The Truth Is the Light

by Vanessa Davie Griggs

  —Habakkuk 2:3

  “Where have you been?” Brent asked as soon as Angela stepped inside the house from the garage. “You called me three hours ago to go pick up the children. I was worried about you.” He gave her a quick kiss, more like a peck, on her lips.

  “I called you and told you I was all right and that I would be home soon,” Angela said. “Where are the kids?”

  “In the kitchen eating. They were hungry. I had to fix them something.”

  “Let me guess: beanie weenies.”

  “They love my beanie weenies, and it’s all I know how to cook that they really like.” Brent followed her as she hurried into the kitchen.

  “Hi, guys!” she said, putting her purse on the counter. She gave Brent the Second, sitting at the table, and then Shaun, sitting in his high chair, each a big hug and a kiss.

  “Mommy!” Brent the Second said with fanfare. “Daddy fixed our favorite.”

  “I see,” Angela said, rubbing Shaun’s head as he chased a weenie with his hand.

  “I want some more,” Brent the Second said, holding up his plate in the air.

  “I want some more what?” Angela said, walking over to him and picking up his plate as she continued to stand beside him.

  “I want some more beanie weenies now,” he said with a giggle. She tapped him on his nose. “I want some more please,” he said with even more giggles.

  She got him more, sneaking a forkful off his plate for herself.

  “So are you going to tell me what’s going on?” Brent said to his wife.

  She kissed the children again, then walked out of the kitchen with Brent in tow.

  Flopping down on the den sofa, she grabbed one of the decorative pillows and hugged it. “I went to visit Ransom Perdue, or Gramps, as he likes being called. And although it took some doing, it turns out I was right, Brent.” She looked into his eyes. “Gramps admitted, not that he knew it before now, that he is Arletha’s real father.”

  “You’re kidding,” Brent said, nestling up to his wife.

  “No, I’m not. So I tried to arrange a meeting between the two of them, and you know how Arletha can be.”

  “I don’t think I like where this is going,” Brent said, hugging her even more.

  “Before we even left to go visit her, we had to battle a nurse and the director of the nursing home trying to get Gramps a ‘furlough’ just so he could leave with me.” Angela chuckled. “The director, Miss Frigid, was not hearing that at all.”

  “Miss Frigid? Is that her real name?”

  Angela looked at him and smirked as she shook her head. “No, silly. You know I was just being funny and descriptive at the same time. I don’t recall her name. Gramps and I were too busy trying to figure out how to get him out of there.”

  “I hope you didn’t sneak that man out of that nursing home,” Brent said.

  “Of course I didn’t. How would something like that look on the nightly news? Breaking news: Woman kidnaps elderly man from a nursing home. Details as they develop.” She imitated the way a news reporter might say it.

  “So, were you not able to get him out?”

  “Yeah, we got him out, by calling his grandson, Clarence. He’s the guy that sang ‘I Trust You’ when Pastor Landris preached at Divine Conquerors Church.”

  “Yeah, I remember him.”

  “Well, that’s Gramps’s grandson. And apparently he and Gramps are cool enough that Gramps could just ask him to come sign him out without having to explain to him why or what he was up to. I get the impression that Clarence and Gramps are in cahoots quite a lot. Gramps may be old—which, by the way, we’re going to his one hundredth year birthday party November seventh at six PM, so don’t schedule anything for that night.”

  “How do you know I haven’t already scheduled anything?”

  “If you have, cancel it. This is my great-grandfather’s birthday party.” She grinned. “We’re not missing this for anything.” She did the Cabbage Patch dance.

  “Bossy, aren’t you?” he said, leaning in close as though he was going to kiss her. “You know, I like it when you’re bossy.”

  She hit at him. “Behave,” she said. “Anyway, Gramps may be old, but he still has a lot of fire in his belly. That’s how I want to be when I get old. Still getting around and enjoying life. Maybe not as fast as I used to, but living life like I don’t really have a care in the world. Any other man who had just learned he had a child he didn’t know about may have tried to back away from it. But not Gramps. He embraced it so fast he almost knocked me out of the way trying to get to his daughter. And do you know what Arletha did?”

