Chapter 6

Cassie

Brother Hudson had a big appetite, which is what I'd always heard about farmers. Of course he wasn't a farmer anymore, since he'd been away to Bible college and then pastoring churches since he left high school a couple of years ago, but he still had calluses and he still had a tan and he still talked like some hick. Though I found out at lunch that most of his country phrases were when he got excited preaching. That day he sounded almost like he was from Albuquerque, although even when he was speaking perfect English that thick accent made it impossible to think he was from here.

We all sat down around the table. Usually I sat at the foot and Mama and Daddy at the sides, but with Brother Hudson there Daddy sat at the head of the table, Mama at the foot, and Brother Hudson and I sat opposite each other. It was really my first chance to observe him, unless you count the times I was flirting at him, since I guess you can't call it flirting with someone when he's not flirting back but is just treating you like a woman.

He was tanned, of course, with a paler forehead where, I guess, he wore a hat all the time in the fields. I noticed that he had blunt fingers, thick fingers from working all the time. I knew that's how they got thick because we've got a couple of mechanics in the church and that's how their fingers are. His hands were dark, and with his sleeves rolled up I saw when he reached for the mashed potatoes that the tan went up to where he rolled the sleeves, and above that his skin was pale. I guessed that probably he never went swimming or anything else without his shirt. I'd never met anyone with that kind of a tan and it was interesting, and I found myself staring at his arms from time to time thinking about how the tan went up so far and no farther.

His fingers were curved, like the fingers on those mechanics, and I knew that was also from a lifetime of working with his hands, although he hadn't lived as long as the mechanics. Daddy's hands aren't that way, but then he works in an office and about the only time he has a tool in his hands is when he's changing the oil or helping Mama with her flowers. Brother Hudson's hands were working hands, and though I'd never thought them attractive on Jim Ferguson or Donald Wilkes, I decided that on him they weren't unattractive. I'd been flirting with him to get his attention, and now that I'd given it up I was finding that he was worth getting the attention of.

But what I really liked was his face. Under the tan I saw that he had a skimpy beard, and I suspected that he still didn't have to shave more than two or three times a week, but I hadn't ever liked whiskers anyway. He had a gentle mouth, if a mouth can be gentle, with thin lips that were frequently smiling. He had little white marks around his eyes, and I realized that they were the untanned places where his eyes crinkled up in the sun. I wondered if all farmers had those little crinkle marks, and I supposed they did. His eyes were hazel, and they looked at you directly when he was looking at you, though sometimes they'd slide down, as if he were shy. And probably he was shy. He was only 20 years old after all, and pastoring a church in a city bigger than he'd ever lived in as far as I knew, unless you count that short time in Dallas while he was studying, and if he hadn't been shy it would have surprised me.

But it was his conversation that really got my attention. I'd been so busy noticing the hick accent and the way he preached sounding like he'd just come out of a "holler" somewhere that I hadn't realized he was educated. I asked him about it.

"Well, Miss Morrison," he said, "I graduated from high school with a B average, I guess. I studied, but I was just indifferent as a student. Where I got my education was from reading, mainly. My granddaddy preached some, and my daddy pastored till the stress got to him. And I read their books, my daddy's mostly, and they were older books. You can't—" it was "cain't" again "—read Jonathan Edwards or Stephen Charnock unless you understand English. And when you read that old theology you find yourself learning some history, and some geography, and other things." He seemed to always talk in those short sentences, except sometimes in the pulpit he'd get going and tack one thing onto another until he ran out of breath – sort of like I do, I guess, except I've never been a preacher and wouldn't ever want to be. "So whatever I know, some of it came from ordinary schoolin' and some of it came from my own study." He also sometimes dropped his Gs – but then everyone does that, even city people.

I nodded. "My name's Cassie, Brother Hudson."

"I know that, but it's not fitting for me to call you by your first name. At least, it's not fitting on such short acquaintance."

I dropped my eyes at that. I hadn't been flirting then. I'd really wanted him to call me by my name, but his manners were a lot better than mine, it seemed, at least in some ways, because he showed more respect for me than I'd had for him until that day, and then my respect was more giving up than real respect. "I don't want you to do anything that isn't ... fitting, Brother Hudson."

"Nor do I want you to do anything that's not fitting." I looked up at the tone of his voice. He wasn't being a pastor, exactly, but his voice sounded like someone older and wiser, someone giving of his understanding to someone who needed to learn. It humbled me, and I felt glad, that he would treat me that way instead of like a little kid to just shuffle off with a pat answer. "Miss Morrison, I care about you. I care about every one of my people. And I'd sooner cut out my tongue than say anything that would harm your reputation."

I nodded, and Daddy spoke up. "He's right, you know, Cassie."

"I know, Daddy. And I wasn't trying to do anything wrong. It's just..."

"It's just," Mama said, "that Cassie's a young girl, and you're a young man, and she wanted to be on familiar terms with you. Right or wrong, she meant no harm."

"I never thought she did," Brother Hudson said. "You have a fine daughter, Mr. and Mrs. Morrison. She's a real fine daughter, intelligent and pretty and—" he looked at me with a bit of a mischievous grin "—not above having a bit of innocent fun with her boy pastor. Y'all ought to be proud of her."

Daddy almost swelled up at the praise, though I felt myself going beet red. For once in my life I didn't lap up someone's good opinion of me, and maybe I got a dose of genuine humility just then, for all I could think of was that I didn't deserve that kind of praise. I looked down at my plate and pushed a bit of steak around with my fork, while Daddy said, "We are proud of her, Brother Hudson. We're probably the proudest parents in Albuquerque."

"I don't blame y'all a bit," I heard Brother Hudson say. "And you, Miss Morrison," he said, "you can be proud of yourself too. I think your parents noticed what you were doing." I looked up and they nodded, trying not to smile. "But you had the good sense not to make a fool out of yourself. You're young, and you act like it. But you've got a mind, Miss Morrison, and that's more important – that and a will committed to the Lord Christ – than anything else."

I knew I was red again, but this time I refused to drop my eyes. "Brother Hudson, you're a good man. I thought you hadn't noticed, and ... and you were just being a better man than I was being a woman. I ... I apologize for treating you the way I did, and I hope you can forgive me for being so stupid about it."

He looked at me for a second, those hazel eyes looking directly into mine and then dropping in their shyness. His voice was low when he spoke. "You were just being a young woman. There's nothing to forgive – but if there is, I forgive you ... Miss Cassie."

Yirmeyah

The weeks went by. Pastoring isn't easy work. I'd learned that in Cisco, and I learned it for certain in Albuquerque. It's work enough preparing and preaching sermons. That alone, if you do it right, takes your time. But a church expects a pastor to visit the sick, to visit the well, to participate in meetings, to have something to do with the church's finances, to pretty much do all the evangelism. Hopeful Church wasn't as bad as it might have been. Previous pastors had introduced the people to the idea that they have to preach the Gospel. But I still had to push against the tendency to "let the pastor do it – that's what we're paying him for."