Pay the Piper by Joan Williams Page A

me is just outdated, Mister Tate,” Sam said.
    â€œLook over there,” said Allie. “Loma’s out on her store porch trying to see what we’re doing. She knows if we’re turning cream you won’t be buying Smoky his popsicle today. That dog’s going to end up with worms and bad teeth both.”
    â€œSmoky wants his popsicle, don’t you, boy.” Tate rubbed the dog’s ears.
    â€œLoma going to be giving her produce away if that price war don’t end,” Agnew’s wife said.
    â€œSmall storekeepers are just as obsolete as the small farmer,” Sam said. A boy in shorts emerged through hedges holding a small melon. “Boy, what you got?” Sam said to his grandchild.
    â€œFound a wallermelon.”
    â€œYou ain’t found nothing. That’s Mister Tate’s. Carry it on back where you got it.”
    â€œWe don’t need that melon,” Tate said. “Tony, carry it on home.”
    â€œSam, I’ve got cream dished up for Fanny, too,” Allie said. “Get home before it melts.”
    Soon the party broke up. People went away in pickups or cars, and a few ambled off down the roadside.
    Mister Zack accepted a ride from Laurel and asked to be let out at his garden. “Going to have a beer?” she said.
    â€œYou want one?” He winked.
    â€œNo, thanks.” She had not thought about a drink since the night they arrived.
    â€œYou and the boy always looking around. Come on out the New Africa Road to my tent revival.”
    Tent, New Africa ; the words held magic. She and Rick looked at one another. “We’ll be there,” Laurel said.
    At night, the open-sided tent appeared to be a carousel from a distance; the interior was aglow from a butane light and people swarmed about. A little of that day’s broad blue light was still in the sky, and, using it, she parked along the road’s shoulder, among a conglomeration of vehicles. Already a wailing kind of singing was going on, and music from strummed instruments. In the short time it took her to park, the early night sky became less silver. In the silence following the cessation of harsh sounds within the tent, they heard the mellifluous lowing of cows watching from behind nearby barbed wire, their nighttime peacefulness shattered. She and Rick laughed. As they approached the tent, Mister Zack lounged outside, talking to another man, and turned, grinning in delight, almost as if he was waiting, waiting there each night to see if she was coming. Laurel resented this; he seemed to feel some claim to her. But maybe this feeling was only obstinacy in her personality: if wanted, she declined; if not wanted, she sought. Something of that in most people, she thought. He introduced them to the preacher, Brother Roundtree, whose diamond stickpin caught the last silvery light and glittered in the early dark. When Mister Zack introduced them as his visitors from up the country—from New York—she decided maybe his attitude was pride, not ownership. She squinted to read a penciled sign tacked to a slit of board outside the tent: F AITH H EALING . A LL I NVIDED .
    â€œWhat kind of religion is this?” she said.
    â€œIt’s a know-so religion.” Brother Roundtree spoke as loudly as if he were already preaching. “Everything about it, the people know is so.”
    â€œPray till you are saved.” Mister Zack grinned.
    They went on into the stifling heat inside the tent. She and Rick found two folding chairs together in one row. People put out hands kindly to help them crawl past their knees. “Thanks,” they each kept saying. They were recognized as strangers.
    A simple wooden platform stood at one end of the tent. There musicians sat playing heartily, their shirts already dampened in dark soaked places. Brother Roundtree came inside and leaped to the platform, long-legged and stiff. He rattled a tambourine above his head. In front of Laurel a