by Doug Worgul
“How could I have not known about ribs before now?” he said. “This might be the best thing I’ve ever eaten.”
“I don’t know,” laughed Peri. “Where are you from?”
“Michigan. I grew up in Michigan.”
“Don’t they have ribs in Michigan?”
“I guess not in the part of Michigan where I lived.” He took a deep breath. “So? How about some of those dry ribs?”
Peri feigned shock. “You want some dry ribs now?”
“Why not?” Ferguson smiled. Peri went into the kitchen and Wren came out.
She eyed Ferguson. “You look like that Beatle,” she said. “John Lennon.”
“Thank you, Wren,” Ferguson laughed. “You like the Beatles?”
“Not really,” she said. “I like Sam & Dave.” She went and sat in one of the booths and played with the tableside jukebox. Soon the Sam & Dave tune “Everybody Got to Believe in Somebody” was playing. Wren sang along. Peri came out with the dry ribs and Ferguson started in on them. Halfway through the slab he notified Peri that he preferred dry over wet, and promptly returned to his work.
“I’m glad there are only two kinds of ribs,” he groaned, when he had cleaned the last bone. He wiped his mouth with his napkin. Peri poured him a third glass of whiskey.
“You and your husband own this place?” Ferguson asked.
“There is no husband,” Peri said. “Just me and my daughter. I got the restaurant from my father.”
“Does ‘General Bar-B-Q’ mean it’s kind of an all-purpose barbecue restaurant?” Ferguson asked.
The small-talk nature of this question made Ferguson realize that he didn’t want to leave. He was buying time.
“No,” said Peri. “It means that my father’s name was General Brown. And, no, he wasn’t a general in the army. My grandmother named him General because she liked the name General. She said it sounded important and that people would give him respect with a name like that. She named my two uncles Royal and Ambassador, and she named my aunt Honor.”
Ferguson smiled. His small talk strategy was working.
“I guess your father could have used his middle name for the restaurant,” he said.
“Except that his middle name was James,” said Peri. “And if he called the place ‘James Brown’s Bar-B-Q’ there would have been a whole different kind of confusion. Unusual names are just a part of our family’s tradition. Like barbecue.”
“My father’s name is Angus,” said Ferguson. “Like the cow. Better than Holstein, I guess.”
It went quiet between them. Ferguson sipped his drink.
“What’s your speech about?” asked Peri. “Over at the school.”
“It’s about the Gospels,” said Ferguson. “And what they have to say about white people and black people in America in 1968.”
“Well,” said Peri, softly. “The Gospels have a lot to say on that. But most people don’t listen.”
They were quiet again. Ferguson worried that the time had come for him to leave.
“So, are you an Episcopal minister?” asked Peri.
“Yes,” said Ferguson. “I was ordained a couple of years ago.”
“We’re Baptists,” said Peri. Ferguson nodded.
“Did you always know you wanted to be a preacher?” Peri asked.
“Probably,” Ferguson said. “My father, my grandfather, an uncle, and a cousin are all priests. It’s like the family business. Like barbecue is for your family. It was hard for me to imagine doing anything else with my life, and God always seemed so real to my father and to my uncle and cousin. I felt pulled in that direction.”
“Sometimes there’s no escaping our fathers,” Peri said. “Mine left me with a good business, which has provided some security for me and Wren. And I’m grateful for all that. But sometimes I feel trapped here in this place. Like I’ve got no other options.”
Ferguson nodded. “Well, there’s probably some poor soul out there who inherited a sewer cleaning business from his father and he’s looking at you and me thinking that he’d sure rather his dad had been in the wet ‘n’ dry ribs business or the God business.”
Peri laughed. “When do you give your talk at the seminary?”
“Tomorrow morning at eleven,” said Ferguson. “Why don’t you come?”
Peri shrugged and frowned. “I have to be here. We’re pretty busy at lunch.”
There seemed to be nothing else to say. Ferguson paid and got up to go. Peri stood up, too. Wren was asleep in the booth. They walked toward the door.