  “What?”

  “She wouldn’t come to the door and let me in. I called her and told her I was coming over. I suppose the mistake I made was telling her I was bringing someone with me.”

  “Oh, now, let’s see. We’re talking about the same woman who looked you dead in your face and told you flat out that she wasn’t your grandmother. The same woman who came to your wedding, watched you get married knowing how much it would have meant to you if she had been standing beside you, yet she never said a word. The same woman who, even after she admitted she was your grandmother, didn’t want you to refer to her as such and asked if the two of you could start off your new relationship being friends. The same woman who, after about a year, finally consented to you calling her Grand. That Arletha?” Brent said.

  “The one and only. You would think I would have known she would react that way, but call me naive. I just thought she’d grown in that area. How was I to know if I told her that I was coming to visit and bringing someone with me that she would revert to her old ways and not even come to the door for me?”

  Brent squeezed Angela. Angela wondered how he always knew exactly what she needed from him when she needed it without her ever having to ask.

  “I called Arletha on my cell phone. At first she wouldn’t answer. Of course, I got worried, had a flashback of the last time she didn’t come to the door and we found her lying on the floor almost dead. I was beating on the door and calling for her. I’m sure Gramps thinks I’m certifiable now. He probably doesn’t want to be kin to either one of us after this episode.” She snuggled up closer to Brent. She loved the smell of his cologne, Obsession, the same brand Pastor Landris wore.

  “When I called her again after that, she must have remembered that I don’t have a problem with calling the police and having her door busted down, so she answered the phone. Before I could say anything, she blurted out, ‘I’m fine. I’m not answering the door. So go home to your family and take whomever you have out there with you.’ Bam! She hung up. Well, you know me.”

  “Persistent to a fault,” Brent said. “But in a good way,” he quickly added before she could give him her evil eye.

  “Anyway, I decided I would call her back and just blurt out something to make her answer the door.”

  “And what exactly did you think you were going to say over the phone?”

  “Brent, you know Arletha. I was going to say, ‘Your father is standing out here with me.’ Or ‘It’s your father. Now open the door so we can talk.’ Just put it out there and make her listen from there. Telling her Ransom Perdue was out there wouldn’t have made her open it. I had to say something dramatic to get her attention. But she didn’t give me another chance. She refused to answer the phone again.” Angela heard Shaun crying. She jumped up and ran into the kitchen.

  Shaun’s empty bowl of beanie weenies was turned over on the floor. “Oh, little man, it’s okay. Don’t cry. Mommy has it.” She picked him up out of his high chair. “Look at you—you’re a mess. Let’s go upstairs and get you into the tub.”

  “Me too?” Brent the Second said, holding up his plate to show he was finished.

  “Yes, you too.”

  “What?” Brent said with his arms wide open. “You’re just going to leave a brother hanging? I think you need to quit reading Johnnie Mae’s books. You’re starting to tell your stories the same
way she writes hers. I, for one, despise cliffhangers.”

  “Okay, Brent,” she said as she carried one child in her arms and marched the other one alongside her up the stairs. “Gramps didn’t get to see, meet, or talk to Arletha. I took him back to the nursing home, and he and I are going to come up with another strategy later.” She stopped, smiled, and looked at Brent.

  “The end,” Angela said with a laugh at her own cleverness as she continued to the bathroom to run bathwater for her two beanie-weenie-sauce-encrusted sons.

  Chapter 57

  The wicked have laid a snare for me: yet I erred not from thy precepts.

  —Psalm 119:110

  Pastor Landris had gone by Reverend Walker’s office the next day as agreed upon before going in to work at the church. But when he got there, Mrs. Greer told him Reverend Walker was not there. He’d had a family emergency and had been called away out of town. He had asked that they reschedule their appointment upon his return, but Reverend Walker couldn’t say exactly when that would be. As it turned out, he was gone for five days. His oldest son by his first wife had had a heart attack. They weren’t sure whether he was going to make it at first. But by the grace of God, he pulled through.

