Delta Belles

by Penelope J. Stokes

  Vinca sat on the lopsided porch steps, clutching a paper grocery sack. When she saw them pull up, she rose and came toward them, casting furtive glances back toward the house.

  Delta stayed in the car with the sleeping child on her lap. Rankin got out. “Come on, Vinca,” he said. “You’ll spend the day with us. Have dinner. We’ve got plenty.”

  She thrust the paper bag in his direction. “It’s mincemeat pie and corn casserole. For your dinner.” She turned as if to go back into the house.

  Rankin caught her arm. “No, Vinca. Leave him. Come with us.”

  Vinca hesitated. The screen door swung open and Ham lurched out onto the porch, reeling drunkenly. “Bitch!” he yelled. “Stupid worthless bitch!”

  He lunged toward the edge of the porch, and for just an instant Delta glimpsed a vision of a full-blown attack, with Ham Hollowell bearing down on Rankin intent on breaking bones. Then Hollowell took a step back, swayed, and collapsed into a rusted metal glider.

  “He’s out now,” Vinca said. “He’ll sleep it off. I’ll be fine. He’ll be sorry when he wakes up. He always is.”

  “Let’s go, Vinca,” Rankin said again.

  She let out an enormous sigh, bit her lip, and followed him to the car. “Thank you, Pastor. I needn’t have called, but thank you all the same.” She slid into the backseat.

  Delta turned and looked into her eyes. Unshed tears pooled there, and an expression of stolid resignation. “You have to leave him, Vinca. You have to keep yourself safe.”

  She looked up, and the tears fell, sliding down her cheeks in wide tracks. “He’d never hurt me, Delta.”

  “He hasn’t hurt you yet, you mean,” Delta said. “At least not physically. But what has he done to your spirit, Vinca? To your soul?”

  She gulped back the tears. “He loves me—he does, in his own way,” she insisted. “And I can’t leave him, Delta.”

  “Why not? You’ve got plenty of reasons, plenty of justification.”

  Vinca smiled and patted Deltas shoulder—a gesture that said Delta could never understand, not in a million years. “I’m his wife,” she said simply, as if that explained everything. “And he needs me.”

  SOMEHOW THEY MANAGED to get through Christmas and New Year’s without another incident. But the third week in January, Vinca Hollowell called again. This time Ham had hit her— beaten her so badly that she ended up in the emergency room with a broken wrist and three bruised ribs. They kept her overnight for observation, to make sure she showed no signs of internal injuries. At noon the next day he appeared, hung over, disheveled and sheepish, pleading with her to forgive him and swearing it would never happen again.

  Rankin and Delta had been at the hospital when Ham arrived. Delta greeted him coldly, without a shred of Christian grace. Her concern was for Vinca’s soul, not Hollowell’s, for Vinca’s battered mind and broken heart, her crippled spirit and pummeled body. Delta gazed at the livid plum-colored bruises across her face and arms, the plaster cast running from fingers to elbow, and could not find it within herself to show mercy to the beast who had inflicted those wounds.

  Ham eyed the two of them with suspicion.

  “I wanta talk to my wife—alone,” he said.

  Rankin flicked his eyes from Hollowell’s face to Vinca’s. She looked at him, entreating, but said nothing. Delta could not tell if she was begging them to stay or go.

  “We’ll be right outside if you need us,” Rankin said, and ushered Delta out of the hospital room.

  He stood with his arms crossed and his back to the door. Delta leaned on the wall beside him. With the door ajar, they could hear every word. Vinca silent, sniffling a bit, uttering a little sob or two now and then; Ham by turns gruff and insisting or whiny and beseeching, vowing he’d quit drinking, get a job, straighten up and fly right, demanding that she come home where she belonged.

  To her credit, Vinca made no such promise.

  When Ham was gone, muttering curses to himself as he stumbled down the hallway toward the elevators, Delta and Rankin reentered the room.

  Vinca lay motionless with her eyes closed, the bruising vivid against the stark white pillowcase. Without looking up she said, “I guess you heard all that.”

