"Evening," he said and smiled.
Clarissa turned sharply away from him without
saying anything. She ran down the two flights of stairs into the
lobby and was surprised to find Rowland seated on the faded gray
velvet sofa talking to Dusty. Rowland stood up with a great deal of
effort when she approached him, smiled, and offered her his
arm.
"I'd be honored, Miss Dugan, to take you to
dinner," he said. "Kitchen's only just down the street."
Clarissa took the offered arm hesitantly and
Rowland led her out into the humid evening.
"You're shaking like a leaf, child," Rowland
said as he patted the thin hand on his arm.
"I don't like to be out on the street at
night," Clarissa replied. "Especially here." She wrapped her arm
tighter around the comforting warmth of Rowland's tweed
jacket.
"They ain't safe, for sure. Kitchen is only a
block away. Nobody will mess with a poor eighty year old man. They
know I ain't got nothing."
"It doesn't matter if you have nothing,"
Clarissa whispered. "They'll take whatever they can."
"You been on the streets, child?"
"A long time ago. Not too far north from here.
East part of Hollywood, up near the hills. I was fifteen. I ran
away rather than live with my brother overseas after my mother was
killed."
Rowland glanced up into the grim set of
Clarissa's face.
"It was dark and raining. I went through an
alley to the back of this restaurant I knew gave out some food. I
thought it was safe. It was Beverly Hills. I was raped."
There was silence between them for a long
moment. Rowland patted the thin hand that tightened on his arm. He
led her into the parking lot of a church. The sign on the front
lawn read "Mount of Olives Baptist Church, Rev. Marlin Stone,
Pastor."
"Short cut?" Clarissa asked.
"No, we's here."
Clarissa had never been religious. Myra had
not taken either of her children to church, never mentioned God or
prayer in their home, yet she knew her mother had come from a
Christian family. What knowledge Clarissa had of any religion was
during the two years that Andy managed to pay for her tuition to
St. Hector's parochial school up on Los Feliz Ave, just up the
street from the tenement apartment she and Myra shared. It was not
to give her any particular religious background but was just
another of Myra Hayden's efforts to isolate Clarissa from their
life of crushing poverty. The church grounds of Mount of Olives
Baptist Church reminded Clarissa of St. Hector's. There was a warm
comfort and a peaceful feeling that calmed her, making her realize
the toll the last twenty-four hours had taken on her. She leaned
more heavily on Doc Rowland's arm and he nodded slightly and
smiled.
"Ham and green beans tonight," he told her.
"Bread pudding and mashed potatoes, 'Course they got mashed
potatoes every night except Friday, when they got Mexican
rice."
Clarissa stopped and stared at the large hall
with the banner stretched across the entrance that read "God's
Kitchen.
"This is a bread line," she snapped
indignantly. "A soup kitchen!"
"What did you think it was?"
"Not this. I thought a little diner or....not
charity. I can't go in there, Rowland. I can't go back to that. Not
after all I've been through. I can't let this happen to
me."
Rowland glared at her, his eyes suddenly hard.
"They do God's work, Miss Dugan. No shame in feeding the poor folk
who ain't got milk for their babies, or cereal for their young
'uns."
"Take me back to the hotel," Clarissa
demanded.
"Ain't no shame in letting God bless you with
hot meal if your stomach's empty and you ain't got no
money."
"Take me back, Rowland."
"Or with a bed in a shelter if you ain't got
no wheres else to go. God takes care of you and me. Someday we just
might get the chance to give some back. Right now I'm gonna accept
His blessing. I'm hungry and that food smells almighty
good."
"I have money. I'm not a charity case. How
dare you call me poor folk, Rowland? I'm not like you. I made a
good living. I have diamonds and a Mercedes and I live in....oh,
God."
She stared in horror at the pity on Rowland's
face. It mirrored the image of herself in Virginia's
rags.
"Come inside, child," Rowland reached out for
her arm. She swatted him away with a vengeance.
