Books : A Burning in Homeland : Excerpts

I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer.

-- THE SONG OF SOLOMON

Prologue

At the end of our dirt road, on the top of a green hill, beside a live-oak tree draped with Spanish moss, there was a little white church, and beside that little white church was a little white house, where the pastor lived. His name was Ned Jeffries, but everybody called him Pastor. He was a small man, and thin, with dark hair and squinty eyes. He wasn't a very friendly man, and some people said he was too sour, even for a Baptist preacher. Momma didn't like him much; she said he was too cold, that he didn't like people. But Daddy said it wasn't that Pastor didn't like people, he just liked God more. "That's terrible," Momma said. "That's a terrible thing to say." Daddy said, "What I mean to say is, he finds God more interesting." Momma said she never heard of such a thing. "Any man who finds God more interesting than people has no business in a church." Daddy didn't say anything after that.

Now Pastor had a wife, who we called Miss Mavis, and she was the prettiest lady in town. Daddy told my brother Bertram she was the prettiest lady in town because all the other pretty ladies in town talked about her, about how her looks were slipping, and that's how you tell who the prettiest lady in town is.

I didn't know much about that, but she sure seemed pretty to me. On Sundays she wore a white dress, and most of the time she wore her hair up, except for some dark strands that would come loose and hang beside her round face, the ends curling under to touch her neck. She was a lot prettier than Pastor. Her teeth were small and even; Pastor's were long and yellow. Her eyes were large and blue; his were squinty, like I said, and very dark, almost black. She was a very pretty woman who looked even prettier next to her husband. His homeliness made her shine. They would stand together after the service just outside the main doors, greeting everybody as they came out, her smiling and laughing and him grinning like it hurt, putting his limp hand in yours and giving it a quick shake while he was looking at the next person in line. "It's good to see you," he'd say, and when my turn came he'd put a sweaty hand on my head and say, "And how good it is to see you, Robert Lee." I wouldn't say anything back and Momma would poke me, and later in the car she would turn around in her seat and say, "You must start talking to the pastor, Robert Lee." And Bertram, my brother, would say, "Shiny don't talk to nobody." And Momma would tell Bertram to hush.

They had a daughter together, Pastor and Miss Mavis, their only child. They named her Sharon-Rose. She was a big girl for her age, with long, golden hair and a round face like her momma. She was three years older than me so I didn't know her very well, until that summer came when she moved in with us, because God burned her house to the ground, and me and her became engaged to be married, through no fault of my own.

But it wasn't Sharon-Rose's fault, either, when I think about it. It was more Miss Mavis's fault, for making her take a bath so late. But that wasn't really Miss Mavis's fault, because she wouldn't have been in my house taking a bath if it hadn't been for the fire, which wouldn't have happened if Halley Martin hadn't killed Walter Hughes years and years before I was even born.

So maybe it was Halley Martin's fault I got engaged at the age of seven. Everybody said the fire that night was God's will, but that was hard to think about, God willing Halley Martin to fall in love, so Walter Hughes would die, so Miss Mavis would marry Pastor and have Sharon-Rose, so their house would burn down, so they would have to move in with us, just so I would be engaged to a girl I didn't even like.

God's ways are mysterious indeed. That's what Momma always said. I never knew what she meant by that, but I started to understand, just a little, beginning on that night when the pastor's house burned clear to the ground.