Unmentionables
By David Greene
First Five Chapters for Preview
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Chapter 1
Sammy Speaks
“Stop your fussing, Ella,” Wally said.
“Just swat a fly, mama.”
“Must be the sugar. They smell that sugar you spilled on your dress. Now you’ll have no end of flies.”
The sugar was for a bowl of raspberries that Wally picked from a bramble. The raspberries were in a new bowl she bought in town with her Sunday money. Slaves were not obliged to work on the Sabbath, but if they did, it was the custom to remunerate them with modest pay. Over the years, Wally had devoted most of her Sunday money to the purchase of wooden bowls, which she prized especially because they did not break if someone should drop one.
Ella settled back with the bowl, and pondered whether to eat one berry at a time and make them last or just …. She stopped, and turned toward the sound of a horse’s hooves behind her. Mr. Holland maneuvered the buggy into the yard from Christmasville Road, towing a clapboard utility wagon. He whistled to Willis to come unhitch Maple. Ella and Wally went to see what Mr. Holland had in the wagon. There in the back, wrapped in a gray blanket, was a small dark boy, a stranger.
Wally was the first to speak, “Well I’ll be ….”
Willis ran up alongside Maple and took the rein from Mr. Holland’s hand. He looked at the boy in the back. “And who’s that you brought along here?” he asked.
The boy clutched the blanket around his shoulders. He turned and shot a glance at Wally, Ella and Willis, who stood around the wagon to inspect him. He turned his eyes away and stared straight ahead at a spot where no one stood. For a moment no one spoke. Leaves rustled from a light breeze in the courtyard.
“This is Samuel,” said Mr. Holland at last. “Boy of five years old. Regrettably, the boy’s mother passed away in June. So his people sent him up to Memphis with traders. And when I got into town, I ….”
He stopped. Aroused by the sound of the buggy, Mrs. Holland had come out of the big house with Sarah and Dorothy. They walked quickly toward the wagon. From the other direction, Jimmy strode out of the slave cabin and joined the group. In the twilight, Mrs. Holland squinted at the boy bundled in a blanket.
“George, what in the world …?” Her hand waved.
“I was just saying,” said Mr. Holland, “that this boy is named Samuel. His mother passed away in June and ….” He paused, trying to anticipate his wife’s reaction as he considered his words.
George Holland’s wife wore a pale blue dress with lace trim, which she often wore in the evenings, but which was nevertheless insufficient for the cool night air. She put one hand around her bare shoulder, and the other firmly on the wagon’s sideboard. She scanned the wagon’s contents. “George, did you purchase this …?”
“Yes, Henrietta, the boy was put in the charge of two gentlemen who happened to bring him into the dry goods store where I was transacting business. They said he was a most obedient and right-acting lad at an especially low price … I ….” He turned to the boy. “Look at him, my dear.” He swung an upturned hand toward the boy as if he were presenting the Prince of Wales. “I thought he’d be fine with Wally and Jake.” He looked around the group. “We need to think of the future,” he said.
Mrs. Holland stared at the blanketed boy in the back of the wagon, who continued to look straight ahead, as if he couldn’t hear what anyone was saying. His wide eyes were two chestnuts set sunny side up in a face like dark chocolate. No one dared speak. The entire assembly waited to see if Mrs. Holland would be angry or not. The boy turned for a moment, bravely flashed his bug-eyes at her, and quickly turned back.
“Oh Lord help us,” said Mrs. Holland. “I hope he won’t be much bother. I hope he’s quiet.” She shivered, rapped her knuckles on the side of the wagon and turned to walk back toward the house.
Mr. Holland clambered out of the wagon to follow her. “Yes, yes,” he said. “He’s been as quiet as a mouse for two days. You’ll see, my dear, a good investment at a bargain price. The child cost but a trifle, Henrietta.”
The master and mistress disappeared into the house. Dorothy and the assembled slaves pressed in on the wagon, while the boy sat inside, not moving.
For a moment, no one was sure what to do. Willis led Maple away toward the barn. Wally reached into the unhitched wagon and put her hand on the boy's shoulder, “How d’ye do, young Sammy,” she attempted a formal tone. “Welcome to our house.” The boy didn’t move. “Looks like you’re going to live here now.” She rubbed his head. “We’re going to be your people.”
Wally shook her head as the weight of this realization sank in. She clasped her hands together as if she were about to pray. The boy sucked in a breath and craned his head back to look up at the sky. His chestnut eyes rolled around, searching for stars, some of which twinkled faintly in the evening twilight.
Wally unclasped her hands and climbed into the wagon. She was a slim, strong woman. She was short, but when she stood up straight in the wagon next to Sammy and looked up at the October sky she seemed tall. Wally surveyed the group around her. “OK now,” she said.
She knelt and took hold of the boy by both his arms. “They call me Wally,” she said. She looked at Dorothy, who was craning to see over the side of the wagon, bouncing on her tiptoes. “And down here is Miss Dorothy, Massa Holland’s daughter. And there on Miss Dorothy’s right is Sarah, the cook. Her husband, Willis, is the man who took the horse to the barn. Sarah and Willis live with the Hollands up in the house and they are the house servants.”
The boy cocked his head but did not speak.
“And over here on Miss Dorothy’s left is my Ella.” Wally pointed at Ella, who still held the bowl of raspberries in her hand. “And this here,” she pointed at a tall, crow-black boy with a bright orange rag tied around his head, “is my son, Jimmy. I reckon Ella and Jimmy are going to be your new sister and brother.”
Jimmy stuck out his hand and held it in front of the boy’s face. “Hey, brother,” he said.
Sammy closed his eyes, then opened them and looked around the group. He saw that Jimmy was holding his hand out and that he was supposed to shake it. He looked at the orange head rag on Jimmy’s head, and then into Jimmy’s eyes.
“It’s OK, brother,” Jimmy said. “We gonna look after you. You gonna be all right now.”
But Sammy closed his eyes again, pulled his arms out of Wally’s grip, took the blanket from around his shoulders, raised it over his head, and pulled it down until he disappeared beneath it.
“Poor child,” said Wally. “What a sorrowful time he’s had!” She put her hand over her mouth for a moment, then let it drop. “Oh I guess ….” She looked around the yard trying to think what to do next. “I guess we better take him in the cabin.”
Jimmy climbed into the wagon, scooped the boy up, holding him with one arm, and gently tugged the blanket off his head with his free hand. “I’m gonna take you in the house now, Mr. Sammy,” he said. “You don’t have to worry about nothing or say nothing.” Jimmy hopped to the ground with the boy in his arms and led the way toward a cabin across the yard from the Hollands’ house. The whole group, including Willis, who had returned from the barn, filed in a procession to the slave cabin where Wally, Ella and Jimmy lived with old Jake.
Inside, Jake snored in his wooden bed. It was unusual for a slave to have a wooden bed, but Jake had belonged to George Holland’s father, Walter, who in his lifetime was a furniture maker in North Carolina. Walter, when he died, bequeathed Jake not only the bed, but also a wooden table and three good chairs, which sat in the center of Jake and Wally’s cabin. Walter also bequeathed Jake himself to his son, George Holland, which, though not unexpected, had ended Jake’s unspoken hope that he might someday be set free.
Jake, as was his custom, had gone to bed early. But when the procession streamed into the room, he sat up and rubbed his eyes.
“Jake, what do you think? We got us a new member of the family,” Wally said. “Massa Holland done bought this child up in Memphis on account of his mama passed away and his people sent him up to the traders in Memphis.”
Jimmy held the bundled boy aloft and sat him down slowly on the side of Jake’s bed as evidence of Wally’s truthfulness.
Wally sat on the bed, too, and once again took the boy’s hands. “Sammy, this is Jake. When Jake was a boy, just like you, the traders got him in Africa. Them traders brought him over to North Carolina. Jake was the first ever slave of Massa Holland’s father. Back in Africa his name was Juba, so we call him Juba Jake.”
Juba Jake glanced at the child’s face. He bowed his head remembering his first encounter with the new world. He reached out to put his hand on the boy’s shoulder and closed his eyes. For a moment his eyelids trembled. Then he opened his eyes and looked at the boy tenderly. “Ain’t nothing I can say to make it better—but you gonna be better by and by.” Jake coughed to clear his throat. “You got to know you lucky to come here now. Massa Holland’s a good one, ’bout as good as can be, I suppose.” As he spoke, Jake realized Dorothy was standing in the group, along with the others. But he continued, “And we all had our lot thrown in here together and you got to know we gonna look after you. You gonna get by, child.” Jake looked up at Wally. “Is Massa Holland fixing to have him live here?”
“Yes, that’s what he said. He said, ‘He’ll be fine with Wally and Jake.’”
* * *
The next morning Jimmy and Ella gave Sammy a tour of the farm. Sammy held Jimmy’s hand.
“We live in the first cabin,” said Jimmy. “In the next cabin is Daniel, Jefferson, Little Andrew and Solomon.”
“One, two, three, four,” said Ella. “Four men.”
“They’re all field hands,” said Jimmy, “like me.”
“Me too,” said Ella.
“Nah, you don’t work in no field, Ella.” Jimmy turned to Sammy. “Ella is the water girl. That means she brings the water out to us when we’re working in the field.”
“Yup, I bring the water,” Ella said, “but nobody works today ’cause it’s Sunday.”
“Right,” said Jimmy. “And here in the last cabin we got Luke, Big Andrew, Paymore and John Henry.”
“John Henry has two names,” said Ella, “but he’s just one man. Little Andrew and Big Andrew are two men. Big Andrew ain’t really so big. But Little Andrew is short, so since he’s littler than Big Andrew, we call him Little Andrew.”
Sammy stared at the unadorned clapboard cabins, which seemed small to house so many men. He looked back at Jimmy and Ella, but said nothing.
“I don’t think he’s ever going to talk,” said Ella.
“He don’t need to. You talk enough for both of you.”
“I ain’t either.”
Jimmy continued. “Over in the big house is where Sarah and Willis live. They live behind the kitchen. Then upstairs is Massa Holland and Mrs. Holland.”
“And Dorothy,” Ella said.
They had come to the barn, a large painted wood building with a chicken coop attached to one of the exterior walls. Inside the barn were two horses, seven mules and a milk cow. On the right side of the barn were ten stalls, one for each animal. The first two stalls held the horses; then came a slightly larger stall for the cow, with room for a stool and assorted pails. Then came the smaller stalls of the mules. Bales of hay sat stacked like giant loaves of bread along the opposite wall with pitchforks stuck in two of the loaves.
They stepped inside. The smell of animals and hay was pungent. Jimmy led them to the horses’ stalls. “Little brother, this is the horse that drove you in last night.” said Jimmy. “Her name is Maple. And the dark horse, his name is Walnut.”
Sammy nodded, but still did not speak.
Ella tugged them on to the next stall. “This is the cow,” said Ella, “Her name’s Basheba.”
“Bathsheba,” Jimmy corrected, “Bathsheba is the milk cow.” Then he pointed at the mules’ stalls. “Massa Holland named the mules like a music scale. They’re names are ‘do,’ ‘re,’ ‘mi,’ ‘fa,’ ‘sol,’ ‘la,’ and ‘ti ’ I can’t say for sure which one is which, but Paymore knows each one by name. He says we got a pack of musical mules.”
A chicken waddled in through the open barn door. Ella pointed at it and giggled. “Jimmy, don’t forget rooster.”
Jimmy smiled. “Oh yeah, we got one rooster and we call him George Junior.”
“Cause even before it’s daytime,” said Ella, “George Junior, he wakes everyone up and Massa Holland’s name is George and so you can’t say nothing about it, cause Massa Holland don’t know about it.”
“He won’t say nothing,” said Jimmy.
Sammy tugged out of Jimmy’s hand and went to stare at Bathsheba more closely.
“I don’t think he ever saw a cow before,” said Ella.
“Could be there weren’t no cows where he lived,” Jimmy said. “Someday maybe he’ll tell us where he comes from.” He took the boy’s hand again. “But don’t worry, little brother; you don’t have to talk about it today.”
There were three short barks out in the yard. In through the open barn door ran a medium sized yellow dog with floppy ears just shorter than a rabbit’s. The dog’s tail wagged furiously as it rushed up to Ella.
“Venus!” Ella exclaimed.
Sammy clung to Jimmy’s hand, but Jimmy beckoned the dog over to them.
“Come on, Venus. Come over here; meet our new brother.” The dog approached Sammy with its mouth open in a silly grin. Sammy tentatively put one hand out. The dog sniffed it, and Sammy pulled away. “She won’t hurt you,” said Jimmy. “She’s a real nice dog.”
Sammy let go of Jimmy and leaned toward the dog. His eyes widened. With both hands, he brushed the dog’s back. The dog turned to lick one of Sammy’s hands. Sammy’s eyes lit up. He looked up at Jimmy. Jimmy nodded.
“Venus,” Sammy said.
Instantly Ella ran out through the barn door and down the line of cabins to the first one in the row. She burst into the room where Wally was scrubbing the table.
“He talked!” Ella shouted. “Sammy said Venus!”
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Chapter 2
“A child don’t know”
Christmasville Road was the main thoroughfare from the Hollands’ farm to the town of Jackson, Tennessee. It was a dirt road—a mix of clay and sand with a yellowish tinge. There were farms and plantations all along the road. A strip of woods, mostly narrow, sometimes wide, separated the road from the private properties. Occasionally, an entry gate or service lane interrupted the wall of trees, which lined the length of the road from the county line to the town. There were scaly bark hickories, sweet and black gums, that turned bright orange in October. There were mulberry trees that scattered purple splotches of fruit on the ground all around.
Slaves made good use of these woods after dark. If a slave was out without a pass, a slave had to sneak. And the best way to sneak was in the woods. At night, paddy rollers and dogs patrolled the road. Most often, they peered into the woods with whale oil lamps, and cursed the darkness that hid dark faces.
The woods were a sanctuary in another way. The slaves held prayer meetings and church gatherings in the woods on Sundays. Their meeting place was in a grove along the banks of Dyer Creek. The creek formed the left side of a V of which Christmasville Rd. made the right side. The spot where the creek and road met was the halfway point from the Hollands’ farm to the town of Jackson. Since woods lined both the creek and the road, their juncture was where the woods were thickest. It was there that the road crossed a wooden bridge over the creek.
It was 1857. Ella and Dorothy stopped at the bridge, as they always did. Dorothy was on her way to school. Ella was on an errand to buy potatoes for the Hollands’ dinner. Dorothy was 16 and Ella was 15, both wavering between youth and adulthood.
Dorothy was supposed to ride one of the mules so she wouldn’t tire on her way to school. Ella was supposed to walk alongside the mule and carry Dorothy’s books. But Dorothy refused to ride. She said she’d rather walk. When they left the farm, Ella carried Dorothy’s books for show, but once they got on the road, Dorothy took half the books herself. Dorothy’s discomfort with slavery had been evident since she was little.
Ella was her best friend. Dorothy could not square that with being Ella’s mistress. Dorothy half-heartedly acted the part when her family was present. But even that effort waned. By the time she reached 16, Dorothy felt old enough to disagree with her parents. Nonetheless, she bided her time. She understood that the thoughts she had were radical. She watched and waited—looking for signs—for anything that might help her understand why slavery existed. She felt she must be older before she passed judgment.
Ella, for her part, saw Dorothy as an exception, as not really part of the Hollands in particular or of the white race in general. Ella had accepted the fact that she was a slave. Because she liked Dorothy, she was more willing to play the slave with Dorothy than she was with any of the other Hollands. But Dorothy’s questioning of the status quo sometimes made her feel worse. When Dorothy wondered aloud why Ella couldn’t go to school with her, it was the first time Ella thought what it might be like to go to school. Dorothy’s reordering of assumptions made it harder for Ella to come to terms with her situation.
“Don’t you want to learn things? Don’t you want to learn how to read?” Dorothy asked.
Ella took her time answering. “This child has no time for reading. Besides, I don’t need to read to do what I have to do. I learnt cooking from Wally and Sarah. I learnt cotton picking from Paymore.”
Dorothy smiled. “From Paymore?”
“Yup,” said Ella. “Why, you thought I was born knowing how to do it? You think it’s easy?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s not really that hard—not for me anyway.” Ella thought back to her first day picking cotton. “After your daddy bought Sammy, he decided Sammy would carry the water instead of me. He said it was time for me to learn to pick cotton. So they gave me a bag and took me out to the field. They wanted Jimmy to teach me what to do, but I said no. I said I have enough trouble with him telling me what to do all the time. I said let Paymore teach me, ’cause he’s always polite to me.”
“Was he a good teacher?”
“He knows how to pick cotton. When he showed me what to do, I said, ‘Is that all there is to it?’ and he said, ‘Miss Ella, that’s all there is to it, and soon enough you gonna wish there’s more to it than there is.’”
Dorothy laughed. “I guess it must be boring.”
“Yes’m, if you’re just doing it, it’s boring. But you got to play a game. You got to be quick with your fingers. You got to watch out not to break the buds that ain’t bloomed. Your hands got to fly around like a butterfly. You got to drag that sack up and down the rows. That sack gets heavier and heavier just when you get more and more tired. When I’m picking cotton, I say to myself, ‘Somewhere somebody must be using a whole lot of cotton.’ With all the cotton I personally picked, you could make clothes for half the people in the world.”
“The world is bigger than you think.”
“Course I don’t pick as much as some do.”
