Light From Heaven (31 page)
Authors: Jan Karon
“Pole beans grew on that trellis,” said Father Tim. “I picked a hatful two years ago.”
“Prob’ly t-taters here.” Sammy kicked at the mounded earth. “An’ t’maters over yonder.”
“Think we’ll have any room for squash?”
“What kind?” asked Sammy.
“Yellow.”
“Yep. How ’bout watermelons?”
“I don’t know. Can you grow watermelons in the mountains? I believe they need sandy soil.”
“You c’n g-git sand at a nurs’ry.”
“That’s the spirit! As ye sow, so shall ye reap!”
“I’d put c-corn in here, ‘bout f-four or five rows. And put y’r okra in next to th’ c-corn.”
“How do you know all this?”
“I learned it offa Lon; he g-grows ever‘thing he eats. If we’re goin’ t’ git seeds an’ plants an’ all, we need t’ b-bust ass.”
“We’ll make a run to Wesley tomorrow.” Sammy’s arms were definitely longer than the sleeves in Dooley’s sweat shirt. They’d hit the department store while they were at it, and a haircut wouldn’t hurt matters, either.
“About the fertilizer. Mrs. Owen says they use sheep, cow, and chicken manure.”
“That’ll work.”
“The problem is—you have to collect it.”
“You mean—git it out of th’ f-field?”
“Right.”
“Is it rotted?”
“I don’t know. You’ll need to work with Willie on that. A good wheelbarrow, a pitchfork, a shovel, and you’re in business.”
Sammy adjusted his ball cap.
“Can you use a tiller?”
“I don’ know; I ain’t never used one.”
He clapped Sammy on the back. “I’ll show you.”
Two robins swooped across the garden. The emerging leaves of a fence-climbing trumpet vine trembled in the morning breeze.
Though Sammy seldom allowed his face to register his feelings, his eyes weren’t under such strict command. Father Tim saw that this garden would be more than food for their table; it would be food for Sammy Barlowe’s soul.
“Willie, how’s it going?”
Willie held out two egg cartons. “Fourteen. This here carton’s five short.”
“Just fourteen?” He’d promised a dozen to Emma, a dozen to Percy, a dozen to Esther . . .
“The hens must be on strike.”
“Looks like.”
“They’re on their laying mash?”
“Same as ever.”
“Snakes?”
“Too early.”
“Right. Well! I’m town folk, you know. Thank you, Willie. Anything new at the barn?”
“Two singles.”
“Almost done, then.”
“Yessir. An’ thank y’r missus f’r th’ pie. I et it at one settin’.”
“Good! My wife will love hearing that!”
He hated to give away less than a full carton. Percy would have to wait.
With Andrew’s cordial permission, he and Sammy dug through the Plymouth looking for, as he told Sammy, a manila envelope. At scarcely more than four feet tall, and weighing less than ninety pounds, Miss Sadie wouldn’t have had the strength to pull the lower seat out and stash something behind it, but they pulled it out anyway.
They felt around behind the dashboard; they looked in the glove compartment; they examined the roof liner as best as they could without removing it. They opened the trunk and rifled through a rusted green toolbox, they looked under the floor mats, and even inspected the ashtrays.
“You c-couldn’t git a big envelope in them little bitty ashtrays,” said Sammy.
“True!” he agreed.
Their labors, he knew, were rudimentary. All the places they looked would have been the places Miss Sadie could easily access, but Miss Sadie was no dummy. She wouldn’t have hidden nine thousand dollars where any Tom, Dick, or Harry could stumble across it.
He remembered George Gaynor talking about the jewels hidden in the oil pan of a Packard, but Miss Sadie, for all her savvy, was not the oil pan type.
“Nothing,” he said to Andrew, who was looking his usual trim and urbane self, while lamenting the downward spiral of the dollar and the upward spiral of the pound.
“We probably shouldn’t mention this to anyone,” he suggested to Andrew.
“I agree completely.”
“Tony said you may be having it restored?”
“I looked into it a few months ago. Something nostalgic for the Independence Day parades! However, at several thousand dollars to bring it into mint condition, and the economy in its present state . . .”
“Indeed. How’s business at the Oxford?”
“Slow.The good stuff is harder and harder to find. How’s life in the country?”
“Slow,” he said, chuckling.
“Law, lookit how you’ve growed!”
“J. C. Hogan, Percy Mosely, Mule Skinner, Lew Boyd—meet Sammy Barlowe, Dooley’s brother.”
“No way!” said Percy. “I took ’im for Dooley.”
“Set down, set down,” said Lew, clapping Sammy on the back. “Let me treat you to a Coke an’ a pack of Nabs.”
“I’ll kick in a bag of chips,” said Mule. “You want sour cream or barbecue?”
“B-barbecue,” said Sammy.
“I thought we’d have lunch in Wesley,” said Father Tim.
“Don’t go over there an’ fling your money around.” Percy dropped a half dollar in the slot of the vending machine. “Keep y’r b’iness at home is what I always told my customers.”
A Moon Pie thunked into view; Percy handed it off to Sammy. “On me!”
Father Tim eyed the Moon Pie with some disdain. “We were going to the all-you-can-eat salad bar in Wesley.”
Percy rolled his eyes. “This boy don’t need a salad bar, he needs somethin’ to put
meat
on ’is bones! Ain’t that right, Sammy?”
meat
on ’is bones! Ain’t that right, Sammy?”
“They got another word out of Edith Mallory.” Conversation froze; J. C. looked around at the assembly, relishing his moment.
“Spit it out, buddyroe.”
“Said she rolled into ’er breakfast room th’ other mornin’, looked her people dead in th’ eye, an’ said . . .” J. C. leaned back in his plastic chair and milked the pause.
“He’s doin’ it again,” said Mule. “Come on, dadgummit.”
“An’ said . . . ‘God
is
. ’”
is
. ’”
“God is what?” asked Percy.
J.C. shrugged. “That was it. All she wrote.”
“Could have been a complete sentence,” said Father Tim. For Edith Mallory, those two words alone would be an astonishing affirmation.
“Prob’ly tryin’ to say God is one mean soan’-so for droppin’ a ceilin’ on ’er head. Who knows? Who
cares
?” Percy’s estimation of his former landlady was decidedly on the low side. “How’s that little church comin’ along?”
cares
?” Percy’s estimation of his former landlady was decidedly on the low side. “How’s that little church comin’ along?”
“Growing! Attendance is up one hundred percent.”
“No way,” said Mule.
“I’ll be dogged,” said Percy.
“They ain’t got a t-toilet,” said Sammy. “Have t’ use th’ b-bushes.”
Hee haws, thigh slapping, general hilarity.
Lew Boyd stepped in from the grease pit.
“That’s what I like to see at Lew Boyd’s Exxon,” he said. “People enjoyin’ theirselves.”
They schlepped the whole caboodle into the kitchen until it could be sorted through tomorrow morning: seeds, seedlings, seed pots, planting mix, an English garden spade, a set of tiller tines, fifty pounds of organic fertilizer, four sport shirts, four T-shirts, a sweatshirt with a hood, two pairs of khaki pants, two pairs of jeans, a dozen pairs of socks, tennis shoes, a V-neck sweater, a windbreaker, two packages of underwear, a case of Cheerwine, and, in readiness for Lily’s visit tomorrow, four sacks of groceries.
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