The Last Ballad(118)

If someone had discovered him they would have believed that he had fallen at the feet of Jesus in prayer, but Brother did not pray. Instead he picked at the lock on the tabernacle box with the scarred bit of wire, the chair he wore around his neck swinging like a pendulum before him. His hands sweated, his fingers shook. The light from the red candle licked the floor around him. He did not know how much wine the monks had blessed and set aside for the communion of the homebound and those who might need last rites at a moment’s notice; all he knew was that the lit red candle signaled that the wine was inside.

He opened the box and peered inside, saw the crusty loaves and the glass pitcher, the dark wine catching the flickering light. He took the Mason jar from his pocket and unscrewed its lid, picked up the pitcher, and poured the wine into the jar until it overflowed the sides and ran through his fingers. He set the near-empty pitcher back inside, closed the box, and stood, stuffing the capped Mason jar back into his pocket.

He walked along the shadows of the basilica’s west wall. Above him the morning sun illuminated the stained-glass windows that portrayed the lives of saints: Bernard, Patrick, Boniface. He’d almost reached the back wall of the basilica when something made him stop: the sound of feet coming up the steps outside, the basilica’s front door creaking open.

Brother opened the door to the small confessional closet, stepped inside, and pulled it to behind him. It squealed, the noise of it echoing along the basilica’s floor. Brother closed his eyes tight and tried to slow his breathing. The footsteps continued into the basilica and stopped nearby. Whoever it was knew he was there. He was surprised to hear a woman’s voice.

“Father?” she said. She waited. “Father? Are you there?”

In his old life, Brother had asked this same question of God many times, and now he wanted nothing more than to offer this woman the same silence that God had always offered him, but she was persistent, and the more Brother tried to slow his breathing the more difficult it became. He swallowed, ran his dry tongue over his teeth.

“Yes, child?”

“May I give confession?”

Inside the darkened closet, Brother placed his hands over his face and pressed his fingers into his eyeballs. He stayed that way until his breathing slowed.

“Father?”

“Yes, child,” he said. “Yes.”

He listened as she opened the door and stepped inside, settled herself only inches away from him. He slid open the screen that separated them from one another, stared down at his lap, did not raise his eyes to her. He pictured her as a dark-haired woman of middle age who smoothed her dress over her legs when she sat down, who wiped at the corners of her eyes where tears had already collected.

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,” she said. “It has been three weeks since my last confession.” She waited.

He eased the wine-wet Mason jar from his pocket, careful not to drop it. He unscrewed the lid as quietly as possible, tipped it toward his lips. A drop of wine spilled onto his white shirt, blossomed like blood gushing from a wound. He took a sip. “Go ahead, child,” he said.

“I am weak,” the woman said.

Her northern accent surprised him. He took another sip of the wine.

“We are all weak,” he said. “We are all human.”

“I am weak because I fear my husband,” she said. “I remain silent while he commits violence and leads others to commit violence. And I know more violence will be committed today.” He heard her stir and resettle herself. “And I fear that someone might be killed.”

Brother took another sip from the jar. “Have you gone to the police?”

“The police?” she said. “They can’t save her.”

“Who is she?”

“That singer at Loray,” she said. “That woman Ella May.”





Chapter Fifteen

Ella May





Saturday, September 14, 1929



Ella was alone in the struggle now; at least it felt that way. Fred Beal and Carlton Reed and several other strike leaders remained in jail, charged with Aderholt’s murder. Sophia and Velma had been arrested and then freed for lack of evidence. They’d both left town, Sophia heading home to her parents in Pittsburgh, Velma back to New Jersey. Sophia had promised Ella that she would return as soon as possible, but Ella couldn’t wait for her, especially after the collapse of the Gastonia Local. She’d acted alone in opening the office of the Bessemer City Local, which she’d organized as an integrated branch of the National Textile Workers Union. Most of the members were from Stumptown, but a handful of Gastonia strikers had joined. Others had returned to Loray or moved on to other mills.

Today’s rally in Gastonia had been organized by the national office. Party officials would be there, as would workers from mills in other parts of the state, all to show support for Beal and the jailed strikers. After how he’d treated Hampton and thwarted their attempts to integrate, Fred Beal was the last person Ella wanted to support. But she could not risk running afoul of the national office. The money Kate had given her was running out. She’d been able to piece together some kind of life from the meager funds that dripped down from New York, but she knew it wouldn’t last forever, because the strike wouldn’t last forever. Her only choice was to keep going, to try to recruit new members, to keep working to shut down the mills, to keep insisting that the union’s demands be met. If it worked, her life would change. She could go back to the mill, feed her children, take care of them if they got sick. If it all fell apart, she didn’t know what would happen.