Canaan's Tongue (33 page)

“I don’t much enjoy trading how-dos with a muslin sheet, Mrs. Buh,
Buh, Bradford,” he said. He sounded crest-fallen, apologetic. “What say you
come out, as is, and I avert mine eyes?”

“Get you gone from this house,” Anne said in a hiss. Her breath came
whistling against my nape. “Get you gone, sir, before I call my husband—”
(here she took in a frantic, gasping breath, but so quietly that only I could hear
it)—“or my boy.”

The man guffawed. There was nothing threatening in his laugh, perhaps, but no politeness, either. “Your boy’d have no objection, I think, if I tuh,
tuh, took you off his hands,” he said. He laughed again, more quietly, then
raised his voice—: “Would you, boy?”

Anne spat out a curse. “Let me caution you of something, Mister—”

“Kennedy,” said the man. The mirth was gone out of his voice already.
“Kennedy’s the name I were born into. I’m here on a errand for Mr. T. H.
Morelle, gentleman, of Nuh, Nuh, Natchez-on-the-River.”

A brief, unwieldy silence fell, during which Anne did up the buttons of
her shift. The man said nothing, did nothing. Evidently he was content to
wait for her to dress. His conduct was unlike any burglar’s I’d heard tell of.
But in truth I never mistook him for a burglar—; I knew exactly who he was.
He was my day-dream of deliverance made flesh.

“Morelle?” Anne said finally, stepping out from the curtain. “Does that
name excuse a man from ringing my house-bell?”

“It should,” said Kennedy.

“We’ve a power of customers here, Mr. Kennedy. Quite a number of well-heeledand accredited gentlemen buy their mash from Mother Anne. You’ll
have to forgive us if a name escapes—”

“ ‘Us’?” Kennedy said. His voice was suddenly flat as a crypt-cover.
“What do you mean by us, ma’rm?”

“Why—just what I said, sir. Us. Me, my husband, and the boy.”

“Your husband is upstairs with his guts strung around his ankles,”
Kennedy replied.

Anne made a sound at this that seemed stripped of any meaning. It could
have been a laugh, or a snort of indifference—; it could have been a cry
of pain.

“You borrowed four hundred State of Louisiana dollars from Mr. Amos
Dall, of Vidalia, Louisiana,” Kennedy said, as though reading from a receipt.
He cleared his throat and spat onto the floor. Mother Anne made to answer,
but her voice was oddly muffled, little better than a gurgle, as though Kennedy
had his hand over her mouth.

“That sum were to of been paid back, with interest, at a monthly rate of
three puh, puh, percent, in three-and-one-half years from the time of borrowing,” he went on. His stutter seemed to be worsening. He spat again, more
loudly still. I decided he was chewing on a tobacco-plug.

“Not that terms matter much, marm. That money weren’t Mr. Amos
Dall’s to get fancy with. That money belonged to Mr. T. H. Morelle of
Natchez-on-the-River, gentleman and financier.”

Anne gave another gurgle, louder and more desperate than before. It was
clear from the sound that she was not more than three paces from the curtain,
and also that she was kneeling on the floor.

“Let go of my trouser-leg, Annie. No harm will cuh, cuh, come to you
today.” He went quiet for a moment. “Am I right, little Annie, in saying so?”

Again she tried to answer but could not. “Please,” she managed finally.
“Please, Mr. Kennedy—I beg—”

“Am I right in saying so,” he repeated with great deliberateness. “That
no harm will come to you.”

Anne gave no answer.

“Where do you keep your profit-box, marm?” Kennedy said smoothly.

He must have turned her loose, for she sucked in a breath and scrambled
to her feet. “Under the roof,” she said. “Under the roof, Mr. Kennedy. In a
linen-trunk.”

To this day I wonder what Mother Anne intended. To win a minute’s
time? To coax Kennedy out of the cellar, away from the profit-box and from
me? It makes little difference now.

“That’s a lie, Mr. Kennedy!” I said.

Anne cried out, tried to speak, then cried out again.

