Authors: Ardella Garland
Our hands touched and that spoke of the promise we both sensed was in the making. Then Doug walked away.
I wanted to go with him to track down the informant but I knew that hell would be a snow scene in a Christmas toy before Doug would let me tag along with him this time. Actually that was best. I needed to take stock of all that had happened and regroup. I would need to be at the top of my game for what was coming next: the rally. Little did I know that it would be the turning point in this baffling case.
T
he get-together spot for the rally was the parking lot of Sweeter Water Baptist Church. Zeke was there waiting for me just as we’d planned. He had his gear ready to go. We walked amongst the crowd, gathering background information that I would need to include in my story.
The building was originally the Cathedral of the Saints when the area was predominately white. After white flight, the parish fell on hard times. The Chicago Archdiocese decided to sell the church, which it did in 1978 to a group of neighborhood citizens armed with a King James version and a loan from a black bank.
They weren’t just any group of neighborhood citizens, I was told. They all belonged to Sweet Water Baptist Church, a storefront, with a growing sanctified congregation. When they moved into the new building the members wanted to make a fresh start yet keep the original community feel of their church. They decided to call themselves Sweeter Water Baptist Church. The new name was suggested by Miss Mabel Stewart, who at the time was rocking Butter’s mother in her carriage and petting her aunt Angel, who was playing on the floor.
Sweeter Water Baptist Church was a huge building, carved out of dolphin gray stone with narrow stained-glass windows. The two back doors were made of bleached wooden slats and had brass handles drilled in the center. The doors opened out like barn doors. A large crowd milled around.
What I saw was layers and layers of people who longed for change. Their expectations were high; they were just waiting to pitch a revival tent so they could celebrate how they got over this latest troubled time. It was a sad thing to see, a mass of people waiting for a miracle in the daylight of a society that cast shadows over miracles and the people who believed in them.
The response to this rally was bigger and better than many of us had anticipated—
us
being the media who collectively doubt just by the nature of the business. I once knew a reporter so cynical that if he had witnessed Jesus walking on water, he would have written a story about the prophet who couldn’t swim.
Zeke was with the cameramen from all the other television stations. They shot b-roll of the signs that had been painted or drawn with markers on white boards and nailed to long Popsicle-thin sticks. My favorite two signs were: “Gangbanging done played out” and “If you can read this you’re too smart to be in a gang.”
I asked a couple of people about the Stewart family and they said Kelly was somewhere passing out ribbons and that Miss Mabel and the Olive Leaf Club were in the church basement. No one, they said, had seen Trip or his mother, Angel.
I eventually spotted Butter’s mother, Kelly, handing out black and white ribbons. Kelly had her braids pulled back and tied up high in a ball on top of her head. Her hands clutched the ribbons as she twisted them together and knotted the ends, making a black and white pinstripe. She was working those ribbons.
Zeke was in close. He panned up from the box of ribbons, to Kelly’s hands twisting them, to her face, also twisted with grief. Kelly saw us and smiled for a second then continued passing out the ribbons.
“Kelly,” I asked easily, trying not to alarm her, “have you seen Trip?”
“No, I don’t know where that boy is or my sister. They’re both supposed to be here. Me and Mama just came on by ourselves.”
I nodded. “Can I interview you about the rally?”
Kelly said sure, and I took a handheld mike from Zeke and started my interview: “Kelly, explain to us what the ribbons are for?”
“The black ribbon is in memory of Jackie.” When she said the girl’s name she had to choke back a sigh. “The white ribbon,” she went on to say, “is in hope for Butter’s safe return. We’re gonna wear ’em on our wrists.”
“Do you think this march and rally will help convince the gang to return Butter?”
“Yes, I do. I don’t know why, but I think everything is gonna be all right, I don’t know why … but I just know,” she said. I could see the faith in her eyes.
