‘I don’t know. He could find out easy enough.’ He raised his head as January drew breath to speak, went on, ‘I can’t leave him, sir. He’s in …’ He stopped himself – from saying what? That he’s in trouble?
‘I had to get out of that house.’ Mede picked his words carefully. ‘But I need to be where I’m close.’
‘So he can hit you again?’
Mede wiped the blood that trickled from his cut ear. ‘He’s drunk this evenin’.’
In the silence that followed, January heard Minou’s voice in the hall, low and troubled, and Preston saying something in reply.
‘—it would not have happened,’ she said, and Frank answered, his own voice tired.
‘In Louisiana a man frees the children of his free plaçée. Does no man father children on his house women and pretend that they aren’t his?’ And when Minou did not reply, into her silence he went on, ‘Do you think even the French there aren’t being drawn into the American way of doing things these days?’
Her voice was sad. ‘It is not as it was.’
Daylight faded from the windows. In the dining room, someone lit the lamps. China rattled softly as Octavia Trigg took it from its cupboards. When the door beyond opened, January could smell onions, biscuits, stew.
‘He’s been very good to me,’ Mede said after some time. ‘When I was little – three years old, four years old – and my mama died, he’d let me tag along after him. Would take me up on his horse when he’d go hunting. Got Old Marse Luke to have me taught my letters, and made his valet.’
January let his breath out in a tiny sigh. On Bayou St Cecile, just upriver from Bellefleur, he remembered M’am Gertzer had taken up a pretty little girl from the quarters as a pet: fed from her own plate at table, dressed in pretty calico, taught to fix hair and run about after her carrying her sewing box. And Michie Paul, thirteen-year-old son of the master of Lac Mort Plantation along Bayou St John, had done much the same with a boy out of the quarters: Hell, P’tit Roux’ll follow me anywhere …
Another custom of the country.
‘He ever put you up in a poker game?’ January remembered what had eventually happened to P’tit Roux, and to M’am Gertzer’s pretty little maid-girl.
‘He paid two thousand dollars to get me back the next day.’
As if that made it all right.
‘And he was drunk.’
‘Like this evening.’ Outside the window, Trigg and the Reverend came across the yard, bats on their shoulders, reliving each strike and run and throw.
‘That sounds stupid, doesn’t it?’ Mede raised his eyes to him. ‘For me to care about him? He’s a good man, Mr J. You’ve seen him at his worst.’
Does he have a best?
How many years since YOU’VE seen it?
‘I can’t leave him. Not flat cold, get-out-of-town leave. He’s in trouble—’
‘What kind of trouble?’
The young man shook his head.
‘Do you think you can get him out of it?’
‘No, sir. But even if I’m free, I’m still his Man Friday. I won’t leave him in it alone.’
‘It have anything to do with why you had to get out of his house?’
Mede hesitated for so long before replying, as if weighing incidents and impressions, that January thought he wasn’t going to answer. At length he said, ‘I can’t say that, sir.’
Did Mrs Bray put her hand on your thigh some afternoon when the two of you were alone in the house?
Did Luke?
‘I don’t—’ Mede broke off, thought about his words. ‘I don’t rightly know what to do, sir. I do need advice, but I don’t … I don’t know how to go about getting it, without someone getting hurt.’
Bright, soft voices in the dining room: little Olive Perkins, and Mandie Trigg. Mrs Trigg’s deep alto: ‘No, honey, the blade of the knife got to turn toward the plate, ’cause you don’t want to be pointin’ the edge of a knife at your guest …’ Trigg’s voice and Perkins’ in the hall, and a moment later the front door closing: ‘Evenin’, Mr Poe, sir. Can my wife make you a cup of tea, ’fore dinner’s ready?’
‘Thank you, sir, I would take that most kindly of her, if it won’t be any trouble.’
January thought Poe’s footfalls hesitated a moment before the big parlor door, before they crossed the hall to his small and privileged sanctum opposite. Because he’d seen that January was in conversation with a man of his own race? Or because it didn’t behoove a white man to go ask a black one how the investigation was proceeding?
Mede seemed to hear none of it. Only sat looking into the neatly-swept fireplace, where logs and kindling stood ready to warm the chilly room.