“Is that you, boy?” said Kennedy. “Speak on up!”

“It’s nobody,” Anne said quickly. “Don’t you mind—”

“That’s right, missus! Nobody whatever!” I yelled, thrashing impotently
against the wall. “The bills are behind the mash-kettle, Mr. Kennedy! Twined
up in a blouse!”

I date my entry into the Trade from that instant. What doomed me was
not the betrayal itself, ruinous though it was—; my doom lay in the reasoning
behind it. I didn’t give the lie to Mother Anne out of a sense of the wrongs
done to me, or out of righteousness, or vengefulness, or even out of fear—: I
did it out of the simple desire to matter. Friendless and without the least
standing in the world, I was nonetheless guilty of the sin of pride. Sometimes I
think there is no other.

“Thank you kindly, Mr. Nobody,” Kennedy said, and as he spoke there
came a sound like that of a boot-heel striking a sack of rice and Anne dropped
slackly to the floor. Her milk-colored fist, balled gracelessly together, like a
child’s hand taken from a railing, fell against my heel and quivered there.

Kennedy rummaged about behind the boiler, cursing industriously under
his breath. Anne’s white fist held me enchanted.

“Oho!” Kennedy said at last. “Yes.”

“Tie me loose, Mr. Kennedy!” I called out. I hadn’t yet set eyes on him, but
I pictured a squat, hard-featured man—; grave, of course, but with a ready
smile. When at last he came, shoving the curtain aside so it fell over Anne’s
fist and stilled it, he looked nothing like the men that I’d imagined. His long,
stooped body and shriveled bloodless face looked like nothing, in fact, that I had
ever seen, except perhaps the winged skulls carved by the richer families in
town onto their head-stones.

He looked me up and down and gave a laugh. “Mother Bradford’s buh,
buh, boy,” he said.

I stood as straight as I could, struggling to look dignified, but after a spell
of time had passed without his saying a single word I began to suffer sorely
under my nakedness. When I could meet his gaze no longer, I dropped my eyes
reluctantly to Mother Anne. Her shift was ripped open at the breast and a
palm-sized bruise was darkening at her temple. Farther down, above her
belly, a stain was spreading whose source was hidden by the bunching of her
shift. When it was clear to me that she was dead I looked at Kennedy to see
whether he had noticed, but he seemed oblivious to all around him. He stood
before me awkwardly, breathing through his mouth, with an expression on his
face that I knew well enough, though it took me a long, dull moment to
decipher it. His right hand clasped the ring above me—; his left twitched restlessly
at his trousers. Instinctively I turned to face the wall.

Kennedy took in a rattling breath behind me.

“Mother Bradford’s boy,” he said.

Stutter Kennedy.

I’M JUST ON MY WAY FROM THE PRIVY, having paid my evening tithes. The End is waiting for me there with a grin on its face fit for a monkey’s christening. I hang back, quiet as a dove, and bide. So here it is.

So here it is, says I. I won’t be keeping you as I know you’re very busy.

There has to be an end, Stuts.

Does there? says I.

You’ve been no end of help, Stuts, the End says. Truly.

Aye! says I. That I have. And is
this
—you don’t mind my asking— how you shows your appreciation of it.

You know I appreciate it, says the End. I’ve given you room to play in, after all. If you haven’t made good use of it, the fault is not my own.

I’d of liked to make use of it to whup that niggra boy, says I.

You’d of liked to slip one into his knickers, the End says, giving me the wink.

I set quiet. The one don’t rule the tother out, says I.

No. The one don’t rule the tother out, says the End. It grins.

Just you answer me this, says I, before you do me under. Answer me
this.
Why is that niggra such a bother to my mind?

We are each of us someone’s nigger, Stuts. Didn’t your mother tell you?

Each of us a niggra, says I. Each of us—?

The End plucks at a piece of grass.

That’s it, then? That’s all? You sound like bleeding Asa Trist!

The End shakes its head. A little something to remind you of your place, Mr. Kennedy. That’s all.

I curse and spit. What place is
that,
pray to tell us? Hey?

