green, with the whole world sitting there watching? Better just to stay put, and hope like a sudden hard downpour this would all be over soon, no harm done. Ma’am grabbed Willie down beside her, said something to him, and sent the boy scurrying off for reinforcements.
“And Mister Light-Bright, with the red beard and spots on his face, always smirking—oh, I know just what that one was up to! Think folk around here don’t know about St. Louis? Everybody know! The Devil walked abroad in St. Louis. And that bushwhacked Confederate gold, we all know just how you got it. Them devil-hainted tabacky fields too—growing all outta season, like this some doggone Virginia. This ain’t no Virginia out here! Well, where he been at, all these last years? Reaped the whirlwind is what I’m guessing. Got himself strick down by the Lord, huh? Bet he did.”
Preacherly and loud, Old Mrs. Crombie had the families within earshot anything but indifferent to her testimony. But no matter the eyes, the ears, and all the grownfolk, Easter didn’t care to hear any evil said of Brother. She had to speak up. “Ma’am, my brother was good and kind. He was the last one to do anybody wrong.”
“And here come the daughter now,” shouted Old Mrs. Crombie. “Her brother blinded my eyes when I prayed the Holy Ghost against them. Well, let’s see what this one gon’ do! Strike me dumb? Ain’t no matter—til then, I’ma be steady testifying. I’ma keep on telling the Lord’s truth. Hallelujah!”
At last the son showed up. “Mama?” Mr. Crombie took firm hold of his mother’s arm. “You just come along now, Mama. Will you let hungry folk eat they dinner in peace?” He shot them a look, very sorry and all-run-ragged. Ma’am pursed her lips in sympathy and waved a hand, it’s all right.
“Don’t worry none about us,” Pa said. “Just see to your Ma.” He spoke in his voice for hurt animals and children.
“Charleston?” Old Mrs. Crombie said timidly, the fire and brimstone all gone. “That you?”
“Oh, Mama. Charlie been dead. White folk hung him back in Richmond, remember? This Nathaniel.”
Old Mrs. Crombie grunted as if taking a punch—denied the best child in favor of this least and unwanted. “Oh,” she said, “Nathaniel.”
“Now y’all know she old,” Mr. Crombie raised his voice for the benefit of all those thereabouts. “Don’t go setting too much store by every little thing some old lady just half in her right mind wanna say.”
Old Mrs. Crombie, muttering, let herself be led away.
Ma’am stood up, and smiled around at Pa, Mrs. Toussaint, Señor, Soubrette. “Everybody excuse us, please? Me and Easter need to go have us a chat up at the church. No, Wilbur, that’s all right.” She waved Pa back down. “It ain’t nothing but a little lady-business me and the baby need to see to, alone.” When one Mack spoke with head tilted just so, kind of staring at the other one, carefully saying each word, whatever else was being said it really meant old Africa magic. Pa sat down. “And don’t y’all wait, you hear? We might be a little while talking. Girl.” Ma’am held out a hand.
Hand-in-hand, Ma’am led Easter across the crowded green, across the rutted dirt of the Drive, and up the church steps.
“Baby child,” Ma’am said. When Easter looked up from her feet, Ma’am’s eyes weren’t angry at all but sad. “If I don’t speak, my babies die,” she said. “And If I do, they catch a fever from what they learn, take up with it, and die anyhow.” As if Jesus hid in some corner, Ma’am looked all around the empty church. The pews and sanctuary upfront, the winter stove in the middle, wood storage closet in back. “Oh, Lord, is there any right way to do this?” She sat Easter at the pew across from the wood-burning stove, and sat herself. “Well, I’m just gon’ to tell you, Easter, and tell everything I know. It’s plain to see that keeping you in the dark won’t help nothing. This here’s what my mama told me. When…”