Pray for Us Sinners

by Marilyn L. R. Hall

  As his maniacal laughter faded away, Rose noticed he was no longer paying her any mind. Instead he was looking off down the road and his head was cocked to one side as if he was listening for something. “Shush!” he told her. It wasn’t long before she heard it too. The soft thud of hooves in the dust, still a ways off, but coming on fast. Wild Honey was coming back! And Rose was nailed to the road! Her fear of that crazy mare was big enough to take away every bit of sense she had and she just couldn’t make herself move out of its way. And anyway where would she go? Then Rose saw her. A big undulating black shadow coming out of the dark and bearing down on her like a steam engine. Rose could hear her labored breathing and still she stood there like a statue.

  The thing that moved her at last was the sound of Jack’s voice, quiet and calm but urgent, calling her to come to him. She turned and ran back to him and with the beast almost upon her she leaped off the road and into the ditch streaking around Jack to stand behind him—putting his body between hers and the mare’s. From there she kept a wary eye on the beast, prepared to bolt if she made a move toward her. Jack kept his face turned to the horse but he motioned with his hand for Rose to step closer to him. Then he leaned on her and started to pull his body up just as if she was a fence post again. She tried to get loose but Jack stopped her. “Don’t you move a god-damned inch further!” he ordered. “You got me into this mess and you are gonna get me out of it!” He was leaning hard on her but still down on his knee with his bad leg bent at a crazy angle beside him. He allowed himself one lengthy groan and then he got a better grip on her and she dared not protest. By then, he was talking in the same gentle, soft way to the mare and by then she was standing in front of them just up the ditch a little way.

  “If I can get hold of the reins, I can pull myself up,” Jack was telling Rose. “Just get me over to her.” At the same time he kept talking low and easy to the horse. Rose did the best she could but she was no stronger than she had been when the ordeal began and she was a whole lot tireder.

  “O sweet Jesus! She prayed again, but silently this time so as not to get Jack any more riled up. “I just cain’t do this!” though she was pretty sure she’d do it—or else. Then like a miracle, Honey moved to meet them, and Jack grabbed the reins and lifted most of his weight off Rose. Then he leaned against the mare and let go of Rose altogether, and that was when he gave her a sharp little jab with his hip which Rose thought unkind as well as uncalled for.

  “Now, get my saddle!” he demanded and Rose rebelled. “I cain’t” she wailed. “It’s too heavy!”

  But Jack’s patience had reached the end of its rope. “I’m gonna say this one time, slow and easy, little girl, and then I’m gonna get mean! Pick the damn saddle up and toss it over your shoulder—get down on your hands and knees and push it with your nose, or pull it with your teeth—I don’t give a damn how you do it—just get me my god-damn saddle!”

  Rose sucked in a breath and then ceased breathing altogether for a time while she contemplated throwing a tantrum-fit! That always won her arguments at home—but not likely with Jack Nash. He’d just get meaner and curse at her. And call her a brat! And a baby—

  That was when the breath she’d been holding drained out of her in one prolonged moan of capitulation and she made up her mind she would lift that saddle. Even if it killed her. She was gonna pick it up and swing the dang thing straight up over Jack’s head and drop it square across the back of his crazy old mare.

  And with super-human strength, born of fear and rage, that’s what she did—with a little help from him.

  The ordeal of getting Jack onto the horse however, might have gone on forever except that Papa and Brother showed up looking for Rose because of the late hour. There was a nasty smirk on Brother’s face and ugly suspicion in Papa’s pale blue eyes when he held his lantern up to get a good look at Jack’s leg, but the terrible noises Jack made while they were removing his boot and the hideous red and purple and yellow-green swelling that stretched all the way from his toes to his knee convinced even Papa that Jack Nash, at least on this one occasion was truly an innocent victim. And because he felt it was the Christian thing to do, he wouldn’t let anybody leave the scene of the crime until Rose Sharon apologized for her part in it. And truth be told, that took a long time. For Rose Sharon had a stubborn streak wide as the Mississippi, and Jack Nash had hurt her pride. He was in grave need of medical attention by the time she relented and he was able to ride out of there. Even at that, he wouldn’t let Brother accompany him. Rose figured he was so happy to be rid of the Saylors, he’d have dropped dead with a smile on his face anywhere along the road back home.

