Claudia doubted whether the pompous Reverend Wilson had the faintest idea of what was in store for him. When she thought of the shock he would feel when he found himself deposed, Claudia’s breath caught sharply in her throat.
Gracelyn, hearing the soft gasp, turned her attention from Rebecca’s steely expression and looked over at Claudia, who had raised her delicate hand to finger a choker of onyx and gold beads at her neck. Suddenly, Gracelyn’s loud giggle broke through the ruminations of the other two.
“Haheeeee!” she squealed. “That calls for another piece of pie.”
“You just better be careful how those hips are spreading,” Claudia said.
Gracelyn, completely ignoring the admonition, raised her slightly plump frame and bounded into the kitchen, returning with the remaining pie.
“Rebecca, you could even become a deaconess and really run things!”
Rebecca looked at Gracelyn’s flawless skin, her round black eyes, beautiful round face, and velvety black hair. Even as a child, Gracelyn had had a zany sense of humor and unquenchable spirit. She had also always been an acute observer of everything around her, and considered following in the footsteps of two older sisters with arresting personalities her life’s great adventure. From watching Claudia, she learned the uncanny effect a strong sense of personal style had on other people. Shorter than Claudia and not as slender, Gracelyn refined a different look for herself, dressing conservatively but in a way that flattered her curvaceous build. She dressed daily in jersey or soft cotton fabrics in deep colors. On her arms she wore collections of bracelets, sleek European designs or ornate African or Asian pieces. Because her thick hair was hard to control, she kept it cropped. She made sure of always appearing well groomed and tasteful.
Throughout their growing up, Rebecca’s bold brilliance had made Gracelyn unafraid of her own. Now, at fifty, she was extremely comfortable with her eccentricity, and, having survived years of Bernard’s silent torture of her during their marriage, believed she was the intellectual equal of any man. Rebecca, her rock, was definitely up to the task of toppling the arrogant Wilson. He would never be able to outthink her or even fathom her motives.
Rebecca smiled patiently at Gracelyn.
“Now, why would I want to be a deaconess after all these years. I just want our congregation to have the pastor it deserves. I’m not talking against Wilson, just saying he needs a little straightening out.”
Gracelyn was not ready to abandon her point.
“Rebecca, we need a woman deaconess or some kind of leader, something. You see how the women do all the grunt work at the church, all that cooking and setting up for programs, but then the pastor and the deacons make all the important decisions about money. Rebecca, that’s our money they are spending. Yours, Claudia’s, and mine. And we’re women and we should have a say-so like all the other women should.”
“Yes, dear, I know,” Rebecca said calmly.
“Those morons nixed a day-care center. Can you believe that? A day-care center! That would have made things easier on most of the young mothers in the congregation.”
“Now, Gracelyn, don’t call our church elders morons.” Rebecca tried gently to rein her in.
“Walks like a duck!”
Rebecca and Claudia chuckled. Gracelyn forged on.
“And something happened with that woman from the seminary. Nobody would just up and leave like that. We wait years to get a woman in the pulpit and she stays for all of four months. Somebody should at least have investigated what happened to her.”
“Gracelyn, the first thing we have to do is get free ourselves. The way I see it, we’ll start with Wilson because we have to. But we’ll have our new lives, and if our sisters in the faith catch our drift, we’ll keep our good name.”
“Do you think they will?” Claudia asked, her eyes widening.
“That’s the plan, honey child. Gracelyn’s right about our deep pockets. But we want people’s hearts to be in the right place, too. Ladies, we follow the plan and it’s win-win for us.”
Not one of the three women voiced concern over the ethics of what they were embarking on. They were united in one goal, to achieve power over their lives, and if Rebecca had not acknowledged any gray areas in their morality, the other two would not. Recapturing freedom and a new vision for themselves had been a powerful craving for the Cates women for some time. In these later years, past their youth but with many more years to live, given robust health, frustrations and yearnings could more easily translate into physical or mental ailments. Arthritis, headaches, metabolic disorders, chronic fatigue, depression—all awaited them if their spirits became mired in the hopelessness of nothing to look forward to.