“Who picks the most?” asked Dorothy.
Ella was reluctant to admit it. “Jimmy picks the most.”
“Oh, I cannot believe that!”
“He likes to work, but don’t tell him I told you, cause he’ll say it ain’t true. When he works, it’s like he’s dancing. He gets going. Then you see him catch himself. He slows down. But it’s his mind that slows him down, not his body. If he wanted to, he could pick circles of cotton round the rest of us.”
“Why does he slow down?”
“He don’t like bein’ a slave.”
“Oh.”
“’Course he be upset about everything. He be upset with me ‘cause I ask too many questions. He be mad at Wally ’cause she don’t let him do what he want. The only one he never be mad at is Sammy. They stick up for each other. When Sammy first carried the water, he always took the bucket to Jimmy first. Jimmy would stop his picking and say, ‘Oh, little brother, I been waiting on you. I been dreaming of that water for the longest time. Oh, I’m a thirsty cotton picker, and here you come with all that good water to give me.’ He’d make a big show of it. Sammy would giggle and dip the gourd in the bucket real slow. And Jimmy would fall on his knees and spread his arms wide and let Sammy pour the water in his mouth, while Jimmy threw back his neck and slurped and ooohed and ahhhed. Well it was quite a show for the rest of us, cause we all standing around thirsty waiting for them to get through playing. And you know Sammy would sometimes start to pour a little too fast and spill water on Jimmy’s face and nose, and they’d both fall out laughing. Your daddy was never too happy about this.”
“He probably wished someone would pour water all over his face too,” Dorothy said.
“One day it went too far. Sammy got carried away. While Jimmy was on his knees, Sammy poured the whole bucket down onto Jimmy’s face. Jimmy fell back on the ground, soaking wet. Then Sammy fell down next to him and they both laughed and laughed. But when your daddy saw, he came up and stood right on top of them. Your daddy was real mad. He was hot and thirsty, and all the water was spilt. With one hand, he reached down and grabbed Sammy by the back of his shirt. He picked that boy up and held him in the air. He started to shake him. I thought for sure he’s gonna go get the whip. But just then, Wally ran up and grabbed him out your daddy’s hand, and scolded the boy real loud. She said, ‘Child, you got to behave. You got to behave. We not out here playing games child. You wasted all that water and now Massa Holland and the rest of us is thirsty. We working hard out here and won’t be too long ‘fore you know what I’m talking about. Now you run like the devil and bring back some fresh water for your Massa before we all come get you with the whip.”
“Your mama’s smart.”
“Mmm, she turned to your daddy and said, “Look here, the boy don’t know what he’s doing. A child don’t know. I’ll see to it that he brings the water from now on straight to you.”
Ella and Dorothy had tarried on the bridge too long. Dorothy grabbed Ella’s hand. “Come on,” she said, “we’re going to be late. You make me forget the time with your stories.”
After they’d walked a quarter mile past the bridge, they heard the rumble of horse hooves behind them. Dorothy had been holding Ella’s hand. Now she yanked her toward the side of the road. “Watch out!”
A carriage rushed toward them at tremendous speed. As they turned, they saw a plume of dust rise like a windstorm behind the carriage. There was a break in the dust plume as the carriage clattered onto the bridge over Dyer Creek. At the end of the bridge, the clatter stopped, and the rumble and dust cloud resumed. In an instant, the horses and wheels whooshed upon them. A uniformed black coachman peered at them and cracked the whip on the horses. Dorothy and Ella lurched from the road to a shallow ditch, where they turned to look back at the coach. They glimpsed a white man in a tall black hat. His hands rested on a black walking stick, propped between his knees. He cupped a pair of white gloves, which sat folded on the polished silver crown of the stick. The man looked at them from the carriage glass—but his eyes glazed over. He did not see them.
The dust storm trailing the carriage erupted all around them. Their dresses flew up. Each girl instinctively put one hand out to hold her dress down, and another to her mouth to keep from choking. When the dust died down, they climbed back onto the road, and swatted their clothes.
“Who was that?” asked Ella.
“Augustus Askew,” Dorothy said.
“So that’s what he looks like,” said Ella.
“Seems like he doesn’t care who he runs over,” said Dorothy.
“I don’t think he saw us.”
“Oh he’s a selfish, cruel old man. May his carriage tip and fall and end his misery,” Dorothy said.
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Chapter 3
The Light Within
In May of 1860, a traveling painter arrived in Jackson. Erastus Hicks painted “anything that wants an artist’s hand,” including portraits, signs, keepsakes, lithographs, and Biblical illustrations. Word of the artist’s arrival spread. Within a week, Mr. Hicks received a commission. Mr. Augustus Askew engaged Mr. Hicks to paint two paintings: first, a portrait of his wife, Lucille, and, second, a painting to illustrate one of Mr. Askew’s favorite Biblical scenes, in which Mary of Bethany, sister of Martha, washes the Lord’s feet.
Mr. Hicks began his work at the Askew plantation, which bore the name Hickory Grove in honor of the row of stately hickories that lined both sides of the lane from the gate on Christmasville Road to the plantation house.
As he calculated his financial expenses, Mr. Askew briefly explored with Mr. Hicks whether the artist might combine the two projects by inserting the portrait of his wife into the Biblical allegory in the role of Mary. However, Erastus convinced Augustus that he would do better with a likeness of his wife piously reading the Bible, than to subject her to the uncertain implications of foot washing, even though the foot would be that of the Lord himself.
Mr. Askew gave the task of assisting Mr. Hicks to his twenty-year-old slave Cato. Everyone at Hickory Grove, except for his wife, Lucille, knew that Cato was the offspring of Augustus’ rape of the slave Josline in 1840, three years after he met and married Lucille Watford.
Lucille might see as well as anyone that Cato’s lineage was not pure. His skin was more the color of butternut than walnut. His hair and features disclosed mixing of blood. What Augustus hoped was not obvious to Lucille was how much Cato resembled the way he himself had looked when he was a boy of a similar age. There were no portraits to reveal the appearance of the young Augustus. Since Lucille had not laid eyes on her spouse until he was past 40 years old, she had no basis upon which to make a comparison between her husband and this fair-skinned young slave, who was always kept close at hand.
Relying on the invisibility of the familiar, Augustus calculated that keeping Cato ever present would lessen the possibility of Lucille’s happening upon him at chance intervals in which the uniqueness of his appearance might arouse her curiosity. She watched the boy grow for twenty years; yet so accustomed was she to his presence that she did not notice the particulars of his eyes, or of his nose or lips. She did notice that Cato was deferential to her in an odd, sometimes anxious way. However, this eccentricity gave her nothing she could ever put her finger on.
Mr. Erastus Hicks, on the other hand, a close observer of all things visual, did notice the particulars of Cato’s features. When Mr. Askew informed him that Cato would be his assistant, Erastus sought to gain the boy’s friendship. He saw eagerness and curiosity in Cato’s wide eyes. He also noticed that the boy abruptly changed from exuberant youth to humble servant whenever Lucille entered the room.
Cato, for his part, soon learned to trust Erastus. When they were alone together, he did not hide his enthusiasm. Not only was Erastus an artist, but he told stories of his travels across the country. He was different from all other white men. When he spoke, it was with an accent that Cato took to be a Northern dialect. His speech was full of mysterious words. He spoke to Cato as if speaking to a kindred spirit. This above all else set him apart.
As the portrait of Lucille progressed, Cato marveled at the ability of the painter to bring the blank canvas to life with an accurate likeness. Cato saw that Mr. Hicks gave his customers just what they wanted. In her portrait, Mrs. Askew sat beside a small table upon which rested an open copy of the Bible. Her hand lay outstretched on one page of scripture, as if pointing to a particular passage, while her face entreated the viewer with a stern smile that conveyed her piety. Mr. Askew was pleased with the portrait. More important, so was Mrs. Askew.
The day after that project was finished, Erastus moved his painting operation from the parlor, in which Lucille had sat, to a shrubby corner of the garden, where a bank of closely planted dogwood bushes provided shelter. As assistant, Cato had begun to learn the practical aspects of making a painting. While Mr. Hicks set up his easel, Cato fetched charcoal sticks, paints, cloths and sundry brushes. He also carted out two chairs and a bucket of water.
When they were ready, Erastus explained the project to the boy. “Son, I will now commence to paint a Biblical illustration, depicting the washing of the foot of Jesus by Mary, or more explicitly, the drying of the Lord’s foot with her hair, since I reckon that particularity of the story is one that your Master Askew is most apt to find inspiring.”
“Yes, sir, Master Hicks,” said Cato, with the wide-eyed look of a puppy watching a bone.
Erastus smiled at the boy. “Now, Cato, my lad, here we are quite alone, don’t you see. And as we will be working together hereabouts in the garden, quite out from under the eyes and ears of your master and mistress, I propose that we dispense with formalities and commence with the familiarities. Why don’t you call me Erastus, and I, for my part, will call you Cato?”
“Yes, sir, Master Erastus,” replied Cato.
“No, truly, you needn’t say ‘sir’ or ‘master’, Cato. It makes me feel—what shall I say?—too immodest, and truth-be-told, I’m a Quaker, you see, and we Quakers believe in modest ways.”
Cato nodded. He wasn’t sure what a Quaker was, but he could see that they were strange. “All right, Erastus,” he said.
“Fine, now, do you know your Bible? Have you heard this story of Mary washing the feet of Jesus?”
“I don’t recall as I have,” said Cato. “I don’t recall that Reverend Zeke has mentioned it.”
“Reverend Zeke?”
“He’s our preacher, the slaves’ preacher. We go to him on Sundays down by Dyer creek. He tells many fine stories, but I don’t recall him telling a story about washing the Lord’s feet.”
“Well, Cato, this story is connected to the story of Lazarus.”
“Lazarus? I know that story. Reverend Zeke told us that Jesus raised him from the dead.”
“Yes, well then no doubt you know that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead because his sisters, Mary and Martha were quite distraught. When Mary wept, Jesus wept too; so he was right fond of Mary, you see. Sometime after Jesus brought Lazarus back to life, the whole group, Lazarus, Martha, Mary, Jesus and the disciples, they all sat down for a pleasant supper. Mary brought in a pound of costly ointment, anointed Jesus’ feet, and then wiped his feet with her hair. Well, old Judas, he didn’t like that. He said, ‘Why was not this ointment sold and given to the poor?’ And Jesus said, ‘Let her alone: against the day of my burying hath she kept this. For the poor always ye have with ye; but me ye have not always.’” Erastus quoted the gospel with a devout intonation.
Cato’s eyes searched Erastus for an explanation of the moral. “So I reckon Jesus was thinking about his death,” Cato ventured.
“Yes, and I think in truth he was moved by Mary’s love and gratitude,” said Erastus.
Cato hesitated, then asked, “Do you suppose she was good-looking?”
“Yes, Cato, I do suppose she must have been good-looking. Anyway, that’s how I expect to paint her, don’t you think?”
“Yes,” Cato agreed, “but how will you draw her? Will you make her like someone you know?”
“Oh I expect I will use my imagination for Mary. That would be best, in this case. But I’ll want to work with a model for Jesus … especially so I can draw his feet. Feet are considerable hard to paint, you see.”
“A model?” said Cato, who was not sure of the word’s meaning.
“Yes. A model, you know, is someone who stands in for somebody else.”
“Will you ask Master Askew?”
Erastus laughed. “No, no, I don’t suppose old Askew will have the time or patience to sit as a model, much as he might hanker to see himself painted in as the Lord. No, I need a body with a pair of good feet to model.” As he spoke, Erastus looked down at Cato’s bare feet, then back up at him with a wink.
“Me?” Cato was astonished. He looked down at his feet in dismay. “Oh but my feet are all dirty.”
“Well, lad, I’d allow that Jesus’ feet were dirty too, and that’s why Mary thought to wash them for him.”
“But what if Master Askew finds out?” Cato asked. “I don’t believe he’d think it fitting for me to be a model for Jesus.”
“No, Cato, I expect you’re right about that.” Erastus agreed. “So that’s why we’ve come out here in the garden, where all these fine dogwood shrubs and bushes block the view from the house. Nobody can see us here. And if someone should happen upon us while I’m sketching you, I will surely pretend to cuss you out as if I’d just caught you sitting down on the job. No one will be the wiser.”
Cato was not convinced. “But won’t they recognize me in the painting?”
“Well that depends.” Erastus scratched his chin. “I calculate that if I use your face and body, I’ll disguise it just enough so no one will know it’s you … except you and me, of course.” He winked again. “I can alter your complexion, and fix you up with a fine beard.”
“Gracious!” said Cato with a broad smile. “I’ll be the model for Jesus!” His eyes shone as he paced beside the chair. “A beard! I don’t know what I should look like with a beard. … Do you want me to sit here on the chair?” He looked at the chair, and then at the bucket beside it. “Should I wash my feet first? Is that what this bucket of water is for?” He sat down on the chair. He sat on his hands to keep them still. Then his eyebrows arched, “Oh Erastus, what about the ointmlent?” His hands flew up. “We haven’t any ointment!”
“Now, now lad, let’s be methodical here,” said the artist. “The first thing I need is some libations for the artistic muse. Tell me, Cato, do you happen to know where Mr. Askew keeps his anti-fogmatics? I need something to embolden my palette. A dram of bourbon and sugar for a julep should do the trick.”
“Do you mean liquor?” asked Cato.
“Yes, my boy, I do indeed. I mean to have a smile of a drink before we commence, and if you can fetch that for me from the house, I’m inclined to suggest that you might join me in a swallow to our health.”
“Ah, to our health … yes, but the bourbon is locked in a cabinet,” Cato said. “I’d have to ask Mrs. Askew to open it.” He hesitated. “I do believe it might go better, if you wouldn’t think it too inconvenient, if you were to ask Mrs. Askew for it yourself. Otherwise I fear Mrs. Askew would question such a request from me, and wonder if I’d taken leave of my senses.”
The artist considered this. “Well, yes, I suppose it would be better if I inquired after the bourbon myself,” he concluded.
While Erastus went to the house to negotiate the liquor, Cato busied himself arranging the easel, paper and charcoal sticks. He contemplated whether he ought to wash his feet. He was uncertain whether the artist wanted him to model with clean feet or dirty feet, so he decided to wait. He was beside himself with excitement. Never in his life had he imagined that such a moment might fall to him, to have his portrait painted in a likeness of Christ, by a white man who offered him bourbon and asked to be called by his first name.
As Cato was contemplating these things, Erastus returned from his mission with a beaker of bourbon, a small pouch of sugar, and a glass. Then with yet another wink, Erastus, reached inside his waistcoat and pulled out a second glass, which he had secreted from the pantry.
“Now, we’ll have a proper toast to launch this project,” he said. He placed the glasses on the ground, poured a half inch of sugar in each, and then topped the sugar with the bourbon. He handed Cato one of the glasses. “Are you partial to juleps?” he asked.
“I’ve never tasted one before,” said Cato.
“Have you had liquor ever at all, my lad?”
“No, Erastus, not as I can recall.”
“Well, I do believe you should recall it had you done so,” said Erastus. “So here is a start; and here’s to your health, my friend.” He handed Cato a glass and clinked it with his own. “May all the dreams of your heart someday come true.”
Cato had never received a toast before. He tasted the sweetened bourbon, which felt warm in his throat. “And, well, to you also, Erastus.” He clinked his glass on the artist’s. “May the dreams of your heart also come true.”
“Ah, my friend, thank you,” said Erastus. His eyes narrowed. “You know, I think I can say that the dreams of my heart have indeed come true. Look, don’t you see, here we are on a fine summer day in a splendid garden, about to commence upon the undertaking of an inspiring artistic depiction, and you are as fine a model as I could ever hope to paint.” He put his hand freely on the boy’s wrist, and held it there.
Cato felt the blood rush to his head. Perhaps it was from the bourbon. He was not sure why, but he felt as if he wanted to grasp the artist bodily and clasp him to himself. However, he simply looked at the ground and said, “Yes, Erastus, it is a fine day to model for Jesus.”
“Well, let’s get to it then, shall we?” Erastus swallowed the last of his drink, then turned to the easel, which sat a dozen feet from the chair and water bucket. “Now let’s see, have a seat there, and I’ll sketch out the basics of the scene. I’ll commence with a study, a charcoal sketch, proportional to but smaller than the final painting.”
“Do you want me to wash my feet first?” asked Cato, recalling his earlier dilemma.
“Ah … .” Erastus considered this. “I have a surprise,” he said.
Cato sat on the chair, and rolled up his pant leg in preparation for modeling. The artist observed this, then came up in front of the boy, knelt and slid the water bucket round in front of him. He reached into a pocket of his waistcoat and pulled out a small vial and a cloth. He popped the stopper off the vial and passed it under Cato’s nose. “And when Mary washed his feet,” Erastus said, “the house was filled with the fragrance of the ointment.”
Cato inhaled the rich flowery aroma, which recalled a perfume he’d smelled on Mrs. Askew at Christmas time. He felt his eyes roll back in his head.
Erastus poured the contents of the vial into the bucket of water, which had sat warming in the sun for half an hour. He placed his hands in the bucket and swirled the water, gently stirring it. Then, with his wet bare hands, he cupped Cato’s foot and began to rub it. Startled, Cato raised his head, which had sunk back, and stared down at the man at his feet as if he were dreaming. He felt the warmth of the water and the smooth, massaging strokes of Erastus’s hand. He heard himself murmur, “Ah, that feels … .” He let the sentence trail off.
