He waved his hand again. "Nothing to be sorry about, Jonas. I've lived a full life and am as ready as any man to go meet his Maker. But while I'm still able, I wanted to introduce you to Randall Woodbridge, the new president of the Carrie's Crossing Branch. Randy, this is Jonas Thatcher, one of this bank's most important clients, and an old and dear friend. I've known him since he was a boy."
Jonas shook hands with the new bank president and wondered how closely he was related to those Woodbridges. He'd have to ask Audrey or, better, Alice. "Welcome to Carrie's Crossing, Mr. Woodbridge, and congratulations."
"Thank you, Mr. Thatcher. I look forward to doing business with you." He looked at Grady, who nodded, and continued. "I'll be doing things a little differently, and I just wanted to say that to you in person."
"How different? Different enough that I'll have to withdraw all my money from your bank?"
Woodbridge paled. "Good heavens, no." And Grady Allen, deathly sick as he was, managed a dry chuckle.
"Horace was in here this morning trying to get some money out of you all's business account. You know how he does."
"That account requires two signatures, Mr. Thatcher, and I'll enforce that rule. That's what I meant about doing things differently. In the past, I know Grady would call you to get the OK to release the funds, but I won't be doing that."
Jonas nodded. "That's fine with me, Mr. Woodbridge."
"He also tried to withdraw funds from you wife's account—"
"He what?"
"Of course I wouldn't let him do that, Jonas," Grady said, "but Randy was going to have him arrested for fraud, theft, and a few other things." Grady had clearly enjoyed the spectacle that must have been.
Randall Woodbridge touched a stack of files on the desk in front of him. "I've been carefully reviewing your accounts, Mr. Thatcher, and if you don't mind an impartial observation—?" When Jonas nodded, he went on, "I don't know why you're in business with Mr. Edwards. I see why he needed you—still needs you—but why you need him I don't know."
Jonas looked at Grady who explained the how and the why of the improbable and unlikely Thatcher/Edwards partnership. He also detailed its volatility. Then he gave Jonas a look unweakened by illness and recommended in a strong, clear voice that Jonas buy out Horace and terminate the partnership. "It'll cost you roughly three hundred thousand, but it'll be worth it, both long and short term. And given his love of cash, I think he'll jump at the chance."
Grady Allen didn't live to see it; he died just after Thanksgiving, but Jonas took and followed his advice and by Christmas, the Edwards/Thatcher partnership no longer existed. It cost him and Audrey almost four hundred thousand dollars, and it was worth it. They hung lights on the house and the stable and the trees in the yard; they decorated the huge tree in the living room and had their big holiday party. But what they most enjoyed about that Christmas was planning the January 1944 Grand Opening of the Audrey Thatcher Interior Decorating Company. They would write the name in gold lettering on the front window of the no-longer-in-existence real estate development company. Jonas would move his office to the rear of the building—he didn't need a lot of space anyway, he said—and the big front room would be taken up with fabric books and swatches, paint color wheels, and sketches that Mack would draw of potential bathrooms, kitchens and solariums. She would hang draperies in several colors and styles from the walls, and blinds and shutters, too. Audrey was so excited she was vibrating. She was so excited that her father's Christmas present to her—a 1941 Cadillac Darrin—was met with only a mild reaction, which infuriated Horace. "A car like this is hard to come by," he fumed, "and 'specially with Cadillac and all the car companies makin' tanks and fighter planes these days. Only way I came by it is the fella who owned it got killed over there and his folks wanted to get rid of his things. I got it a real bargain price."
"You thought I'd like to have a dead man's car," Audrey said.
"And you found a new way to make a buck off the casualties of war," Jonas said.
Instead of increasing his fury, though, Jonas's remark provided Horace with the entrée he needed to talk about the several new business ventures he had in the works and all the money he would make. As an afterthought, he mentioned his Christmas present to his wife, something neither Audrey nor Jonas had noticed when Alice arrived, and for which they felt an enormous guilt: It was a full-length mink coat, and despite the fact of its total impracticality, it was gorgeous, and Alice was as excited about it as Audrey was about her new business. That they hadn't noticed her wearing it hurt her deeply.