Everyone Mede knew, January recalled, was back in Georgetown. Maids, cook, stableman … Or else back in Kentucky, where ‘Marse Luke’ had been so kind. January well remembered his own sense of isolation, that first year in New Orleans. He had cried every night because he missed the other members of the hogmeat gang, desperately missed his father and his aunties and uncles, missed every dog and mule and kitchen cat on the place where he’d been beaten, starved, and lived every day of his life in terror that he’d lose his family and friends at a drunkard’s whim.
And ashamed that he was so weak as to cry.
Trust has to be earned. It was years before he’d found anyone he could speak to.
‘It’s all strange now.’ He lightly touched the young man’s back. ‘Took me years to get used to it, and I was just a kid – and a field hand at that.’
Mede glanced up at him, as if startled to find that someone else – someone free and who seemed to know his way around – had started the same road from the same place.
‘That was a good game you played this afternoon. Settle a bit, and get some sleep. But don’t go back to him.’
‘No, sir. I won’t do that.’
FIFTEEN
Sunday after Mass, January, Poe, and Henri met in the ‘white folks’ parlor’ and divided the surgeons in Washington up amongst them. More accurately, January, Poe, and Chloë each took a list of surgeons from the City Directory, but as it would be wildly improper for a lady – be she never so married – to go visiting the offices of medical gentlemen without a male escort, when they sallied forth on Monday, she went on Henri’s arm, to observe the reactions of those gentlemen to her husband’s carefully-conned questions.
The tale – invented by Poe in the face of the obvious fact that neither he nor Henri could convincingly pass himself off as a medical student – was that M’sieu Viellard (or ‘Mr Allan’) was an aspiring artist, disbarred from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the American Academy of the Fine Arts, and the National Academy … ‘Out of jealousy! Sheer jealousy!’ went the story, in tones which would, it was hoped, imply that overfondness for wine and women had more to do with his expulsion than his ability to out-paint the likes of John Trumbull. Mr Allan (or M’sieu Viellard) sought instruction in anatomy in order to paint in the muscular style of Michelangelo and was willing to pay extremely handsomely for lessons in the specific attachment of muscles, and the arrangement of tendons, organs, and veins.
Since the idea of a black man being either a professional artist, or wealthy enough to pay handsomely for anything, was almost as ludicrous as that of a well-bred white woman visiting surgeons’ offices by herself, January worked in partnership with Poe. ‘You’re a credit to your parents, sir,’ he observed on the way down the rather grimy steps of the office of Mr Clunch, on D Street, after that gentleman had informed them in no uncertain terms that if dissection was what Mr Allan was hinting at, he, Bernard Clunch, had nothing further to discuss, not for a hundred dollars or a thousand.
‘My stepfather would suffer an apoplexy to hear you say so, sir.’ Poe sounded pleased at that prospect as he straightened the lapels of his black greatcoat. Despite his preference for black, he had also – when Henri had given him the money for a new waistcoat in the interests of verisimilitude (‘You need to look as if you
could hand them a hundred dollars to show you how to cut up a corpse’) – chosen a dandyish jonquil-yellow garment to further his role. ‘God knows,’ he went on with a grin, ‘I’m sufficiently familiar with the breed to do a creditable imitation of the would-be Michelangelos I’ve met … Actual working artists are in general very businesslike fellows, you know.’
‘That’s my experience as well,’ agreed January. ‘Mad as hatters, of course—’
‘Oh, God, yes!’ He paused as they emerged on to the street, and January ticked Mr Clunch’s name from the list.
‘And jealous as schoolgirls, some of them …’
‘Most artists are.’ Poe considered the list, and then the sky, which was gray and threatening rain. They were in the heart of the town, near the city hall and Judiciary Square; the streets were a gumbo of mud, the air redolent with the cursing of Irish teamsters, the cracking of whips.
