House of Purple Cedar

by Tim Tingle

  But Pokoni died. How could she die when all we knew to do was rock?

  Amafo became an infant before my eyes, rocking and crying. And I began rocking. How could I not, seeing him so small and frail and beautiful. Even the wrinkles of his skin were beautiful, like sculpted leather waves that rolled and washed and tucked into each other. My grandfather was a newborn child, wet and wrinkled from the moist weeping of his birth.

  As I watched, Amafo began wiping the tears from his cheeks with both palms and rubbing the moisture on Pokoni’s face. He ran his wet palms across the glass of the picture frame holding my Pokoni’s image. He was touching my grandmother, hoping somehow to reach her spirit.

  I felt warm and strong and happy. I cried from deep inside myself at this beholding. Somehow my feet floated across the floor and my arms stretched to place the tray upon the table by the window. Standing over Amafo, I was engulfed in the fragrance of gardenias. I looked about the room, expecting to see a bowl of soft yellowing petals on the table, but the source of the fragrance remained unseen, at least to my eyes.

  Moments later my back leaned against the closed door and I stood in the hallway, trying to form questions for my mind to ask, but I was mute in the presence of a power far beyond any I had ever known.

  That night I lay as quiet as I could, out of my body limp, moving only by the ebb and flow of my breathing and the running of blood through my veins. I imagined I was Pokoni. I tried to smell the dried rose petals and cedar sprigs on the coffin floor beneath me, beneath her. I was Pokoni, dead to the world but still wanting to feel it, more intensely than when I was alive.

  As I drew deeper and deeper into becoming my Pokoni, I realized that what I so desperately wanted—to be able to feel—would be forever denied me without a body. A body is the total of its senses, the fingertips of feeling, the ears like tiny hands that catch the breeze of sounds, the tiny circle doors for fragrance, all of it, the glassy eyes to blink in disbelief that what we see can yes be real.

  Without a body I can never feel. I must find another.

  I shivered and with a startling tremor, from my chest to my knees, I came to myself. My skin was cold. My breath formed clouds, illumined by a streak of moonlight through the muslin curtains on my bedroom wall.

  I lay trembling in the knowledge of what was happening. Pokoni’s shilombish was wandering, seeking a way to return.

  I awoke the next morning unsure of what I had seen, thinking it might have been a sweet and mournful dream. When Amafo did not appear at breakfast the next morning I knew it had been real. Amafo wiping his tears on the picture of Pokoni, that had been real, as had the fragrance of gardenias.

  Pokoni, I knew, was still with us.

  Spinning Wheel of Spiro

  One month later

  Marshal Hardwicke leaned against the cedar post supporting his roof overhang, watching the gathering hordes of people. Several hundred town residents and outlying farm families crowded Main Street, Choctaws and Nahullos both. Some had risen as early as three in the morning to pile onto wagons for the long trek to town.

  Saturday mornings in Spiro had the make-believe buoyancy of a carnival, courtesy of the local merchant association. Three aging Civil War Veterans––two trumpeters and a drummer––blared marching music at random intervals from a bench behind the day’s real attraction, the famed Spinning Wheel of Spiro.

  The wire spinning cage, circular and mounted on wheels, sat like a giant turtle in front of the Spiro Bank and half a block from the Spiro Drygoods Store. Every merchant, even Hiram, donated items to be given away. Red, white, and blue flutters of paper danced against the inside of the wire cage, each sporting the name of a hopeful must-be-present-to-win resident.

  As town dignitaries announced the prizes, spun the wheel, and called the names of winners, the crowd broke out in scattered cheers and clapping.

  Today was allotment day and hundreds of Choctaws made their way to Skullyville to collect their treaty-guaranteed monies. Many stopped at Spiro for the festivities and the crowd doubled in size.

  Hardwicke always arrived at his office early on these once-a-month days––to get ready for the heathens, he told his friends at the saloon. He always bought an extra bottle of whiskey the night before and began his celebrating as the sun peeked over the railroad depot two blocks to the east.

  Long lines of people waiting to sign their names to colored cards flanked the spinning wheel. When a name was called and a prize delivered, more people ran to join the line.

