Soon Be Free (18 page)

“Not until the Doll Dance,” he said, sounding like a stubborn child. “Do you have the doll?”

Tracy whispered to me, “The oldest in the clan must have the doll and perform the sacred Doll Dance.”

“Well, do you?”

“No, sir, I'm sorry.”

“Then don't come back.” He turned his face to the wall as we left. I was embarrassed and confused and angry and glad to be out of that depressing house. But when we were getting into Tracy's car, someone whistled to us from the third-story porch,
and it was a sound like a coyote. We looked up. Mr. Prairie Fire had opened the screen and was leaning out the window. “Girlie, come back tomorrow, I give you more.”

In Belleville, Illinois, the Freemen Society hid the women and Solomon and Homer in the Negro section of the city. Two Freemen escorted Will and James to Hamilton Street, the edge of the Negro neighborhood, and gave them directions to a safe house for the day's rest.

It was at least an hour's walk through the richest section of the city, which held James in thrall. The streets were empty, since most people were still asleep. James studied each house they passed, observing the clean spaces between windows, the elevations of the doors, the brick and stone and stucco and wood, and all sorts of gewgaws and gargoyles that made each house distinctive. He sketched in his mind, fixing a window that seemed out of proportion, front steps too steep, chimneys that stuck up from the roofs as awkward as giraffes. And he filed away in his mind every detail that seemed beautifully fit to its purpose.

Will was yammering about something, which James ignored, until he felt a jolt to his arm. “James, look behind!”

Homer was following them. “Missuh James, Missuh Will, wait up.”

James turned around. “Homer, it's not safe for thee to be in this neighborhood. Thee must go right back to Solomon and thy mother.”

“Yes, suh, but I cain't stay in tha' house.”

James sighed. Was it going to be the cave all over again? “Why not, Homer?”

“Ain't never see a color person home so fancy as Miz Ophelia Simms's, no, suh. Ain't right.”

Two elegant men stepped out of the hotel they were passing, and Will spun Homer around and stuffed him into a space under the building. Will and James scrambled up onto the fire escape, where they wouldn't be seen.

The men wore stovepipe hats and had gold watch fobs draped across their well-fed bellies. The one with white spats said to the other, older man, “Cyrus, I do believe that was a Negro person who darted under the hotel. What do you suppose the scalawag is doing under there?”

“Up to no good, you can be sure,” the other man said.

Of course, neither wanted to get his fancy clothes dirty, so they grabbed a delivery boy walking by, and the one called Cyrus said, “Young man, you duck down under there and see if you spot a Negro. You can be sure he means trouble, sneaking around that way.”

The boy crouched down and gazed under the
house. James held his breath, sure that Homer was doomed. Then a ferocious dog began to growl and yip under the house, and the boy jumped back and told the men, “I'm sorry, sirs, only thing under the hotel is a lot of dirt and a mad dog.”

White Spats reached into his pocket and pulled out a silver coin, which he flicked with his thumb into the boy's hand. The two men walked on, having lost interest in Homer.

As soon as the street was clear, Will and James ran with Homer back to the Negro section. Safely across Hamilton Street, James said, “Thee was lucky, Homer, lucky that dog was under there with thee.”

“Yes, suh, onee I be the dawg. I see these two blue eyes huntin' me out, and in my head I be hearin' my houns back at Bullocks'. Then this growl start up in my throat like Hannibal, and a coupla sharp barks comes out like Daisy. You shoulda see those two blue eyes jumpin' back in they head. Nex' thing I hear that boy say, ‘Ain't nothing but a mad dog unner there.' Fool him, ole Homer did! Dawgs, they's mush in my hands.”

• • •

That afternoon James and Will and Solomon met at Mrs. Ophelia Simms's brownstone to plan the next leg of the journey. Mrs. Simms was the richest Negro lady in Illinois. She owned two bakeries and a pool hall and a blacksmith shop. Fourteen people worked for her. Her front parlor was all done up in
brocade and lace. James's ma would have turned her lip up at the showiness of it all. But Mrs. Simms and her family were good folks; they couldn't help being rich.

James asked, “Solomon, has thee got the papers?”

