This Tender Land

by William Kent Krueger

  And son of a gun, that crippled boy began to draw himself up. It was like watching a leaf unfurl. I could have sworn I heard the cracking of every vertebra as his spine straightened. He stood fully erect, and the lights came back up, and he turned toward all of us sitting on the benches, and I saw that I had been right. A waterfall of tears ran down his cheeks. His father was crying, too, and embraced him.

  “Thank the Lord, and God bless you, Sister Eve,” the grateful man cried.

  “Praise the Lord,” someone shouted from the benches, and others took up the cry.

  Maybe there was supposed to be more healing, I didn’t know. Maybe they were going to pass an offering plate or something. But if this was so, it didn’t happen. What did happen was this. As the man and boy sat themselves back down, a voice from behind us hollered, “Bullshit!”

  All heads turned toward the tent entrance, where four young men stood together, grinning like rattlers and unsteady on their feet. One of them held a pint bottle of what I was pretty sure was bootlegged liquor. He’d been the one to call out, and he called out again, “Bullshit, you phony bitch.”

  The other three laughed and handed the bottle around.

  The man who still held Sister Eve’s cross set it down and stepped up next to her on the stage. He was a burly guy with a nose and face that made me think he might have once boxed heavyweight. Sister Eve raised a hand to keep him at a distance, then she addressed the rowdy group in back.

  “Do you have any idea what brought you to me tonight?” She spoke gently, as if coaxing a frightened animal.

  “Yeah, I heard about your dog and pony show, this healing crap. Wanted to see it for myself. Sister, let me tell you, I’ve seen better shows on a burlesque stage.” He hooted, grabbed the bottle, and took a pull.

  “You’re here because your soul needs tending,” she said.

  “I got something you can tend, Sister, but it sure as hell ain’t my soul.” He made a lewd gesture with his hips and gave a drunken whoop.

  “Get out,” someone shouted. “We don’t need you busting in here, you drunken ass.”

  A general murmur of agreement arose.

  “It’s all right.” Sister Eve raised her arms to quell the rising tide of anger. “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart, and ye shall find rest unto your souls.”

  “I’d rather find rest unto those big boobs, Sister.” That got a good laugh from his cohorts.

  Sister Eve left the stage and walked slowly down the aisle, the long hem of her robe trailing behind. Everyone turned as she passed and watched mesmerized as she approached the group of drunken men at the back. She stood before them like a white lamb before dark, hungry beasts. “Take my hand.” She held it out to the rude young man.

  He seemed startled, then a wary look came into his eyes.

  “Take my hand, and I will refresh you.”

  He stared at her open palm and didn’t move.

  Sister Eve smiled gently. “Are you afraid?”

  That got him. He reached out and roughly grasped her hand.

  Sister Eve closed her eyes for a moment, as if praying. When she opened them again, the look she gave him was warm with understanding. “How old were you when she died?”

  Now the young man looked stunned, as if she’d smacked him between the eyes with a pipe wrench. “When who died?”

  “Your mother. You were very young, weren’t you?”

  He jerked his hand from hers. “Leave my mother out of this.”

  “She died in a fire.”

  “I said leave her out of this.”

  “You watched her burn.”

  “Goddamn you!” He raised his fist as if to strike her.

  “You believe it was your fault.”

  “No,” he shouted and waved that fist in the air. “No,” he said again, but with less force this time.

  “You’ve carried this burden too long. I can take it from you, if you’ll let me.”

  “Get away from me, bitch.”

  “Let go of this burden and you will be refreshed. You will feel whole again, I promise.”

  He let his arm drop and stared at her, eyes huge and, I thought, pleading. “I . . . I can’t.”

  “Because you believe you are too full of sin. So are we all. Yet we are all forgiven. We just need to believe it. Take my hand and believe.”

  He bowed his head and stared at the ground, as if he couldn’t bring himself to look into her eyes.

  “Take my hand,” she said, so quietly I could barely hear.