Their uninspired marriages were like nooses around their necks. Either they would unload their husbands and renew themselves or suffer corrosive, deadening twilight years. The small community’s standard for respectability would have to be met for the Cates women to retain their eminent profile, though. They would have to have the vocal approval of their church and community. Rebecca thought she knew how to sway their female neighbors. The men she would have to think long and hard about.
Rebecca’s sisters understood that her intention to speak with the pastor about an issue involving the women of the church was like a declaration of war. Rebecca in fact knew Wilson would take her comments as mildly insulting, but he would not understand the full import of her action; that with this move, she would begin a campaign against him.
Reuben’s power within the church had been considerable, though he had never abused it, complacent in the awe he inspired among his neighbors as a black man who could make money as competently as white men, and in the grudging respect of the pastors whose tenure he had lived through. The men of the cloth knew one word from Reuben Cates would more than likely result in their ouster. They both resented him and needed his support to undertake anything requiring money outside the congregation’s meager budget. Without Reuben Cates, there would be no big projects, no photos of themselves and their parishioners in the local papers, and no worldly signposts measuring the extent of their dedication to holy purposes.
Gracelyn had zeroed in on and voiced Rebecca’s own logic. It was still Cates money underwriting First Baptist’s unquestioned prominence among Peoria’s black congregations. And with no longer having to defer to Jake, Rebecca had inherited Reuben’s clout as head of the most important dynasty. She knew she could never control the dogmatic Wilson. So, she reasoned, she would install a pastor that she could control. She was Reuben Cates’s daughter, and with no direct male descendants and no functioning spouses, the matriarchal head of the Cates clan. Rebecca and her sisters, once freed from the constraints posed by their ailing husbands, could enjoy their community profile with renewed pride and enthusiasm. Wilson’s exit would be their first milestone as healthy and purposeful women eagerly anticipating their new agenda.
Gracelyn’s high-pitched giggle broke into Rebecca’s thoughts.
“Well, you go, girl!” was her animated response.
Rebecca’s deep concentration broken, she looked at the mature woman she could never quite think of as anything except her baby sister. She never really knew what Gracelyn was thinking, but she knew her soft-featured, ultrafeminine youngest sister would be champing at the bit to do whatever she was bid, never flinching initially like prim Claudia.
Rebecca didn’t realize that Gracelyn’s bold streak was a mirror image of her own, and attributed her loyalty to seeking to uphold the Cates family name. Gracelyn was indeed loyal to her family, but whereas Rebecca worshiped Reuben, Gracelyn identified Rebecca specifically as her idol and found over the years that she could successfully imitate her straightforward actions. When Gracelyn, living on the Northwestern University campus with her professor husband, Bernard, first thought about writing a novel, a voice inside her head kept saying it would be an impossible goal. But she kept thinking about Rebecca’s orchids, the perfection she reached with each species, and how people far
away from Peoria, indeed, all over the world, had written to request photos and cuttings and were willing to pay enormous prices.
With this turn toward confronting Reverend Wilson, Gracelyn saw Rebecca entering a new era of womanhood in which she was finally conscious of her own power. The Cates sisters were on the verge of a new era of freedom from their earthly partners. To the younger Gracelyn, born into the generation of women who rediscovered feminism, Rebecca was the Chosen, the woman who would lead the women of their community into greater self-knowledge and maybe even the freedom she and her sisters felt was rightfully theirs. They would seize control of their church, the place they relied on for spiritual guidance, and because of this, their lives and potentially the lives of many other women would change.
Rebecca’s agenda was more narrowly focused. She wanted freedom for herself and her sisters. She knew she had a knack for using what she considered to be each of her sister’s strengths to best advantage. Having Claudia make repeated announcements at church would put her glamour to good use and give people a chance to get used to her and better, like her. Rebecca was sure that in the right situation, Claudia would warm to people unlike her, and they to her. Gracelyn, despite her conservative appearance, tended to have an overdeveloped sense of mission and could be extreme. Rebecca knew she would be best utilized in situations that required immediate action, enabling her to expend her manic store of energy.