  “Our next prize is a dress from Erlene’s Millinery Shop. A dress made to fit from this beautiful green cloth,” shouted Councilman Dilliard. The noise of the crowd swallowed his words, but he held aloft a ream of ladies’ dress-making cotton, dyed a dark green. Dozens of women drew closer as Dilliard spun the giant wheel.

  “Mrs. Meredith Blankenship!” he boomed.

  “Oh!” squealed Meredith, and the crowd cheered. A breeze lifted the green-colored cloth, held at the skein by a young stockboy from Perkin’s Grocery, and sent ten feet of it waving over the women.

  “It’ll take a cloth that long to wrap around that squaw!” hollered a young Nahullo farmer. Townsfolk within earshot laughed and looked his way, and when big-hipped Meredith stepped from a cluster of Choctaw women and ambled her way to collect her prize, a wave of laughter accompanied her every step.

  From their perch beneath the awning of Hiram’s store, Rose glanced at Amafo. A friend and big brother to Meredith since their early childhood days, Amafo smiled and shrugged.

  “She is one happy ohoyo. Little bit of laughing not gonna bother Meredith, I ’speck not now.” A fat horsefly landed on Amafo’s collar, humming and burrowing on the backside of his neck. Before he could lift his hand to slap at it, Rose brushed it away, kissing the spot and blowing behind his ear to tease him.

  Amafo caught his breath and stood stiff and silent.

  I know it’s you, Hester, Amafo thought. You gone and figured out a way to come through Rose. Yakoke, sweet lady. Come ’round whenever you want. I won’t be sad no more. I promise. I just miss you is all.

  Nearing the wheel, Meredith broke into a sprint. She snatched the cloth in midair, flipped the loose end of it over one shoulder, and began a slow spin, wrapping herself in a cocoon of cedar green. Her friends giggled and covered their mouths before unleashing a babbling river of Choctaw.

  “Mercy, mercy, mercy.”

  “Her momma is rising from the grave. I know it.”

  “Her daddy too.”

  “Her daddy! Owww, that man is coming to drag her to the grave with him.”

  “She always acts so shy. How come she carrying on so?”

  “Yeah. She shy. But look at all these men. She not so shy now.”

  “They sure set Meredith to spinning.”

  “Mercy, mercy, mercy.”

  “Holy, holy, holy.”

  “She better be in church tomorrow.”

  “She better stay all day.”

  From across the street the marshal squinted his brow and settled a cold gaze across the crowd. He scanned the faces, noting the strangers, nodding and smirking at the parade of weak and worthless people.

  Oscar Armstrong. Why you smiling? That daughter of yours chases every boy in town. Won’t be long before she chases the wrong one and gets what she’s after. You think all that money you give to the church gonna change that?

  You keep on having those babies, Selma Conners. What happens when that old man you married cain’t run the business anymore? You gonna do it?”

  That’s it, Tommy. Keep tugging on your daddy’s sleeve. He’ll knock your little ass to next Christmas and I’m gonna laugh when he does it.”

  Hardwicke felt the whiskey warm his belly now.

  Nice fine little pony you got there till he breaks a leg crossing that stone pasture you too damn lazy to clean, Emmett Waterfield. Hardwicke spat. That hired hand you so fond of will stick a gun to your pony’s ear and blow his brains out. You won’t even watch, you
’ll be off whimpering somewhere.

  A gnawing grew in his chest and sent him turning to the door, but his eye froze on the scene in front of Hiram’s store. A young girl stood close to an elderly, stoop-shouldered Choctaw man. Even from the distance and across the crowd of townsfolks, Hardwicke recognized the man as the one with the broken glasses.

  He watched as the young girl leaned to kiss the old man.

  I know you. You were there. That morning. You kin. Yeah. You love that old man. That’s good. He loves you, too. He’d hate to see you get hurt.

  Rose felt his look burn her cheeks and her hand went to her face.

  Yeah, I see you looking so strong. But I know something you don’t. Yet. Some man’s gonna beat that look out of you. Wonder how long it’ll take. Long time, I hope.

