“Suh?” she asked, with that softness in the word designed to carry the note of subservience, “would you be havin’ supper?”
“I would be. And I’m not a ‘sir’, I’m just plain Curtis.”
She nodded but she looked confused, because obviously he was a guest in the house and, though he was a Negro and never had there been a Negro guest in this house and surely not one to sleep in the guest bedroom as Mr. Ludenmere had told her this young man was going to be doing tonight, he must be of some important status or he would not have been allowed to set foot in here.
She cast her gaze up and down his uniform and then glanced at his red cap on the table where he’d placed it. “Mind my askin’, are you a soldier?”
“No’m, I’m a Redcap at the Union Station.”
“I didn’t hear that Mr. and Mrs. Ludenmere are takin’ a trip,” she said. Her own world had never included train travel. Her brow furrowed. “Mind my askin’, where are the children tonight?”
Curtis figured she couldn’t ask the master of the house that question without seeming to overstep her boundaries, but to him she could. “They’ll be home soon,” he answered, and she knew that was all she was going to get even though she’d heard Mrs. Ludenmere give a pitiful cry and something was very wrong with the orderly nature of the house, but in keeping with her place she continued what would be her usual duties by asking, “What would Mr. Curtis like for supper this evenin’?”
It was a question he had never been asked before in his life.
“You decide,” he told her.
Her mouth opened and then closed again and she looked completely lost. Curtis thought that maybe no one had ever offered her the chance to make her own decision…so here they stood in the beautiful room, neither speaking, each uncomfortable in their unaccustomed freedom, both waiting on the other like shadows soon to pass.
****
Night had fallen, the full dark of the countryside far away from the smear of lights and the sound of cars on concrete. Around the cabin on the lake the crickets, cicadas and other insects in the woods were sending out their music of clicks and chirrups, clacks and drones. The air had turned heavy, the rain had ceased, and in the wet heat the mist rose from Lake Pontchartrain and slowly drifted through the forest leaving pieces of itself hanging in the pines and oaks like old fragments of fragile and yellowed linen.
In the total darkness of the prison room, Nilla heard the sound of the heavy table being moved from the door. Several times she had tried to sleep and had failed. Little Jack’s bravado had broken again what might have been two hours ago, and he had begun to cry in the dark until she had gotten up next to him, shoulder-to-shoulder. Hartley had attempted to ease their situation by starting the game of Twenty Questions but Little Jack wouldn’t play and Nilla felt so tired and listless she couldn’t concentrate.
“Everybody stay still,” Hartley cautioned from his sitting position on the floor across the room.
The door opened and a glare of light intruded. It was only the flame of an oil lamp, yet its brightness stung their eyes.
“Three blind mice,” said Donnie as he followed the light into the room. He closed the door behind him and stood directing the lamp’s glow all around the cramped little chamber. “Now it smells bad in here,” he said. “Who had the runs?”
Nilla longed to tell the man to get out and leave them alone, but she feared even speaking to him.
“Isn’t it past your bedtime?” Hartley asked.
“Naw. The others are out smokin’ on the back porch, thought I’d step in and visit for awhile. Hey, how do you like this?” Donnie knelt down on the floor and lifted the lamp so Hartley could see the gleaming glass eye stuck to the center of his forehead with electrical tape. “Now I’m a three-eyed sonofabitch. How ’bout that?” When Hartley remained silent, Donnie said, “I asked you a question, asshole face…how ’bout that?”
“Fine,” said Hartley.
“Fine, he said,” Donnie grinned in the light at Nilla. “Ain’t I pretty, little girl?”
“Yes,” she answered, staring at the opposite wall.
“Damn right. Handsome, I should say. Got three eyes the better to see you with, Little Red Ridin’ Hood. Hey, what’s your daddy call you?”
“Nilla.”
“I mean…like…a pet name. I’ll bet he’s got one for you. Like…Sugarlips, or Sweet Fanny, or—”
“Why don’t you leave us alone?” Hartley said. “Isn’t it enough that we’re in here with no food or water, and—”
“Shut up,” Donnie said, with a harsh rasp of dread menace in his voice. “If I want to hear you fart, I’ll kick it out of you.” He moved the lamp a few inches so it shone more fully on Little Jack, who had pressed up close against his sister and clenched her fingers as much as he was able with his hands bound before him. “Look at the tough guy now,” said Donnie. “You been cryin’, toughie?”