  Like a thing long dead, his arm rose ever so slowly. He placed his hand again in Sister Eve’s palm and fell to his knees before her. He began to weep, deep sobs that racked his body. She knelt and took him into her arms.

  “Do you believe?” she said in the most comforting voice I’d ever heard.

  “I believe, Sister.”

  “Then let your soul be at rest.”

  She held him awhile longer, and finally stood and brought him up with her. “Go now in peace, my brother.”

  He couldn’t speak. He simply nodded and turned, and he eyed the three young men who’d come with him in a way that made them step back. They retreated from the tent and he followed.

  Sister Eve opened her arms to us all. “The table has been prepared. Let us thank the Lord and share in his bounty.”

  A flap at the side of the tent was drawn back, revealing a long table on which sat a couple of big, steaming pots, and the smell of chicken soup wafted in, the aroma of heaven.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  THAT NIGHT, I lay on my blanket, once again unable to sleep. I could hear the soft rustle of the Minnesota River only yards away, sweeping through the bulrushes along the edge of the sand spit. We were near enough to the town—whose name I didn’t know yet—that occasionally I heard the undercarriage of a truck rattling like metal bones as it bounced along the streets. Along the river, the tree frogs sang a natural, lulling melody that did nothing to make me drowsy.

  I knew the reason I couldn’t sleep. It was because I understood the young drunk at the healing crusade. He believed his heart was so full of badness that it could never be cleansed. I was a murderer twice over. If ever a soul was damned, it was mine.

  Then I heard the voice of the angel, so soft I wasn’t sure it was actually there. I got up, climbed the riverbank, and made my way through the trees and across the railroad tracks. I stood at the edge of the meadow, where I could see the huge tent. Behind it was the town, a few lights still shining here and there among the hills. Most of the automobiles were gone, the meadow nearly deserted. A soft glow lit the tent canvas, not at all the brilliant blast from the host of electric lamps that we’d seen earlier. Maybe from just one or two. The music wasn’t the great flourish it had been but was quiet now. There was only the piano, and the horn, and that heavenly voice.

  I crossed the meadow. The flap that covered the tent entrance wasn’t closed all the way, and I found that if I knelt, I could see inside.

  They were gathered around the piano on the platform: the trumpet player, the piano player, and Sister Eve. A single light shone above them. Sister Eve no longer wore a white robe but was dressed in a western shirt with snap buttons. Her blue jeans were rolled up at the ankles, and I could see that on her feet were honest-to-God cowboy boots. They were playing a song I’d heard on the radio at Cora Frost’s house, “Ten Cents a Dance,” a sad melody about a woman paid to dance with men but desperate for someone to take her away from all that. The trumpet notes were long, mournful sighs, and the beat the piano player laid down was a funeral dirge, and Sister Eve sang as if her soul was dying, and oh, did that sound speak to me.

  When the song ended, they all laughed, and the trumpet player said, “Evie, baby, you oughta be on Broadway.” He was tall, with slicked black hair, and a pencil-thin mustache across the pale white skin above his upper lip.

  Sister Eve pul
led a cigarette from a small, silver case, and the trumpet player lifted a lighter and offered her a flame. She blew a flourish of smoke and said, “Too busy doing the Lord’s work, brother.” She took up a glass that sat near her on the piano and sipped from it.

  “What next?” the piano player asked. He was as slender as a sipping straw, his skin the color of dark molasses, and he wore a black fedora tipped at a jaunty angle.

  Sister Eve drew on the cigarette, then her lips formed a little O, and she puffed out two perfect smoke rings. “Gershwin really sends me. I’ve always been a sucker for ‘Embraceable You.’ ”

  Which was a song I knew, though I didn’t know who’d written it. I felt the weight of my harmonica in the pocket of my shirt, and my lips twitched with eagerness. As the piano player laid down the first few bars, I moved out into the dark of the meadow, sat down, pulled out my mouth organ, and played right along with them. Oh, it was sweet, like being fed after a long hunger, but it filled me in a different way than the free soup and bread earlier that night had. Into every note, I blew out that longing deep inside me. The song was about love, but for me it was about wanting something else. Maybe home. Maybe safety. Maybe certainty. It felt good, in the way I’d sometimes imagined what prayer might feel like if you really believed and poured your heart into it.