  December 1933

  “Poor Jack.” Rose opened her eyes and smiled, remembering that night. Jack Nash had spent a big part of his life under a heavy cloud of suspicion.

  But then she caught sight of the alarm clock on top of the bureau again and instantly she was on her feet. The morning was flying past and she’d miss her wash time if she didn’t hurry. With a swoop of her arm she pushed the pile of dirty clothes she’d collected into a pillow case and flipped it over her shoulder; then she left her apartment and hastened toward the back stairs.

  It was two buildings Mary Jean owned—looking at them from the street the grocery store occupied the one on the corner, and a small shoe repair shop took up the front half of the building to its right. The back half of the second building was used as storage space for the grocery, and the second floor where the apartments were located spanned both buildings. An enclosed staircase between the two stores led from the street to a landing off which both apartments opened and then continued on toward the back, where the stairs leading down to the grocery was located near a rear exit into the alley. The basement stairs were built against the back wall of the grocery at a right angle to the main staircase and the door to it opened between the other two exits. The Nash apartment was in the front above the shoe repair shop and Mary Jean’s apartment was at the back. The second floor above the grocery had once been a doctor’s office but had been empty for years and was rented out occasionally for wedding parties or neighborhood meetings.

  Rose breathed in deeply of the musty smell peculiar to basements and cellars, mingled with the scents of steamy soap-water and damp clothes drying on lines that crisscrossed the long narrow space—she found it comforting. In the corner at the end of the stairs there was a partially enclosed coal bin, and a monster furnace with big pipes growing out of it in all directions like the tentacles of an octopus almost filled the front half. A laundry sink, the washing machine and adjoining rinse and starching tubs were crowded along the inside wall.

  After Rose got the clothes agitating in the water and the rinse tubs filled, she sat down on an old wooden bench that was pushed against the side of the stairs. She thumbed through some magazines Mary Jean kept there to pass the time till the clothes were ready to rinse and hang. Rose loved to read the movie magazines, but she took her greatest pleasure from the romance periodicals that called themselves “True Love Stories” and “Secret Love” and “Secret Romance.” Some of those set her heart racing and gave her goose bumps. She’d often thought about writing up her and Jack’s story and sending it off to one of them. She believed their story was a lot more interesting than most and a lot more passionate than any of them.

  Today, to her disappointment, Rose found she’d already read them all, except for one that she thumbed through without much interest. Fashions!, of all things—she turned up her nose with scorn. In this day and age with everybody so hard up! She herself hadn’t had a new dress since … but it was best not to think about that. And then her thoughts turned to the blue silk Jack wanted her to wear tonight. That dress was a real store-bought one. The first she’d ever owned that hadn’t belonged to somebody else before her. Up to then all her new dresses were homemade and never what you could call stylish. Not that she’d cared about that—until she married Jack and learned there was a whole other world out there. And Jack bought her a
slew of new dresses when he was making money at the lumberyard. That blue silk was the first, though, and the most beautiful.

  Jack let her pick it out herself at Miss Anna’s in Maysfield, which was the finest ladies’ wear store around. Truth be told it was so fancy they spelled “shop” with two ‘ps’ and stuck an ‘e’ on the end of it! Rose giggled to herself. Jack had, right out of the blue that first morning after they’d run off and got married, announced to her that he was going to buy her the prettiest dress in town. And then he took her to Miss Anna’s Dress Shoppe and told her to pick out whatever she wanted and never mind the cost. When she put that dress on and came out to see how he liked it, he just stood there and stared at her with his amazing blue eyes like she was a big plate of meat and potatoes and he was hungry. Then he said to the saleslady, “Don’t put that in a box, she’s going to wear it, and bring us some silk stockings and a set of your best undergarments.”And then he asked the lady to show Rose some “high heeled dancin’ slippers!”

