by Morgan James
Shane looked at me expectantly, perhaps waiting for a compliment on the motorcycle. I don’t know a Harley from a hairnet, but I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. “Wow. Very impressive. You must be very proud.”
Now he really smiled—a large sincere grin, his eyes a luster of rhinestones—a pleasant face, after all. “I am proud. That’s fact.” He ambled over to give the Harley a loving rub with a clean white handkerchief from his hip pocket. “Been saving my whole life for this big beauty. She’s my dream come true. Everybody needs a dream. Don’t you reckon?”
A dream? How wonderful to be young and think of dreams as events happening down the road rather than episodes of sleep disruption. I’d gladly trade my own nighttime dreams, peopled with restless souls traveling eternity, for daytime wishes and wants.
We left the motorcycle and walked to the burned patch in the goat yard. I held the dummy end of the tape for Shane to measure and record the dimensions of the barn in his pocket-sized spiral notebook. We discussed siding the new structure with Hardi-Plank, a concrete based material he assured me was immune to curious goats with a habit of chewing anything within reach of their cute little mouths, and settled on a new dark green metal roof. Within fifteen minutes, he promised to call me the next day with a price for the barn, and was riding away on his rumbling two-wheeled dream.
Alfie and I went inside to check on Cat and Junior. They were both asleep on top of the dryer, food bowl empty, and water bowl turned over onto the utility room floor. “All right, Mister,” I admonished Alfie, “if you want the luxury of sleeping in front of the kitchen fireplace while I’m out, no eating the cat food, and no dumping over the water bowl.” The hound tugged on one end of the towel as I wiped up the mess. “Come on, I forgot to buy dog food while I was in town. You can ride with me, instead of staying to watch the kitties.”
I made a quick survey of the fridge contents and snapped on Alfie’s red leash, a stylish match to his new collar. “Auntie Susan brought you this. She’s a thoughtful person.” I’m sure the hound agreed, and we locked up and headed for the Subaru.
Alfie is a natural traveler. He knows just where to stand in the back seat to balance his weight going around our tightly curved mountain roads. If only he didn’t insist on hanging his head over my right shoulder and drooling down my neck. I drove slowly, giving him time to get his sea legs, and about a mile from the house we saw Shane’s motorcycle parked off to the right on a wide turnout at the base of Fire Mountain. Alfie barked. I pulled over to make sure Shane hadn’t had engine trouble. I didn’t see him, but I did see a hiker’s trail leading from the turnout into the woods. I assumed an afternoon hike was the reason Shane had plans to come out my way, even before Susan’s call.
About an hour later, when Alfie and I came back from town, the motorcycle was still there. By then, dusk was smothering daylight and the temperature was dropping. It would be full dark by the time I reached home. Tiny crystalline flecks of snow peppered the windshield. Thunder groaned low in the valley. Cruel weather for the end of March. My buttery-yellow daffodils already nodded in a sunny patch of the back yard, yet Mrs. Allen was correct. Winter wasn’t done with us yet. If I hadn’t been so sleep deprived from my ordeal of the night before, I’d probably have questioned Shane’s Harley still parked on the grassy shoulder.
By eight o’clock I’d eaten a bowl of Susan’s delicious homemade butternut squash soup. Did I mention Susan finished a degree in culinary arts over in Asheville last year? The girl is amazing. Just as I was getting out of the shower, the phone rang. Running for it was out of the question, I was way too tired for that, but I did manage to pick it up on the fourth ring, just before it rolled over to voice mail.
“Promise, don’t hang up.”
“I wasn’t going to hang up, Daniel. I was going to say, hello.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yes, I’m fine. Just extremely tired. How about you?”
“Me?” Daniel made the “me” sound like I’d asked him the most absurd question in the universe. “Jesus, Promise. How can you be so flip? I’m not the one whose property was vandalized in the dead of night by some crazy arsonist. Susan just called me. Why didn’t you call me? You’d have to know I’d be worried sick about you.”
