The Orphan Mother (28 page)

There, sitting neatly next to the door, sat a pair of men's boots, scuffed and worn, a deep gouge in one of them. She recognized them immediately as her son's, and Tole's.

She picked them up and hugged them to her chest. “You be careful, George Tole,” she whispered to the new day. “And you come back, hear?”

August 10, 1867

Down the steps he went, then up the hill past the big house, which shone in the morning light like something freshly created, like a gift. The underside of the porch ceilings had been painted blue and glowed as if the sky were right overhead.
Such a world we live in
, he thought, terrible and extraordinary in equal turns.

No one was about, and he picked his way barefoot across the driveway, past the rows of the dead Confederate boys lying calm and easy, wrapped in the care of Mrs. Carrie McGavock, who would do all she could to write to their loved ones, to make the connection, to give peace if peace were at all a possibility. He wondered for the hundredth or thousandth time if he'd ever seen any of those Confederate boys through his bead moving behind their picket lines, laughing at a joke or reading a letter or trying to scrub off the funk of blood and battle. He wondered at the coincidences of the world, that perhaps that soldier and he, a broken Union sharpshooter, a rarity out of the ranks of the Colored Troops, should for an instant share another patch of ground. The sunlight fell in orderly shafts through the trees; the whitewashed plank markers glowed and stretched for an eternity.

He would go, for a while, to Hooper's camp. There he'd find clothing enough, and new boots, and as much moonshine as he needed or could ever want. From there he could watch—watch Elijah Dixon, and watch over Mariah Reddick.

He was now past the brick pile that was Carnton, beyond the fields and into the woods, stumbling down a steep hill to where water splashed in a stream. He thought about the quiet that would come with living so deep in the forest. A woodpecker rattled a tree a few paces away, and insects buzzed. Would life always be this quiet? Would Mariah really come or would life somehow get in the way? Could he be the man she needed him to be? Right now had been too soon for her to come with him, he knew—she'd just buried her son. He would be there when she was ready.

Cicadas whirred in the trees. High summer in Middle Tennessee, warm and sultry and so very much alive. Winter was a lifetime away, and in the meantime there were boots he needed finding at Hooper's camp.

Off to his left a kestrel called, sharp and choppy, repeating its cry over and over as if desperate for understanding. Another kestrel, over the next hill, answered.

The sound wasn't coming from quite the same direction as where he was headed, but it was close enough. Tole followed.

August 11, 1867

The moonshine was the undoing of George Tole: gallons of moonshine, neatly stacked in one of the cordoned-off areas in Hooper's camp. Tole had just wanted a sample, just a taste; it had been just a bit shy of a month since his last sip of alcohol, or at least it seemed that long—the longest he had been without a drink for years now. But the sip had turned into a swallow, and the swallow into additional swallows. He didn't remember falling asleep.

But now, suddenly, suddenly he was terribly awake. It wasn't quite morning. The moon was full and poured waves over the woods and the camp. Boughs heavy with leaves blocked the stars. Down the hill the creek poured and poured itself away, onward to the Harpeth and the Mississippi and the ocean; and nearby a drip, drip from the moonshine kettle rang out clear and soft and unattainable.

All of this he was aware of, as if all the universe had without warning invaded his senses.

For what centered his attention, in that last moment, as Hooper's moonshine dripped its song upon the world, was the soft, almost comforting feel of the hand cupping his right shoulder, pulling him up into the air and the light.

A breath on his face: foul, smelling of corn liquor and garlic and fear.

A voice: “Hello, nigger.”

And then the sound of the cock of a pistol.

December 12, 1912

The tea had been drunk, the washing-up complete (“We will wash and dry, Mrs. Reddick, it's no trouble at all”), and the daylight had begun to fade. It was the time of day Mariah liked best: when the sun cast no shadow, when the world glowed with a last tremulous light before dusk poured in.

Her visitors rose by some unseen signal. Reverend Cravath thanked her yet again for her hospitality. “Time to be going,” he repeated for the second or third time. “And please, Mrs. Reddick, come to see us. See how your generosity will be put to good use. We would love to have you.”

“Maybe I will. Would be a treat, seeing young Negro men learning and making something of themselves. Reckon I'd like to see that.”