The End gives a curtsy. The next in line.

A Penance.

VIRGIL COME UP ON ME, Dodds says. Seeking to lay a penance on me.

In broad day-time, while I clambring up the hill with this blankety-blank bucket. Looking at me like he never did make my right features out before. He come up on me all in a sudden and stop me in my tracks and in a voice fit to bring down the Union cannon holler out—

Dodds! I’m wise to your racket after all this time. You and I are going to revisit the scene of our finest hour.

I stand up straight as a picket. Don’t follow you, sackly, Mr. Virgil.

That’s right—I’m going to follow
you,
old snake-in-the-weeds. Get shambling.

He clutching a long wedge-tip spade, same spade we use to fill in the privy-hole over the Deemer, in he left hand. In he right hand they a bottle full of lantern-oil. I don’t say nothing past that. I hunch down and make slow as a mule for the Deemer’s hole. I look for Parson or somebody but they ain’t nothing doing at that hour.

You’re looking for someone to get in my way, Virgil say. I’ll confess something to you, Dodds. I’m hoping to see them try.

Can I put the bucket down, I say.

You’d best get moving, you son-of-a-bitch, or you’ll be wearing that god-damned bucket for a girdle.

This a error of judgment, I say.

Virgil laugh. One more won’t make much difference.

We come to the old privy-hole. Filled in now. Tobacky-house twixt us and the rest the property, woods all behind. Patch show dark on the ground where we put the Deemer under. Part of it glitter against the rest and I pick up a sly old chip of mirror.

Sloppy, Virgil mutter. We were sloppy.

It were dark, I say, watching he hand fingering that spade. I suppose we done it good enough.

I suppose otherwise, he say, chucking the spade down. Get to work.

I look at the spade. This a grave error of judgment, I say. This won’t bring no good but evil.

As if you knew the difference, Virgil say. He face gone flat and white and if I didn’t know he knew the game before, I know it now. The words get themselves upright, slow and easy, and line up in a row—:

Virgil—knows—the—game.

But that ain’t gone help him much at all.

Dig! Virgil holler.

I take the spade and get cutting. The ground good and mealy, praise Jesus. It ain’t but a quarter-hour’s work. First they water in the hole, then clay.

We sure didn’t plant him deep, Virgil mumble.

Another cut and I catch a scrap of cotton.

That’s enough, Virgil say. Scrape the clay off of him.

The carcass kept up pretty well, account the clay. First I think it withered some, it so frail and childish—; but that just the measure of the Deemer.

Pull him loose, Virgil say. Put the spade by, Doddsbody. Use your hands now. Get hold of him.

No heavenish way C. B. Dodds gone touch that item.

Virgil give a sigh. You’re just not afraid of me, are you, Charlie.

I drop the spade. You less to me, sir, than a rarebit of the field.

Step aside, then. Will you step aside?

I do.

He snatch the spade up and bring it down again quick. Worrying the Deemer into bits. The sound of it like a butcher working on a chop.

What you aim to fix that way, little rarebit? I say.

Virgil give a laugh. Fix? he say, and give a laugh again. I’m long past fixing things.

You dug up a heap of dead troubles. That’s all you done today.

Virgil don’t answer, just hackety-hackety with the spade.

I’d love to know what Parson’s promised you, Dodds. If I were you I’d be gone away long since. Gone for good across the river.

Why
you
still here then, Virgil? They the river yonder.

He stop and smile. You know full well.

She not the cause of nothing. You want a old nigger tell you why?

He give a laugh. Yes, Dodds. Tell me why. I’d be beholden.

Nobody ever leave the Trade. Not ever.

I reckon I might be the first, he say. He hush a spell. I’d like to see outside of it one day.

They
ain’t
no outside! We floating in it, all of us. Like fishes in a tub.

Yes, that’s the gospel, Virgil say, poking at the Deemer. The gospel according to Thaddeus. We all know he was his own archbishop.

Trade eat archbishops for supper, I say.

