Citizens Creek (30 page)

Yes, this was destined to be a good day, full of celebration and forgiveness both.

Chapter 41

MIDDAY, AND STILL
her grandfather slept the sleep of the dead. Rose made excuses to pass the tepee, on her way to the newly built smokehouse put up at the beginning of summer, on her way back from picking blackberries beyond the pasture, off to the Canadian to fetch water, but each trip, all she heard from the tepee were snores. She daren’t disturb her grandfather, or her next brush with Gramma Amy wouldn’t go so well as this morning’s.

As she wove a basket alongside Elizabeth, a lone man on foot entered their compound from the north side. Only one person on earth had such a strut, and if she’d been a slip of a child, and not so close to a grown woman, she would have given in to impulse to run to him full tilt.

The appearance of Harry Island always broke up routine, and everyone young and old competed for his attention. He enjoyed his popularity too, always playing to the crowd, whether audience of one or dozens. He had gained weight since she last saw him at Fort Gibson, a more healthy fullness to his bronze cheeks, his long wooly hair pulled back and almost tamed by a leather cowhide strip knotted at the base of his neck, his moccasins more new than old. She supposed they must all look better than they did in those dark days. Sometimes she thought overmuch, she decided, and ran to intercept him before all the others realized he was here, Elizabeth fast on her heel.

“Uncle Harry,” Rose said. She turned shy, close enough to catch the stink of the road on him.

“What now? Who is this lady in front of me? Do madam have
more children at home, or just this one?”

“It’s me, Rose,” she protested. “And this is Elizabeth. She’s not my child, she’s my sister . . .” Rose let her voice trail off as she realized he had funned her.

“Rose? You sure? Because the only Rose I know would surely offer a poor, tired man who walked all the way from Grand Fork some water and a bit of biscuit.”

“Yes,” said Rose. She was reluctant to leave his side. Harry Island popped up no matter where they lived, and was looser with his storytelling than Grampa Cow Tom, at the ready to share their adventures as young men.

She walked with him farther into the compound, and Elizabeth slipped her hand into Uncle Harry’s.

“Leave him be,” Rose warned her sister. “Men don’t like being bothered.”

Uncle Harry stopped to appraise the child. “This one is beauty in the making,” he said.

Rose fought not to read anything into a comparison. Her younger sister
was
stunning, and fawned over for her ebony hair, her lively eyes, her smooth, dark skin.

By the time they reached Gramma Amy at the fire pit, they’d attracted followers, but Elizabeth had no intention of giving up her place beside Uncle Harry, playing with the soft of his whiskers, a-pout when he talked to anyone else. Gramma Amy dished their visitor up a big bowl of
sofki
and cha-cha, and he lit into the still-warm stew as if it were a feast.

“Go rouse your grandfather,” Gramma Amy said to Rose, as beguiled as everyone else with Uncle Harry. “Time to see in the day.”

Rose sped to the tepee and pushed at her grandfather’s shoulder, quickly standing back. Sometimes Grampa Cow Tom woke hard,
and woe to the innocent standing in the way when he came to himself from a dream.

“Yes?” he mumbled, without opening his eyes. His tone was neither friendly nor harsh, reserving the right to go either way.

“Harry Island’s come.”

Cow Tom opened his eyes then, looked her through. “Here?”

“At the pit, eating.”

Her grandfather was up, not bothering to brush the twigs from his hair or tongue the night fuzz from his teeth.

“Why didn’t you say so, girl?” But his tone this time was full of tease. “We got celebrating to do,” he said, and she followed behind, running to keep up.

Harry Island whooped when he saw her grandfather come across the clearing. “We done it!” he proclaimed, and Grampa Cow Tom’s grin in response was as wide as Rose had ever seen.

“We Creeks, proper,” he said.

She thought the two men ready to hug, to lock arms in satisfaction to commemorate the moment, but they held back from that public display.

“We can’t drink, and we can’t fiddle. How we gonna mark the largeness of the occasion?” asked Uncle Harry.

“Remember Florida? That military parade?” Grampa Cow Tom said, pulled into the excitement. “We could rig one up our own self, with marching. Decorate the mule. All the little ones taking a part. Mr. Lincoln freeing the slaves, winning the war, the Creek Council meeting, and us, brought in as members of the tribe. Mix in some Creek stomp-dancing. How about that? And food. Whatever we have.”

