Street of Angels

by Joe Derkacht

“I was trying to make a confession, not enlist you in my sin.”

  John was vehement in his protests. “Sin? What are you talking about? The man burned down your church!”

  “‘The wrath of man does not achieve the righteousness of God.’”

  “Yeah, well, sometimes you let the chips fall where they may. There’re consequences and there’re consequences, you know. You were helping God out a little--how does that sound?”

  “That’s what I’m concerned about, I guess.”

  “I don’t get it, I don’t get the point,” John said in frustration. “I really don’t.”

  “He’s leaving the ministry.”

  “He doesn’t belong in it!”

  “He’s leaving the faith.”

  “He was never part of it--let him go and good riddance to the--to the--if I wasn’t in church I’d be cussing about him myself. Let him go, he’s going out from among us because he was never of us--1 John 2:19. Is that scriptural enough for you?”

  Cedric shook his head and looked bleakly about the room.

  “There’s his wife--his church--” his voice quavered. How many people would fall away because of his departure? How would his wife and unborn child be affected?

  “I don’t have your experience,” John said quietly. “But from my few years, the way I see it, there’ll always be somebody dragging the Lord Jesus’ name through the mud and people getting hurt because of it. It’s just part of the--part of the whole ball of wax it seems like. And when it’s all through, there’ll be some who stand and some who fall.”

  John slapped his knees with both hands and stood up. “Sometimes you have to let go, just let God handle it all,” he said. “In the end, it all comes out in the wash, that’s about all I can say.”

  He went to the door, and turned one last time. “I hope that helps.”

  Unable to find it in his heart to tell the white minister otherwise, Cedric nodded assent.

  “Anything you need from the hardware store?” John asked.

  Cedric shook his head. He waited until Willimon’s footsteps died away and he heard the front door click shut, then came out from behind his desk and began to pace the floor, hands raised in prayer. His confession to John hadn’t helped at all. While he hadn’t meant to seek the man’s support, it still felt like the result was the same, like he knew ahead of time how the younger man would react and that he’d somehow been attempting to justify his actions.

  Even worse, to his thinking, he didn’t feel badly about how he’d dealt with Erwin. It had felt wonderfully exhilarating to finally take action, to let his anger spill over into the moment, to slam him against the wall and to walk away with the knowledge that he could destroy the man at any time he wished--until Sharese had shown up at his office and bared her soul to him. Her dark, haunted eyes, shading from violet into black, reminded him that there were other people involved, an entire church, and a marriage at stake besides. Not just a marriage--a family, if he considered Erwin’s unborn child.

  He wondered if Erwin knew about the baby. The baby was the real reason for Sharese’s visit. Erwin was leaving Calneh immediately and had laid down an ultimatum for his wife. Sharese could come along, if she wanted. If not, he would divorce her. He had been offered a leadership position with some kind of Muslim congregation in Atlanta and meant to begin a new life for himself.

  She felt torn. She loved her husband but didn’t understand why he had to leave Alabama or why he suddenly wanted to become a Muslim and seemed so willing to throw away their marriage. Sensing it all had something to do with the night of Cedric’s visit in company with Chance Odoms, she figured Cedric could provide the answers to her questions.

  Reluctantly, Cedric revealed Erwin had burned down Alliance Baptist. A moment later, she burst into tears. He assumed the dark flush over her complexion was shame.

  He didn’t know if Sharese would follow her husband to Atlanta, and doubted she knew the answer herself. He prayed for her to make the right decision. Though Erwin was lost, which he didn’t doubt, he felt compelled to pray for him as well. At the same time, he wondered if he could have done anything differently. If so, the answer eluded him. Even to those who gladly err on the side of mercy, there are boundaries that cannot be ignored. Erwin’s phone call to Theodora had been the crossing of one of those boundaries.

  Still, Cedric suffered as he prayed. It broke his heart that he’d been unable to turn the young man from hatred and vengeance, and it broke his heart that Erwin would further dishonor God by abandoning his faith in Christ. How many people would stumble because of his failure to lead Erwin in the right path? How many would stumble because of Erwin’s sin?