  By then there was a whole crowd of ladies standing around just gawking at him, and that was the first time Rose felt a little twinge of jealousy. But that was okay—knowing it was she he loved made her proud and playing jealous was just kind of a fun game. Anyway, that purchase was unbelievably extravagant and maybe it was even sinful to spend money like that, but Jack wasn’t much took-up with sin or with the Bible either, for that matter. He pretty much did whatever he felt like doing. Not that Rose worried a whole lot about his lack of religion. She was certain salvation would come to Jack Nash one way or another. God knew how much she loved him, after all.

  When Rose had pinned the last sock to the line and emptied the washer and rinse tubs, instead of returning to her lonely apartment, she opened the door next to the one she had just exited and stepped into the bright and bustling grocery and meat market run by Leo and Viola Wesselman, the couple she now considered her own family. Jack’s too, since neither of them had any blood relations who claimed them anymore. And today, because there were in-store customers and Viola was busy filling their orders, Leo put Rose right to work packing boxes with delivery orders. Thus what was left of the morning passed quickly into afternoon when all three of them took their lunch in turn, upstairs with Mary Jean as had been their practice for years. That was so Leo and Viola didn’t have to go far from the store when it was open and Mary Jean didn’t have to eat alone. Nowadays, if Jack was working, Rose usually joined them. And today, being excited and all, she almost did that one thing Jack told her not to—though she had to bite her tongue a passel of times to keep from blabbing his secret.

  And then sure enough, Jack got that job he was hoping for. And Rose thanked Jesus, although she never was sure exactly what kind of job it was. And she was kind of disappointed because by the time he got home that night, it was too late to go anywhere to eat and too bitter cold for a romantic stroll. But she had dressed up like he’d asked her to and so Jack turned the radio down low and they danced to celebrate anyhow. With only the lights from the street to illuminate the parlor, they could pretend they were in some swanky hotel ballroom. Just before they went into their bedroom, Jack whispered in her ear that they had just taken the elevator to the twentieth floor, and then he led her across the room to the window and with his arms around her they imagined they were looking out at beautiful Lake Michigan all a-shimmer in the cold blue moonlight.

  January 1934

  It was about a month after that when Jack was finally able to take her to supper at The Wine Cellar. After they were seated and he was studying the menu, he nodded with his head to indicate the others in the softly lit room and told her in a quiet voice that these were the sort of gentlemen he was working for. Rose breathed a sigh of relief. The men all wore expensive-looking suits with white shirts and ties, and their shoes gleamed like Abigail Nash’s polished silver. It was plain that they made a lot of money, and Rose thought they must be prosperous businessmen, maybe even bankers! Whatever they were, they could afford to pay Jack fair wages, and she decided that all the money he was spending on their dinner tonight wasn’t sinfully extravagant after all.

  With a happy sigh, she turned her attention back to her husband and smiled proudly. All these well-dressed gentlemen and their fine ladies who wouldn’t even meet her eyes but looked right through her chair as if nobody was sitting in it might have intimidated her, but it was plain that Jack was undaunted. He looked like he ate there every day and he knew exactly what those foreign looking words on the menu meant and just what to tell the waiter when he asked which wine they would like with their dinner. And she noticed none of those snooty ladies looked right through his chair. But that made her proud too. Because he wasn’t looking back at a one of them. He was making it real plain that he considered her the most beautiful woman in that room. The look in his eyes said that! Heck, it just about shouted out loud how special she was to him and how much he was in love with her. What if her dress was almost six years old? It looked better on her tonight then it did when he bought it because she filled it out better now. And her legs in those fancy high-heeled pumps would look as good as anybody’s when he spun her round on the dance floor later. Everything was perfect tonight and this one night made up for all the lean times that had gone before it. Rose knew it was the beginning of a brand new life for her and Jack Nash!

