All That Lives (27 page)

I hurried to get ready, relieved Mother had not requested I remain at home to entertain the gawkers. As I changed I heard
Mother and Father downstairs discussing J. Bratton, the cobbler, who had recently announced in church that he was making shoes
designed for left and right feet, rather than the standard two of one kind.

“We must have him round to size us, Jack,” Mother insisted, “and also the slaves, all of them, men, women and children, should
be shod before the cold weather.”

“Their feet are tough as cowhide, Lucy, and they have the shoes we issued last year.” Father quickly objected to having the
cobbler down at the cabins. “We can give them extra tallow to rub the leather up, and they can turn their stockings over the
tops come winter.”

“Chloe tells me plain all their shoes are worn too thin for extra tallow to do the job.” Mother was exasperated and I wondered
if the company was simply too much for her, as she did not generally involve herself with Father’s methods in the running
of the farm. “Jack, you must have seen it yourself!” She did sound annoyed.

“They will last another year.” Father held firm, as was his custom, to his decision, and I knew Mother would not have her
way. Beyond their arguing voices I became aware of a high-pitched screaming outdoors. I paused, and soon recognized the wailing
as the squealing of a hog. I wondered if Father planned to slaughter a pig for the strangers. I finished dressing and ran
downstairs, finding Father in the hall, about to leave the house.

“I must make haste to the barn,” he said, the scream of the hog punctuating his speech.

“Is that the pig we’ll eat for supper, Father?” I asked.

“It is,” he nodded without looking at me, engaged in pulling on his leather work gloves.

“Why do they cry like that?” I had always wondered, but never asked.

“Every marked hog will squeal until it hangs from a short rope.” Father allowed the heavy door to bang shut behind him as
he hurried out.

“How is the hog marked, Mother? How does it know?” I turned to her, watching as she tied her bonnet, preparing for our trip
to Thorn’s store.

“Your father and the hands decide in conversation, Betsy, and it is a mystery how the hogs do know, but know they do.” She
must have read the puzzlement on my features, for I was thinking, a mystery? How is it possible? “All God’s creatures are
imbued with certain knowledge and the hogs do know when it is time to call their angels down.” Mother seemed to think this
was perfectly understandable, but I wondered if a
person
were marked to die, would they know it? Would they sing songs like the Spirit’s sweet hymns to bring their angels down? Or
would they scream and wail like hogs? These were curious thoughts and only momentary, for Mother wished to leave and I was
sent back upstairs to bring the boys down. While searching for Joel’s slate, I heard her talking with Chloe.

“Miz Lucy, on your way, will you tell masta Bell, Dean done stacked a pile of green hickory in the smokehouse and tell him
to make a memory of how we need the hog guts to fall in the big kettle for the soap making.”

“Last time Jack sold the lard off, didn’t he? We nearly had to buy it back.” Mother laughed at Father’s unusual error. “All
we had from that pig was the hocks, the crackling bread and sausage.”

“If he do catch the blood, I’ll make us up a pudding.” Chloe banged her bread pans on the porch to clear the crumbs and I
licked my lips recalling her blood pudding as most delicious. I hoped Father would not waste the innards.

“I’ll deliver the message now, before the blood is spent into the ground. Hurry, Betsy! Boys!” Mother walked out the door
as we ran down the stairs.

Lessons were in progress when we reached the schoolhouse and I found it difficult to open the large painted door. I looked
over my shoulder at Mother riding on to Thorn’s store. Her back was straight and her bonnet tied tight and from behind she
appeared relaxed, as Zeke slapped the reins on the horse’s back, forcing them down the hill. I took a breath and stepped back
so Joel and Richard would enter first.

“Why, class, it is Elizabeth Bell and her brothers, come to join us! Greetings.” Professor Powell smiled warmly across the
heads swiveling in our direction, and I curtsied, noticing most everyone’s feet were the color of summer dirt. The room was
not full and Joel and Richard promptly took their customary bench, but I did not know where to sit.

“Good day, Professor Powell.” I kept my head bowed, feeling Vernon Batts’s black eyes narrow on me. Josh Gardner was not present,
nor Becky Porter. Where was Thenny?

“Here’s a place, Miss Betsy!” I looked up and saw Thenny was forcing Amanda Ellison to move and make room for me. When I saw
Amanda, I froze and felt I could not walk the seven paces to the bench where I was meant to take a seat. Her long blond braid
swung out behind her head as she settled into her new spot, and I imagined her long hair undone, floating like translucent
angel wings, face down in the lake.

“Please, be seated.” Professor Powell smiled, but gestured I should make haste to the bench, as he was waiting to continue
the lesson.

“Forgive me the disruption,” I managed to speak and found my limbs capable of crossing space, but I could not look at Amanda.
I kept my eyes most purposely averted from her, for the feeling in my soul was overwhelming and oddly embarrassing. I wondered
if Father had been right deciding we should keep the Spirit’s morbid prediction quiet. What if we did not warn her and it
came to pass? I felt uncertain but I believed it best to keep quiet about my thoughts.

“Miss Mary, please continue with dictation.”

“Honesty,” Mary spoke the first word and everyone labored to write it out in cursive on their slates.

“Miss Betsy, I would have you be my assistant examining the quality of our dictation today, but I wish not to ask too much
of a pupil so seldom seen.” Professor Powell stood and examined my slate. “Your absence has in no way affected your abilities,
I see. Class, behold a perfect ‘honesty.’” He held my slate up for the class to see and I blushed with the extra attention,
but it felt wonderful to be in an environment where the old routines still functioned. I said a silent prayer to the Spirit,
please leave me be, allow me this, speak not.

