The Drawbridge

“The black woman who sits alone in the back pew of the church,” Jerome Shipley spoke in a faltering, uncertain tone. The family was sitting at the breakfast table Saturday morning. The boy’s mother teased a maple sausage from the frying pan and deposited it on Jerome’s plate.

“Yes,” Mrs. Shipley replied. “She always comes by herself and leaves shortly after receiving communion without speaking to any parishioners.” “The woman’s probably Haitian.”

“How would you know that?”

“The thick French accent.” She returned to the stove where a cheddar omelette was sizzling on a bed of butter. “I heard her talking to the priest one time after Mass.”

“She never smiles… never looks anyone full in the face and wears that grumpy expression.” Jerome thought of the woman's desultory expression as her ‘drawbridge face’. He imagined a Medieval castle fashioned from granite blocks surrounded by a crocodile-infested moat and weighty drawbridge. Enemies could lay siege, but none would ever breach that impassable fortress.

“You miss the obvious,” Jerome’s mother interrupted his solitary musings. “When we passed the black woman in the aisle the other day, she was fingering her rosary beads. Her lips were moving in deep devotion, petitioning God in silent prayer.”

“That may very well be the case,” Jerome’s father cautioned, “but she’s still an enigma.”

“There’s a Baptist Holy Roller Church diagonally across the street from Our Lady of Mount Carmel,” Jerome spit the words out in a challenging tone. “Why doesn’t she go with her own kind, where she might feel more comfortable?”

Mrs. Shipley flashed her son a somber, self-assured smile. “Because she’s not of their spiritual persuasion; she’s Catholic, which is to say, one of us.”

* * * * *

After breakfast, Jerome wandered out into the back yard, where his father was raking up a scattering of pine cones that littered the lawn from the previous winter. Mr. Shipley held a pile of twigs and pine cones balanced on the upturned rake. “If you could hold that bag open while I get rid of this trash.”

“About that black woman,” he said in a neutral tone, sifting the debris into the bag, "Haitians tend to get Christianity all mixed up with heathen beliefs brought from Africa.” “When the French colonists arrived in the nineteenth century, they included Capuchin and Dominican missionaries intent on converting the natives to Christianity. But their plans went badly awry. The Haitians were only too happy to embrace Catholicism along with a hodge podge of primitive beliefs and sacrificial practices,. even voodoo.”

Jerome tamped the bag on the soft earth and watched as the debris settled to the bottom. “And how do you know this?”

“Teaching history at the community college, it’s my responsibility to understand such things.”

Jerome had seen two older horror films, Creepshow and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, where malevolent characters stuck pins in tiny dolls to cause pain and suffering. “Voodoo… isn’t that where they stick pins-”

“No need to belabor the issue,” Mr. Shipley brought his son up short. “Just understand that their ways and beliefs don’t necessarily mirror ours even though we attend the same church.” “Also,” his father added as a belated afterthought, “the black woman’s probably a green-card alien.”

“What’s that mean?”

“She’s not an American citizen and has to behave in a proper manner.”

“Oh, I see.” Actually, Jerome saw nothing at all. One minute the woman was a member of the local church, fingering her rosary beads and offering Hail Mary’s up to an unseen God. The next minute she didn’t belong here.

* * * * *

In the early summer Jerome was hired to bus tables at the local diner. The second day on the job he approached Dottie Evans, a middle-aged waitress with blond hair. “That woman taking the order at the table by the window… What's her name?”
“That’s Esme.” The waitress threaded a pencil in the thick curls behind her left ear. “You know her?”

“She attends our church.”

“You don’t say!” The woman leaned closer. “She’s pleasant enough but rather quiet… don’t say much.” Dottie reached out and thumped Jerome rather forcefully on the chest. “You see that older lady with the three-pronged cane over by the pastry display?”

Jerome glanced to his left, where an elderly lady was devouring a breakfast special as though it was her last meal on planet earth. She wore far too much rouge and a garish, fire engine red lipstick. A slight tremor was visible as she raised a fork laden with scrambled eggs to her mouth. “That’s Mrs. Goldberg,” Dottie continued, lowering her voice several decibels. “She’s one of Esme’s regular customers. Watch what happens once the Jewish woman finishes her meal.”

“I don’t follow you.”

