Heaven Sent (Small Town Swains)

by Pamela Morsi

  The Hensleys lived a good distance from Henry Lee's place, so they started out early to arrive at midmorning before the majority of the mourners. Although Henry Lee's wagon was well-sprung, it was not as comfortable as the buggy. In addition to the jostling, there was no top and Hannah didn't own a parasol, so she was forced to wear her bonnet down close, with the brim shading her eyes from the hot sun. It certainly would not do to show up at the funeral with a bright red nose and too much sun in her cheeks.

  The wagon held the coffin. In the bright sunlight it was polished and pretty. Almost too pretty, Hannah thought, to put into the ground. There was also a caldron of butter beans cooked in fatback and a big basket of Hannah's yeast rolls. This made up her contribution to the funeral dinner. How food and funerals had become so closely tied in the communities of the prairie, Hannah did not know, but having a funeral with no dinner was tantamount to not saying words over the grave. It was as if the deceased was not much missed or deserving of the grief of the survivors. It was the responsibility of a preacher's wife to organize the dinner and Hannah, as her father's daughter, had instigated many a funeral meal and she knew that Reverend Brown's wife would be grateful for her help.

  Lost in her own thoughts, she was unaware of Henry Lee's preoccupation. He had spent most of the night pacing his room and planning his future with Hannah. Now in the morning sun, he felt somewhat foolish. She was his wife, she'd made this bargain of her own free will. He had never wasted so much time and worry over a woman before. Of course, he'd never really had one that was his very own.

  As he pulled his wagon into the shade in the Hensley's yard, the family began filing out of the house. Henry Lee helped his wife down from the wagon seat and then reaching into the wagon bed he retrieved the basket of rolls and handed them to Hannah. He carried the heavy kettle of butter beans himself, until they reached the porch where Young Newt relieved him of his burden, leaving Henry Lee standing on the porch with the menfolk, Newt Senior, his two brothers, his sister's husband, a couple of male cousins, and Reverend Brown.

  "Good of you to come, Watson," the preacher told him, shaking his hand.

  "Glad to do it." Henry Lee turned to Newt and his brothers. "I'm real sorry about your father. I didn't really know him much myself, but I've heard it said that he was a fine old gentleman."

  His condolence conveyed sincerity and was gratefully accepted by the men. Hands were shaken all around, and when Newt took his he grasped it affectionately.

  "I appreciate you making the coffin, Henry Lee," Newt said, "I can put together a bench or a chicken coop, but you got a way with wood that is mighty fine. I want my daddy to have the best."

  "I know you do, Newt. And I think you'll be pleased." He gave him a hearty pat on the back. "Why don't you come on down to the wagon and have a look, if it suits you we can take it into the house."

  As they headed back out into the yard Young Newt ran out to join them. In the clumsiness of his youth he allowed the screen door to slam loudly, which drew an immediate look of rebuke from his father and uncles. Henry Lee gave the young boy a private little smile of courage. The boy returned it shyly, grateful.

  As they gathered around the wagon, Henry Lee drew back the tarp that protected the coffin from the sun and the dust. There was a moment of silence as each man realized how final today's events were.

  Newt ran his hand over the beautifully finished wood with genuine tenderness. His reverence disconcerted Henry Lee, because he understood it. He quickly averted his eyes.

  "This is very fine," Newt said at last. "It may take a while for me to pay you what I owe for this, Henry Lee, but it is what I want my daddy to have."

  "It's only pine," Henry Lee said, wanting to quickly dispel any misconception about the price. "That's what the boy said to use. I just rubbed it up a little and put some roseberry shellac on it. Five dollars ought to cover it, pay me whenever you have a mind to."

  Newt clasped his hand again. "I'm grateful."

  They all stood together for another couple of minutes, exchanging small talk. It seemed strange to Henry Lee that no move was made to take the coffin into the house. It was as if they were collectively waiting for something to happen.

