The Visitor by Frederick Foote

The Visitor by Frederick Foote

The evening shadows grow longer; the early night birds announce their arrival, and the relentless heat and oppressive humidity lessen their grip on the village of Goodwill, Alabama.

Esther Livingston, her vision impaired by cataracts, her walking slowed by arthritis in both knees and her left hip, continues her eight-block trek from the Piggly Wiggly to her modest home on Broad Street. At every fifth or sixth step, she stops to massage her right knee. She addresses the complaining joint in a firm but caring manner. “Oh, I know you have provided sixty-eight years of exemplary service.” She feels the angry heat from her tender knee. “But we’re all in this together, and we need to get this wagon home with our food for the week. Remember, Dr. Sang said exercise is the best medicine for what ails us.”

The American Flyer wagon had belonged to her son, Charlie. Three months ago, when her cataracts became so severe that they prevented her from driving, the wagon was promoted from toy to essential tool.

Three steps later, she stops to massage her right hand. “Oh, you’re truly my right hand. Don’t desert me now. Please, God, don’t let this be arthritis too.”

The stranger approaches her from the rear, as silent as the evening shadows. She’s unaware of his presence until she feels his warm hand on her right wrist. It’s a calming touch. Esther isn’t frightened at all. She turns and looks up at the face of a tall, thin-faced man, Italian or Spanish. He tips his wide-brimmed hat. His eyes are difficult to see, but it’s clear he’s a stranger to these parts. He pulls the wagon. He walks with her at her halting pace in total and comfortable silence.

The thin man carries her bags into her kitchen. As Esther sits, rests, and recovers, the stranger follows her directions in putting away the groceries, folding and storing the grocery bags, and returning the wagon to the garage.

Esther has never allowed any man, since her husband died nine years ago, to have this level of access to her home that she freely gives to this silent stranger. She starts to rise and get her purse to tip the Good Samaritan, but the agony in her right knee leaves her cringing in pain, and she falls back into her kitchen chair.

The stranger kneels in front of her and places warm hands on both knees. She feels relief at the first touch. He slowly massages her knees. The relief from the pain brings tears to her eyes, prayers of thanksgiving to her lips, and the fevered hope that she’s not dreaming.

“Thank you, Jesus! Oh, my God. I don’t remember what it was like to be pain-free. Thank you, Jesus. Hallelujah! Praise his name. Amen.”

The glorious hands are halfway up her thighs before she’s aware of their invasion. She pulls her dress back to confirm what she feels.  The healing hands are moving into her sacred place. She looks into his eyes and starts to protest. He gives a hint of a smile. Her protest dies on her lips.

She gasps and closes her eyes as his magic fingers invite themselves into her vagina. She explodes, soaks her panties, and wets her chair cushions. She’s lifted to some new reality sweeter than heaven and hotter than hell.

Her next memories are of her straddling him on that same chair, riding his penis and screaming like a heathen. She falls asleep on his sturdy post, awakens, and works herself into a frenzy, sleeps, and repeats the cycle too many times to count.

The next day, around noon, she stirs from her bed, stiff and sore with a new assortment of aches and pains between her legs. She sits up in bed, swings her legs out of bed, and stands. Esther’s frozen in place, unable to comprehend the lack of pain in her joints and the range of motion and flexibility of her legs, hips, and back. She sinks back into the bed, returns to her sleeping position, and rises again, again, and again.

& & &

Martian McMartin looks out his window in confusion. Some woman wearing his neighbor’s dress practically dances down Esther Livingston’s front steps and into her garage.

A few minutes later, the impersonator drives Esther’s fifteen-year-old Camry out onto and west on Broad Street.

Martin calls Esther repeatedly, but there’s no answer to his phone calls or his pounding on her front door. 

The only reason he doesn’t call the cops is that the woman looked so much like his disabled neighbor. McMartin believes it might well be a close relative of Esther’s.

Martin camps on his front porch, waiting to confront the woman driving Esther’s car

& & &

Betty Jane Madison does a double-take as she sees Esther Livingston step out of her old car, moving quickly and confidently, standing straight as a soldier. Esther recognizes her postwoman and waves as she strides, with newfound confidence, toward the ATM next to the post office.

What the hell happened to her? Yesterday, when I delivered her mail, she was using her walker. Shit, it must be the heat. I’m seeing things, hallucinating. 

Betty Jane moves toward her own car, away from her world of work, and on to the world of domestic strife. God blessed her with two daughters just as she prayed for and had lived to regret. Boys would have been so much easier. Now, she must deal with a thirteen-year-old and a sixteen-year-old. She remembers her mother repeatedly telling her that raising her three brothers was a walk in the park compared to raising her only daughter. She hates to admit her mother was right on that one.

