Time passed since Cheyenne’s accusation, yet no one made a sound inside Reverend Tom’s study. Only the outside grunts of old buses warming up to await passengers filtered through the closed windows.
Sister Betty had wanted to confront Cheyenne earlier to learn what she meant when she made that same claim in Belton, but with everything going awry at the prom, she hadn’t done so. Now, in the midst of her pastor’s worst moments, her dear friend had delivered an accusation so close to an impeachment that Sister Betty thought she’d faint.
If Reverend Tom wanted to remain a pastor in good standing and of high spiritual fiber he should’ve just kept his mouth shut like he’d done since he arrived. But he didn’t. Cheyenne had pushed his hot button and he let go.
“Miss Bigelow,” Reverend Tom said slowly, “I’m not accustomed to having disagreements with my senior members—”
“Liar,” Cheyenne replied. “You don’t know nothing about your seniors to disagree or agree with them.”
He clenched his teeth and his fists. His eyes swept around his study for something to toss before she became that something to toss. “Woman, you know nothing about me!”
“I know more than you think I know about you!” Cheyenne rose, using her cane for support. She put one hand on her hip and whipped her long braid around as though it were a karate move. “I know your grandmother Lillie Sinclair was a whore! I know Lillie Sinclair left your family well-off. And I know Lillie Sinclair’s money sent you to that fancy divinity college.”
A swooshing sound went through the study and sucked out all the air along with it.
“You’re a liar!” The reverend’s pecan-colored complexion darkened and his eyes turned into ebony orbs. Since the woman didn’t respect his anointing he decided he’d lay it down for a moment. Reverend Tom used words that came close to cussing and laid her out. It seemed that over the past few weeks he’d become good at it.
While Reverend Tom and Cheyenne Bigelow went at it, Sister Betty retreated to a chair in the corner. Her eyes darted from side to side as she waited for someone to rush in and holler, “Cut, it’s a wrap.” It all seemed like a movie and a very bad one at that.
But if it was a bad movie there were plenty of folks to take the credit. Cheyenne made sure that they did.
“Well, I see you inherited Lillie’s filthy mouth and her combative spirit. That’s good. Perhaps, you’ll use both when you take your stubborn self-righteousness and deposit them along with that twenty-five million dollars that you ignorantly refused.”
“The Devil is a liar!” The reverend tossed a few books against the wall, nearly slapping Sister Betty upside her head with them.
“Oh, that’s good, too. Lillie had that same fire. I remember when she’d cut a John if he was a penny short.”
Reverend Tom began to lose moral ground with every accusation. First, it was Bea and her claim that most of the tithes had some sort of tainted beginning. Now this woman claimed his grandmother was a whore. He knew his grandmother Lillie to be a very successful businesswoman who’d died of a stroke when he was a young boy. He refused to believe she’d left him money from prostitution or that it had sent him to the pulpit. There was no way that all these years he’d preached and pastored God’s untarnished word was embedded in tainted money.
But what if Miss Cheyenne was wrong, he thought. Sister Betty and she are friends. Surely, my spiritual mother would’ve said something, especially since she sided with the trustee about his money.
Somehow, Sister Betty’s silence gave him hope. Cheyenne Bigelow, on the other hand, was an old politician relic.
The reverend’s angry face morphed into one that smiled. He apologized. “I’m sorry for my bad choice in words. I’m asking you and God to please forgive me.”
“It didn’t bother me none,” Cheyenne replied. “I know some preachers who come through the door cussing and don’t stop until they say amen.”
“That may be with some preachers, Cheyenne, but that’s not how my pastor runs God’s church.” Sister Betty had finally found her voice. She’d heard enough to understand what Cheyenne had tried to tell her back in Belton. But what she didn’t have was the proof. Cheyenne would need to prove those accusations to her.
Sister Betty looked at Cheyenne and Reverend Tom. Both seemed resolute. Did they both know just a little of the truth, but not all? She felt a headache coming on and then her left knee started twitching. It hadn’t twitched in a few days and it happening now was not a good sign.