I wanted so much to tell Kelly what I knew about Trip hiding Butter. But now Trip was in danger of being killed or in danger of killing somebody. Telling her that would only shift worry from one child to another.
I wondered briefly if Doug had found his informant. What did he know? Where was Trip? I couldn’t say anything to anyone. I quickly ended my interview with Kelly and let her tie a set of ribbons around my wrist.
Zeke and I headed inside the church looking for Miss Mabel. We walked down the marble stairs; we could hear voices humming and singing, no words, just a devotional hymn. The rhythm made me think of rivers washing against rocks, rain tapping against windows, hands patting against knees, feet stomping against floorboards, mouths talking in tongues, hips rocking against pews, and hallelujahs flying against ceilings.
“Sounds good,” Zeke whispered in my ear.
That whisper moved me forward, down the stairs. All of the women were standing in a circle, including Miss Mabel and Auntie Vee. My grandmother could be one of their prayer posse. All of the women were dressed in white blouses and lengthy black skirts. They all had pressed, oiled, shimmering hair pulled away from their concentrating faces. They did not notice me or Zeke at first and we didn’t want to be noticed. I heard the soft click of his camera and he wisely left off the overhead light and started shooting video of this engagement raw, just like it was.
Auntie Vee, no longer hunched over by grief on a hospital cafeteria table, was stouter and taller than I had realized. She was slapping her hand against a red-covered Bible.
Miss Mabel was clutching her black-covered Bible against her chest, popping up and down on her toes in sync with the clapping. Their voices died down and Miss Mabel began to pray. “Jesus, my savior in times of need. When I’se in trouble, where else can I go but to thee. Turn your eye from the sparrow and come by here, oh Lord, into the basement of our humble house of worship, Sweeter Water. Oh Lord, my God, our sorrows are running deep this evenin’.”
“Yes! Yes!” Auntie Vee said.
I felt the ebbs and tides in her voice as Miss Mabel continued to pray.
“Lord, we want to ask you to bless Jackie’s spirit this evening as we go about some important business in this neighborhood. The devil done got a toehold, a foothold, and a hip hold on things ’round here but we’s here to say not for long—”
“How long, not long,” a member of the circle said.
“We ’bout to get a prayin’ spirit on these hoodlums and my grandbaby Butter. We pray that you wrap your arms around her and be a shield, send the Holy Spirit to her wherever she is and wrap arms ’round Butter till the victory is won—and when it is over, Sweet Jesus—bring Butter on back safe, happy, and prayerful as she was ahfore and I know you will ’cause you a mighty God who answers prayers. These blessings we ask in Jesus’ name for our sakes, amen.”
“Amen,” said the members of the circle.
If that didn’t fix everything, I thought, we’re all in trouble.
M
omentum. March. Message.
The sun was low in the sky and had a beautiful glow to it when Reverend Walker began to speak. He shouted, his head back, launching the words into orbit, “What do we want?”
“Peace!” the marchers answered back.
“When do we want it?”
“Now!”
The marchers were walking six across, a good fifty rows deep. Across the front were Reverend Walker, Miss Mabel, Auntie Vee, Kelly, a man I recognized from the deacon huddle in the parking lot, and a woman I recognized from the basement prayer service. Zeke and I, like all the other television crews, had anchored ourselves to a spot well in front of the marchers to get a long shot of them walking toward us.
“Up with hope!” Reverend Walker shouted.
“Up with hope!” was the repeat.
“Down with gangs!” he said.
“Down with gangs!”
Zeke was lying flat on the street getting a tight shot of the ground as the army of feet came into the picture, and then he started panning up to focus on the faces of the people. Everyone in the neighborhood had agreed to move their cars from the street so the marchers would have a clear path to the park. A hazy, golden shadow was cast back and away as the marchers walked past us. They had spaced themselves just right so that their shadows were falling back and adding another layer to their ranks. Somebody, somewhere had done some stone-to-the-bone, black-power fist-in-the-air protesting back in the sixties. This rally had that kind of a feel to it.