Erastus washed and kneaded Cato’s foot, while he gazed at the boy’s face. He appraised the head of soft sepia curls, the warm, hazel eyes, the nut-brown whiskerless skin, the mulatto medley of features: Caucasian nose and cheeks, Negro lips and eyes. “Yes, Cato, you’re as handsome a lad as I can recall, and I shall paint the Lord as an older version of you, so no one but you and I will know it.”
Cato was not sure what was happening. The warmth of the water, and the sensual touch on his foot, shot up his leg in a way quite similar to the way the bourbon had glided warm and sweetly tingling into his throat. He felt a strange, comfortable feeling. Instinctively, he placed his hand on his leg and squeezed it. He saw the artist’s eyes watch his hand, and then felt the man’s grip tighten, rubbing up and down his foot. There were goose bumps on Cato’s neck.
Cato wanted to say something, but he was speechless. He had never before felt sensual pleasure at the hands of any person. His whole life now seemed as if it had been a yearning for a kind touch such as this; and here was this gentle man, washing his foot, anointing it now with a sweet perfume. He wanted to thank him, to say something to convey the gratitude that flowed in his heart for the Quaker’s friendship.
Erastus peered at Cato with an earnest look. He pulled himself slightly forward using Cato’s foot, and seemed, for a moment, as if he was going to lay his chin down on the chair right between Cato’s legs. His gaze froze there in midair, as if to appraise a rare jewel. Cato could not decipher the transfixed look in his eyes. The painter seemed almost frightened. He stayed that way awkwardly long, staring at Cato’s lap, his head suspended, not moving down or up, but poised above Cato’s legs.
Then Erastus sucked in his breath, turned his head, and closed his eyes. He said, “Someday my lad, you shall have the dreams of your heart come true, for you are one of God’s finest creations.” He pulled back, lifted his head and smiled. “All I can do is tell you this: You will find this dream, someday. For God has given me the gift of vision, the gift of imagination, and I can see the happiness of that time, when you shall know the yearnings of your heart, and the truest joy of life shall come to you.”
Cato did not know what Erastus meant, nor could he see what place or yearnings the man imagined, but he felt the kind intentions of his friend’s wishes. He placed his hand gently on the artist’s head, and, as he did so, Erastus voice squeaked, “Oh … God help me.”
Erastus shook his head, as if brushing off a fly, and stood. He shrugged his shoulders. “Yes, God help me lad, we’ve got much work to do and I’m inclined to say we could fritter away the hours with no accomplishment if I don’t set about my work.”
Erastus returned to the easel and took up a pencil. “All right, now let’s see you extend your foot there. Find a comfortable position, and I shall commence to draw.”
Cato lay back in the chair and propped his leg on the bucket with his bare foot extended. He folded his hands behind his head and looked up at the sky. His body tingled. He thought of a time past, when he’d sat by himself on a stool in a room adjacent to the parlor. The Askews were entertaining. One of the guests played the piano. The pianist had announced that the music was a nocturne written by a man whose name was “show pan.” Cato had thought at the time that those moments he sat listening to a nocturne, had been the best moments of his life. Now he considered that this moment in the garden might supplant that in his memory.
“Erastus, do you know famous piano music?” he asked.
“I do.”
“Do you know music written by a man called ‘show pan?’”
The artist smiled. “Why yes, Frederic Chopin, composer of etudes, nocturnes and waltzes. I have heard his work. But where in the name of gracious did you hear of him, my young friend?”
“A man came to visit the Askews last year. He played the piano in the parlor. I was in the next room. I thought it must be how it is in heaven, to hear music like that.”
“Yes, well, you have a sensitive soul, my lad. I hope that someday you will rest in heaven, and hear all the great music of the world. I do believe that humankind has done its best when it comes to music, Cato; better than at any other art.”
Cato had never thought about humankind in this way. “Where does music come from?” he asked.
“I should think it comes from God,” Erastus answered. “In fact, anyone who might doubt the Almighty’s existence, should only have to hear the music of Chopin or Mozart to know for a fact that it must come from the Holy Spirit.”
“Where did you learn to paint, Erastus?”
“I studied it as a boy,” the artist replied, “with a man my father knew. His name was Thomas Fields. He painted portraits in my home city: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.”
Cato had heard of Pennsylvania. Master William told him about it, as he had told him of so many things. William talked about the North as if it were quite another world. “What is Pennsylvania like?” he asked.
“It’s full of woods, my lad. The name Pennsylvania means ‘Penn’s woods’ after Mr. William Penn, a great man, a man of peace. He was a Quaker, you see, like me. He was the first governor of the colony.”
“How come you are a Quaker?”
“My people in Pennsylvania are all Quakers, and so I was brought up in the Quaker faith.”
“Are Quakers the same as Shakers, Erastus?”
“Now lad, how ever did you hear of Shakers?”
“From William, he’s Master Augustus’ son. I was his servant until he went to college. William said there were Shakers in Kentucky. He said they shaked when they were in church.”
“Well the Shakers split off from the Quakers, Cato. I guess you could say we quake and they shake.”
Cato laughed. “How come you quake?”
“Well that’s what Quakers do when they are moved by the Holy Spirit, you see. It means you feel the power of God upon you, and it causes you to tremble.”
Cato tried to imagine the feel of the hand of the Holy Spirit upon him. “I think I would like to be a Quaker,” he said.
“Well, my lad, we don’t just quake. We call ourselves the Society of Friends. We believe in brotherly love, mainly. Quakers founded the city of Philadelphia, which means the city of brotherly love.”
A city of brotherly love seemed fantastic. Cato could not imagine what it would look like. “Do the Quakers have slaves too?” he asked.
“No, lad, no.” Erastus looked toward Cato with tender eyes. “That is not our way. We believe in love and friendship … among all God’s creatures.”
“I expect it is right that creatures should be friends with each other,” Cato said.
Erastus smiled. “We Quakers, we Friends, speak of the light within, which means the light of God that shines in everyone. When I paint, I try to capture that light in my painting.”
“Is that’s why Missus Askew’s portrait glows so?”
“Well, it is a question of how you use the paint, you see, Cato. Each man can put himself in the service of the Lord, no matter what job he does. You only have to look for the light within each person you meet.”
“I can’t say as I ever saw the light within Missus Askew, Erastus. She’s generally strict where I’m concerned, though she’s always been kind to William.”
“Well Cato, you have to consider if you may be sometimes unfriendly toward her. I’ve noticed that your manner is different when she’s about.”
“I … well … .” Cato was not sure if he should confide in the painter. “I’m afraid that she might find out about me,” he said.
“Find out what?”
“About where I come from.”
“Weren’t you born here?”
“Yes … well … that’s just it. … I was born here, and my mother was, well, she was a servant to Master Askew and he …. well … I reckon, from what everyone says, that he was my father.”
“Ah … .”
“And you know Erastus, I think everyone in the whole county knows about it, excepting for Missus Askew; and I do believe if she knew it, she would not glow so.”
“Perhaps not … ,” the painter conceded. “But what does Askew think of you. Does he treat you well?”
“Yes, mostly he does. But … well … he never does look me in the eye. I think he always looks to my left or my right. Only once did I see him look at me. It was in the mirror, once … in the dining room. That’s the only time I recall him looking right at me, and I think he was staring then for certain.”
“Well, now, I expect he can see himself in you, wouldn’t you think? But it must be considerable hard for him to see it.”
“Yes, considerable.”
“And what of your mother?”
“My mother passed away ten years ago.”
“I see.”
“I was ten then. They wouldn’t let me see her when she died. She was sick with fever. I guess it was catching.”
“Ah, my gracious.”
“So, now I’m mostly on my own.”
“Yes. Well, Cato, that is the truth, we are all on our own, you see, in a manner of speaking. There’s nothing wrong with that. But you have the light within.”
“Do I?”
“Ah, lad, it glows powerful strong in thee. I can tell you that. But look now, you must look for it in others, that’s the thing. Look for it in the people you meet. That’s how you can see it best.”
“I’ll try, Erastus.”
“The more you’re able to see the light in others, the more brightly it will glow in you. Watch and see.”
“How do you make the paint glow, Erastus?”
“It’s a trick of the eye my boy. When you control the whole world within the painting you can choose the relative glow of anything within it.”
“I wish I could paint.”
“Ah, well … .” Erastus looked at the boy with tenderness. “I wish it was a world in which you could do all that you are capable of doing. For I think you could learn to do anything you put your mind to. But you must make the most of what God gives you. If you were born to serve, always remember that you can serve with grace.”
_________________________________________
Chapter 4
A Pot to Catch the Sounds
The reverend Ezekiel Daniel’s life changed upon the death of his owner, James Greer. Greer whipped Ezekiel regularly in his early life. But near the end of his life, when the specter of his demise was before him, Greer grew repentant for his sins. It came to him in a dream to strike a bargain with his slave. He told Zeke he would set him free, if in return Zeke would take a vow to spread the word of the Lord among his people.
At that time, Zeke had not come unto the Lord. But when Master Greer put forth this proposition, Zeke accepted salvation on that day. They struck a bargain, and each was as good as his word. Greer brought in a tutor to teach Zeke to read, so he could study the Bible. Zeke came each Sunday to the back row of Greer’s Methodist church to hear the teachings of its minister. When the old master saw that Zeke had learned to read the Bible well enough to quote chapter and verse, he signed the papers that set Zeke free upon his death.
The night the old man passed away, Zeke knelt next to his master’s body and kissed his forehead. Zeke had both his freedom and a sizable sum of money, which Greer left him for good measure. Zeke might have done any number of things, but the very next day he set upon his mission. He spread word among the slaves in the northern districts of Jackson to come to the woods along Dyer Creek near Christmasville Road on Sunday morning, there to hear the word of the Lord.
The Forked Deer was a narrow river, brown from Tennessee mud, which did not run straight for any meaningful distance. Even so, it was navigable for the flat-bottomed boats that carried cotton west to Memphis then down the Mississippi. Several tributaries along its course fed the Forked Deer, and these creeks crisscrossed the farms and plantations of Madison County. Dyer Creek was one of the largest of these, wide-enough to require a bridge on Christmasville Road, and deep enough in late spring or early summer to accommodate a full baptism.
The slaves gathered in a clearing along the banks of Dyer Creek, surrounded by woods thick enough to assure concealment. A big clay pot sat tipped on its side near the stump from which Reverend Zeke held forth. The slaves believed the pot could catch the sounds, the amens and exhortations of the faithful. The pot would prevent wayward words from reaching white ears. This was an important precaution, because the forum at Dyer Creek provided an occasion for frank talk, permissible in only a few places in the life of a slave.
When he wasn’t preaching, Zeke was a quiet fellow. He lived in a shack on the edge of the old Greer farm. He was a big, heavyset man, much given to perspiration and blowing his nose. Apart from food, his principal temptation came from clothes. In this, he held himself to moderation, lest he become too worldly. His natural inclination was to dress nattily, and to keep himself oiled and sharp. But in deference to modesty, he focused his love of ornamentation upon a single collection of accessories: his handkerchiefs.
Drawing from time to time upon his financial endowment, Zeke collected handkerchiefs from the humblest plain white cotton to the most fanciful embroidered silk. These he bought from merchants and traveling salesmen. Others he received as gifts from members of his congregation of followers.
Zeke put his ever-present handkerchief to good use when he preached. It came and went from his vest pocket as he spoke. Sometimes, in an impassioned moment, it rose up to wipe the sweat from his brow. Sometimes it hung in his hand by the side of the tree stump that served as his pulpit. Sometimes it waved in the air making a point. It could be the flag that parted the waters of the Red Sea. It could be the trumpet that sounded in Jericho. It could be the prodigal son working his way back from the excesses of sin to the simple redemption of home. It could be the crown of thorns on Jesus’ head, or the whip that scourged his body. It could be the cross itself, carried up Golgotha, heavier than any sack of cotton ever dragged to the gin, or it could be the great stone which rolled away from Jesus’ tomb on Easter morning.
Soon enough, Zeke found a good crowd gathering on Sunday mornings to hear him preach. As it happened, the slaves’ yearning for the Lord and their yearnings for each other found a common purpose at the Creek, as there was no better place to begin a courtship or learn the news of the land than while pursuing salvation. Slaves from a dozen farms and plantations mingled together, and the opportunities for the slaves to enjoy social intercourse were greater at the Creek than at any other place in Madison County.
Wally accustomed her children to attending Zeke’s services on Sunday mornings. At age 18, Ella went willingly, not only because she wanted to hear the gossip, but also because she enjoyed Reverend Zeke’s sermons. Reverend Zeke and his handkerchief kept folks shouting, fanning, and leaning forward. The sermons roused her. Emotions yanked at her heart. But then a sober voice in her head would see that the flag, or the stone, or the scourge was just a handkerchief, that it was made from cotton cloth, that back home when he was by himself, Reverend Zeke must surely have blown his nose in it.
Jimmy, who was 23, had no patience for hearing about yet another Master who set forth commandments and required obedience. He was indifferent to gossip, and though he was of age, he was indifferent as well to the opportunities for romantic advancement. He endured the weekly ordeal only because Wally gave him no choice. But one Sunday, events conspired to bring Jimmy’s simmering resentment to a head.
Sara, a slave from the Askew’s Hickory Grove plantation, had been caught stealing food from a locked storehouse. In reprisal for this, and by way of setting an example to others, Augustus Askew had arranged to have one of Sara’s children, her son Charles, sold to traders who would take him to a distant county. Mr. Askew told Sara he would use the proceeds from this transaction to replenish the stolen storehouse supplies.
“You have taken from me. Now I will take from you,” he told her. “The child will be gone by the end of the week.”
Within a quarter of an hour, the whole gathering at Dyer Creek had heard the story. Sara herself came to the side of the stump, where Zeke stood with his head bowed. She knelt in front of him, and said simply “Help me.”
Reverend Zeke stood over her. He was a big man, big as a mountain. When he looked up at the sky, his eyes flashed. They flashed as though lightning struck the mountain from a cloud. There was a storm of emotion brewing. Reverend Zeke moved to take control of the storm. He raised his hands to quiet the congregation.
“I know you got a hurt”, he roared. His voice boomed with the power of the mountain behind it.
“I’ve been there,” he whispered. His whispering voice cracked.
“I’ve been there,” he said yet again, even more softly. It was hard for him to say it, hard for him to let the pain of it back up, to let it out of his soul, to show it so clearly to his people.
Sweat beaded on Zeke’s face. His eyes closed. His face wrenched into a question, and his eyes opened. “Anybody else been there?”
He looked around the clearing in a sweeping arc. All around the bank of the creek, hands shot up and waved. The slaves leaned forward with their arms stretched out, leaning so far across the backs of those in front of them and waving so hard that the whole congregation seemed on the verge of toppling over.
Zeke smiled. “You’ve been there?” he asked. “You know what it is to hurt?”
Sara, on her knees, could not speak. Several days of tears had choked away her voice. Her face was raw and soggy. She looked around the clearing at the faces that mirrored her pain, at the arms stretched out and waving at her.
“I know you ask, ‘How’d we get this way, Lord?’” Zeke was imploring. He spoke upward to the sky.
“I know you ask, Lord, why? – Why, Jesus?” Zeke got lost in his question. He didn’t know the answer. He hadn’t prepared an answer before he spoke.
He asked again, “Why?” He wanted God to hear him clearly.
His voice grew louder, “Why would you let this happen?”
His voice grew angry. “I mean to say, why should it be this way?”
Zeke forgot about the people around him. He straightened himself up and raised his arm up toward God. He yelled now, angry and shaking his fist. “Why should this woman … ?” His hand pointed down at Sara. He took a step forward and then a step back, as if he were preparing for a fight.
“Why should Sara … ?” His voice cracked when he said “Sara,” and his eyes fell closed again.
“Why should Sara – a good mother …” He began shaking his arm as he pointed down at Sara. “… a woman who loved her little children.” There were shouts now in the congregation. Zeke was saying too much, saying it too clearly, more than anyone could bear.
“No, I’m gonna say it now.” Zeke shook his head. “… a woman who loved her children, a woman whose only thought, whose only thought was to get some food for their hunger.”
Zeke opened his eyes again and cast them out over the congregation. “What mother wouldn’t?” He looked at a slender woman who leaned against a tree while she slapped her head with the back of her hand. “What mother wouldn’t?” he asked again.
Zeke stepped forward to the edge of the tree stump. He pulled out his handkerchief to dangle it in front of him like a hungry child. “Little boy says, ‘I’m hungry.’”
A woman in the back shouted, “That’s right!”
Zeke smiled, swung the handkerchief back behind him, and said, “Well, let me get you some food then.”
Several voices answered, “That’s right!”
“Gonna go over to that store house,” Zeke said, and waved the handkerchief to his side. “Gonna go over to that house where they got all that food locked up!”
“Go on.”
“Got to go and get my little boy something to eat.”
“Amen.”
“Don’t care about Askew!”
“No!”
“Askew don’t need that food.”
“No!”
“The plain truth of it is, Askew’s got too much food.”
Zeke began laughing now. “That’s why he’s got to keep it locked up!”
Everywhere heads nodded.
“But the Bible says …. .” Zeke paused, and dropped the handkerchief to his side. “…. The Bible says, ‘Thou shalt not steal.’”