“No,” the boy said, throwing the word like a poisoned dart.
“Well now, that’s a damn lie, ain’t it? Your eyes are all puffed up, looks like somebody’s been doin’ a two-step on your face. How do you like where you are, toughie? Kinda a far piece from your rich daddy’s mansion. Bet you’ve got all the toys and games and shit you ever wanted, don’t you? Bet you just have to name somethin’ you want and it’s handed right to you, no sweat. Huh? Ain’t that so?”
“No.”
“I’ll bet.” Donnie sat in silence for a time, as Nilla’s heart continued to thud in her chest with fear of the man. “One thing your goddamned daddy has failed at, boy,” Donnie went on, “is teachin’ you respect for your elders. You’re supposed to call me ‘sir’ when you speak to me.”
“I won’t speak to you anymore, then,” said Little Jack. “Go back to your hole.”
Hartley winced. Nilla thudded her shoulder against her brother’s to warn him to silence, but the words were out and gone.
Donnie gave a hard laugh followed by a low whistle. He brought the lamp over closer to Nilla and Little Jack and crouched there barely two feet away, while Hartley was gathering his strength to scrabble into action if need be.
“You,” said Donnie to Little Jack, “are a piece a’ work. I might admire your balls if you didn’t piss me off so bad. Hey, think fast!” He reached out and slapped the boy across the side of the face. “Think fast!” he said, and slapped him again on the other side.
“For God’s sake,” Hartley growled. “Leave the boy alone! If you want to bully somebody, come bully me!”
“Naw, that ain’t no fun. Think faster!” Smack, went the slap. It had been a harder blow, and the sound of it made Nilla’s stomach churn. She thought if she threw up on him he would leave but there was nothing in her to expel.
“Stop it!” Little Jack said, with the first glimmers of fresh tears in his eyes. “I didn’t—”
Smack! And that was the hardest slap yet. In the lamplight Nilla saw her brother give a stunned blink and a thread of blood broke over his lower lip.
Hartley struggled to his feet before the next blow could be delivered. “All right,” he said. “You want to fight, let’s get to it. I’ll knock your teeth out with my hands bound up.”
“Will you, now? Huh,” said Donnie, and as he came up off the floor Nilla saw his face turn red just before he drove a tremendous punch into Hartley’s groin. Their chauffeur doubled over, gasping. Donnie hammered him across the back of the head with a noise like an axe hitting timber and Hartley went down face-first to the floor.
“Help!” Nilla suddenly shouted. “Help us, please!”
At once Donnie had spun around, leaned in and gripped her chin in a hand like a crushing vise. His enraged face loomed as large as an ugly planet. She felt his fingers tighten as if he were trying to crack open a walnut. Then there was a solid-sounding thunk, Donnie released her and staggered back, and beside Nilla Little Jac
k was staggering too, his eyes rolling up from the force of the headbutt he’d just delivered to the side of Donnie’s skull. He fell to his knees and leaned over and Nilla saw the terrifying sight of her brother’s blood drops spattering the floorboards from his busted lip.
“Fuck all, what’re you tryin’ to do?” came what was nearly a scream from the doorway. Nilla squinted into the beam of the flashlight the woman held, and behind her was the shape of the man who had betrayed her father.
“Donnie!” Ginger shrieked. “You fuckin’ idiot! What have you done to ’em?”
“Fun…havin’ some fun, that’s all,” Donnie answered. His voice sounded like he was eating a bowl of mush. “Hartley came at me, I had to put him down.” He shook his head back and forth to stop the bells ringing. “Little bastard popped me in the head, I had to lay him down too.”
“That’s a lie!” Nilla shouted, and she felt her own face swell with the blood of anger. “All of that’s a lie! That man kept slapping Little Jack!”
“Okay, okay!” Ginger held up a hand to silence everyone. Hartley was groaning and doubled up on the floor. “What’d you do to him?”