Solomon opened the flap on his leather pouch. Lamplight glinted off the stark-white inside. “Miz Simms's son, Otis, did up the papers like they're a whole family.” Solomon took out the sheaf of parchment. “See? Mr. and Mrs. Homer Biggers, their daughter, Callie Biggers, and Homer's mama, Mrs. Prudence Biggers—all free by law.”

“Or by forgery, dad gum!” said Will.

James admired the beautiful hand lettering on the rich parchment. He itched to have his sketchbook in his hands again. The image that had haunted his dreams through these fitful days flooded his mind again: the sketchbook pages skipping on the water, then bloating up, sinking into the creek they'd jumped in that first day out in Kentucky. “It's fine work,” James said enviously. “We'll be able to get Homer and the women on the steamboat with these papers.”

“Fool,” Will muttered. “You think it's going to be that easy?”

James felt his hackles rising again. He'd not had the luxury of being mad at Will while every step had felt like a leap into peril, but now that they
were only hours away from safety, he allowed the comfortable wave of anger to wash over him. “Person's got to have hope, Will Bowers. Thee's a sour-plum pessimist.”

Sabetha and Miz Pru and Callie were delivered to Mrs. Simms's front parlor.

“Chicken livers,” Callie said, touching the brocade drapes and every one of Mrs. Simms's glass animals on the tables. “Wish me and Mama and Miz Pru could have stayed here. The place we stayed was just two shades better than a pigsty.”

“Was not,” Miz Pru said. She couldn't bring herself to sit in the puffed-up chairs, so she lowered her backside to the edge of the piano bench.

Sabetha said, “Notice anything different about Callie?”

There
was
something, but James couldn't put his finger on it. She seemed right clean and a little taller, but there was something else.

Callie sank back into one of the brocade chairs and propped her feet out in front of her on a filigreed ebony table.

Shoes! Big, black, shiny ones covered her bony ankles, and those shoes were tied with leather strings that hung over the sides. She jumped to her feet, making an unholy racket on the inlaid wooden floor.

James looked at the shoes enviously. His own boots had been soaked and dried stiff, and the soles were worn so thin that each step scraped at the pudgy underside of his toes.

All of them were slicked up in fresh clothes for the steamboat trip. Loading up on an ample day's worth of food, they started out again at dusk. Callie stamped her feet. “How
do
people abide these clodhoppers? They pinch me awful bad.” She clomped around in those big shoes, raising dust and drawing smiles from the black shopkeepers who swept the sidewalks outside their doors.

One more night,
James repeated to himself. One more night on the road, and they'd be safely aboard the steamboat in St. Louis, Missouri. They'd sail into Kansas, where the Negroes would be welcomed by Ma and sent North along the Lane Trail up toward Canada and freedom. One more night.

On Saturday, right after I got my Ronald McDonald curls cut off, Tracy and I went back to talk to Bo Prairie Fire. Rain was pounding the roof of the porch like horses' hooves. A bucket in the corner caught a steady leak. The other residents weren't around to show off their weird clothes. I didn't miss the spooky fox martens.

Mr. Prairie Fire lay on the couch with an army-issue wool blanket pulled up to his chin. We sat on the floor beside him, and Tracy asked how he was feeling. Well, I mean you could tell just by looking at him. He was the color of bilgewater.

“Poorly, can't you see? Elder Brother won't come.”

“You have an older brother?” I couldn't imagine anyone older than he.

“What we call the sun. Very powerful god. Dresses in smooth deerskin and red feathers. Travels east to west across the heavens. Goes back under the earth at night.”

He coughed, a volcano that began deep in his belly and shook him as if he were a puppet on a
string. I hurt all over just watching him. When he caught his breath, he talked in spurts, like a faucet turning on and off. “Won't come. Out today. Too much. Rain. Good for the. Thunder beings.”

I had a million questions, but Tracy said we should come back when he was feeling better. “Just one question?” I begged, and she said okay, one. “Mr. Prairie Fire, do you know anything about James Weaver? He was a famous architect from here in Lawrence.”

The man shook his head. Silver hair stuck out all around his stained pillow. I wondered what the stains were. I slipped in one more question. “Do you know Faith Cloud?”

His eyes rolled back in his head, which scared me to death. “She's Turkey Clan. Too. Kin to Straight. Feather. Same as me.”

