by R. T. Kaelin
He stared out through the window toward the setting sun which had just reached the ridge to the west.
Kinjin waited, hands folded, feeling lost.
He looked to Dashiyen, who bowed his head, and then recorded where Manhamha stared so they could begin the search for their newly birthed lama.
Despite the feelings of loss, a small bit of pride blossomed within Kinjin. He had helped the lama, and that was enough.
He turned to Dashiyen. “Is there room here? For someone like me?”
The smile on Dashiyen’s face warmed Kinjin’s heart. “We may be able to find room, young novice.”
*
The Burning Servant
by Steven Saus
“That was a fascinating story, Mister Lambert.” The young African-American man lifted a mug of beer to his mouth, leaving a pale mustache against his black skin. “But there are intellectual mysteries in our past that cannot be explained as simply as the canonical effect.”
Doctor Montegro harrumphed from his stool, hand rubbing his muttonchop whiskers. “What kind of foolishness are you speaking of? Are you going to offer us math riddles in the middle of a tale of savages?” The rotund man laughed as he shifted the stethoscope that lay around his neck like a strange shawl.
The younger man flushed, his skin darkening further as he spoke over the scattered laughs from around the room. “Savages? No, sir, I would tell you a story of your own… civilized history. My name is Jonathan Freeman; I am an associate professor at the University. Surely the patrons of the Wanderer’s Club are familiar with it?”
Jonathan smiled as he continued. “My grandmother, Sarah Freeman, told me this tale, and I will vouch for its veracity. Her mind is—”
“Just fine, Jonathan, dear.” The woman stood in the doorway, surveying the room. Her dark face was wrinkled in the contour map’s ridgelines of a long, busy life. The men shifted to the side, making a path as she hobbled toward Jonathan, resting her weight on a simple wood cane. “So this is where you go of a evening, is it?” She nodded at the few other women in the room, and whispered, a little too loudly to her grandson, “At least there are some women here for you.”
Jonathan blush grew hotter. “Grandmother, I—”
“You was going to tell my story again. I know.” She squeezed between Jonathan and Dr. Montegro, her speech formalizing into schoolmarm diction. “It was a difficult task, Jonathan, but I did earn my degree at Oberlin through my merits, not my good looks.” She turned to the bartender. “Bourbon. Neat.”
The others in the room laughed softly as she took the glass and took a drink. Her voice melted back and forth between Southern fluidity and formal diction. “Mmm. Burbon’s a warm liquid, sirs. At my age, I crave some kind of fire to warm my bones.” Her gaze wandered over the men in the room. “Don’t get old, boys! There’s so much you give up, getting to be my age. Compromising, you see. You sacrifice something—a memory, a smell, joints that don’t ache you of a morning—just so you can see another day.”
“Mrs. Freeman,” Dr. Montegro said, “I believe there was a tale in the offering. While your observations of old age are…fascinating…they are not the coin of the realm. So to speak.” The doctor looked down through his glasses at her. “We trade stories here, madam, and your grandson was going to tell one.”
The smile creased her face even further. “Why, yes, yes, he was.” Jonathan tried to guide his grandmother to an armchair, but she waved him off, settling onto a barstool. “You fine educated men know of General Sherman, don’t you? The Union commander who burned his way from Atlanta to Savannah?” Several men nodded; a few, who had betrayed Southern accents earlier in the evening, frowned. Montegro’s hand touched the silver chestpiece of his stethoscope.
Sarah looked up at the paneled ceiling for a moment, then back at the listening men. “What you don’t know is that Sherman didn’t do it all himself.”
* *** *
I was a slave (Sarah said) from the time I was a little girl until the end of the Civil War. I like to think it didn’t change me much, though the world changed a right bit around me. I don’t remember much of my very early days. My father, I don’t recollect much of him at all—he was sold just after I was born, before my momma and I were sold to Mister Chipman. I was born on Mister Chipman’s land, and my momma raised me there. She remembered Africa, remembered being free. She tried to teach me, and those lessons I recollect right well, though I don’t always remember when she taught me.