“Why don’t you come to prayer meeting at our church tomorrow night?” Peri asked, surprising herself and Ferguson, too.
“I’d love to,” Ferguson smiled.
“Just meet me here at 6:30, and we’ll go over to church together. Make sure to dress like a priest. All the old mothers will be impressed.”
*
Ferguson had news when he arrived at General Bar-B-Q, the next evening.
“Dr. King is here in Memphis,” he told Peri.
“I heard that,” said Peri. “He’s here to help our trash collectors with their strike.”
“Do you want to go over to hear him talk after prayer meeting?” asked Ferguson. “Someone at the seminary said he’ll be speaking at Mason Temple. Is that close to your church?”
“Close enough,” said Peri. “I’d go a long way to see Dr. King.”
Prayer meeting at Mt. Gilead Baptist Church was held in the fellowship hall in the church basement. Rows of folding chairs faced a small wooden podium and a cream-colored upright piano. Most of the church members who had come for prayer meeting were elderly women, though there were a few older men, some younger women, and a teenaged white boy with cerebral palsy in a wheelchair. Ferguson Glen was the only other white person.
After twenty minutes of hymns, Pastor Duane Ellison led the gathered in a devotional study of the Gospel of Luke, chapter 12, verses 11 and 12:
“And when they bring you unto the synagogues, and unto magistrates, and powers, take ye no thought how or what thing ye shall answer, or what ye shall say. For the Holy Ghost shall teach you in the same hour what ye ought to say.”
And also the Gospel of John, chapter 20, verses 20 through 22:
“And when he had so said, he shewed unto them his hands and his side. Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord. Then said Jesus to them again, ‘Peace be unto you: as my Father hath sent me, even so send I you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and saith unto them, ‘Receive ye the Holy Ghost.’”
As Pastor Ellison illuminated the meaning of his chosen text, Wren sat on the floor at Peri’s feet coloring in a Donald Duck coloring book. She had completed six pictures of Huey, Louie, and Dewey, Uncle Scrooge, Donald and Daisy, and had worn her blue crayon down to a nub by the time Pastor Ellison concluded his meditation with these words:
“The Holy Ghost gives us supernatural power when we need it most. The supernatural power of the Holy Ghost supersedes the powers of those in authority to hold us captive, to oppress us, and to deny us our dignity and freedom.
“The Holy Ghost gives us supernatural power that supersedes the power of poverty, ignorance, drink, immorality, selfishness, hostility, and hatred.
“When the Lord Jesus Christ left us here on Earth, he did not leave us alone. He left us with the Holy Ghost. And the Holy Ghost will always give us what we need, when we need it. But to receive the Holy Ghost we have to get close to Jesus. Close enough for him to breathe on us. The gospel says ‘He breathed on them, and saith unto them, “Receive ye the Holy Ghost”.’
“So I ask you tonight, brothers and sisters, are you close to Jesus? Are you close enough to Jesus to receive his gift of the Holy Ghost? Are you close enough to Jesus to feel his breath on you? Do you have an intimate relationship with our Lord? Can you feel th
e warmth of his breath on your face? Are you close enough? If not, get closer. Get closer to Jesus.”
After devotions, Pastor Ellison led the group in singing “Breathe on Me, Breath of God”, after which he asked that heads be bowed in prayer. He asked God’s blessings on those gathered and thanked God for his steadfast mercies, then he asked for prayer requests.
The first several requests sought God’s healing for those in the congregation who were sick, including two members with cancer, one with pneumonia, one with bursitis, one who was losing her thinking, and one with stubborn corns.
Ferguson heard Wren giggle at this. He opened his eyes and saw Peri reach over and gently squeeze her daughter’s knee.
Then there were prayers for jobs needed, for the daughter in trouble at school, for the husband in jail, for the son who needed to get on the right road, for the water department that threatened to turn off the water at the apartment building, for the mother with a hard heart who needed to forgive and accept forgiveness, and for the family whose house burned down. Ferguson prayed to himself that he would feel the breath of God.
