Sister Lydia held out a rose as if she were admiring herself in a hand mirror. “But a thing so beautiful, so ambrosially fragrant can only be appreciated in contrast to those things which cannot be thought beautiful or fragrant or caressing of the human spirit. My children, the rose has thorns for a very good reason. As we embrace the Rose of Sharon that is our loving, merciful Jesus Christ, we must realize that faith is a thing to be earned through triumph over adversity, through the endurance of all the pain of life’s trials and tribulations. It is a gift, yea, it is a gift, brothers and sisters, of most divine purpose, but we must make the journey that will place us in the garden to receive it. God helps us in our struggles by setting our sights upon the garden, upon the rose that dwells within. There are thorns along that path, children, nettles and briars, and spines and needles of the thirsty desert, but we persevere for the love and grace that waits for us at journey’s end.
“Our blood is red for a reason, brothers and sisters. It is red to match the blood of Christ in his sufferings upon the Golgotha cross, and it is red to match the exquisite color of that Rose of Sharon which is the floral incarnation of our dear and loving Lord.”
Now the choir members rose to their feet and sang out:
Just as I am — without one plea,
But that Thy blood was shed for me,
And that Thou bid’st me come to Thee,
O Lamb of God, I come.
I come.
___________
Rose looked nothing like Ruth, but Will drew the similarity in his mind’s eye.
And Rose was good. She was very good.
“What are you doing here?” she asked unsmilingly. “Men aren’t allowed in this room.”
“I couldn’t care less,” said Will, closing the door behind him.
The two stood for a moment, staring at one another in silence. Then Will began his advance. Each step forward elicited a corresponding step of retreat from Rose, until she was halted by the wall behind her. With no place else for her to go, Will stood before her, his muscular arms hanging at his sides like slaughterhouse slabs of beef, the veins of his thick and corded neck prominent and pulsing. He was breathing deeply, perspiring heavily at the temples. He was regarding Rose with menacing contempt — the jungle predator taking the measure of his cornered prey.
Rose responded. She demanded that he leave at once, hissing the words at him with requisite venom. She was playing the game — just as Minerva had instructed her — but it was all she could do to tamp down the genuine fear she was feeling at this moment — a fear which, left unchecked, could only undermine her performance.
Yet there was no performance so far as Will was concerned. What Will saw standing in defiance before him was a woman who could very well have been Ruth — a woman who could have gotten along quite well without Will, without any man for that matter.
And how does man subdue, subjugate, subordinate woman if woman is going to muck up the works with all this ridiculous ramping and resisting?
Will would see to it that at least this one woman knew her role, knew her place and did not depart from it.
No matter what it took.
___________
The rehearsal ended after more stirring words from Sister Lydia, performances from several singers — a trio of young men in A.E.F. uniforms who sang “Soldiers of Christ, Arise,” a quartet of older women from the choir who sang softly and tenderly the old hymn “Softly and Tenderly,” two eight-year-old twin girls in ribbons and pigtails who earnestly belted out “The Church in the Wildwood,” with one of the two mostly singing the lyrics and the other mostly doing the “come, come, come”s. Finally, a stout Negro woman from the largest of the city’s A.M.E. churches walked out on the stage to astonished gasps from the ushers (who hadn’t been apprised of her participation), half of whom were touched by her willingness to contribute her beautiful voice to the day’s celebration and half of whom either didn’t know or had forgotten the fact that Sister Lydia was fond of Negroes and hoped to make her tabernacle services as racially integrated as her tent revivals had been.
The woman sang “His Eye is on the Sparrow,” and three of We Five wept: Molly, who was reminded each time Sister Lydia spoke the words “our Heavenly Father” that the fate of her own earthly father still remained in question; Carrie, who deeply missed her late mother, herself a woman of strong religious faith; and Ruth, who recalled that this very song was sung by a member of her aunt and uncle’s own racially integrated church at a memorial service for the woman’s nephew who was lynched by members of the Indiana Klan.
It wasn’t the clean uppercut which brought Will down, or even the not-so-clean-but-powerfully-delivered left hook. It was the liver punch. It left Will on his knees, cradling his gut in agony, as if all of his insides had been violently rearranged. He was left there on the floor by Big Jim, the Negro ex-boxer whom Minerva employed for the purpose of rescuing her girls from the violent drunks, from the all-around women-haters, from the odd ducks like Will Holborne who were either unwilling or unable to take revenge upon the true objects of their wrathful discontent but must seek a paid surrogate to abuse in their stead.
And Rose Sowell was much abused. In the time it took Big Jim to hear her cry for help and then race up the stairs to her room (with Minerva following close behind), Will had taken the opportunity to clabber up the girl’s painted face with his pummeling fist and to change the hue of various parts of her pink chubby flesh to red and black and a species of blue-green not often seen imprinted upon human epidermis.
Under his threat of tossing Will down the stairs, Big Jim kept Will on ice until the cops arrived — specifically the two cops with whom Minerva had a special relationship. (They were both on the take.)
“I’m afraid that things got just a little out of hand,” said Rose in answer to one of the officers’ questions. Ordinarily this particular officer liked to conduct his interview with one of his hands roving absently about the female victim’s smooth, conveniently exposed thighs, but for this interview, in deference to the severity of Rose’s injuries, he kept his paws to himself.
“I worried that things might go in this direction,” said Minerva, tossing a regretful look at Will, who was now sitting handcuffed and wild-eyed upon Rose’s quilted vanity chair in the corner of the room.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Rose painfully groaned.
“Oh, I really should have. Here, darling. Take another aspirin.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
London, England, October 1940
“Is the professor sick?” asked Molly, sawing a piece of her stewed steak.
“Not sick, really,” replied Bella. “Just a little knocked up.” Bella, playing to the hilt the role of hostess to her six impromptu dinner guests, passed a serving plate of currant rolls to Maggie, who was seated next to her. “I barbitoned him, you see. The poor thing hasn’t slept for the last two nights, so I thought I’d give him a few good winks before the sirens go off again.”
Ruth spooned up more new potatoes for her plate. “You take very good care of your new husband. You’re taking good care of us, as well. Bella, you’ve become quite the mother hen in your premature old age.”
Bella laughed. “I get lots of help. Mrs. Hood from next door cooked most of this feast. I wanted to give all of you one thumping good meal before you head off to points unknown. Of course they’re known to you, but I’d rather you not tell me in case the police drop by and start asking questions. I can certainly lie if I have to, but it’s so much nicer if I don’t have to.”