  Finally, after an embarrassed glance toward the preacher one of Newt's brothers asked, "You got a jug on you, Henry Lee?"

  Henry Lee glanced quickly at Reverend Brown. To his credit the preacher hurriedly masked his shocked expression and excused himself. Suddenly Henry Lee had an inexplicable wish that he were not in the whiskey business.

  "We're not really drinking men," Newt explained, "but when things like this happen, well, it just seems like a little snort would help a lot."

  "I'm sorry," he began lamely, "I don't have a drop with me. I ... I mean my wife . . ." Henry Lee didn't really know what he had planned to say, but whatever it was it didn't come out.

  Newt raised his hand. "I know what you mean," he said. "My wife wouldn't approve neither, even if it does help. Somebody will show up with some sooner or later and if they don't, well, we'll just get through this the best we can."

  Henry Lee nodded, thinking he was a hundred kinds of fool for forgetting. He was in the whiskey business, how in heaven's name could he have missed this opportunity?

  "We best get this thing into the house," one of the cousins suggested.

  Henry Lee and a couple of the younger men carried the coffin into the front parlor. Two dark-skinned women, who were sitting with the body, scurried away when the men arrived.

  The old man was laid out on two boards strung between a couple of ladder-back chairs. The men set up a couple more chairs and placed the coffin between. Henry Lee opened the coffin and placed the lid standing on its side in front of it. This hid the chairs from view and gave the viewer less of the sense of a box.

  "I'll send one of the women to lay him out again," Newt said retreating from the room. He was quickly followed by his brothers, cousins, and his brother-in-law until there was no one left except Henry Lee and Young Newt. Henry Lee wanted to leave also, but the body couldn't be left unattended and he didn't have the heart to leave Young Newt alone. The two stared at each other for a couple of minutes, the inactivity making them feel uncomfortable.

  Henry Lee looked down at the body of the old man. He looked somewhat familiar, but he couldn't remember actually seeing him alive. He reached over and touched the white material that lay between the old man's body and the boards.

  “Are they going to bury him with this tablecloth?" Henry Lee asked the boy.

  "Yessir," he answered. "Mama says it was a wedding gift that he and Grandmama got when they married, and he ought to bring it up to heaven when he meets Grandmama."

  Henry Lee nodded, understanding the strange blending of religion and superstition.

  "I think the two of us can lay your granddaddy out just fine and save the womenfolk some grief."

  The youngster nodded, soberly.

  Henry Lee wrapped the body with the ends of the tablecloth and told Young Newt to grab his legs. The man weighed very little in his old age and was rigid as a load of kindling. It wasn't difficult for the two of them to lift him off the boards and up into the coffin. He unwrapped the body and carefully arranged the excess material of the tablecloth around it, making sure that none of the rough wood of the coffin interior was visible. When he assured himself that there was nothing more that he could do, he picked up the boards laying between the chairs and set them aside.

  Newt's wife entered looking overworked but stoic. She was flanked by Hannah and another woman. Henry Lee glanced at his wife, as if to gather strength, and then grasped Mrs. Hensley's hand.

  "Mrs. Hensley, I'm so sorry for your loss," he said glancing at his wife from the comer of his eye. "Young Newt and I went ahead and laid Mr. Hensley in the coffin. Come see if there is anything that we've neglected."

  They made their way to the side of the coffin where Newt's wife looked down at her father-in-law and gently smoothed his hair.

 
"He looks right peaceful, don't he?"

  The others agreed with her.

  She turned to her son. "You and Mr. Watson done laid him out like this?"

  "Yes, ma'am," the boy answered, a bit unsure.

  "Thank you,” she said to Henry Lee and then gave a gentle motherly hug to Young Newt, who beamed brightly at having finally done the right thing.

  The afternoon sun blazed down on the gathered mourners at the grave side. Henry Lee and Hannah stood together as Elijah Brown gave the eulogy for the old man.

  The deep and melodious voice of the preacher was a comfort to those gathered.

