The Sleeping Night (5 page)

The river roared through the trees, white tipped and rough, a normally sleepy ribbon of gray where mosquitoes bred and catfish slept. Today it had edged over its banks a bit and branches floated on the current that hurried it to the Gulf, but the worst had passed. A weak morning sun pushed at the clouds, sparkling on the wet leaves of cottonwood and willow trees.

Angel breathed deep of the washed air. She stretched her fingers up toward the sky and felt her tired muscles ease all along her spine. She spoke again, “Thank you, God, for stopping the rain in time.”

She picked up a handful of branches thrown down by the storm and tossed them off the porch. Taking a last, long sniff of the heavy air, she went back inside to get coffee started and put things back where they belonged. There was no guarantee anybody would be able to get over the river or up the road, wet as everything was, but anybody who could, would.

Turned out to be a slow morning, for which Angel, exhausted by the long night, was grateful. Old man Younger passed on his mule, waving as he went by. His place was nearly five miles away, the farthest farm out in a string of cotton lands, most of it parceled out too small to make a decent living on nowadays.

When ten o’clock came and went, Angel knew the bridge to Lower Gideon was bound to be submerged. By nightfall, somebody would have rigged a way across so folks could get to their jobs tomorrow. Again she peered at the river, wondering what the rain had done to the homes across the stretch of water. She could hear shouts and saw a flash of red at the bend near Renden’s place. Hard to tell.

Her garden was ruined. The little seedlings, her pride the week before, were buried now under six inches of muddy water. With a sigh, she took off her shoes and splashed barefooted through the yard for a better look, keeping her eyes open for snakes.

The water was cool, the mud gritty on her feet, and Angel smiled, hearing Georgia’s howl should she drive up now. She glanced over her shoulder guiltily, then laughed out loud. “Look at me, Daddy. Scared already without you here to chase her off.

Shaking her head at her foolishness, she peered down at the seedlings—drowned corn and flattened tomatoes and demolished collards. Plant again as soon as it was dry, she thought, scanning the sky, which showed clear and blue now, not a hint of the storm left. But that meant another month till harvest, too.

No help for it. Wading into the mess, she began plucking out the obviously dead, measuring the possibility of recovery in others. She was no stranger to hardship, after all. A body did whatever was next. Today, this was it.

January 1, 1943

Dear Isaiah,

It has taken me much longer than it should have to get this letter written back to you, what with Christmas and all, but it’s quiet today and I ought to have enough time to get it done now.

Your letter about Solomon came just in time, because I really was feeling regretful about things I could have done better—like marrying him sooner. I don’t know why I didn’t, seemed like we drifted that way for years and years and years. I guess I thought I might really get out of Gideon, and Solomon didn’t want to leave. But then when the war started, I knew I was stuck here, so I married him when he got drafted.

Now that sounds awful. But you know what I mean. You’re right. He was a good man, as patient and kind as anybody I ever met. And I know he understood about the two of you, that you knew, I mean, why he had to be like he was. Hard enough for him to hold up his head in town with that family of his (they all went north, by the way, to work in some airplane factory or something) without having to explain why his best friend was a colored boy. So, anyway, thank you for thinking of me. It’s sad to think of his body deep in the water somewhere halfway around the world. But my daddy said that war just goes like that.

He’s pretty worried about this war. Seems like it’s been going on forever, and now it’s getting harder and harder to get supplies of all kinds. Folks get mad when we don’t have this thing or that one in the store, but a lot of times there’s just none to be had. Coffee is hardest to get and keep right now, since you only get a pound every five weeks, but sugar’s been a problem for months. Don’t really think about how much you use until you have to be careful—iced tea and all my cakes take a lot more sugar than I thought. Guess I’ll bake bread more when I feel the yen to get fancy in the kitchen. But we hear it’s much worse over there. Do people have enough to eat? Can we send you anything?

How do you like England? (I have always, always wanted to go there, you know.) I would like to hear about it if you ever have time to write.

