Child of Gilead: a Novel by Douglas S. Reed

Author:Douglas S. Reed
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2020-07-16T21:32:35+00:00

CHAPTER

THIRTY

The Old Man has a story to tell.

But the Old Man says, “I don’t tell my story to everyone. I only tell those who are believers. You must believe in miracles.”

∏

There once was a Young Girl. She was a runaway. Her father had abandoned the family. No one knew what happened to him or what became of him. But he left this Young Girl alone with a mother disinterested in loving and caring for her in a meaningful way. So, at the age of fifteen, the Young Girl ran away. She roamed the backcountry roads of the South. Her life was just about finding food and shelter. To do so, she sought out extended family and the kindness of strangers. She’d sleep in their barns, or an extra room, if it was available. This went on for some time.

The Young Girl eventually journeyed to the next town over from where she was born. She wandered upon a little country diner and the small home settled in the backfield behind it. The young girl didn’t ask for food and a place to rest right away. She spent a day just watching the place from afar. She came to see that the diner belonged to an older couple. She saw that they were some twenty years or so older than she was. They were childless.

Spider is what everybody called the man. He was long and wiry, with arms and legs that went on for days. And he had a pockmarked face, always covered by the stubble of a two-day old beard. The runaway girl approached Spider long after the wife had gone off to the home out back. She had seen how the couple worked so hard running the business by themselves. Surely, they needed help. Spider was tying up the trash when the Young Girl came up to him. He wasn’t surprised to see her. It was almost as though he was expecting her. His first words to her were, “Do you know me?”

The runaway told him, “No.”

“Then why are you here, young girl?”

“You and your wife need me. I’ve seen how you both work so hard. You won’t have to pay me. All I need is food and a place to rest my head.”

It must have been the Young Girl’s boldness. Maybe it was her pretty smile, or her light brown eyes. But Spider took her in. He didn’t ask the wife what she thought. He simply told her, “This pretty girl is here to help you. See that she has enough work to do.”

People called her ‘Miss Radiance’, because as a little baby lying in her cradle, she had the brightest, most beautiful smile one could ever see in a child. Miss Radiance grew to be a dutiful wife, who did what she was told by her husband, because she had resigned herself to a life mainly meant to support Spider’s ambition to work for no man but himself. Miss Radiance told the Young Girl when to clean and what to clean.

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