  Cedric nearly fell into the same chair John had sat in earlier. Was it his imagination or had he really heard a voice?

  “I’m listening, Lord,” he said.

  Let him go, son.

  “Are you sure, Lord?”

  Would you have me enter uninvited?

  The picture of Jesus knocking at the door instantly crossed his mind. Then a second picture, that of a bricked-over doorway. Briers quickly climbed the bricks, obscuring the former entryway.

  Even for someone as articulate as Cedric, it would have been hard to describe the impact of the Spirit’s voice to anyone who has never heard it, still harder to explain visions to those who claim God no longer speaks to His children except through Holy Writ. But as always, to Cedric, who had heard that voice before, sometimes in comfort, once in stern rebuke, it brought the same finality, the same absolute sense of closure; no matter how simple the message and to the point, or how oblique it might at first seem, it cut away his misery like some kind of heavenly scalpel and at the same time was like the hidden manna given to sustain the weary and troubled soul.

  ****

  Part Five

  Chapter 35

  Hermione parked Stella’s Ford Galaxie in the corner of the parking lot furthest from the entrance to the Federal Correctional Institution for Women at Owaloosa. Though the pavement was perfectly level and the nearest car or truck was perhaps fifteen feet away, she set the emergency brake before she opened her door. There was no use in taking chances, not when the car wasn’t her own; just because the car was bug-splattered and dusty from the 200-mile journey (and about ready to give up the ghost besides) didn’t mean she wanted anybody carelessly dinging it or scratching the paint.

  Whew! The Georgia sun did seem hotter than the Alabama sun, she thought, as she stepped out and went to the rear passenger door. Ioletta opened the door on the opposite side at the same time. They both looked in on Stella.

  “You all right?” They asked in unison.

  Pale with sweat beading her forehead, Stella nodded a shaky affirmative. In spite of the heat shimmering off the surface of the asphalt, her plaid car blanket was tucked up around her chin.

  “Lordy, you look puny,” Ioletta said. “You sure you all right? Maybe we could find you a doctor?”

  “I’ll be fine, just the flu,” Stella said through chattering teeth. “Don’t forget the box in the trunk. I don’t want us to come all this way and forget to give it to her.”

  “Lordy, you musta told us that a dozen times in the last fifty miles,” Ioletta complained. “We don’t forget that easy, you know. We got brains, too.”

  “You’ll make sure you ask her why she never answers my letters, won’t you?”

  Ioletta rolled her eyes in exasperation. It was the same other question Stella had asked a dozen times in the last fifty miles.

  “I’ll wrassle it out momentary like,” Hermione told her, walking to the rear of the car. As she opened the trunk, she wished she had parked closer to the prison entrance. The box was heavier than when it had contained the Florida oranges advertised on its lid. Now Bibles and a stack of Rev. Billy Graham’s Decision magazines lined the bottom, plus there was packaged food along with a variety of toiletry items they thought Mertie and her cellmates would find usefu
l. As she closed the trunk lid, she noted with anxiety that the passenger side of the car seemed lower than the driver side. A mechanic should look into that, she thought. Or maybe there was a problem with the tires?

  She grinned suddenly, realizing the problem was only her aunt, who was bent over, talking to Stella, her right foot braced on the open door sill.

  “You ready?” Hermione asked.

  “Ready,” Ioletta answered. To Stella, she said, “We could leave the keys in the car, let you listen to the radio.”

  Stella shook her head. She felt too miserable for music.

  “I hope you don’t plan on dyin’ before we come back.”

  “Aunt Letta!”

  “Just makin’ sure,” she said. “It did come on awful sudden like.”

  Furrows crossed Stella’s forehead. She managed a sickly smile.

  “We’ll make it quick as we can,” Hermione promised.

  Ioletta considerately eased the door shut and pressed against it until she heard it click.

  “Aunt Letta--” Hermione began, as they walked toward the prison.

  Suspicious of her niece’s tone of voice, Ioletta scrunched her mouth into a frown. “I suppose you think I should carry the box in this heat, not you?”

