The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek Read online

  A red stain spread across the thin sheet below her legs, deepening in the thighs and bottom.

  “I have to get the doc,” I said.

  “Don’t leave me. Hain’t got time…” She grimaced and moaned. The baby jerked and gave a sharp cry, then stilled to nurse. “Bluet, you”—Angeline weakened—“you take Honey.”

  I leaned away from her. “Take her?”

  “There’s no one else. He’ll never come back for her. Weren’t no one but me and Willie. My kin’s dead, and Willie never had hisself a pa, and his ma left him with strangers when he was a babe.”

  “Angeline, please let me get you help. You need a doc.” I looked around the tiny cabin for anything—herbs, something to help her. The home was empty except for the newspaper-coated walls that were fat with printed talk and Angeline’s writings. I pressed fingers to my knotted forehead and tried to think.

  “Hain’t time now,” she wheezed as she raised herself up on a shaky elbow, clinging to the babe with her other arm. “Seen this with my ma when she birthed her last one. Keep her, Bluet,” she begged and then slumped back down.

  I whipped out my hand to protect the baby’s head. “But I can’t—”

  “She’s a Blue, and hain’t no one gonna love her. No one but you.” Angeline’s knowing eyes reminded me, hollow in the slanted light.

  I touched the baby’s hand, my own eyes filling, my mind grappling with losses, the unbearable pain of loneliness. Nary a townsfolk, not one God-fearing soul, had welcomed me or mine into town, their churches, or homes in all my nineteen years on this earth. Instead, every hard Kentucky second they’d filled us with an emptiness from their hate and scorn. It was as if Blues weren’t allowed to breathe the very same air their loving God had given them, not worthy of the tiniest spoonful He’d given to the smallest forest critter. I was nothing in their world. A nothingness to them. And I looked into Angeline’s dying eyes and saw my truths, and the truths that would be her daughter’s. Know’d that without love, in the end, her babe would have no one, nothing, and would be fated to die alone in her own aching embrace. Nothing. The truths collapsed in my chest, crushing.

  “Please, you’re all she has,” Angeline implored.

  The baby twisted, and a weak cry slipped from her breath. I picked up her little hand, stroked the cupped blue fingers.

  This child would suffer it all, and alone. Every hard hate. Every minute of damning solitude. Honey deserved love and more than the stingy spoonful that the white world would see fit to give her.

  “Please, Bluet. Please promise you’ll be her ma.”

  Ma? Her ma.

  “Please help my baby.” Angeline rolled her head, sweat popping on her forehead. “Dear Jesus, help… Take this Blue for yours.”

  “Shh, shh, don’t worry none,” I comforted. The child would bear the horrific load of being the last Blue now, the one hunted and harmed if I didn’t protect her. “I’ll take her, Angeline, and I will love Honey as much as you do. I promise.” The words spilled out from deep inside me, from that place deeper than thoughts, from the deepest pocket of my guarded heart and wounded soul. And I silently vowed to God to love this babe, keep her safe from the harm and hate me and my family, and their families, had suffered.

  It stops with Honey. I closed my eyes and lifted a fierce declaration to God, to mankind.

  Angeline pulled my hand to her mouth, kissed and pressed it to her pale, wet cheek.

  I took her hand and kissed it back and placed a light palm on Honey. “Promise,” I said to her again.

  Angeline’s breaths came harsh as she pointed a finger toward the magazine. “It—it…it got busted some when Willie had hisself a fit,” she said shakily, but still with that soft, shy smile.

  I picked up her loan, the old copy of a Good Housekeeping magazine. The cover with a little brown-haired girl reading a book had been ripped off and left on the floor smeared with a bloody footprint. Willie’s. Beside it lay the corn-husk doll Angeline’d crafted, now torn and scattered in shreds.

  “Reckon it’s nothing I can’t get bound,” I said, struggling to smile back.

  “Read it for me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Read the page about the pretty mama and happy baby to Honey an’ me. Read that, Bluet.”

  I opened it to where Angeline’d marked her page with scrap paper and saw the beautiful, stylish mother in a pretty spring dress and white heels. She sat in a finely crafted rocker and read to a plump, smiling baby garbed in a beautiful ruffled gown. The babe held an expensive dolly in matching clothes—a baby that would never know this harsh land, go hungry, perish from starvation, or lose a mother.

