The captain says nothing. He nods at Rufus and digs into his dinner. As he chews, he runs his eyes over nautical charts on the table next to his plate, stopping every now and then to lift the glass to his mouth. Rufus can feel the warm tongue of liquor unfurling down his own throat. He clamps his lips together, thinking of his father and uncles gathering to talk. How they spill that first sip as a libation for the ancestors, then watch the dry ground soak up the spirits before anybody says a word.
After the captain has pushed the last of his dinner onto his fork with his knife, after he has run the heel of his bread around the smooth circle of his plate for the last of the gravy, then topped it off with the last sip of his drink, he reaches to pull the rope again. When Cook comes back to clear, the captain tilts his head toward Rufus, saying call Pinson to get him settled for the night.
After a few days of this, the captain pushes his plate across the table until it sits right in front of Rufus who stares at the far edge of the floor so he won’t see the birds. He steadies his mind by running his fingers across a link in his chain, feeling for hammer marks. The plate cools untouched and shadows fall deeper into the hollows between his bones. The captain takes the plate back, eats his dinner cold and feels Rufus slipping through his fingers.
The next night, the captain rises and comes around the table. He sets his plate down in front of Rufus and raises one finger to signal he will unshackle one hand for him to eat with. Pointing first to the left and then to the right. Which will it be?
Rufus looks at him for a long time. Fans out the fingers of his right hand as if he’s just stretching them. The captain nods and bends to unlock that one shackle. He picks up a thin piece of balsa wood from his desk, no wider than two fingers and no longer than his hand. He sets this harmless utensil next to his plate on Rufus’s side of the table and then sits back down in his chair to wait.
Rufus resists the urge to rotate his freed wrist because he does not want the captain to see how good it feels. He lets his fingers close lightly on the balsa wood, trying not to grab it so hard that it breaks but unsure of his muscles after so long. The steam and smell of the food rise into his face, his mouth waters and his stomach curls inside him like a fist.
They sit across from one another for what feels like a long time until the captain reaches into a shelf under his desk for a second glass then leans across the table to set it in front of Rufus. He reaches forward to pour a slug of golden rum into it. Then he lifts his own glass and tilts it toward Rufus, looking dead at him.
With that salute, something inside Rufus gives. The wall he has built between himself and the fact of those birds tilts and falls as he turns his mind to face whatever new life might be coming toward him. He scoops a bite of mashed potatoes onto the tip of the balsa wood, the gravy having cut a brown delta through the pale. Lifts it to his mouth. As his lips close around that soft savory bite, the captain smiles.
Once Rufus begins to eat, always with the captain, always with that slug of rum in his own cup, he starts looking like a man breathing in and filling up instead of a man sighing out and collapsing. Their shared ritual is their mutual secret. Both crew and cargo would be enraged. Too many lines being crossed. Cook stays quiet on account of all the captain has on him. He knows if he opens his mouth, he’ll be stepping off right then and there. The strength of the captain’s reputation for breaking Africans, for cracking even the toughest nuts, depends on secrecy.
All the captain will say when he tells this story later is that he scanned Rufus until he found the one kindness that hooked him, then granted him that one kindness over and over. Used that soft spot to drag Rufus back to the surface of this strange new world. The captain believes it is this one carefully chosen kindness, the lift and tilt of a shared glass held in the one freed hand, burning like a star in the midst of the degradation, that finally brings Rufus to heel.
And the captain is partly right. But the birds came first. It was seeing those sacred birds atop their ceremonial staffs, leaning toward the corner of this captain’s cabin, that knocked Rufus loose from the only world he knew. Once he stood separate and alone, the toast tipped him the rest of the way. Served as some kind of witness. And these evenings with the captain do suggest to Rufus that all is not lost, that there might be some way to navigate this new life. Even as he wonders whether he can use this special treatment to unseat the captain, he knows his lot is well in with the man by now.
What Rufus does not realize is that the captain reads each of these thoughts as they cross his mind, no matter how closed he keeps his expression. The captain knows exactly how seeing the birds will affect Rufus. That’s why he has them on his wall. He has years of experience trading with the kings along this coast before their power started to fade. Negotiations had stretched out over days, forging relationships as well as understandings, teaching him to appreciate the complexity of his opponents.
So the captain has been reading Rufus rather than those nautical charts all along. He recognizes the calm arrogance of superiority Rufus can never quite hide and decides to grant him that rather than try to beat it out of him. He will say Rufus has royal blood because this will raise the price. Only a fool tries to buy royalty, but since they are fools, they won’t see the trouble there. Africa remains a mystery to those men crowding the markets in Charleston, Savannah and New Orleans. Since that fact works to his advantage, the captain plans to keep it that way.
He will tell these buyers whatever he feels like telling them and they’ll be glad to hear it, cherishing those nuggets of information, correct or not, because everybody wants life to come wrapped in a story. Most people prefer a good story over one that’s accurate so he plans to oblige.
The captain has learned a few phrases from various kings which he enjoys trying out on Rufus. His favorite expression happens to be in a language close enough for Rufus to grasp its meaning. When he has to sit and listen to this captain tell him that it comes down to knowing how much you can afford, Rufus finds himself starting to agree.