I grabbed my terry robe from the back of the bathroom door and wrapped up. If I was forced to endure Daniel sending me on a major guilt trip for not calling him about the barn fire, I wanted to be warm for the ride. “I didn’t call you because you left angry with me, and I wasn’t sure you even wanted to talk to me. Besides, it was just the hay barn— hardly a seven o’clock news story. Of course, I really need the space for storing hay…” I heard myself rambling on like an old woman and stopped to reorganize my thoughts before I continued. Daniel let the silence alone. He’s good at that, sometimes.
“Everything’s under control. No one was hurt. Susan sent Shane Long over to give me a price on rebuilding the barn. She says you know Shane, that he’s an okay guy.” The sound of fizzy liquid over ice cubes came from Daniel’s end of the line. “You drinking a Coke? I’ve never known you to drink a Coke.”
“I’m a North Carolina Tar Heel. We drink Pepsi. You Georgia Crackers drink Coca-Cola. I’m drinking a soda because the ribs I ate for supper gave me indigestion. Probably because I was so worried about you.”
“How could you have been worried at supper? You told me Susan just now called you.”
“Well, she did…but that’s beside the point. I’m still worried.”
I was trying hard not to react to Daniel’s digs. “So, is Shane Long a good choice for rebuilding the barn?”
Daniel took a long noisy drink before he answered. “Yeah, he’s okay. The worst I can say for him is he used to run with the Goddard twins in high school. But I think he’s put them behind and grown up. He’s had his own construction business for three or four years now. How come you didn’t call Mac and report someone torched your barn?”
“I don’t know that the barn was torched. Maybe it was some freaky natural thing.”
“Yeah, it was probably a freaky natural thing, all right. Some freak with two legs, a box of Diamond matches, and a half-gallon jug of gasoline.”
“The firemen didn’t see any evidence of gasoline. They couldn’t tell how it started.”
“Well, that’s why you should’ve called the sheriff. We have an arson unit in the county. They need to investigate. Who have you pissed off lately?”
“You mean besides you?”
He laughed. I wished he were beside me. Daniel’s laugh is warmer than my terry robe. “Let me rephrase that question. Are you working on a case for that attorney down in Atlanta? Maybe stirring up trouble? Anyone angry enough to want to hurt you?”
Why doesn’t anyone remember the consulting jobs I do for Garland Wang where nothing out of the ordinary happens? Where no one even remembers my name, much less wants to hurt me. I interview the folks; do my research, testify in court as an expert witness, collect my fee, and go home. No excess excitement. No snakes nailed to my door, no one shooting at me, no contraband cigarettes raining all over my Subaru.
“Fletcher Enloe asked the same question, and the answer is no; I’m not working on a case for Garland Wang.”
“Then it has to be a meth-head husband, or boyfriend, belonging to one of the domestic violence victims you’re counseling. Has to be one of them sons of bitches…they’re ruining Perry County with their shit drugs and violence. Used to be all we had to worry about was some local boy making a little shine on the side or growing a field of pot. Now look at what we got. I swear to God, I’d be happy to hang every one of them. Public hanging. Right on the square in downtown, make an example of them.”
“Daniel, Daniel, please, calm down. You’ll give yourself a heart attack.” Meth creeping into the Western North Carolina Mountains was a hot button for Daniel. In his mind, redemption or rehab didn’t apply to methamphetamine. It was catch’em and hang’em. Simple as that. I could understand his
hard line opinion. As a counselor, I’d seen the violence and waste of human potential meth brings. But that didn’t mean I wouldn’t try to help victims caught in the tsunami of the drugs.
“We don’t have any idea the barn burned because of my work with family violence victims.” I could feel my blood pressure, and my voice, rising. “What would you have me do, refuse to help because I’m afraid? Which I am not. Don’t you see, that’s just what those guys want? Isolate their women and children, and then scare the rest of us into hiding from them so they keep control. We have to break the cycle, if for no other reason than for the children.”
“No use preaching, to me, Babe. I understand. I’ve seen the billboards, ‘Love Shouldn’t Hurt.’ And I agree, love shouldn’t hurt. But why you? You’re too old to be worrying about some fool coming after you just because you are trying to help his woman.”
“Oh Daniel, please! Too old? I can’t believe you said that. At what age do we hang it up and play safe? I do what I’m trained to do. If I don’t, someone else might not do it. Then the bad guys win.”