The congregation fell silent. Zeke had come to a trap. He didn’t know where he was going. He closed his eyes again, seeking to implore his heart.
“God says, ‘Thou shalt not steal.’” Zeke repeated it slowly. He looked hard at the commandment, looked for a way around it. But it seemed locked tight. Silence rippled across the creek.
Zeke turned around. He turned to face the water for a moment. Then he raised his hand above his head and turned back to his flock. “Now some might say that Askew stole – that Mr. Augustus Askew stole that child from his mama when he determined to sell that boy away from her.”
Several slaves looked at the pot. Others turned and peered into the woods behind them. No one was there. There was no sound except the echo of Zeke’s defamation.
Zeke shook his head. “But Askew, he says, ‘No, I didn’t steal. These children, they’re my property. Sara, she’s my property.’”
Ella moved to the edge of the rock she was sitting on. Jimmy was glaring. Sara looked up now at Zeke with vacant eyes. Zeke stared at her for a moment, and then wiped his face with the handkerchief.
“But I say … I say, if Sara took some of Askew’s food, well that’s not stealing. No, that’s not stealing.”
He raised his voice now to drive home his message. “Those children put that food in their mouths. That food went down in their stomachs. If Askew owns the children, then he still owns the food even when it’s down inside them. So Askew didn’t lose none of his food. He still owned it. Ain’t nothing got stole!”
This line of reasoning stunned the congregation. Zeke had found a way past the commandment. “You see, brothers and sisters, that’s just one piece of Askew’s property eating another piece of his property!” Zeke boomed.
“But old Askew,” Zeke cocked his head, “he don’t see it that way. Askew say he’s gonna make an example.”
Zeke screwed up his face and looked back over his shoulder. He said, “An example?”
He looked down at Sara. “Now brothers and sisters, we have here before us an example.”
Zeke stepped in front of the stump. He reached down to take Sara’s hand. He raised her to her feet.
“We have an example of the sadness of losing a child.” Sara stood meekly, tears glistening on her face.
Zeke raised his eyes and looked at the sky. “But what can this teach us?” He looked back down at his congregation. He said, “I say to you and I say to the Lord, ‘What does this teach us?’”
Zeke let go of Sara’s hand and stepped back behind the stump. “Jesus said …” He paused and looked around slowly at the slaves, “Jesus said, ‘If a man strikes you – you ought not to strike him back.’ Jesus said, ‘You’ve got to turn the other cheek.’” Zeke turned his face to the side as he said this.
Then, with his head sideways, he turned his eyes back toward the listeners. “Well, alright …” He turned his face forward again.
“Alright, I turned my cheek.” He turned his head to the other side, “and then I turned the other cheek,” he turned his head once more, “and then I turned back to the first cheek again!”
“I’m ’bout run out of cheeks.” He raised his handkerchief in front of his face. “But I say …” he shook the handkerchief. “I say you got to keep on to the last.” Zeke was trembling now, summoning the power of his faith from within himself.
“Listen to me!” The light began to shine in his eyes again. “Listen to what I say.” Zeke was summoning back the storm.
“After Jesus had been whipped …” Zeke paused. “… whipped and scourged! ….” Zeke looked at the sky, at a soft white cloud. “Do you know what that’s like?” Zeke put a twisted smile on his face. “Do you know what whipping feels like?”
The congregation was silent. Everyone knew how often Zeke had been whipped in his youth.
“After Jesus was whipped, they nailed him …” Zeke’s voice faltered. “… they nailed him…” Zeke swallowed his voice completely now. “… to a cross.” Zeke’s eyes glazed with the vision before him. The sun was beating on his face. Beads of sweat dropped from his chin, but he did not feel them.
“And when Jesus was nailed on that cross, he had something to say.” Zeke opened his eyes. His eyes were full of his pain and anger. They held the storm that was raging in his heart, in the hearts of all those present. And for a moment, it looked as if he couldn’t go on, as if he’d reached the limit of what he could say. He was teetering on the edge of the small rock upon which he stood behind the stump. His muscles strained against his weight. A passing cloud caused the sun to darken, stretching a shadow quickly and quietly across the clearing. Several slaves looked up—surprised by the sudden chill. Then the cloud passed and the sun leapt back into the clearing. The expanding brightness soothed the hurt in Zeke’s eyes. His weight settled back on the rock. His upstretched arm slowly glided down to his side.
“When he was nailed to the cross, Jesus said, ‘Forgive them.’ He said, ‘Forgive them, for they know not what they do.’” Zeke’s voice was gentle now. A glint of tear showed in the corner of his eye.
“I say, Alright! Askew has given us his example. Now let us give Askew ours!” Zeke shouted the last word so abruptly, that several heads jerked forward.
“We have a higher example, an example that puts Askew to shame. We can be better than Askew. We can do what that man has never done! We got to say, ‘Forgive them. Forgive him brothers and sisters. Forgive this man! For as God is my witness, this man does not know what he do. He doesn’t know it!”
Zeke paused and shook his head. “This is a man who has seen fit to put his own son into slavery.” All eyes darted around the clearing for Cato, looking for the slave that everyone knew was the offspring of Askew’s rape of his house servant Josline. But Cato was not there this day.
“This is a man who has whipped and punished and taken and given nothing but suffering to those who work to care for his home, his land, his property, even his wife and his children.”
This is a man who does not know, cannot know, will never know, until that day when he finally stands before God almighty, what he do.”
Zeke wiped his face with the handkerchief. “They know not what they do. And Jesus said, ‘Forgive them, Father. They know not what they do.’”
Zeke finished his sermon with his face bowed. He took Sara’s hand again. Her face was empty. Zeke said, “Let us now join our hands brothers and sisters, in prayer for our sister Sara, and for the well-being of her precious son Charles.”
With that, Ella reached to take Jimmy’s hand, but Jimmy pulled his hand away. His chest was heaving. He seemed to be struggling to breathe. He was so incensed, so outraged by the forgiveness that Reverend Zeke proposed that he could barely speak. He stood and crackled these words to Wally, “I will never come here again.” And with that, he pushed past the people near him and walked back into the woods.
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Chapter 5
Bel Canto
As the summer of 1860 ripened, so too did Erastus Hicks’ painting of the washing of Christ’s feet by Mary of Bethany. Having completed an assortment of charcoal studies, the painter began preparations for the painting itself. One morning, he became a carpenter, fashioning stretchers with wood and glue. In the afternoon, he coaxed the canvas onto its frame, then brushed its surface with sizing of rabbit skin glue. The next morning he primed the skin with a coat of lead white paint. A week later, he painted the entire area with a ground using burnt umber, a dark, neutral pigment, which would allow the flesh of the figures to incarnate with three-dimensional force.
At first, the characters emerged from the background without context. The figure of Christ sat in a space that would eventually hold a stool. In front of Christ, the specter of Mary, on her knees, dried his foot with her hair. The body of Jesus leaned back on the invisible stool in a yielding, dreamy posture, his left leg raised toward Mary. The face of Jesus—a delicate, sable-brushed sheen of color--was wrapped in hog bristle strokes of chestnut hair and beard. Erastus, seeking a heretical realism, intended to paint Christ as an ethnic Jew, with Semitic blood in his veins. So the hair, a flurry of passionate paint strokes, was coarser than that of the pious fine-haired Protestant Christs Erastus had seen in a New York museum.
While Erastus had painted most of the face of Jesus, he had not yet painted his eyes. A plain umber wash still showed in the spot where he would render those eyes. As he prepared, the painter looked toward Cato, who sat on a tree stump, in the same yielding posture as Jesus, his left foot similarly raised. With great concentration, the painter stared at Cato. He wanted to capture the eyes in quick, deft strokes of his brush.
Cato sat patiently watching the painter. He asked, “Why do you paint, Erastus?”
Without interrupting his staring, Erastus spoke. “I don’t know if I can explain it well, my boy. It has to do with yearning … yearning to get hold of what I see. Sometimes I’m overcome, Cato, truly … .” He looked away from Cato now, and swept his eyes around the Askew garden. “When I look at this world and see it, I wonder if what I see … is this what others see too?” He looked back at Cato. “Because I think if others saw it as I did, they too would be compelled to take up paints and brushes—to try to rope the magnificence of this world onto a canvas … just to try to get hold of it … . I’d say it’s like putting a saddle on a horse. Of course, when I paint for folks like Askew and when I paint for myself, it’s like the difference between riding a Shetland and riding a Mustang. One’s a pleasant enough journey, but the other … my boy, I hold on for dear life.”
Cato’s eyes were wide as he pictured the painter on a charging horse. “I wish I could see things through your eyes,” he said. “I think I only have my eyes half open most days. I get to thinking … and my thoughts take over, and I walk around, and I do my work, but inside I’m thinking so very hard … I don’t know what I do see.”
The painter smiled. “Your thoughts light up your eyes, my boy. You carry that depth in your eyes. And I want to get that look in Jesus’ eyes. There’s a whole inner world that looks out from those eyes.” He turned to look at the canvas with a critical gaze. “I don’t know if it can be painted, God help me. Things like that, they’re more than just light and shadow. I’m not sure that I can paint it. It’s like a twinkle or a moon ray. Such fleetingness can’t be fixed in pigment through repeated effort. I can’t work it and re-work it. I must get it in a few certain strokes.”
Cato sat listening to his mentor. “Erastus I don’t know what I shall do when you leave. I wonder if I will ever again meet someone like you. I fear my whole life will come and go with no one to talk to about the things that you talk about.”
The painter blinked his eyes in a befuddled way, and thought for a while. Then he said, with sudden optimism, “Truly, my lad, the best thing for you would be to take up reading.”
“Reading?!” Cato shook his head. “Oh, no.”
Erastus picked up a small brush. He balanced it in his hand as if he were sizing up the trueness of an arrow. “You’d meet many a fine mind in the great books,” he said. “And it would comfort you right well, I know it.”
“It’s not possible,” Cato insisted. “If I were caught, I’d be punished. You don’t know Master Askew. He’s terrible strict—and no one dares cross him.”
“Yes, I know it’s dangerous,” the painter said. “But … well my boy …” He arched an eyebrow. “Surely you do things now in secret.”
“But how would I learn to read?”
“You’d learn from me, of course. I can start you off … , teach you the alphabet. Once you get the idea of it, you can learn the rest on your own.”
“But I don’t have any books.”
Erastus frowned, as he saw that there was to be a host of objections. “Doesn’t your Master Askew have a library? Aren’t there scores of books on his shelves? I should think you could find a way to take a volume out, now and then, without leaving an empty space.” The painter mimed taking a book from the shelf with his hands and replacing it with the brush. “That’s the key … you must always leave a place holder.” He returned to staring at the painting. “I can give you a proper book for that purpose: a nice plain volume, one that won’t call attention to itself.”
“No. No. He’d find me out.”
Erastus shrugged this away. “Do you think he inspects the library day by day?” He took a rag and dabbed it at the canvas. “I’ve seen enough of the man to know his mind. I’d wager he’s read but a few of those books.” He looked back at Cato again. “His library’s for show, my boy. Askew is not a man who hungers for the written word.”
“But Missus Askew … ,” Cato said. “She reads the books. I’ve seen her. And she watches me close.” He looked around suddenly, as if Lucille might be watching him even now. “I don’t know where I would hide a book, either.”
“Oh my gracious, hiding is easy,” the painter asserted, looking exasperated. “You can make a hiding spot outdoors. Somewhere seldom visited. You can fashion a fine hiding spot with an arrangement of rocks.” He kicked a nearby rock to make his point.
“And how would I carry a book from the library to the rocks and back? And where would I read them?” Cato shook his head. “If anyone should come upon me reading! Don’t you know? It’s strictly forbidden. No slave is allowed to read.”
The painter’s exasperation melted. He looked at Cato now with the patience of a kind parent. “Knowledge gives a man power, my boy. That’s why they’ve made that rule.” His eyes widened. “I know it will be dangerous for you. I know there will be risks. But any risk is worth it if it saves your life.” Erastus gestured for emphasis with his brush. “And I fear that your life may be in greater danger if you are without this companionship, without this counsel, without the life-giving knowledge that is stored on the printed page. Your mind will not rest. I see how you are. Your soul will be forever yearning. You must have this friendship of reading.” Erastus set down the brush, came up to Cato and knelt in front of him. “You must let me give you this gift.” He put his hand on Cato’s foot. “Someday, my boy, you will understand my reasons. I know it must seem fearful strange to you to take this step. But I have a special book, one book in particular that I want you to read.”
“Is it the Bible?”
“The book I have in mind for you is a book of poems … a poetry book.”
“Poetry?” Cato cocked his head. “What is that? Is it something religious?”
The painter smiled at the slave’s innocence. “Poetry is like a painting made of words, my boy. It is a fine and subtle thing. And, yes, these poems are religious in their way. They are imbued with spiritual passion. These words carry the inner light of which I spoke. You’ll see it plain and true in this book.” He reached inside his vest and removed a worn volume. “I have but this one copy. I can find another. I want you to have this.” He handed the book to Cato, whose hand hesitated when he took it, as if it were a precious jewel.
Cato looked at the markings on the spine: gold letters on dark green leather. He knew enough to know that there were three words at the top and two words at the bottom. That was all he understood. “What is this book called?” Cato asked.
“If I tell you the title, you will have begun your reading lesson. Are you ready to begin this journey?”
Cato opened the book. He turned over a few pages. He stared at the printed marks. … How strange that these funny marks could speak, could tell stories, could become … through mysterious magic … his friend.
“I’ve never heard Master Askew, or Missus Askew or William or anyone ever speak of poetry,” Cato said. “But in my heart I know I would feel the rest of my life … what was the word you used? … yearning, if I had no one to talk to, no one to teach me. So if reading and poetry and books can be my friend when you are gone, then yes, teach me to read.”
“Bravo! And courage, my lad.” Erastus reached out, closed the book in Cato’s hand, and pointed to the first word on the cover. “This first word is ‘Leaves,’ ” he said. “The next word is ‘of’ and the last word is ‘Grass.’”
Cato repeated it. “Leaves of Grass?”
“That’s right. ‘Leaves of Grass’, written by the poet Walt Whitman. When you first learn to read, you’ll find it easier to speak the words out loud. So you must practice in a place where you can’t be heard. This is a book meant to be spoken out loud, my boy. The poet is an admirer of bel canto, which means ‘beautiful singing’ so you must practice reading with a beautiful voice.”
“Bel canto,” Cato repeated.
“You have to say it like an Italian,” Erastus said, “Bel canto.” And he gestured with his hand, raising it, and at the same time closing it, as if he was grasping, then shaking a piece of paper. “Say it like you’re about to sing.”
Cato laughed. “Bel canto,” he intoned. And he imitated the hand gesture. “But what does it mean, ‘leaves of grass’?”
“Well you see that’s how poetry is, my boy. You might think of the pages of a book as leaves. That’s what printers call them: ‘leaves’. So perhaps the poet wishes you to think of the humble beauty of something as common as a leaf of grass when you hold this book of poems. As you’ll see, these poems find beauty in many common things. After reading them you might well see the world differently.”
Cato turned the pages of the book again, looking hard at the printed markings and letters. “Will you read something to me, Erastus, to let me hear how it sounds?”
He handed the book to the painter who looked at the open page and smiled. “These verses,” he said, “are on page 92 … I’ll read a few lines to you.”
It is no little matter, this round and delicious globe, moving so exactly in its orbit forever and ever, without one jolt or the untruth of a single second;
Cato giggled. “…this delicious globe …,” he repeated.
Erastus continued reading.
I do not think it was made in six days, nor in ten thousand years, nor ten decillions of years,
Nor planned and built one thing after another, as an architect plans and builds a house.
I do not think seventy years is the time of a man or woman,
Nor that seventy millions of years is the time of a man or woman,
Nor that years will ever stop the existence of me or any one else.
Is it wonderful that I should be immortal? as every one is immortal,
I know it is wonderful . . . . but my eyesight is equally wonderful . . . . and how I was conceived in my mother's womb is equally wonderful,
And how I was not palpable once but am now . . . . and was born on the last day of May 1819 . . . . and passed from a babe in the creeping trance of three summers and three winters to articulate and walk . . . . are all equally wonderful.
Erastus closed the book. “There now what do you think? It seems the poet has a lesson to teach us about wonder.”
“Could there really be ten decillions of years?” Cato asked. “I didn’t know there was such a number.”
“Well, my boy, this may be what we call ‘poetic license’ … that is, the poet invents a figure of speech to evoke an image or a feeling—even if he makes things up a bit. It’s no different really than using you to model for Jesus. Jesus may not have looked just like you … but how you look … for me … evokes the right image for Jesus. That’s ‘poetic license’”
“Poetic license …,” Cato repeated, and shook his head. “I don’t know if I’m going to understand poetry. But I do like how it sounds. It sounds ‘delicious”. Cato smiled broadly.
Erastus was looking hard at Cato. “There now. That look in your eyes when you said ‘delicious.’ That’s what I want to capture.” He dashed back to the easel, picked up the brush, twirled it once in his hand, held his other hand behind his back, dabbed the brush on his palette, took one last look at Cato, then, while holding his breath, executed a series of quick strokes. When he was done, he let his breath out in a sigh, panting heavily, as if he’d just finished a sprint. “Ah, now” he said with great self-satisfaction. “I think I’ve done it!” With that, the painter took up a rag and wiped his hands. “Now, my boy, it’s
By David Greene
First Five Chapters for Preview
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Chapter 1
Sammy Speaks
“Stop your fussing, Ella,” Wally said.