Rose held her breath, waiting to see if this met with Harry Island’s approval. Even Gramma Amy, whose job it was to make the food last, parceling out stingy portions today in anticipation of tomorrow’s want, paused motionless.

“Perfect,” Uncle Harry said. “Long as the part I play is head of the Creek Council.”

“Then let’s get to work,” her grandfather said. He gave Rose a playful pinch on her cheek. “What say we choose Rose here to carry the flag? We make our own traditions.”

Rose could barely recall such pride and happiness.

Chapter 42

ROSE FOUND A
clean break in the fence line and doubled back on her pony to discover one of the laying hens gone. She checked the inside of the henhouse, the condition of the setting straw, mostly undisturbed, and noted the faint trace of footprints in the mudded grounds outside.

“Doesn’t look like coyote,” she reported back to Grampa Cow Tom. “More likely wild Indian, hungry and on the prowl.”

“Not sure what annoys me more, repairing this fence or the prospect of a meatless supper down the road.”

“But chicken tonight, still? For the white men?”

Her grandfather grunted. “Agriculture agents. From the United States government.”

“Agriculture?”

“Farming. Crops. They say they want to see how different tribes use the land.”

“They’ll try to make us change our ways?” asked Rose.

“That’s my Rose. Always suspicious.” Grampa Cow Tom removed the broken fence post, putting the plank off to the side. “The agents don’t present threat or gain for us at this moment, but we’ll show off a little anyway what we’ve managed in the three years since war’s end. You have to learn how to talk to white people, Rose. Don’t give them too much power, but don’t cause them such unease they feel the need to respond in kind. Remember, keep to your own, but curry favor when and where you can. You never know when a friend comes in handy, and with the government, you can never be sure what they might be up to. So, hen lost or no, tonight
we offer chicken to our guests.”

“I best be getting back to the house to help,” said Rose. “Ma’am’s on the third day of a fresh batch of
sofki
and everyone’s cleaning the ranch house top to bottom.” Rose ran her fingers through her pony’s mane. Her grandfather had returned not long ago from a month at Fort Smith in Arkansas, representing the Creek Freedmen. He’d been in a good mood since. “Or I could stay and help you mend the fence.”

Her grandfather hesitated. “A few minutes more out here won’t hurt,” he said.

“Ma’am won’t like it though.”

“You’re with me.”

Rose set straightaway to the shed, took up the stump ax, and split four lengths of wood for fence rails. She brought them back to where her grandfather waited.

“I won’t always be here, Rose.”

She froze. “Where you going now?”

“My time on this earth runs down. Don’t fret. Not now, but someday.”

Rose struggled to find words, but none came. She couldn’t imagine a world without her grandfather in it. She thought of the night at Fort Gibson when Grampa Cow Tom came back to their camp and found Granny Sarah still and dead, and the bottomless well of his grief. She thought of the brightness Grampa Cow Tom brought to her days, no matter where they lived, how good or how bad the condition. She was sixteen, and sometimes she felt as if her grandfather was the only man who knew her. Who truly loved her. Who would ever love her.

“You understand the land, Rose. The sacrifices we have to make
for the land. Land, family, friends, tribe. That’s all we have. That’s all we need.”

“Are you sick, Grampa?”

“Not sick. Just getting you ready.” He positioned the split rail in the fence, notching the wood in the groove at the post. “Go on. I’ll finish up here. Help your mama now.”

All the way to the ranch house, Rose thought about the last three years, how hard they’d all worked to build up this ranch. For the first time in years, there were younger men with them to help—some straggled back from the war with a limp or a distractedness or a new worldliness to their face, but useful.

Even so, her grandfather continued to include her in his everyday doings whenever he was home, whether tending cows or ginning grain or riding the fence line. Occasionally, he even let her sit off to the side when he met with other men, talking of the future of Canadian Colored Town. Her grandfather was an important man here, which made Rose feel important too. And time spent with Grampa Cow Tom meant less time under the disapproving eye of Ma’am.

Small puffs of dirt exploded in the air each time Gramma Amy whacked one of the rugs and quilts hung over a taut clothesline behind the ranch house. Rose waved to her grandmother as she passed. One of her aunts scraped at dirt caked on the outside of the real glass windows and, pail in hand, soaped them down after with a coarse scrap of rag. The moment Rose entered through the back door of the ranch house, her eyes teared and she smelled a sharp burn. Her sister Elizabeth sat by the fireplace, where the big, black pot hung above the flames, humming, playing by herself, some private game with beanbags.

