The Blessed

by Ann H. Gabhart

  “Is he thinking on jumping?” Sister Abby whispered.

  “He wouldn’t do that,” Reuben said quickly. “That would be a sin that he couldn’t never get forgiveness for. I’ve heard him say as much in the pulpit more than once. If you kill yourself, there ain’t no way to ask forgiveness for the killing. Because you’re dead.”

  “Whether he throws himself off or simply slips and falls, the ground will be every bit as hard either way.” Aurelia walked up behind them.

  “Shouldn’t we do something?” Sister Abby whispered, her hands fluttering on her chest again. “Perhaps call out to him. Let him know we’re watching and don’t want him to fall.”

  “Yea, why haven’t you called out to him already, Sister Lacey?” Aurelia asked.

  “I feared startling him and making him lose his footing,” Lacey said.

  “Is that what you choose to believe?”

  Lacey looked from the preacher to Aurelia. “I don’t want him to fall.”

  “It would free you.”

  “Free her from what?” Sister Abby asked.

  “Her sins.”

  “Miss Lacey ain’t doing no sinning,” Reuben said. “She’s a good woman.”

  Lacey ignored Reuben as she looked back up at the preacher trying to balance on the railing like a crow on a fence rail. “I don’t want him to fall,” she repeated. “It is wrong for you to think I would.”

  “Yea, the angels were only testing you, Sister. They don’t want him to fall either,” Aurelia said. “You can call out to him. It will pull him away from his torments so that he can step back to safety.”

  Lacey cupped her hands around her mouth and called up to the preacher. “Brother Elwood, be careful. We fear you might fall.”

  For a minute she didn’t think he heard her, but then Aurelia added her call to Lacey’s. “Yea, be careful, Brother Elwood.”

  Aurelia was wrong. He was startled by their voices as he looked down toward them. He teetered there for a moment before he grasped hold of the edge of the chimney. Even then, Lacey wasn’t sure he was going to be able to keep himself from falling. Another brother appeared on the roof and ran to grab his shirt and tug him back down on the roof. They fell backward together.

  Lacey’s knees felt weak as she blew out a breath of relief. Reuben clapped his hands together, shut his eyes, and started praying out loud. After waving air toward her face with her apron hem, Sister Abby glanced toward Lacey with a trembling smile before she went on up the steps into the house. Aurelia kept staring up at the rooftop as though expecting something else to happen. Perhaps her angels to appear to take credit for the preacher’s delivery from death. But all that happened was the man who had appeared on the roof helped the preacher to his feet and guided him toward the cupola.

  “For the wages of sin is death,” Aurelia said barely above a whisper.

  “But all sin.” Lacey kept her voice low too, as beside her Reuben kept pouring out his thanks for Preacher Palmer not falling.

  “And all die,” Aurelia said.

  “The Lord promises us forgiveness.”

  “Do you think every promise is kept?” Aurelia’s eyes bored into Lacey. “If you do, then you are even more innocent than the angels think.”

  “The Lord keeps his promises. Your angels have to know that. Every Believer believes that.”

  “And so, have you become a Believer?” Aurelia raised her eyebrows at Lacey. “Are you ready to sign the Covenant of Belief? To become one of us?”

  “I am not a Shaker, but I do believe.”

  “And what do you believe?”

  It was the second time in one day she’d been asked that question, and once again she didn’t have a ready answer. What did she believe? Beside her Reuben stopped praying as though he too was listening for her answer. She could claim what Miss Mona believed. But she needed to find her own words of belief. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Was that her? Poor in spirit, but still believing. Depending on the Lord to somehow make a way for her and for Rachel. Trying to step away from sin. “I believe I am blessed.”

  Aurelia’s lips turned up the barest bit. “Gifted with blessings. That is not a bad thing to believe.” She turned to walk away. When Lacey didn’t follow, she glanced back. “Aren’t you coming?”

  “Nay.” Lacey held up Reuben’s paper. “I must do Reuben’s letters first.”

  “Then write out the letters of the dead child’s name. And think in your heart whether that mother feels blessed on this day.”

