The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek Read online

  The baby’s eyes fluttered open, and she squinted up at Pa. A tiny smile pulled at the corners of her lips as she twisted to suckle his finger. Pa ran a pinkie over her mouth, turning it all in his mind. Honey rooted, latched hold of his little finger, sucking.

  Pa’s eyes grew round as he watched her a second. “What kinda ma are you?” he grumbled, snatching back his hand. “Make her a pallet over by the stove, then get that ornery critter of yours to town and fetch this hungry babe real milk!”

  I stared at him, dumbfounded and grateful.

  “Go on now ’fore she gets to fussing and disturbs me,” he said and turned away.

  “Yessir.” I stepped out the door, grinning as I raced to Junia.

  Forty-One

  After I saddled Junia, I looked in on Pa and the babe and saw that Honey was sleeping. Pa had settled into a chair near her pallet and fallen asleep too, holding one of my children’s storybooks in his lap.

  I headed toward the Moffits’ homestead, eager to make the stop before I went for the baby’s milk. I needed to make sure Honey’s folks got themselves the burial Jackson’d promised.

  As we got close to the broken-down cabin, every few steps, Junia would switch her stride and walk sideways, her nose arrowed toward the Moffits’ home, a soft bray blistering her lips like she was calling for her friend Angeline.

  The air smelled of mud. Turkey buzzards circled above, pressing blackened smudges against the hard Kentucky sun.

  I found Jackson around back with his horse tied to a stick post. He stood over the potter’s ground where he’d dug up two fresh mounds under a half-broke tree, the only shade back there. Jackson rested an arm on the shovel with his back to me, head bowed in what looked like thought or prayer. A damp circle bull-eyed his shirt as the July sun hammered its waves of heat onto everything.

  I slid off Junia and fumbled with the reins before dropping them. Instead of staying put, the mule trotted toward Jackson, blew over his shoulder, then—to my surprise—nuzzled his arm.

  “No flowers today,” he told her solemnly and rubbed her neck.

  I stepped up beside him and reached into my pocket. “Thank you, Jackson. I have your pay.” I pulled out money.

  He dropped the shovel and raised a palm in protest. “For the baby. How’s she doing?”

  “I got her settled in. Pa’s tending to her. She seems right fit.”

  Jackson pointed to one of the graves, cleared his throat, and said, “Takes a mighty special woman to take in a mother’s baby like that, Cussy Mary. To raise Mrs. Moffit’s babe.”

  I studied Angeline’s grave. The mound of loose dirt. Even it was sparse. “She’s a right special baby,” I said more to the heavens, hoping the words would reach dear Angeline.

  “And a lucky one.” He dug into his pocket, pulled out hair that had been braided into a small ring, and gave it to me. “I thought Honey might want her parents’ locks. Snipped them off for her keepsake.” A sorrow clung to his words.

  He’d done that for Honey—thought to cut off small locks of her folks’ hair like that. Jackson’d woven each of their strands, then carefully weaved those two together into a third, the one that represented Honey.

  As if reading my thoughts, Jackson said, “My mama died of smallpox when I was twelve, and I lost my twin baby brothers a week later.” He grimaced. “I can still see my papa saying it was important to honor the dead by keeping a part of them living. He’d tucked their locks into our Bible. I did the same to his, two years later after he drank himself to death.”

  “I’m sorry.” Without thinking, I told him, “After Mama died, Pa went on a tear, ran off into the woods somewhere. He soaked his boots in the shine, had himself a mighty battle with devils and angels, I reckon. He didn’t come out of the hills for three nights and not a second sooner and until the miners found him and dragged him home. I thought I’d lost them both.”

  I’d never shared anything about Pa’s tear before, not to anyone. That Jackson could draw this story out of me so easily frightened me, and I searched his face to see if my words did something to him too.

  Jackson nodded with the kinship of knowing something no one else did. “I ended up leaving these hard parts when I was fourteen and swore I’d never come back. Wandered around the country till I settled out west. Worked a lot trying to forget it all. But, hell, anyone knows a Kentucky man ain’t gonna let the wandering legs plant themselves anyplace other than here—can have hisself one foot on foreign soil, but the other is always pointed home.”