Betty Jane’s nearing her house on County Lane just outside the Village limits when she sees Cleo, her youngest, standing in the middle of the road next to a tall, light-skinned black man. The man has a three-foot-long tree limb in his hand and is facing a large, snarling, brown dog. The dog jerks forward, stiff-legged, growling at the man and her daughter as it advances.

The worried mother drives closer to the dog, honking her horn to distract the animal. At first, it seems as if the dog doesn’t hear the horn, but as she creeps closer, the dog suddenly turns and leaps on the hood of her car, snarling and growling at her and drooling on her windshield. It scares the shit out of her. And just as quickly, the beast is off the car and racing into the woods.

Betty Jane drives quickly toward her daughter and the stranger as they race to the car. The two runners are opening the rear door as the dog reappears. The stranger shoves Cleo into the back seat, turns, and kicks at the charging canine.

Betty Jane lays on the horn. The dog stops, looks stunned and disoriented by the noise. The stranger leaps into the car next to Cleo and slams the door.

& & &

“Matthew, the quiet Creole from New Orleans, who rescued Cleo, stays for a remarkably cordial and peaceful meal. Afterward, he sits with Betty Jane on the back porch. He spends three enchanted nights in her bed.

On the fourth morning, Matthew’s note says: “Thank you all. I will not forget you.”

& & &

The man called Matthew claims to be Luke from Atlanta when he spends two nights with Emily and Edna Hatch, fifty-year-old twin, spinster, schoolteachers.

He left them asthma-free for the first time in their lives and sated with memories for a lifetime.

& & &

The same tall, thin man answers to Paul when he spends a night in Hilda White’s various orifices. Hilda entertains Paul in an abandoned barn less than a mile from the Madisons’ house.  Hilda, a fifteen-year-old runaway, Black, heroin addict, wakes fulfilled and free of addiction and acme.

& & &

Elmer Scott, aged eleven, finds the bodies at the Willow Creek swimming hole on the seventh day of the stranger’s visit. Black, Billy Rodgers, and white, Warren Smith, both eight years old and lifelong friends, are lying on their backs with arms crossed over their chest and eyes closed – at rest, at peace.

The cause of death is never determined.

The Village is the epicenter of shock waves that roll through Dallas County, the state of Alabama, the South, and the nation.

The Dallas County Sheriff’s Office immediately focuses on the mysterious stranger with many names.

With assistance from the federal, state, and local governments, their combined efforts are unable to locate or even find a trace of the stranger who spent the night with Esther.##

Unable to locate their chief suspect, local law enforcement can locate, interview, serve search warrants on, and attempt to intimidate the women who gave their elusive suspect shelter and comfort. In the case of Hilda White, she was detained in Dallas County as a material witness and “Unsupervised Incorrigible Minor” ward of the court.

“Sheriff Dunn, what is it this time? You have already ripped my house apart under the pretense of looking for your so-called suspect.”

“Esther, you know this is a double homicide investigation that—“

“Dunn, did you expect to find that six-foot man in my hat box, under my kitchen sink, or in my dresser drawers?”

“Clues could be anywhere— “

“Your search warrant was for a thin man over six feet tall. Not clues. Just a tall, thin man.”

“Well, we’ll not hold back on this. Those boys were— “

“Is your suspect Black? Is he White? Do you even know?”

“I, I you, you said he’s White. The Madisons say he’s Black— “

“And I say you need to tell me what you’re doing here, or you can get off my property.”

“Well, Esther, ah,” Sheriff Dunn removes his hat. “Well, there’s quite a bit of talk here and about, you know, about your arthritis and cataracts being healed and such. Now, some ignorant folks are saying you made a deal with the Devil. Now, you and I got better sense than that. But you know how my Nancy has been suffering. You know her arthritis is worse than your own. Now, if there’s something, anything at all, that you can tell me that would help my wife, well, I would do anything in my power to help you.”

“Amos Edward Dunn, if I could relieve arthritis suffering, I would do it for everyone. I would not trade for favors and such. Now, you have imposed so much suffering on every one of us women who knew him. You know, we had nothing to do with the death of those boys. You get off my property. The next time I see you, you better come with warrants, proper ones. I’m ashamed of you, Dunn. I’m ashamed of you.”

The Sheriff, red-faced, stuttering, and dripping sweat, steps back from the porch and slaps his hat on his head. “Sha, Sha shame! You, you Jezebel, you let a strange nigger in your house overnight! You supposed to be a Christian— “

The sheriff is now talking to a closed door. He stomps his foot in frustration and slowly moves to his squad car.

& & &

The seven material witnesses are plagued not only by the news media and law enforcement but also by neighbors, family, friends, and strangers who question them or remark on their remarkable recoveries from their various ailments.

The witnesses have become virtual shut-ins.

