Mercy Me

by Margaret A. Graham

  Late as it was, we all trooped back to Elijah’s to tell him he could rest easy. He kept thanking us over and over again.

  On the way back to town, we were feeling so good we stopped at the Dairy Queen for a dip. As we sat around talking and laughing, we felt proud. We women get a kick out of bossing men around.

  8

  We had high winds the Monday after we buried Maude but no rain, and the phone went out. Beatrice tried to call me and panicked even more when she couldn’t get through. She scribbled me a note, stuffed a clipping from the newspaper in the envelope, and mailed it overnight express! In the note she said she was shaking all over, which, with all her fears, was nothing new.

  It don’t look like I will live long enough for my dreaded disease to come back on me. Yesterday up in Springs County two masked men come in a gas station and killed the old man who was running it. They got clean away and chances are they are headed this way. I have no doubt in the world but what I am next on their hit list. Every car rolls up I duck down behind the cig counter and peep out to see if they are wearing masks.

  Esmeralda, if you should read in the paper that I been shot, remember you promised to look after my estate. You will find my will right between the mattress and the box springs.

  A pickup has just drove up.

  This is wrote later. It was the pigtail man who comes in to buy coffee. Drives that truck with a sign on it, Insect Killer Company. Most likely insects is not what he has on his mind. For all I know he is a cereal killer.

  Yours very truly,

  Beatrice

  P.S. I will see you in heaven if I can find you.

  I read the details in the newspaper story and found out that man who got killed was not old, he was just my age. I was sorry he got gunned down, but, of course, my main worry was Beatrice. She was in that store alone most of the time, and it was that kind of store gets robbed time and time again.

  The phone got fixed that very day, so I called her up. When she used to get herself in a panic, first thing I would do was joke around, hoping that would help her get a grip. “Beatrice, if fears were dollar bills, you would be right up there with them lottery winners,” I said. “You don’t need to worry about getting killed by a bullet. A masked man come in your station, I guarantee you will drop dead before he can fire off a shot. Ha! Ha! Besides, that holdup happened a couple or three days ago, and Springs County is just across the river. If they were on their way to rob you, they must’ve got lost or run in the river. Mr. Splurgeon says, ‘Fear God and you got nothing else to fear.’ Now get over it, honey!”

  “That’s easy for you to say, Esmeralda,” Beatrice said with a big sigh, “but if you were in this store all day by yourself, facing such danger as this, you would not be laughing. I just shake all over.”

  “I would not be shaking all over. I would be trusting the Lord and taking no chances. Tell you what, when you get off the phone, draw yourself a full tub of warm water and take a long bath. Then drink some warm milk and go to bed.”

  “I’m out of milk.”

  I ignored her and went on to the next thing I always would do to calm her down. I changed the subject like I wasn’t concerned about the danger she was in. I told her about Maude dying, but I didn’t give her all the details. To tell the truth, I was too nervous to go into all of that.

  So I said, “Beatrice, quit worrying about that termite man. He’s just loafing to pass the time.”

  I was running out of things to say, but I had to keep her on the line until she felt better.

  I began again and tried to sound lighthearted. “Let me tell you about Clara,” I said. “Clara is deaf as a post but won’t think about getting a hearing aid. I don’t understand people who are too vain to wear hearing aids. They don’t know what they’re missing. A hearing aid will give you the edge, I tell you. Mine picks up sounds I have not heard in years. I can hear every stomach that growls, and when Boris lets go with that Nashville sound, I can tune out. On my pew, all the heads are gray and all them hearing aids whistle, sometimes together, sometimes not. Either way, we’re a lot better sounding than them bell ringers. Ha! Ha!”

  Beatrice was not laughing.

  I remembered the couple upstairs. “You say that young couple fights all the time? Well, you can do something about that. Either you can ask the landlord to evict them or you can ask Jesus to show you how to help them. Maybe that’s the very reason the Lord put them upstairs there, so you could help them.”