  His words were measured with regret and relief, a flash of old hurts sweeping across his eyes.

  I gave Jackson a sympathetic smile and said, “My great-grandpa came from a small village in France, but my folks always claimed he came here to collect his ’tucky heart. They say I favored him, and they named me after the town he was born in.”

  “Cussy, France?” Jackson looked at me like he saw something new. Then, “Well, I didn’t think it was because of your mouth.”

  I smiled at that. “It’s a right pretty place from what I’ve seen in the National Geographic.” I peered at the ring he’d made. “Much obliged, Jackson. This is a special gift, and I’ll keep it in the Bible for Honey.” I held up the keepsake, peered at the tiny woven ring of Willie’s dark hair and Angeline’s blond. A precious piece of their life, for Honey’s new life that she could hold forever. I pressed it to my mouth with a silent prayer and slipped it into my pocket, grateful for what Jackson had seen fit to do.

  “This old land.” Jackson stared off. “It sure makes a man yearn for it and want to flee it altogether.”

  “Ain’t never had the chance to leave,” I said and wondered if he would again, wondered if I’d ever. At that thought, a peculiar new ache seized me.

  Jackson darted his eyes to mine and held them.

  “Queenie Johnson wants me to visit her. She says there’s opportunities in Philadelphia. That it’s a fine place to raise colored young’uns.” For the first time I thought hard about Honey, what kind of life we could have there, reckoning anyplace might be softer, better than here.

  “Cussy Mary, I’ve been wanting to apologize for my words back on the trail that day. I had no right telling you how you should feel. No right claiming knowledge on things I could and will never feel. I’ve never known harm or exile because of my skin. Nor felt the lash of leather whips or angry tongues because of it.”

  I shifted uncomfortably.

  Jackson stepped toward me. “Forgive me. I was damn foolish, blind, because I only saw a smart librarian, a fine lady. I see more now…see your burden and grief, and I am sorry for it.”

  A silence fell as I searched his anguished eyes, grasping the words.

  He was about to say something more, then stopped and pointed to the hill behind the graves. “I’m not finished here.”

  My eyes followed his.

  “There should be some sort of markings.” Jackson climbed up the rocked slope and picked up two hand-sized stones, weighed them and scampered down. He placed one at the head of each grave and stepped back to inspect them. “I’ll take them home and see if I can chisel proper headstones for them. Bring ’em back tomorrow at first light.”

  “I’m much obliged.”

  Jackson scooped up a handful of dirt beside the covered plots, letting it sift over the graves. He bowed his head.

  I followed his lead, grabbed a fistful, and sprinkled it over the hungry earth.

  “Go in peace, you’ve earned your sleep. God rest,” Jackson said, picking up their stone markers. He walked them over to his horse, stuffed them into bags. Then he was off, galloping away.

  For a while I stood over the graves, babbling to Angeline, praying, promising her that I’d take care of Honey till she was good an’ grown—till the day I died. I looped my prayers and declarations until the ground seemed to shift, and Junia brayed a warning. I
squeezed my eyes, and then opened them and saw the buzzards had tightened their circular pattern. Their afternoon shadows hungered, had grown bigger.

  Forty-Two

  Honey was a week old when I traveled the mile and a half to Loretta Adams’s door and knocked.

  “Iffin’ that’s Bluet, get on in here, child.”

  “It’s me, Book Woman, ma’am.”

  “And poor-sighted I am, not deaf,” she answered back, as always.

  Candles flickered and cast extra light in the cabin. Loretta sat at her table, her head bent to fabric, sewing.

  “I’m making a new apron. This one’s so tatty.” She plucked the yoke of her old one she wore.

  “Sure is looking pretty, Miss Loretta.”

  Loretta whipped a few more stitches into the new cobbler’s apron, inspected its cotton lace trim. “You haven’t been by,” she chided. “I don’t have the tea made.” She stuck her needle into a pincushion and pushed away the long apron panels.

  “No, ma’am. I’m not here to read today.”

