Taking Care of Moses by Barbara O'Connor

nerve.”
    â€œWhat you talking about?” Mrs. Gilley held the screen door open and motioned Miss Frieda inside.
    Randall raced over to the side of the house and crouched under the open window to listen. Jaybird and
T.J. joined him, crawling behind the shrubbery on their hands and knees. Randall motioned for them to keep quiet, but Althea was making so much noise with her clanging tin cans that Randall could catch only bits and pieces of what Miss Frieda was telling Mrs. Gilley.
    â€œ … them social workers from Spartanburg came down and …”
    â€œ … must think she don’t have to be licensed like everybody else …”
    â€œ … ought to take that child away from her …”
    Every now and then Mrs. Gilley would say, “Well, I never,” or “Don’t that just take the cake?”
    â€œI’m telling you, Lottie,” Miss Frieda said, “that woman thinks she don’t have to do things like the rest of us just ’cause she’s a preacher’s wife. She’s got them folks up in Spartanburg letting her rule the roost and making everybody think she’s got the keys to the Pearly Gates.”
    Mrs. Gilley muttered some indignant words of sympathy, and then Miss Frieda’s hollering came right out the window clear as anything.
    â€œMaybe them folks up there need to learn that the bucket always brings up what’s in the well,” she said.
    Randall looked at Jaybird and T.J. What did that mean, he wondered. Jaybird cupped his hand over his mouth to stifle a giggle.
    The boys had been so busy trying to hear Miss Frieda that they hadn’t noticed that Althea had disappeared.
Suddenly those tin cans clomped down the porch steps.
    â€œMiss Frieda said she’s going right to the top,” Althea called out.
    â€œWhat’s that mean?” Randall asked, brushing dirt off his knees.
    â€œIt means she’s calling the FBI to take Mrs. Jennings to prison for kidnapping Moses.” Althea hopped off her tin cans and began swinging them over her head by the strings. Randall had to duck as the cans whipped around.
    Jaybird and T.J. crawled out from behind the shrubbery.
    â€œYeah, right, Althea,” Jaybird said. “Like anybody believes you .”
    â€œAnd when the FBI finds Moses’ mama, she’s going to prison, too,” Althea said. “’Cause it’s against the law to leave your baby in a box.”
    â€œHow’re they gonna find his mama?” Randall asked.
    â€œMiss Frieda’s gonna keep lookin’, but she’s got to hurry up ’cause she’s gonna die.” The tin cans made a whirring sound as Althea swung them around and around over her head.
    Jaybird jumped up and grabbed for the strings, pulling the cans down with a clang. “What you talking about?” he said.

    Althea yanked the tin cans away from Jaybird and began to swing them back and forth, closer and closer to Jaybird with each swing.
    â€œMiss Frieda’s gonna find that baby’s mama if it kills her, and the way she’s been feeling lately, it’s liable to. And then Mrs. Jennings will get to keep that baby over Miss Frieda’s dead body.”
    Althea swung the cans harder. “ And ,” she said, pushing her chin up and glaring over at Randall, “she said Moses belongs with his own kind instead of over there with them highfalutin do-gooders at that church.” She stopped swinging the cans and pranced off toward the house. When she got to the porch steps, she stopped and said, “I heard her with my very own two ears.” Then she disappeared into the house, dragging the clanging cans along behind her.
    Jaybird and T.J. were laughing and carrying on, but Randall didn’t think what Althea said was so funny. Randall was feeling his worry get bigger and bigger. Everything was turning into a big, scary mess—and all he had to do was say, “I know who left the