Blessed Assurance

by Lyn Cote

  Linc ran to the house with a “Whoop!”

  Jessie murmured, “I hate it when I start to sound like that man.”

  “Your stepfather is of a strong temperament. It is hard to overlook.” Dr. Gooden smiled wryly.

  Jessie grinned. “How perceptive. And you just met him today.”

  “I’d say, he’s a man who’s easy to know, and hard to avoid,” Lee added.

  This forced a chuckle from her.

  Pleased, Lee followed her up to the porch.

  She called out, “Caleb, Ben, will you come in and carry out the kitchen table. Dinner is ready.”

  Lee along with the other men brought out the kitchen table, chairs, napkins, plates, and silver. His appetite awoke as women arranged bowls of creamy mashed potatoes, yellow corn bread, and platters of golden fried chicken on the long table with its white oilcloth. The fragrance of butter and the chicken did indeed make his mouth water. Throughout the bustle, the pup he’d given Linc yapped excitedly, nipping at the men’s pant legs and racing back and forth under the women’s wide skirts.

  When all was in place, Reverend Mitchell took off his hat and bowed his head. Lee noticed Susan reach for her grandmother’s hand and something deep inside him ached for a similar touch. His eyes automatically sought out Jessie. Their gazes met over Linc’s blond head. When Dr. Gooden edged closer to Jessie, Lee felt a grinding inside.

  The pastor cleared his throat. “Father, we know it was Thee who brought Susan and Ruby together once more. Give Mrs. Wagstaff and her son back the kindness that they show us each day, pressed down and overflowing in abundance. Thank Thee for Lincoln on this day of his birth and for this dinner and the hands that lovingly prepared it. In Christ’s name, Amen.”

  Immediately excited chatter and laughter broke out as the buffet line formed, but everyone stood back waiting for someone to go first.

  Then Linc, pulling Lee along with him, headed to the table. This brought chuckles. When Jessie shook her head at the boy, Lee held his hands out in a gesture of helplessness.

  “It is the boy’s birthday, Mrs. Wagstaff,” Dr. Gooden said.

  Then Lee offered Jessie a plate and urged her to follow her son. For once, she did not balk at a suggestion of his. But when she drew Dr. Gooden with her in line, Lee averted his gaze. When Lee served himself, he complimented Susan who stood behind him, “You’ve outdone yourself.”

  Susan smiled. “I didn’t know when I was cookin’, I was cooking for my grandma.” She wiped away fresh tears.

  Soon the picnickers, except for the elderly who had accepted kitchen chairs, were sitting on the grass in the slender shade cast by the shed and porch. Though Jessie had invited Susan and Ruby to sit on the porch, they observed a decorous separation of races by positioning their chairs on the lawn, just inside the shadow of the porch. Jessie, Linc, Lee and the doctor were the only ones who sat on chairs on the porch.

  Lee wondered if Jessie realized that her black friends did this to protect her. Did she realize the backlash she might reap if she continued to flout the standard separation between the races?

  After dinner, Linc blew out the candles on his cake. Lee, like everyone else, settled back comfortably, Lee tilting his head back, as he looked up into the clear, blue sky. Life is good again, his heart whispered. He savored Jessie’s words to Huff: “You are not the master here.” How delightful to witness Jessie’s routing of the hypocrite! Smiling, he turned to her.

  The doctor was speaking close to Jessie’s ear and she was smiling. The sight triggered the grinding feeling again. This time he identified it—jealousy. What’s happening to me? I can’t be jealous of Jessie and the good doctor. He’s just the kind who’d make her a good husband. But Lee squirmed at the thought.

  Ruby spoke up, “This surely be the best day of my life. Till I find my girl, my onliest girl, I never enjoy my freedom.” Ruby leaned over and kissed Susan’s cheek. Susan gave way to tears again, hugging Ruby. Lee noticed Jessie dab her eyes. He edged his chair closer to her and whispered, “I wish your mother could be here.”

  “My stepfather has always forced her to choose him over me,” she whispered back.

  “A shame.”

  She turned away from him, raising her voice, “He’s a shame to all Christians.”