Their absences increase public speculation about their “Miracle Recoveries.” To some of their neighbors, they are viewed as witches who have traded their souls to the mysterious disappearing Devil for their magical recoveries. To others, they are selfish and unfeeling because they do not share their secrets with the larger community. Still, others see them as divine, having been touched through “The Stranger” by the healing hand of God.

& & &

Five weeks after the deaths and the disappearance of “The Stranger,” Betty Jane Madison discovers that she and her daughters are pregnant. Both girls readily admit that the stranger impregnated them.

Betty Jane’s heart is broken at the thought of her 13-year-old being pregnant. She tries to hate Matthew, but she still carries such loving memories of him that her hatred’s difficult to sustain.

Cleo and Angie, her sixteen-year-old, are both adamant that the sexual relations were voluntary, consensual, and exquisite. They declare that they would do it all over again given a chance.

In her heart of hearts, Betty Jane, like her daughters, hopes that Matthew will return.

Betty Jane shares the news of the pregnancies with the others in the significant seven.

& & &

Emily and Edna Hatch are alternatively devastated and delighted to discover they are also pregnant.

& & &

Hilda White confesses, with a proud smile, that she’s pregnant.

&  & &

Most remarkable of all, after a series of tests, Esther Livingston was confirmed to be pregnant.

& & &

As the news of the pregnancies leaks out, the news media returns the unwelcome and far brighter spotlight on the expectant seven.

The seven pregnant witnesses are now actual prisoners in their own homes.

The media coverage is manic, invasive, exploitive, and sensationalized to the point of absurdity.

Sheriff Dunn appears less than interested in protecting the women’s privacy or their property.

& & &

The Hatch sisters petition the court for temporary custody of Hilda White. Their petitions granted.

& & &

The Madisons’ home is firebombed. Fortunately, there are no injuries. Esther Livingstone welcomes the three Madison women into her home.

Sheriff Dunn speculates to the media that the firebombing may have been self-inflicted for the purpose of insurance recoveries. The Sheriff‘s unable to find any leads in the firebombing and declines the assistance of the State Police and federal authorities in investigating the arson.

& & &

“Esther, the girls are asleep. I, we thank you for taking us in. I don’t know where—”

Esther points to her kitchen chair. “Sit, sit, take a load off, have some herbal tea, and rest your mind and body.”

“Oh, God. What’re we going to do, Esther? We, we’re pariahs, tabloid queens, carrying the spawn of the Devil.”  Betty Jane wipes a tear from her eye,

“Well, first, you’re going to sip your tea and put your mind at ease. Second, we’re going to do just fine, all fourteen of us. Betty Jane, this storm will pass, and we’ll grow stronger for having survived it.”

Betty Jane makes a half-hearted smile and touches the older woman’s hand. “I wish I had your faith. God seems so far away and indifferent right now, you know?”

Esther pats Betty Jane’s hand. “Sheriff Dunn was around here calling me out about not being a good Christian. Well, that dumb ass doesn’t get much right, but he got that right.”

“What? I don’t understand. I see you praying all the time. I see you in your bedroom or the kitchen asking for His blessing and support.”

Esther laughs and looks away from Betty Jane as she speaks. “I stopped praying to God after I was healed, after I could see and move without pain for the first time in decades.”

Betty Jane looks out the kitchen window at the Weeping Willow flowing in the breeze. “So, so who are you praying to, exactly?”

Esther smiles distractedly. “And, I just… find myself… thinking oddly about… religion and…”

Betty Jane has a growing sense of unease. “Esther, are you OK? You look, look lost?”

“Oh, just my mind drifting. You have lovely children. They’re smart and tough. Helpful too. They keep this house neater and cleaner than I ever did. You’re blessed.”

“We’re all blessed. All seven of us. I thought it was a curse at first, but now I’m not happy, but not unhappy or resentful, you know what I mean?”

“A little. I understand you. I don’t understand myself so well. I’m ecstatic, overjoyed. I find myself smiling at the oddest times and situations. I know the odds are heavily against this conception and a healthy child. But I know in my soul that you and I and all our offspring will be in excellent health and fine form.”

The two women sit quietly sipping their tea as the outside world prepares new assaults on the seven.

& & &

Emily, Edna, and Hilda are sharing a bitter tide of mail at their kitchen table. Two certified letters inform the sisters that the Sleepy Creek School District Board of Directors is holding a special meeting to terminate their teaching contracts for violating the “morals clause” in their agreements.

Hilda has a letter from her Public Defender advising her that she’s going to be charged with child endangerment for using cocaine during her pregnancy.

“This is bullshit! I haven’t used any drugs since my night with Paul. Why’re they messing with us like this? They better leave us the fuck alone.”