"Don't let yourself become too much like your pa," Alice had said as they were talking in the kitchen after dinner. "Paying attention only to what matters to you."
"I won't, Ma."
"Don't become too much like Jonas, either," Alice said.
"What do you mean?"
"You worry too much about niggers, and I will call 'em that 'cause that's what they are. And that's what I mean about lettin' Jonas rub off on you too much: You heard 'em called that all your life and it never bothered you."
"It did bother me. I just didn't know it bothered anybody else."
"They're not like us, and they never will be, no matter how nice you treat 'em. They lie, they cheat, they steal, and they won't do a full day's work unless you're standin' right over 'em with a stick."
Audrey walked away from her mother then, feeling a deadening inside more than anger. She knew that what her mother and father believed was wrong—she had firsthand knowledge and proof that they were wrong—but how was it that more people believed as they did than shared her and Jonas's view?
"Don't think anymore sad thoughts." Audrey hadn't heard Jonas approach. "It's the Christmas holiday. It's almost the New Year, and I've got a resolution for us: From now on, we won't let anybody make us sad or angry. How does that sound?"
"People you love can always hurt you or make you sad," Audrey said. "How do you stop loving your parents? That's the question."
"I don't have the answer to that. I wish I did."
"I have made a decision about one thing, though: I'm giving Pa that car back."
"It is a beautiful automobile, Audrey."
"Then you drive it. I don't like it. I feel like I'm in a magazine advertisement and I should be smiling and waving. But the reason that he gave it to me is the reason I won't keep it."
"He gave it to you because he's your father and he loves you."
"Oh, stop it, Jonas. You hate him, and he hates you. You know as well as I do that he gave me the car to spite you, to be better than you, to give me a gift bigger than the gift you gave me, and what he doesn't understand—oh never mind. I'm going to take it back tomorrow and get my old car. I'll say I'm coming to have a New Year's lunch with them, just me and Allie. We'll be back before dark."
Jonas had just convinced JJ to lie down on the sofa and take a nap while he finished the job of undecorating the Christmas tree when the phone rang. JJ's eyes snapped open, and he was wide awake and off the sofa quick as a lightning strike. "I can answer it, Papa," he yelled, running towards the hall. As he was halfway up a ladder, there was no way Jonas could stop him, so he took his time getting to the phone which JJ gave to him. "Grandpa said where is Mama."
"Horace?"
"Where's my daughter?"
"What do you mean, where is she? She's at your house."
"If she was at my house I wouldn't be askin' you where she was."
Jonas's heart was in his stomach, and his stomach had dropped below his knees. "She left here at twelve o'clock, said y'all were serving dinner at one."
"We been waitin' on her," Horace said, bluster gone, replaced by worry.
Jonas couldn't think. She had to be there. Where else could she be? He'd go look for her...but where? Think. Think. "I'm going to look for her," he said and hung up.
"Where's Mama?" JJ asked.
"I'm going to go get her, Buddy, but I can't take you." And just as he thought to ring for Ernestine, he remember
ed that the three of them were at their own homes and wouldn't return until tomorrow night. He picked up the telephone and dialed Rachel, told her what he could without alarming JJ and found that it was sufficient to alarm his sister. "Your Aunt Ra is gonna watch you while I go get your Mama and Allie," he said.
"Ok, Papa," the boy said, some wise thing within him knowing this was not the time to resist.
Jonas got himself and his son dressed and out the door in record time. There was little traffic; it was two o'clock on Saturday afternoon, the second of January, and still part of the long holiday weekend. Many people wouldn't return home from their New Year's celebrations until Sunday. Rachel and Cory lived halfway between Carrie's Crossing and Stevensville, where Horace and Alice lived, so dropping JJ off was convenient. Rachel met Jonas in the yard, hugged him tightly, told him not to worry about JJ. Then she hugged him again, even more tightly, and the fear inside him turned to terror.