‘In our heart of hearts. I don’t know if musicians are the same,’ Poe said. They turned their steps along the plank sidewalk toward the neighborhood known as Reservation B – swampland on the so-called ‘Mall’ that had been sold off for commercial development. ‘God knows I’m eaten with envy when I see another man’s poem in print, when mine has been passed over: how dare they? Terrible when it’s better than mine, because I wish I’d had the talent to write that well—’
‘Desiring this man’s art, and that man’s scope,’ January said, quoting the greatest of poets who’d ever gnashed his teeth over another’s success, and Poe laughed.
‘Yes, at least I’m in good company.’ He shoved his hands in his greatcoat pockets, against the sharp chill of the river breeze. ‘And it’s ten times more maddening when it’s some abominable effusion by a Gothic rodomontodian whose entire repertoire of human experience has been gleaned from other peoples’ novels. At least that conceited puppy “Mr Allan” is trying to get himself cadaver drawing-lessons by inquiring for grave robbers. The infuriating ones are those who write execrably and refuse to listen to a breath of criticism: mightn’t it be a trifle unlikely that the exchanged baby daughter of a French duke should be the one flower girl whose wares are bought by a disguised Prince seeking his long-lost father in the slums of New York?’
January pretended deep thought. ‘Could happen …’
Poe made a face, as if he’d bitten sour fruit. ‘The author’s husband called me out.’ They halted before the shabby line of clapboard shops given as the address of Mr Nicholas Wellesley, Surgeon; there was a note of weary bitterness in the poet’s voice. ‘Well, not immediately. First he attempted to sue me. I believe his lawyer pointed out to him that the publication of a book – even if one’s husband pays for it – places that book in the domain of a public document, open to criticism by those who are paid by the newspapers to read and criticize books. Then he called me out. When I refused to meet him – I do have a family to support, who unlike his would be left quite destitute by my martyrdom to the principle of literary verisimilitude – I was warned that he’d paid three of his employees – he is a building contractor – to teach me a less formal lesson in keeping my opinions to myself. I thought it best to leave Baltimore for a time.’
‘If you’ll pardon the liberty, sir –’ with whites, even friendly ones, it was always well to be careful – ‘I did wonder what you were doing in Washington.’
‘It isn’t only that.’ The young man stood for a moment in the mouth of the passway between that building and the next: a sign pointed down the mucky slot with the information that Mr Wellesley’s office could be found further along. ‘The incident brought home to me the fact that it might, perhaps, be a trifle quixotic of me to attempt to make my living entirely by my pen. Quixotic, and detrimental to those who depend upon me for shelter and food.’
After a few moments’ thoughtful silence, January said, ‘I can’t argue with you there.’
Cold wind skirled down the wide avenues of Washington, whipped the black skirts of Poe’s shabby greatcoat. Flecks of rain bit like the promise of sorrow to come.
‘Well.’ Poe sighed and straightened his shoulders. ‘In the meantime, I comfort myself with the reflection that to an artist, no experience is ever wasted – and I must and will have an interview with a bona fide grave-robber! Allons-y, Benjamin.’ And with that curious inward reconfiguration characteristic of actors, he ceased to be a wryly intelligent poet, critic, and observer of human nature, and became the arrogant and self-obsessed would-be Michelangelo Mr Allan. ‘Come along.’
A good and humble valet, January said, ‘Yes, sir, Marse Eddie,’ and followed him along to the surgeon’s door.
‘Of course I have no dealings with such people myself,’ Mr Wellesley hastened to explain.
‘No, certainly, sir, I would never mean to imply …’
‘But one does hear things in my profession.’ The stooped gray-haired gentleman cast a sharply calculating eye over his visitor … His WHITE visitor, January observed. The large valet who had accompanied Mr Allan into the outer room of the surgery was, of course, no more regarded than the hat his master had handed him. ‘I believe I could get in touch with someone who could provide us the – er – facilities you require … though I warn you now, a hundred dollars …’
‘The hundred dollars is for your services, sir,’ replied ‘Mr Allan’ loftily. ‘Naturally, I understand such people charge for their – ah – goods.’ He produced a twenty-dollar gold-piece from his pocket and laid it on the corner of the surgeon’s scarred desk. January took note of how Mr Wellesley’s eyes flared. Judging by the disused look of the office, enthusiasm was understandable. Surgeons cost money. Poe was far from the only man in Washington with a family to support.