“And they would love to meet you,” Parmalee Edwards put in.

“Even if they don't know my name?” She couldn't help teasing him a little, him being so kind and humorless.

“Even so. We could host a special dinner for you, introduce you to some of the best scholars—young Whittaker Doolittle, for instance, studying medicine—a fine young man he is, whip smart, with a memory that just eats facts and figures.”

“I don't imagine young Whittaker Doolittle would have a lot to say to this old woman.”

“Probably more than you'd think.” By now they were donning coats, finding gloves in errant pockets. She wondered if they were staying in Franklin for the night or taking the train back to Nashville. Perhaps they even had a motorcar, but she doubted it.

As they moved toward the door she said, “I reckon you forgot the second reason you came.”

They stared at her a moment, and then Reverend Cravath recovered. “The condition of the bequest was that someone from the university had to come out here, meet you—”

“I wanted you to come out here because I have something else to give you.”

“Something else? But you've already been so generous—really, Mrs. Reddick—”

“This is important.”

She left them for a moment but was soon back, carrying a worn carpetbag, its reds and blues long faded to gray and shreds. She needed both hands to lift it and place it in Cravath's own.

For a moment he had to tug it, as if her fingers refused to loosen. But then they did and the handle fell away and the man in the jeweled stickpin, whose hands had probably never held a rifle or a pistol or a plow or a cobbler's hammer, took the bag into his smooth hands. Something in Mariah's chest loosened as if she'd been holding a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding, and now that breath poured out of her.

He opened the bag and peered inside.

“What is it?” Edwards asked, craning to look.

Cravath didn't answer, pulling out a pair of polished black leather boots. The toes were scuffed, one heel deeply scarred, but the leather shone, soft and supple, as if waxed and cleaned a few hours ago. “These are yours?” he asked her, holding one out.

“In a manner of speaking. They were my son's. They were other folks', too, for a while. But they're mine now. And I want you to have them.”

“What do you want us to do with them?”

“You find a place to put them,” she told them. “Find a tall place in some belltower somewhere, someplace where they can look out and see all those fine earnest young scholars you've been telling me about. Find someplace where the wind will dry them and the birds can nest in them and in a few years they won't be shoes no more. Just put them somewhere high, you hear me? Put them somewhere where they can see, and if you're looking in the right place, where you can see them.”

An odd request, certainly, but an easy one. The men eyed her warily. She wondered for a moment if these founders of this fine university would just toss the boots from the carriage window on their way back to Nashville—but no, they wouldn't. That was why she had summoned them. To look them in the eye and to see them for herself, to size up what kind of men they were.

They were that promise come to life, she thought. All those babies, freshly washed in the air of the world, twisting their fingers and crying out as the force of life shuddered into their lungs for the first time. Those children had grown and they would keep the promises they made to her. Or if they didn't—if the world blew in, raw and ugly—that was all right, too. Because they would try. They were good men and they would try.

That would be enough for Mariah.

My agent, Jeff Kleinman, asked me the question that I had been dreading anyone asking. He asked in light of the slaughter of the innocents in Charleston, in light of the events in Ferguson, in light of all the rest that swirls around us these days, how could I, a very white man living in the first quarter of the twenty-first century, justify writing a novel about the plight of a mixed-race woman living in the second half of the nineteenth century?

It's a tough question. I will not try to rattle off some dubious credentials about growing up around black people, as if somehow their “blackness” rubbed off on me. The truth is, while the world I grew up in was painfully unequal for those around me, it was hardly separate. Yet, I make no claim to somehow understanding anyone by proximity.

In truth, I realized, Jeff asked me two questions. The first question is “Why now?”—how, at this point in history, can I even attempt to address the life of this woman in the world we live in? My answer to this is simple. I can think of no better time than today to speak about race and history. Despite all the politically correct attempts by those around us to mask what we see every day, the issue of “race” is always with us. It has been so since the first slaves arrived at Jamestown, and perhaps it will be with us for years to come.

Events in the past few years, however—what happened in Charleston and Ferguson and all the other places of late—has focused me as never before. I believe that we are, all of us, called to examine the human condition—
our
condition—and race remains there, front and center. So that, Jeff, is why this story needs to be told now.