  “Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted,” Lacey said.

  “Words easy to speak. Ask our Brother Isaac about mourning. Ask him if comfort is easy to find.” She turned and began walking quickly away.

  “I do know her.” Reuben spoke up beside Lacey. “No matter what she says. Well, maybe not know her like I know you with your name and all, but I saw her. More than once. I never forget a face.”

  “Pay her no mind, Reuben,” Lacey said. “This place can get in a body’s head and spin it around. Like it’s done the preacher. Like it’s doing mine.”

  “You think he really wanted to jump?”

  “I don’t know, Reuben. He’s not himself. We shouldn’t have ever left Ebenezer.”

  “Could be he’s still grieving Miss Mona. I mean, I know he married you and all, but he loved Miss Mona a lot.”

  “You’re probably right.” Lacey smiled at him. “You wait here on the road and I’ll go write out the names over on that step.” She pointed toward the Centre Family House.

  Lacey said a silent prayer that no Shaker sister would come out the door and ask what she was doing while she sat on the steps and printed out the letters. Then she prayed that the trembles that were besetting her would go away so she’d have a steady hand. She took a deep breath as she carefully unfolded the paper and began blocking out the letters. J-A-M-E-S. She made them nice and square with the straight lines Reuben liked except for the S. He knew about S. With each letter she said a prayer for Miss Sadie Rose and Deacon Crutcher and tried not to think of anything else. Just the letters and the prayers.

  But other thoughts kept sneaking in. The joy of the little calf getting born and the thrill of Isaac whirling her around. Aurelia’s mercurial personality changes from happy to quarrelsome to doomsday saying. How could she have thought that Lacey would want the preacher to fall? She might not love him as a wife should, but she was still his wife. Bound by wedding vows to love, honor, and obey. In sickness and in health.

  In sickness. The words echoed in her head as she began printing out the letters for “Crutcher.” In sickness. That’s what it was. The preacher wasn’t well. The poor man had taken leave of his senses. It happened to people. Sometimes they got better after a spell and sometimes a family had to lock them away so they wouldn’t do harm to themselves or anybody else. O dear Father in heaven. She was the preacher’s family. She was responsible.

  She kept printing the letters, filling up the whole page with what Reuben would chisel on the stone of little Jimmy. B-E-L-O-V-E-D S-O-N. She could imagine how Sadie Rose’s arms were aching to hold that beloved child. She had a beloved child she was aching to hold too. But at least her child was alive. She concentrated on drawing the letters perfectly and on the prayers rising up out of her heart. Now not just for Sadie Rose and Deacon Crutcher but for the preacher and her too. If anybody had ever been in need of prayer, she was.

  The good Lord honored her first prayer. The door stayed closed and the steps empty until she had all the letters drawn clear and dark. The very second she stood up to carry the paper out to Reuben, the bell began to ring summoning people from their duties to their time of contemplation before the evening meal. Soon there would be many people spilling out of their workplaces onto the pathways.

  “I’m much obliged, Miss Lacey.” Reuben stared down at the paper. “You made the letters just the way Miss Mona used to do them for me.”

  “About little Jimmy, you let Miss Sadie Rose know how sorry I am
.” Lacey brushed away a tear that slipped out of her eye.

  “You ought to come tell her yourself.”

  “I can’t right now. She’ll understand.”

  “That other one didn’t understand. The one I knew. I wasn’t aiming to cause trouble for you, Miss Lacey.”

  “If you’re talking about Sister Aurelia, she’ll be fine tomorrow,” Lacey said.

  “Aurelia. I never heard of that name before. But it was her. She looks like her, don’t she? The eyes and that dark hair. Just like your Rachel.”

  “Like Rachel?” Lacey stared at him with his earlier words echoing in her head. The words he’d said before Sister Abby screamed and took their attention to the preacher on the roof. “She was the one I told you about.”

  “I guess she knew you and Miss Mona would take good care of her baby.” He folded up the paper and carefully slid it back in his pocket. “I’d better be going on home before the dark catches me. Anything you need, you just let me know, Miss Lacey. I’ll be asking the church folk to pray for the preacher.”