The first year I can put a number to was ’59. That summer was blazing hot. Mister Chipman’s plantation sprawled outside Rosewell, Georgia, a little ways outside Atlanta and right up against the Chattahoochee River. Oh, that river looked so cool, shimmering under the summer sunlight.
I suppose I should tell you a little about Alb… Mister Chipman. He was a widower, living with his two sons. He tried to be decent, the kind of slave-owner apologists like to talk about. He gave us cotton clothes, straw mattresses, and real walls for our homes. He would even let you call him Albert some days if no other white folk were around. His sons acted like managers, and treated us like employees. They’d only whip you if you really deserved it, or tried to run away.
But just because they treated us nice didn’t mean we weren’t slaves, don’t you make any mistake. I remember that summer right well. One hot afternoon, the sweat just running down me so heavy that I thought I’d faint right away, I decided to slip into the river for a moment. Charles, Mister Chipman’s oldest, saw me in the river and then they had to whip me. None of the slaves could get in the river. They were too afraid that we’d run off. They all acted real sorry about it, but I still got lashes deep enough to leave scars.
The best thing was that momma didn’t have to be secret about our worship. She practiced the way she learned as a child, from her mother back in Africa. She acted as a priestess for the slaves on Mister Chipman’s plantation, and he let her. Momma told me that most owners would whip you for worshipping the way she did. Mister Chipman didn’t; so long as we listened to the traveling preachers on Sunday morning, he let us have our worship on Sunday night.
Days and years passed. I let a man start courting me in the winter of ‘60, then in the spring of ‘61, just after my mother married my Joe and me—it was damp and clammy that spring—she got pneumonia bad, and passed it on.
* *** *
Dr. Montegro waved his hand at Sarah. “Surely you mean ‘passed on’, madam.”
Sarah scowled at him. “If I’d meant such a thing, I would’ve said it.” A deeper twang crept slowly into her words. “I weren’t educated early on, suh—” Montegro winced at that “—but in the decades since Lincoln I’ve had nothing but time. My speech may have not been grammatical at that time, sir, but these days I know exactly what I say and what I mean.” She waited a moment, then continued. “My mother passed it on. A little pouch with herbs and salt, a special oil for rubbing the heads of babies. I became our priestess a full year before my mother died.”
Dr. Montegro harrumphed. “I’ve never heard of a type of voodoo being passed down that way, madam.” He took the stethoscope and placed the earpieces around his neck, the chestpiece glinting in the light.
Sarah raised her right eyebrow, an impressive number of wrinkles rising on her forehead. “In those days, there were as many types of voodoo as there were slaves. I won’t take offense that you haven’t heard of my type of voodoo any more than you would take offense that I’ve never heard of your grandmother or aunt.”
“You might have—”
She bit off her words—and his complaint. “I haven’t.” She looked around the room. “Do I have your permission to continue?” The men around her did not say anything, and she began speaking again.
* *** *
Most days, I worked in the kitchen. I fetched water, mopped floors, served the food. Mister Chipman liked to have me serve when company was over. When he was talking business, he always had me bring the drinks. Oh, my, it was something, the way
those white men would just start looking at me. It felt good that they thought I was pretty, but if it weren’t for Mister Chipman refusing to sell me… Well, he got right mad at Mister Holden one night when Mister Holden tried to pull me in his lap.
That was just the smallest bit of it, though. Most of it was simple work, good work, and I didn’t mind it none. Each night, the head cook let me slip leftover sweet cornbread into my skirt. I would take it home and offer a little bit to the Virgin, and a little bit to the gods to keep my promise to the cook. Then my Joe and I would lay in on our bed and feed each other the rest, small bite by small bite. Those were some good times, but my Joe, he was haunted by his life before Mister Chipman bought him.