  “No, no, I’m fine.”

  “Well, what?”

  “I was just thinking,” she said, letting her gaze wander deliberately. How to put this delicately? In her mind’s eye she saw the Galaxie’s door panel dimpling as Ioletta leaned against it. “Did you ever consider maybe we should go on a diet?”

  Ioletta looked startled. Her eyes swiveled toward Hermione. “A diet? You and me? Now why would you be talkin’ like that? You know you don’t mean us, you mean me!”

  “Well, I could go on one, too. I don’t suppose it would hurt anything.”

  “Hmmph. Pot callin’ the kettle black.”

  “Just a thought, Aunt Letta.”

  “Some people should keep their thoughts to themselves.”

  “That’s true.”

  “The Lord has blessed me and you’re jealous, that’s all it is.”

  “I suppose you might look at it like that, Auntie.”

  “Auntie? Don’t you auntie me like I’m nobody.”

  “Auntie doesn’t always mean that, Aunt Letta.”

  “Well, it did when I was growin’ up.”

  They had come to the sidewalk. For the moment Ioletta forgot her ire. She took the box from Hermione and told her to follow her through the doors. If someone refused to let them take the box in for Mertie, they would have to deal with her first. She had visions of a snarling white man barring the way.

  The first guard they met smiled pleasantly. He was a large man, well over six feet tall, and looked like a younger version of their own Elder Wiggins at Alliance Baptist.

  “How are you beautiful ladies this fine day?” He asked.

  The women exchanged glances, and grinned.

  “That’s right, jus’ like you said,” Ioletta answered, her voice turning to honey. “Beautiful.”

  #

  Hermione stood at Ioletta’s shoulder for a clear, unobstructed view of the woman who had taken Stella’s son. The visitor’s alcove couldn’t accommodate both their chairs, or rather their combined girth, confirmation of her opinion that dieting might be a good thing. On the drive up from Calneh, Stella had described Mertie Davies as pretty, skinny as a toothpick, a flat one not a round one, fragile with cancer and in need of lots of TLC. Ioletta and Hermione recognized her immediately, as the gaggle of women prisoners were let in. What surprised them was that her eyes were not sunken and gray like Stella had told them. Unusually large, luminous, and blue were more like it, flitting nervously about, as the burly woman guard gestured her to her seat. They widened, as she suddenly realized she was sitting opposite two black women, both of them complete strangers.

  With trembling hands, she picked up the phone on her side of the glass and held the receiver to her ear. Ioletta had picked up her own phone as the women filed in.

  “Hello?”

  “Are you Mertie Davies?” Ioletta asked in return, to make doubly sure. She wished the woman’s prison outfit had a name instead of a number stenciled over her breast. The voice surprised her; she had expected it to sound coarser.

  Mertie nodded her head, and blinked owlishly.

  “Stella done took sick. She wanted I should--I mean me and my niece Hermione here, come in to talk instead. Is that all right?”

  Mertie nodded again.

  “My name is Ioletta Brown.”

  “I’m Mertie Davies,” she replied unnecessarily.

  “We brought you a big box full of stuff. They made us leave it out front but said they’d pass it on to you once they gone through it all, made sure there weren’t no contryban nor nothin’ like that.”

  Mertie smiled stiffly and raised a hand to one eye, where she knuckled a tear about to brim over.

  “Why would you do that?” She asked.

  “Because it’s what the Lord would want us to do.”

  “Ask her if she received Stella’s letters,” Hermione urged her aunt.

  “I-I did,” Mertie said, clearly hearing the question on her end of the line.

  “Why didn’t you never write back?” Ioletta demanded.

  “Ask her if she did what Stella told her to,” Hermione said.

  “Let her answer my question first, Miny,” she shot back.

  Mertie nodded slowly. She knuckled her eye again, started to answer but faltered.

  Blunt and to the point, Ioletta asked, “You can read and write, can’t you?”

  “Not so good,” she said, shaking her head in regret. Brightening, she laughed suddenly. “Most people say my handwriting’s no better than chicken scratches.”

