‘I got a son

　　‘I got a son,’ he said at last, ‘and the Lord’s going to rise him up. I know—the Lord haspromised—His word is true.’
　　And then she laughed. ‘That son,’ she said, ‘that Roy. You going to weep for many aeternity before you see him crying in front of the altar like Johnny was crying to-night.’
　　‘God sees the heart,’ he repeated, ‘He sees the heart.’
　　‘Well, He ought to see it,’ she cried, ‘He made it! But don’t nobody else se it, not evenyour own self! Let God see it—He sees it all right, and He don’t say nothing.’
　　‘He speaks,’ he said, ‘He speaks. All you got to do is listen.’
　　‘I been listening many a night-time long,’ said Florence, then, ‘and He ain’t never spoke tome.’
　　‘He ain’t never spoke,’ said Gabriel, ‘because you ain’t never wanted to hear. You justwanted Him to tell you your way was right. And that ain’t no way to wait on God.’
　　‘Then tell me,’ Said Florence, ‘what He done said to you—that you didn’t want to hear?’
　　And there was silence again. Now they both watched John and Elisha.
　　‘I going to tell you something, Gabriel,’ she said. ‘I know you thinking at the bottom ofyour heart that if you make her, her and her bastard boy, pay enough for her sin, your son won’thave to pay for yours. But I ain’t going to let you do that. You done made enough folks pay for sin,it’s time you started paying.’
　　‘What you think,’ he asked, ‘you going to be able to do—against me?’
　　‘Maybe,’ she said, ‘I ain’t long for this world, but I got this letter, and I’m sure going togive it to Elizabeth before I go, and if she don’t want it, I’m going to find some way—some way, Idon’t know how—to rise up and tell it, tell everybody, about the blood the Lord’s anointed id goton his hands.’
　　‘I done told you,’ he said, ‘that’s all done and finished; the Lord done give me a sign tomake me know I been forgiven. What good you think it’s going to do to start talking about itnow?’
　　‘It’ll make Elizabeth to know,’ she said, ‘that she ain’t the only sinner … in your holyhouse. And little Johnny, there—he’ll know he ain’t the only bastard.’
　　 Then he turned again, and looked at her with hatred in his eyes.
　　‘You ain’t never changed,’ he said. ‘You still waiting to see my downfall. You just aswicked now as you was when you was young.’
　　She put the letter in her bag again.
　　‘No,’ she said, ‘I ain’t changed. You ain’t changed neither. You still promising the Lordyou going to do better—and you think whatever you done already, whatever you doing right at thatminute, don’t count. Of all the men I ever knew, you’s the man who ought to be hoping the Bible’sall a lie—’cause if that trumpet ever sounds, you going to spend eternity talking.’
　　They had reached her corner. She stopped, and he stopped with her, and she stared into hishaggard, burning face.
　　‘I got to take my underground,’ she said. ‘You got anything you want to say to me?’
　　‘I been living a long time,’ he said, ‘and I ain’t never seen nothing but evil overtake theenemies of the Lord. You think you going to use that letter to hurt me—but the Lord ain’t going tolet it come to pass. You going to be cut down.’