  He untied his horse and walked him down the road a ways before he mounted. When he turned back to call a farewell to Lacey, she just waved. She couldn’t do anything else. The truth she’d been staring at for days and not seeing had knocked any words right out of her.

  30

  Aurelia’s place was empty at the supper meal. Later at the evening gathering in the top room, Lacey searched through the sisters for sight of her, but Aurelia was nowhere to be seen. She couldn’t stay hidden forever. But now with Sister Drayma frowning her way, Lacey tried to quiet her runaway emotions and pay attention to the leaders talking with growing excitement about the Feast Day coming up on Saturday. They practiced a special song of prayer that one of the sisters told Lacey they only sang on the two feast days held in May and September. That didn’t take much learning for Lacey since the words were the Lord’s Prayer. Our Father who art in heaven. While she’d never sung it before, she’d spoken the words hundreds of times. Miss Mona had taught Lacey that prayer first thing after Lacey came to stay with her, and Lacey had been teaching it to Rachel.

  Rachel. Would she ever be able to kneel with Rachel by her bed as she recited the words of the prayer again? Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Lacey looked around for Aurelia again. She had no doubt that Reuben was right about Aurelia being the one to leave Rachel on the preacher’s back porch, but she wanted to hear it from Aurelia herself. Aurelia was Rachel’s mother. Birth mother. She had carried Rachel in her womb. She had given her to Miss Mona. To Lacey. That was what she needed to hear come out of Aurelia’s mouth. That Aurelia had given the child to Lacey to love and keep.

  The next morning, Aurelia’s place was empty yet again at the breakfast table. After the meal, as they left the eating room, Sister Drayma stepped up beside Lacey. “You will work with me today.”

  “Where’s Sister Aurelia?” Lacey asked.

  “She has special duties to prepare for the Feast Day on Saturday.”

  “What duties?”

  “Things we need not question, but that are necessary for her to prepare to be an instrument of the spirits. Others who have shown such gifts in the past are doing the same.” Sister Drayma looked over at Lacey. “You have seen with your own eyes the way our sister gets drained of energy when the angels speak through her. During the feast time the angels come with great energy to distribute many holy gifts of refreshment.”

  “Have you ever entertained angels, Sister Drayma? Seen them with your eyes or felt them in your spirit?”

  “I will.” Sister Drayma’s face became fierce. “Yea, I will. Sister Aurelia promises me that the angels will reveal themselves to me in time. My belief is strong.” She tightened her hands into fists and squeezed her eyes shut, as though she could force the angels to appear through sheer desire. After a moment she opened her eyes to glare at Lacey. “Much stronger than yours. And she tells me the angels have danced with you.”

  “She has told me the same,” Lacey said.

  “What do you mean?” Sister Drayma’s eyebrows almost met over her eyes.

  “That if there have been angels dancing with me, I haven’t caught sight of any of them.” Lacey had not promised Aurelia to lie about the angel dancing. Too many lies were already floating around their heads. But she did attempt to soften the denial a bit. “Sister Aurelia sees the angels for me.”

  Sister Drayma’s face lifted. “And for me.” She almost smiled. “I had doubts one so new to our ways as you would be so blessed by the angels. Or gifted so abundantly by our Mother Ann.”

  “You see things truly, Sister,” Lacey said. “Worldly thoughts still trouble me.”

  They picked up their baskets and started toward the strawberry patch. It took many berries to feed so many.

  “Yea,” Sister Drayma said as they walked. “As they do poor Brother Elwood. It is said the poor man can’t keep his mind on his tasks and is wont to escape Brother Forrest to run after forgiveness for his wrongs. He keeps being compelled—by the spirits he claims—to climb up on some precipice to balance between the earth and heaven. He claims that until he can achieve that perfect balance he cannot be truly forgiven.” Sister Drayma clucked her tongue and shook her head slightly. “Such a shame. He showed such promise when he first came among us. The poor soul is misguided.”

  “What do you mean misguided?”