  I walked over to her chair and bent down. “I’m here to show you Honey.” I lifted back the baby’s light covering and moved her closer to Loretta’s face.

  Honey made soft noises.

  “Honey? A baby?”

  “Yes, ma’am, my baby. She’s mine.”

  She didn’t respond, and I know’d her manners wouldn’t allow her to pry.

  Loretta peered closer at Honey, and the babe cooed, struck up her tiny fists, and yawned. “Let’s put her on my bed,” Loretta said.

  Myrtle and Milkweed crawled out from under the woodstove, and Loretta scatted them out the door. The old woman hobbled over to the bed faster than I’d ever seen her move.

  “Let me hold her, child. Could you open the curtains wider?” She sat down on the mattress, and I placed Honey in her arms.

  I pulled back the homespun curtains, and the light spilled across Loretta’s adoring smile.

  “Miss Loretta—”

  “Have a seat. Sit,” Loretta urged and patted the spot beside her, intent on studying Honey.

  “Thank you, ma’am.”

  “She’s precious.” Loretta lifted Honey’s small blue hand, gently stroked her tiny fingers.

  “Yes, ma’am, she’s a good babe sure enough.”

  “Perfect. I haven’t held myself one of these in ages,” Loretta said in a strange choked voice. “Thank you for bringing her by.”

  “Miss Loretta, I need to ask if you would be willing to keep her while I’m on my route, if you’d feel up to it, that is. I’d pay you square, and the babe don’t need much—”

  “Up to it? You don’t need eyes to know what Honey needs, child. I raised my li’l sister, fed, cleaned, clothed, and rocked her, and she was a fussy babe too. And she grew into a fit child and a fine young woman. Raised her boy after she passed too. I can sure ’nough take care of our sweet Honey.”

  I sighed, relieved. “Yes, ma’am, I thought you’d do a fine job is why I brought her to you. And I’ll pay on time.”

  “I won’t accept money,” Loretta said firmly. “Can’t accept pay for being in the company of this angel.” She shot Honey a big, toothless grin, dipped her wagging head to the babe. “An angel, the prettiest petunia,” she told Honey. “A right purty blue-eyed Mary beauty…”

  “I insist, ma’am. It wouldn’t be right.”

  “Ain’t having it.” The woman blinked and rubbed her tired eyes, and I could see they were paining her.

  I figured Loretta would be too proud to accept payment. I thought a moment and said, “Only if I can pay Doc to drop by and treat your eyes with his fine city medicine.”

  “Doc’s a smart man,” she said. “Know’d him a long time.”

  “He is, and he’ll care nicely for you, Miss Loretta. He could fit you for spectacles.”

  “Spectacles.” Loretta peered out the window and then squinted down at Honey.

  “They’ll help your weak eyes see—and they’ll fix ’em up good as new.”

  “Oh, to see again.” She pondered, rubbing them. “That would be a fine thing. Fine thing as any.” She picked up my hand, squeezed it. “Thank you, child, thank you for bringing me Honey. She shan’t want for naught. I’ll tend to her right good.”

  My heart told me Miss Loretta would do just that. “I’ll make sure I fetch you milk and bring clean diaper cloths.”

  But she didn’t hear, for she was under Honey’s sweet spell. Loretta bent over and brushed her lips across the baby’s soft head, picked up her tiny hand, spread the fingers, and kissed each nub. When Loretta raised her eyes, I could see they were bright and shiny, youthful and strong.

  “Me an’ Honey’s gonna get along jus’ fine, child,” she said, handing her to me. “Where’s my broom?” Miss Loretta jumped up like a spry young’un and began bustling about. “I have to get this place cleaned. Oh, land sakes! I must shake out the rugs. Clean my stove. This place ain’t fit for a new babe. Not for my Honey girl.”

  Forty-Three

  The babe was barely two weeks old on August 7, 1936, when Pa lit a new courting candle, pouring the hot wax onto a glass drip tray he’d fashioned from a saucer and cementing the naked taper in the puddle to burn later for an alarming length of time. A straight thread of smoke rose toward the wooden beams, then shivered from a breeze that blew through the open window.