As far as the second part of the question—as to how I, a white man, can attempt to speak for a black woman—well, that's a bit harder. When my first novel,
The Widow of the South
, came out, again and again women would confront me, asking me how I could possibly understand what a mother could go through, losing a child. After all, I was not only not a woman, but had never had a child, let alone lost one.

In the end, all I could say to them was that I had not tried to understand what it was to be a woman so much as I had tried to understand what it was to be human. I was writing about human loss.

There are several qualities required to be a good storyteller. I have never claimed to possess an abundance of many of them, but whatever else I may lack, no one can claim I wasn't given the empathy gene. I say “gene” for, like my dad, it seems to be more than just sentimentality. Even as a child, I was struck by the sadness of those around me and wondered why they were sad.

So, how can I dare write and speak for a black woman? The answer is that I didn't. I have tried, once again, to understand a human being, with the same hopes and dreams, the same responses to sorrow and loss, that all humans have, whatever their circumstances.

I remain fascinated with the themes of transformation and redemption—the kind of transformation, and redemption, that I imagine a former slave named Mariah Reddick might have possessed.

The first time I was given the privilege to create a list of acknowledgments, I began by saying that while it would be long, it would never be complete. Nothing has changed. There are so many folks who have pushed—and often dragged—me along over the years to reach this point in time. I could never possibly name them all any more than I will ever be able to appropriately thank, let alone repay, their kindness and support.

At the top of any list of thanks is my agent, Jeff Kleinman, at Folio Literary Management, who's advised, guided, directed, encouraged, and supported me through it all. His greatness is his passion for his clients and his credibility in expressing that passion to the world. I've come to realize that none of this could have happened without Jeff. I can't imagine a better agent nor a better friend.

An enormous, heartfelt thanks to my tireless editor, teacher, and advisor, Duncan Murrell, who consistently went well beyond the call of duty to make this book a reality. And to Kenny Porpora, whose insights really changed this book for the better.

A team of readers lent their time and sage wisdom to this endeavor: most especially, Amy Rosenbaum, Annika Neklason, Natalie Edwards, Hannah Smith, and Corinne Kleinman.

I am forever grateful to Jamie Raab, who is not only my publisher, but has evolved into my editor. While there is no doubt that I am indebted for life to both Amy Einhorn and Deb Futter, ace editors on my first two novels, yet even then I knew Jamie was there for me. She seemed just offstage, encouraging and making subtle suggestions along the way. Now she has stepped onstage as my editor. I am grateful for her taking on this role, grateful for her wisdom, support, and encouragement. Likewise, I am indebted for all the folks at Grand Central who have played a real role in making this happen: Maddie Caldwell, Anne Twomey, Bob Castillo, Abby Reilly, Andy Dodds, Roland Ottewell, and Deborah Wiseman.

Then there is my family, so far away—Marcus and Candy, Nova, Danny and Ivan.

With gratitude to all those who have walked alongside me during this often arduous journey; the best friends anyone could have ever had—Beth and Peter Thevenot, SK and Russell Hooper, Olivia and Justin Stelter, Jayne and Julian Bibb, Susan and Damon Byrd, Trish and Jim Munro, Deborah and Mike Lovett, Susan and JT Thompson, Ann Johnson, Violet Cieri, Estee Pouleris and Monte Isom, Ashlyn and Brian Meneguzzi, Lynn and Ghislain Vander Elst, Elaine and Rick Warwick, Tim Putnam, Jamie Kabler, Carol and Joel Tomlin, Kelly and Bo Bills, Jenilee and Philippe Vander Elst, Nathalie and Tyler Stewart, Evan Lowenstein, Mike Cotter, Andrew Glasgow, Greg Lancaster, Mary Springs Couteaud, Ellen Pryor, Mindy Tate, Elizabeth and Johan Sorensen, Joseph Spence, Emily Volman, Christina Boys, Willie Steele, Scott Sager, Teresa and Danny Anderson, Mary Pearce, Michael Curcio, Cahl Moser, Danelle Mitchell, Dave Wright, Carroll Van West, Kay and Rod Heller, Mary and Winder Heller, Pat and Hanes Heller, and so many, many others.

Thank you, all.