“Honey,” Mum said, “we got to get down on our knees.”
Twelve
JESSE PEGLER
THE MORNING OF THE last dance, my mother and Seal and I worked on ACORN applications.
When Mrs. Davison, our housekeeper, announced that lunch would be served in fifteen minutes, my mother said, “Seal, honey, you’ll stay for a bite to eat, won’t you? Donald’s staying.”
“I can’t,” Seal said. She was working in white short shorts, and a yellow cotton sweater the color of her hair, with a thin belt around it. “Dickie and I are going to work on our hats, so I’m having lunch at the Clowards’.”
“Are you up to all that excitement?” I said. I’d intended to sound cool, but my voice cracked midsentence. I think Seal noticed how weird I sounded, because she didn’t zing me back.
“You go along, dear,” said my mother. “You worked with Diane-Young yesterday, didn’t you? How’s she coming?”
“She’s finally got the removable braces,” Seal said, unwinding her long, tan legs, getting to her feet, “but the contact lenses aren’t working. They irritate her eyes. She’ll have to go back to her regular glasses.”
“Not those pink things?” my mother said.
“Those pink things,” Seal said. “But I’ve been teaching her about makeup, and quelle change! The only thing is, she says s-h-i-blank every other word—or crappy—and she’s not too believable as a witness. Her eyes blink madly whenever she talks about the healing.”
“Oh, I’m not worried about Diane-Young,” my mother chirped. “The Cheeks are so delighted she’s going on the Winning Rally! You’ll get her into shape. You and Dickie are doing wonders with her.”
“How’d Dickie get in on the act?” I asked. It was news to me.
“He wants to help”—Seal shrugged—“so he’s helping.”
“Why not?” my mother said. “Nothing going on with the Methodists, and he’s an enthusiastic young man. The more the merrier, I say.”
“Anyway,”—my mother began one of her old familiar refrains—“ACE’s aim is to form a coalition with local churches, all working together, with the same goal, to spread the Lord’s—”
Et cetera, et cetera, while I watched Seal comb her long blond hair and pull down her sweater after. I smelled her perfume. I remembered nights Bud would come back from dates with her, that same smell was on his clothes.
As soon as Seal left my mother’s office, my mother whispered across at me, “I think they’ve got a thing going on.”
“Dickie Cloward’s my age,” I said. That was getting to be my own old familiar refrain.
“I always said a girl like Seal isn’t going to wait around forever.”
“You don’t have to whisper, Mom, there’s no one here but us chickens.”
“Let that be a lesson to Bud.”
“If Bud wanted her back, all he’d have to do would be show up. That thing would be pffft.”
“I wonder,” my mother said.
I was beginning to wonder myself. I found myself looking past my mother, out the picture window, where Seal was walking down the path from our house. The wind was blowing her hair, and she was taking these long steps as though she was in a big hurry.
I watched her until she was out of sight.
My mother began gathering up her papers. “Don’t think I’ve forgotten about your hat, darling.” I was planning to wear a derby to The Last Dance, with two ears of corn attached to it, representing Virgo’s harvest. “I’m going to fix it for you right after lunch,” my mother said.
“Thanks, Mom. I love you, sir.”
She laughed. “I love you, too,” she said. “I just wish your father and I could go to that thing tonight.”
“So do I. Then I wouldn’t have to make a speech.”
“Your father’s right, I guess. It’s fine if we go to the Cheeks’ dinner, but we’d be too big a distraction at St. Luke’s.” She went across the room and picked up Blanche. “It wouldn’t be fair to The Ladies’ Association. Remember how your father got mobbed at Rotary’s Las Vegas night?”
She held the cat up to her face and let out a long sigh. “Seems like can’t go wins out over can go about ten to one these days,” she said. “Blanche, here, gets out more than I do.”
At lunch Donald sawed a piece of rare roast beef and announced that the Lord was suggesting to my father that ACE ought to take the Winning Rally to England.
“Guy included?” my mother said.
Donald said, “It wouldn’t make much sense to go over there without our star attraction.”
“I wonder where our star attraction is?” my mother said, glancing at her watch.
“He’s probably signing autographs,” Donald said. “He’ll be along. … I remember reading about Billy Graham’s first crusade beyond America. It was in 1954.”
“I don’t like ACE going over there,” my mother said.
“Anyway,” Donald went on, “Billy got himself invited to Windsor Castle for tea with the Queen.” Donald swallowed a chunk of roast beef and chuckled, anticipating the story he was determined to tell.
“What happened was”—another chuckle, another chunk of beef—“Billy strolled in and grabbed this fellow’s hand—fellow was in tails, white gloves—and Billy said, ‘Honored to meet you, sir.’ Well, this fellow turned out to be the butler. He just wanted to take Billy’s hat.”
My mother wasn’t that amused. She said, “Where are we going to get the money to go to England?”
“We’ll raise it,” Donald said. “We’ll get it back over there. There’s a whole new resource to tap over there. … The Lord will provide.”
“Is the Lord suggesting this or are you suggesting this?” my mother said.
“The Lord made the motion and I seconded it,” said Donald.
I said, “All in favor say aye. … Nay.”
“Nay,” my mother said. “When and where do we stop? I read where Billy Graham’s hardly ever home. Television is one thing, traipsing all over the globe is another thing.”
“What do you think, Jesse?” Donald asked.
“I already said nay. Enough is enough.”
“Is enough,” my mother said. “Amen.”
Donald’s mouth was open and he was ready to say something, when Mrs. Davison came into the dining room.
She said the Seaville
