The Feet of God

67 - ONE IOTA OF DIFFERENCE

It was turning light outside and morning dew sparkled like glass beads.  It was time for me to go.  I tucked the gun back with the stacks of bills stashed inside Yeller Tom’s leather case, then headed over to a gravel path that snaked downhill toward two lanes of asphalt where I might hitch a new ride.

While walking along the path a white pebble landed at my feet.  I didn’t know I had company.  I looked back and saw an old man and woman tossing away whitewashed stones from the second letter E in BIBLE HELL.  (I figured there wasn’t much for kids to do around here except maybe Fentanyl, alcohol, screwin’ their first-cousins, and pull’n practical jokes like this.)

“Hey, up there, watch out!” I shouted, as a flung white rock hit me above the eye.

The elderly couple stood up in a shock of surprise, almost as if they was caught red-handed do’n something wrong.

“Sorry, friend.  We were cleansing away some smut.”  The old man shielded his eyes from the rising sun.  He sure was a big guy, wearing a brown suit, yellowed white shirt and a wide brown tie.  The woman was a scrawny thing, with snowy white hair topped by a prim pink hat with pert artificial flowers.  They both seemed over-dressed for the occasion of strenuous outside labor near daybreak.

“Did you see who did this?” the man asked.

“Nope.”

“What?” he tilted his head and cupped an ear.

“No!” I yelled.  And to highlight my own recent experiences on Bible Hill, I added, “That sure ain’t my idea of anything comical.”

“Amen to that,” the man sighed in disgust as he blotted his forehead with a handkerchief.

I watched the old woman as she continued to chuck away the offending stones.  In short order she completed the task of restoration, and they both stepped back to examine their work.  They exchanged words but I couldn’t exactly make out what they was saying to each other.  Then the man took long loping strides down the side of the hill with the woman following behind taking tiny little steps.  He reached the gravel path first and took her hand as she stepped down to join him.

“Praise the Lord, friend, my name is Virgil Knockers,” he reached out a big calloused hand to me.  “And this is my better-half, Edith.”

Mrs. Knockers gave me a shy, country smile.  “Virgil and I were on our way to Sunday services when I looked up and saw the sacrilegious vandalism.  I couldn’t believe my own eyes.  Who could do such a thing?  I told Virgil, ‘Virgil,’ I said, ‘we need to go up there and remove that blasphemy on Bible Hill,’ and then I told him I didn’t care if we were going to be late for church.”

“That’s the Gospel truth,” Mr. Knockers avowed.  “So, what’re you doing up here on Bible Hill so early, friend?”

The Knockers must’a been so intent on moving and casting away stones that they never noticed the black smoke rising over the hill from the plane crash.  Or maybe their eyesight wasn’t so sharp.  I figured they might be hard of hearing, too, if the explosion didn’t get their attention.  In any case, I went with an abbreviated version of my situation.  “Oh, I just hitched me a ride in a plane with some guy and it developed engine problems and we crashed a split second after seeing this sign from above.”

“A sign from heaven,” Mrs. Knockers nodded as she and her husband stepped back and admired all the correctly arranged letters in whitewashed rocks.  Then both Knockers looked over at me.

“We’re parked nearby,” Mr. Knockers pointed to a lot that’d escaped my notice.  “If you need a ride.”

“Why thank you, Mr. and Mrs. Knockers, that’s very considerate.”

“You can just call us Virgil and Edith, friend.  All our friends do.”

Together we walked down to an old, tan Dodge van with bald tires, rusty bumpers and faded paint.  It was the lone vehicle sitting idly in the parking lot.  I noticed a bumper sticker was stuck on the back window:  CAUTION:  If occupants disappear while driving, it is the Rapture.  Virgil pulled the side door open so’s I could climb in.  I set the black briefcase on the floor next to me and buckled up.  They both got in and buckled up, and off we drove.

I thought how dramatically my life had changed overnight.  I mean, here I was, a guest riding with a sweet elderly couple on their way to Sunday worship, and it was a spectacular dawn in Bible Hill.

Edith turned slightly in her seat, “Where are you from, friend?”

“California, mostly.”

“Did you hear that, father?  He’s from California,” she gave her husband’s arm a squeeze.

Virgil’s eyes fixated on me in the rear view mirror.  “Powerful wicked place, that California.”

I hate it when people rip on the Golden State.  “Well, sir, in my experience good and bad dwell just about everywhere there’s people.”

“Amen to that,” Edith gave Virgil’s arm another squeeze.  She turned around, “Over there in that plastic container you’ll find some of my homemade cookies.  They’re for our congregation’s coffee hour, but I think we can spare a few now.  You look like you could use some old-fashioned, homemade cookies.  The ones with the fork marks are peanut butter and the others are oatmeal-raisin.”

I wasted no time in unbuckle’n my seatbelt to get on my knees on the seat and scarf down some homemade cookies.  Of course, a Western omelet, hash browns, an English muffin and a boilermaker would’a been preferable, but I wasn’t about to look the proverbial gift horse in the mouth.  I grabbed me a handful of the peanut butter.

“I did my fair share of traveling around the country in the younger day,” Virgil continued to monitor me in the mirror, “after I got out of the service.  Back then all able-bodied, young Americans served their country proudly.  You ever been in the service?”

I shook my head negatively back and forth with my mouth full of cookies.

“It’s good for a boy to grow up and become a man.  Anyhow, I’d just come through this way to visit a cousin of mine who still lives not far from here, and we and some friends went out looking for something to do, when we wandered up here on Bible Hill one afternoon.  We sat around, not doing anything much in particular, just shooting the breeze, when this pretty little gal walked by.”  Virgil turned and winked, lay’n his hand to Edith’s arm.  She radiated affection back at him in return.

“Of course, in those days I thought I was something real special, so I said to her, ‘Hey, girlie, how’d you like to go to the dance with me Saturday?’  And she stopped in her tracks and said, ‘Can’t do that, but you can come to church with me tonight if you like.’  Before I knew it, I said I would.  The fellers with me thought I was crazy, that her folks went to a holy-roller church.  But I didn’t care.  I was in love at first sight.  So I borrowed my cousin’s car to drive over to the church and meet up with Edith and her family.  They were having revival out at the Tabernacle, and I was privileged to be introduced to Brother Hiram, who preached things I never heard before.  That night my heart was touched with the anointing, and my life was changed forever.  That was forty-seven years ago, friend.”

“Praise Him,” Edith gazed dreamily up at the roof of the van.

Just then I heard something rustle’n behind me.  I turned to investigate the odd sound.  It was coming from underneath a Tupperware tub on top of a folded red-checkerboard tablecloth.  I moved the plastic container and lifted the tablecloth.  Underneath was a wooden crate with a clear plastic lid held in place with a couple’a bricks.  Coiled up inside was a half-dozen copperheads....

“Nyyyaaaaaagggggghhhhhhh!”

“The serpents are for church,” Edith smiled.

Virgil’s mirror image frowned, “Please watch your tongue, friend.”