Rose rushed to take up the long spoon and tried to stir the bubbling mixture. Great chunks of charred corn began to surface, and the burned smell overwhelmed. “Elizabeth, haven’t you been tending at all?”

Elizabeth looked up, guilty. “Ma’am’s going to be mad,” she said.

“Didn’t Ma’am tell you to stir?”

Elizabeth’s eyes grew narrow and her chin quivered.

“I’m sorry, Rose.”

Both Gramma Amy and Ma’am came at a run into the room at the same time, sniffing at the air. Gramma Amy carried in the quilts she’d cleaned and Ma’am’s arms were full of firewood.

“Smells like the whole house is going up in flames,” Ma’am said, as her grandmother threw open the doors to let the smoke out.

“
Sofki
looks to be ruined, Ma’am,” Rose said.

Elizabeth started to cry in earnest, great gasping sobs, equal parts fear and performance. She positioned herself as far behind Rose as she could, trying to hide herself, grabbing hold of Rose’s tunic and refusing to let go.

“It’s my fault, Ma’am. I should have watched her,” Rose said, diverting her mother’s disapproval from Elizabeth.

“Three days wasted, and no time to start again,” Ma’am said to Rose. “Short on looks and long on clumsy. No husband will want the likes of you.”

“Malinda,” Gramma Amy said sharply. “Enough. We’ve time to make corn stew instead.”

“Always off doing man’s work,” Ma’am grumbled. “Putting on airs, trailing behind Papa Cow Tom. Well, there’s corn in the crib for you to start over by yourself. Be done by supper.”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“First take this mess and throw it to the hogs.”

Elizabeth sniffled. “I want to help Rose.”

“See what you’ve done to her?” said Ma’am, prying Elizabeth from behind Rose. “No need making the same mistake twice. Elizabeth, you come with me, help me put fresh linen on the beds.”

Ma’am led Elizabeth from the room, the girl piteous in the looks she threw Rose over her shoulder.

Rose wrapped her hands in dishrags and wrestled the hot, heavy pot off the fireplace latch. She heard the sizzle as the pot brushed
her arm, and the jolting sting threw her off-kilter. She managed to right the pot before she spilled too much of the spoiled
sofki
on the kitchen floor, but an angry pucker marked the burn spot on her skin. She scanned frantically to make sure her mother hadn’t seen. But it was only Gramma Amy in the room.

Her grandmother took a look at her arm. “Not too bad,” she said. “We’ll cool it down with cold water from the stream and put honey on it.”

“What’d I do?” Rose asked. “What’d I ever do to her?”

“Your mama’s wrong. Isn’t true, the things she says. Those are her private devils talking. Started long ago. You just weren’t what she dreamed up, is all.”

Gramma Amy let her hand linger on Rose’s arm. Her touch was firm and warm.

“You go on fix yourself up and get the corn started. I’ll clean up here, take the rest to the hogs, and we’ll get another pot going in no time. Go on, now. The white men be here soon enough.”

Chapter 43

“LOOKING FORWARD TO
supper,” said one of the white men. He was taller than the other by almost a full head length.

From the first, the talky agent, heavily whiskered and a bit overbearing, took the lead between the two overnight guests, and tried to awe all of the family with his position as an agricultural agent. He addressed her grandfather as if they were longtime acquaintances, confidants in a conspiracy.

“Look here. How’d you come by so much tamed land so quick after the loss and want of war? Cows, corn, cotton, chickens. We seen many a citizen, Creek freedman or full-blood, trying to scratch a second-rate living from the soil, one step from starvation.”

Rose watched her grandfather puff up, gravitating to the sound of admiration, welcoming a chance to impress.

“First time I come to Indian Territory was over thirty years ago, in a scouting party from Alabama. I know this territory, where’s the good land and the bad, and so long as Creek law allows me all the land I put under fence and cultivation, I will run my cattle and plant my crops to the better of any man.”

The agents exchanged a look, trying to figure him out. Rose enjoyed their puzzlement. Sometimes she couldn’t figure him out either, so how could they? Absently, she touched the raw, red, tender spot of the fresh burn on her arm, now sticky with honey administered by her grandmother. The wound was minor. Her grandfather
came to the kitchen shortly after their guests arrived and plucked her from her tasks, telling Ma’am he needed Rose as well as the younger men as he escorted their guests the width and breadth of the ranch.