  "Brother Hensley loved these prairies," he said. "He started up his first place not far from here. He tried three different times to make a go of it in different parts of the territory, before he finally came down here to Sandy Creek with his son."

  Many of those gathered had lived a similar life, moving from one place to another hoping to have better luck at the next plot of ground.

  "All that time, all his whole life," the preacher went on, "Brother Hensley was looking for a home."

  There were nods of affirmation from the family and friends.

  "He was looking for a home!" he repeated loudly. "He was just looking for a home."

  His voice became quiet, just above a whisper. "And yesterday, brothers and sisters, he found a home in heaven at last."

  "Amen!" was heard from one listener.

  "Hallelujah!" from another.

  Old Man Hensley's daughter began sobbing loudly and was comforted by Newt's wife.

  Hannah couldn't stand to look at them, so she stared at the coffin as if in a trance and took her mind elsewhere. It was a trick she had acquired years ago. Funerals always reminded her of her mother's death, and as a member of the preacher's family, she had to attend a good many of them. She had learned when still in her teens to allow her mind to wander to the necessary tasks to be completed. If was impossible to think of two things at once. If she thought about the practical details, her mind had no room for the pain. She quickly made inventory of the last few hours. She had never worked with these women before, but found them much like the women in her father's congregation. Their ways were different from Hannah's, but everything had got done. It was not how Hannah would have done it, but then her way was not the only way.

  It was nice, however, not to feel the burden of responsibility. For Hannah, this was the first time in a very long time when the congregation did not turn to her automatically to organize things. It enabled her to spend more time comforting the family.

  They were holding up very well, she thought. And she was glad she had been there for Newt's wife, who seemed to be carrying the rest of the family and needed a strong shoulder to lean on herself.

  It was still hard for her to believe that Henry Lee had put the man in his coffin and arranged the body. Newt's wife's relief had been blatantly obvious. And Young Newt's face, when he saw that he had pleased his mother, was something not easy to forget. Henry Lee had done that. Her Henry Lee. Without prompting, or previous experience, he had instinctively known how to help. Even her father, who Hannah had always considered the closest thing to a saint on this earth, would never have known to do that. It was just more evidence of the goodness and depth of her husband's nature.

  Hannah was aware of Henry Lee at her side, and in her ruminations upon his decency and kindness she reached over and took his hand. His warm, calloused fingers felt perfectly matched to her own. She looked up at him to find him looking at her. His deep blue eyes searching her own, as if to read what she was thinking and feeling. Yet it seemed he must already know. They felt the same way. In this they were one.

  Continuing to gaze at each other, they both suddenly became attuned again to what the preacher was saying.

  "After Brother Hensley's wife, Mattie, died," he was saying, "it was almost as if a part of him died with her. Oh, he wanted to be here, to watch his grandchildren grow up, to see the community prosper, just to watch the sunrise every morning. But a part of him wanted to be with the woman that he loved, the woman that he had committed himself to all those years before. The woman that had shared his life, through better and worse, richer and poorer, sickness and health, only death could part them."

  There seemed to be a flow of energy racing back and forth between Henry Lee and Hannah, connected by their hands but also by their hearts, as they heard the preacher speaking the words that they had so recently said to each other. When they had made those vows, neither had understood the depth of their meaning. Now as they stood at the site of the newly-dug grave, both silently reaffirmed that their lives were irrevocably entwined.

  Reverend Brown closed his Bible quietly as he concluded, "Death no longer parts our brother from the woman he loves. They are together again in paradise."

  The movement around them broke the trance between the two and Henry Lee moved to pick up one of the ropes to lower the coffin into the ground.

  As the preacher committed the body to the ground, Henry Lee returned to Hannah's side and took her arm. He felt a sense of pride and ownership, this woman was his, all his and would be forever. Hannah thought she finally knew what it felt like to be married.

