“Must make it awkward for you,” I probed.
“Not really,” He walked along beside me with his hands clasped behind his back. “If you don’t work outside the home, if you confine your social interactions to the African-American community, it’s amazing how long you can go without having to speak to an ofay.”
His voice parodied the offensive word and took the sting from it.
“School?” I asked. “PTA?”
The excitement over, the kids had resumed their volleyball game. We watched as Ralph’s son took the setup and spiked the ball for another point.
“Sports?”
“Well, yes, there are those times,” he conceded.
Despite a certain sadness in his voice, I sensed that he felt disloyal to say even this much about his wife and I quit pushing.
“Lashanda’s okay?”
He seized gratefully on the change of subject. “Oh, yes. Ms. DeGraffenried—Cylvia? The prosecutor?—she took Lashanda up to your house to change out of her bathing suit and then there was some mention of a lemon meringue pie. I can’t thank you enough for what you did.”
“Not me. My aunt.”
“She might have prayed the fire out, but you were the one got her to your aunt so quickly.”
I shrugged.
Ralph Freeman stopped and smiled down at me, a smile as warm and uncomplicated as July sunshine. “You don’t like to be thanked, do you?”
“Sure I do, but not when it’s for something as elemental as helping a hurt child.”
He brushed aside my demurral as if I hadn’t spoken. “All you have to do is say ‘you’re welcome.’”
“Excuse me?”
“I say ‘thank you,’ you say ‘you’re welcome.’ What’s so hard about that?” There was such genuine goodness in his smile.
Goodness, and yet a touch of mischief, too, in the tilt of his head.
“Thank you for helping my baby girl,” he said.
I smiled back at him.
“You’re welcome,” I said.
17
Cyl soon returned with Lashanda, who had a flick of meringue on the tip of her little nose. For the child, getting changed had been a simple matter of sliding a pair of yellow shorts on over her bathing suit and stepping into a pair of yellow jelly sandals. She trailed an oversized yellow T-shirt across the grass and seemed too tired to walk.
Ralph Freeman swung her up on his broad shoulders so that a leg dangled down on each side of his chest and motioned to his son, who had just stripped off his rugby shirt and was ready to follow the other kids into the pond. The boy immediately put on a typical teenage face.
“Aw, Dad” do we hafta leave now? I didn’t even get to swim yet.
I was amused to see that a preacher could be as torn as any father between the needs and desires of his children. Seven-year-old Lashanda was clearly exhausted and in bad need of a nap after such an emotional experience, while thirteen-year-old Stan was enjoying the swing of things.
“I don’t mean to interfere,” Cyl said hesitantly, “but if your son wants to stay a little longer, I could drop him off on my way home.”
Stan’s face lit up. “Can I, Dad? Please?”
“Are you sure it won’t be too much trouble?” Ralph asked her.
“Positive. Just so Stan can tell me where you live. Cotton Grove, right?”
“Right,” said Stan. “It’s only two blocks off Main Street on this side of town.”
“No problem then,” Cyl said.
With a paternal injunction to behave himself and to come as soon as Ms. DeGraffenried called, Ralph thanked Cyl for her kindness and me for my family’s hospitality. Then he headed out to the parking area with his daughter clinging drowsily to his head.
“Nice man,” I said, watching them go.
“For a black man?” Cyl asked sweetly.
Stan had gone racing down the pier and we were alone for the moment beneath the hot July sun.
I felt as if I’d been spat on. “Excuse me?”