“Just swat a fly, mama.”
“Must be the sugar. They smell that sugar you spilled on your dress. Now you’ll have no end of flies.”
The sugar was for a bowl of raspberries that Wally picked from a bramble. The raspberries were in a new bowl she bought in town with her Sunday money. Slaves were not obliged to work on the Sabbath, but if they did, it was the custom to remunerate them with modest pay. Over the years, Wally had devoted most of her Sunday money to the purchase of wooden bowls, which she prized especially because they did not break if someone should drop one.
Ella settled back with the bowl, and pondered whether to eat one berry at a time and make them last or just …. She stopped, and turned toward the sound of a horse’s hooves behind her. Mr. Holland maneuvered the buggy into the yard from Christmasville Road, towing a clapboard utility wagon. He whistled to Willis to come unhitch Maple. Ella and Wally went to see what Mr. Holland had in the wagon. There in the back, wrapped in a gray blanket, was a small dark boy, a stranger.
Wally was the first to speak, “Well I’ll be ….”
Willis ran up alongside Maple and took the rein from Mr. Holland’s hand. He looked at the boy in the back. “And who’s that you brought along here?” he asked.
The boy clutched the blanket around his shoulders. He turned and shot a glance at Wally, Ella and Willis, who stood around the wagon to inspect him. He turned his eyes away and stared straight ahead at a spot where no one stood. For a moment no one spoke. Leaves rustled from a light breeze in the courtyard.
“This is Samuel,” said Mr. Holland at last. “Boy of five years old. Regrettably, the boy’s mother passed away in June. So his people sent him up to Memphis with traders. And when I got into town, I ….”
He stopped. Aroused by the sound of the buggy, Mrs. Holland had come out of the big house with Sarah and Dorothy. They walked quickly toward the wagon. From the other direction, Jimmy strode out of the slave cabin and joined the group. In the twilight, Mrs. Holland squinted at the boy bundled in a blanket.
“George, what in the world …?” Her hand waved.
“I was just saying,” said Mr. Holland, “that this boy is named Samuel. His mother passed away in June and ….” He paused, trying to anticipate his wife’s reaction as he considered his words.
George Holland’s wife wore a pale blue dress with lace trim, which she often wore in the evenings, but which was nevertheless insufficient for the cool night air. She put one hand around her bare shoulder, and the other firmly on the wagon’s sideboard. She scanned the wagon’s contents. “George, did you purchase this …?”
“Yes, Henrietta, the boy was put in the charge of two gentlemen who happened to bring him into the dry goods store where I was transacting business. They said he was a most obedient and right-acting lad at an especially low price … I ….” He turned to the boy. “Look at him, my dear.” He swung an upturned hand toward the boy as if he were presenting the Prince of Wales. “I thought he’d be fine with Wally and Jake.” He looked around the group. “We need to think of the future,” he said.
Mrs. Holland stared at the blanketed boy in the back of the wagon, who continued to look straight ahead, as if he couldn’t hear what anyone was saying. His wide eyes were two chestnuts set sunny side up in a face like dark chocolate. No one dared speak. The entire assembly waited to see if Mrs. Holland would be angry or not. The boy turned for a moment, bravely flashed his bug-eyes at her, and quickly turned back.
“Oh Lord help us,” said Mrs. Holland. “I hope he won’t be much bother. I hope he’s quiet.” She shivered, rapped her knuckles on the side of the wagon and turned to walk back toward the house.
Mr. Holland clambered out of the wagon to follow her. “Yes, yes,” he said. “He’s been as quiet as a mouse for two days. You’ll see, my dear, a good investment at a bargain price. The child cost but a trifle, Henrietta.”
The master and mistress disappeared into the house. Dorothy and the assembled slaves pressed in on the wagon, while the boy sat inside, not moving.
For a moment, no one was sure what to do. Willis led Maple away toward the barn. Wally reached into the unhitched wagon and put her hand on the boy's shoulder, “How d’ye do, young Sammy,” she attempted a formal tone. “Welcome to our house.” The boy didn’t move. “Looks like you’re going to live here now.” She rubbed his head. “We’re going to be your people.”
Wally shook her head as the weight of this realization sank in. She clasped her hands together as if she were about to pray. The boy sucked in a breath and craned his head back to look up at the sky. His chestnut eyes rolled around, searching for stars, some of which twinkled faintly in the evening twilight.
Wally unclasped her hands and climbed into the wagon. She was a slim, strong woman. She was short, but when she stood up straight in the wagon next to Sammy and looked up at the October sky she seemed tall. Wally surveyed the group around her. “OK now,” she said.
She knelt and took hold of the boy by both his arms. “They call me Wally,” she said. She looked at Dorothy, who was craning to see over the side of the wagon, bouncing on her tiptoes. “And down here is Miss Dorothy, Massa Holland’s daughter. And there on Miss Dorothy’s right is Sarah, the cook. Her husband, Willis, is the man who took the horse to the barn. Sarah and Willis live with the Hollands up in the house and they are the house servants.”
The boy cocked his head but did not speak.
“And over here on Miss Dorothy’s left is my Ella.” Wally pointed at Ella, who still held the bowl of raspberries in her hand. “And this here,” she pointed at a tall, crow-black boy with a bright orange rag tied around his head, “is my son, Jimmy. I reckon Ella and Jimmy are going to be your new sister and brother.”
Jimmy stuck out his hand and held it in front of the boy’s face. “Hey, brother,” he said.
Sammy closed his eyes, then opened them and looked around the group. He saw that Jimmy was holding his hand out and that he was supposed to shake it. He looked at the orange head rag on Jimmy’s head, and then into Jimmy’s eyes.
“It’s OK, brother,” Jimmy said. “We gonna look after you. You gonna be all right now.”
But Sammy closed his eyes again, pulled his arms out of Wally’s grip, took the blanket from around his shoulders, raised it over his head, and pulled it down until he disappeared beneath it.
“Poor child,” said Wally. “What a sorrowful time he’s had!” She put her hand over her mouth for a moment, then let it drop. “Oh I guess ….” She looked around the yard trying to think what to do next. “I guess we better take him in the cabin.”
Jimmy climbed into the wagon, scooped the boy up, holding him with one arm, and gently tugged the blanket off his head with his free hand. “I’m gonna take you in the house now, Mr. Sammy,” he said. “You don’t have to worry about nothing or say nothing.” Jimmy hopped to the ground with the boy in his arms and led the way toward a cabin across the yard from the Hollands’ house. The whole group, including Willis, who had returned from the barn, filed in a procession to the slave cabin where Wally, Ella and Jimmy lived with old Jake.
Inside, Jake snored in his wooden bed. It was unusual for a slave to have a wooden bed, but Jake had belonged to George Holland’s father, Walter, who in his lifetime was a furniture maker in North Carolina. Walter, when he died, bequeathed Jake not only the bed, but also a wooden table and three good chairs, which sat in the center of Jake and Wally’s cabin. Walter also bequeathed Jake himself to his son, George Holland, which, though not unexpected, had ended Jake’s unspoken hope that he might someday be set free.
Jake, as was his custom, had gone to bed early. But when the procession streamed into the room, he sat up and rubbed his eyes.
“Jake, what do you think? We got us a new member of the family,” Wally said. “Massa Holland done bought this child up in Memphis on account of his mama passed away and his people sent him up to the traders in Memphis.”
Jimmy held the bundled boy aloft and sat him down slowly on the side of Jake’s bed as evidence of Wally’s truthfulness.
Wally sat on the bed, too, and once again took the boy’s hands. “Sammy, this is Jake. When Jake was a boy, just like you, the traders got him in Africa. Them traders brought him over to North Carolina. Jake was the first ever slave of Massa Holland’s father. Back in Africa his name was Juba, so we call him Juba Jake.”
Juba Jake glanced at the child’s face. He bowed his head remembering his first encounter with the new world. He reached out to put his hand on the boy’s shoulder and closed his eyes. For a moment his eyelids trembled. Then he opened his eyes and looked at the boy tenderly. “Ain’t nothing I can say to make it better—but you gonna be better by and by.” Jake coughed to clear his throat. “You got to know you lucky to come here now. Massa Holland’s a good one, ’bout as good as can be, I suppose.” As he spoke, Jake realized Dorothy was standing in the group, along with the others. But he continued, “And we all had our lot thrown in here together and you got to know we gonna look after you. You gonna get by, child.” Jake looked up at Wally. “Is Massa Holland fixing to have him live here?”
“Yes, that’s what he said. He said, ‘He’ll be fine with Wally and Jake.’”
* * *
The next morning Jimmy and Ella gave Sammy a tour of the farm. Sammy held Jimmy’s hand.
“We live in the first cabin,” said Jimmy. “In the next cabin is Daniel, Jefferson, Little Andrew and Solomon.”
“One, two, three, four,” said Ella. “Four men.”
“They’re all field hands,” said Jimmy, “like me.”
“Me too,” said Ella.
“Nah, you don’t work in no field, Ella.” Jimmy turned to Sammy. “Ella is the water girl. That means she brings the water out to us when we’re working in the field.”
“Yup, I bring the water,” Ella said, “but nobody works today ’cause it’s Sunday.”
“Right,” said Jimmy. “And here in the last cabin we got Luke, Big Andrew, Paymore and John Henry.”
“John Henry has two names,” said Ella, “but he’s just one man. Little Andrew and Big Andrew are two men. Big Andrew ain’t really so big. But Little Andrew is short, so since he’s littler than Big Andrew, we call him Little Andrew.”
Sammy stared at the unadorned clapboard cabins, which seemed small to house so many men. He looked back at Jimmy and Ella, but said nothing.
“I don’t think he’s ever going to talk,” said Ella.
“He don’t need to. You talk enough for both of you.”
“I ain’t either.”
Jimmy continued. “Over in the big house is where Sarah and Willis live. They live behind the kitchen. Then upstairs is Massa Holland and Mrs. Holland.”
“And Dorothy,” Ella said.
They had come to the barn, a large painted wood building with a chicken coop attached to one of the exterior walls. Inside the barn were two horses, seven mules and a milk cow. On the right side of the barn were ten stalls, one for each animal. The first two stalls held the horses; then came a slightly larger stall for the cow, with room for a stool and assorted pails. Then came the smaller stalls of the mules. Bales of hay sat stacked like giant loaves of bread along the opposite wall with pitchforks stuck in two of the loaves.
They stepped inside. The smell of animals and hay was pungent. Jimmy led them to the horses’ stalls. “Little brother, this is the horse that drove you in last night.” said Jimmy. “Her name is Maple. And the dark horse, his name is Walnut.”
Sammy nodded, but still did not speak.
Ella tugged them on to the next stall. “This is the cow,” said Ella, “Her name’s Basheba.”
“Bathsheba,” Jimmy corrected, “Bathsheba is the milk cow.” Then he pointed at the mules’ stalls. “Massa Holland named the mules like a music scale. They’re names are ‘do,’ ‘re,’ ‘mi,’ ‘fa,’ ‘sol,’ ‘la,’ and ‘ti ’ I can’t say for sure which one is which, but Paymore knows each one by name. He says we got a pack of musical mules.”
A chicken waddled in through the open barn door. Ella pointed at it and giggled. “Jimmy, don’t forget rooster.”
Jimmy smiled. “Oh yeah, we got one rooster and we call him George Junior.”
“Cause even before it’s daytime,” said Ella, “George Junior, he wakes everyone up and Massa Holland’s name is George and so you can’t say nothing about it, cause Massa Holland don’t know about it.”
“He won’t say nothing,” said Jimmy.
Sammy tugged out of Jimmy’s hand and went to stare at Bathsheba more closely.
“I don’t think he ever saw a cow before,” said Ella.
“Could be there weren’t no cows where he lived,” Jimmy said. “Someday maybe he’ll tell us where he comes from.” He took the boy’s hand again. “But don’t worry, little brother; you don’t have to talk about it today.”
There were three short barks out in the yard. In through the open barn door ran a medium sized yellow dog with floppy ears just shorter than a rabbit’s. The dog’s tail wagged furiously as it rushed up to Ella.
“Venus!” Ella exclaimed.
Sammy clung to Jimmy’s hand, but Jimmy beckoned the dog over to them.
“Come on, Venus. Come over here; meet our new brother.” The dog approached Sammy with its mouth open in a silly grin. Sammy tentatively put one hand out. The dog sniffed it, and Sammy pulled away. “She won’t hurt you,” said Jimmy. “She’s a real nice dog.”
Sammy let go of Jimmy and leaned toward the dog. His eyes widened. With both hands, he brushed the dog’s back. The dog turned to lick one of Sammy’s hands. Sammy’s eyes lit up. He looked up at Jimmy. Jimmy nodded.
“Venus,” Sammy said.
Instantly Ella ran out through the barn door and down the line of cabins to the first one in the row. She burst into the room where Wally was scrubbing the table.
“He talked!” Ella shouted. “Sammy said Venus!”
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Chapter 2
“A child don’t know”
Christmasville Road was the main thoroughfare from the Hollands’ farm to the town of Jackson, Tennessee. It was a dirt road—a mix of clay and sand with a yellowish tinge. There were farms and plantations all along the road. A strip of woods, mostly narrow, sometimes wide, separated the road from the private properties. Occasionally, an entry gate or service lane interrupted the wall of trees, which lined the length of the road from the county line to the town. There were scaly bark hickories, sweet and black gums, that turned bright orange in October. There were mulberry trees that scattered purple splotches of fruit on the ground all around.
Slaves made good use of these woods after dark. If a slave was out without a pass, a slave had to sneak. And the best way to sneak was in the woods. At night, paddy rollers and dogs patrolled the road. Most often, they peered into the woods with whale oil lamps, and cursed the darkness that hid dark faces.
The woods were a sanctuary in another way. The slaves held prayer meetings and church gatherings in the woods on Sundays. Their meeting place was in a grove along the banks of Dyer Creek. The creek formed the left side of a V of which Christmasville Rd. made the right side. The spot where the creek and road met was the halfway point from the Hollands’ farm to the town of Jackson. Since woods lined both the creek and the road, their juncture was where the woods were thickest. It was there that the road crossed a wooden bridge over the creek.
It was 1857. Ella and Dorothy stopped at the bridge, as they always did. Dorothy was on her way to school. Ella was on an errand to buy potatoes for the Hollands’ dinner. Dorothy was 16 and Ella was 15, both wavering between youth and adulthood.
Dorothy was supposed to ride one of the mules so she wouldn’t tire on her way to school. Ella was supposed to walk alongside the mule and carry Dorothy’s books. But Dorothy refused to ride. She said she’d rather walk. When they left the farm, Ella carried Dorothy’s books for show, but once they got on the road, Dorothy took half the books herself. Dorothy’s discomfort with slavery had been evident since she was little.
Ella was her best friend. Dorothy could not square that with being Ella’s mistress. Dorothy half-heartedly acted the part when her family was present. But even that effort waned. By the time she reached 16, Dorothy felt old enough to disagree with her parents. Nonetheless, she bided her time. She understood that the thoughts she had were radical. She watched and waited—looking for signs—for anything that might help her understand why slavery existed. She felt she must be older before she passed judgment.
Ella, for her part, saw Dorothy as an exception, as not really part of the Hollands in particular or of the white race in general. Ella had accepted the fact that she was a slave. Because she liked Dorothy, she was more willing to play the slave with Dorothy than she was with any of the other Hollands. But Dorothy’s questioning of the status quo sometimes made her feel worse. When Dorothy wondered aloud why Ella couldn’t go to school with her, it was the first time Ella thought what it might be like to go to school. Dorothy’s reordering of assumptions made it harder for Ella to come to terms with her situation.
“Don’t you want to learn things? Don’t you want to learn how to read?” Dorothy asked.
Ella took her time answering. “This child has no time for reading. Besides, I don’t need to read to do what I have to do. I learnt cooking from Wally and Sarah. I learnt cotton picking from Paymore.”
Dorothy smiled. “From Paymore?”
“Yup,” said Ella. “Why, you thought I was born knowing how to do it? You think it’s easy?”
“I don’t know.”
“It’s not really that hard—not for me anyway.” Ella thought back to her first day picking cotton. “After your daddy bought Sammy, he decided Sammy would carry the water instead of me. He said it was time for me to learn to pick cotton. So they gave me a bag and took me out to the field. They wanted Jimmy to teach me what to do, but I said no. I said I have enough trouble with him telling me what to do all the time. I said let Paymore teach me, ’cause he’s always polite to me.”
“Was he a good teacher?”
“He knows how to pick cotton. When he showed me what to do, I said, ‘Is that all there is to it?’ and he said, ‘Miss Ella, that’s all there is to it, and soon enough you gonna wish there’s more to it than there is.’”
Dorothy laughed. “I guess it must be boring.”
“Yes’m, if you’re just doing it, it’s boring. But you got to play a game. You got to be quick with your fingers. You got to watch out not to break the buds that ain’t bloomed. Your hands got to fly around like a butterfly. You got to drag that sack up and down the rows. That sack gets heavier and heavier just when you get more and more tired. When I’m picking cotton, I say to myself, ‘Somewhere somebody must be using a whole lot of cotton.’ With all the cotton I personally picked, you could make clothes for half the people in the world.”
“The world is bigger than you think.”
“Course I don’t pick as much as some do.”