Was it hard to be so far from home at Christmas? Things went pretty much like always here. My Sunday school class did a good job on their part of the pageant and I knitted my daddy a sweater. I don’t know how he did it, but he got me a whole stack of books from Dallas and a silk scarf painted with bright birds.

He’s not well this winter. Coughing a lot and, though he doesn’t complain, I think he’s hurting. Lost some weight, too, though he swears it’s my imagination. But you know he’ll never go to the doctor. Worries me. Can’t be good for him living by this mucky old river, either, and it seems like things never get dry lately.

Anyway, I didn’t mean to run on so long. If you ever wanted to tell me about England, I sure wouldn’t mind hearing. Must keep you busy, though, I know that. Be careful out there.

Angel

PS I am not just speaking idly in asking if you need something. We’d be happy to send things we can get hold of, so don’t hesitate to ask, all right?

A.

When Angel, breathless from the walk to church Sunday morning, entered the room where her Sunday school class met, the children had a surprise for her. The motley collection of nine-, ten- and eleven-year-olds each pressed a rose into her hand and gave her a hug, then stepped back to let Jimmy Hemit present a huge card they had made for her.

Each child had printed and illustrated some verse of comfort from the Bible, and as Angel looked at the laboriously printed words, she clenched the flowers until rose thorns pressed into her thumbs. Tears welled up in her eyes. The children waited, arranged awkwardly around the low table in the room.

Without trying to hide her tears, she slowly met the eyes of each child. “This is so very special. Thank you.” She spread her arms. “Let me hug all of you.”

Her arms overflowed with thin and round and sturdy bodies. Elbows poked her, giggles wiggled into her ears, hair brushed her mouth and ears and cheeks. She smelled sunshine and starch and soap on their flesh. “Bless these children all of their lives, Dear Lord,” she prayed aloud, kissing a head and an arm and a nose. “Bless them for being so filled with Your loving kindness.”

Unfortunately, she thought later, that same spirit seemed to have deserted Georgia. Instead of taking her usual seat next to Angel in the pews, she barely glanced at her niece and passed by to sit with her friend Margaret. For a time, it seemed no one at all would sit with Angel, and she sat in one of the front pews, her face burning.

So this is how it would be—they’d just freeze her out until she did what they wanted.

She clutched her fingers together in her lap, sat straighter. She had nothing to be ashamed of, nothing to apologize for. If she let them get to her that easily, her daddy’s entire life would practically be a waste.
Ain’t always easy to stand up for what’s right
,
Angel,
he always told her,
but God needs our hands to do his work.

Finally, just before services began, Edwin Walker slid in next to her. A wash of cologne came with him. “Hey, Angel,” he said.

She licked her lips, coughing discreetly at the overpowering scent of him. “Morning, Edwin.” She didn’t look at him, speaking instead to the hymnals in front of her. “How are you?”

“Fine.” His voice carried a raspy edge that seemed to add to his appeal as far as the women in Gideon were concerned. To Angel, it sounded liked he’d thrown one too many temper tantrums. “I’m just fine,” he repeated. “How are you?”

“Considering everything, I’m all right.” She could feel his gaze licking at her face, but she kept her attention fixed on the pulpit, where the now preacher was standing, getting ready for services to begin.

Edwin leaned a hair closer, though even he wouldn’t act in an unseemly way in church, particularly since he’d just been named a deacon. But the truth was, more than one older member of the congregation would be pleased to see Edwin win his long suit of Angel Corey. If she looked around, there would no doubt be gentle little smiles directed their way. Taking a long breath, she steeled herself not to move away and give them even more to discuss in their tittering little voices.

“I hear your roof got torn up in that storm,” Edwin said quietly. “I’d be happy to fix it for you if you’ll let me have first option on buying the store.”

“No, thank you,” she said. “I’ve already hired somebody to do it for me.” It was a lie, but nothing on earth would induce her to let Edwin Walker come down that road every single day and hang around her store with his crazy eyes. And if she even
thought
of selling it to him, her daddy would flat turn over in his grave. Probably cause an earthquake, she thought with a private smile.