His was the only car on the road, and he took advantage of the opportunity to drive much too fast, thinking and hoping that he'd get to Stevensville and find Audrey seated at the dining room table, eating her lunch. He was paying so little attention to his driving that when the curve in the road straightened, he almost stripped his gears downshifting to stop the car. The road ahead was blocked by two police cars, a truck with a winch, and a hearse from the funeral home in Stevensville. Jonas stopped his car in the middle of the road and jumped out, but then he had to jump back in because he hadn't set the brake. He was just running, not thinking, just running, past all the people standing in the roadway and all the vehicles. Many pairs of hands tried to stop him, and voices called out to him—they even called him by name. He ran until he could run no farther, until he could see clearly what they all saw: The crumpled Cadillac roadster on its side in the ditch, improbably wedged between two pine trees. He didn't remember seeing or hearing or feeling anything else for several days.
***
– Belle City –
Ruthie
"I'm not afraid, Ma," Thatcher said. He was holding both her hands in his, and she studied them, his man-hands, and wondered when they had become such. He was her third child and still a child to her, and yet they wanted him to register for the draft because, as of three days ago, he now was eighteen years old. Her two eldest children—no matter that they were twenty and twenty-two years old, they were and always would be her children—had been two years in the United States Army, and now that Army wanted Thatcher.
"I know you're not, Thatch, but I am. I'm terrified."
"Mackie and Wil are fine, Ma, and I will be, too. Besides, if I don't go register, they'll come arrest me and send me to jail." That was the fate of two of Thatch's friends who'd refused to register, declaring themselves Conscientious Objectors. Apparently that wasn't a designation available to Colored men, for both presently were housed in the Federal Penitentiary.
Bastards! Ruth thought she'd only thought the word, but the look on the faces of her three youngest children and her husband told her she had spoken it aloud. Mack had been dozing beside the fireplace, the book he'd been pretending to read open on his lap. He got up and came to her on the sofa. So did Jack and Nellie, who'd been sprawled on the floor in front of the fire playing Monopoly.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said that. All the preaching I do about not using bad language, and I say something like that. I hope you'll forgive me," she said, looking at each pair of eyes in turn, "and I truly do hope that none of you will follow my example."
"Miss Sadie says that word all the time when she's talking about white people," Jack said. "Dirty bastards, she calls them, all the time."
If anybody had reason for calling white people dirty bastards, both Ruthie and Mack were thinking, it would be Sadie Hill. Still...
"I've heard her muttering to herself," Thatch said, "especially after I've read something to her from one of the newspapers, but I'm surprised she lets you all hear her."
"What does it mean, Ma? That word?" Nellie said.
Ruthie looked at Nellie. The girl's mind never shut down, never even slowed to a walk. There was always something she wanted to know. "It means a despicable, horrible and disgusting person, the kind of person you'd never invite into your home," Ruth said. "And before you ask, it's always a bad word no matter who uses it." She looked directly at Thatcher. "Especially your mother, and I apologize for it. I'm sorry and it won't—"
"I think you already apologized enough," Mack said. He looked pointedly at the children. "Don't y'all think your Ma has apologized enough for her mistake?"
"Yes, Pa." This time there were three voices in unison, and Ruthie relaxed.
"I'm going with you tomorrow, Thatch," Mack said. "I went with your brothers, and I'll go with you."
Thatcher smiled his thanks, bravado and bravery on the back burner for the moment. Mack and Ruth already had pulled every string at their disposal to ensure that Thatcher, when he was called up (nobody thought "if" was a possibility) would go directly to Tuskegee. He was a college student fluent in French. The top Colored Army officers would want him close at hand. For what purpose though? To train other recruits or to be used as "eyes and ears on the ground," as Mackie and Wilton were.
"I think I'd like a piece of fruitcake and some eggnog," Mack said, and the children were in the kitchen before he finished his sentence. He gave his wife a tight hug. He didn't speak—no point in telling her not to worry or that everything would be all right. She would worry, just as he did, and not a single person, Franklin Roosevelt or Winston Churchill included, could tell them, or any parent, that their sons would be all right.