Gracelyn’s second peal of hysterical laughter finished off Rebecca’s concentration completely.
“What’s got you so tickled, girl?”
“Reverend Wilson’s road kill,” Gracelyn managed to blurt out, before giving way to loud, unladylike guffaws.
In spite of herself, Claudia’s trim shoulders began shaking, she gave up on decorum, and she began laughing louder than Gracelyn. Rebecca broke easily into laughter that shook her frame.
Lucy made her last set of rounds and descended the back stairs of the house leading into the kitchen. Hearing the noise in the dining room, she cautiously pulled back one of the lace curtains. The Cates sisters were laughing uncontrollably. Opening the door just a crack, she managed to say above the din, “Sister Rebecca, I’ll be leaving now. I’m all finished.”
Rebecca, slouched down in her chair, pulled herself upright, and still chuckling, said, “Lucy, just a minute. I’ve got a check for you.” She reached into her skirt pocket and pulled out a white envelope. “This is through the end of the month. I thought you could use it early, since Earl is laid up with that back injury.”
“Oh, thank you, Sister Rebecca. You are certainly a Christian woman.”
“As are you, Sister Lucy. I hope the men didn’t work you too hard today.”
“I was up to it. I left my notes on the counter. There shouldn’t be too much to do except feed them tomorrow. You probably won’t need to bathe Bernard until Tuesday. Only thing is, I would call Dr. Turner about that colostomy. The poor man doesn’t look too comfortable. Even if Miss Gracelyn has to give him the bedpan for a day or two, it might be a good idea to have the doctor adjust it for him.”
Lucy’s suggestion destroyed Gracelyn’s humor, but she was able to answer swiftly.
“It’s not right to move that man about right now; it’s so painful for him. I think we better leave that colostomy where it is.”
Gracelyn’s earnest protestation was enough to satisfy Lucy’s tender concern for her charges.
“Oh, what am I thinking,” she replied, remembering how tired she was from the day’s work.
Rebecca, recovered and wiping her eyes, chimed in, “Sister Lucy, you know what each one of us is faced with. We’re just trying to keep some joy in our hearts this evening before our work begins again tomorrow. I want you to keep us in your prayers this week.”
“I always do, Sister Rebecca.”
Claudia, on her feet and arranging the pleats on her shantung skirt, walked skittishly to the front door and held it open for Lucy’s exit. “Thanks for all your hard work, dear,” she proffered, echoing Rebecca’s sentiment. “We sure needed this day of rest, and you never let us down.”
Rebecca looked approvingly at Claudia’s action. She was quite charming when she reached out to people, and Lucy Sims, known for her integrity and moral character, would need to remain an important ally for the Cates women. Rebecca would have Claudia reaching out to more and more people in the months to come.
Each of the Cates sisters relished the narrow sliver of evening left. The men would stay locked in their rooms until the morning. The sisters hoped each of the men would remain peaceful during the night.
“Damn!” Gracelyn, alone in the kitchen, inhaled a deep breath following her brief expletive. She was pained, thinking about Bernard’s colostomy problem. There was little she could do about his body’s disintegrating, yet she still did not know how to cope with his dying. She was angry also because Lucy’s mention of the colostomy was one more worry cutting into her energy and time for creative work. She didn’t suppose Bernard would be any worse off in the scheme of things, bedpan or no, though it would have been no use trying to explain all this to Lucy.