  “We weren’t trying to eavesdrop,” Delta said. It wasn’t the whole truth, but she figured God would forgive her such a small prevarication.

  “What am I going to do?”

  Rankin stepped forward and took her hand. “I think you should press charges,” he said. “But that’s your decision, Vinca. I can’t make it for you.”

  She sighed and reached for the tissue box on the table next to the bed. Delta saw her wince as her torso twisted. “You’ve been very patient with me, Pastor. Both of you. You warned me this would happen. I was just too stupid to listen.”

  Rankin gave a half-smile. “A good pastor never says ‘I told you so.’ ”

  “But you did tell me so.” She blew her nose and wadded up the tissue. “I’ve always believed it was a wife’s duty to stick by her husband for better or worse,” she said quietly. “It’s in the Bible.”

  “A lot of things are in the Bible, Vinca,” Rankin replied.

  “Slavery, violence, incest, the subjugation of women and children as property. That doesn’t mean God condones them.” “So you don’t think I have an obligation to stay?” “We’ve talked about this before,” Rankin said. “No child of God needs to subject herself to such treatment.”

  Vinca nodded slowly. “But where will I go? What will I do?” “You’ll go to a shelter or a safe house; I’ll arrange it. When you’re feeling better we can talk about options.”

  JANUARY 1979

  Delta sat in the courtroom behind Vinca, listening as Rankin testified against Ham Hollowell. As it turned out, Vinca didn’t have to press charges against her husband. While she was still healing in the safe house, Ham had gone on another roaring drunk, attacked a guy in the bar, and left him beaten to a bloody pulp in the parking lot. By the time the police got there, the fellow had gone into a coma and died two days later.

  It took a year to get to trial. The prosecutor told them that, given the dozen or so eyewitnesses to the bar fight, there would be no doubt about Ham’s conviction. But the case would be infinitely stronger and the sentencing more stringent if they could demonstrate a pattern of violence from a hostile, volatile, unpredictable abuser.

  Rankin testified. Ham got fifteen to twenty.

  After the sentence was read, Vinca Hollowell sat dry-eyed and stony-faced as her husband was led away in handcuffs. Then she broke down and bawled.

  “It’s not your fault, Vinca,” Delta said helplessly. “Ham did this to himself. You have nothing to feel guilty about.”

  “It’s not guilt,” Vinca said between sobs. “It’s relief. ” She heaved a deep breath and got control of herself. “But I do feel a little guilty about feeling so relieved.”

  Delta laughed, and the tension inside her own chest released. She hadn’t known, until that moment, how scared she had been. Scared for Vinca. Scared for Rankin too, and for herself and Sugar.

  And now, thank God, it was over.

  THIRTY

  BROKEN Bread and

  POURED-OUT WINE

  APRIL 1994

  Early Sunday morning was Delta s favorite time. The sanctuary not yet filled with milling, chatting parishioners and their energetic children, seemed a hushed and holy place. Morning sunlight filtered through the stained glass and arched across the empty pews in vibrant shapes and colors. Two pots of lilies left from last Sundays Easter celebration emanated the fragrance of new life throughout the room.

  Delta let her eyes take in the brilliant hues, the serenity of the space. She had quarreled with Rankin this morning, over something utterly insignificant, and as a result had come to church stressed and harried. Now the peace of this place worked into her, calming the storms of her inner sea. They would make it up, as they always did. Everything would be fine.

  She went into the
sacristy, a small room to the left of the altar, and turned on the light. She took down the rough crockery chalice and paten, laid out the bread, and poured the wine.

  In the years they had been here, the church had grown, the faces had changed. But the spirit of the place had remained. Like bread from many grains and wine from crushed grapes, diverse individuals blended together into one. One community. One heart.

  Including, much to her own amazement, Delta herself.

  She still wasn’t quite certain how it had happened. She had learned much from Rankin over the years, certainly. Through him, and in him, she had discovered and embraced an image of God far different from the vindictive and demanding deity of her childhood. But the real beginnings of the change, she believed, went back to Grandma Mitchell and her practical wisdom about faith and life. Somehow in Grandmas acceptance Delta had found permission to be a perpetual seeker. She didn’t have to have answers, did not even have to know the right questions. All she needed to do was be open to the mystery, the miracle.