Some nights, my Joe would wake me, thrashing in the grip of a nightmare. He remembered the ships, and I could trace the scars of the whip from his first master. When he cried out in the night, I tried to soothe him. I’d whisper a lullaby in his ear, then listen to his breathing, hoping the chickens clucking outside wouldn’t wake him again. We were married long enough to know each other well—the details of my moods as clear to him as the shape of his face was to me—but we still surprised each other.
* *** *
“It was early in September, in ‘64.” Sarah smiled a little, closing her eyes. “I’ll never forget it, my Joe’s strong head nestled against my chest.” She paused, taking in a deep breath through her nose before continuing, “The sweet scent of a night-blooming vine mixed with the sharp tang of our sweat.”
Sarah let out a small surprised gasp and opened her eyes. A blush crept up her cheeks. “I had something horribly important to tell him.” She surveyed the room, making sure she had their full attention before continuing.
* *** *
“Joe,” I said, “I’m with child.”
He looked up at me, sharp, quick. I remember the bright glisten of his green eyes. “Are you sure?” he asked. He held me, and I felt the whip-scars along his back.
“Of course I’m sure,” I told him. “My momma didn’t raise a fool of a priestess.” Joe got tense, then, muscles tight, and I rubbed his back a little harder. “I checked all the signs before I told you.”
He pushed himself up away from me without a word. He stood in the door of our hut, his body outlined by the moon and stars. “Sarah,” my Joe asked, “are you happy?” He turned and knelt next to our bed. “Are you happy… here?”
A brief gust of cool fall air followed him in and played across my skin. The smooth spiraling coolness reminded me of the Chattahoochee. I remembered swimming in the water, then imagined swimming with Joe. We’d swim down to Atlanta, past all the docks, then keep going all the way out to the sea. Oh, I imagined the sweat and grime and filth sliding off our bodies, and we would be free. Mister Chipman was a good man, but if he saw the fire I saw in Joe’s eyes, neither of us would have been let near the water ever again.
“Yes,” I told my husband. “Yes, I am happy.”
Joe lay down next to me, and I fell asleep in his thick arms. I thought I woke briefly, that I heard my Joe crying, but I never found out if that was just a dream.
The next morning, I learned what Joe already knew. The Union army was nearby. Not only was it near, but it was headed south, and the slave-owners all headed to our plantation to decide what to do.
I never did find out why they came to meet at his home. We thought we knew what they were planning; we’d heard plenty of the revolts and runaways that followed rumors of the Union army. It was one thing to run when safety was states away, but when there was an army just over the horizon? Anybody could do that, and we all knew it.
Albert—Mister Chipman—wanted me serving that night. I was glad to be out of the hot kitchen. That night was a blur of bringing food and drink to the men gathered around the grand old cherrywood table. Even in September, the men sweated through the main course in wool suits, hardly eating the food I laid out for them. All those men had their faces twisted in the same mask of fear and worry. That is, except Mister Chipman, who seemed angry at something, and sitting at the far end of the table, Mister Holden. That night Mister Holden kept his hands off me, but he sure looked at me, and it seemed like he just kept looking right through my clothes. With his narrow face and goatee, his brown hair slicked back, the man just looked like a weasel ready to bite through the walls of a henhouse.
The men started talking while I helped clear the table, so I don’t know exactly what all they said. I know I heard one man talk about the “devil Sherman,” but it wasn’t until I came back out with drinks that I really heard what they were saying. Mister Holden waved me over, so I went and refilled his glass with sweet tea. Mister Chipman then gestured to me, so I went back around the table to him. Mister Chipman didn’t offer his glass, and didn’t move so that I could get to it. So while I waited for him, I listened. I’d figured they were going to do something to keep us under control while the Union men passed by. I was wrong.
* *** *
Sarah leaned back and gestured the bartender over. “Another bourbon, but wait here just a moment.” She waited to see if the others were paying attention. “I see the similarity, of course, but I got another reason in keeping him here.”