  Beatrice wasn’t listening. “If I should get shot,” she said, “you will take care of my estate, won’t you, Esmeralda?”

  “Of course, I will, Beatrice, but you are not going to get shot. Tell the Lord how scared you are, and he’ll send a flock of angels to camp all around you.”

  “Do you really think he will?”

  “I know he will.”

  When I hung up, I thought I’d better put Beatrice on the prayer chain. All I had to do was call Thelma, tell her, and she would pass the request on until all the W.W.s got the word. I admit, I was worried about Beatrice. Christians get shot, the same as others. Look at what happened to Bud. Look at what’s happening to Christians all over the world being tortured and killed for Jesus.

  That whole day, I couldn’t get Beatrice off my mind for one minute. I wondered if maybe I ought not to go up there and see about her. On second thought, I figured I couldn’t really do anything and that it would only make her more nervous knowing I was so concerned about her. You can’t win with a nervous person no matter what you do. Still . . .

  Once the news spread through the prayer chain, every last one of the W.W.s called me. Those women get confused real easy, especially when word is passed from one to another of them. Some of them thought it was Beatrice that got robbed. By the time I straightened them out, answered their questions, and repeated the story over and over, I was wore out. “Get off the phone,” I would tell them. “Beatrice might be calling me.”

  But she didn’t.

  That night I tumbled and tossed and didn’t get a wink of sleep. So before daylight I just got up and made the coffee. The Psalms is supposed to comfort a body, so I read a few of them, but there was nothing that jumped out at me. When it got light, I walked down to the garden in my bathrobe, although I’m usually dressed by daylight.

  The garden was about burnt up, it was so dry. I couldn’t afford to water it enough; my bill was sky-high. I’d shoot just enough water on it to keep stuff alive, but that’s not the way to treat a garden.

  As I sat there looking at my poor, sorry garden, I thought about Elijah. I needed to go down and see him, but I didn’t want to leave the phone in case Beatrice called. I knew Elijah wouldn’t never have another mule, and I got to thinking maybe he could use a tiller. It was too soon to ask him, of course, hurt as he was, but I figured it wouldn’t do no harm for me to check the ads and take a look-see at yard sales. People buy them things, use them once or twice, and never roll them out again. Next time they clean out the garage, they have a sale, and you can get that tiller at a giveaway price.

  I walked back in the house, but I couldn’t get nothing done. I wasn’t hungry, so I went on the porch and fed the birds. Since there was no water in the birdbath, I filled it up before I went back inside.

  I was tired, and seeing as I was not going to get anything done, I picked up my Bible and sat down to read a while. I read three or four chapters, but it was no use; I couldn’t have told you one thing I read. I closed my eyes and just asked the Lord to forgive me and do whatever he would for Beatrice.

  Knowing I was expecting a call from Beatrice, the W.W.s left off calling me for one day, which has got to be a record. In a way, I wouldn’t have minded if one of them had called. There was nothing on TV and I was too lazy to cook. I was just rattling around in the house, so I picked up the phone and called Thelma to remind her to check on Maude’s grave.

  “We’ve already checked,” she told me. “So far there’s been no sign of grave robbers. Has Beatrice called?�
��

  “Not yet,” I said and hung up. I knew Thelma was disappointed not to have any further news to spread around.

  The phone didn’t ring until after six o’clock. When it did, it made me jump, and my heart started beating fast. It was Beatrice.

  “Esmeralda, they’ve caught two suspects, but they weren’t wearing masks, so they’re probably not the real robbers.”

  “What do you mean? They wouldn’t be wearing masks except when they’re holding up a store.”

  “Don’t worry me with details, Esmeralda. I’m too nervous to live, much less think straight. I’ve broke out in a rash that is itching me to death. I’ve got more on me than a body can take, what with murderers on the loose and them two upstairs. Last night he left, slammed the door on his way out, stomped down the stairs, and left her bawling upstairs. I could hear her on the phone to her mama. He don’t come home until the wee hours. I can’t put up with much more of this. I tell you, Esmeralda, I have about had it. I might just as well give up this job, move back to Live Oaks, and get set up in the county home.”

