Sadie slips in at the last moment and squeezes into the last row. Merciful heavens. Roy has battered her sweet face since I saw her Monday. I work to keep my face neutral. God only knows what injuries are out of sight under long sleeves. It angers me to see she likely paid dearly to be here today. Her Granny Gladys sits on the middle pew with a crooked straw hat on her head and her usual sour look on her face. I guess curiosity brought her here like it did a lot of folks who don’t practice church regularly.
Miss Shaw wears trousers and polished boots, and along with the absence of a hat and a thin purse clutched in rough hands, she is set apart from the women here today. She is incongruous. She is our blessing. I worry we’ll lose her before she’s even in our grasp.
I stand at the podium dizzy and don’t quite know why. I pull the folded paper out of my pocket and the words swim in front of my eyes, unreadable. Nerves. I open with a joke, then quote from Deuteronomy 32:2: “My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass.”
It’s a lovely, poetic opening meant to honor the teaching gift of Miss Shaw, but sadly, I fail to tie it to the sermon very well. No one looks at or listens to me anyway. All eyes are on the back of the head whose eyes are on me. I ramble on, then frustrated, I cut short my sermon and talk about what’s on everybody’s mind.
“Today, we welcome Miss Shaw into our family. She has come to us in good faith and with a willing spirit to teach our children reading and writing and important lessons. The gifts she has given us in her first week are remarkable. Your children are more eager than ever to use the brains the good Lord gave them.”
I look straight at Kate. “I speak for everybody here when I say thank you, Miss Shaw, for coming to Baines Creek.”
Just before I dismiss the crowd, Miss Shaw says, “Reverend Perkins?”
There’s a unified intake of breath at her boldness.
“May I address your congregation?”
“Of course.” I gesture for her to stand at my podium and I sit, straightening my tie. I’m mildly conscious of the fact that few women have ever stood in front of this church, and I think it’s a shame.
“Thank you.” She looks around and I hope she sees humble souls, not tattered clothes. She speaks. “I lost my last teaching job because I stood up for what I believed was right.”
She pauses, runs a hand through her short hair, and clears her throat. I’ve never seen my congregation so still. They’re mesmerized by language, appearance, and behavior foreign to their ways.
“When I lost my last post, I saw it as a chance for a new beginning. One that would test me. One that would matter more than what came before. An index card on a church bulletin board asking for a teacher looking for a challenge brought me to the education board, then to Baines Creek. Preacher Perkins’s letter made it easy for me to decide. I hope this community might benefit from my love of learning. In turn, I hope to find renewed purpose.”
Folks start to squirm in their pews. They’re confused. They don’t understand everything Miss Shaw said, but they did bits of it. She did something wrong that got her fired, then she came to Baines Creek.
“I’d like to stay to teach your children. I believe I’m where I’m supposed to be.”
Kate Shaw sits and folds her hands in her lap.
Awkward tension strains the walls of my little church. No one knows what to do with this odd turn of events, so I say, “Soup is served.”
? ? ?
Outside the church door, Kate stands one step down from me, and I introduce her to the parents of her students and to her close neighbors. Widow Jolly lives to the right of the school. Lila Moon, Mooney’s reclusive sister, lives to the left. Both are old and feeble, and neither one comes out except to go to church and the Rusty Nickel. The others I introduce are equally shy and don’t want to say the wrong words. They look at their feet, at Miss Shaw’s trousers and short, gray hair, and raise a tepid hand to hers, but for the most part, they muddle through.
When Sadie steps forward to introduce her aunt Marris to Miss Shaw, I want to fold the child in a hug and cry for her. She casts a glance across the clearing into the shadow of the tree line and to Roy Tupkin. He leans against a tree and smokes a cigarette, his sights tight on Sadie. He tips his hat to me and I want to throttle him. No surprise that Billy Barnhill is there, too.
What I really want to do is send Sadie home with Marris, to her tender care, but I can’t make decisions for the girl. The line between duty and what’s right isn’t always clear-cut. All I whisper today is, “I’ll keep you in my prayers, child.” I know that’s not enough.
Twenty minutes later, only Kate Shaw and I remain in the churchyard. She stayed behind and now faces me and fills in the missing pieces without me asking.
“I helped a girl get an abortion,” she starts. There’s a hard glint in her eyes, defensive. “She threatened to kill herself if I didn’t. Even without the threat, I would have helped. Women have a right to make their own decisions about their bodies. The law on the books is archaic.”
I look to heaven before I give the standard answer. “God and the law know killing an unborn baby is wrong. It’s murder.”
“I disagree.” She shakes her head both in sadness and fatigue. “Anyway, that’s the action that got me dismissed.”
Physically we stand four feet apart, but ethically and morally, a million miles. One long moment rolls into two as we sort the deliberations before us. Lord knows Baines Creek has its rash of babies born to girls too young, in some cases fathered by incest, but the issue with babies is clear when I trust the Bible’s law: killing a helpless fetus is murder.
“I won’t sanction abortion, Kate,” I say, knowing full well that pennyroyal and blue cohosh grow on these mountains and can end early pregnancies. I’m not naive. I am consistent.
“I’m not asking you to sanction it, Eli.” There’s respect and compassion in her tone. I see in Kate’s eyes she’ll never change her mind, but neither will I.
We call a truce and lay it to rest.
Eli Perkins
Today, on a Saturday lit with the gold of autumn, I sit in Kate’s cabin and she pours tea. Her first three weeks of teaching have gone well and attendance numbers are up. I drop two sugar cubes in my cup and stir with a teaspoon. There’s a brightness to the air here in her cabin where thoughts breathe and expand. Despite our differences, I’m content here like nowhere else.
“Well, Kate Shaw.” I clear my throat. “I can’t quite tell from the bits and pieces I’ve collected about you. Are you an atheist or an agnostic?”
“To the point, Preacher Eli Perkins,” she counters with an easy smile as she drops two sugar cubes in her own cup and stirs. “I call myself an agnostic. From as early as I can recall. I never saw the need for blind faith, nor am I patient with man-made rules.”