  The notes ended, and I sat in the warm glow that had come from being a part of the music. The tent flap lifted. Silhouetted against the light from inside stood Sister Eve, motionless, staring into the night.

  * * *

  MORNING DAWNED BRIGHT and warm, but we all slept late. When Albert finally rolled out of his blanket, he said, “We need to get on the river, make some distance. I’m still worried about Hawk Flies at Night. But first I’m going to see if I can scrounge some food to take with us.”

  “Couldn’t we stay just one more day?” Emmy said. “The soup last night was so good. And I’d like to see the town, Albert.”

  “One town is pretty much like every other.” His words came out harsh, although I didn’t think he meant them that way. It was just that Albert, once he had a thing set in his mind and thought it was for the best, became a big boulder rolling downhill, and God help you if you got in his way. But he saw Emmy’s hurt look, and he knelt so that his face was level with hers. “I don’t want us to get caught, Emmy. Do you?”

  “No.” Her mouth turned down and her lower lip trembled, just a little.

  “You’re not going to cry, are you?”

  “Probly,” she said.

  Albert gave an exaggerated sigh and rolled his eyes. “Okay. You can go into town, for just a little while, then we leave, all right?”

  “Oh, yes,” she said, and her whole demeanor changed in a flash.

  Emmy’s emotions had always been up front and true, but it was clear to me that she’d played Albert. I didn’t know if this was a good thing, but I figured, given our circumstances, it was probably inevitable. You can’t hang out with outlaws and not become a bit of one yourself.

  “I’ve got a lot of scrounging to do, and I don’t know where that might take me. I might have to fight off another hungry dog, so it’s best if you don’t go with me. And you can’t go by yourself.” He looked at Mose and me and made a quick decision. “You go with her, Odie. Make sure she keeps her seed cap pulled down low. If someone from the crusade last night spots you, it won’t seem strange the two of you being together. Anybody asks, you’re two brothers, got it?”

  I grinned at Emmy. “I always wanted a little brother.”

  Mose signed, What about me?

  “Somebody needs to stay with the canoe,” Albert said. “Besides, you’re Indian and mute. If anybody tries to talk to you, you’ll get noticed, and we need to stay invisible.”

  I could tell this galled Mose, but he grudgingly accepted Albert’s logic.

  “I’ll go first,” my brother said. “You guys wait a little while, then follow.”

  Albert headed up the riverbank and through the trees and was gone.

  Mose sat down, picked up a rock, and threw it at the river.

  “Mad?” I asked him.

  Hate being Indian, he signed.

  I handed Emmy her seed cap, took her hand, and we climbed the riverbank.

  We quickly learned the place was called New Bremen. The center of town was built around a square where a big courthouse stood. We strolled the sidewalks, standing in the shade of green awnings, staring into store windows. I was nervous, exposing ourselves this way, but we walked slowly and no one seemed to notice us and Emmy was delighted. We passed a Rexall drugstore, and next to it was a confectionery.

  “I wish we could take Mose some licorice,” Emmy said, eyeing the sweets inside. We all knew licorice was Mose’s favorite.

  We sat on a bench next to the little sweet shop and watched automobiles roll past on the square, people going in and out of the stores. New Bremen was much larger than Lincoln, the streets and sidewalks much busier. A group of boys carrying baseball gloves and bats jostled their way across the square and disappeared behind the courthouse, heading toward a ball field somewhere.

  “We could live here,” Emmy said.

  “Nice town,” I admitted. “But Saint Louis is where we’re going.”

  “Is it nice?”