“Who picks the most?” asked Dorothy.
Ella was reluctant to admit it. “Jimmy picks the most.”
“Oh, I cannot believe that!”
“He likes to work, but don’t tell him I told you, cause he’ll say it ain’t true. When he works, it’s like he’s dancing. He gets going. Then you see him catch himself. He slows down. But it’s his mind that slows him down, not his body. If he wanted to, he could pick circles of cotton round the rest of us.”
“Why does he slow down?”
“He don’t like bein’ a slave.”
“Oh.”
“’Course he be upset about everything. He be upset with me ‘cause I ask too many questions. He be mad at Wally ’cause she don’t let him do what he want. The only one he never be mad at is Sammy. They stick up for each other. When Sammy first carried the water, he always took the bucket to Jimmy first. Jimmy would stop his picking and say, ‘Oh, little brother, I been waiting on you. I been dreaming of that water for the longest time. Oh, I’m a thirsty cotton picker, and here you come with all that good water to give me.’ He’d make a big show of it. Sammy would giggle and dip the gourd in the bucket real slow. And Jimmy would fall on his knees and spread his arms wide and let Sammy pour the water in his mouth, while Jimmy threw back his neck and slurped and ooohed and ahhhed. Well it was quite a show for the rest of us, cause we all standing around thirsty waiting for them to get through playing. And you know Sammy would sometimes start to pour a little too fast and spill water on Jimmy’s face and nose, and they’d both fall out laughing. Your daddy was never too happy about this.”
“He probably wished someone would pour water all over his face too,” Dorothy said.
“One day it went too far. Sammy got carried away. While Jimmy was on his knees, Sammy poured the whole bucket down onto Jimmy’s face. Jimmy fell back on the ground, soaking wet. Then Sammy fell down next to him and they both laughed and laughed. But when your daddy saw, he came up and stood right on top of them. Your daddy was real mad. He was hot and thirsty, and all the water was spilt. With one hand, he reached down and grabbed Sammy by the back of his shirt. He picked that boy up and held him in the air. He started to shake him. I thought for sure he’s gonna go get the whip. But just then, Wally ran up and grabbed him out your daddy’s hand, and scolded the boy real loud. She said, ‘Child, you got to behave. You got to behave. We not out here playing games child. You wasted all that water and now Massa Holland and the rest of us is thirsty. We working hard out here and won’t be too long ‘fore you know what I’m talking about. Now you run like the devil and bring back some fresh water for your Massa before we all come get you with the whip.”
“Your mama’s smart.”
“Mmm, she turned to your daddy and said, “Look here, the boy don’t know what he’s doing. A child don’t know. I’ll see to it that he brings the water from now on straight to you.”
Ella and Dorothy had tarried on the bridge too long. Dorothy grabbed Ella’s hand. “Come on,” she said, “we’re going to be late. You make me forget the time with your stories.”
After they’d walked a quarter mile past the bridge, they heard the rumble of horse hooves behind them. Dorothy had been holding Ella’s hand. Now she yanked her toward the side of the road. “Watch out!”
A carriage rushed toward them at tremendous speed. As they turned, they saw a plume of dust rise like a windstorm behind the carriage. There was a break in the dust plume as the carriage clattered onto the bridge over Dyer Creek. At the end of the bridge, the clatter stopped, and the rumble and dust cloud resumed. In an instant, the horses and wheels whooshed upon them. A uniformed black coachman peered at them and cracked the whip on the horses. Dorothy and Ella lurched from the road to a shallow ditch, where they turned to look back at the coach. They glimpsed a white man in a tall black hat. His hands rested on a black walking stick, propped between his knees. He cupped a pair of white gloves, which sat folded on the polished silver crown of the stick. The man looked at them from the carriage glass—but his eyes glazed over. He did not see them.
The dust storm trailing the carriage erupted all around them. Their dresses flew up. Each girl instinctively put one hand out to hold her dress down, and another to her mouth to keep from choking. When the dust died down, they climbed back onto the road, and swatted their clothes.
“Who was that?” asked Ella.
“Augustus Askew,” Dorothy said.
“So that’s what he looks like,” said Ella.
“Seems like he doesn’t care who he runs over,” said Dorothy.
“I don’t think he saw us.”
“Oh he’s a selfish, cruel old man. May his carriage tip and fall and end his misery,” Dorothy said.
_________________________________________
Chapter 3
The Light Within
In May of 1860, a traveling painter arrived in Jackson. Erastus Hicks painted “anything that wants an artist’s hand,” including portraits, signs, keepsakes, lithographs, and Biblical illustrations. Word of the artist’s arrival spread. Within a week, Mr. Hicks received a commission. Mr. Augustus Askew engaged Mr. Hicks to paint two paintings: first, a portrait of his wife, Lucille, and, second, a painting to illustrate one of Mr. Askew’s favorite Biblical scenes, in which Mary of Bethany, sister of Martha, washes the Lord’s feet.
Mr. Hicks began his work at the Askew plantation, which bore the name Hickory Grove in honor of the row of stately hickories that lined both sides of the lane from the gate on Christmasville Road to the plantation house.
As he calculated his financial expenses, Mr. Askew briefly explored with Mr. Hicks whether the artist might combine the two projects by inserting the portrait of his wife into the Biblical allegory in the role of Mary. However, Erastus convinced Augustus that he would do better with a likeness of his wife piously reading the Bible, than to subject her to the uncertain implications of foot washing, even though the foot would be that of the Lord himself.
Mr. Askew gave the task of assisting Mr. Hicks to his twenty-year-old slave Cato. Everyone at Hickory Grove, except for his wife, Lucille, knew that Cato was the offspring of Augustus’ rape of the slave Josline in 1840, three years after he met and married Lucille Watford.
Lucille might see as well as anyone that Cato’s lineage was not pure. His skin was more the color of butternut than walnut. His hair and features disclosed mixing of blood. What Augustus hoped was not obvious to Lucille was how much Cato resembled the way he himself had looked when he was a boy of a similar age. There were no portraits to reveal the appearance of the young Augustus. Since Lucille had not laid eyes on her spouse until he was past 40 years old, she had no basis upon which to make a comparison between her husband and this fair-skinned young slave, who was always kept close at hand.
Relying on the invisibility of the familiar, Augustus calculated that keeping Cato ever present would lessen the possibility of Lucille’s happening upon him at chance intervals in which the uniqueness of his appearance might arouse her curiosity. She watched the boy grow for twenty years; yet so accustomed was she to his presence that she did not notice the particulars of his eyes, or of his nose or lips. She did notice that Cato was deferential to her in an odd, sometimes anxious way. However, this eccentricity gave her nothing she could ever put her finger on.
Mr. Erastus Hicks, on the other hand, a close observer of all things visual, did notice the particulars of Cato’s features. When Mr. Askew informed him that Cato would be his assistant, Erastus sought to gain the boy’s friendship. He saw eagerness and curiosity in Cato’s wide eyes. He also noticed that the boy abruptly changed from exuberant youth to humble servant whenever Lucille entered the room.
Cato, for his part, soon learned to trust Erastus. When they were alone together, he did not hide his enthusiasm. Not only was Erastus an artist, but he told stories of his travels across the country. He was different from all other white men. When he spoke, it was with an accent that Cato took to be a Northern dialect. His speech was full of mysterious words. He spoke to Cato as if speaking to a kindred spirit. This above all else set him apart.
As the portrait of Lucille progressed, Cato marveled at the ability of the painter to bring the blank canvas to life with an accurate likeness. Cato saw that Mr. Hicks gave his customers just what they wanted. In her portrait, Mrs. Askew sat beside a small table upon which rested an open copy of the Bible. Her hand lay outstretched on one page of scripture, as if pointing to a particular passage, while her face entreated the viewer with a stern smile that conveyed her piety. Mr. Askew was pleased with the portrait. More important, so was Mrs. Askew.
The day after that project was finished, Erastus moved his painting operation from the parlor, in which Lucille had sat, to a shrubby corner of the garden, where a bank of closely planted dogwood bushes provided shelter. As assistant, Cato had begun to learn the practical aspects of making a painting. While Mr. Hicks set up his easel, Cato fetched charcoal sticks, paints, cloths and sundry brushes. He also carted out two chairs and a bucket of water.
When they were ready, Erastus explained the project to the boy. “Son, I will now commence to paint a Biblical illustration, depicting the washing of the foot of Jesus by Mary, or more explicitly, the drying of the Lord’s foot with her hair, since I reckon that particularity of the story is one that your Master Askew is most apt to find inspiring.”
“Yes, sir, Master Hicks,” said Cato, with the wide-eyed look of a puppy watching a bone.
Erastus smiled at the boy. “Now, Cato, my lad, here we are quite alone, don’t you see. And as we will be working together hereabouts in the garden, quite out from under the eyes and ears of your master and mistress, I propose that we dispense with formalities and commence with the familiarities. Why don’t you call me Erastus, and I, for my part, will call you Cato?”
“Yes, sir, Master Erastus,” replied Cato.
“No, truly, you needn’t say ‘sir’ or ‘master’, Cato. It makes me feel—what shall I say?—too immodest, and truth-be-told, I’m a Quaker, you see, and we Quakers believe in modest ways.”
Cato nodded. He wasn’t sure what a Quaker was, but he could see that they were strange. “All right, Erastus,” he said.
“Fine, now, do you know your Bible? Have you heard this story of Mary washing the feet of Jesus?”
“I don’t recall as I have,” said Cato. “I don’t recall that Reverend Zeke has mentioned it.”
“Reverend Zeke?”
“He’s our preacher, the slaves’ preacher. We go to him on Sundays down by Dyer creek. He tells many fine stories, but I don’t recall him telling a story about washing the Lord’s feet.”
“Well, Cato, this story is connected to the story of Lazarus.”
“Lazarus? I know that story. Reverend Zeke told us that Jesus raised him from the dead.”
“Yes, well then no doubt you know that Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead because his sisters, Mary and Martha were quite distraught. When Mary wept, Jesus wept too; so he was right fond of Mary, you see. Sometime after Jesus brought Lazarus back to life, the whole group, Lazarus, Martha, Mary, Jesus and the disciples, they all sat down for a pleasant supper. Mary brought in a pound of costly ointment, anointed Jesus’ feet, and then wiped his feet with her hair. Well, old Judas, he didn’t like that. He said, ‘Why was not this ointment sold and given to the poor?’ And Jesus said, ‘Let her alone: against the day of my burying hath she kept this. For the poor always ye have with ye; but me ye have not always.’” Erastus quoted the gospel with a devout intonation.
Cato’s eyes searched Erastus for an explanation of the moral. “So I reckon Jesus was thinking about his death,” Cato ventured.
“Yes, and I think in truth he was moved by Mary’s love and gratitude,” said Erastus.
Cato hesitated, then asked, “Do you suppose she was good-looking?”
“Yes, Cato, I do suppose she must have been good-looking. Anyway, that’s how I expect to paint her, don’t you think?”
“Yes,” Cato agreed, “but how will you draw her? Will you make her like someone you know?”
“Oh I expect I will use my imagination for Mary. That would be best, in this case. But I’ll want to work with a model for Jesus … especially so I can draw his feet. Feet are considerable hard to paint, you see.”
“A model?” said Cato, who was not sure of the word’s meaning.
“Yes. A model, you know, is someone who stands in for somebody else.”
“Will you ask Master Askew?”
Erastus laughed. “No, no, I don’t suppose old Askew will have the time or patience to sit as a model, much as he might hanker to see himself painted in as the Lord. No, I need a body with a pair of good feet to model.” As he spoke, Erastus looked down at Cato’s bare feet, then back up at him with a wink.
“Me?” Cato was astonished. He looked down at his feet in dismay. “Oh but my feet are all dirty.”
“Well, lad, I’d allow that Jesus’ feet were dirty too, and that’s why Mary thought to wash them for him.”
“But what if Master Askew finds out?” Cato asked. “I don’t believe he’d think it fitting for me to be a model for Jesus.”
“No, Cato, I expect you’re right about that.” Erastus agreed. “So that’s why we’ve come out here in the garden, where all these fine dogwood shrubs and bushes block the view from the house. Nobody can see us here. And if someone should happen upon us while I’m sketching you, I will surely pretend to cuss you out as if I’d just caught you sitting down on the job. No one will be the wiser.”
Cato was not convinced. “But won’t they recognize me in the painting?”
“Well that depends.” Erastus scratched his chin. “I calculate that if I use your face and body, I’ll disguise it just enough so no one will know it’s you … except you and me, of course.” He winked again. “I can alter your complexion, and fix you up with a fine beard.”
“Gracious!” said Cato with a broad smile. “I’ll be the model for Jesus!” His eyes shone as he paced beside the chair. “A beard! I don’t know what I should look like with a beard. … Do you want me to sit here on the chair?” He looked at the chair, and then at the bucket beside it. “Should I wash my feet first? Is that what this bucket of water is for?” He sat down on the chair. He sat on his hands to keep them still. Then his eyebrows arched, “Oh Erastus, what about the ointmlent?” His hands flew up. “We haven’t any ointment!”
“Now, now lad, let’s be methodical here,” said the artist. “The first thing I need is some libations for the artistic muse. Tell me, Cato, do you happen to know where Mr. Askew keeps his anti-fogmatics? I need something to embolden my palette. A dram of bourbon and sugar for a julep should do the trick.”
“Do you mean liquor?” asked Cato.
“Yes, my boy, I do indeed. I mean to have a smile of a drink before we commence, and if you can fetch that for me from the house, I’m inclined to suggest that you might join me in a swallow to our health.”
“Ah, to our health … yes, but the bourbon is locked in a cabinet,” Cato said. “I’d have to ask Mrs. Askew to open it.” He hesitated. “I do believe it might go better, if you wouldn’t think it too inconvenient, if you were to ask Mrs. Askew for it yourself. Otherwise I fear Mrs. Askew would question such a request from me, and wonder if I’d taken leave of my senses.”
The artist considered this. “Well, yes, I suppose it would be better if I inquired after the bourbon myself,” he concluded.
While Erastus went to the house to negotiate the liquor, Cato busied himself arranging the easel, paper and charcoal sticks. He contemplated whether he ought to wash his feet. He was uncertain whether the artist wanted him to model with clean feet or dirty feet, so he decided to wait. He was beside himself with excitement. Never in his life had he imagined that such a moment might fall to him, to have his portrait painted in a likeness of Christ, by a white man who offered him bourbon and asked to be called by his first name.
As Cato was contemplating these things, Erastus returned from his mission with a beaker of bourbon, a small pouch of sugar, and a glass. Then with yet another wink, Erastus, reached inside his waistcoat and pulled out a second glass, which he had secreted from the pantry.
“Now, we’ll have a proper toast to launch this project,” he said. He placed the glasses on the ground, poured a half inch of sugar in each, and then topped the sugar with the bourbon. He handed Cato one of the glasses. “Are you partial to juleps?” he asked.
“I’ve never tasted one before,” said Cato.
“Have you had liquor ever at all, my lad?”
“No, Erastus, not as I can recall.”
“Well, I do believe you should recall it had you done so,” said Erastus. “So here is a start; and here’s to your health, my friend.” He handed Cato a glass and clinked it with his own. “May all the dreams of your heart someday come true.”
Cato had never received a toast before. He tasted the sweetened bourbon, which felt warm in his throat. “And, well, to you also, Erastus.” He clinked his glass on the artist’s. “May the dreams of your heart also come true.”
“Ah, my friend, thank you,” said Erastus. His eyes narrowed. “You know, I think I can say that the dreams of my heart have indeed come true. Look, don’t you see, here we are on a fine summer day in a splendid garden, about to commence upon the undertaking of an inspiring artistic depiction, and you are as fine a model as I could ever hope to paint.” He put his hand freely on the boy’s wrist, and held it there.
Cato felt the blood rush to his head. Perhaps it was from the bourbon. He was not sure why, but he felt as if he wanted to grasp the artist bodily and clasp him to himself. However, he simply looked at the ground and said, “Yes, Erastus, it is a fine day to model for Jesus.”
“Well, let’s get to it then, shall we?” Erastus swallowed the last of his drink, then turned to the easel, which sat a dozen feet from the chair and water bucket. “Now let’s see, have a seat there, and I’ll sketch out the basics of the scene. I’ll commence with a study, a charcoal sketch, proportional to but smaller than the final painting.”
“Do you want me to wash my feet first?” asked Cato, recalling his earlier dilemma.
“Ah … .” Erastus considered this. “I have a surprise,” he said.
Cato sat on the chair, and rolled up his pant leg in preparation for modeling. The artist observed this, then came up in front of the boy, knelt and slid the water bucket round in front of him. He reached into a pocket of his waistcoat and pulled out a small vial and a cloth. He popped the stopper off the vial and passed it under Cato’s nose. “And when Mary washed his feet,” Erastus said, “the house was filled with the fragrance of the ointment.”
Cato inhaled the rich flowery aroma, which recalled a perfume he’d smelled on Mrs. Askew at Christmas time. He felt his eyes roll back in his head.
Erastus poured the contents of the vial into the bucket of water, which had sat warming in the sun for half an hour. He placed his hands in the bucket and swirled the water, gently stirring it. Then, with his wet bare hands, he cupped Cato’s foot and began to rub it. Startled, Cato raised his head, which had sunk back, and stared down at the man at his feet as if he were dreaming. He felt the warmth of the water and the smooth, massaging strokes of Erastus’s hand. He heard himself murmur, “Ah, that feels … .” He let the sentence trail off.