‘Approximately how long should your enquiries take, sir? I can return Thursday, at about this hour …’
‘That should give me time.’ Mr Wellesley’s skinny fingers nipped up the coin as if he feared Poe would change his mind and take it away again. ‘Farcy uses an accommodation address, but he’s generally fairly quick to reply …’
Since Henri was no more an actor than he was a medical student, it had been agreed that it was Chloë who would be the besotted and ambitious wife, and who would do all the talking. Like Poe, she had sufficient experience with overbearing French Creole matrons to personate one with terrifying accuracy.
‘I only hope I shan’t be obliged to actually assist at a dissection,’ fretted Henri that evening when they reassembled in the boarding house parlor. ‘I’m not sure that I could – well – sustain the role to that extent.’
‘No reason why you should have to, sir,’ returned January bracingly as he spread his list and Chloë’s on the table in the small parlor. ‘Remember, you’re a poseur. You only think you’re a second Michelangelo. This may be the first occasion you’ve ever been in the same room with a corpse.’
‘If you faint dead away, I’ll have smelling salts on hand,’ encouraged Chloë heartlessly.
‘Cher—!’ Dominique put her arms protectively around Henri, who had turned slightly green. She looked tired and fretful, as if the day’s inclement weather bore upon her nerves. Like Mede Tyler, thought January, she was separated from almost everyone she knew – her friends, the little household she kept on Rue Dumaine, the familiar rhythms and activities of her community. She might assist the Perkinses with teaching the children, or cut and stitch clothing for her own child, or shop – accompanied by her maid – in such facilities as Washington offered women of color, but the fact remained that she was uprooted and alone in a strange town.
‘In any case,’ soothed Poe, ‘we will have made our contact with our resurrectionist – and gotten from him Mr Pease’s direction, if he isn’t Mr Pease himself – long before the proceedings start.’
‘Bleu.’ Chloë looked up from considering the lists over January’s shoulder. ‘I have never seen a dissection – don’t look like that, Henri … I don’t suppose there’s a way that I can come along and watch, M’sieu Poe? Oh, all right,’ she added as January
and Henri both shook their heads. ‘How many took the bait today, and who must we visit tomorrow?’
‘Benjamin and Mr Poe – if Mr Poe would be so good as to continue his efforts on our behalf – could take Alexandria all in a day, I dare say.’ Henri took up the papers, on which January had underlined in kitchen pencil the surgeons willing to “make arrangements” and had further noted the names mentioned by the surgeons in question, if any. ‘But if you recall, my dear, you and I will be paying a call on Dr Woolmer at the Potomac School.’
With this, Chloë and Henri departed, and Poe ascended to his own spartan chamber to change shirt and waistcoat before setting forth for another Washington ‘at home’ in the hopes of encountering some department head in quest of a clerk. ‘And I can only pray that none of the other guests there is one of the surgeons we’ve visited,’ sighed the poet as he came downstairs, adjusting his best black silk cravat, to encounter January in the hall again. January had changed clothes also – a coarse mechanic’s shirt made of ticking – and bore four long ‘pegs’ and his bat on his shoulder.
‘I shouldn’t worry, sir,’ returned January cheerfully. ‘What would a surgeon be doing at such an event? He’s already got a job.’
The afternoon’s sprinkly showers had ceased. A sufficient number of the Centurions were assembled in the field beside the Reedy Branch in the gray end of afternoon to ensure a ball game, but the atmosphere was more helpful than competitive. ‘Hell,’ said Fip Franklin of the Centurions as he took January aside to give him a little extra practice at hitting the ball, ‘every man on the team got money on you boys, against the French.’
January picked out Gonesse and Lenoir in the crowd along the fringes of the field – quite a gathering, this evening, particularly for a Monday – observing the game. With them he recognized Mr Noyes, the lanky young abolitionist clerk who’d come down to the kitchen of the British Ministry Tuesday night.
‘He’s captain of the Eagles,’ Trigg identified him, coming over to January while the other Stalwarts lined up into ragged order behind the striker’s position, halfway between two of the pegs. ‘New England boys – Whigs.’
Good Man Friday Page 14