  After Reverend Walker returned, he had such a backlog that he tried to put Pastor Landris off for another week. Pastor Landris wasn’t having any of that. He wanted to know what was going on with that cash money he’d received. He couldn’t put it in the bank, because if he did, it would trigger paperwork to alert the government, including the IRS, of its existence. Banks were required to report deposits of ten thousand dollars or more. And even though it was cash and he could have broken it up to deposit it, he was sure there was something in place to track folks who tried to game the system this way as well. Besides, he wasn’t trying to sneak and do anything. He’d done nothing wrong.

  Since he didn’t know where the money had come from, he wasn’t about to deposit it into his account. But that meant he’d had to put it somewhere in his house. He’d never kept that much cash in his house before. He was thankful they had a wall safe, so he had put it there until he could speak with Reverend Walker about it.

  He now had a firm appointment. But when Pastor Landris walked into Reverend Walker’s office, he didn’t like what he saw.

  “What is he doing here?” Pastor Landris asked.

  Reverend Walker got to his feet. “You remember Mister Threadgill, don’t you?” he said.

  “Yeah,” Pastor Landris said as he first shook Reverend Walker’s hand, then cautiously shook William Threadgill’s.

  “Oh, please, call me William,” he said to Pastor Landris, and looked at Reverend Walker as though those instructions were for him as well. “We’re all family here. We’re all brothers in the Lord. Although I’m not a preacher like the two of you, we’re still a part of the same family.”

  “Please, Pastor Landris,” Reverend Walker said as he sat back down in his overstuffed burgundy leather chair, “have a seat.”

  “I thought you and I were scheduled to meet. I’ve been trying to get with you for more than a week now. I can wait outside with your secretary until the two of you are finished up.”

  “I apologize for not being able to meet with you until now,” Reverend Walker said. “You know how demanding our lives can be as ministers of the gospel. And whether people believe it or not, we still have families and the things that come along with that.”

  Pastor Landris remained standing, although Mr. Threadgill had sat back down in his chair, across the desk from Reverend Walker. “How is your son doing?” Pastor Landris asked Reverend Walker. “Your secretary told me he’d had a heart attack.”

  “Thank you for asking,” Reverend Walker said, softly tapping together the matching fingers of each hand. “He’s doing much better. He’s just forty-five and had a heart attack. The doctor said it was his pack-a-day smoking and what he’s been eating for most of his life that caused it. I’ve tried to tell him that his body is the temple of God, but I suppose some folks think they’re untouchable and that things like this only happen to other folks. He certainly got his wake-up call, as we all at some point tend to get. I pray he’ll make the necessary changes his doctor is prescribing.” Reverend Walker laced his fingers together as he leaned forward.

  “As for Mister Threadgill, I invited him, knowing you were going to be here. So if you would . . . please, have a seat.” Reverend Walker smiled and sat back up straight.

  “With all due respect to this being your office,” Pastor Landris said, “I’ve told Mister Threadgill here that I’m not interested in anything he is proposing or cares to discuss. And I don’t appreciate you trying to set me up when I’ve been trying to get with you on another matter. So, I’ll just wait outside your office until you two are finished.” Pastor Landris turned around to leave.

  “Pastor Landris,” Reverend Walker said, “Mister Threadgill is here because of the money you received: the twenty thousand dollars cash presently in your possession.”

  Pastor Landris stopped dead in his tracks. He turned around slowly.

  “So . . . if you will, Pastor Landris,” Reverend Walker said, “please come and have a seat.”

  Pastor Landris came back toward Reverend Walker’s desk. “There’s no need for me to have a seat. It appears you’ve answered my question.” Pastor Landris took out the envelope of money from inside his coat pocket and dropped it on the desk in front of William Threadgill. “I’m not interested in receiving anything from you or your elected official for any reason. And if you think I’m for sale or that our church is, then you have another think coming. Count it. It’s all there.”