  A farmer snatched his hat from his head and slapped it against his thighs. The sudden sweeping motion of the hat caught Rose’s attention, pulling her eyes from the spectacle of the wheel. She watched the skinny Nahullo stomp and swagger and when she realized he’d been drinking, her mind returned to the railroad depot and her first sight of morning drunkenness. Her eyes moved to the sign above the marshal’s roof overhang before finally reaching their destined port.

  The marshal stared hard and mean at her.

  I know you, he seemed to say.

  Gathering her strength and asking herself what Pokoni would do, Rose returned his look. She turned her mind to the words that flew between them, riding the hardness of the gaze.

  I know you as well.

  You belong to that old Indian.

  You struck my grandfather.

  You haven’t learned?

  You left him lying there.

  Lucky I didn’t kill him. I still can, you know.

  You stay away from us.

  Maybe I will let him stay alive.

  Help me, Pokoni.

  Maybe I’m the one––

  I am not strong without you. Please, Pokoni.

  ––to beat that look out of you.

  Hardwicke whirled and stepped into his office as Rose dropped her head and drew in gulps of air.

  “Time we go,” Amafo said. Rose nodded and nudged herself beneath his arm, a child in the still-firm grip of her grandfather.

  An hour later they rested in the cool of Amafo’s praying tree, watching the remaining people move to a slow and dusty rhythm. The noonday dance of blinding sun gave way to the long shadows of afternoon. Rose leaned against the tree and slept.

  Sing me something, Hester. Anything. A breeze came up and Amafo heard the first verse of a sweet and simple hymn, one that always set the children to singing.

  Hatak hush puta ma!

  Ho minti;

  Hatak hush puta ma!

  Ho minti;

  Hatak hush puta ma!

  Yakni achukma kut

  Uba talaiushke;

  Ho minti.

  Amafo sang the whole verse before he realized the words came from his own lips.

  Ho, you never stop, do you, hon? Just like when you’s living. Letting me know it’s time to do things for myself.” He leaned to touch Rose, then stopped so as not to wake her. He ran his hand instead against the flank of Whiteface. But I am not lazy, he continued. I am just missing you is all. Don’t ever leave me here alone.

  Two trees to the west, hidden by the foliage of a red maple, a panther stretched herself across a low-lying limb. Her tail twitched and her eyes followed every movement of the girl, the horse, and the man.

  Roberta Jean

  Rose

  That evening, barely a half hour till sunset, Roberta Jean Willis appeared at our front door, carrying a sharp digging tool and a drooping gardenia bush in a bucket.

  “Come in, child,” Momma told her.

  “Thank you,” said Roberta Jean, “but I didn’t come to visit. I want to pay my respects to Grandma Pokoni. I’d like to plant this gardenia bush near her gravehouse. Would that be alright?”

  “Of course,” said Momma. “She’d be happy to see you plant it there. But it’s getting on towards dark.” I heard the whole conversation from the kitchen, where I was cutting potatoes and putting them on to boil. I dried and wiped my hands off, expecting to accompany Roberta Jean to the gravehouse. When she saw me peep through the kitchen door and hang my apron on the wall, she seemed a little embarrassed.

  “I won’t stay long,” she said, looking from Momma to me and back again. “Besides, I know my way through those woods in the dark.”

  “I guess you do, hon,” said Momma. “You purt near was raised there.”

  Roberta Jean turned to me, looked down, and said, “Don’t let me keep you from your cooking, Rose. I’ll come by tomorrow and we can go water it, maybe look in on it every few days, just to make sure the roots take.”

  I wanted more than anything to share this time with my best friend. But Roberta Jean wanted to be alone with a friend of hers, my Pokoni.

  “Come see me early tomorrow,” I said. She nodded and wrapped her thin arms around herself as she stepped into the cool of evening.

  “Here,” I said, “take my jacket. You’ll need it by the time you get home.” She draped my cotton jacket over her shoulders and went to be with my grandmother at her grave.

  ef

  Roberta Jean approached the cemetery with awe and reverence, stepping carefully among the gravehouses. She came to the newest, the one where Pokoni lay. Roberta lifted her face and closed her eyes, catching the sweet aroma of the fresh-cut pine shingles of the roof. The soft dirt circling the gravehouse was moist and easy to dig.