"I'm not one of you. I don't belong here. I'm
not poor. I'm not. Damn it, Rowland, get me out of here! Help
me!"
She fell into the old man's arms and he held
her, patting her hair, trying to think of something soothing to
say, but he was just not good at those kinds of words.
"Oh, God, Rowland, they've taken everything
from me. They're together. They're probably laying in each other’s
arms right now and laughing at me. Damn you Morgan Wolfe. Damn you
Virginia Essex. Both of you rot in hell."
"Come inside now, child."
"No. Just leave me alone."
Rowland went inside without her after her
repeated refusals. She stood outside the hall and watched the
people come and go, her hate for Morgan and Virginia welling up
again. They had brought her here, to the brink of her abyss and
shoved her over the edge. The mental image of Virginia in Morgan's
bed, her bed, ignited her bitterness. The endless procession of
ragged poverty in and out of the mission, sickened and repulsed
her. She rebelled against accepting that tonight she was one of
them. Her animosity reached out to include every tattered soul that
came and went from God's Kitchen.
Clarissa screamed obscenities and hurled
insults at them, railing and crying until her voice was hoarse and
her energy spent. They ignored her ravings, giving her only a
cursory glance. They had seen too many crazy people, drug induced
hysterics, and mental illness in their neighborhood to care about
one more of the lost that had taken the plunge and escaped the
desperate reality.
The church parking lot grew dark and the
florescent lights were reflected in the rain puddles. Clouds
gathered again, drifting across the evening sky, and intermittent
rain drops rippled in the puddles. Clarissa leaned against the side
of the building, the heaving sobs subsiding. The dark, gnarled
fingers closed about her wrist and she tried to pull
away.
"It's starting to rain, child," Rowland spoke
softly in his raspy whisper. She put her arms around his neck and
buried her face in the rough tweed of his coat. "Alright, now.
Alright. Come on, child. Get some warm food into your belly, you'll
feel a whole lot better."
She let him lead her into the noisy, brightly
lit hall. She glared with contempt at the rows of long tables as
Rowland gently ushered her into the line and pushed a red plastic
tray in her hands. Clarissa paid little attention as he placed
napkin wrapped plastic utensils on the tray and reached for a glass
of milk for her. He eased her forward toward a server, a rotund
Latino woman with a round face that smiled broadly.
"She alright, Senor Rowland?" the woman asked
as she put a plate of food on Clarissa's tray. "That was her
outside bellowing at everybody?"
"She'll be fine, Louisa" Rowland assured the
server. "She's scared as all. Be alright."
"Well, you look out for her, now," the woman
said.
"I got my eye on her," the old man replied.
"She's stayin' at the Hempstead down the hall from me."
Clarissa eyed the server contemptuously
without saying anything and accepted a small dish of bread pudding.
The smell of the food make her sick to her stomach and she felt as
if she were going to pass out. She felt Rowland steady her and
guide her toward a table where an old woman wrapped in a purple
crocheted shawl sat alone at the far end. The Oriental woman eyed
Clarissa as she passed, then pulled a wire cart filled with old
clothing protectively closer to her. The woman went back to eating
her dinner, occasionally watching Clarissa, and smiling with an
empty grin tinged with madness.
"I'm not hungry," Clarissa protested as she
shoved the tray away.
Rowland unwrapped the plastic fork and knife
and began to cut the slice of ham. "Drink some of that milk," he
said. "Get something into your stomach. Go ahead now, child. Go
on."
He kept urging her, turning her attention from
the crowded hall to the food on her plate. She ate slowly at first,
but it tasted so good and melted away the hunger pangs and the
headache. When Clarissa looked up and wiped her mouth on the thin
paper napkin, Rowland was grinning at her.
"Now that feels a lot better, don't it,
child?" he said.
Clarissa gazed around at the banners hanging
on the walls. Some read "Jesus Loves", others cited quotations from
the Bible.