“But think of what this man’s heard,” she continued. “Not just things you told him, but things he heard while you didn’t think a lick about him being around.” She waved her hand, encompassing the whole room.
She turned to the bartender, who held a flyswatter. “What are you doing?”
“Um… there’s a spider, ma’am.”
Sarah tsked sharply, collected the spider on a napkin, and walked it outside. The few murmured conversations died again as she walked back into the room.
“That proves my point, doesn’ it? Look at your own servants here. It don’t matter that you pay them, just look at ‘em. The bartender wears black. That girl there, serving sandwiches. She wears black. You wouldn’t have noticed him swat that spider, but you noticed me saving it.” Sarah waved the napkin that had saved the spider. “There’s a reason it. It makes us—it makes servants invisible.”
She took a sip of her drink. “And then folks will say things they never meant for you to hear.”
* *** *
I stayed pressed up against the wall, holding the cold pitcher of tea against my chest, hoping the cold might help keep me from coughing in the clouds of cigar smoke. I couldn’t quite catch what the men were talking about. All of them were talking at once, at least until Mister Chipman’s voice boomed through the chatter. “I forbid it. You will not use my workers as sacrificial lambs.” He gazed at each other man around the table, but stopped when he got to Mister Holden.
Sacrificial lambs? I thought. What are they planning to do with us? Are they going to make us into cannon fodder for the Confederate army? We’d heard tales of Confederate soldiers doing that, though I don’t think it ever happened.
Mister Holden glared right back at my master. “Forbid it, Albert? Forbid?” His finger slowly jabbed the smooth wood of the table as he spoke. “Your…slaves… are needed.” He waved vaguely to the north. “You know what is coming.”
The bald spot on Mister Chipman’s head flushed a deep red. “I am a Christian man, Mister Holden. I’ll have nothing to do with—”
Mister Holden laughed. “The devil is on the way, Albert, and we have to use all—all—the tools at our disposal to stop him.” Mister Chipman started to say something, but Mister Holden cut him off. “Albert, your name is on the compact the same as ours, signed the same as ours, bound the same as ours.” Mister Holden drained the glass of tea. “We have to move quickly. Tonight. It would simply take too long for any of the rest of us to gather our slaves and bring them to the river. Your land is right against the water, Albert, so it falls to you and yours.”
Mister Chipman turned to me, holding out his glass. “Sarah, some tea, please.” His face had lost the flush of rage. He was paler than I’d ever seen him, sweat beading on his forehead. I filled his glass in silence; the ot
her men in the room had noticed me and stopped talking. When his glass was full, Mister Chipman said, “Thank you, Sarah. That will be all. Make sure no one else disturbs us.”
I left the dining room for the clanking hustlebustle of the kitchen. I remember the tea pitcher clattering when I set it down with numb hands. Angie, one of the cooks, stopped by and picked up my hand. “Sarah,” she told me, “you’re the color of ashes. What’s wrong?”
* *** *
Sarah paused, staring at the images reflected in the small puddle of liquor in her glass. She tipped the glass back, letting the last drops trickle into her mouth. She gestured to the bartender for more. As he splashed amber liquid into her glass, Sarah said, “What’s your name?”
Jonathan laid his hand on Sarah’s shoulder. “Grandma, haven’t you had enough to drink?”
“No.” She waved him off, then turned back to the bartender. “What’s your name?”
“Glenn, ma’am.”
Her wrinkled hands grasped the bartender’s. “Glenn, how long you worked here?”
The bartender looked up at the other patrons, a forced grin arcing the mustache on his lip. “It seems like forever, ma’am.” The others laughed politely.
“Do you know that girl’s name?”
“Yes, ma’am. Her name is Tamiko.”
“And that busboy’s?”
“That is Darrin, ma’am, but he is not a busboy, he’s a—”
“That’s not my point. You know the dishwashers too, don’t you?”
“Yes, ma’am. We all play cards on Thursday nights after the club closes.”
“And you wouldn’t just leave any of ‘em to die, would you?”