  I read the title. “‘Having the Happy Baby.’”

  Angeline murmured to Honey. “I want you to read everything when you grow’d some, know your letters same as me—same as your new mama taught me.” She looked up at me sweetly, kissed the baby again, and closed her eyes.

  I ran the back of my hand lightly down her cheek and across her jawline, wanting to remember her for Honey. Angeline sighed softly, and I read aloud for five minutes, peeking over the top of the page to see her pale face lighted with pain, nestled beside Honey’s peaceful one, droplets of breast milk coating the sleeping babe’s mouth.

  Though she was a Blue, Honey didn’t look any different than any other sleeping baby in her mama’s arms, but she would grow up and feel the world’s different eye on her color.

  For another five minutes I read the article, my words faltering, choking with tears, scratching out strings of rushing sentences as I glimpsed the frail sixteen-year-old mama fading.

  I paused when Angeline coughed again and said drowsily, “Me and Honey, we loves you to read to us.”

  “I love reading to you,” I whispered. “I love you, Angeline.”

  “Sure is pretty words, jus’ like Heaven.” She fumbled for my hand, wrapped hers over mine, and pressed both to her mouth, tucking our double fists closely under her chin. “I want you to read lots of books,” she murmured to the sleeping babe. “Books’ll learn you, Honey.”

  I kept reading until her grasp went limp, and a few minutes beyond until my tongue couldn’t scrape off another word, and my soaking eyes dared to see her dead ones.

  The magazine slid to the floor. A prayer hummed softly on my lips. Another, and another. The pleas to a God I’d abandoned now begged for Angeline’s revival, chewed across the newspaper-lined walls for her parting.

  “God.” I struck a fist into an empty spot on the mattress, scattering straw. The bed swallowed my fury, rocking the mother and child. The baby startled, whisked out a cry, then settled.

  I climbed into bed beside Angeline and the sleeping babe. Curling up next to their bodies, I cradled my arm across them both, and wept, howled—a dry howl, an empty riverbed droughted from heartache, hurts, and hardships—till the sobs rent the hollows, the deep rock caverns of my soul, and brought forth rivers of agony.

  Thirty-Eight

  For a long time, I laid on the Moffits’ bed and stared out the window, busted in grief, then folded myself into the hymn Pa’d sung to Mama on her sick bed.

  I’ve wandered far away from God,

  Now I’m coming home;

  The paths of sin too long I’ve trod,

  Lord, I’m coming home.

  Coming home, coming home,

  Nevermore to roam;

  Open now Thine arms of love,

  Lord, I’m coming home.

  I softly brushed a lock from Angeline’s cheek as I finished the chorus.

  Something buzzed past and pulled me out of my misery.

  The first blowfly landed on the sill, its skinny black feet twitching, eager to feed from Angeline’s flesh. Outraged, I cried out and flicked it away.

  Another one quickly replaced it, its ugly eyes parked on Angeline.

  I swat
ted.

  The baby kicked, and I jumped up, hurrying to cradle her in my arms. What would I do with a baby? A Blue one at that?

  I draped Angeline with her eiderdown counterpane, walked out to the porch with the newborn, and sat down on the stoop. I stared up at the tree, rocked the babe in time with her dead swinging pa. On a branch above Mr. Moffit, a cardinal trilled sweetly into a distant train song, the hymns washing the old mountains.

  I forced myself to turn away. Old-timers believed when a cardinal called close by, it was the dead kissing you, and for the first time I thought it might be true.

  I pressed Honey to my bosom, cupped her face, shielding her. I kissed her head, stroked her pale-blue cheek. She was the very last of me. And I cradled her closer, feverishly wishing I could take the title back from the helpless infant.

  Junia was at the end of the porch with her backside to me and the tree, like she couldn’t bear to see it either. The mule’s head hung cheerless, her flesh quivering. She wouldn’t come to greet me.