  Perhaps it was just this openness that had made the difference. Shortly after Ham Hollowell’s trial and conviction, Vinca had come to her and asked if the two of them could meet to talk about faith. Her own trust in God had suffered in the face of Ham’s abuse, and Vinca felt that Delta was a person who could understand that struggle without condemning it.

  Vinca came. Then Mary Beth, a single woman who desperately wanted to be married. Then Connie, angry with God over her miscarriage. Kathleen, who agonized over her son’s problem with alcohol. And Deb, battling the enduring wounds of an emotionally absent mother.

  Dozens of women cycled in and out of the group, all asking the same questions in different ways. Where is God? Who is God? How can I trust? What is faith all about?

  Delta had no answers, but needed none. The important thing was to provide a safe place for the questions to be raised and the issues discussed. And if tears fell or voices were raised in anger, nobody got upset.

  Gradually, almost without her noticing, Delta s own faith began to take shape. She became aware of a gracious presence that surrounded these women and the way their labyrinthine discussions always worked them back around to God. There was an invisible nucleus here, a force that held them all together. A center that could be trusted.

  She mounted the two shallow steps to the altar and set out the elements for communion. The scent of the yeasty loaf and the tang of the grape reached her nostrils, and her heart leaped.

  More than any other aspect of worship—more than the music, the scriptures, even more than Rankins preaching, the sacrament of communion brought the Presence alive. For a long time she hadn’t understood the ritual, but gradually the truth dawned on her. This was a palpable experience of connection with God and the community. The center was here. The nucleus. The still point of the ever-changing world.

  On occasion Delta had stood with Rankin and served communion, and it was an experience she would never forget. One by one the people came forward, looked into her eyes, heard the words of hope and dipped the bread into the cup. They often sloshed wine onto the hand that held the chalice, and for hours afterward she could feel it, smell it, could touch it to her tongue and taste the grace that had dripped down her fingers. Broken bread and poured-out wine. The loaf of life, the cup of the covenant. The unmistakable flavor of love.

  Behind her, she heard the door to the sanctuary creak on its hinges.

  “Pastor?”

  It was Vinca Hollowell. For years now Vinca had served as part-time secretary, and although she struggled with the computer and still didn’t quite understand the intricacies of the voice mail system, Rankin liked having her around. Fleshier than she had been fifteen years ago, and grayer, she nevertheless exuded a buoyant energy, and she always made Delta smile.

  “It’s me, Vinca. Rankin’s around somewhere.”

  Vinca nodded. “I just needed to make some last-minute photocopies for the adult Sunday school class. Tell him I’ll be in the office if he needs me.”

  She turned and exited again. Delta heard the front door shut as Vinca headed over to the church offices, on the main floor of the parish house next door.

  She finished the communion preparations and went back into the sacristy for the white cloths to cover the bread and chalice. The communion wine was running low; she’d need to remind Vinca to tell the chair of the Altar Guild.

  The door between the narthex and sanctuary squeaked again. It was probably Rankin, coming in to get ready for service. She peered out the sacristy door and saw him behind the pulpit, going over his sermon notes.

  She stood and watched him for a moment. An apology for her crabbiness this morning could come later. She wouldn’t disturb him now.

  Then at the edge of her peripheral vision she saw something else—a movement in the shadows, under the overhang of the balcony.

  Rankin saw it too, and looked up. “Can I help you?” He glanced at his watch. “Worship isn’t until ten thirty. There’s Sunday school in the parish hall, starting in about half an hour—”

  “Where is she?”

  It was a man’s voice, and something about it chilled Delta to the core. He stepped out of the shadows into the carpeted center aisle. He looked to be fifty, perhaps, but a very fit fifty, with close-cut gray hair, a broad chest, and muscular forearms. He wore blue jeans and a black T-shirt.

  “Excuse me?” Rankin came down from the altar and stood at the base of the steps, where the carpet runner ended in a T with its arms stretching left and right in front of the first row of pews.

