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them right now,
decided Elizabeth, watching the small congregation on that Saturday night. The cacophony of prayer had died down and the worshippers had resumed their seats, but three women still stood, arms uplifted, eyes closed, and tears streaming down their shining faces. Aunt Belvy alone continued to speak, but the incomprehensible syllables of the gift of tongues suddenly segued into recognizable language.
    “Seek and ye shall find, yea, there's one here who seeks an answer.” Like a stately ship, Aunt Belvy made her way through the parting throng of worshippers to the back of the church where Elizabeth and Miss Birdie sat. Birdie was gazing openmouthed, her eyes fixed with rapt attention on the prophetess.
    Aunt Belvy was a big woman, tall and powerfully built. In spite of her age
—She must be in her eighties,
thought Elizabeth—she stood straight and moved gracefully. Her flowing white hair, now completely freed from its knot, was bone straight and fell to the waist of her ankle-length print dress. She had high cheekbones and dark eyes, and Elizabeth found herself wondering if there was Cherokee blood in this alarming but undeniably impressive personage.
    “Lift up yore eyes unto the hills from whence cometh yore help.” Birdie rose unbidden, as if lifted by invisible strings, and stood looking up at her old friend. Aunt Belvy rested her two big hands on the smaller woman's shoulders and continued. “In the dens and in the rocks of the mountains they try to hide. But the righteous will seek them out and the truth will be known.” Aunt Belvy's eyes were closed now and her head was thrown back. “The sanctuary in the wilderness is red with blood, and the wicked rejoice. But a day will come when the veil is lifted and the truth is shown.” The sibyl's eyelids fluttered open, revealing only white. She turned her head and Elizabeth felt the sightless eyes stare down at her. A feeling akin to panic rose in her as the old woman declaimed, “Woe to the sinner for she shall ride with death. Death and corruption wait within her gate and her child shall weep in the wilderness.”
    Aunt Belvy raised her hand and pointed heavenward, then swayed and at once two men were there to catch her when she fell. Elizabeth felt stunned
—Was she talking to me?—
and glanced at Miss Birdie to see what her reaction had been. Birdie's head was bowed; she was smiling peacefully as her lips moved in prayer.
    A tall man in black trousers and a pale blue long-sleeved shirt made his way to the front of the room. He was broad shouldered and slim hipped, with a wide, unexpectedly sensual smile that flashed white against the rich tan of his face. His dark, hooded eyes swept the little congregation and there was an expectant hush as people settled back on their benches. It seemed to Elizabeth that his gaze rested on her briefly, summed her up, found her wanting, and moved on. She noticed two young women sitting together in a pew near the front nudging each other and blushing as the man at the pulpit nodded and smiled at them.
He'd be good-looking if he didn't use so much hair goop,
Elizabeth thought.
A preacher with bedroom eyes, how odd.
    “Thank you, Lord, for layin' your hand on Sister Belvy.” The tall man held up a Bible with an odd mottled binding. “It's in His Word, ain't it?”
    “Preach it, brother!” called out a man on the front row.
    “First Corinthians, book twelve, verses eight through ten tells us ‘For to one is given by the Spirit the word of wisdom; to another the word of knowledge by the same Spirit; to another the working of miracles; to another prophecy; to another discerning of spirits; to another divers kinds of tongues; to another the interpretation of tongues.'” He was speaking from memory, the Bible still unopened. “‘They shall speak with new tongues,' it says in Mark.”
    The sermon, if it was a sermon, continued. Aunt Belvy, now recovered, sat up straight near the front, fanning herself vigorously