Finally, prayers were offered up for the striking Memphis sanitation workers.
The meeting was closed with the hymn “Spirit of the Living God.”
“That’s probably not the way you Episcopalians do prayer meeting is it, Reverend?” asked Peri, as they got up to leave.
“No,” said Ferguson. “But we don’t do it any better.”
*
In Peri’s car, on the way to the Mason Temple, Wren asked Ferguson about words in “Spirit of the Living God.” Specifically she wanted to know the meaning of the expression “fall afresh on me.”
“It’s like when something happens to you for the first time,” he said. “Or maybe it’s happened to you before, but you didn’t notice, then it happens again and you do notice and it feels like it was the first time. It feels fresh. And sometimes if this happens suddenly and it surprises you, you just fall right down. Your legs go out from under you and boom! You fall. And that’s how they came up with the expression “fall afresh on me’.”
Ferguson looked at Periwinkle Brown to see if this explanation was going to fly or if he was going to have to try again. She smiled and shrugged. He looked in the back seat to see if he had satisfied Wren but she had turned her attention to changing the clothes on her Barbie doll.
Ferguson noticed, as if for the first time, that all the Barbie dolls he’d ever seen were white.
*
At the temple, they heard Martin Luther King, Jr. tell his followers that he had been to the mountaintop, that God had allowed him to see the Promised Land, and that they would all get there someday. And though they might not all get there together, they would get there. He told them all that his eyes had seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.
Ferguson and Peri stood close as they listened. He felt the warmth of her body. His arm touched hers. Once, when the crowd moved and pushed against Wren, Wren took hold of Ferguson’s hand and held it. Peri smiled at Ferguson and took hold of his other hand. The word “afresh” came into his mind.
After the speech, Peri drove Ferguson back to the seminary. They sat in the car in front of the student union. In the backseat, Wren sang “Soul Man” under her breath as she played with her doll.
Ferguson spoke first. “I’d like to think those weren’t the last ribs I’ll ever have.”
“They don’t have to be,” said Peri softly, looking out the window.
“Then maybe I’ll come back,” said Ferguson. “I’d like to come back.”
“That would be good,” said Peri.
They said goodbye.
*
The next morning Ferguson Glen boarded an airplane and returned to New York.
Back in his apartment he felt empty and tired. He lay down on his couch and slept until he was awakened by his telephone ringing. It was Walker Briggs, his editor.
“Ferguson, there’s news from Memphis,” he said. His voice was taut. “Turn on your television. King’s been shot.”
Ferguson drank whiskey and watched the news reports in dumb silent horror. The hotel balcony. The hospital. The police and the reporters. The weeping and confusion. Then cities exploding in anger and grief. Detroit. Cincinnati. Kansas City. Memphis. He watched until the station concluded its broadcast day with the playing of the national anthem.
He was numb-faced and wobbly on his feet, but he stumbled to the phone and called Memphis information. There was no Periwinkle Brown listed in the Memphis phone book, but there was a G. J. Brown. Ferguson guessed that maybe Peri had also inherited her father’s house so he tried the number. A man answered.
“Is Peri there?” asked Ferguson.
“No, she’s not,” said the man. “Who is this?”
“I’m a friend,” said Ferguson. “Is she alright?”
“No! She’s not,” was the hostile reply. “She’s not alright. She’s at the hospital with her daughter.”
“Wren?” asked Ferguson, anxiously. “Did something happen to Wren?”
“Yes!” The man shouted angrily. “The girl was blinded by some tear gas or mace or something. The child can’t see! Who is this? Why are you calling here?”
“I’m just a friend,” said Ferguson. He hung up the phone, went to the kitchen sink and vomited.
*
In Plum Grove, Texas, LaVerne Williams sat with his grandmother Rose at her kitchen table listening to the news on the radio.
“This changes everything,” he said.