∞
Wash
Rufus was West African, like my mamma and me, but not from the same stretch of coast. From what I heard people say, they doublecrossed him. He was sold by his own. And he acted up pretty bad coming across so he got seasoned hard.
What he told me was, once he decided to live, it was just one thing after the next. And he’s got sense enough to know a sweet spot when he finds it. Said he hadn’t been on the Thompson place more than a day when he first saw Cleo and that was that.
And he knew those boys were pushing them over the broom for the children they’d have but he didn’t let that ruin it. Said he’d find some kind of way. Might even buy em both with the money he made from forging at night.
Rufus and my mamma and me, we all looked alike, but that don’t mean we got treated the same. So far as Rufus was concerned, he was quality and they needed to show they knew how to handle him. His coming to those boys as a special order from their daddy, his being the last present they ever got from the old man, gave Rufus some leverage. He said they had to learn to treat him right so they could show him off good.
But I was a whole different story. The way their daddy treated my mamma and me out on that island for all those years burned those boys right up. Running buck wild was what they called it. Said I was nothing but green broke and spoiled.
What Rufus said about it was if you can’t ride a green horse and you need to beat it to make it do right, that’s you being a man. But if you can’t ride a well broke horse without having to beat it, that’s just you being worthless.
They stayed back off Rufus. Seemed like he turned them a hair timid, so Rufus took that slack and he ran with it till folks started calling him Prince, with that shop his castle. He’d been there a year before we got there and had the place pretty well sorted. He knew folks talked about him but said he learned a long time ago to let sleeping dogs lie.
I remember stepping onto the big house porch, fetching those boys some mor
e drink and hearing em talk to their company about Rufus and Cleo. How much they were making on his metalwork. Then watching Cleo walk by and calling her their insurance on Rufus. Saying I sure would stay around for some of that. Egging each other on, saying I know you would. Then all of em laughing till one started coughing, making his drink splash on the porch.
Made me mad but Cleo walked through that talk like it wasn’t even there. Seemed like she shut everything out till all she saw in her life was what she wanted. Her cabin with Rufus over by his forge, set off from the quarters some. Closer to Pickens than I’d like, but they had what they needed.
Then one day, I remember everybody dressed up for a cornshucking. Strolling, meeting and greeting like everything is fine. And for that minute, it is. Those Thompson boys acting proud of themselves, like they was saying see, we can do this. We can let these fine nigger women deck out and have themselves a good man without jumping all over em.
They stood on their porch, calling out good evening Cleo, good evening Rufus, you two sure do cut a lovely figure tonight. And I watched those two just smiling and dipping their heads, saying thank you, like none of that nasty talk from before ever happened. Cleo told me they was having too good a time to get tangled up with those boys and their mess. But it made me mad, watching them shucking and grinning like everything was fine when it wasn’t.
Course I didn’t see this for what it was at the time. I mean I saw it, but took me till later to understand it like I do now. Back then, I was mostly confused. I was confused and I was headed right into those two boys’ worst nightmare, just as sure as the devil. All I needed was time.
Eli
Something about Rufus always took me right back to that first and last batch of saltwater Africans my daddy ever bought. Same stance, same peppery smell. Even that copper bracelet he wore.
I was seven and peeping through the cattails, watching my daddy ride in the lead with his overseer Grove bringing up the rear and a line of ten new negroes walking chained together between them, headed for the lake. But those Ibos didn’t look like the others. They looked like they came out of some picture book. Sea monsters drawn in the blank spaces on my daddy’s maps, rearing up from the water next to the boats.
I caught a few glimpses, then they were gone. I never heard a word about it that day. Then a ruckus just before dinner the next night. My mother had fretted all day till my daddy rode into the yard. I heard them in the hallway as I was coming down the stairs. Low talking ran tight like a wire till I stepped around the corner. My daddy wheeled to look and I saw him scared for the first time. He looked skinnier and his hair stood up from him running his fingers through it too much.
My mother tried to calm him down. Saying that’s a good idea, go do it now, then calling me to her with her hands, pulling my head against her belly because she knew I liked that. I never guessed she was doing it to cover my ears so she could finish what she was saying. I felt her voice humming inside her. My daddy listened and nodded and turned on his heel like he was back in charge.
“Right, I’ll start now. Go ahead with dinner. I’ll be back.”
Me and Campbell and my sister Abigail sat clustered together at my mother’s end of the table. All while we ate, she asked us for stories about our day like we always wanted her to do. And she leaned in like she was listening, but I could tell she was with my daddy in her mind. Her face was flushed too pink because she was already sick. We got sent straight to bed afterwards.
It wasn’t till after lunch the next day when I could sneak away to see for myself. It was hot and the bugs were loud. I headed out through the far corner of the front yard, past the smooth cut grass into the tall reeds where the ground starts to get soft and sinky closer to the water. I knew I wasn’t supposed to go down that far, but those Ibos were working there and I wanted to see. I heard the tearing grunts of their shovels biting into the mud sounding like snuffling dragons. Just a little farther. If anybody caught me, I’d say I was hunting the eddy where the tadpoles swim thickest. I’d say the ones I’d already found died before turning into frogs.