“I see,” Edwin said. “Must be somebody you like, the way you’re smiling.”

Annoyed, Angel looked at him. “It’s none of your business, Edwin Walker—and that’s not what I was smiling about, anyway.”

The pianist struck the chords of the first song and, grateful for the distraction, Angel grabbed the hymnal and stood up. For the rest of the service, she ignored Edwin no matter what he did to get her attention—bumping her ankle, brushing her elbow, coughing. Subtle enough to ignore. She was relieved when it came time for the offering and Edwin stood up with the other deacons to collect it.

As services ended, she made her way through the milling, visiting groups of parishioners. No one spoke to her. Shoulders squared, she passed Georgia without looking at her and made for the door.

The preacher stopped her. A thin young man with a high-bridged nose and earnest dark eyes, Reverend Adams had only been pastoring the First Southern Baptist church for a few months. “Good morning, Angel.”

“Morning, Reverend.” She smiled. “Good sermon.”

“Thank you.” He took her hand gently. “How are you doing?”

“Well enough, I reckon. I miss him, but he was ready to go.”

“It’s never easy, but he was the most honestly Christian man I’ve ever had the pleasure of knowing. I like to think of him telling jokes to Jesus.”

Angel laughed. “That’s a fine picture. Thank you.”

He didn’t release her hand. His brown eyes sharpened. “I’m sorry the church family hasn’t been kinder to you this morning.”

She looked away. Last Sunday, with her daddy two days gone, the church had swarmed around her in comfort. She supposed she had expected some chilling, that she’d understood the town would not take her keeping the store lightly.

What was alarming was to find out that she cared. It was a lot harder to stand up for herself knowing that she had to do it alone. She shrugged off the unkind comments rising to her lips. “They’ll get used to my having that store by myself in time. I’ll be all right.”

“I know you will.” His fingers tightened gently and released her. He stepped back a notch, hands folded properly over his belt buckle. “You let me know if you need anything.” His eyes warmed. “If it helps at all, I think you’re doing the right thing. God bless you.”

Angel felt her heart lighten for the first time since her Sunday school class. “Thank you, Reverend.”

She stepped away as other members of the congregation pressed forward to their pastor and, heart lighter, she stepped outside into the bright sunshine. A soft breeze blew away some of the worry of the past few days.

Somehow, things always worked out. She ought to remember that. The store had been busier than ever last night, the customers’ pockets fuller than they’d been all winter now they had field work.

She kicked a rock with her toe. Even those receipts wouldn’t buy a new roof, though, and it wouldn’t make it through another rain.

Maybe that was the big plan. The roof would go and she would be forced to find another life for herself. Maybe God had something planned for her that she didn’t know anything about and he was just using this whole trouble to get her to see it.

A crow sailed overhead, cawing noisily at a hapless cat whose ears flattened immediately. Angel grinned to herself, thinking that she’d been looking a lot like that cat these days, almost certain the sky was falling. “Is that it?” she asked, continuing her conversational prayer. “If so, I wouldn’t mind a little hint of the direction we’re going.”

It occurred to her that she almost never spoke to God in church. She prayed, if a body could call it that, in bed and while she did dishes, while she served customers in the store and while she embroidered and tended her garden, but almost never in church. Maybe it had something to do with the Southern Baptist’s stormy, angry God. Maybe she didn’t think that one would listen.

She grinned to herself and took a long deep breath, letting it go as the store came into view. As she neared the porch, a laugh rolled out into the high noon sunlight. It was a luxurious sound, rich with patience and pleasure.

Angel froze. For a moment, she thought it was God laughing, just the way she always heard him in her mind, and had since she was a little bitty girl.

But God didn’t laugh out loud, not that Angel had ever heard, anyway. As she stood there frowning, she placed the familiar notes. Twenty years and she could still remember it—Jordan High laughed that way.

