Marilynne Robinson - Lila

Lila went along with him to Boughton’s house to drink iced tea on the porch and listen while they talked, and one afternoon as she listened she understood that Doll was not, as Boughton said, among the elect. Like most people who lived on earth, she did not believe and was not baptized. None of Doane’s people were among the elect, so far as she knew, except herself, if she could believe it. Maybe their lives had gone on, and some revival preacher somewhere had taken them in hand. But Doll’s life ended, and no one had rested his hand on her head, and no one had said a word to her about the waters of regeneration. If there was a stone on her grave, there was no name on it. A real name might have made her easier to find, or have added another crime to child-stealing, so she never even told Lila what it was. When Doll gave Lila her knife she said, “It’s only for scaring folks with. If you go cutting somebody it’s going to be trouble no matter what the story is.” So Doll might have been hiding already when Lila first knew her, sleeping in that miserable, crowded old cabin, coming and going in the night the way she did. Calling herself by that one name. Maybe she died with dark sins on her soul. Lila had heard the preachers talk that way. Or maybe the other crime was just some desperate kindness, like stealing a sickly child. And maybe it made no difference to the Lord, one way or the other.

The old man said, “We’ll be going home now. It must be close to suppertime.” He could tell when she was bothered, and Boughton could tell when he was concerned about her, so they said good evening without any of the usual joking and lingering and clearing away of glasses and spoons. He walked along beside her, silent in the way he was when he could not be sure what to say, or to ask. He opened the door for her. That house, so plain and orderly and safe. He said, “Boughton likes to talk about the thornier side of things. You don’t want to take him too seriously.”

She went into the parlor and sat down, and rested her head in her hands. He stood near her chair, keeping a respectful, patient distance as he always did when he hoped she would tell him what she had on her mind.

She said, “I just never thought about all them other people. Practically everybody I ever knew. Some of them been kind to me.”

He said, “I’m so glad they were kind to you. I’m very grateful for that.”

“But they never gave one thought to the Sabbath. You never heard such cussing and coveting. They stole sometimes, if they had to. I knew a woman who maybe killed somebody with a knife. She’s dead now, so I guess there’s nothing to be done about that.” She said, “Them women in St. Louis, I believe adultery is about the only thing they was ever up to. And there was no one to help them with any of it. Their sins. So I guess they’re all just lost? What happens to you if you’re lost?”

He said, “Lila, you always do ask the hardest questions.” There was a gentleness in his voice that made her think he wouldn’t tell her painful things in words that really let her understand them.

“I knew a man once who said churches tell folks things like that to scare them.”

“Some do.”

“So they’ll give them their money.”

He nodded. “That happens.”

“You never say nothing about any of it.”

“I don’t really know what to say about it.”

“But it’s true, then?”

“There are other things I believe in. God loves the world. God is gracious. I can’t reconcile, you know, hell and the rest of it to things I do believe. And feel I understand, in a way. So I don’t talk about it very much.”

“That’s the only time I ever heard you say that word, ‘hell.’”

He shrugged. “Interesting.”

“Does Jesus talk about it?”

“Yes, He does. Not a lot. Still.”

She said, “I don’t know. For a preacher you ain’t much at explaining things.”

“I’m sorry about that. Sorry if you’re disappointed. Again. But if I tried to explain I wouldn’t believe what I was saying to you. That’s lying, isn’t it? I’m probably more afraid of that than of anything else. I really don’t think preachers ought to lie. Especially about religion.”

She said, “I just wish I’d known a little more about what I was getting into. My own fault. I should’ve gone to them damn classes.”

He sat down on the sofa. “My fault, too. My fault entirely.” They were quiet for a while.

Then she said, “I know you didn’t mean no harm.”

He shook his head. “I didn’t do you any harm. I’m sure of that.”

Well, he didn’t know Doll and the rest of them. The loneliness that settled over her at the thought that they were lost to her. He buried his face in his hands, praying most likely. So she went into the kitchen and made sandwiches.

He’d wanted to get her baptized before she could take off and lose herself in some rough life and then be lost in whatever came after it. That was kind of him. Dipping his hand in that bucket, river water running up his sleeve while he blessed her with it. Bees buzzing, her catfish flopping in the weeds. He surely did look like he meant every word he said. The heavens torn asunder. A dove descending. There was no sign of all that except the look on his face and the touch of his hand. It wasn’t often in her life that anyone had been so set on doing her good as he was, after she had said she wouldn’t marry him, too. A preacher doing what preachers do to give you what safety they can. But it might not be a kind of safety you want, once you think about it. For a while Lila had liked the thought of resurrection because it would mean seeing Doll. The old man might have his wife and his child. She would have Doll, so that would be all right. There would be such crowds of people, but she would look for her until she found her if it took a hundred years. She understood the word “resurrection” to mean just what she wanted it to mean. The idea was precious to her. Doll just the way she used to be, but with death behind her, and all the peace that would come with that. A few blisters ain’t going to kill you. A little dust ain’t going to kill you. Nothing going to kill you ever again! Hanging couldn’t kill you! Doll would laugh at the surprise of it all, because she’d probably never heard of such a thing.

But Boughton mentioned a Last Judgment. Souls just out of their graves having to answer for lives most of them never understood in the first place. Such hard lives. And there Doll would be, whatever guilt or shame she had hidden from all her life laid out for her, no bit of it forgotten. Or forgiven. But that wasn’t possible. The old man always said that God is kind. Doll was so tough and weary, with that stain on her face, and the patient way she had when people looked at her — I never see it, but I know what you see. Whatever it was she did with that knife, who could want to cause her more sorrow? Lila hated the thought of resurrection as much as she had ever hated anything. Better Doll should stay in her grave, if she had one. Better nothing the old men said should be true at all.

He came into the kitchen and sat down at the table. “I must seem like a fool to you,” he said. “You must think I’ve never given a moment’s thought to anything.”

She was always surprised when he spoke to her that way, answering to her, when she had never read more than a child’s schoolbook. “I’d never think you was a fool,” she said.

“Well,” he said, “maybe. But I do want to say one more thing. Thinking about hell doesn’t help me live the way I should. I believe this is true for most people. And thinking that other people might go to hell just feels evil to me, like a very grave sin. So I don’t want to encourage anyone else to think that way. Even if you don’t assume that you can know in individual cases, it’s still a problem to think about people in general as if they might go to hell. You can’t see the world the way you ought to if you let yourself do that. Any judgment of the kind is a great presumption. And presumption is a very grave sin. I believe this is sound theology, in its way.”