One more step and I fall through the reeds where the bank drops off. I land in a pile of dirt and mud so slick I can’t stand. I’m looking up at one of those new men, much closer than before. I’m right at his feet. He looks down at me from inside a cage made of cut saplings standing in rows for bars, sunk deep in the ground. And there are more laid across the top, making a ceiling for this cage that’s big enough to hold all those Ibos where they dig my daddy’s canal.
The grass is trampled and the ground torn up. Nobody sees me yet but him. Sitting in that slick mud, staring up in his face, I know it’s this man, these men, that had my parents so upset last night. This muddy bank is where my father was while we sat with my mother eating dinner. He was down here with Grove and Grove’s boys, building this cage.
What I look for first is the door. I don’t know whether I’m looking for a door so they can get out, or so I can get in, or just because every cage in every story I ever heard has a door and a lock and a key. Maybe I want to see it for myself so I can know this man is locked in there good and won’t get out that night or the next to hide under my bed. I run my eyes over the whole thing twice before I let myself be sure. There is no door. These men do not go in or out. Ever. They sleep here on the banks and then wake to dig some more. My daddy built this cage with these men already inside it.
This one man looks at me so hard, I keep expecting him to try to reach through the bars and grab me. Then I see he can’t. His hand might fit between the bars if he turned it sideways but not his muscly arm. I see where he tried. I see where the skin is worn flat and shiny into an almost perfect ring halfway up his forearm. That is as far as it will fit.
He squats and we are face to face. He’s got scars. Three lines coming down his cheeks from under each eye, like the lines I draw coming out from the sun. I’m still looking at those scars, wondering who put them there and did it hurt, when I feel his grip tight on my calves. Both legs.
I didn’t know I was so close but now he’s got me and he’s pulling. Trying to drag me inside with him even though I won’t fit through the bars. I fall on my back, scrabbling for something to grab but it’s all mud. I twist around to see the bank rising behind me. There’s a root running down, thick enough but buried deep in the bank.
I get one foot braced on a sapling, but he’s pulling and my foot is muddy and sliding. I’m scratching at the bank, trying to wrap my fingers around that root. Just as my braced foot slides off that edge, I get a good grip. He’s still pulling, but now I’m pulling too and I’m strong.
I look over my shoulder at him and he raises his eyebrows like he’s surprised. I start kicking at him and he starts looking around. My daddy is standing farther down the bank with his back to us. All I have to do is yell but I don’t have any breath. All my daddy has to do is turn around. By the time he does, I’m standing knee deep and covered in mud and the man has gone back to shoveling, acting like nothing ever happened.
I’m standing there shaking, watching my daddy run towards me. When he starts yelling at me for getting so dirty and for coming down there in the first place, I can see he’s still scared. That was the day when I first saw him trying to act like he knew. Mud topping his boots and he didn’t have a handle on any of it.
All I could think was, things won’t be like that for me.
Thompson
What my seven year old Eli didn’t know was that two of those Ibos I bought had already run. Their very first night here and two were already gone. The first without a trace except for a chicken he’d snatched on his way, snapping its neck to silence the cackle. Then the next one, just as gone, but not before tracking his muddy footprints right up onto my overseer’s porch. Right up to the window of his bedroom. The window Grove had left open so he could better hear his dogs.
The windowsill where this second Ibo had left a scattering of small smooth stones not from around here and a bone. A pale, flattened ou
t, T shaped bone that would fit in the palm of your hand. Chipped out from inside a turtle shell. Bottom of that T tapered into a point sharp enough to prick yourself. And this second Ibo had done just that, leaving a few drops of blood to turn dark brown along the windowsill and across those stones, letting the night breeze blow in quiet and soft across all of it, carrying his mojo into the room where Grove was sleeping.
I left so early the next morning that those first two runaways had not turned up missing yet. But I made it home just before dinner to learn I’d lost a good eleven hundred dollars and stood to lose more if I didn’t fix it right quick.
My wife was furious. Not to mention the hell I would catch from my neighbors, trying to explain how it was that two fresh unseasoned Africans were now wandering loose. And everybody knew Ibos were the worst. All the old men had warned me to steer clear of them, but I thought I could save some money.
We all start out thinking we know. I was certain I could handle saltwater Africans. All my knowing did for me was to bury me knee deep in the muck of my canal I’d bought them to dig. After those first two vanished, I had to make the rest stop digging long enough to build a cage around themselves right there where they stood. Cut saplings, hammered them deep, then braided the whole cage from pillar to post with chain. Had to rebuild my cage further down the bank after each day’s work just to be sure those damn Ibos would be there in the morning.
And you bet they slept there. Nighttime was the trouble. I had Grove’s oldest son sit up all night with a fire and a gun, hoping he wouldn’t have to shoot. Then I stood there all that next day with mud cresting the top of my boots, watching those swags of chain running from neck to neck, rising slick and wet up out of the water, stretched tight by their bending to dig. I had em so pinned down they could hardly finish a good stroke. My precautions doubled the days it took, but what was I to do?
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