  I tried to right my mind. If I called on Pa to help, folks might cast blame on us for the deaths. Worse, they might hurt Honey. Would anyone miss this baby? Care? I worried if Angeline and Willie’d been receiving mail, and if the old postman would’ve seen Angeline’s pregnant belly. She’d been so tiny beneath all her skirts. In all my time spent with the Moffits, I’d never seen letters for them. Surely, they would’ve had me read the letters if there’d been some. I know’d her relatives had died, and not much else about him, except he came from parts deeper in the hills. But it was like the world never know’d those two had rooted here and scratched out a life, fought every day to stay alive. Had I been the only one to bear witness? Would anyone else notice they were gone? Still, I had to see to it that Honey’s folks got a proper burial.

  The infant stretched in my arms, fluttered her lids. I set her down beside me, stood and cupped my hand against the sun’s watering rays and turned to the west, thinking.

  In a minute, I walked over to Junia. “We have to take this baby to a safe place,” I told the mule. “And we have to do it very carefully.” Junia nuzzled my neck, and I stroked her mane. “Let’s get our Honey home for our sweet Angeline.” Junia pricked her ears as if she understood, gazed big-eyed and solemn to the porch, hoping the girl with the carrots would appear. I pressed my cheek to Junia’s soft muzzle and kissed it. “From Angeline.”

  Pulling the reading materials out of one of the saddlebags, I stuffed them into my other. I dared not trust my trembling body to carry the child in my arms. The empty satchel was roomy enough to tote the tiny baby who was no bigger than the cloth doll my mama’d sewn me long ago. Satisfied, I took my bonnet and made a cushion before placing Honey inside, careful to make sure she was cradled safely, bending back the leather flap for air.

  I mounted Junia and turned her toward Jackson Lovett’s place, the closest on my route, with a prayer he’d be near and willing to help with two burials.

  “Easy, girl,” I said, and looked over my side and down at a sleeping Honey before snatching one last glimpse back at the Moffit cabin.

  In a moment, I found one of Angeline’s cradle songs tucked in my heart. Junia whisked a gentle whinny into the honeyed melody. I lifted the lullaby higher and sang for the baby. Though she weren’t sad none or scared like me.

  Thirty-Nine

  I rode up Lovett Mountain with misgivings. Several times I turned around only to double back, the growing unease sticking to my dampening collar.

  When I didn’t see Jackson in the yard, I dismounted and took Honey from her bag. I stood at Jackson’s door for a long moment, flexing a fist before braving a knock. I hadn’t seen him in weeks, not since the Fourth of July. Every time I tried to drop off the books, he was nowhere to be found.

  Maybe he didn’t want to be found, didn’t want to be around me and the books anymore.

  Dismayed, I turned to take my leave when he opened the door wearing nothing but his work britches, a pencil tucked behind his ear. Books and papers lay scattered on his table inside.

  “Cussy Mary, come in.” He barely glanced at me, turned back, and grabbed clothes off a chair, tossed them across the room, stacking papers and books on the table to clear a spot for me. “Excuse this mess. I wasn’t expecting company.”

  “How are you?” Jackson called over his shoulder. “Listen, I’m sorry about keeping the book so long.” He rubbed his head while scanning his quarters. “Ah, here it is. I’ve been going back and forth to Georgia lately to help out a friend with his turpentine camp.” He turned back to the door, opened it wider, and held up Mama’s book. “It’s good to see you—”

  The baby squirmed in my arms. Jackson stared at her, confused, and then laughed. “Where’d you get that?” He raised a brow at Honey. “You delivering for the stork now?”

  He glanced at my face, took note of my shabby appearance, Angeline’s smeared blood on my skirts, and I saw the alarm in his eyes. “What… Are you okay? What happened, Cussy Mary? Please…please come on in.” He stepped aside.

  “The Moffits,” I rushed, “it’s the Moffits—they’s dead. Dead.”

  “Slow down.” Jackson motioned me inside again, flicking his hand. “What are you saying?” he asked and darted his eyes to the baby.

  “She’s the Moffits’. Was the Moffits’,” I babbled and stepped over the threshold. “The mama done gave her to my care before she passed from birthing.”

  “Where’s the papa?”

  “Hanged himself.”

  “What—?”