But ghosts, so far as she knew, didn’t laugh either.

Realization washed over her, and she pressed a hand to a place in her ribs that suddenly pinched. Sudden, emotional tears clogged her throat.

Isaiah. Only a year had passed since his last letter to her, but five or six had gone by since she’d last seen him. Somehow, she’d imagined that she would have some time to prepare.

And yet, there he was, coming around the corner of the store. Isaiah, grown into a man. He’d been a thin and leggy boy, with hands too big for his wrists and feet like flippers. Now he was a tall man, long-limbed and lean, with skin the color of oiled pecans.

As he noticed Angel, staring like she’d been shot, he halted. The small boy walking with him stopped, too.

She swallowed. “Hello, Isaiah.”

“Angel,” he said with a nod. His eyes, luminous and grave at once, took her measure as surely as she took his.

She found it hard to keep looking at him, harder still to stop. “Your mama didn’t mention you were home when I saw her last night.”

“I asked her not to.”

“Oh.” The word came out a little airless and she tried to think of normal things you might ask some returned soldier, a person who was essentially a stranger. Except that he wasn’t, not really. She cleared her throat. “How long you been back?”

“Got home the day after they buried your daddy.” His voice had grown deep on his travels, and some of Texas was gone from it, replaced with a hint of places Angel had never seen. “I’m real sorry.”

She shifted under the warming sun, trying to swallow the quick grief swelling in her throat. Waving toward the porch, she asked, “Y’all want some tea? I have some made.”

“No, thank you.” Isaiah glanced up the road. “We just stopped for a minute.”

Angel shaded her eyes to look up at him. The sun haloed his proud, well-shaped head and tipped the edges of his ears, throwing his face into shadow. “You look well, Isaiah. The Army must have done you some good.”

He shrugged. “Some good, some bad.”

“I sure didn’t expect to ever see you in Gideon again.”

“Brought Mrs. Pierson’s niece home to her. I don’t aim to stay. “The thought seemed to give him some pause, for his eyes narrowed briefly before they fixed on Angel again. His mouth moved, pursed and relaxed. “I hear your roof is ruined.”

“Been going a long time,” Angel agreed. “This last rain did it in.”

“I come to say I’ll fix it for you.”

Angel made a dismissive noise, halfway between a laugh and a snort. “I don’t have any money.” She shook her head. “And I won’t have any. Cost me everything I had to bury my daddy.”

He measured the roof with his eyes for a minute. “That man got me out of here when there were folks who would have gladly seen me go straight to hell.” He looked at her. “I’ll take care of it.”

She hesitated. It gave her a worrisome ache in her shoulders to think of him here, after all this time, working so close by.

“What else you gonna do?” he prodded.

“I don’t know.” She looked at the roof. Even at this distance, it was plainly shredded. “I just can’t let you do it all for nothing.”

“You been doing for people your whole life,” he said quietly. “Let somebody do something for you.”

Biting her lip in indecision, she made herself look at his face. His dark eyes, above the high slant of broad cheekbones, glowed briefly with a pale white light. His square, smooth chin lifted. She remembered there was a dimple deep on one side of his mouth, but it didn’t flash now.

“All right,” she said suddenly. “Thank you.”

He nodded, glancing at the boy. “I reckon we better get back before they eat without us.”

Angel wiped a palm on the skirt of her dress. “Well.”

“I’ll come by to look at that roof tomorrow sometime.”

“Fine.” Feeling paper crackle in the pocket of her skirt, she shook off her surprise at Isaiah’s sudden appearance. “Oh, Paul, wait a minute.” She smiled at the boy, the ginger-haired grandchild of Maylene McCoy, a four-year-old with a crooked smile and mischievous eyes. His mother had gone north a few months before to find work. “I saved this for you, and was going to give it to your grandmamma tomorrow, but you can have it now.” She reached into the pocket of her skirt for an assortment of cut-outs of disciples, left over from Sunday school.