  “That is not hard to understand. Even for one new to our ways.” Sister Drayma’s frown was back. “The spirits don’t prompt us to do things that threaten life and limb. All our brother need do is confess whatever sins are bedeviling his soul and accept the peace the forgiven find in such abundance here in our Society.”

  “What makes you think he hasn’t admitted his wrongs and asked forgiveness already?”

  In sickness and in health. The words circled in her head.

  “Sometimes, Sister Lacey, I think you block the truth from your mind of a purpose.” Sister Drayma gave Lacey an exasperated look and then spoke her next words slowly as though Lacey were dimwitted. “If he had done so, if he had confessed and repented of his sins, he would not have reason to hear the spirits tell him to climb on precarious rooftops.” She stopped at the edge of the strawberry patch where the berries lay ripe in the rows waiting for them and the other sisters, but instead of leaning down to begin their task at once, she kept talking. “They say he came near to falling from the Centre House roof.”

  “Yea, so he did.”

  “That’s right. You and Sister Aurelia were witnesses to his folly. Along with Sister Abby.”

  “I’m thinking his mind is troubled,” Lacey said.

  “Then as I just got through telling you, he should shake free of his sin and embrace forgiveness.” Sister Drayma peered over at Lacey. “As you should as well. I will expect you to ask forgiveness for speaking to your acquaintance from the world without proper permission to do so. We don’t deny our brothers and sisters visitors, but we do expect the visitors to abide by the rules and ask to see you in the proper manner. Not just wait alongside the road to waylay you.”

  “Reuben is harmless.”

  “The world is not.” Sister Drayma stepped out into the strawberry row. “You will need to make confession during the rest time before the evening meal. In two days we will be given our heavenly garments for the Feast Day. Such garments would not sit well on shoulders that carry unconfessed sin.”

  Lacey wanted to ask why she couldn’t just confess right then and there and be done with it. While she would never believe in the Shaker way, she didn’t have a problem admitting she’d done wrong. At least to Sister Drayma’s eyes. She’d broken Shaker rules of which there were many. She wouldn’t have been surprised to find out there were rules on which eye to wink with first or instructions on the proper way to lick the strawberry juice off her thumb. She was beginning to think the whole bunch of them had troubled minds just like Preacher Palmer with their talk of heavenly garments and peace. Blessed are the
peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.

  Peace was good. She bent down to join the other sisters in the duty of picking the ripe berries. She’d told Aurelia she believed she was blessed. Blessed are the meek. Blessed are the poor in spirit. Blessed are those who mourn. So many ways to be blessed. Blessed with faith. Blessed with love. Blessed with forgiveness. Blessed with hope.

  What would it be like to gather those blessings and fill the basket of her heart the way she was filling her strawberry basket? Then she could take some and hand them out to Sadie Rose or Aurelia or Isaac. Or poor Preacher Palmer.

  That afternoon before the bell rang to signal the evening meal, Lacey pretended to confess her wrongs, at least enough of them to satisfy Sister Drayma’s need to hear repentance. Aurelia was back in her place at their table, but she kept her eyes either on her plate or on a spot in the distance that no one could see but her. As soon as they left the eating room, she melted away and was gone. Lacey was about ready to believe her angels were spiriting her away.

  The next two days, Aurelia didn’t even show up for meals. Sister Drayma said she must be eating with the angels in preparation for their spiritual feast. Lacey bit back her doubting words as she worked alongside Sister Drayma in the strawberry patch. It would do no good to bedevil the sister with the questions boiling up inside her. The answers she needed could only come from Aurelia. So Lacey filled her baskets with strawberries and her thoughts with prayers for Rachel while biding her time. The Feast Day would come and go, and then Aurelia would return to her daily duties.Lacey would have her questions ready.

  On Friday night amid the flickering candlelight, the elders and eldresses stood at either end of the upstairs meeting room. Lines formed with the brothers on one end of the room and the sisters on the other. Again she could not find Aurelia in the lines of sisters, but she did spot Isaac in the brethren’s lines. He was watching her in return and smiled when he caught her looking at him. Lacey wanted to smile back but instead she turned away. Blessed are the pure in heart. A pure heart did not chase after sin.