“Keep an eye on her,” the waitress repeated cryptically, “then come back and tell me what happens.” Without further explanation, Dottie cracked a mischievous smirk and wandered off.

Ten minutes later Jerome located Dottie in the kitchen arranging a neat row of plates on the side of her arm. “So what did you learn?”

“Mrs. Goldberg finished her meal.”

“Yes, then what?”

“She waved goodbye to Esme.”

“Anything else?”

“With the help of the three-pronged cane with the gold knob she limped out the door without paying or even leaving a small tip.”

“And?”

“Esme went about her business as though nothing unusual had happened.”

As Dottie explained it, Mrs. Goldberg was a fairly wealthy woman who had run through her entire life savings living at the lavish facility. Once the money was gone, management declared her indigent and transferred her to a tiny, one-bedroom Medicare apartment, where the woman could live out the remainder of her life. Mrs. Goldberg groped her away across the street twice a week to spoil herself as in the more resplendent past. Each time, Esme picked up the tab, putting the unpaid money in the till on behalf of the wayward customer.

“The manager caught Esme putting her own money in the till one day,” Dottie continued, “and told her not to do that anymore. In the future the diner would pick up the tab for the recalcitrant customer. Then he gave the Haitian a modest raise.”

When Jerome returned to the dining area, he found the chocolaty-skinned waitress resting over by the water cooler with the same impassive, unflappable expression. The drawbridge - yes, that was the perfect analogy!

Noticing the boy, she quickly approached. “Jerome,” she said in a French-inflected, singsong tone, “the milk dispenser ran dry. Would you please replace the empty jug with a new one.”

“Yes, I’ll do that right away,” Jeome replied meekly and ran off to the refrigerated storage bin.

* * * * *

Three months passed. When school resumed, Jerome continued working at the diner weekends and a handful of evening hours. One night in late November as the diner was getting ready to close, his cell phone tweeted shrilly. “The car won’t start… battery's dead.” His mother was on the other end of the line. “You’ll need to find a ride home.”

A flash of lightning lit up the sky followed by a deafening peal of thunder. Moments later a drenching shower pummeled the street, sending shoppers scurrying for shelter. “What if -”

“Worse case scenario,” she interrupted, anticipating his train of thought, “take a taxi.” The phone went dead.

Jerome told Dottie his dilemma. “Unfortunately, I’m travelling in the opposite direction.”

“I’ll give the boy a lift.” Esme, who had been putting on her coat near the lunch counter, stepped forward. “I can drive him home.”

Five minutes later the twosome were in a metallic blue honda heading south. The worst of the storm had passed, though the sky was still spitting frigid rain. Esme said nothing. Her features wrapped in an insular privacy. “You’re Haitian?” Jerome asked in a faltering voice.

“Yes, from Port au Prince.”

“My father says that your people tend to mix Catholic religion with African beliefs. I suppose you believe in Voodoo.”

Esme blinked several times and her features dissolved in a limpid smile. “We Haitians have a saying…pou sevi lwa yo se pou'w bon katolik."

“What does that mean?”

“You have to be a good Catholic to serve the spirits".

“Voodoo teaches the existence of only one God, the divine creator, Bondye. There are other spirits similar to angels or your Catholic saints.” Esme pulled up at a traffic light. The rain having ceased altgether, the sky was clear. “Most Haitians have no interest in sorcery or black magic. We pay no mind to such silliness. We don’t even have a devil. There is no evil Satan in our Voodoo culture, only Bondye, the benevolent God.” Esme began to chuckle softly as though at some private joke. “Sticking pins in tiny dolls to cause pain or suffering… that’s Hollywood rubbish intended to scare people half to death and sell movie tickets.”

As they were pulling up in front of Jerome’s house, the boy could see his mother hovering by the picture window staring out into the darkness. Cracking the passenger side door open, he felt a warm hand reach out and grab his forearm. “Remember,” Esme spoke in her signature melodic voice, “Pou sevi lwa yo se pou'w bon katolik.”

“You must be a good Catholic to serve the spirits,” Jerome replied.

Esme lowered the drawbridge just far enough to elicit a close-lipped grin. "When do you work again?”


“This Saturday I’m doing the afternoon shift.”

“Then I will see you in a few days.”

“And the following morning at Sunday Mass.”

“Yes, of course. That goes without saying.”