Erastus washed and kneaded Cato’s foot, while he gazed at the boy’s face. He appraised the head of soft sepia curls, the warm, hazel eyes, the nut-brown whiskerless skin, the mulatto medley of features: Caucasian nose and cheeks, Negro lips and eyes. “Yes, Cato, you’re as handsome a lad as I can recall, and I shall paint the Lord as an older version of you, so no one but you and I will know it.”
Cato was not sure what was happening. The warmth of the water, and the sensual touch on his foot, shot up his leg in a way quite similar to the way the bourbon had glided warm and sweetly tingling into his throat. He felt a strange, comfortable feeling. Instinctively, he placed his hand on his leg and squeezed it. He saw the artist’s eyes watch his hand, and then felt the man’s grip tighten, rubbing up and down his foot. There were goose bumps on Cato’s neck.
Cato wanted to say something, but he was speechless. He had never before felt sensual pleasure at the hands of any person. His whole life now seemed as if it had been a yearning for a kind touch such as this; and here was this gentle man, washing his foot, anointing it now with a sweet perfume. He wanted to thank him, to say something to convey the gratitude that flowed in his heart for the Quaker’s friendship.
Erastus peered at Cato with an earnest look. He pulled himself slightly forward using Cato’s foot, and seemed, for a moment, as if he was going to lay his chin down on the chair right between Cato’s legs. His gaze froze there in midair, as if to appraise a rare jewel. Cato could not decipher the transfixed look in his eyes. The painter seemed almost frightened. He stayed that way awkwardly long, staring at Cato’s lap, his head suspended, not moving down or up, but poised above Cato’s legs.
Then Erastus sucked in his breath, turned his head, and closed his eyes. He said, “Someday my lad, you shall have the dreams of your heart come true, for you are one of God’s finest creations.” He pulled back, lifted his head and smiled. “All I can do is tell you this: You will find this dream, someday. For God has given me the gift of vision, the gift of imagination, and I can see the happiness of that time, when you shall know the yearnings of your heart, and the truest joy of life shall come to you.”
Cato did not know what Erastus meant, nor could he see what place or yearnings the man imagined, but he felt the kind intentions of his friend’s wishes. He placed his hand gently on the artist’s head, and, as he did so, Erastus voice squeaked, “Oh … God help me.”
Erastus shook his head, as if brushing off a fly, and stood. He shrugged his shoulders. “Yes, God help me lad, we’ve got much work to do and I’m inclined to say we could fritter away the hours with no accomplishment if I don’t set about my work.”
Erastus returned to the easel and took up a pencil. “All right, now let’s see you extend your foot there. Find a comfortable position, and I shall commence to draw.”
Cato lay back in the chair and propped his leg on the bucket with his bare foot extended. He folded his hands behind his head and looked up at the sky. His body tingled. He thought of a time past, when he’d sat by himself on a stool in a room adjacent to the parlor. The Askews were entertaining. One of the guests played the piano. The pianist had announced that the music was a nocturne written by a man whose name was “show pan.” Cato had thought at the time that those moments he sat listening to a nocturne, had been the best moments of his life. Now he considered that this moment in the garden might supplant that in his memory.
“Erastus, do you know famous piano music?” he asked.
“I do.”
“Do you know music written by a man called ‘show pan?’”
The artist smiled. “Why yes, Frederic Chopin, composer of etudes, nocturnes and waltzes. I have heard his work. But where in the name of gracious did you hear of him, my young friend?”
“A man came to visit the Askews last year. He played the piano in the parlor. I was in the next room. I thought it must be how it is in heaven, to hear music like that.”
“Yes, well, you have a sensitive soul, my lad. I hope that someday you will rest in heaven, and hear all the great music of the world. I do believe that humankind has done its best when it comes to music, Cato; better than at any other art.”
Cato had never thought about humankind in this way. “Where does music come from?” he asked.
“I should think it comes from God,” Erastus answered. “In fact, anyone who might doubt the Almighty’s existence, should only have to hear the music of Chopin or Mozart to know for a fact that it must come from the Holy Spirit.”
“Where did you learn to paint, Erastus?”
“I studied it as a boy,” the artist replied, “with a man my father knew. His name was Thomas Fields. He painted portraits in my home city: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.”
Cato had heard of Pennsylvania. Master William told him about it, as he had told him of so many things. William talked about the North as if it were quite another world. “What is Pennsylvania like?” he asked.
“It’s full of woods, my lad. The name Pennsylvania means ‘Penn’s woods’ after Mr. William Penn, a great man, a man of peace. He was a Quaker, you see, like me. He was the first governor of the colony.”
“How come you are a Quaker?”
“My people in Pennsylvania are all Quakers, and so I was brought up in the Quaker faith.”
“Are Quakers the same as Shakers, Erastus?”
“Now lad, how ever did you hear of Shakers?”
“From William, he’s Master Augustus’ son. I was his servant until he went to college. William said there were Shakers in Kentucky. He said they shaked when they were in church.”
“Well the Shakers split off from the Quakers, Cato. I guess you could say we quake and they shake.”
Cato laughed. “How come you quake?”
“Well that’s what Quakers do when they are moved by the Holy Spirit, you see. It means you feel the power of God upon you, and it causes you to tremble.”
Cato tried to imagine the feel of the hand of the Holy Spirit upon him. “I think I would like to be a Quaker,” he said.
“Well, my lad, we don’t just quake. We call ourselves the Society of Friends. We believe in brotherly love, mainly. Quakers founded the city of Philadelphia, which means the city of brotherly love.”
A city of brotherly love seemed fantastic. Cato could not imagine what it would look like. “Do the Quakers have slaves too?” he asked.
“No, lad, no.” Erastus looked toward Cato with tender eyes. “That is not our way. We believe in love and friendship … among all God’s creatures.”
“I expect it is right that creatures should be friends with each other,” Cato said.
Erastus smiled. “We Quakers, we Friends, speak of the light within, which means the light of God that shines in everyone. When I paint, I try to capture that light in my painting.”
“Is that’s why Missus Askew’s portrait glows so?”
“Well, it is a question of how you use the paint, you see, Cato. Each man can put himself in the service of the Lord, no matter what job he does. You only have to look for the light within each person you meet.”
“I can’t say as I ever saw the light within Missus Askew, Erastus. She’s generally strict where I’m concerned, though she’s always been kind to William.”
“Well Cato, you have to consider if you may be sometimes unfriendly toward her. I’ve noticed that your manner is different when she’s about.”
“I … well … .” Cato was not sure if he should confide in the painter. “I’m afraid that she might find out about me,” he said.
“Find out what?”
“About where I come from.”
“Weren’t you born here?”
“Yes … well … that’s just it. … I was born here, and my mother was, well, she was a servant to Master Askew and he …. well … I reckon, from what everyone says, that he was my father.”
“Ah … .”
“And you know Erastus, I think everyone in the whole county knows about it, excepting for Missus Askew; and I do believe if she knew it, she would not glow so.”
“Perhaps not … ,” the painter conceded. “But what does Askew think of you. Does he treat you well?”
“Yes, mostly he does. But … well … he never does look me in the eye. I think he always looks to my left or my right. Only once did I see him look at me. It was in the mirror, once … in the dining room. That’s the only time I recall him looking right at me, and I think he was staring then for certain.”
“Well, now, I expect he can see himself in you, wouldn’t you think? But it must be considerable hard for him to see it.”
“Yes, considerable.”
“And what of your mother?”
“My mother passed away ten years ago.”
“I see.”
“I was ten then. They wouldn’t let me see her when she died. She was sick with fever. I guess it was catching.”
“Ah, my gracious.”
“So, now I’m mostly on my own.”
“Yes. Well, Cato, that is the truth, we are all on our own, you see, in a manner of speaking. There’s nothing wrong with that. But you have the light within.”
“Do I?”
“Ah, lad, it glows powerful strong in thee. I can tell you that. But look now, you must look for it in others, that’s the thing. Look for it in the people you meet. That’s how you can see it best.”
“I’ll try, Erastus.”
“The more you’re able to see the light in others, the more brightly it will glow in you. Watch and see.”
“How do you make the paint glow, Erastus?”
“It’s a trick of the eye my boy. When you control the whole world within the painting you can choose the relative glow of anything within it.”
“I wish I could paint.”
“Ah, well … .” Erastus looked at the boy with tenderness. “I wish it was a world in which you could do all that you are capable of doing. For I think you could learn to do anything you put your mind to. But you must make the most of what God gives you. If you were born to serve, always remember that you can serve with grace.”
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Chapter 4
A Pot to Catch the Sounds
The reverend Ezekiel Daniel’s life changed upon the death of his owner, James Greer. Greer whipped Ezekiel regularly in his early life. But near the end of his life, when the specter of his demise was before him, Greer grew repentant for his sins. It came to him in a dream to strike a bargain with his slave. He told Zeke he would set him free, if in return Zeke would take a vow to spread the word of the Lord among his people.
At that time, Zeke had not come unto the Lord. But when Master Greer put forth this proposition, Zeke accepted salvation on that day. They struck a bargain, and each was as good as his word. Greer brought in a tutor to teach Zeke to read, so he could study the Bible. Zeke came each Sunday to the back row of Greer’s Methodist church to hear the teachings of its minister. When the old master saw that Zeke had learned to read the Bible well enough to quote chapter and verse, he signed the papers that set Zeke free upon his death.
The night the old man passed away, Zeke knelt next to his master’s body and kissed his forehead. Zeke had both his freedom and a sizable sum of money, which Greer left him for good measure. Zeke might have done any number of things, but the very next day he set upon his mission. He spread word among the slaves in the northern districts of Jackson to come to the woods along Dyer Creek near Christmasville Road on Sunday morning, there to hear the word of the Lord.
The Forked Deer was a narrow river, brown from Tennessee mud, which did not run straight for any meaningful distance. Even so, it was navigable for the flat-bottomed boats that carried cotton west to Memphis then down the Mississippi. Several tributaries along its course fed the Forked Deer, and these creeks crisscrossed the farms and plantations of Madison County. Dyer Creek was one of the largest of these, wide-enough to require a bridge on Christmasville Road, and deep enough in late spring or early summer to accommodate a full baptism.
The slaves gathered in a clearing along the banks of Dyer Creek, surrounded by woods thick enough to assure concealment. A big clay pot sat tipped on its side near the stump from which Reverend Zeke held forth. The slaves believed the pot could catch the sounds, the amens and exhortations of the faithful. The pot would prevent wayward words from reaching white ears. This was an important precaution, because the forum at Dyer Creek provided an occasion for frank talk, permissible in only a few places in the life of a slave.
When he wasn’t preaching, Zeke was a quiet fellow. He lived in a shack on the edge of the old Greer farm. He was a big, heavyset man, much given to perspiration and blowing his nose. Apart from food, his principal temptation came from clothes. In this, he held himself to moderation, lest he become too worldly. His natural inclination was to dress nattily, and to keep himself oiled and sharp. But in deference to modesty, he focused his love of ornamentation upon a single collection of accessories: his handkerchiefs.
Drawing from time to time upon his financial endowment, Zeke collected handkerchiefs from the humblest plain white cotton to the most fanciful embroidered silk. These he bought from merchants and traveling salesmen. Others he received as gifts from members of his congregation of followers.
Zeke put his ever-present handkerchief to good use when he preached. It came and went from his vest pocket as he spoke. Sometimes, in an impassioned moment, it rose up to wipe the sweat from his brow. Sometimes it hung in his hand by the side of the tree stump that served as his pulpit. Sometimes it waved in the air making a point. It could be the flag that parted the waters of the Red Sea. It could be the trumpet that sounded in Jericho. It could be the prodigal son working his way back from the excesses of sin to the simple redemption of home. It could be the crown of thorns on Jesus’ head, or the whip that scourged his body. It could be the cross itself, carried up Golgotha, heavier than any sack of cotton ever dragged to the gin, or it could be the great stone which rolled away from Jesus’ tomb on Easter morning.
Soon enough, Zeke found a good crowd gathering on Sunday mornings to hear him preach. As it happened, the slaves’ yearning for the Lord and their yearnings for each other found a common purpose at the Creek, as there was no better place to begin a courtship or learn the news of the land than while pursuing salvation. Slaves from a dozen farms and plantations mingled together, and the opportunities for the slaves to enjoy social intercourse were greater at the Creek than at any other place in Madison County.
Wally accustomed her children to attending Zeke’s services on Sunday mornings. At age 18, Ella went willingly, not only because she wanted to hear the gossip, but also because she enjoyed Reverend Zeke’s sermons. Reverend Zeke and his handkerchief kept folks shouting, fanning, and leaning forward. The sermons roused her. Emotions yanked at her heart. But then a sober voice in her head would see that the flag, or the stone, or the scourge was just a handkerchief, that it was made from cotton cloth, that back home when he was by himself, Reverend Zeke must surely have blown his nose in it.
Jimmy, who was 23, had no patience for hearing about yet another Master who set forth commandments and required obedience. He was indifferent to gossip, and though he was of age, he was indifferent as well to the opportunities for romantic advancement. He endured the weekly ordeal only because Wally gave him no choice. But one Sunday, events conspired to bring Jimmy’s simmering resentment to a head.
Sara, a slave from the Askew’s Hickory Grove plantation, had been caught stealing food from a locked storehouse. In reprisal for this, and by way of setting an example to others, Augustus Askew had arranged to have one of Sara’s children, her son Charles, sold to traders who would take him to a distant county. Mr. Askew told Sara he would use the proceeds from this transaction to replenish the stolen storehouse supplies.
“You have taken from me. Now I will take from you,” he told her. “The child will be gone by the end of the week.”
Within a quarter of an hour, the whole gathering at Dyer Creek had heard the story. Sara herself came to the side of the stump, where Zeke stood with his head bowed. She knelt in front of him, and said simply “Help me.”
Reverend Zeke stood over her. He was a big man, big as a mountain. When he looked up at the sky, his eyes flashed. They flashed as though lightning struck the mountain from a cloud. There was a storm of emotion brewing. Reverend Zeke moved to take control of the storm. He raised his hands to quiet the congregation.
“I know you got a hurt”, he roared. His voice boomed with the power of the mountain behind it.
“I’ve been there,” he whispered. His whispering voice cracked.
“I’ve been there,” he said yet again, even more softly. It was hard for him to say it, hard for him to let the pain of it back up, to let it out of his soul, to show it so clearly to his people.
Sweat beaded on Zeke’s face. His eyes closed. His face wrenched into a question, and his eyes opened. “Anybody else been there?”
He looked around the clearing in a sweeping arc. All around the bank of the creek, hands shot up and waved. The slaves leaned forward with their arms stretched out, leaning so far across the backs of those in front of them and waving so hard that the whole congregation seemed on the verge of toppling over.
Zeke smiled. “You’ve been there?” he asked. “You know what it is to hurt?”
Sara, on her knees, could not speak. Several days of tears had choked away her voice. Her face was raw and soggy. She looked around the clearing at the faces that mirrored her pain, at the arms stretched out and waving at her.
“I know you ask, ‘How’d we get this way, Lord?’” Zeke was imploring. He spoke upward to the sky.
“I know you ask, Lord, why? – Why, Jesus?” Zeke got lost in his question. He didn’t know the answer. He hadn’t prepared an answer before he spoke.
He asked again, “Why?” He wanted God to hear him clearly.
His voice grew louder, “Why would you let this happen?”
His voice grew angry. “I mean to say, why should it be this way?”
Zeke forgot about the people around him. He straightened himself up and raised his arm up toward God. He yelled now, angry and shaking his fist. “Why should this woman … ?” His hand pointed down at Sara. He took a step forward and then a step back, as if he were preparing for a fight.
“Why should Sara … ?” His voice cracked when he said “Sara,” and his eyes fell closed again.
“Why should Sara – a good mother …” He began shaking his arm as he pointed down at Sara. “… a woman who loved her little children.” There were shouts now in the congregation. Zeke was saying too much, saying it too clearly, more than anyone could bear.
“No, I’m gonna say it now.” Zeke shook his head. “… a woman who loved her children, a woman whose only thought, whose only thought was to get some food for their hunger.”
Zeke opened his eyes again and cast them out over the congregation. “What mother wouldn’t?” He looked at a slender woman who leaned against a tree while she slapped her head with the back of her hand. “What mother wouldn’t?” he asked again.
Zeke stepped forward to the edge of the tree stump. He pulled out his handkerchief to dangle it in front of him like a hungry child. “Little boy says, ‘I’m hungry.’”
A woman in the back shouted, “That’s right!”
Zeke smiled, swung the handkerchief back behind him, and said, “Well, let me get you some food then.”
Several voices answered, “That’s right!”
“Gonna go over to that store house,” Zeke said, and waved the handkerchief to his side. “Gonna go over to that house where they got all that food locked up!”
“Go on.”
“Got to go and get my little boy something to eat.”
“Amen.”
“Don’t care about Askew!”
“No!”
“Askew don’t need that food.”
“No!”
“The plain truth of it is, Askew’s got too much food.”
Zeke began laughing now. “That’s why he’s got to keep it locked up!”
Everywhere heads nodded.
“But the Bible says …. .” Zeke paused, and dropped the handkerchief to his side. “…. The Bible says, ‘Thou shalt not steal.’”
