Page 26 of Blood Hymn

No answer comes. None can. The line only carries one direction, and he's on the far end of it by the Esso ice machine with his engine idling.

She opens the door before I knock, in a housedress and a cranberry cardigan, her white curls fresh from the beauty shop. She pulls me down into her arms and rocks me side to side, and as I bend, something catches the light in the V of her cardigan, on a fine old chain I'd know blind.

My mother's silver cross.

"You look worn clean through, sugar. You look like you haven't slept since Sunday."

"I haven't."

"Well, get in here. I just made tea."

The house smells like lemon Pledge and something baking. Doilies on the chair arms. A curio cabinet crowded with Hummel figurines. The console television in the corner wears a lace runner and a framed picture of Delilah and me at Easter, maybe six and eight, in matching yellow dresses. I take the couch, the same cushion I occupied every Sunday afternoon of my childhood, while ice clinks into glasses in the kitchen.

She returns with a tray: two tall glasses sweating onto crocheted coasters and a plate of pecan sandies. She settles into her recliner and beams at me.

"Go on. You look parched."

I lift the glass and let the tea touch my lip without letting it past. Under the sugar there's a faint bitterness, the kind you'd miss unless you were hunting for it. I set the glass back down.

"It's good."

"Your mama's recipe. She taught me, and I never could get it to taste like hers." Charlotte sips her own and sighs. "Now. Where have you been hiding, and who's this friend you're staying with? The whole church is buzzing, and I haven't had a thing to tell them."

"I'll explain. I need to ask you something first, though. About Mama."

Her expression holds. "What about her?"

"The night she died you stayed with us. You made grilled cheese and let us sit up for Unsolved Mysteries, and she never came home, and you tucked us in."

"I remember."

"Where was she?"

Charlotte takes another sip, sets her glass on the end table, and folds her hands over her stomach. Something in her face shifts, like a woman removing reading glasses she's only been wearing for show.

"Drink your tea, Evie."

Before I can answer, the oven timer buzzes in the kitchen. Charlotte clicks her tongue and pushes herself up out of the recliner.

"That'll be the second batch. Don't you move."

The instant her back clears the doorway, I tip half the glass into the pothos on the end table beside me, the way Dee and I used to ditch liver and onions as girls. The oven door creaks, and a pan scrapes the rack. When she comes back through with a fresh plate of sandies, I'm lowering the glass from my lips and letting my shoulders go loose and heavy.

She eyes the glass, lighter than she left it, and she's satisfied. I see her decide she's safe.

"You always had the head," she remarks, settling back into the recliner. "Dee had the heart. You had the head, and the stomach. That's why I've been saving you."

"Saving me for what?"

"Oh, sugar. You found the room. Raymond's dead, so I expect you found his drawer, and I expect that man of yours led you down under Front Street." She clucks her tongue. "Silas Cain. The best thing the old man ever built. Shame to see him turned."

My skin goes cold beneath the sweater. My face stays slack.

"Your mama was a fool," she continues, easy as gossip over a fence. "She got it in her head the family had done something to a girl in her Sunday school class, and she wrote a letter to the attorney general. Showed it to me before she mailed it and asked me to check her spelling." She lets out a small laugh. "I checked it. Then I phoned Robert Harlowe, and he sent a car that night. She thought she was going to a meeting to talk it out. Marianne always believed people would do right if you just sat them down."

"And you stayed with us."

"They waited on me. It can't be done without the witness." She smooths her housedress over her knees. "I fed you girls and let you sit up for your program. Then I put you to bed, and I sat at that kitchen table until I heard you both breathing slow. Then I drove down to Front Street. I was back and making coffee before either of you stirred."