I smiled. “You’re right about that.”
“And you figuring you can clear forty acres in two years?”
“I’m figurin’ I can . . .” I met Mitchell’s eyes. “With your help.”
Mitchell smiled. “Now, how my name get into this? I don’t recall sayin’ anythin’ ’bout any land. You the one wanted land.”
“Well, to my figuring, if you came in and helped me on this, we could split the acreage. You take twenty, I take twenty.”
“What I’m gonna do with twenty acres?”
“Farm it.”
Mitchell considered. “You gonna do the same?”
“For a spell. Figure, though, to sell the timber on it for cash money eventually and buy a better piece.”
“You mean that land you been wantin’.”
“Yeah . . . that land.”
“What ’bout supplies? You got everything you need?”
I nodded. “I bought four mules, wagon, axes, saws, rope, food. Yes, I think I’ve got everything we’ll need.”
Mitchell turned his back on me and stepped away, considering. Then he turned again to face me. “’Fore I decide on that, there’s some news I gotta tell you.”
“I think I know,” I said.
“What’s that?”
“You’re getting married.”
Mitchell looked at me in silence, his lips slightly agape.
“So it’s true.”
Mitchell made a hissing sound, expressing his surprise that I already knew. “How’d you find out? Who told you?”
“Well, just so happens I was doing some business with the family of the young lady you proposed to. Her daddy told me.”
Mitchell shook his head and let out an embarrassed laugh. “Who’d’ve figured, huh? Me? Fella wasn’t never gonna get tied down.”
I smiled at his predicament.
He became suddenly serious. “But this one, Paul, she special.”
“I know,” I said. “I’ve met her.”
“Did?”
“Met her whole family. Her daddy came in one day up to Luke Sawyer’s place wanting me to make a rocker for her mama, and I met the young lady then. She’s a fine young woman.”
“Ain’t she, though?” Mitchell grinned at his good fortune. “I first seen her back last summer when she come t’ the camp with her mama selling pies, but I ain’t started ’changing many words wit’ her ’til the spring.” He laughed. “I s’pose she kinda scairt me!”
“Is that why you went off?”
“Ain’t ya heard? My daddy was low sick.”
“Uh-huh.”
Mitchell laughed again. “Ya right, Paul. I was tryin’ t’ get her off my mind. She’s young, but she’s sure got a woman’s hold on me. I figured t’ take up my time with somebody else and put some distance between us, but it ain’t helped. All I could think ’bout was her.” He looked at me a bit sheepishly as he confessed that. Then he said, “So, ya seen her, huh? Ain’t she somethin’?”
I nodded and was honest with my friend. “I was on the verge of asking her daddy if I could court her myself when he went and told me she was spoken for.”
“That a fact?”
“It’s a fact, all right. I reckon I was just too slow getting up my nerve to try and court her.”
“Reckon you was,” said Mitchell; then he hesitated. “You liked her that much, huh? I got reason t’ worry?” Mitchell studied me close, no longer laughing. “You got any problem ’bout me and her? You do, you tell me now.”
I shook my head. “You spoke for her. She accepted. Whatever feelings I had, or I’ve got, I’m letting them go. I’ve got no part in it now, except as your friend.” I said that, and I meant what I said, though I was feeling a hurt I’d never felt before.
Mitchell looked at me long, accepted my words, and sighed. “Who’d’ve thought it, Paul? Me, with a fine young lady like that? I don’t know if her daddy care much for me, but I promised him he got no cause to doubt me. I’m gonna take care of Caroline. I’m gonna take care of her fine.”
“I expect you will,” I said. “Especially if you’ve got yourself twenty acres of good farmland.”
Mitchell let go a raucous laugh. “You really tryin’ t’ get me ’bout this thing, ain’t ya?”
“You going to turn me down?”
Mitchell was silent. “You know I done had my share of the womenfolks, Paul, and you know jus’ ’xactly where I come from and where I been, so I ’spect you know what I mean when I say Caroline Perry the best thing ever come into my life.” He looked at me, and I answered him with a nod.