“He ain’t hurt, not too bad. Hey, I’m gettin’ bored just sittin’ and countin’ my warts.”
Ginger swung the flashlight’s beam into Donnie’s face. The glass eye gleamed on his forehead in its nest of black tape. He gave a toothy smile though his own eyes were still dazed and the silver fang in his mouth gleamed.
“You’re makin’ me crazy,” Ginger said.
“Well,” he answered, “that wouldn’t be too hard to do, would it?”
Something seemed to rush into the room. Pearly felt it, like another presence that had suddenly elbowed its way in. Even though the air in the cabin was warm and damp, he felt a chill gnawing at his bones.
Ginger kept the light aimed into Donnie’s stupidly-grinning face. Her hot anger had gone away, but the cool quiet of her voice was to Pearly somehow worse when she spoke a single word, delivered with menacing power: “Don’t.”
Donnie shrugged. “Ain’t nothin’ to me.”
Nilla was beside her brother, who was spitting blood. Little Jack gave a shudder but he did not cry or release a single sob; it seemed to her that he might never cry again, and that suddenly he was far older than his eight years of life. “I’m all right,” he said, and even his voice sounded more manly. She crawled over to see about Mr. Hartley, who was trying to sit up and having a tough time of it.
She looked up at the three kidnappers who stood between her and the door. “We need some food and water,” she told them. “Can’t we have any?”
“Donnie,” Ginger said, “go get the canteen.”
“Why me?”
“Because I’m tellin’ you to, that’s why. Pearly, watch ’em a minute.” She went out to where the grocery bag sat on the kitchen table. They’d gone through two cans of pork ’n’ beans, one of the bottles of Coca-Cola and Donnie had chomped down two of the apples. She didn’t feel like opening the ham spread for sandwiches or opening another can of the pork ’n’ beans. She plucked out one of the boxes of Cracker Jack and took that back to the room. “Here,” she said, and threw it on the floor between Nilla and Hartley. “That’ll have to do.” Donnie came in with a metal canteen and Ginger told him to unscrew the cap and give them all a drink. Pearly heard Donnie mutter something that was unintelligible and probably foul, but the young hellion obeyed the mistress of the house. Nilla got a drink first. When Little Jack turned his head away from the canteen, Nilla told him to take a drink in the strongest sisterly voice she could muster and he did. Hartley was up on his knees by now, and he also drank from the offered canteen without comment.
“All right,” said Ginger when Donnie was done. “Daddy Ludenmere’s payin’ up about this time tomorrow mornin’, so nobody’s gonna be dyin’ from thirst or starvation. Everybody happy now?” She didn’t wait for the reply that would never come. “Go,” she told Donnie, who gave a small but infuriating chuckle as he followed Pearly out of the room.
When the door was closed, Nilla heard the noise of the table being propped up again. After that, she could hear the muffled voice of the woman telling Donnie to go get a smoke or take a walk or go squat in the woods but to leave the kids alone. The woman used language that a whole crate of soap could not wash from a person’s mouth.
“Help me with this,” Little Jack said.
He was trying to get the Cracker Jack open. He wound up holding the box while Nilla’s fingers tore at the paper. At last they got it open and they were able to tilt the box into each other’s mouths to get some of the caramel-covered popcorn. “Do you want some of this, Mr. Hartley?” Nilla asked.
“No,” he answered hollowly, and still in pain. “You kids eat up.”
Nilla sat back, her teeth crunching the popcorn. To try to reach Curtis again? No, he needed his rest too…and the thing was, she feared that her fear was making her lose the concentration to connect, and that fear grew past fear into dread. She would try again later in the morning, and before then she would try to force herself to get some sleep if she could.
“Gimme some more,” Little Jack said.
With a precarious grip by the tips of her fingers, she tilted the box again into his mouth.
“Hey, hey!” he said with his mouth full. He spat something out on the floor and when he could speak through the popcorn he said, “I got the prize!”
“Good for you.” Nilla closed her eyes. It was no darker than it had been before.
“I lost it. Wait…here it is.” His searching fingers had found the small paper packet next to his left knee. “What do you think it could be?”
“Glasses to see in the dark.”