As if Cheyenne read their minds, she said, “I guess y’all probably wondering who else would know about Lillie’s money-making skills and her benevolent spirit.”
“That would help.” Reverend Tom had already decided he’d humor the woman because something about what she’d revealed bothered him. Not all of it had to do with his grandmother. Some had to do with him.
“Well, you’d better buckle up, son, because if anyone knows about your grandmother’s wanton ways, I certainly do.”
Cheyenne stopped speaking and motioned to the reverend that she’d like one of the Vitamin Waters he had off to the side of his desk. “Could you make mine a pomegranate and blueberry? I’m trying to keep what little health I got at my age.”
The reverend did as she asked and after he took off the cap and handed it to her she produced her flask and poured the water in it.
Cheyenne threw her head back and in an instant, she’d wrapped her long braid about her head and swigged from the flask. “From what I’ve read and heard, you’ve been acting like you are about to lose your mind and the Promised Land, too.”
She leaned forward on her cane and narrowed her eyes in his and Sister Betty’s direction. The way she’d done it was more conspiring than she’d meant, but she would have her say.
“You sir, Reverend Leotis Tom, need to come down off your high horse before that same high horse tosses your butt and tramples you. Even your grandmamma, a bigger whore than me, didn’t act all highfalutin. The difference was she made her money on her back for those fancy pants in Charleston. I made mine on my back serving up those sleazy geezers on Capitol Hill. Lillie made more money than me, too.”
If there’d been a fireplace in the pastor’s study, the flames couldn’t singe Sister Betty more than Cheyenne’s hot words of accusation about the reverend’s grandmother. “You mean Reverend Tom’s grandmother truly was a . . .” Sister Betty couldn’t say the word.
Cheyenne chuckled and took another swig from the flask. Replacing the cap, she turned toward the reverend.
“Poor Reverend Tom. Here you are unable to suspend your disbelief. You probably didn’t know that about your grandmother. If memory serves me I believe Lillie died while you was still crapping in diapers and both your parents followed each other to the grave soon after.”
Cheyenne rested the cane against the chair’s armrest and sat back. “I’m getting ready to tell you a story. And the best way for me to do that is to tell it to you like you wasn’t Lillie’s grandbaby. It makes it a little easier to tell it that way, especially since I don’t have too much animosity for you.”
“Yes ma’am.” The reverend felt as whipped as when he’d fought that angel in his living room. He couldn’t raise a fist if his life depended upon it. What had he done to God to deserve this?
“Reverend Tom,” Cheyenne said softly, “why don’t you turn on your security monitor and fix it so it shows the fellowship hall and those seniors. That way if anything crazier than what’s already happened pops up, you’ll know about it. And that way you can pay attention to what I’m about to say, too.
“Sister Betty, why don’t you move a little closer so I don’t have to raise my voice or repeat something. If the clock on that wall is correct the fellowship hall should be shutting down about now.” Cheyenne waited until the reverend turned on the monitor and set the split screen to show inside the hall and outside in the parking lot.
“Well,” Cheyenne said as she took another swig from the flask, “I don’t hear any police sir
ens so I guess nobody pulled a weapon on anybody, but Bea and Sasha fought tonight.”
Nervous laughter filled the space words left empty, and Sister Betty moved her chair closer and sat down next to Reverend Tom.
“Lillie Sinclair was the absentee mama of Leotis’ mama, Helena. I believe there wasn’t too much of a maternal relationship between Lillie and Helena.” Cheyenne spoke directly to Reverend Tom as though she were continuing from where she left off. “Helena never raised Leotis but Helena’s sister-in-law Mabel Tom did after Helena passed away.”
Cheyenne stopped and laughed softly. “Who am I kidding? The truth was that Lillie Sinclair was a whoring hustler who made Jezebel, Delilah, and me all look like angels. Lillie Sinclair put whoring on the map back in Charleston and made a ton of money for a lot of folks when she’d done it.”
If Cheyenne noticed that the reverend flinched every time she mentioned the words whore or whore’s money, she didn’t show it. She just kept right on telling the story as though narrating about somebody they didn’t all know.