“Yes!” I replied.

He rolled on his side and drew his knees up to his chest. “Morrison,” he said, his face to the wall.

“Morrison, Mr. Prairie Fire?” I encouraged him while Tracy tugged at my sleeve. The rain kept on pounding.

“Jedediah Morrison. He's the one. Took my home. My Lulu and me. Move to Indian Territory. Some call it—” He'd lost his train of thought, and I finished it for him.

“Oklahoma.”

“Sounds right,” he said, which brought on
another fit of coughing. Tracy called one of the house managers over to keep an eye on Mr. Prairie Fire, and we thanked him and left. I don't think he even heard us go.

The
Queen of the Delta
ruled the river, beckoning all her loyal subjects aboard. Tickets in hand, James felt relief roll over him like a prairie wind, and homesickness stabbed his heart as he thought about Ma and Pa and Rebecca. Twenty-eight days and twenty-eight treacherous nights had passed since James had last seen his house in Lawrence, where Ma cooked up belly-warming treats and where Miz Lizbet, who'd started this whole journey, had been laid to rest. And now it was First Day, March 30, and they were only minutes away from boarding the boat that would deliver them safely to Wyandotte, Kansas.

James could already feel the crisp white sheets he'd sleep between this night, and the splash of hot water on his face and neck when he'd wash up for dinner. Dinner would be served in a dining room sparkling with crystal lights. Older folks would be dancing half the night away, and Will would find a poker game and set about wooing pretty girls.

James felt the springy wood beneath his boot as
he started up the gangplank with Will. Just ahead, Homer carried Miz Pru. Suddenly she started to shake like she was in the grips of a raging fever. “NO! No!” she shouted. “We ain't getting on that boat, not while I'm alive and kicking.” And she
was
kicking.

James had to jump out of range; lucky she wasn't wearing Callie's clodhoppers. He was just too tired to put up with one of Miz Pru's fits this close to home. “Sabetha, can thee do something with her?”

Sabetha closed her eyes to gather strength against Miz Pru's relentless tide, then tried to reason with the old woman. “Miz Pru, we've got
free
papers, hear? And paid-for tickets. A nice, clean bed's waiting for you down below on that steamboat. Aren't you about ready to lay down your head and rest to the humming of those engines?”

“No, no, no!” screamed Miz Pru as other passengers stared and walked around their sorry circle.

“Homer, set her down,” Sabetha ordered. She reached out for Miz Pru's hand, which was jerked away.

Miz Pru was shrieking, and it took both Homer and Solomon to keep her from flying in the air. “No! You tell 'em, Callie. Tell 'em.”

James glanced at Callie. Her big shoes seemed nailed to the gangplank as her body swayed like the river. Her eyes were deep, deep in her head. James sensed that they were turned backward, reading
something in her mind. “Callie?” He poked her arm. “Is thee alive, Callie?”

Quietly, the girl said, “Miz Pru's right. We can't go on that boat.”

“Cal-LEE,” Will whined. “I'm just plain sick of you.” The leather toe of Will's crutch was worn to the rough wood, and the last day's journey had been painful and exhausting. “If you had the sense of a possum, you'd keep your mouth shut.”

Callie looked up at Will as if seeing him for the first time. “You can't get on that boat, Mr. Will, can't, can't, can't.”

“Watch me do it,” Will snapped.

“But don't you see? Miz Pru sees it, I see it, why can't you?”

“See what?” James demanded. “What does thee see?”

Callie just shuddered, unable to bring the words out.

“What I see,” Will said, “is that you're a superstitious, squirrely girl, ungrateful, too, and Miz Pru's crazy as a loon. That boat sails in half an hour, and I'm sailing with it.” He whipped his ticket out of James's hand and hobbled up the gangplank.
Clunk, clunk
—the crutch's footsteps echoed all around.

James started after him, but Solomon stopped him with a firm grip. “Mr. James, we'd best listen to Miz Pru.”

James swallowed ripples of anger as Will vanished inside the boat. Its engine was churning away here where the Mississippi and the Missouri pooled together. Minutes ago the water had seemed calm and welcoming. Now waves splashed against the body of the boat as the huge side-wheels spun in torrents of violent water.