“What do we want?” Reverend Walker shouted.
“Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang!”
came the response to his words. I jerked around in time to see the crowd hit the street in waves, like a tide rolling out. Zeke was on the ground, his camera still on, still rolling. I quickly got down on the ground next to him. I looked up and around at the houses and the two flats on the street. Then I saw little shards of paper floating down from the sky.
“Awww, wasn’t nothing but firecrackers!” someone yelled. Then we heard a loud rattling sound. Three little boys were laughing from behind a couple of garbage cans. I recognized them immediately as the little boys I’d given the ice cream to. One of the marchers spotted them and yelled, “Hey, there they are!”
The boys took off running down the closest alley.
Slowly everyone began getting up, Zeke first. I was waiting for my heart to stop pounding. He took his camera off his shoulder and laughed.
“Hey, gimme a hand up!”
“Naw, I’m already overworked as it is!” Zeke said, ignoring me.
I slapped at his pants leg until he reached down and pulled me up.
The marchers were shaking off the commotion: some mumbling, others cursing, all disjointed. Then Reverend Walker started it up again: “What do we want?”
“No firecrackers!” someone answered in a playful voice.
Everyone laughed, including Reverend Walker. “I say, What do we want?”
“Peace!” the crowd shouted and they began marching again.
There was a squad car stationed at every other corner. I looked around for Doug. I didn’t see him anywhere.
We finally reached the park, the field house being the stopping point. A plywood podium had been built right next to the field house, nestled against the park swimming pool. There were folding chairs for the preacher and politicians lined up in two angles that faced the oncoming crowd. The marchers spread out in front of the podium.
I got ready for a long, long sermon by Reverend Walker and more speeches from other political power mouths. Zeke began milling through the crowd, picking and choosing his shots to conserve precious power in the battery pack.
Suddenly I felt a hand on my shoulder and a voice in my ear. “Where your cop friend at?”
I turned to face Angel, Trip’s mother. She looked worse than the last time I had seen her, if that was at all possible. Her skin was splotchy, her face was drained of color, and her hands were shaking. She was rocking nervously. Angel still had on the T-shirt Butter had won at the spelling bee. She asked again about Doug.
“I don’t know where he is. Are you okay?”
“You don’t know?!” She groaned. “Damn, when you need a cop you can’t find him!”
“Angel, it’s okay—”
“No!! No!! How the hell is it okay? Huh?”
“Angel, let’s just get one of the officers around here—”
“Naw, naw, that ain’t gonna work. I want him. He know Trip and he would fix it with the law!” Angel said, and put her hands in front of her face.
She was coming loose at the seams. Tell her what I knew? In her shape? I had no choice really.
“Oooh-we,” Angel said, rocking. “I got the jitters!”
“Where’s Trip? Angel, we gotta find Trip because—”
“I know! I know! I know what Trip’s done and what he tryin’ to do. I know!”
“You know that Trip hid Butter?”
“Yeassssss!”
“All this time you knew!” I shouted at her.
“Hell no! Do you think I’m crazy or something? I just found out,” Angel said, standing in front of me rocking and scratching her arms. “I didn’t know before he done hid her! If I’d ah knowed that I’d ah whupped his ass and made him tell it. But now Trip ’bout to get in more serious trouble. One of my friends told me, wanted to cop some of my hit and I said naw and she—she said I know somethin’ you wished you knowed. And then she said it’s ‘bout Trip and what he did and gonna do. She told it all. I knew she wasn’t lying ’cause she sleeping with one of the top ones in the Bandits and I know she wanted them drugs badder than me. She wanted ’em badder than me.”
“Angel, let me just tell one of these officers and I know—”
“No! Can’t trust ’em! I’ll go myself!” Angel turned and slid around the side of the field house. I ran after her. We were hidden by the building as we walked across the open grassy area of the park.