  Lee admitted to himself he admired Jessie Wagstaff. She might be bossy, but when an issue of right and wrong was concerned, she was unmoved by criticism. Since the war, she had become more determined to fight for her ideals while he had deserted his altogether. Unfortunately, this might put her in harm’s way.

  His good humor ebbed.

  Susan and her friends began to hum and sing, “O, happy day when Jesus washed my sins away. O, happy day…”

  After his years in the South, Lee was familiar with this spiritual—“O, happy day…” He hummed along, feeling the joy in the words, their balm pouring through him like the bright, hot sunshine around them all. Glancing toward Jessie, he saw her lean closer to Dr. Gooden again. Lee strained to hear her words.

  “Doctor, if it were a matter of life or death, would you come—if I needed your help?”

  Dr. Gooden looked around him solemnly. “If it is life or death, I will come.”

  Lee sat back in surprise. Dr. Gooden had unexpected depths.

  As the song ended, Ruby sighed. “Rev’rund, today I want to hear the song we couldn’t sing.”

  Without hesitation, Caleb stood up, tall and straight, his dark, handsome face fiercely proud. “I was born free, but I sing this song for the day when we’ll all be really free.”

  The way Caleb Mitchell said the words “really free” made Lee certain the man wasn’t alluding to heaven. And Lee knew only one spiritual had been forbidden in the South before the war.

  Caleb sang: “When Israel was in Egypt’s land, Let my people go! Oppressed so hard they could not stand. Let my people go!

  “No more in bondage shall they toil, Let my people go! Let them come out with Egypt’s spoil, Let my people go!” The low tones of Caleb’s voice vibrated through Lee’s bones and sinew and the stark longing in them sobered him.

  Then Susan’s rich soprano lifted above Caleb’s voice in exaltation: “Thus saith the Lord, bold Moses said, Let my people go! If not, I’ll smite your first-born dead, Let my people go!” A shiver sliced through Lee.

  As the people around joined in the final chorus, a long repressed sadness, longing, and defeat surged through Lee. “When Israel was in Egypt’s land, Let my people go! Oppressed so hard they could not stand. Let my people go!” The final notes, Caleb’s and Susan’s, reverberated in total silence. Lee felt himself near tears and couldn’t think why. Slavery had ended. The war was in the past.

  Linc leaned back against Lee’s leg as though seeking comfort. Lee reached down and ruffled Linc’s hair.

  “Uh-oh,” Linc murmured a warning.

  Lee followed the direction of the lad’s gaze. A tall, angular woman came from the house on the other side of Jessie’s home.

  Jessie rose and went to meet her neighbor. “Mrs. O’Toole, how nice. You’re just in time for a piece of birthday cake.”

  “It’s not for the cake I’m here,” the woman snapped. “You send these people home. They don’t belong here.” She crossed her arms over her meager bosom.

  Lee knew Jessie would never back down.

  Jessie stood straight. “These people are my guests on my property—”

  “This is outrageous. ’Tis bad enough you’ve hired a black girl instead of my niece an honest Irish girl—”

  “Mrs. O’Toole, I think it’s time you went home.”

  Lee shivered at Jessie’s tone. He had heard captured Rebel soldiers reply to Union officers in warmer tones. The tall woman stalked away.

  Linc let the pup go. Butch charged after the woman yapping and growling at the intruder. Linc paused a moment; then chasing after the dog, he snatched up Butch just as he was about to follow Mrs. O’Toole through her gate. Linc ran back to his mother.

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nbsp; When the dog quieted, Dr. Gooden patted Linc on the shoulder. “Happy birthday again.” He pressed a silver dollar into the boy’s hand.

  Linc shouted, “Thank you, sir!”

  The doctor grinned. “I will show myself out, Mrs. Wagstaff.”

  “Thank you for coming,” Jessie said as the doctor bowed over her hand in farewell. He nodded to Lee and walked toward the front of the house.

  The doctor’s departure seemed to signal an end of the celebration. The men pulled on their black hats. The women shook out their full skirts and straightened their hat pins.

  “Please don’t go,” Jessie implored. Her words were cut off by the arrival of three mounted police. She gasped.

  Lee stepped forward to intercept them, protect her. “Good afternoon, gentlemen. What can we do for you?”