  The man advanced. Something about him nagged at the back of Deltas mind, as if they had met before, but she couldn’t place him.

  “I said, where is she? My wife.”

  The voice. Delta knew that voice. Then the stench wafted toward her—the unmistakable, sickly sweet odor of whiskey— and the bottom dropped out of her stomach.

  It was Ham Hollowell. And he had been drinking. In one hand he carried a half-empty bottle of Jack Daniel’s. In the other, a tire iron.

  “Ham,” Rankin said.

  “Ah, so you do remember,” Ham slurred, his lip curling. “You cost me my life, Preacher. Fifteen years and four months of it, give or take a day or two.”

  “You don’t want to do this, Ham,” Rankin said, trying to keep his voice calm.

  Delta looked about frantically. The sacristy was in the far corner of the sanctuary behind the organ console. There was no way to get out, and no telephone.

  “What else have I got to lose?” Hollowell’s voice rose and echoed off the vaulted ceiling. “I already lost everything. She divorced me, did you know that? Of course you did. You probably put her up to it. Soon as I got released, I went home. The place is empty and falling down. Now, answer my question. Where is she?”

  “She’s not here,” Rankin said. “Put down the tire iron, Ham, and let’s talk about this like reasonable men.”

  The sanctuary door swung open, and Delta caught a glimpse of Vincas round red face. She dropped the papers she was holding, and they scattered.

  Hollowell turned his head, just slightly.

  “Run!” Delta screamed. “Vinca, run! Call the police!”

  But Vinca stood frozen, rooted to the spot.

  Rankins head snapped around, and his eyes fixed on Delta. At last Vinca fled.

  For a man of his bulk, and in his condition, Ham Hollowell moved with surprising speed. “Goddamn interfering preacher!” he shouted. “I swore if I ever got out—” He lunged and swung the tire iron.

  Rankin put up his hands to defend himself. The weapon connected. Blood ran like wine down his useless fingers and dripped onto the carpet. Delta felt the jolt as if in her own body.

  The second blow caught Rankin in the side, just under his arm.

  “No!” Delta lunged forward, crashed into the organ bench, and went down. As she fell she caught sight of Hollowell—red-eyed, crazed, full of rage and drink, closing in on Rankin. The tire iron rose and fell again
as if in slow motion; Delta thought she could hear the crack as a shinbone broke.

  “God!” Rankin cried. “God!”

  Then the weapon found its mark and sank into his skull.

  She scrambled to her feet and dashed toward him, but it was too late.

  Sirens screamed. Ham ran for it, out the front doors onto the church porch. But Delta didn’t follow.

  The sanctuary had gone eerily silent. Across the front pews the stained glass windows split the sun into shards of green and blue and purple. The heavy odor of Easter lilies hovered on the morning air, mixed with the scents of bread and wine.

  And all the while Rankin lay motionless at the foot of the altar with his arms outstretched, a pool of red-black blood gathering under his skull.

  SEPTEMBER 1994

  Delta stared down at the puddle of ketchup on her plate.

  How long had she been sitting here, remembering? The Park Bench Tavern had cleared out; only a handful of students still clustered here and there around the dark wooden tables. The remains of her french fries had congealed into a greasy mess.

  She pushed the plate to one side.

  “Anything else you need?”

  Delta blinked and looked up. Yeah, she thought. An angel from on high telling me what I should do with my life.

  The waiter rocked back on his heels and regarded her. The fellow who had served her had been short and dark. This was a skinny blond kid in his twenties with a name tag that read Gabe. Her mouth went dry.

  “What happened to the other guy?” she asked.

  “He had class at one,” the waiter said. “I usually tend bar, but occasionally I pitch in and serve when they need me. I’ll be sure he gets his tip.” He picked up the plate. “Want some more Diet Coke?”

  “That would be great. Thanks.”

  He disappeared, and a few minutes later set a fresh drink down in front of her. “Are you a student?”

  Delta gave an involuntary chuckle. “Me? No. I’m a—” She swallowed down the rest of her answer. “Should I be?”