And archbishops eat bankers, he say. And bankers eat politicians. And politicians—

Ain’t no man, woman, nor child
never
left the Trade. Never, Virgil. Not a one.

Let’s send this child ahead of us, then, Virgil say, pouring lantern-oil top the pieces. On a voyage of discovery.

I don’t say nothing then.

I wish you a safe and speedy transit to the bottom of the Pit, Virgil hisper. Then he let a lit match fall.

I SCUFFLE BACK UP TO THE HOUSE. A week ago it were mischief in every room, but now the house right quiet. Delamare laid up with the shivers. Miss Clem hispering through she window at the Lord Christ Jesus. Parson in he attic laying out for Charlie Dodds.

What is it, I say.

Parson sigh. It’s Kennedy.

I know. Kennedy tomorrow.

Kennedy’s done, Parson say. Kennedy’s done already.

Done? I say.
How
done? Murthured?

Parson set quiet. Done. That’s all.

Put in a hole?

Parson shake he head. We’ll have to do without.

I hush a spell. Put me in, I say. Put me down in place of Kennedy.

He laugh. We still have need of you, Charlie. Kindly remain alive a few more hours.

You swore a oath, I say. My blood go pricklish. You swore!

Parson give a smile. And the Redeemer will make good on that promise, Charlie, when he comes.

When he comes hell, I say. We short two holes. He gone skip two steps when he come down?

He’s skipped two steps before.

Before? I holler. Before
when
?

He hand come over my mouth like nothing. Do you fancy this is his
first
transfer, nigger? Were you not listening when I explained to you the fruitings and the harvestings of the Trade?

Just tell me who come next, I mumble. Tell me who.

Next you take something to the prisoner. Keep his body working.

What you mean, something? Water?

Yes. Water, Parson say, like it he don’t care if it be fire.

An idea come to me then. We could use
him,
I say. That Foster. To fill the next hole up.

Parson make a cluck. No, Dodds. The prisoner is set aside.

What for?

He cluck again. A lower purpose.

I FETCH AJAR AND HOBBY-NOB IT DOWN. The cellar door wide open. They the prisoner, deathly quiet. Water! I say. Like talking at a deaf. Mouth hung open, tongue stuck out, lips gone dry and cracklish. I dip two fingers and rub them on he lips. I set the jar down in the dirt. I fixing to go when he hand come up back of my poor bald head.

Dear Lord! he hisper.

I brung water, I say. On the floor, Foster. Drink it.

He hand on my neck. What are you, sir? A slave?

That’s right, I say. But I be mancipated soon.

Soon? he say.

Yes sir. My marse coming down. Then I be put to rights.

Now he hand on my throat. Where is he? Up those stairs?

Who? I say. Parson?

It so fierce on me now I can’t catch my air. Where is he? Where is he? Where is he?

Parson just upstairs—

Upstairs? Can he hear?

Not if we quiet. Ease up on me, sir!

He say nothing then. Just hide under the steps.

PARSON LAYING FOR ME STILL. Nesting. He look up at me and yawn.

Well?

He awake, I say. Foster.

Parson give a stretch. Well! I should go and see him, then.

You gone pour the Deemer in him, ain’t you.

That would be telling.

Virgil burnt the other one, I say. The carcass.

Yes. That’s all correct and proper.

His promise, I say. The Deemer’s. You aim to keep it, Parson?

Parson in high spirits all up a sudden. He laugh. I haven’t forgotten it in the last quarter-hour, Doddsbody.

You aim to keep it?

He give me a whistle. He give me a wink.

I make a breath and groan and drop down on my knees. Let it be tomorrow, I say. I won’t bear another hour, sir. I can’t. I’ll dig the rest they holes tonight. Ah! Let it be tomorrow, Parson. Learn me how to speak the tongue!

Parson study me a good long while with he tom-cat face and he pebble eyes.

It was always going to be tomorrow, Charlie, he say at last. He reach under himself and come out with my bottle. They a powder in it now.

Angel of mercy! I hisper. Sweet righteous angel!

Dig your holes, pilgrim, that you may rest.