'May the Lord be with you as you carry out your holy task.'
'They're the ones who'll cleanse the buildings,' whispered Poroth, his arm around his wife. He looked pleased, though Deborah's face was blank. 'They're robed in innocence, you see, and are fit for such holy work.'
'Oh, so that's the object,' said Freirs. 'Yes, I guess it makes sense.' Virgins, he said to himself, as, in silence, the Buckhalter girl began walking past the company toward the barn while the Lindt girl proceeded toward the house.
For all the awkwardness of it – the round self-conscious teen-aged shoulders and the determinedly stately pace, the silly white feathers and the corn leaves in their hair – it was a curiously solemn moment. He scanned the assembled crowd. Parents were nodding and murmuring silent prayers; Poroth was gazing at the two girls like a proud papa at graduation. Only one face made Freirs pause: that of Poroth's mother. For the first time that he could remember, the woman looked surprised and uneasy. Freirs followed her gaze. She was staring hard at the Lindt girl as the latter walked slowly toward the house, her girlish face grave, eyes directly before her, clutching the white feather as reverently as if it had been plucked from an angel wing.
'What's troubling your mother?' whispered Freirs.
'Sshh!' said Poroth, not looking at him. He did, however, turn to look at the woman, and, seeing her expression, his own face grew puzzled.
All this time the Lindt girl had been advancing slowly toward the house past the rows of assembled men and women. Suddenly Freirs saw her pause and, for the briefest moment, gaze wide-eyed with terror and misery at a white-faced young man who stood in the midst of the crowd. It was him once again, the one from the truck; Freirs had no doubt of it now. For an instant the young man returned the girl's gaze; then he looked guiltily away.
The eye contact between the two teenagers had been brief, and only someone who'd been watching for it could possibly have noticed. But it had lasted long enough for Freirs to see the look that passed between them, and he almost burst out laughing. Hah! he thought, she's not really a virgin! And the only ones who know it are her, the boy, and me! Scanning the crowd again, he saw the shock on the face of Sarr's mother. And maybe, he added, Mrs Poroth.
No one else had seen. Sarah Lindt continued moving toward the house, Eve Buckhalter toward the barn. At last the two disappeared into the buildings, the Lindt girl hesitating a moment before entering, and there was an audible sigh from the assembled Brethren. As if suddenly released from a spell, they broke ranks and milled around the yard while Freirs and Poroth looked on, the crowd eventually spreading over the lawn so that each person was left standing before a small clump of household objects.
'What's going on?' whispered Freirs.
Sarr, too, seemed more relaxed. 'Well, the girls are inside now. Sarah will go through every room of the house, from attic to cellar, blessing each room with a prayer, and Eve will do the same with the barn. Meanwhile, the others are going to bless our possessions out here. Deborah and I aren't allowed to participate.'
The blessing he'd spoken of had already begun, Freirs saw; Brethren with waving hands were making signs and passes in the air, murmuring strings of prayers like people at some ancient bazaar.
"This does my heart real good,' said Sarr, taking it all in.
Obviously size didn't matter. Freirs saw a little boy who looked all of seven standing solemnly before the grandfather clock, which dwarfed him, while hulking Rupert Lindt, his younger daughter in the house, stood mumbling a prayer over several lanterns and a rolled-up rug. Corah Geisel stood before a table piled high with jugs and jars and bowls; nearby stood her husband, blessing two of the implements from the barn, a broken plow and a rusted vehicle with wicked-looking prongs around the wheels. Brother Joram gravely blessed the pickup truck, whose cab, Sarr had said, still smelled of decay. Freirs wondered if the smell would disappear now.
Watching Geisel at his prayers, he realized that an item had been overlooked. He slipped into the outbuilding and emerged with Poroth's shiny little sickle, which had been lying on his night table. 'I wouldn't want anything to escape your blessing, Matthew!' he said, tossing the sickle on the ground beside the plow. The old man nodded distractedly and continued praying.
At last Eve Buckhalter appeared in the doorway of the barn. Sticking the white feather like a talisman into a chink in the wood by her head, she gazed around her, smiling. Moments later Sarah Lindt appeared and forced a smile too, though she looked somewhat drawn and pale. Pausing at the back door, she struggled for a moment and finally managed to fit the white feather into a crack in the wood. She descended the back steps to a host of smiling faces; the praying had stopped. The Cleansing was completed.
'Brothers, Sisters,' said Poroth solemnly, climbing onto the porch, 'I thank you all for the service you've performed and the kindness you've done me and Deborah. Now let us thank the Lord for allowing us all to be here together.'
He bowed his head; they all prayed silently for more than a minute. Freirs bowed his head, too, but only briefly; looking around, he saw that all other heads were bowed. Deborah was gazing at her feet, seemingly either deep in thought or not thinking at all. Sarr's eyes were shut tight, as if with profound concentration. Joram glared severely at his clasped hands, obviously with weighty matters on his mind. But Sarr's mother was staring intently at Deborah.
Moments later Joram raised his head. 'Amen,' he said.
There was a further easing of tension, a loosening of posture. A faint breeze had sprung up, tempering the force of the afternoon sun. Across the dome of sky a white half-moon hung just over the horizon like a smoke wisp. One by one, as if a film had been reversed, the Brethren picked up the objects on the lawn and carried them back inside. The bed and bureau were hauled up to the Poroths' bedroom; the truck was rolled into the barn.
Freirs checked his watch. It was just after one p.m. Deborah was standing silently on the porch. Sarr was supervising the moving in, pointing out where objects were to go, but was obviously not worrying much about exactness. "Tis fine, 'tis fine,' he was saying, as the women replaced the dishes in the cupboards. 'Deborah and I can arrange it all later.'
'Are you going to have to feed all these people?' asked Freirs, during a moment when the other was not distracted.
'No, thank the Lord.' Poroth smiled. 'We Brethren know how to control our hungers.'
'It's clear you do,' said Freirs, but he was thinking of the Lindt girl.
People, as he spoke, were beginning to leave: making their goodbyes, blessing one another, and drifting off up the road in little groups or, more frequently, piling into cars parked near the front of the house. On their way out, many of the Brethren stopped to thank Poroth and wish him well.
'I think the Cleansing went splendidly,' said Abram Sturtevant, a dutiful brother, 'and I know Joram thinks so as well.' In fact, the later and his family had been among the first to depart.
'I just hope it proves a help to us all,' said Amos Reid. And old Jacob van Meer stopped to offer wishes from himself and his wife that Deborah, who had long since retired to her room, would make a speedy recovery.
Moments later Freirs saw Poroth talking in urgent whispers to his mother. The farmer looked annoyed. 'I will,' he kept saying. 'Don't worry, I'll be there.' At last the woman left, but Freirs could see she was dissatisfied and troubled.
The Geisels appeared reluctant to go. 'Please,' said Poroth, 'stay and share our Sunday meal. We'd like you to, Deborah and I.'
Corah Geisel elected to stay, but it was with the express purpose of caring for Deborah. 'I'd like to stay too, Sarr,' said Matthew. 'I know your woman's in no fit way to cook or fix the house after today. But I'm sorry, I have to go. There's been a mess of trouble at our place too – in fact, we may call for a Cleansing of our own, if we can get the Brethren together before next Sunday. Our hens and cows haven't been right all week.'