  The oldest of the three officers swung down from his saddle. “We received a report of a black mob—”

  “Mob?” Jessie repeated the word incredulously. “Does this look like a mob?”

  Shaking his head at her to be still, Lee stepped closer to the officer. “It seems you received a false alarm.”

  “Appears so, but—”

  The preacher approached them. “Begging your pardon, officer, but did you mention a rumor of about a black mob?”

  Lee felt as uneasy as the black pastor sounded.

  “I’m afraid so,” the policeman replied. He gave the preacher a meaningful look. “You know how rumors—”

  “Spread,” Lee finished.

  “Would you escort us home, officer?” the pastor asked.

  “What?” Jessie objected.

  “Jessie,” Lee restrained her with a hand on her arm. “You don’t understand.”

  His face stormy, Caleb spoke up, “Mrs. Wagstaff, what he means is if a rumor about a Negro mob spreads, our people could be in danger not just here but all over the city.”

  Reverend Mitchell intervened, “But if these policemen will give us escort home, the rumor will be blunted.”

  “He’s right, Jessie. Matters could get out of hand in no time. You don’t want people hurt.” Memories from the past flared inside Lee. He’d seen what evil men were capable of.

  “Susan.” Jessie turned and took both Ruby’s hands in hers. “Ruby will stay here with us.”

  Susan protested, “But what about the neighbors?”

  “She stays, Susan.” Jessie looked to Lee. “Are you deserting us, too, Mr. Smith?”

  Challenged, Lee found he couldn’t disappoint the appeal in Jessie’s imploring gaze, especially when Linc also looked up at him hopefully. “I’ll walk the Reverend’s congregation home.” The phrase came out before he could hold it back.

  Jessie reached for his hand. “Thank you, Lee.”

  She’d touched him and called him by his given name for the first time since he arrived on her back porch. A fierce protectiveness stirred in him for this woman and her son. Words from deep inside him bubbled up, “Don’t worry, Jess. Everything will be all right.”

  Chapter 8

  Inhaling the clean fragrance of fresh starch, Jessie shrank from taking a long-dreaded step today. But it must be today. “Your grandmother stays.” Jessie punctuated her sentence by snapping off the stems from a handful of garden string beans, dropped them into a large pot in her lap. Snap. Snap.

  Standing at the ironing board, Susan began pressing Linc’s white Sunday shirt, the iron hissing on the damp fabric. “But the neighbors—”

  “My hiring a cook is none of their business.” The cloying heat and quiet of the afternoon wrapped around Jessie. “Susan, are you sure you should be ironing in this heat?”

  “I used to pick cotton on hotter days. Don’t be trying to turn me. We just ain’t got enough room,” Susan protested.

  Jessie’s stomach tightened at this reminder. “Leave that to me.”

  Susan slid a black blouse of Jessie’s onto the board. “When are you gone get out of mourning?”

  “Don’t you try to turn me.” Jessie pointed a string bean at Susan. “Ruby’s staying.”

  Susan paused, holding the iron in the air. “You’re too good for your own good.”

  “You mean stubborn, don’t you?” Jessie grinned.

  Susan snorted. “I wish everybody stubborn like you.”

  Jessie snorted in turn.

  In the overpowering heat, the two of them fell silent.

  To the homey beat of the iron as Susan worked, Jessie’s mind drifted. Her mother’s siding with her husband against Jessie on Linc’s birthday still stung. Not even Susan’s nearness prevented a stunning loneliness from sweeping through her. He always made certain I came last with my mother and I always will. Setting the pot of beans on the table, she stood up before she could give way to tears. Besides she shouldn’t put what she must do off any longer. “I’ll go tell Miss Wright—”

  “Tell me what?” the old woman, drooping over her cane, asked from the doorway.

  Jessie, wiping her hands on her apron, walked to Miss Wright. “Let’s go into the parlor. It should be cooler on the east side of the house by now.”

  Though the spinster scowled, Jessie drew her into the parlor and helped the older woman to sit down on the rose-sprigged sofa by the front window. “We have to make a change. I am going to move you downstairs into the parlor—”

  “Where anyone can walk in or look in from the entryway.”

  “I’ll keep the pocket door to the foyer closed from now on.” Jessie pressed her hankie to her perspiring face.

