Read Online The Homecoming of Samuel Lake by Jenny Wingfield - Free Book Online

him and dancing up and down.
    “Hey, hey, wait a minute,” Samuel protested, but he liked the reception.
    “Are we moving?”
    “We are.”
    “Good. Where to?”
    “We’ll talk about that later. Where’s your mama?”
    Just as he asked, Willadee appeared on the porch and waved, and the two of them started walking toward each other. Bernice was sitting in the swing, sort of off to one side, almost hidden by the morning glories that meandered across the porch rail. She watched while Samuel and Willadee moved into each other’s arms. Noble and Bienville, who had been off in the pasture, were charging into the yard, bearing down on their parents—hugging them both at once, because those two were still standing welded together. One thing about Samuel and Willadee. They sure said hello like they meant it.
    Eventually, Samuel turned loose of his wife and picked Bienville up and shook him like a rag, and made noises like an animal roaring, and set him down again. He greeted Noble by boxing him on the shoulder. Noble boxed back. Samuel grabbed his shoulder, as if that had hurt more than he expected, and while Noble was wondering whether he’d hit his old man too hard, Samuel cuffed him another good one.
    All this, Bernice observed from her perch in the swing. Samuel and Willadee and the kids were starting up the steps, all jabbering at once. When they got even with Bernice, she stood up, sleek and graceful as a cat. She was wearing a soft little cream-colored dress that clung to her curves when she moved. And when she didn’t. Everybody stopped stock-still. Bernice had that effect on people.
    “How you doing, Bernice?” Samuel asked.
    Bernice said, “Fine as wine.” Smooth and warm, like butter melting.
    Willadee rolled her eyes up in her head and drawled, real slow, “I’ve got something on the stove, Sam. You just come on in whenever you’re ready.” And she went inside the house. Talk about trust.
    “Where’s that husband of yours?” Samuel asked Bernice. She motioned toward the backyard. A vague gesture. Samuel glanced in the direction she had pointed and nodded, as though indicating approval of Toy’s presence out there, somewhere. “I hear he’s been keeping things going around here the last few days.”
    “Some things, yes.”
    Samuel’s eyes played over Bernice’s face. No fondness, no malice. Just a look that said he knew where she was heading, and he wasn’t going along with her. He looked at her like that until she looked away. Then he opened the screen door and waved his children inside.
    “C’mon, c’mon, your mama’s waitin’.”
    “Sure am, preacher boy,” Willadee called out. Drawling again.

    All during supper, Swan and Noble and Bienville kept after Samuel to tell them where they were moving, but he kept putting them off. This wasn’t like their father. Usually, he couldn’t wait to give them the news, and to embellish it with every single positive comment he’d been able to drag out of anybody who’d ever seen the place. As a rule, the new town was so small that it wasn’t easy finding people who’d been there, even just passing through—except for the pastor who was leaving, and he was apt to be more full of warnings than full of compliments. But Samuel always managed to find something good to tell about it. The people were the salt of the earth, or the countryside was a sight for sore eyes, or the church building was a relic and there were rumors that it had secret passageways, or the parsonage yard had a good spot for a playhouse, or something.
    Tonight, though, was different, and everybody noticed. Even Calla and Toy and Bernice had questioning looks on their faces.
    “Anything wrong, Sam?” Willadee asked.
    “I was planning to tell you about it first, and then break it to everybody else.”
    Willadee passed the speckled limas across to Toy. “They must be sending us to bayou country. We’ve been everywhere else.”
    Samuel said, “They’re not sending us to