  She removed Rose’s jacket, set the bucket of gardenias near where she knew Pokoni’s head lay and, kneeling, went about her work. When the hole was a foot deep, she brushed the dirt from her hands and dress and carried the bucket to the water pump, tucked away in a clump of blackjack oak trees on the east side of the church. The water was fresh and cool.

  Roberta filled the bucket, lifting and dipping the gardenia bush to separate the fine-haired roots and give them a good drink before the planting. Returning to the gravehouse, she dug several scoopfuls of dirt from the hole and mixed it with the water in the bucket, thickening the mixture till a soft wet clump formed in the bucket bottom. She tilted the bucket over the hole and eased the gardenia bush, with its earth-rich root clump, into the hole near Pokoni’s head.

  “Just like you taught me,” she said smiling as much to herself as to Pokoni. “The roots will live through the winter and rise again, so you can smell the gardenias in the spring.” Her work complete, Roberta settled in for the real purpose of her coming. She had yet to have her own longing time with Pokoni, her best friend’s grandmother. Roberta sat still and listening, leaning her back against the bucket. She closed her eyes and whispered.

  “I ’member when you held me close the day I walked the aisle for Jesus. You told me you were proud to welcome me, how pretty I looked. I helped you plant your garden when I was ten years old. Rose and I both helped you. We cooked supper for our families that night. The grape dumplings, remember? You taught me how to make ’em.”

  Roberta cried soft tears. They trickled down her cheeks and she let them flow for long minutes before she wiped them away.

  When the sun moved behind the treetops and the wind picked up, Roberta rolled to her feet, put on Rose’s jacket, and turned towards home. She took the shortcut through the red oak woods beside the church, but soon the shadows of the thicket closed in around her. She wished she had stayed on the dirt path leading to the road.

  She paused and considered retracing her steps. A soft sound, the thud of a heavy step, told her that the choice had been made and it was too late for her to return. With that sound a shift occurred, a shift in the wind of this day’s final wording, a trembling move to fear and darkness. A strange shudder washed over her. She knew that something was wrong, horribly wrong.

  She was not alone.

  From the moment the sun sank behind the purple hills, she knew this with all certainty. Her s
enses were keen and told her she shared this small grove of oak trees with a drunken man. The wind was thick and carried the smell of slept-in clothes soaked by the odor of whiskey sweat.

  She felt his eyes staring at her. She imagined his right hand holding a bottle, lifting it to his lips and sipping the burning liquid her father ranted about at least once in every Sunday sermon. At some point she felt his anger and impatience grow. She imagined he shifted his grip from the bottom of the bottle for drinking to a different grip, holding the neck of the bottle as if for striking.

  The man’s refusal to move sent shivers over her skin. Roberta thought of speaking, of calling out.

  “Maybe he wants to be left alone,” she thought. “If I walk away, he’ll not come after me.” She was lying to herself and she knew it. Tears welled up in her eyes and her breath left her. “Of course he will come after me. He is after me.”

  This man was mean, she could feel it, and he was watching her this very minute. And this also she knew. He wanted her dead.

  He watched everything she did­––every turn of her head, every shift of her weight­­––and he drew strength from her fear. An image flashed before her, a vivid picture of herself sprawled against a tree, her legs and arms broken at unnatural angles and blood trickling down her mouth.

  Roberta stood rigid, tall and straight as the looming pines. Her arms hung at her sides and her fingernails dug into her skin. She shook in terror. When he finally moved, Roberta jumped and a low moan parted her lips. He was behind her, less than twenty feet, she guessed. He took only that single step, as if announcing himself a dancer in this dark and deathly reel.

  Roberta’s fingers crept to her purse, slowly so as not to attract his eye. Her hand moved to the dense ball of volcanic rock so feared by her brothers. She gripped the rock and eased her fingertips over the tiny pockmarks of its slick surface. She felt the sharp angles and knew that in a few short moments blood would soak these church grounds.