Edna winces at Hilda’s profanity and sighs as she responds to Hilda. “Fear and, and a rare chance for some of them to have their five minutes of fame. But, there are many, many good people—”

“Humm, where are these good people, sister? I have yet to hear from them or see their support. Not one fellow teacher or staff. Not one message of support or comfort.”

“Emily, do you think he had anything, anything at all to do with, with Billy and Warren’s death?”

Edna is furious as she turns on her sister. “Are you mad, crazy? There’s nothing connecting him to those boys, nothing at all!”

Hilda breaks the tense silence. “Of course, Paul sacrificed them. How could you not see that?”

The sisters jump like they have been struck by lightning. Edna recovers first. “Hilda! Why would you say that? That’s an outrageous slander. How could you?”

Emily grabs her sister’s shoulder. “Edna! Wait! Just wait a minute.” Emily turns to Hilda and softens her voice. “Hilda, did Paul tell you that he, he killed the boys?”

“No. He never mentioned the boys. He hardly said a word— “

Edna is on her feet. “Why are you even saying this, this, these lies?”

Hilda jumps to her feet. “Listen, we get gifts, good shit. I mean, stuff to die for. I know everything has a price. Somebody has to pay. You think all this shit is just a coincidence? You have to be crazy to believe that.”

Edna balls up her fist, grits her teeth as she speaks. “That’s just speculation! That’s not proof of anything! You have a reckless mouth, reckless and dangerous.”

Enda has a lot more to say, but the looks on Emily’s and Hilda’s faces show her that arguments and logic will not win this debate. Enda bolts to her back porch to think and to try to convince herself that no reasonable person would find Luke or Paul guilty of the murder of the boys. There’s no proof at all. None.

& & &

“Will he come back? Will we ever see him again?”

Angie stops loading the dishwasher to look at her sister. “I don’t know. How would I know?”

Cleo moves closer to her sister. “I think he will come back. I know he will.”

Angie sighs. “I dream about Billie and Warren… I dream about them…”

Cleo nods and grabs her sister’s hands. “He needs to come get us, to save us all.”

Angie hugs her sister and knows that they must save themselves. “I think if we have a boy, Billy or Warren would be good names, huh?”

Cleo smiles and nods yes.

& & &

 Esther shakes her head in frustration, “The nerve of that brat. He told me he was ashamed and disappointed in me, but I never thought he would try to have me found mentally incompetent. Children are a double-edged— “

Betty Jane offers Esther a cup of tea. “Esther, we’re about to produce more double-edged offspring. Stop Pacing. Sit. Avery’s an excellent attorney. I don’t think you have any worries— “

Esther sits at the kitchen table across from Betty Jane. “I’ve never had a Black attorney before. I never imagined that Lloyd would not represent me.” Esther sips her tea. “Charlie’s spoiled. We, my husband and I, spoiled him. I hope I do better this time.”

“We will. We have each other now— “

“But they keep us in turmoil. They charge you with being an unfit mother, charged Hilda— “

“I know. Esther, I need to ask you something. This is going to sound strange, OK?”

Esther gives a nervous giggle as she nods for Betty Jane to continue.

“Now bear with me. Do you think he is human? I mean, amazing things happen when he appears.”

Esther takes Betty Jane’s hands in hers. “Of course, not. He’s, or it is not like us. Angel, Devil, I don’t know. I just know, despite everything that has happened, I would not change a thing.”

“I know. I know, but if you’re right, what about our kids? What’ll they be?”

“Betty Jane, you need to call the girls in here. This is something we all need to discuss.”

& & &

As the delivery dates draw near, there’s a growing unease in Goodwill.

Nervous law enforcement officers are on the alert for the possible return of The Stranger.

The Southern Baptist Convention declares the births, “Looming disasters that threaten all of mankind.” However, a rapidly growing number also believe that the appearance of The Stranger and his offspring are historical religious events, akin to the Second Coming. These groups are forming congregations of their own.

Several Satanic worship groups have moved to Goodwill to await the arrival of the anti-Christ.

An “elite team” of scientists is standing by to evaluate the offspring and parents for possible “national security” issues.

The media presence is overwhelming the Village and the nearby towns.

& & &

On the eve of the first delivery Sheriff, Dunn resigns amid rumors that his wife, Nancy, has made a remarkable recovery from her crippling rheumatoid arthritis. Dunn and his wife leave the County separately without leaving forwarding addresses or responding to questions about his wife’s health.

& & &

Esther Livingston delivered a healthy eight-pound, ten-ounce baby boy named Billie Livingston on Sunday, June 1, at 7:00 a.m.

& & &

The riots and chaos commence at 7:03 am throughout Dallas and neighboring counties. The unrest continues and is spreading and intensifying across state and county lines.

There’s no relief in sight.

* * * * THE END * * * *
Copyright Frederick Foote 2025