  Mr. Threadgill picked up the envelope, smiled, then put it back on the desk without counting it. “Impressive, Pastor Landris. I’m impressed. You’ve actually had this money for over a week and you weren’t tempted to use any of it?”

  “I assure you, Mister Threadgill, had Reverend Walker here been candid with where it had come from in the first place, it never would have left this office in my possession. I don’t play this kind of game. So whatever the two of you are cooking up or have cooked up, you can leave me out of it.” He nodded. “Good day to you both.”

  “Pastor Landris, before you make another hasty decision,” Mr. Threadgill said, “you might want to take a look at these.” He handed Pastor Landris a large, gold-colored envelope.

  “There’s nothing in there I care to see,” Pastor Landris said.

  “Oh, I don’t know about that,” Mr. Threadgill said as he pulled out several eight-by-ten glossy photos. “Even if you’re not interested, I’m certain the Feds or, at the very least, the media and your congregation might be.” He laid out the photos on Reverend Walker’s desk.

  Pastor Landris glanced at the top photo. “What is this?” Pastor Landris said, picking up the picture of himself with Reverend Walker handing him the stuffed envelope of cash. He looked at the next picture; it was of him putting the envelope inside his suit jacket. The other photo was of the three of them talking, which appeared to be in a conspiratory manner and had to have been taken when they were outside the office when Mr. Threadgill first approached him.

  “What does it look like?” Mr. Threadgill said.

  “I know what it looks like.” Pastor Landris turned to Reverend Walker. “That whole afternoon was a setup? You weren’t trying to reset any buttons between us, as you said; you were trying to get me here so you could produce these pictures to try to blackmail me. The two of you acting as though you’d never really met before. Then getting me back here in your office so you could give me that envelope, making it appear like I was taking a bribe or something while someone else was hiding away, snapping away.”

  Mr. Threadgill put the photos back inside the envelope. “Pastor Landris, what I’m asking of the two of you is not anything other preachers aren’t doing or haven’t done before. And all I’m asking is for you to hear the whole plan out. Think about it, pray about it if you feel led to do that, and if
you still can’t find a way to say yes to it, then . . . I can’t be responsible for what becomes of these photos.”

  “But I’m innocent of what these pictures are portraying and you both know it, no matter how you might try to twist your unfounded lies,” Pastor Landris said to both men.

  Mr. Threadgill scratched his head. “True. But most things are perception, and I can promise you that this looks like something may have been going on. Even if you’re able to prove otherwise, think of the public relations hit your name and your church will take while you defend it. And then there will always be those who, no matter what you’re able to do, will believe that the rich and famous, once again, have merely manipulated the system to get off the hook. Why put yourself, your family, and your congregation through all of that when it’s not necessary and all you really have to do is cooperate.”

  “Pastor Landris,” Reverend Walker began, “what they want really doesn’t require much from us. It’s what we do most of the time anyway. Tell people what we think God is telling us to do, and convince them it’s in their best interest to go along with it. That’s it. I don’t know why you want to make things so difficult, a mountain out of a molehill.”

  “Reverend Walker, if you feel okay in doing this, then that’s on you. But I’m still not interested, and I’m going to pray for you . . . for both of you.” He looked at them both, alternating his gaze between them.

  “I tell you what,” Mr. Threadgill said. “This is a lot to process in a short amount of time. Why don’t you think about it, and we’ll talk later. In the meantime”—Mr. Threadgill picked up the envelope with the photos and the envelope with the $20,000 and held them both out to Pastor Landris—“you can hang on to these. And believe me, there are plenty more Benjamins where those came from. Plen-ty. That was merely your down payment.”

  Pastor Landris looked at him, then at Reverend Walker. “Thank you, but I believe this concludes my involvement with either of you.” He then turned and left Mr. Threadgill holding both envelopes and Reverend Walker holding a look of disdain on his face.