Her mind on these thoughts, she cleared the dining table of the dessert dishes and placed them in the dishwasher. She went into the living room and swiped chocolate truffles from the candy dish, thinking she would need extra sugar to keep her mind awake. She wanted to complete a long poem begun the night before and get started on a piece about her life with Rebecca and Claudia. Gracelyn, accustomed to her sisters’ idiosyncracies, never grew tired of observing them. Sometimes, after they had talked until after midnight, she would climb eagerly upstairs to her attic garret and begin writing about the day’s events in her journal, describing in detail Rebecca’s anecdotes about neighbors and church members, and quoting Claudia’s barbed evaluations of their friends’ husbands and children, and the friends themselves.
After hours of recording everything she heard and saw during the day, she would run water into the ancient bathtub. The attic bathroom was lined with green ceramic tiles, and the uncurtained dormer window framed many lustrous moons and varying constellations. If, during the week, her caretaking duties wore on her nerves so that she could jot down only a few lines, then collapse in bed each evening, on Sunday Gracelyn was energized and productive enough to stay awake a few extra hours to soak in a scented bath while gazing at a hypnotic sky.
Gracelyn relaxed for a few minutes on her bed. Lying on her back and glimpsing the chunk of moon visible from the window, she thought about Lucy. Lucy worked with the children’s group at church on special programs, and Gracelyn had been thinking about offering them a wonderful play she had discovered about Harriet Tubman in the Cates library. She had wanted to talk with her about doing the play, but thought this might make her look uninterested in Bernard’s colostomy problem, the matter at hand. After Bernard was committed, she would definitely talk with Lucy, and might even offer to work with her on the project, thus having her ear more frequently. She would ask Rebecca when to proceed.
To recover her good mood, Gracelyn decided to put on some music. She roused herself and went downstairs to the third floor to see if Claudia’s light was still on.
Claudia stood before her closet shuffling the orderly arrangement of dresses, blouses, and skirts. Stacked on her cedar chest were three pairs of pants that needed mending. Planning her fashion statement for the week and preparing her wardrobe was a Sunday night ritual. Though her daily chores as a caretaker were unglamorous, she had managed to find a smart set of casual clothes. An oxford shirt, khakis, a silk around her neck, quiet gold jewelry, a vintage Claire McCardell casual dress with pockets, impeccably ironed denim jeans, a light cashmere pink sweater set could all withstand dragging a staggering Timothy to the nearest chair to let him sleep off his drunkenness.
Toward the late afternoon, Claudia would excuse herself from the bustle in the kitchen and the trips up and down the back stairs to the men’s floor. She would go up the front stairs to her suite, wash her
face, and touch up her makeup for a trip to the pharmacy or grocery store. Sometimes she would even shower and change into something elegant and ladylike if she had multiple errands. Tomorrow, she thought, the green-and-white-striped cotton Geoffrey Beene dress cut on the bias would do.
Gracelyn peeked in at Claudia, who was folding a cashmere shawl.
“Claudia, will it bother you if I play some music?”
Hearing the footsteps, Claudia turned around and, seeing her sister, her humor of earlier in the evening returned.
“Did you give Bernard his bedpan yet?”
Immediately, Claudia regretted her gallows humor. Gracelyn smiled at her sister faintly; then the tears came.
“Oh, darling, please forgive me. That was so thoughtless.”
Without answering the stricken and embarrassed Claudia, Gracelyn turned away and swiftly mounted the stairs to the attic.
Rebecca came in from the backyard greenhouse where she had gone to adjust the thermostat. The balmy spring weather they enjoyed earlier that day would turn into a night freeze, according to the weather report. All the orchid varieties were sensitive to sudden changes in temperature, and Rebecca, knowing which ones were particularly at risk, kept a watchful eye on them. Part of Rebecca’s fascination with the flowers was their delicacy. Hale and hearty all of her life, she found frailty a mystery and the flowers brought out a deep-seated protectiveness in her character. She took pride in successfully nurturing things of such great beauty.
Coming in through the back door, she walked purposefully through the kitchen. She stopped abruptly when she spied Lucy’s notes lying unobtrusively on the counter, slightly wet now so that the ink drizzled down the page. Snatching up the sodden document, she scanned it distractedly, then continued her trek through the spacious house, dimming the lights as she went.
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