  “Now, Beatrice, you’re overreacting. Calm down. Those gunmen are behind bars, and as for the situation upstairs, there is no reason why that has to go on forever. Just give me a little time, and I’ll think of something. Right now, we got to take care of that itch.”

  The phone cord was all kinked up again, but this was no time to try to unkink it. She was historical. “They may be behind bars, but you know our court system lets criminals go scot-free. Our jails have got swinging doors! I’m about to have a nervous breakdown, Esmeralda. I can’t go on like this.”

  “Yes, you can. Now get hold of yourself!”

  “Get hold of myself? How can I? I come to work, and first thing happens is that termite man. He gets his coffee, then comes up to the counter and hangs around—reads the warning on the cig pack, puts it down, says he don’t smoke, as if that mattered to me. Told me his name, Carl something-or-other, as if I wanted to know. Then he starts with the questions: Do I like to go to picture shows? Do I like to bowl? All he gets out of me is a grunt, and I keep so busy behind the counter that I do everything twice that can be done.”

  She was running on at the mouth like a floodgate let loose. I had to stop her somehow.

  “Beatrice, have you forgot what I told you when this thing first happened?”

  “What about?”

  “About the Lord protecting you.”

  “No, I have not forgot, but I don’t understand why I should fear God. He’s the onliest one I am not afraid of.”

  Oh, my, I thought. How in the world can I ever get through to her on that? I took a deep breath. “Beatrice, to fear God don’t mean what you think. When you are not so nervous and we can sit down and talk about that, I’ll try to explain it. It’ll take a lot of time for me to get through to you, but I think I can do it.”

  “What about the angels? Do you think when I’m in that store, there’s a flock of angels around me?”

  That made me squirm a bit. “Who needs angels,” I said, “when we have got Jesus? When angels aren’t praising the Lord, all they do is run errands. People who don’t know the first thing about Jesus have gone crazy over angels. You have got Jesus. He will never leave you nor forsake you.”

  It was the best I could do under the circumstances. And it was the truth.

  Beatrice heaved a big sigh. “Esmeralda,” she said, “I don’t mean to complain. I am thankful to the Lord they caught suspects, but this rash is itching me so bad, I am about to go out of my mind.”

  “Beatrice,” I said, “you and I both have been out of our minds for years. Both of us together do not make a whole wit.”

  She didn’t catch that. Anyway, she was in no mood to joke around. “All right, then,” I said. “A skin rash is nothing to keep. Don’t go to a doctor. He’ll put you on nerve pills, and with your low blood, you would never wake up. Instead of scratching yourself raw, splash on plenty of witch hazel, and when you take your bath, put olive oil in the water, then drip-dry when you get out.”

  “I have not got no olive oil,” she said.

  “Any kind of cooking oil will have to do. Now as for your nerves, give me a break! The holdup men are behind bars, I have got a plan to solve the problem upstairs, and when you’re up to it, I have something to say about the pigtail man that will surprise you. Everything is under control. You got nothing to worry about, so get over it!”

  That night I slept like a log, and I hoped she did too. But I doubted she would.

  9

  Soon after we talked, I got a note from Beatrice. In it, she enclosed a dollar to give to Elijah in memory of Maude, and there were a few scribbled lines. Tell Elijah I cried when I heard Maude passed. How is he holding up?

  Well, that gave me an excuse to go visit Elijah, as if I ever needed an excuse to do that. When I got to his place, those kids we saw up on the tracks were playing in the branch out in front. Elijah came to the car, and I asked him who those kids were, but he just said they were catching tadpoles. Well, I could see that for myself, but there was no use pressing Elijah. He was not going to say nothing. Maybe he didn’t know nothing.

  I told him the dollar was from Beatrice and how she cried and all. His bottom lip commenced to trembling, and he couldn’t say nothing. He’d known Beatrice since she was a little kid.