12
Cashier
The primary source of pride in A.B. Clayton’s life is that LaVerne Williams trusts him. More than once Angela has pointed out to her husband that he has, over the last 20 years, become a mentor to A.B. LaVerne’s typical response to this is to look away and mumble something along the lines of “I don’t know about that. But, yeah, he’s a good kid.”
A.B. has earned LaVerne’s trust by understanding the things that matter most to his boss; the top three being honesty, cleanliness, and punctuality. These are not values A.B. learned from his mother or any of her husbands or boyfriends. He learned them from LaVerne himself. A.B. has become the main enforcer of these standards, a responsibility that has, on occasion, challenged A.B.’s personnel management skills.
LaVerne is not a people person. He’s most comfortable when he’s alone in the kitchen cooking or tending the smoker. He has neither the interest nor the patience to closely supervise a crew of teenagers and parolees. So early on he began delegating many of the restaurant’s human resource tasks to A.B., whom LaVerne felt was better suited to checking time cards and providing instruction on the finer points of clearing tables and filling napkin holders.
“That’s not the job of the CEO,” LaVerne told A.B., when A.B. complained to him about a cashier’s chronic tardiness. “As the chief executive officer, I’m in charge of long-range planning and product development. Day-to-day administration is the job of the COO—the chief operations officer. That’s you, boy. You’re operations. My right-hand man. You deal with this the way you see fit and I’ll back you up.”
This seminar on corporate roles and responsibilities took place out back, by the dumpster. Both men were wearing greasy jeans and T-shirts. A.B., who hadn’t shaved in three days, smoked a cigarette and idly scratched his butt. The back of LaVerne’s shirt was tucked into his underwear, which rode up above his belt. A long piece of toilet paper was stuck to the bottom of his shoe.
*
For a friendly guy, A.B. doesn’t really have any friends to speak of. If pressed, he might claim Del James as a friend, or perhaps Bob Dunleavy, because they kid around with him when they come in for lunch. But Del and Bob would be surprised by this news. Both men are old enough to be A.B.’s father.
A.B. knows lots of people at New Jerusalem Baptist Church, where he has a
ttended worship nearly every Sunday morning for nearly two decades. But most of the other men his age have families, and after the service they go visiting or out to eat with their wives and children. A.B. goes home and takes a nap or maybe watches TV.
The only real friend A.B. Clayton ever had was Raymond Williams.
The truth is that his life is structured such that it’s difficult for new friendships to take root and grow. Tuesday through Friday, he arrives at the restaurant at 6 a.m. to start the side dishes. About 14 hours later, he turns out the lights, locks the doors, and goes home. On Saturdays, the restaurant is only open for lunch, so A.B. usually gets to leave at about 3 or 4 o’clock in the afternoon. Smoke Meat is closed on Sundays.
Several years ago, Angela insisted that LaVerne give A.B. Mondays off, which he did, though A.B. typically comes in anyway. He just arrives a little later than usual and leaves a little earlier. When LaVerne sees A.B. in the kitchen on Mondays, he’ll shake his head and grunt, “Damn it, boy. If Angela sees you here, she’ll kick my ass.”
The only time A.B. goes anywhere other than the restaurant or church is when Mother Mary Weaver has a local gig. A.B. will almost always go hear her wherever she’s singing. As a result, he’s become a blues enthusiast and Pug Hale has helped him put together a fairly good collection of blues CDs.
One Saturday night, Mary was the featured act at the New Cherry Blossom, a nightclub in Westport. A.B. was drinking a beer at the bar, thinking he liked Pug’s guitar solo on “Sinner’s Prayer” even better than Eric Clapton’s, when he saw Shawn Irwin.
Shawn Irwin was Smoke Meat’s chronically tardy cashier. Even though LaVerne had given him authority to deal with such matters, A.B. hadn’t taken any decisive action regarding Shawn’s punctuality problem because A.B. liked Shawn and was hoping that regular reminders of the importance of being on time might remedy the situation, though the strategy had yet to achieve its objective.