The following day, the third day of January, 1944, Ruthie took Jack and Nellie to school, then visited Belle, her mother and sisters. The beauty salon was closed Mondays and the women were at home. They knew what the day meant for Thatcher and didn't need to ask her how Ruthie felt; they knew, especially Emma who loved the boys as if they were her own sons. Instead, they talked about their customers—they gossiped about their customers—and shared laughter that more than once grew loud and raucous before turning to behind-the-hand fits of giggling. Then Catherine had shared her good news: She was reuniting with Little Si and moving to Chicago! He'd gotten them a house, she said, next door to a family from Treutland County, Georgia, and in the summer, they kept a garden and promised Catherine all the homegrown fruits and vegetables she could eat. When Ruthie left them, she didn't need to tell them how much she appreciated their taking her mind off her boys for a couple of hours. She didn't know if Mack and Thatcher would have returned home; she thought probably not, so she just walked. The day was cold and even walking briskly, she shivered. Her growing discomfort presented the perfect opportunity to visit the Episcopal Church, something she'd been wanting to do.
The building was stone and not nearly as large as the Friendship or Wheat Street Baptist Churches. The stained glass windows were beautiful depictions of people she did not recognize, Jesus being the one exception. She opened the heavy door and stepped into a warm, aromatic dimness. A deep red carpet covered the floor. A wide center aisle led to an altar. There were rows of pews on both sides of the center aisle, and aisles on the other side of these pews, with smaller rows of pews off those aisles, and adjacent to the walls hung tapestries and art featuring more people unfamiliar to her. She walked slowly up the aisle to the front, to the railing that separated the pews from steps leading up to the altar. She sat in the front row, the deep silence and sweetly pungent scent enveloping her and, she realized, calming her. She was so relaxed that she jumped when she heard her name called.
"I'm sorry I startled you, Mrs. McGinnis."
Ruthie stood up as she recognized the pastor of the church. She had seen him several times, had spoken to him, but she didn't recall his name. He was tall, thin and dark brown, and the oval eyeglasses that he wore made him appear both inquisitive and knowledgeable. His black suit and waistcoat with its stiff white collar gave him an air of authority which he wore with ease bu
t did not seem to require.
"Good day to you, Reverend. I hope it's all right for me to be here."
"This is the House of God, and you are a child of God and always welcome here." He gestured that she should resume her seat and he sat beside her. "Is this the first time you've been inside?"
She nodded. "Yes, it is, though it shouldn't be. It's very beautiful. And very peaceful. And it smells wonderful. What is that scent?"
"Incense. We use it in our services."
Ruthie nodded again but said nothing. Her silence didn't seem to bother the priest; he sat silently beside her, eyes on the crucified Christ above the altar. Ruthie studied the tableau before her, too, though seeking to understand what she was seeing rather than meditating upon it. "What do you think of dancing, Reverend?"
"It's an activity I'd probably think more positively of if I weren't cursed with two left feet. My parishioners enjoy watching me make a spectacle of myself even as they're offering their sympathies to my wife."
Ruthie was shocked. "Your church—the Episcopal Church—doesn't ban dancing or music? You allow it?"
He started to nod his head, stopped, and considered. "To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose under heaven. There's dancing and there's dancing, there's music and there's music," he said, adding, "though some may call that judgmental."
"I'm speaking of me dancing with my husband, my husband and my sons dancing with our daughter or the boys dancing with their aunts."
"There's nothing wrong with a family and friends gathered before the radio on a Saturday night, listening to Duke Ellington or Count Basie, dancing the night away, just as there's nothing wrong with hosting monthly gatherings here at our Parish Hall. You and your husband are welcome to join us some time. And bring the children."
"What do you think about turning the other cheek?"
He reached into his pocket and brought out a small black book in beautiful, soft leather and gilt edges, opened it, turned a few pages, and gave the book to Ruth. She read as he recited, "To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven. A time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up that which is planted; A time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; A time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together."
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