  He took his time folding that dollar bill so it would fit in the bib pocket of his overalls. Then he cleared his throat and asked me to tell Beatrice how much obliged he was.

  I didn’t tell Elijah about the robbery. You do not tell a grieving man any bad news. But I did let him know the W.W.s were taking turns checking on Maude’s grave and would keep that up as long as it seemed necessary. I made a mental note to check on the grave myself.

  “I’m sorry the Lord didn’t answer our prayers about Maude,” I said. “I reckon she just died of old age.”

  “I reckon,” he said, quiet like, so I didn’t know if he agreed about that or not.

  I racked my brain for something more to say, but there was nothing going on that was very uplifting. Then it slipped out. “Pastor Osborne has been taking a lot of brickbats here lately.”

  Elijah didn’t say anything, and that quiet just got deeper, the way it does when he’s rolling something around in his mind.

  Well, there was nothing more to be said about that, so I climbed out of the car and got the box out of the backseat.

  “I brought you some jars of corn, beans, okra, and the like,” I told him. He thanked me and took the box. We went inside his little dark cook room, and I set the jars on the table. He keeps that cook room cleaner than I keep my kitchen.

  We went back outside where it was cooler, and Elijah pointed me to a rickety chair under the shade of the chinaberry tree. Once I was sat down, he parked himself on a bench propped against the tree. I remembered that bench being up at a school bus stop, all the slats broke out. I’d wondered what had happened to it. Elijah must’ve dragged it home and fixed it up.

  I wanted to speak to him about a tiller and thought I’d warm up to the subject.

  “Do you think my garden will make?”

  He looked off toward the children. “It won’t do much if we don’t get rain.”

  “That’s what I figger.”

  We sat there quiet, enjoying a little breeze that whispered in the tree leaves. A June bug was buzzing somewhere. “Any chance we’ll get some rain?”

  Rubbing his head with the knuckles of his knobby old hand, he said, “Not anytime soon, ’less the Lord takes a notion to give us some.”

  The children were squealing and running barefoot, splashing in the water. As we watched them, I figured Elijah knew more about them than he was telling me, and if he did, I needn’t to worry. He would see that no harm came to them.

  I gave up on talking about the tiller. Elijah’s heart was too heavy. And then, too, I figured I might not be able to find one. Besides, he would need a vehicle to haul it in.

  “Elija
h, you need anything?” Of course, he wouldn’t tell me if he did. “You let me know if I can do anything for you. Need a ride to town?”

  “No’m.”

  Well, I had to go, so I stood up. I was about to get back in the Chevy when he called to me. “Miz Esmeralda, if you get a chance, ask your preacher to pray for us some rain.”

  I stopped dead in my tracks and looked back at him. I knew exactly what he was up to. He wanted me to ask that so the preacher would know he had no hard feelings about Maude, and also, more important than anything, that he still believed in Pastor Osborne’s prayers.

  On the way home I kept thinking about Elijah asking me to do that. I don’t know one white man in Live Oaks who would’ve picked up on the preacher’s feelings and figured out a way to encourage him. It takes a long life of living, living beset with put-downs and downright meanness, to spot the same trouble in another man.

  I say Elijah’s wisdom goes beyond just knowing how that kind of trouble feels—he knows how to do something about it. I decided that hard knocks alone don’t give him that gift; Elijah’s wisdom comes from above.

  I couldn’t wait to get home and call Pastor Osborne. I got him on the first ring.

  After I got that done, the next day I made it a point to get back in touch with Beatrice. If she was in a better frame of mind, I had something to tell her that would require my best powers of persuasion. Since she was off work on Friday, I put in the call as soon as I thought she would be up. I knew my phone bill was going to look like the national debt if I kept this up much longer, but I didn’t know what that girl would do without me.

  As it turned out, I caught her just as she rolled out. Of course, she hadn’t slept much because of the noise upstairs, but I didn’t jump on that right away. We shot the breeze a few minutes, and then I got down to business.