  Truth be told, Jack was a lot easier to live with after that. He wasn’t scared anymore once he had money in his pocket and he could pay all the bills. Jack was such a prideful man. The only bad part of their life after that was that he was almost always gone. Rose couldn’t count on him to be home at any certain time of the day or night and it never was all that clear to her why he couldn’t be at home. He told her he was driving a car for his boss. And once he told her he was a sort of bodyguard, and Rose guessed that with the state the world was in anybody who had very much money probably needed a bodyguard since so many people had nothing. So she tried not to press him. Besides, Jack’s temper went off like a firecracker from too many questions. It was wiser on her part to accept his vague explanations than to suffer his wrath.

  And there were other matters that cried out for her attention.

  One most especially.

  Rose had noticed a rather peculiar (for her) aversion to breakfast lately. Sometimes even the smell of the lard in the skillet awaiting the egg assaulted her stomach so violently that she spent minutes in an agony of dry heaves. Or worse, upchucking last night’s supper. At first she guessed she was catching something. There was always some disease or other going ‘round in the neighborhood. But gradually a new thought worked its way to the front of her mind.

  The notion didn’t come easy because she’d been married going on six years already and not having conceived in all that time she felt pretty sure there was something wrong with her and that there would never be any children for her and Jack. Coming as she had from a family where babies grew every summer like the crops, it seemed impossible to have relations with a man for five and a half years and never get pregnant. It had not mattered much to her and seemingly not at all to Jack, who had never once brought up the subject. Their life together was so perfect they didn’t need a baby to complete it, and if the desire ever did cross her mind, it never stayed long. Rose was content giving all her love and attention to Jack, and she relished the fact he had nobody except her to love.

  But the morning sickness had been going on for almost two weeks and now it was time for her monthly to start and nothing was happening. She was fearful and she was excited. Jack didn’t have a hint to what was going on and she wasn’t at all sure she wanted to tell him. At least not until she knew for certain it was true.

  The strain of indecision made her kind of testy though, and he noticed that and the way she cried so easy about everything. But Jack had never spent much time with a pregnant woman so he couldn’t put it all together. And he was gone so much of the time, anyway. Rose felt tears well up just thinking about how lonely she was. Well, she consoled hersel
f, if there really was a baby started inside her, it would settle that problem. She wouldn’t be alone anymore while he was away days and nights at a time.

  February 1934

  As the days passed, being pregnant became more probable in her mind and eventually by the third week in February and a second missed period, Rose decided it was a sure thing. During that time of uncertainty, she began readjusting her priorities and moving herself from the familiar and pleasant path she had been traveling with Jack onto a much more complicated road twisting with mysterious bends, around which she couldn’t see until she turned onto them. She was looking down a road full of ruts and potholes that she feared she might fall into somewhere along the way. Still, the notion of having Jack’s baby thrilled her when she let herself think about it. After all, a baby was the visible sign of their love for one another and the flesh and blood result of their coming together in their love. In the end of her contemplation on the subject Rose decided that a baby was the most blessed gift God could have given her to fulfill her love and the best gift she could ever offer Jack. After that, the thought of telling him started to make her tingle all over with excitement.

  A whole new world was opening before them. Money was not a problem anymore. Jack’s wages were more than fair. He could pay the bills and keep his pantry full and was even talking about a house and furniture. He had already started to spend money on clothes because he needed to dress well on his job and every time he came home he brought something special for her. They even went out now and then to see a movie or to eat at a restaurant, and whenever his boss let him bring the car home, they’d go for a drive out into the country past farmhouses and through little towns that reminded her of Dobbin. Even in her childhood, before the hard times came, Rose had never enjoyed such good and carefree times, and certainly never had such a free attitude about spending money.