For the next ten minutes while Sister Betty and Reverend Tom sat shocked, dismayed, and yet amazed, Cheyenne gave a history lesson on the Reverend Tom’s family, especially his maternal grandmother Lillie.
“My father’s people raised me after my parents died.” Reverend Tom rose and paced. “No one has ever once mentioned anything negative about her family. They were mostly college-educated and very religious.”
“It don’t surprise me none,” Cheyenne replied. “I’m sure those uppity Toms tried to rewrite your history. They’d sooner have you believe that you were a test-tube baby than tell you about your Grandma Lillie’s scandalous ways. But those Toms were the biggest hypocrites of all.”
“Why would you say that?” Sister Betty had learned so much in such a short time she wasn’t sure why she wanted to know more.
“Why would I say that?” Cheyenne’s eyes narrowed and she pointed at Sister Betty and then to the reverend. “Let me tell y’all something. When I was a whore I was a proud one. I didn’t try to hide who or what I was. Now those Toms, they didn’t just try to hide stuff, they buried it all the way down to China.”
“I don’t understand where you’re going with this. What does it have to do with me?” Reverend Tom asked.
“I know this is your office, but please don’t interrupt. I’m honestly having too much fun, if not mixed with a little anger in revealing this.”
Cheyenne reached over and snatched a handful of Christmas Kisses from a candy dish before she continued. She spoke as she unraveled the silver foil in much the same way she unraveled the truth about Reverend Tom.
“I don’t know how to make this any plainer, but let me sum this up for you. You, reverend, are who you are and where you are because Lillie Sinclair laid on her back, then willed her wealth to her only grandson. Lillie’s prostitution paid for your education and all the other nice stuff you’ve gotten. Those Toms didn’t have a dime until Lillie died and left her grandson wealthy. They lived off you and Lillie’s ill-gotten gains like roaches at a picnic.”
Sister Betty’s jaw dropped and her knees started to shake. What was God trying to do to her? She was about to spiritually overdose on too much information.
“It don’t matter to me none whether you accept the truth or not. You are still a fraud. You won’t lift your congregation or community out of this economic mess because of your pride. You’ve done preached yourself into a corner of self-righteousness and you won’t come out of it for your people’s sake.”
“How can you say that? I’ve just learned all this in the past hour.”
“I can say it because you’ve said it. You don’t wanna accept the trustee’s so-called tainted money for God’s business yet you are in God’s business because of tainted money.”
Cheyenne signaled for Sister Betty to help her from her seat. “I’m tired, so if you don’t mind I’ll accept your invitation to spend the night at your house. I’m ready to go as soon as you are. I can’t wait to pass out in one of those fancy bedrooms.”
Cheyenne yawned, then spoke as if the reverend weren’t in the study. “Sister Betty, just remember to handle that hardheaded, self-righteous pastor of yours sitting over there. I don’t cotton to nobody messing with the church whether it’s from the outside or the inside, or whether I belong to it or not.”
Sister Betty’s mind raced as she asked the question that lingered on her and the pastor’s minds. “Does anyone else around here know about Lillie Sinclair?”
“Bea ‘Baby Doll’ Blister probably does. She and I are the last of the really high-class players from the Charleston and D.C. days.”
“Mother Bea Blister! Baby Doll?” Sister Betty thought she’d flatline right on the spot.
Reverend Tom sprang from his chair. “Why hasn’t Bea said anything? Everyone knows she’s done a little time before and that she is always scheming to get money.”
“First of all, Bea can’t say nothing that won’t cause a lot of grief for others. Bea and I are cut from the same cloth. We’ve done our dirt, but we don’t like aiding the Devil in attacking the church. In fact, Bea ran four of the most successful gambling houses in Charleston. Baby Doll and I know so much about some of those old hypocrite geezers. I betcha if we told them to give us their social security checks or we’d tell it, they wouldn’t hesitate. They’d probably break a hip trying to rip it from their pockets.”
“Father, have mercy, I don’t know what to do now,” the reverend whispered as he looked toward the ceiling.