“Don’t yell at me, Babe. I’ll be home tomorrow night. Let’s talk then, okay? No yelling. I’ll try not to be bullheaded. Right now, I gotta go down to the hotel lobby and see if I can find some Tums.”
“There’s nothing to talk about. I said everything I have to say. I’m hanging up the phone now. Thank you for your concern. I hope your stomach quiets down, and I hope you have a safe trip home from your cattlemen’s thing…your meeting. Whatever.”
7
The next morning my shoes crunched across hoarfrost on the grass when I left the house. The Weather Channel said we would be in the fifties by afternoon, but this morning I was grateful to find leather gloves nesting in my coat pocket. My mission, after a visit with my neighbor, Fletcher Enloe, was an appointment with a retired minister who was somewhat of an historian for the First Methodist Church. First Methodist was the oldest church in Perry County, and, according to records I’d found in the library, January McNeal and Reba Connell were married there. Records also indicated Reba and a McNeal child were buried in the church’s cemetery.
I don’t know what made me think I could have a civil conversation with Fletcher Enloe. He positively lives to wind me up. You’d think, after earning a doctorate in psychology, and spending years counseling unhappy people, I could rise above his sharp jabs at life, and at me. Not so. The conversation positively rained verbal javelins.
“Ain’t you got chores at home? Something better to do than banging on my door asking questions? Sure seems to me like you got a swarm of bees in your bonnet about old January all the sudden.”
Fletcher seemed to be trying not to smile, but the fun he was having sparked behind his blue eyes and gave him away. How is it this man is almost eighty and doesn’t wear glasses, except to read? I can’t even tell the color of the clock without my contacts, let alone the correct time.
“It isn’t all of the sudden. You’re the one who told me a year ago that you thought I had kinfolks who once lived in Perry County. I’m just following up on what you said.”
“How come you asking questions this morning of all mornings, iffen you been thinking about it for a year?”
I could feel my teeth grinding together with frustration. There was no way I was going to tell Fletcher Enloe that I’d now had two dreams starring my great grandfather, both leaving me with a sense of urgency to find answers. “Fletcher, please just answer my question. Have you seen a burned out cabin near a waterfall up on Fire Mountain, or not?”
“It’s my land, ain’t it? I reckon I’ve walked about every square foot of it since I bought it off the Sorleys. Iffen old January’s cabin was to be there, I’d know it, now wouldn’t I?”
“Is that a yes? You’ve seen the cabin?”
“Course I seen it. Hit’s a far piece up the mountain. Don’t you go traipsing up there looking for it. You’ll get lost in the mostest laurel thicket you ever want to happen on. You hear me, girl? Come warmer weather I’ll take you to see it. There ain’t nothing but rotting timbers and a scrap of a chimney left anyhow. But like as not, it’s your great granddaddy’s place. That is if the stories are true. You can ask that prissy Methodist preacher-man about the stories. Yes ma’am, you go ahead and ask him why they tossed old January out of the Methodist church. He’ll no doubt give you an ear full.”
“How’d you know I have an appointment with Mr. Kolb?”
Fletcher smiled like a little elf about to do a victory dance. “Cause some old men ain’t got nothing better to do than gossip. Me, I’m going fishing where there’s less conversation and more peace and quiet.” With that announcement, Fletcher closed the door, leaving me standing alone on his front porch.
The man I found waiting for me in the church library was a tall, older gentleman wearing a starched, white, long-sleeved dress shirt, brown tweed blazer, and red tartan bowtie. From the yellowish tones to his thinning gray hair, I’d say Mr. Kolb was once a blond. From the pink blush to his fair cheeks, I’d also say he shaved this morning in honor of our appointment.
I don’t know why Fletcher would say Mr. Kolb was prissy. I found him scrubbed clean and smelling of Old Spice cologne, but not prissy. Mr. Kolb turned out to be a lot more informative than Fletcher Enloe. In fact, once the introductions were said and we settled in soft cushioned, wing back chairs, he was positively chatty.
“I don’t mind admitting to you, Ms. McNeal, I was fascinated by your inquiry regarding your relative, Mr. January McNeal. Your great grandfather, did you say?”
I nodded, yes.