The congregation fell silent. Zeke had come to a trap. He didn’t know where he was going. He closed his eyes again, seeking to implore his heart.
“God says, ‘Thou shalt not steal.’” Zeke repeated it slowly. He looked hard at the commandment, looked for a way around it. But it seemed locked tight. Silence rippled across the creek.
Zeke turned around. He turned to face the water for a moment. Then he raised his hand above his head and turned back to his flock. “Now some might say that Askew stole – that Mr. Augustus Askew stole that child from his mama when he determined to sell that boy away from her.”
Several slaves looked at the pot. Others turned and peered into the woods behind them. No one was there. There was no sound except the echo of Zeke’s defamation.
Zeke shook his head. “But Askew, he says, ‘No, I didn’t steal. These children, they’re my property. Sara, she’s my property.’”
Ella moved to the edge of the rock she was sitting on. Jimmy was glaring. Sara looked up now at Zeke with vacant eyes. Zeke stared at her for a moment, and then wiped his face with the handkerchief.
“But I say … I say, if Sara took some of Askew’s food, well that’s not stealing. No, that’s not stealing.”
He raised his voice now to drive home his message. “Those children put that food in their mouths. That food went down in their stomachs. If Askew owns the children, then he still owns the food even when it’s down inside them. So Askew didn’t lose none of his food. He still owned it. Ain’t nothing got stole!”
This line of reasoning stunned the congregation. Zeke had found a way past the commandment. “You see, brothers and sisters, that’s just one piece of Askew’s property eating another piece of his property!” Zeke boomed.
“But old Askew,” Zeke cocked his head, “he don’t see it that way. Askew say he’s gonna make an example.”
Zeke screwed up his face and looked back over his shoulder. He said, “An example?”
He looked down at Sara. “Now brothers and sisters, we have here before us an example.”
Zeke stepped in front of the stump. He reached down to take Sara’s hand. He raised her to her feet.
“We have an example of the sadness of losing a child.” Sara stood meekly, tears glistening on her face.
Zeke raised his eyes and looked at the sky. “But what can this teach us?” He looked back down at his congregation. He said, “I say to you and I say to the Lord, ‘What does this teach us?’”
Zeke let go of Sara’s hand and stepped back behind the stump. “Jesus said …” He paused and looked around slowly at the slaves, “Jesus said, ‘If a man strikes you – you ought not to strike him back.’ Jesus said, ‘You’ve got to turn the other cheek.’” Zeke turned his face to the side as he said this.
Then, with his head sideways, he turned his eyes back toward the listeners. “Well, alright …” He turned his face forward again.
“Alright, I turned my cheek.” He turned his head to the other side, “and then I turned the other cheek,” he turned his head once more, “and then I turned back to the first cheek again!”
“I’m ’bout run out of cheeks.” He raised his handkerchief in front of his face. “But I say …” he shook the handkerchief. “I say you got to keep on to the last.” Zeke was trembling now, summoning the power of his faith from within himself.
“Listen to me!” The light began to shine in his eyes again. “Listen to what I say.” Zeke was summoning back the storm.
“After Jesus had been whipped …” Zeke paused. “… whipped and scourged! ….” Zeke looked at the sky, at a soft white cloud. “Do you know what that’s like?” Zeke put a twisted smile on his face. “Do you know what whipping feels like?”
The congregation was silent. Everyone knew how often Zeke had been whipped in his youth.
“After Jesus was whipped, they nailed him …” Zeke’s voice faltered. “… they nailed him…” Zeke swallowed his voice completely now. “… to a cross.” Zeke’s eyes glazed with the vision before him. The sun was beating on his face. Beads of sweat dropped from his chin, but he did not feel them.
“And when Jesus was nailed on that cross, he had something to say.” Zeke opened his eyes. His eyes were full of his pain and anger. They held the storm that was raging in his heart, in the hearts of all those present. And for a moment, it looked as if he couldn’t go on, as if he’d reached the limit of what he could say. He was teetering on the edge of the small rock upon which he stood behind the stump. His muscles strained against his weight. A passing cloud caused the sun to darken, stretching a shadow quickly and quietly across the clearing. Several slaves looked up—surprised by the sudden chill. Then the cloud passed and the sun leapt back into the clearing. The expanding brightness soothed the hurt in Zeke’s eyes. His weight settled back on the rock. His upstretched arm slowly glided down to his side.
“When he was nailed to the cross, Jesus said, ‘Forgive them.’ He said, ‘Forgive them, for they know not what they do.’” Zeke’s voice was gentle now. A glint of tear showed in the corner of his eye.
“I say, Alright! Askew has given us his example. Now let us give Askew ours!” Zeke shouted the last word so abruptly, that several heads jerked forward.
“We have a higher example, an example that puts Askew to shame. We can be better than Askew. We can do what that man has never done! We got to say, ‘Forgive them. Forgive him brothers and sisters. Forgive this man! For as God is my witness, this man does not know what he do. He doesn’t know it!”
Zeke paused and shook his head. “This is a man who has seen fit to put his own son into slavery.” All eyes darted around the clearing for Cato, looking for the slave that everyone knew was the offspring of Askew’s rape of his house servant Josline. But Cato was not there this day.
“This is a man who has whipped and punished and taken and given nothing but suffering to those who work to care for his home, his land, his property, even his wife and his children.”
This is a man who does not know, cannot know, will never know, until that day when he finally stands before God almighty, what he do.”
Zeke wiped his face with the handkerchief. “They know not what they do. And Jesus said, ‘Forgive them, Father. They know not what they do.’”
Zeke finished his sermon with his face bowed. He took Sara’s hand again. Her face was empty. Zeke said, “Let us now join our hands brothers and sisters, in prayer for our sister Sara, and for the well-being of her precious son Charles.”
With that, Ella reached to take Jimmy’s hand, but Jimmy pulled his hand away. His chest was heaving. He seemed to be struggling to breathe. He was so incensed, so outraged by the forgiveness that Reverend Zeke proposed that he could barely speak. He stood and crackled these words to Wally, “I will never come here again.” And with that, he pushed past the people near him and walked back into the woods.
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Chapter 5
Bel Canto
As the summer of 1860 ripened, so too did Erastus Hicks’ painting of the washing of Christ’s feet by Mary of Bethany. Having completed an assortment of charcoal studies, the painter began preparations for the painting itself. One morning, he became a carpenter, fashioning stretchers with wood and glue. In the afternoon, he coaxed the canvas onto its frame, then brushed its surface with sizing of rabbit skin glue. The next morning he primed the skin with a coat of lead white paint. A week later, he painted the entire area with a ground using burnt umber, a dark, neutral pigment, which would allow the flesh of the figures to incarnate with three-dimensional force.
At first, the characters emerged from the background without context. The figure of Christ sat in a space that would eventually hold a stool. In front of Christ, the specter of Mary, on her knees, dried his foot with her hair. The body of Jesus leaned back on the invisible stool in a yielding, dreamy posture, his left leg raised toward Mary. The face of Jesus—a delicate, sable-brushed sheen of color--was wrapped in hog bristle strokes of chestnut hair and beard. Erastus, seeking a heretical realism, intended to paint Christ as an ethnic Jew, with Semitic blood in his veins. So the hair, a flurry of passionate paint strokes, was coarser than that of the pious fine-haired Protestant Christs Erastus had seen in a New York museum.
While Erastus had painted most of the face of Jesus, he had not yet painted his eyes. A plain umber wash still showed in the spot where he would render those eyes. As he prepared, the painter looked toward Cato, who sat on a tree stump, in the same yielding posture as Jesus, his left foot similarly raised. With great concentration, the painter stared at Cato. He wanted to capture the eyes in quick, deft strokes of his brush.
Cato sat patiently watching the painter. He asked, “Why do you paint, Erastus?”
Without interrupting his staring, Erastus spoke. “I don’t know if I can explain it well, my boy. It has to do with yearning … yearning to get hold of what I see. Sometimes I’m overcome, Cato, truly … .” He looked away from Cato now, and swept his eyes around the Askew garden. “When I look at this world and see it, I wonder if what I see … is this what others see too?” He looked back at Cato. “Because I think if others saw it as I did, they too would be compelled to take up paints and brushes—to try to rope the magnificence of this world onto a canvas … just to try to get hold of it … . I’d say it’s like putting a saddle on a horse. Of course, when I paint for folks like Askew and when I paint for myself, it’s like the difference between riding a Shetland and riding a Mustang. One’s a pleasant enough journey, but the other … my boy, I hold on for dear life.”
Cato’s eyes were wide as he pictured the painter on a charging horse. “I wish I could see things through your eyes,” he said. “I think I only have my eyes half open most days. I get to thinking … and my thoughts take over, and I walk around, and I do my work, but inside I’m thinking so very hard … I don’t know what I do see.”
The painter smiled. “Your thoughts light up your eyes, my boy. You carry that depth in your eyes. And I want to get that look in Jesus’ eyes. There’s a whole inner world that looks out from those eyes.” He turned to look at the canvas with a critical gaze. “I don’t know if it can be painted, God help me. Things like that, they’re more than just light and shadow. I’m not sure that I can paint it. It’s like a twinkle or a moon ray. Such fleetingness can’t be fixed in pigment through repeated effort. I can’t work it and re-work it. I must get it in a few certain strokes.”
Cato sat listening to his mentor. “Erastus I don’t know what I shall do when you leave. I wonder if I will ever again meet someone like you. I fear my whole life will come and go with no one to talk to about the things that you talk about.”
The painter blinked his eyes in a befuddled way, and thought for a while. Then he said, with sudden optimism, “Truly, my lad, the best thing for you would be to take up reading.”
“Reading?!” Cato shook his head. “Oh, no.”
Erastus picked up a small brush. He balanced it in his hand as if he were sizing up the trueness of an arrow. “You’d meet many a fine mind in the great books,” he said. “And it would comfort you right well, I know it.”
“It’s not possible,” Cato insisted. “If I were caught, I’d be punished. You don’t know Master Askew. He’s terrible strict—and no one dares cross him.”
“Yes, I know it’s dangerous,” the painter said. “But … well my boy …” He arched an eyebrow. “Surely you do things now in secret.”
“But how would I learn to read?”
“You’d learn from me, of course. I can start you off … , teach you the alphabet. Once you get the idea of it, you can learn the rest on your own.”
“But I don’t have any books.”
Erastus frowned, as he saw that there was to be a host of objections. “Doesn’t your Master Askew have a library? Aren’t there scores of books on his shelves? I should think you could find a way to take a volume out, now and then, without leaving an empty space.” The painter mimed taking a book from the shelf with his hands and replacing it with the brush. “That’s the key … you must always leave a place holder.” He returned to staring at the painting. “I can give you a proper book for that purpose: a nice plain volume, one that won’t call attention to itself.”
“No. No. He’d find me out.”
Erastus shrugged this away. “Do you think he inspects the library day by day?” He took a rag and dabbed it at the canvas. “I’ve seen enough of the man to know his mind. I’d wager he’s read but a few of those books.” He looked back at Cato again. “His library’s for show, my boy. Askew is not a man who hungers for the written word.”
“But Missus Askew … ,” Cato said. “She reads the books. I’ve seen her. And she watches me close.” He looked around suddenly, as if Lucille might be watching him even now. “I don’t know where I would hide a book, either.”
“Oh my gracious, hiding is easy,” the painter asserted, looking exasperated. “You can make a hiding spot outdoors. Somewhere seldom visited. You can fashion a fine hiding spot with an arrangement of rocks.” He kicked a nearby rock to make his point.
“And how would I carry a book from the library to the rocks and back? And where would I read them?” Cato shook his head. “If anyone should come upon me reading! Don’t you know? It’s strictly forbidden. No slave is allowed to read.”
The painter’s exasperation melted. He looked at Cato now with the patience of a kind parent. “Knowledge gives a man power, my boy. That’s why they’ve made that rule.” His eyes widened. “I know it will be dangerous for you. I know there will be risks. But any risk is worth it if it saves your life.” Erastus gestured for emphasis with his brush. “And I fear that your life may be in greater danger if you are without this companionship, without this counsel, without the life-giving knowledge that is stored on the printed page. Your mind will not rest. I see how you are. Your soul will be forever yearning. You must have this friendship of reading.” Erastus set down the brush, came up to Cato and knelt in front of him. “You must let me give you this gift.” He put his hand on Cato’s foot. “Someday, my boy, you will understand my reasons. I know it must seem fearful strange to you to take this step. But I have a special book, one book in particular that I want you to read.”
“Is it the Bible?”
“The book I have in mind for you is a book of poems … a poetry book.”
“Poetry?” Cato cocked his head. “What is that? Is it something religious?”
The painter smiled at the slave’s innocence. “Poetry is like a painting made of words, my boy. It is a fine and subtle thing. And, yes, these poems are religious in their way. They are imbued with spiritual passion. These words carry the inner light of which I spoke. You’ll see it plain and true in this book.” He reached inside his vest and removed a worn volume. “I have but this one copy. I can find another. I want you to have this.” He handed the book to Cato, whose hand hesitated when he took it, as if it were a precious jewel.
Cato looked at the markings on the spine: gold letters on dark green leather. He knew enough to know that there were three words at the top and two words at the bottom. That was all he understood. “What is this book called?” Cato asked.
“If I tell you the title, you will have begun your reading lesson. Are you ready to begin this journey?”
Cato opened the book. He turned over a few pages. He stared at the printed marks. … How strange that these funny marks could speak, could tell stories, could become … through mysterious magic … his friend.
“I’ve never heard Master Askew, or Missus Askew or William or anyone ever speak of poetry,” Cato said. “But in my heart I know I would feel the rest of my life … what was the word you used? … yearning, if I had no one to talk to, no one to teach me. So if reading and poetry and books can be my friend when you are gone, then yes, teach me to read.”
“Bravo! And courage, my lad.” Erastus reached out, closed the book in Cato’s hand, and pointed to the first word on the cover. “This first word is ‘Leaves,’ ” he said. “The next word is ‘of’ and the last word is ‘Grass.’”
Cato repeated it. “Leaves of Grass?”
“That’s right. ‘Leaves of Grass’, written by the poet Walt Whitman. When you first learn to read, you’ll find it easier to speak the words out loud. So you must practice in a place where you can’t be heard. This is a book meant to be spoken out loud, my boy. The poet is an admirer of bel canto, which means ‘beautiful singing’ so you must practice reading with a beautiful voice.”
“Bel canto,” Cato repeated.
“You have to say it like an Italian,” Erastus said, “Bel canto.” And he gestured with his hand, raising it, and at the same time closing it, as if he was grasping, then shaking a piece of paper. “Say it like you’re about to sing.”
Cato laughed. “Bel canto,” he intoned. And he imitated the hand gesture. “But what does it mean, ‘leaves of grass’?”
“Well you see that’s how poetry is, my boy. You might think of the pages of a book as leaves. That’s what printers call them: ‘leaves’. So perhaps the poet wishes you to think of the humble beauty of something as common as a leaf of grass when you hold this book of poems. As you’ll see, these poems find beauty in many common things. After reading them you might well see the world differently.”
Cato turned the pages of the book again, looking hard at the printed markings and letters. “Will you read something to me, Erastus, to let me hear how it sounds?”
He handed the book to the painter who looked at the open page and smiled. “These verses,” he said, “are on page 92 … I’ll read a few lines to you.”
It is no little matter, this round and delicious globe, moving so exactly in its orbit forever and ever, without one jolt or the untruth of a single second;
Cato giggled. “…this delicious globe …,” he repeated.
Erastus continued reading.
I do not think it was made in six days, nor in ten thousand years, nor ten decillions of years,
Nor planned and built one thing after another, as an architect plans and builds a house.
I do not think seventy years is the time of a man or woman,
Nor that seventy millions of years is the time of a man or woman,
Nor that years will ever stop the existence of me or any one else.
Is it wonderful that I should be immortal? as every one is immortal,
I know it is wonderful . . . . but my eyesight is equally wonderful . . . . and how I was conceived in my mother's womb is equally wonderful,
And how I was not palpable once but am now . . . . and was born on the last day of May 1819 . . . . and passed from a babe in the creeping trance of three summers and three winters to articulate and walk . . . . are all equally wonderful.
Erastus closed the book. “There now what do you think? It seems the poet has a lesson to teach us about wonder.”
“Could there really be ten decillions of years?” Cato asked. “I didn’t know there was such a number.”
“Well, my boy, this may be what we call ‘poetic license’ … that is, the poet invents a figure of speech to evoke an image or a feeling—even if he makes things up a bit. It’s no different really than using you to model for Jesus. Jesus may not have looked just like you … but how you look … for me … evokes the right image for Jesus. That’s ‘poetic license’”
“Poetic license …,” Cato repeated, and shook his head. “I don’t know if I’m going to understand poetry. But I do like how it sounds. It sounds ‘delicious”. Cato smiled broadly.
Erastus was looking hard at Cato. “There now. That look in your eyes when you said ‘delicious.’ That’s what I want to capture.” He dashed back to the easel, picked up the brush, twirled it once in his hand, held his other hand behind his back, dabbed the brush on his palette, took one last look at Cato, then, while holding his breath, executed a series of quick strokes. When he was done, he let his breath out in a sigh, panting heavily, as if he’d just finished a sprint. “Ah, now” he said with great self-satisfaction. “I think I’ve done it!” With that, the painter took up a rag and wiped his hands. “Now, my boy, it’s