  I peeled back the baby’s covering. “Mr. Moffit told his wife he wouldn’t have her—colored and all.” I felt the child’s loss splinter in my heart. “He went and took his life out in the yard.”

  “Damn. Is the baby okay?”

  “Honey. That’s the name Angeline gave her. She’s not fussing none.” I peeked down and saw she was sucking on a knuckle, content to soak up her surroundings.

  “I need help, Mr. Lovett—”

  “Jackson. Call me Jackson.”

  “Jackson, I need milk. And I need to get them buried up there before the critters take ’em. Can you help?”

  “Where’s their kin?”

  “Weren’t none. That’s why she gave me the baby. I have money to pay you—”

  Jackson waved his hand, hushing me. “You mean to bury a chicken thief? Take in the orphan?”

  I drew Honey closer as if the ugly word would reach out and lash her. “I-I…” Hot tears struck, and I took a step backward. “I’m her mama!” I punched the words and claimed it for the truth. “Her mama. And I aim to bury the Moffits, and proper-like, Jackson Lovett. Do it myself.” I was out the door, my angry skirts swishing a curse across the threshold.

  “Hold up,” he said, following me down the steps.

  Junia blew, swung her head back and forth, tried to break free of her tether.

  I yelled at him. “Stay back…back till I can get my babe out of here!” To Junia I raised a hand. “Whoa. Easy, easy.”

  Jackson retreated back to the porch as if annoyed by Junia’s protection.

  With Honey tucked securely in the crook of my arm, I untied Junia with my free hand, gripped the mule’s reins, and led her out of the yard.

  Jackson called out, “Cussy Mary, I’ll see they get a proper burial.”

  I stopped and turned to face him.

  “As proper as one can get in this graceless land.” His eyes were sad and troubling. “I’ll have them buried ’fore sundown. You have my word.”

  All I could do was nod and breathe out a raspy obliged before continuing onto the path.

  Forty

  I held Honey by the stove while the pap I’d made for her cooled. In a few minutes I dipped a cloth into the breadcrumb broth and dribbled the mixture into her tiny open mouth. Pa stood nearby, allowing a stretch of silence to smother our quar
rel.

  “Daughter, it ain’t right,” he finally said.

  “Pa, I mean to keep her.” I set down the feeding rag and rocked the babe. “She’s mine—”

  “Silence. What would folks say? An unwed mother with a babe? Think. This ain’t a critter you can just up and take a fancy to.”

  “A Blue. I’ll take a week off, then let folks think she’s from Charlie Frazier.”

  Nobody’d be the wiser. Just Jackson. Doc might from examining me, but he never saw Angeline and was too busy with his medical journals and patients. I didn’t think either man would tell, and ghosts couldn’t.

  I added, “The timing would be right, and a lot of womenfolk hide their budding bellies behind the thick skirts. Pa, look. Look at her, she must be our kin. She’s a Blue!”

  “Nonsense, she’s sickly. You’re the last Blue.”

  “She’s strong sure enough, and it’s not true. Doc says all Blues are related somehow. Kin to ourselves. Mr. Moffit had the Blue in him. I seen it with my eyes. Same as Honey here. And her mama must’ve had it in her genes too.” I held up the sleeping baby. “They were Blues, Pa. Just like us.”

  Pa looked closer and muttered a low curse. “It was rumored my uncle Eldon had a bastard out there. Could it be he’d found another Blue that weren’t known?” Pa rubbed his whiskers.

  “It happened to Great-Grandpa. It has to be. We can’t leave our kin orphaned.”

  “They said Eldon’s woman ran away to Ohio, never to be heard of again.” Pa studied Honey and scratched some more at the thought.

  “Pa, Eldon’s woman gave her baby away. Gave Willie away. Please. I have to take Honey as mine. Give her a home, a mama. Ain’t no one—not a single soul on this black-and-white earth—gonna do it if we don’t. Please, I promised the mama.”

  He touched the baby’s blue fingernail and traced her cheek. Something softened in Pa.

  “My patron, Henry, passed,” I whispered. “The boy died of the pellagra, Pa. The Kentucky sickness took him, and it’ll surely take her too. Without us, it’ll happen to her. Our last kin.”