"If Jesus loves us," Clarissa asked
sarcastically, "then why are these people here, Rowland? Why are
they hungry and homeless? If God cares at all, about any of us, he
wouldn't let poverty happen. He wouldn't lock the doors of his
churches at night, or keep his servants huddled behind their doors
when someone needs help. He can't have much compassion, can he, if
that baby over there is going hungry."
"What, that baby over at that table?" Rowland
pointed to a mother breast feeding and rocking a newborn wrapped in
a blue blanket. "Looks like he's getting his dinner to me. God
provided his mama with a good meal, she make him milk, he's gonna
be just fine."
"That mother wouldn't be here if she had the
money to buy her family proper food," Clarissa
countered.
"The Lord ain't no bank, Miss Dugan," said
Rowland. "He has His will and His ways. That woman needed food. The
Lord provided nourishing food through the good people of this
church. You got to look to the need. Let the Lord see to the means.
God don't promise everybody eating off fine china in formal dining
rooms, now does He?"
"What about the homeless?" Clarissa persisted.
"Why do people have to sleep in the streets? Why do they have to
live in rat holes like the Hempstead Hotel? Where is God for them?
Where is God for me?"
"Where you put Him, child," said Rowland.
"He's right where you put him. Lots of folks shut him out of their
lives. They got bitter because they didn't get out of life what
they expected. Blamed God for it. God ain't gonna force his way in.
You got to invite Him. You look around you. You see God in this
room and you see the results of the work of the devil. Takes time
to heal, takes time to open your heart. Meantime, God sees to their
needs."
"What if I can't open my heart?" said
Clarissa.
"You can, child," Rowland smiled. "A little
faith, a little patience. God's faithful. He knows. He's gonna
carry you when you can't walk on your own. Just that sometimes you
don't know that He's the one seeing you through them rough spots.
Startin' to rain again." Rowland put the fedora back on his head.
"We'd best be gettin' back."
Rowland offered Clarissa his arm and they
walked back to the Hempstead Hotel in the light rain.
"Why did you call yourself "Doc" Rowland the
other night?" Clarissa broke the silence between them. "Were you a
doctor at one time?"
"Oh my, no," he laughed. "I worked my whole
life at the race track. I loved them horses like they were my
children. No, child, I cleaned the stables and exercised the
horses, helped the grooms, and polished the saddles. They used to
call me "Doc" around the places 'cause when a horse was nervous or
skittish, I'd go talk to him, or whistle and sing to him. Calmed
them down every time. Said I was one of those head doctors for
horses."
"A psychiatrist," Clarissa said. "A horse
shrink."
"Call it what you will," said Rowland, "but I
got called out to near every race track in California calming down
mares with jitters or pacers with twitters.
Clarissa laughed and it made her feel good.
"You should have been a veterinarian," she told him.
"Naw, I never had no money for fancy
schooling," he replied. "Made some descent money when I worked,
though. Then I got old. Nobody wanted me anymore. Said I got in the
way more than I was helping. Guess when you're ninety three, you
get put out to pasture with the other old horses."
"You don't look ninety three," said Clarissa
surprised. "Don't feel it neither," he laughed. "Don't feel a day
over eighty."
"Do you ever go out to the race track?' she
asked?" Do you like to watch the races?"
"Sometimes I get to go," he said. "Got a few
friends up ta Santa Anita still. Don't drive no more. Best thing
that ever happened to me. I been walkin' everywhere and I'm in
better shape now than I was at seventy-five."
Clarissa hugged the old man's arm, surprised
at the strength in his bone-thin arm under his tweed jacket. She
clutched it tighter, feeling a frail security in his closeness. She
almost lost her footing when he suddenly bent down and plucked a
shiny object from a puddle.
"Well, look here," he held up the shiny
quarter. "My lucky day. Here, child. Now, maybe some luck will rub
off on you tonight."