“Well, you’d better figure it out before Trustee Noel and that geriatric mafia arrives.” There was a quick twitch to Sister Betty’s face, then a puzzled look took over. It wasn’t about to go away. Someone had turned the knob.
Chapter 22
“I didn’t see the light on in here,” Elder Batty Brick lied. “We just wanted to use the choir room to count up the receipts and discuss how the affair fared.”
Elder Batty Brick and Brother Casanova crept quietly into the room. They would’ve walked harder, but stern looks from Bea and Sasha were a warning that something they didn’t know about was going down. The truth was that he and Brother Casanova thought the room was unoccupied and were going to divvy up the tips and hush money they’d made.
As soon as the men walked to the center of the room, they heard Reverend Tom and female voices.
“Who’s the pastor got in the office?” Brother Casanova adjusted his hearing aid and twitched his nose as though he could smell the sound. “One of them women is Sister Betty.” He twitched his nose again and once more adjusted his hearing aid. “I’m not recognizing the other voice. It sounds like a white woman, though.”
“Hush up, you old crabapple.” Sasha pointed with her cane to the AC vent that went from the choir room into the study. She then laid her finger to her mouth to indicate that they shouldn’t speak.
However, Bea gave up her own finger, the middle one, and fled from the room.
She raced the few feet to the office. The one-strap feature holding her dress together now held her back. Her breasts flopped around as though they didn’t want to go wherever she was going. She felt her heart race, and her wide hips felt like flaps on an airplane slowing her down. She nearly bowled over Trustee Noel who’d just put his hand on the study’s doorknob to enter.
Smashing the trustee against the doorframe, Bea burst into the study. She aimed her words at Cheyenne and let go. “Cheyenne Bigelow, how could ya just give up my business like that?”—Bea turned and pointed toward the reverend—“And to my pastor, of all people.”
Cheyenne didn’t answer right away. She motioned for the trustee to take one of the other seats. Just as she’d given him specifics about the food she’d yet to eat, Cheyenne had pointed to a seat over in the corner. Of course, Trustee Noel found it, plopped right down, and reached for that sprig of hair.
“Bea, everybody knows you been to prison, but I didn’t think it’d do no harm if they knew how ba
ck in the day you was Bea ‘Baby Doll’ Blister. You set the standard for all the gambling houses in Charleston and there about.” Cheyenne’s face softened. “You didn’t want none of these folk to know how successful you were as a businesswoman?”
“She almost went bankrupt trying to run a daycare center.” Sister Betty interrupted. “How could she be so successful at gambling and couldn’t run a simple daycare?”
“Were them babies gamblin’ in the daycare center?” Bea shot back at Sister Betty.
“Of course not, Bea,” Sister Betty replied. “They were only babies.”
“Well that’s why it failed.” Bea sucked her teeth and returned to her issue with Cheyenne. “I’ve spent the last half of my life trying to turn things around for me, and then you go and tell my business. You had no right to do that, Cheyenne.”
“Bea, did you overhear everything I said?”
“No, I didn’t. But I did hear ya mention my old street name, Baby Doll.”
Reverend Tom thought it was a good time to enter the conversation. After all, the horse was out of the barn so he might as well ride it. “Mother Bea, I understand you also knew my grandmother Lillie Sinclair.”
“Yes sir, Pastor. I knew Lillie.” A sign of struggle appeared as another wrinkle upon Bea’s dark complexion. She wasn’t quite sure where her pastor’s questions were leading, so she turned and looked at Cheyenne for further instructions. Cheyenne smiled a little and Bea relaxed.
Reverend Tom clasped his hands together and moved his body so his chair swiveled. “Did you know Lillie when she supposedly sold herself as a prostitute?”
Bea’s mouth clamped so tight the echo of her thick lips smacking together made the only sound. If she could’ve fled the room she would’ve. Instead, she stood in the middle of the floor fidgeting. She didn’t know what to say.
Bea turned away from her pastor’s stare. With laser beam accuracy, she fixed her eyes on one of his many certificates, refusing to look away, and hoping no one saw her pain. Bea knew in her heart that Lillie Sinclair would never have stood for any of the mess her grandson had created for his church.
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