part 2 chapter

38

a fter my prison release, i had been stone-deaf to my mother’s constant pleas to join

the church. but then she proposed something that changed my mind.

the mill was closed for the winter season, and farm work was reduced to scattering hay twice

a day for mr. beard’s cow. sunny days were in short supply, and i fell into a deepening gloom.

long, constitutional hikes were my way to escape the women’s hovering concern. i stalked the

upper fields, counting footsteps on the butter-tinted hills and pacing off the bristling tree line.

but as days shortened and the anniversary of bibb’s killing approached, even that practice

wasn’t enough.

dressed warmly for the weather in shawls knotted tightly around her woolen cape, ma found

me one afternoon again in a blanket on the porch. full of righteous purpose, she pulled up a

chair next to me. there was a hint of her old self in her assertive tone. “son, i worry day and

night about what ails you. i lose sleep over it.”

refusing to meet her probing eyes, i looked across the porch railing as if there was

something of extreme interest tacked to the tree by the road. “ah, ma, i just wish you and the

girls would leave me be. can’t a man even find peace in his own home? sometimes i long for

the war again—to get away from all this prying and picking.” as soon as i saw her wounded

expression, i regretted those spiteful words. she was so fragile these days.

unexpectedly, she persevered. “you may be as rude as you like, but i’m going to get to the

bottom of this moping about.” she then went on to address her theory for my melancholy. a

lack of devotion caused my low spirits, and the only solution was to get myself to new

jerusalem church to pray for forgiveness. she told me how she was distraught when i was in

prison. “but i turned to the lord for salvation, and we were blessed with your homecoming.

you should praise your maker for bringing you safely back to us.” she continued on in this

vein, and eventually veered into some nonsense about a coming apocalypse. i ceased to pay

attention and fell back into my own musings, her irrational conversation deepening my solitary

misery.

but then ma said something that sparked my interest. “there are so few who are able-bodied

in the neighborhood these days. reverend brown says he’d welcome your assistance keeping

the church account books when you aren’t busy at the mill. you are a good man, but you need to

get busy before the devil discovers you.”

something shifted in me that day. an idea began to grow. my greatest dread was to be found

out by my family; i needed to do something to redeem myself, something that might tip the

scales more in my favor than against. an adult life of charity and church involvement might do

it. people would say, “yes, as a young man he behaved recklessly, but what an upright person

he’s become—always constant in his faith and helping others.” obituaries in the spectator

consistently cite regular church membership as proof of a life well lived.

but pride kept me from relenting in that moment. believing her argument had been in vain,

ma arose with a heavy sigh and went back inside, leaving me to my doldrums. and yet, to her

immense surprise, on sunday i awakened with the rest of the family, donned a pair of brown

canvas pants and a homespun linen shirt from before the war, and joined them in a pew at new

jerusalem, toting bibb along with me. if ma wanted to believe that by some miracle i’d been

called, i wouldn’t dissuade her. i belted out the words of hymns as though i meant them, and i

even allowed myself to become her attentive student, studying the bible chapter and verse every

afternoon in this very library. gradually, my show of interest seemed to bring her out of the

shadows, and, i hoped, made up for my surliness.

my habits changed, but not my lack of faith in a benevolent god. every sunday i endured

sermons that warned of wrathful old testament fire and brimstone. preachers invoked a harsh

paternal god, and i rejected him before he could reject me. but there were other consolations.

the greatest was meeting my dear ellen that long-ago day in church. the second was that the

presbyterian church required its members to live by the ten commandments’ rules and then

those made by the presbytery, the church’s governing body. if you were guilty of murder,

fornication, failure to tithe, adultery, drinking alcohol, and fighting, you were banned from the

church. i felt i needed rules. for four years, i’d lived by the only rule that mattered: kill or be

killed. during that time, my own choices were often flawed. i no longer trusted my judgment. in

the church, rules were crystal clear. boundaries were unconditionally drawn in black and white.

i wholeheartedly embraced that system and worked my way through it. the first step was to

become a sunday school teacher; then i was promoted to superintendent, overseeing four

hundred students and their teachers. by the time my moustache was white, i was elected an

elder sitting judgment on others. my veneer of goodness was irrefutable, bolstered by my fellow

congregants who voted me into office year after year. the die was cast, and the obituary’s

favorable text assured. i would be lauded as an admirable man in everyone’s opinion but my

own.