“You just make sure you take care of her,” I said. “She’s too fine to be thrown away.”
“Don’t worry,” said Mitchell. “I know that. I know you’ve seen how I’ve done before, but you can believe this, Paul. I won’t ever do that t’ Caroline.”
I accepted my friend’s words and went on. “So, what about the land? Are you going to work it with me?”
“Wouldn’t be able to work it with you for another few weeks. I’m flat broke and I need me some cash money from this camp. Soon as I leave from here, I’m even plannin’ on sellin’ my gun t’ put some money in my pocket.”
“But you’ll come in with me on this?”
Mitchell grunted. “You asked me and I need it.” He extended his hand. “You’re a true brother to me, Paul. Always done been.”
I took Mitchell’s hand. “And you know, you’re more a brother to me than any of my blood.” We shook hands, and the deal was sealed. That night I wrote out the terms of our agreement even though Mitchell didn’t want any part of any written paper. We had shaken hands on the deal, and that was enough for him. But I figured it was the fair thing to do, for if anything happened to me before our two years were up and there was any question about the forty, Mitchell would need some written word about our agreement. I wrote it and signed it, and against his objections, Mitchell signed it too.
That next morning I left the camp early while it was still dark in order to reach the Perry farm in time for breakfast. When I got there, I found my heart racing upon seeing Caroline. She looked even prettier than I remembered. As we sat down to breakfast, I said, “I’ve just come back from the lumber camp over by Mud Creek. I was visiting a friend of mine there. Turns out the two of you know each other.”
Caroline’s eyes seemed to dance as she looked at me. “Do?”
“Yes. . . . His name’s Mitchell Thomas.”
“My Mitchell?” exclaimed Caroline.
“Ya don’t say!” added Mister Perry.
“You really know my Mitchell?” Caroline almost squealed with delight.
I nodded. “Since we were boys. We came into Mississippi together from East Texas. We grew up together on my daddy’s land in Georgia.”
“Well, ain’t that somethin’!” said Sam Perry. “You hear that, Miz Perry?” he asked his wife. “What ya say t’ that? Mister Logan here knowin’ the young man our Caroline gonna marry?”
Miz Rachel Perry glanced at her husband, then to my great surprise turned to me and spoke. “You think he a good man?”
I looked straight into her eyes. “Yes, ma’am, I do. Since the day he became my friend, he’s never let me down, not even one time.”
Miz Rachel Perry kept her eyes on me a moment longer, looked at her beaming daughter, then back at me again, and nodded. She had no more words for me right then, even though the rest of the family had plenty as they asked question after question about Mitchell and me. But after breakfast was over and Nathan and I were packing to go, Miz Rachel Perry pulled me aside. “Mister Logan,” she said, “I wants t’ thank you for my rockin’ chair.”
“No need,” I said. “It was your husband’s doing.”
“But he ain’t made that rockin’ chair. You done that. I know he done paid ya for it and it was yo’ job t’ make it, but still I’m thankin’ ya for it. It’s a finely made piece of furniture and I ’preciate that. I always ’preciate good work and I wants ya
t’ know that.”
“Well, I thank you, Miz Perry. You know, though, I can’t take all the credit for that chair. It was your daughter Caroline painted the flowers.”
“I know that. I know.” She looked away for a moment, pressed her lips together, then turned back to me. “I wanna ’pologize t’ ya too.”
“Apologize?”
“That’s right. My husband and my daughter Caroline, they both done told me I ain’t been the best I coulda been when you come for supper that Sunday. But they ain’t had t’ tell me that. I know’d I wasn’t bein’ a Christian woman, welcomin’ a stranger t’ my house. It wasn’t nothin’ t’ do with anythin’ ya done I acted that way, and I wants ya t’ know that. You seems t’ be a fine young man and ya does fine work. You welcome here . . . anytime.”
I was overcome by Miz Perry’s words. I’m not sure why. Maybe it was because I saw my mama in her. Maybe it was because I saw her pride and felt her pain about her name and what her mother had suffered to give it to her. I was so overcome, all I could do was nod, and she accepted that without another word. She looked into my eyes, and I believe she saw what I felt.