  A few days later, she wasn't sure that she hadn't imagined the feeling. The day of the funeral they had been so close. During the drive home that evening, Henry Lee had actually put his arm loosely around her shoulders as he asked concerned questions about how she was feeling and if she was tired. Hannah was sure now that things were beginning to work out between them.

  But when they arrived home, as late as it was, Henry Lee immediately changed into work clothes and grabbed up his bedroll telling Hannah he would be sleeping outside and would see her at breakfast.

  He had been true to his word and the next day, Hannah saw him only at meals and he seemed to be very rushed and distracted. He barely spoke to her. With the date of their trip rapidly approaching, he did remind her to have her things ready, but he needn't have bothered. Her new dress was finished and she had already picked through the nicest of her clothing to take in her satchel. There was always the possibility of becoming ill or injured among strangers. If it became necessary for a strange woman to take care of her, she wanted her unmentionables to be her best.

  Henry Lee's defection preyed on her mind incessantly. She wanted to please him, to do something to make him want to return to the cabin. She tried to make his home more inviting, a crocheted doily here and a vase of wildflowers there. She made a tick for his Dufold and used the leftover blue material from her new dress to upholster it. He had seemed very pleased and complimented her on the quality of her workmanship, but quickly hurried back out. But mostly she appealed in the manner she thought most successful. She cooked.

  Devoting an unreasonable amount of time to the task, she made Sunday meals three times a day, trying to capture his attention. He ate like a man starved and seemed totally delighted at his good fortune, but never once did he linger at the table.

  This failure only spurred Hannah to new heights of culinary excellence. So, when she was tramping through the woods trying to capture a thieving pig who had run off with one of Henry Lee's shirts from the wash, she was delighted to discover a blackberry thicket just ripe and ready to pick. It might be possible, she determined, to win her husband with a blackberry cobbler.

  In midaftemoon, when all the washing was hanging out on the line and the work caught up, Hannah dressed in her oldest, shabbiest dress. Blackberry picking was a thankless task, and the millions of thorns that grow from the branches of the thicket often made it a painful one. But Hannah was confident that a blackberry cobbler would do for her marriage what her desire for her husband's attention could not.

  As Hannah carefully picked berries, Henry Lee sat working in the cave watching the steady drip from the still. He poured some of the finished brew into a mason jar and after fastening the lid, he shook it thoroughly. Holding it up to the light he examined the bubbles that had formed at the top of t
he liquid and a smile broke out on his face. They were the exact size of #5 shot. The proof was perfect.

  He had laid out some poor quality knotty pine and was busily working on another coffin, not nearly so fine as the one he'd made for Old Man Hensley. Henry Lee had decided since whiskey was in short supply, selling some whiskey right in the middle of the territory could bring him double price. He had to pass through Muskogee anyway, so there was really no reason not to make the trip profitable as well as fun.

  His idea for a coffin, Henry Lee thought, was inspired. Harjo had a brother-in-law who ran an undertaking business in Muskogee. It would not seem strange at all for an undertaker to pull a wagon up to the train to retrieve a body. And no federal marshal would be anxious to inspect a coffin that had been riding in the hot, steamy baggage car for several hours. Henry Lee smiled at his own cleverness. He figured he could easily ship thirty-eight gallons of whiskey in the coffin and it still wouldn't be much heavier than a good-sized corpse.

  He would send a wire to the undertaker saying that Harjo's body was being shipped to him on the Katy. Since he would know that his brother-in-law was not dead, the two of them would pick up the coffin and hold it for Henry Lee.

  It was a good plan, he thought. The only tricky part would be explaining to Hannah why he was shipping a coffin to Muskogee, but since she knew that he made coffins, she might not be too suspicious about hearing an undertaker in Muskogee had requested one.

  He was proud of his business acumen and wished he could share his accomplishments with Hannah. He was not ready yet, however, to tell her about the whiskey. He felt that he knew her better now, and was sure that she would grow accustomed to his line of work, he just didn't want to cause trouble before they took their trip. Once they were really man and wife, once he'd pleased her in his bed, she'd come around soon enough.