Mercy Me by Margaret A. Graham Page A

remembered the couple upstairs. “You say that young couple fights all the time? Well, you can do something about that. Either you can ask the landlord to evict them or you can ask Jesus to show you how to help them. Maybe that’s the very reason the Lord put them upstairs there, so you could help them.”
    Beatrice wasn’t listening. “If I should get shot,” she said, “you will take care of my estate, won’t you, Esmeralda?”
    â€œOf course, I will, Beatrice, but you are not going to get shot. Tell the Lord how scared you are, and he’ll send a flock of angels to camp all around you.”
    â€œDo you really think he will?”
    â€œI know he will.”
    When I hung up, I thought I’d better put Beatrice on the prayer chain. All I had to do was call Thelma, tell her, and she would pass the request on until all the W.W.s got the word. I admit, I was worried about Beatrice. Christians get shot, the same as others. Look at what happened to Bud. Look at what’s happening to Christians all over the world being tortured and killed for Jesus.
    That whole day, I couldn’t get Beatrice off my mind for one minute. I wondered if maybe I ought not to goup there and see about her. On second thought, I figured I couldn’t really do anything and that it would only make her more nervous knowing I was so concerned about her. You can’t win with a nervous person no matter what you do. Still . . .
    Once the news spread through the prayer chain, every last one of the W.W.s called me. Those women get confused real easy, especially when word is passed from one to another of them. Some of them thought it was Beatrice that got robbed. By the time I straightened them out, answered their questions, and repeated the story over and over, I was wore out. “Get off the phone,” I would tell them. “Beatrice might be calling me.”
    But she didn’t.
    That night I tumbled and tossed and didn’t get a wink of sleep. So before daylight I just got up and made the coffee. The Psalms is supposed to comfort a body, so I read a few of them, but there was nothing that jumped out at me. When it got light, I walked down to the garden in my bathrobe, although I’m usually dressed by daylight.
    The garden was about burnt up, it was so dry. I couldn’t afford to water it enough; my bill was sky-high. I’d shoot just enough water on it to keep stuff alive, but that’s not the way to treat a garden.
    As I sat there looking at my poor, sorry garden, I thought about Elijah. I needed to go down and see him, but I didn’t want to leave the phone in case Beatrice called. I knew Elijah wouldn’t never have another mule, and I got to thinking maybe he could use a tiller. It wastoo soon to ask him, of course, hurt as he was, but I figured it wouldn’t do no harm for me to check the ads and take a look-see at yard sales. People buy them things, use them once or twice, and never roll them out again. Next time they clean out the garage, they have a sale, and you can get that tiller at a giveaway price.
    I walked back in the house, but I couldn’t get nothing done. I wasn’t hungry, so I went on the porch and fed the birds. Since there was no water in the birdbath, I filled it up before I went back inside.
    I was tired, and seeing as I was not going to get anything done, I picked up my Bible and sat down to read a while. I read three or four chapters, but it was no use; I couldn’t have told you one thing I read. I closed my eyes and just asked the Lord to forgive me and do whatever he would for Beatrice.
    Knowing I was expecting a call from Beatrice, the W.W.s left off calling me for one day, which has got to be a record. In a way, I wouldn’t have minded if one of them had called. There was nothing on TV and I was too lazy to cook. I was just rattling around in the house, so I picked up the phone and called Thelma to remind her to check on