On the way back to the forty acres neither Nathan nor I had much to say to each other. I had my thoughts on Caroline and Mitchell, and clearing the trees in time, and I reckon Nathan was already missing his family. By the time we reached the forty, it was nightfall. I halted the wagon at the head of the trail because of the stumps, then Nathan and I unhitched the mules and led them to where I had built a shed. We fed and watered the mules and the dog too; we unloaded the wood and my tools, and set them in the shed along with all the other supplies. Once all that was done, Nathan and I settled in the shed as well. I had made only one bed, a crude one at that, and I let Nathan have it. I built a fire, rolled myself into a blanket, and lay on the ground beside the fire. Nathan was already snoring. I was tired, but it was way over in the night before I could fall asleep. The news of Caroline and Mitchell had hit me hard, and now with only my mind for company, that’s all I could think about.
The next morning before the dawn, I rose before Nathan and rekindled the fire. Then I woke the boy and sent him to the creek for water. When he returned, I put on a pot of chicory and unwrapped the biscuits and ham Miz Perry had given us, and we settled down to breakfast without a word. Afterward I began to show Nathan what a day’s work on this place was going to be. I had already cleared the roadway. Now I set Nathan to leveling the stumps that lined the roadway while I chopped more trees. The work was hard, but Nathan didn’t complain. In the afternoon I began chopping trees to build a cabin, for it was already fall and we would soon need sturdier shelter. As soon as the trees fell, I had Nathan hack off the branches, and when the evening came, we gathered all the branches and burned them.
Finally we sawed down a circle of stumps for sitting, dug a fire pit in the center to do our cooking, and sat down to eat more of the good food Miz Rachel Perry had sent. After supper I kept my end of the bargain I’d made with Nathan’s father. Or at least I tried to. I started on the cabinet I’d contracted with Luke Sawyer, and it was my plan to have Nathan help me with every step. But Nathan, though his interest was there, was too tired to do anything much after such a long day. Finally I told him to go on to his bed. Maybe, I decided, the teaching would have to wait awhile, at least until Nathan was accustomed to his new job of logging.
A few days after Nathan and I settled into our work routine, we had an unexpected visit from Charles Jamison’s boy, Wade. He was on foot. He came right up to where we were working on the slope. I was chopping a tree at the time, but I had given to Nathan the less hazardous job of sawing the branches from the fallen trees. Both of us were hard at work, our attention only to the job at hand, when Wade suddenly announced his presence.
“Hello!” he called.
His words were shouted above the buzz of everything else. Both Nathan and I stopped our work and looked toward the sound and the boy who’d issued it.
“Hello!” Wade hollered a second time, and waved at me up the slope. “Remember me, Mister Logan? I’m Wade Jamison!”
I remember thinking he was a boy sure of himself. I gave him a nod.
“My daddy and me, you know we’ve got a place right up the road, so I figured I’d come see ’bout the neighbors.”
“That’s obliging of ya,” said Nathan, not sounding at all impressed.
“Not at all,” said Wade, taking no offense, it seemed, to Nathan’s tone. He looked around. “My daddy said you’re clearing all the trees through here. Forty acres of them. Got your work cut out for ya.”
“Yes, we do,” I said.
“Y’all need some help?”
“We’ve got help coming,” I replied.
“Well, I’ll let y’all get back to it,” said the boy. “Just wanted to say hello.”
“We appreciate that,” I said.
“Oh, I’ll be stopping by again.” He turned to go, took a few steps, then turned around. “’Ey!” he said, looking at Nathan. “What’s your name?”
“Nathan.”
“Well, Nathan, you like t’ fish?”
“Yeah . . .”
“Well, how ’bout us goin’ fishin’ sometime?”
“I work mos’ the time.”
Wade nodded like a wise old man in understanding. “But you ever get a break in your day and wanna go fishing on a Saturday, when I’m out of school, I got some poles and I know some real good spots. I’ll check back sometime when I’m on my way to the Rosa Lee. That’s what we call the creek yonder. That be all right with you?”