Mary dictated “obedient,” “sought,” then “cherished,” and Professor Powell stood over me all the while.

“Very good, class. Now, Miss Thenny, display for us your quick tongue in reciting our June poem.” Thenny stood, and curtsied,
and flashed her teeth in a smile to me before she began.

“Cheerfulness”

There is a little Maiden—

Who is she? Do you know?

Who always has a welcome

Wherever she may go.

Her face is like the May time,

Her voice is like a bird’s;

The sweetest of all music

Is in her lightsome words …

Thenny faltered and Professor Powell frowned.

“Take a seat, I would have Miss Betsy read the rest, from the primer, as she was absent during the memorization.”

I rose and Professor Powell placed the book, open to the page, in my hands. He guided me through the simple verse with his
index finger.

By old folks and by children

By lofty and by low:

Who is this little maiden?

Does anybody know?

You surely must have met her.

You certainly can guess;

What! I must introduce her?

Her name is cheerfulness.

Professor Powell smiled at me above the primer and I was touched by his efforts, though I felt no affinity with the maiden
of the poem. He clearly had no idea how far from cheerfulness my emotions dwelled.

“An appropriate muse for such a lovely day, eh, class? We shall have a recess, and enjoy the sunshine out-of-doors.”

I ran down the steps grateful to be released so I might talk to Thenny, who led me eagerly to the mulberry tree where we could
talk alone.

“I heard a crowd of strangers have settled on your land.” She grabbed my arm, excited.

“Yes, but how did you know?” I felt slightly annoyed I had not had the pleasure of telling this news myself.

“I was at the store early in the morning helping Father load the bins with fresh sugar from Clarksville and a stranger entered,
professing to be amongst the crowd of traveling folk gathered at Jack Bell’s farm.”

“ ’Tis true, there are many strangers camped on our land and the mood is of a carnival and all.” I decided to make it sound
as exotic as I could.

“Will it be fun as a lynching fest?” Thenny rubbed her hands together.

“ ’Tis better, for the Good Lord wills no one must die!”

“He wills mostly mystery surrounding you, Miss Betsy.” Thenny embraced me, tickling my hips with her fingers. “I will beg
my Father to call on you this evening, for I would like to see the strangers. Are they poor whites, drunk on rotgut whiskey
who will eat your dirt?”

“Gracious, Thenny, what outrageous gossip! Do you honestly believe my father would tolerate such visitors?”

“He has tolerated much.” Thenny grew subdued to solicit more information and I complied.

“These strangers hail from Kentucky and they are traveling with slaves who are encamped beside our own, in the cabins. But
there is also a pair of slaveless Shakers from the north.”

“Blasphemy! Shakers on your land!”

“The Reverend knows all about it,” I assured her, momentarily anxious she might not wish to join us.

“I also heard the Witch cast you down again and Dr. Hopson was brought out to your home.” Thenny looked at the ground as she
spoke and I saw her neck tense, knowing her inquiries were sinfully curious.

“It did, but I cannot recall it rightly.” I waited until she looked into my eyes, “For Dr. Hopson dosed me with some laudanum
after it was done.”

“Laudanum! Goodness, Betsy.” She grasped my arm, her voice full of fear. “They gave it to my cousin Edwin before he was consumed!”

“I am not near passing, dear Thenny.” The pleasure of impressing Thenny with my woes was one of the few pleasures left to
me. I smiled and placed my hand over hers on my forearm. “I experienced no ill effects apart from a sublime drowsiness from
my dose.”

“Look! Your mother arrives to fetch you off already …” I turned and saw Zeke and my mother walking up the hill beside the
cart, full of hoop barrels and burlap sacks. Thenny embraced me again and held me tight, speaking falsetto into my ear, “I
will high to your home tonight or I am not Thenny Thorn!” I laughed at her playful ways and kissed her cheek, running to meet
Mother on the road.

True to her word, Thenny did appear early that evening at our home, along with her parents, Calvin Justice, the Reverend and
Mrs. Johnston, Jesse, Martha and many others from the community of Adams who had not come calling for several months, since
Clara Lawson’s death. The news of strangers on our land had caused everyone to put aside their reservations so they might
see the tents and hear the Spirit sing. They dressed up in their party clothes with excitement and curiosity, brimming with
apparent goodwill toward us, and they arrived bearing corn cakes and pies, so we hosted a spontaneous party.

“For you, Jack, I have brought this large bottle of fine whiskey, fresh from the doubler, with the express intent of keeping
yourself and your visitors in superior moods all evening long.” Calvin Justice handed Father the bottle, then sought the Shakers,
so he might engage them in religious debate. I helped Mother and Chloe set out tables between the strangers’ tents and the
stables, for our feast included no less than ten fried chickens and twenty pots of boiled hominy and rosen’yers, the early
corn roasted in the ashes. The boys ran races on our front lawn and spit water from their mouths at the well, and thanks were
given all around for the warm setting sun, for it had so far bestowed on us all a prosperous growing season. The Spirit did
not speak until supper was finished.

I have attended the sultans’ banquets and the Romans’ feasts.

Jesse, John Jr. and Drewry lit the lanterns and torches to keep the mosquitoes off.