  “Ask her if she did like Stella said she should, Aunt Letta.”

  Mertie nodded. “I know I should’ve written.” She looked cautiously around, before adding, “I feel different--somehow. I don’t know how to explain it, except I feel different--not so all alone anymore.”

  “After you prayed, you mean?”

  She nodded tentatively, as if she wanted to say more but was too shy.

  “That’s the Lord, no two ways about it,” Ioletta assured her.

  “There’s so much that’s happened, I just wish I had somebody in here who could explain more to me.”

  “Is there a chaplain?” Ioletta asked. “You could talk to him.”

  Hermione’s hand was on her aunt’s shoulder. “Tell her about the Bibles and magazines, Aunt Letta.”

  “There’s Bibles in the box and magazines from the Reverend Billy Graham--you read those real good. They’ll help.”

  “If you think so, that’s what I’ll do.”

  For a long moment, Mertie and Ioletta stared silently at each other.

  “And pray, pray lots,” Ioletta thought to add.

  “Aunt Letta, ask her about the letter.”

  “Letter?”

  “You know, the one Stella Jo wanted her to write.”

  “Oh, you ask her,” her aunt said, handing over the phone. “I don’t know what to say.”

  “Mertie--do you mind my calling you that?” Hermione asked. “Stella Jo was hoping to ask you to write a letter for her.”

  “A letter?”

  “To her son Duane. To ask him if he’ll write. She’s written letter after letter.”

  “He don’t answer none,” Ioletta interjected, pulling at her niece’s arm to speak into the phone. “She’s written about his twin brother and everything under the sun, and he still don’t answer.”

  “Twin brother?” Mertie asked, unsure she’d correctly heard Ioletta.

  “Yeah,” Ioletta and Hermione said together. Hermione asked, “Didn’t you know?”

  Eyes widening again, Mertie shook her head.

  “The boy’s a cripple and can’t talk, but he’s an angel,” Hermione said. “Everybody thinks
so.”

  Mertie covered her mouth with one hand and sobbed into it.

  “God’s blessed the boy,” Ioletta said, hoping to comfort her. Mertie didn’t seem to have heard. Her eyes were focused elsewhere.

  “Will you do it?” Hermione asked, growing impatient.

  Slowly, Mertie pulled herself together. She adjusted her coverall, and nodded her head. “I can try.”

  Ioletta took the phone from Hermione. “Don’t he read?”

  “Not so good, like me, I guess.”

  “It would mean an awful lot to her.”

  “He’s never been one to write, you know. He’s only ever written once or twice to me in his whole life. But I’ll do my best.”

  “That’s all anyone can ask. They--” Ioletta seemed stumped for words again. “They treat you well in here?”

  “Pretty good, I guess.” She smiled faintly. “It’s not like the outside.”

  “No, I guess not. But it was a bad thing you did, stealing a child like you did.”

  “I know,” she said quietly, not correcting Ioletta. The fact she was in prison for reasons other than kidnapping did not make it better.

  “Well, we’ll have to be leavin’ now,” Ioletta informed her. “Stella’s waitin’ in the car. Poor thing’s not feelin’ too well.”

  “I-I hope she’s not too bad,” Mertie said. “Tell her I’ll be praying for her.”

  Ioletta and Hermione smiled broadly.

  “I hope you’ll pray for me, too.”

  The three women waved and smiled at each other through the glass like they were old friends. Hermione backed out to give her aunt room to maneuver around her chair. Suddenly, Mertie tapped on the glass barrier and gestured for them to pick up the phone.

  “Yes?” Ioletta said.

  “I had a question.”

  Ioletta waited.

  “I’ve heard the Lord heals--does he really do that?”

  “I’ve seen it with my own eyes.”

  “It--then that’s what it musta been. It musta been the Lord who healed me,” Mertie said.

  Ioletta’s jaw dropped in shock.

  “What is it, Aunt Letta?” Hermione asked.

  A tear ran unhindered down Mertie’s cheek. “They haven’t let me see the doctor yet, but I know I’ve been healed of my cancer.”

  ****

  Chapter 36