Nathan glanced back at me, then looked again at Wade and gave a nod.
“All right!” said Wade with a smile. “See y’all, then!” He waved us a good-bye and went on his way. Nathan and I returned to our work.
A week later on a Saturday morning Wade Jamison was back again, and this time he had his fishing poles with him. “Can’t go,” said Nathan when Wade asked him to join him.
“Well, ya know, fishing is really good this time of morning,” said Wade.
“Know that,” replied Nathan. He hesitated. “But I got too much work t’ do.”
I looked at Nathan eyeing those fishing poles, and I knew he was longing to go. He had been putting in nearly the same hours as I and without complaint. I figured he needed some enjoyment and to be with someone near his own age. “Nathan,” I said, “some catfish would sure taste good for supper. Why don’t you go on with Wade and catch us some?”
“But what ’bout the branches?”
“They’ll be here for you when you get back. Just make sure you’re here come noon.”
Nathan grinned wide. “Yes, suh, I’ll do that.” Then he went off happily with Wade. Each boy was holding tight to a fishing pole.
After that, every Saturday Wade Jamison showed up with his fishing poles and I let Nathan go with him. I limited the fishing to just that one morning a week because of all the work to be done, and neither Nathan nor Wade pushed for more. But despite Wade’s showing up just once a week for fishing, we saw him more than that. Every day or so he was on the forty after school, wanting to help if he could. I politely declined his help; still, he often stayed awhile keeping Nathan company as he worked. Since Nathan’s work wasn’t slowed by his presence, I saw no harm at first in his being there. But then as Nathan began to look forward to Wade’s visits and began to parrot Wade’s words to me, with “Wade said this” and “Wade said that,” I decided to speak to Nathan about keeping his distance with this new friend.
“I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to be getting too close to Wade Jamison,” I said when the day’s work was done and we sat at the outdoor fire eating our supper.
Nathan glanced away, then back at me again. “Why not? He nice enough.”
“Nice enough, yes,” I agreed. “But he’s white.”
Nathan’s eyes went downward and he studied his cup. “Ain’t nobody round here much, ’ceptin’ us. Wade, he seem t’ like me and he sma
rt. I don’t see nothin’ wrong bein’ friends with him.”
“Maybe you don’t,” I said. “But in my life I’ve found there’s no such thing as a lasting and equal friendship between black and white.” I thought on my brother Robert. “If you’re colored, that white man’s going to always think of you with your color in mind, and I don’t care how close you think you are, if that white man figure it’s in his interest to turn his back on you, that’s just what he’s going to do.”
Nathan shrugged off my words. “All we do is go fishin’.”
“Fishing?” Again I thought on my brother. I thought on the fishing poles nestled near the creek in that mound of rocks on my daddy’s land. I knew it had to be hard on Nathan being in this place with only me, working this land without his family. I knew what it meant to have a friend when a boy was his age. I knew that kind of blind trust. I knew also about betrayal. I could have told him about Robert, but I chose not to do so. Maybe for a while this boy Wade wouldn’t hurt him. “Fishing,” I repeated. “It’s a good passing of time with a friend,” I said. Then I looked pointedly at Nathan. “Just don’t pass too much of it with Wade Jamison.”
Nathan eyed me resentfully, and I figured he was regretting his daddy’s admonition to do what I told him. “I gotta go fetch water for the mornin’,” he said, and got up. As I watched him heading for the creek with a bucket in each hand, I knew I hadn’t gotten through to him. I took one last sip of my chicory, then tossed another log on the fire. I decided Nathan would have to find out for himself what it meant to have a friendship with a boy the likes of Wade Jamison, a friendship with a white boy.
It wasn’t long following that talk with Nathan that I came down from chopping and found Wade working alongside Nathan hacking off branches. I called Nathan aside. “How come you’ve got Wade working with you?”
“He jus’ helpin’ me out, that’s all.”
“Well, you thank him and tell him to go.”
“But—”
“Do as I say!” My words came out sterner than I’d intended.
The Land Page 24