“It’s been years since I was asked about anything as interesting as a former parishioner. Usually a new pastor or committee chairperson wants to know about business or building issues—the budget in 1976, who donated funds for refurbishing the nursery—that sort of thing. But a chance to research a real person, now that is exciting.”
I nodded again and interjected what I hoped was a small push to get him to the point. “And did you find anything interesting in the church records about my family?”
He reached for a slim file folder on the table and opened it on his lap. “Well, yes I did. Though I’m not at all sure you will be happy with what I found. The event doesn’t seem to recall one of the finest hours of our church. And it may not give you the great grandfather you hoped to find.”
Well, I already knew from my dream that January had stood on the wrong side of the Perry County jail walls. What else could he tell me? “Oh, don’t worry, Mr. Kolb. I really don’t have any preconceived notions about January. Were you able to determine if he and Reba Connell were married here in the Methodist church?”
“Oh, yes,” he replied and handed me a very poor copy of a church ledger. “In 1900, the church was not the present grand sanctuary with its carved doors and stained glass windows of course. Then it was only the small brick building we presently use for staff offices. But the church was well attended, and the members were careful record keepers. Our marriage ledger notes Enid and Joab Sorley were witnesses at the marriage ceremony.”
If I squinted just right, I could read the Sorley’s signatures, and that of the officiating minister, on the ledger page. Mr. Kolb handed me a second page. This copy was even harder to read.
“Granted, it is difficult to decipher the words. However, I’ve had many years of practice reading the old records, so I can tell you what it says. It would appear that the McNeals had a child, a son, Ephraim, who was born in September 1900 and died in March 1901. He was buried in the church cemetery. Another son was born 1902.”
“That would be my grandfather, James. I believe he was born in 1902. I wasn’t aware until recently that another child was born before my grandfather James.”
“Sadly, it would seem so. Not unusual during those times. So many diseases lurked in the water, or came with the hard winters and hot summers. Couldn’t just drive down to the doctor and get a prescription for an antibiotic, now could we?”
January
’s voiced echoed from my dream, take the baby and run, he cried out through the jail bars. “Do you know if March 1901 was the time of the great fire that burned most of Fire Mountain?”
“Yes, that does sound right…somewhere just after the turn of the century. Could have been 1901. That little mountain was called Sorley’s Knob before the fire. You’ll see it named that way on most of the old maps.” A look of recognition dawned across his face. “Ah, I see where you are going. I’m sorry, there doesn’t seem to be a clue as to how the baby died. But if he did die in that fire, that could be a clue as to January’s, shall we say, emotional outbursts alluded to later on in the church records.”
I listened with half an ear to Mr. Kolb and remembered what else January said in the dream. He was screaming something that sounded as though it came from the Old Testament. Rise up oh Israel. Was that what January said? I turned back to Mr. Kolb. “Tell me about the emotional outbursts.”
After a deep breath, and a quick nervous adjustment of his plaid bowtie, Mr. Kolb extracted several sheets of paper from the file and handed them to me. “Look over these as I tell you the story—at least as much of the story as I could glean from the church records. The rest may be lost in time.
“What you have in your hand is the letter from the church membership committee informing Mr. McNeal that his name is being stricken from the membership rolls. The other three papers detail the meeting, or hearing, if you will, conducted to decide if that action would be taken or not. You will see that Mr. McNeal did not choose to attend.”
I must have frowned as though I’d bitten into a persimmon. I’d heard of Amish being banned and Catholics being ex-communicated, but I’d never heard of a Methodist being thrown out of the church.
Mr. Kolb extended his hands toward me. “I know you must be upset. But here is the remainder of the story. The pastor at the time spoke against expelling Mr. McNeal. His testimony is quite passionate and, by my reading, convincing. He admonishes the committee that it is the Christian duty of the church to stand by those in need and sorrow. However, two members of the committee recounted several incidents where Mr. McNeal was arrested by the local sheriff for disrupting the peace at various gatherings in town, as well as on the Methodist Church grounds. It would appear Mr. McNeal was a self-proclaimed apocalyptic preacher, anointed by the Holy Spirit, he claimed. As such, Mr. McNeal lost no opportunity to preach turning away from sin, and strictly following the Bible’s written word. Apparently, his opportunities also included speaking out, uninvited, during Sunday morning church services.”