  “This’ll do just fine,” he said. “Have to do, since I don’t have money for a new one. I can’t be digging up your old courting one and disturbing the dead like that,” Pa fussed.

  I circled around him with the baby in my arms, alarm pricking my flesh. “Pa, don’t do this.”

  “Daughter,” he hushed, letting me know the discussion was wearing him.

  Pa leaned over and blew out the candle. Satisfied, he carried it onto the porch. He was determined. Determined to get his unwed, baby-ridden daughter hitched, and his grandbaby a pa.

  I placed Honey in the crib he’d built her and followed him.

  “Pa, please, I won’t marry again.”

  “Cussy.” He raised the candle. “I’m gonna see you get your respectability just like I promised your mama. And make sure Honey’ll have herself a papa. This stick will hold the fire, Daughter.”

  “I have my respectability—”

  “Honey needs herself a father, and you need yourself a man. A good one who’ll properly care for you.”

  “Please. We’re fine. I have myself good pay with the Pack Horse, and Loretta watches Honey while I work.”

  “Loretta’s old…and…blind,” he rasped, swallowing several coughs.

  “She can use the money I give to the doc for her each month. And she did a right fine job with Honey so far this week. Remember Lila Dawson? She’s blind, widowed, and has raised herself four babes—”

  “I won’t have it!” He smacked the railing, choking. “The mine’s shutting down in a week, and I need to make sure you’ll be taken care of!”

  “You can get work with the WPA, Pa. There’s so many easy jobs now for men needing ’em—”

  Pa cut me a hard, scowling eye. “Beg for scraps, take the government’s relief? If a man can’t make do, he does without.”

  “They have lots of respectable jobs for men—”

  “You mean for me to take their Paupers’ Oath?” he said, deeply offended. A coal-stained hand flew to his chest.

  I winced. It was true. Anybody who wanted a job with the WPA had to swear to poverty, take the oath, and leave their pantries and cupboards opened in case a government man might happen by and snoop around to make sure you were remaining good ’n’ poor. I’d been lucky. The officials hadn’t ventured into our cove yet. And not from lack of trying, but because we were tucked so deep, no matter how many times I’d given the proper directions to the supervisor who’d passed them on to the governme
nt men, they’d given up and turned back.

  “Pa, let me take care of us. I don’t want another courter—another husband.” I wrung my hands, cracked and darkened from boiling Honey’s diapers and Pa’s clothing and sheets. “We’ll be fine, you’ll be fine.”

  “Let me tell you, Cussy, a miner’s life is a short one.”

  “Oh, Pa.” I fanned his words away.

  “Daughter, they buried eight of ’em last January after the collapse. Sealed that pit with them eight poor souls trapped inside it.”

  I had heard the horror of it all. How the men and young boys were trapped so far down in the midnight dust and crumbling rock, no one could reach them. Then a leak of poisonous gas put them to sleep. There weren’t anything left to do, no way to rescue them except to cover the tomb and have a preacher hold a burial service at the face of the mine.

  “Now, I ain’t departing this earth and leaving my two girls to the likes of what the greedy man’s leaving in our hills.” Pa jutted out his chin.

  I warmed at him including Honey as his, and was touched at how easily the babe had grown on him and tamped his moodiness the last two weeks. She’d brought a light into our dreary home and heavy hearts. And the warmth of it all had given me a peace like no other. Still, my belly knotted when he talked stubborn and scary like that.

  “Pa, it ain’t right you working yourself up so. We could go to the city, to Philadelphia. They have fine doctors who care for coloreds.”

  “Enough. I promised your mother.” He coughed for a bit more, the anger attacking his lungs.

  I plopped down into the chair. “Pa.” I turned the conversation. “Who would want to marry a Blue? A Blue with a Blue baby?” I clasped my cold, fearful hands, folding them into my skirts. “It can’t be anybody any good.”

  Pa cringed, and his gray eyes rested over on the creek.

  “I don’t want to leave my home. Leave you,” I said.

  “Cussy.” He sighed and dropped into the chair. “It is I who must leave you. The doc says I’m not in good health.”