It was interesting to see how angry the storekeeper was. The Crusaders, he said, are bad for business. They collar his highway customers or frighten them away, and they intim­idate his local customers so that he's lost a lot of his regu­lars—the ones who live a long way from his store. They've learned to shop as close to home as they can with little re­gard for quality or price.

'Jarret says he can't control his own Crusaders,' the man said. 'Next time out, I'll vote for someone who'll put the bastards in jail where they belong!'

 

Chapter 21

?  ?  ?

From EARTHSEED: THE BOOKS OF THE LIVING

To survive,

Let the past

Teach you—

Past customs,

Struggles,

Leaders and thinkers.

Let

These

Help you.

Let them inspire you,

Warn you,

Give you strength.

But beware:

God is Change.

Past is past.

What was

Cannot

Come again.

To survive,

Know the past.

Let it touch you.

Then let

The past

Go.

I DON'T KNOW that Uncle Marc would ever have told me the truth about my mother. I don't believe he intended to. He never wavered from his story that she was dead, and I never suspected that he was lying. I loved him, believed in him, trusted him completely. When he found out how 1 was living, he invited me to live with him and continue my education. 'You're a bright girl,' he said, 'and you're family—the only family I have, I couldn't help your mother. Let me help you.'

I said yes. i didn't even have to think about it. I quit my job and went to live in one of his houses in New York. He hired a housekeeper and tutors and bought computer courses to see to it that 1 had the college education that Kayce and Madison wouldn't have provided for me if they could have. Kayce used to say, 'You're a girl! If you know how to keep a clean, decent house and how to worship God, you know enough!'

I even went back to church because of Uncle Marc. I went back to the Church of Christian America, physically, at least. I lived at his second home in upstate New York, and I at­tended church on Sundays because he wanted me to, and because I was so used to doing it. I was comfortable doing it. I sang in the choir again and did regular charity work, helping to care for old people in one of the church nursing homes. Doing those things again was like slipping into a comfortable old pair of shoes.

But the truth was, I had lost whatever faith I once had. The church I grew up in had turned its back on me just because I moved out of the home of people who, somehow, never learned even to like me. Forget love. Fine behavior for good Christian Americans, trying to build a strong, united country.

Better, I decided after much thought and much reading of history, to live a decent life and behave well toward other people. Better not to worry about the Christian Americans, the Catholics, the Lutherans, or whatever. Each denomination seemed to think that it had the truth and the only truth and its people were going to bliss in heaven while everyone else went to eternal torment in hell.

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