  “You’re doing this because you’re taking in that girl’s grandmother. How can I make you understand? Susan’s people belong in Africa where God put them. Some are smart enough to go where they belong.”

  Jessie had anticipated Miss Wright’s objections. But just as the day’s heat and humidity, these successive waves of opposition were wearing her down. She tried to sound patient. “How can I send Ruby to live apart from Susan? I know I would give anything to have Margaret here again.”

  “I’m not saying you should send the woman far—”

  Jessie’s forbearance snapped. “Ruby isn’t the only reason I’m making this change. Soon you won’t be able to get up and down the steps and you know it.”

  Miss Wright flushed red at Jessie’s blunt words. “If Margaret were here—”

  “You know Margaret would never turn Ruby or anyone else away if they needed help.” Margaret didn’t turn you away.

  The elderly spinster blinked back tears.

  Jessie regretted upsetting her. But what must be said must be said.

  Miss Wright looked away while dabbing a handkerchief at her eyes. “You didn’t know Margaret as long or as well as I did.”

  “Every time I do something you don’t want me to do, you use Margaret against me.”

  “I’m trying to make you see reason.” The spinster’s voice was thick with unshed tears.

  Jessie couldn’t keep the anger from her voice. “Why am I the one who must see reason? Is it reasonable for my neighbors to call out the police merely because my guests have dark skin?”

  “You don’t seem to understand the boundaries of accepted conduct—”

  But in her anger, Jessie continued, “Is it reasonable for doctors to refuse patients merely because of the color of their skin? If these things are reasonable, then I’m glad to be thought unreasonable.”

  Miss Wright crimped her lips and said in a tight, voice, “What will you use for a parlor, then?”

  “The dining room. It’s warmer in the winter and I think I can fit a few of these chairs at one end.”

  Suddenly aware of the tension in her neck, Jessie rotated her head to loosen the taut muscles. “I will help you move your things down as soon as I have the curtain sewed and Ben to help me move the furniture.”

  “What curtain? You already have curtains on the windows.”

  “It will be a privacy curtain, dividing the parlor into two rooms.”

  “Who is going to share this room with me?�
� Miss Wright’s chin lifted.

  “Linc and I.”

  “Why?”

  Jessie took a deep breath. “Ruby can’t climb two flights of steps to the attic, so Susan will give her grandmother her own little room off the pantry and Susan will take my attic room. Linc and I will move into the other half of the parlor with you. I need to rent out your room. Linc is getting older and I don’t want him to have to leave school early to go out to work.”

  “And if I don’t want to share the parlor with you and Linc?”

  Jessie would not say the words they both dreaded: It will make it easier to care for you when you can no longer walk at all. “Moving you downstairs will be better for you.” Their eyes met and held with tacit understanding.

  Miss Wright stood up, grunted with pain. “I’ll go and sit on the porch.”

  Impulsively Jessie stood up and reached out to touch the old woman, but stopped just shy of her sleeve. Hands at her sides, Jessie watched the old woman shuffle out of the room.

  Jessie folded her arms over her breast. I’ll keep my promise to Margaret and care for Miss Wright for the rest of her life. Miss Wright has forgotten how kind Margaret was.

  The bright Saturday sunshine made Lee pull the brim of his hat farther forward as he walked along the side of Jessie’s house.

  “You’re a liar!” A childish voice shouted from the backyard.

  “Am not!” Linc insisted.

  “Are too!”

  “Am not!”

  Linc’s pup began barking and the unmistakable grunts of boyish fisticuffs made Lee hurry into the backyard. “Lincoln!”

  Startled, the boys parted, but the acrimony between them blazed on their sweat and dirt-smudged faces.

  “Explain yourselves,” Lee said in a stern tone.

  “He said I lied,” Linc declared, his expression stormy.

  Lee spoke to the other boy. “Who are you, young man?”

  The boy said, “I’m Tom. Live next door.”

  “Well, Tom, what do you think Linc was lying about?”

  “He said you played ball with the Knickerbockers.”

  “Yes, while visiting friends in New York, I did get to play an inning of a practice game with that famous team.” Lee had to keep from grinning. The way Tom eyed him left no doubt that he didn’t believe Lee either. “Tom, I wouldn’t lie to you or Linc.”