  The truth was that we were heading toward a big city I barely remembered, looking for a woman I hardly knew and whose address was a mystery. But it was a chance for family, the only chance we had, and it was far better than anything we’d left behind.

  “It’s real nice,” I said.

  The drugstore door opened and two people came out, laughing. Right away, I recognized Sister Eve. Instead of her cowgirl outfit or the white robe, she wore a green dress with gold frill along the collar and a fashionable gold hat, the kind I’d seen in magazines. Her shoes matched her hat and had little straps around the ankles. The trumpet player was with her. He wore a white suit and a white panama hat. As he stepped out onto the sidewalk, he slipped a couple of fat cigars into the pocket of his suit coat.

  They turned in our direction, and Sister Eve’s gaze fell on us. She smiled immediately.

  “Well, hello there. I saw you two last night. Did you enjoy the soup?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said. “It was good.”

  “And you?” She bent to Emmy.

  “Uh-huh,” Emmy said.

  I wanted to nudge Emmy, remind her to pull the bill of her seed cap low, but she lifted her face to Sister Eve, beaming.

  The woman’s eyes, as green as two spring leaves, shifted from Emmy to me and back to Emmy. “You’re alone here?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said.

  “And you were alone last night. Where’s your mother?”

  “Dead,” I said for both us.

  “And your father?”

  “Same,” I said.

  “Oh, dear.”

  She sat beside us on the bench. The trumpet player looked put out, folded his arms, and leaned against the drugstore window.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Buck,” I said. “Like Buck Jones.”

  “The cowboy,” she said with a smile. “And you?” she said to Emmy.

  I tried to answer, but Emmy beat me to the punch and told the truth. “Emmy.”

  “Emmett,” I said quickly. “But we call him Emmy. He’s my brother.”

  “Who takes care of you?”

  “We take of ourselves,” I said.

  “Just the two of you?”

  “Just the two of us.”

  She reached toward me, plucked the harmonica from my shirt pocket, and eyed me knowingly. “You play a nice tune. I heard you in the meadow last night.” She put the mouth organ back, then gazed long and deep into Emmy’s face. “Give me your hand, dear.” She took Emmy’s little hand into her own and closed her eyes. When her lids opened again, she gazed at Emmy as if she’d known her forever. “You’ve lost a great deal, but I can see that you’ve been given something extraordinary in return. I want you to
come back for the crusade tonight. I’ll have something special for you.” She focused on me, as if I were the responsible one. “Will you promise me?”

  There was no breeze, but it felt to me as if there were one, blowing fresh off Sister Eve. In her white robe the night before, with her long fox-fur hair, she’d seemed more beautiful than an angel. Now I saw that her cheeks were freckled every bit as much as Albert’s, and down the left side of her face, just in front of her ear, ran an ugly scar, which her long hair partially hid. She held me with her eyes. I couldn’t look away. Not just because they were wonderfully clear and their look gave me a feel as refreshing as mint. Gazing into them, it seemed as if I was looking into water so deep I knew it could drown me in an instant but so seductive I wanted to leap right in.

  “I promise,” I heard myself say.

  The trumpet player looked at his watch. “Evie, baby, we gotta run.”

  “Candy first, Sid,” she said. “What would you like?”

  “Lemon drops,” Emmy said immediately.

  “Buck?”

  I thought about Mose and said, “Licorice, please.”

  Sister Eve looked up at Sid, who rolled his eyes, but nonetheless went into the confectionery and came out with the candy.

  “I’ll see you tonight, Buck,” Sister Eve said. She gave Emmy a knowing smile. “And you be a good . . . boy.” She stood and walked away arm in arm with the trumpet player.

  As soon as they left, I turned to Emmy and said as sternly as I could, “You can’t just go around telling everyone your real name.”

  “It’ll be okay,” she said, as if she knew something I didn’t. “We can trust her.”

  I watched Sister Eve walking casually away. I didn’t know why exactly, but I believed Emmy was right.