“Oh yeah, that’d be what we need. I’ll hold it if you can tear it open.”
“Jack,” she said, and realized it was the first time she hadn’t put the Little before it, “I’m trying to rest, okay?”
“Just help me.”
“Let it wait.”
“Why?” he asked, and it was a good question.
She sighed with resignation, opened her eyes into the darkness and reached toward him. They found each other and he guided the packet to her fingers. She then guided it to her mouth and tore it open with her teeth while her brother held it. Little Jack said, “Thanks,” and she figured he would either empty it onto the floor or try to pluck it out with his fingertips.
About ten seconds passed, and then Little Jack said, “I think it’s a ring. Yeah, it is…a ring…but there’s somethin’ else on it…kind of a…rocket ship or somethin’…wait, wait…oh yeah…I think it’s a tin whistle.”
From the other side of the room came Hartley’s voice, still raspy with injury: “Don’t blow it. You say it’s tin?”
“Yes sir, I guess. Some kind of metal. I couldn’t blow it anyway, not with my fat lip.”
“Bring it over here. Be careful not to drop it.”
“Yes sir.” Nilla heard her brother crawling over to Hartley. “Here it is,” Little Jack said as he put it between Hartley’s fingers. There was a long pause, and then Hartley said quietly, “I’ve got some change in my left pocket. There’s a dime in there. It’ll be the thinnest coin. Will you get that out, please?”
“What’re you doing, Mr. Hartley?” Nilla asked.
“Quiet,” he cautioned. And then he went on, in a whisper, “This is like a miniature Buck Rogers rocket ship on a ring. It’s a whistle…made of pot metal, I think. But there’s a seam that’s got a very small crack in it. I’m gonna try to work it open with a dime. Got it, Jack?” He too, had lost the Little. “Okay, good…just hold onto it for a minute, I’m gonna need your help to do this.”
Nilla crawled closer to the others. “Why are you going to work it open?” she whispered.
“Gonna try,” he corrected. “If I can use that dime to widen the crack, mayb
e I can peel the metal back and make a sharp edge. Then if that crazy man comes in here to hurt us again I’ll have somethin’ to ward him off with until the woman can calm him down.”
“Is that smart?” she dared to ask. “I mean…if you cut him, won’t he hurt us more?”
“What I want to do is make him think twice if he comes in here again and starts some shi…some business,” Hartley said. “If I can peel the seam back enough, I’ll have a blade, and I think I can get the ring part on the first joint of my little finger. It won’t be much, but I’m not gonna sit and have to watch Jack take another beatin’ without fightin’ back. Okay?” he asked, and she realized he was wanting her permission to continue, because what he was proposing might be necessary but it was awfully dangerous too.
She wished she could ask Curtis his opinion, and through him her daddy’s, but this was up to her.
She thought about it awhile longer, remembering how terrible the sound of her brother being slapped had been, and how terrible had been the sight of Mr. Hartley being hurt and falling to the floor where he lay gasping and defenseless.
This was up to her.
At last she opened her mouth, and she whispered, “Okay.”
Nineteen.
Pearly thought he had found escape from what seemed an endless and humidly hot night by lying on the top bunk of the bunkbeds and fixing his mind upon Mexico. Ginger had stretched out on the bunk below after smoking another cigarette in the aftermath of the commotion caused by Donnie, and Pearly couldn’t help but say to her in the glow of one of the oil lamps, “I told you he was gonna be trouble. He’s a loose cannon.”
“I needed a cannon, loose or not,” she said. “Instead of a pop-gun like you.”
Then he’d wisely shut his mouth, Ginger had said no more, and he closed his eyes and travelled to Mexico in his mind. He saw the blue ocean waves breaking foam upon the white-sand beach, he saw the winding path that led up to his mansion perched atop the green hill, he heard the songs of the wild birds in the verdant trees and smelled…money. It had a particular perfume, a wealthy scent, a smell of freedom. With his share he would never have to go out on that damned road again and sweat out the selling of inscribed Bibles, gold mine bonds, oil well deeds, letters from attorneys and banks and investment firms, all counterfeit to snag the suckers and especially the ill-educated who had caught their own heady whiff of cash.
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