Low Country

by Anne Rivers Siddons

  As we approached the old man and the mule I put a hand lightly on Sophia’s shoulder and said, “I wouldn’t photograph them head-on. Not right now. They’re very shy about strangers until they get to know them, and they don’t like cameras. Later on, after he gets used to you, he’ll probably pose for you all day.”

  She turned a glowing face to me.

  “They don’t by any chance think the camera steals their souls, do they?” she breathed reverently.

  “Not since they got here from Africa a couple of hundred years ago,” I said acidly. “It’s just not considered polite. I think the soul thing was that tribe in New Guinea that had never seen a white man, anyway. Maybe you ought to leave the camera and tape recorder here the first time out.”

  She did not want to do that.

  “I want to be very clear about what I’m doing,” she said. “Really up front with them. I don’t want to seem as if I’d just come to gawk.”

  But I thought that without the tools of her trade she felt uncertain, somewhat at sea, and perhaps afraid that the people of Dayclear would not perceive her authority and expertise at first.

  “You’re with me, and they know me a little,” I said. “That’s the only entree that’s going to work, believe me. You better hope Ezra is around. That’s the best way, by far. Next to being long-lost kin, to be known by a native to the village is the most acceptable way to come into a Gullah community. Their sense of family is tremendous; we don’t have anything like it in our culture, not really. The family structure, the ancestors, the tribe…it’s everything. Mark will be a real draw, too, even if he doesn’t want to say a word. They won’t care about that. Children are almost magical to the Gullahs. Back in Africa they were the responsibility of everybody in the village. Hillary Clinton’s right about that.”

  In the end she left the camera and the recorder in the car, but she was more ill at ease than I had ever seen her when we walked into the little general store. I could not imagine why. Surely her fieldwork in cultural anthropology had led her into stranger and more threatening places than this. Mark lagged behind her, clutching the hem of her jacket.

  Janie Biggins was at the store counter again today. She wore, over a shapeless black cotton dress that looked as if it might have been a maid’s uniform once and probably was, a man’s heavy wool cardigan missing its buttons. The little store was chilly. There was no heat except for the iron stove in the back, but that was glowing red against the nip of the bright, cold day. Several old men sat in chairs around it. They stopped their talk when we came in and stared at us.

  Janie Biggins did, too. There was no cheerful welcome for me today. I knew that it was partly because I had brought strangers with me into the fortress of Dayclear, but I thought, too, that they had all probably heard by now about Clay’s plans for the settlement and the land surrounding it. I knew that they would wait, now, to see what I would do about that. I felt a twist of pure misery, and a stronger one of anger. I hated being in this position.

  “Good morning, Janie,” I said politely. “I’ve brought some friends of mine to visit Mr. Cassells. Do you happen to know where he is?”

  She shook her head slowly, not looking directly at me.

  “I seen him a while ago, but I don’t know where he got to now. I sho’ don’t.”

  I knew that she did know, though. Janie knew where everybody in the settlement was most of the time.

  “We saw Ezra over at my grandfather’s place, too, and he asked us to come over and meet his auntie,” I said. Sophia shot a look at me, but I did not return it.

  Janie met my eyes and I knew I had found the key.

  “Ezra, he down to Miss Tuesday’s,” she said. “I ’spec Mr. Cassells be there, too. They generally both there roun’ lunchtime.”

  And this time she did smile, just a bit. Ezra Upchurch was a powerful totem.

  I thanked her and we walked out of the store and down the sandy road that led through Dayclear. The little houses—shacks, really, leaning badly and unpainted and tin-roofed—were none of them more than two or three rooms large, and many had only one. All sat up on stones or bricks or rotting wooden posts. There were broken-down chairs on the small front porches, and a few under the great live oaks in the neatly swept white-sand yards, but they were empty on this sharp day. The usual cacophony of chickens and the sleeping yellow and black dogs were absent, too. The dogs would be inside, in front of fires along with their masters. Perhaps the chickens were, too. Seeing the look of clinical interest and faint distaste on Sophia Bridges’s face, I hoped that they were. Some of the panes of the windows that faced the road were missing and had been replaced with cardboard and newspaper, but the ones that remained were sparkling clean. I knew that many pairs of eyes watched our progress through them.

  On the other side of the little road there were cleared fields and small garden patches, neatly put to bed now for the winter, where the villagers raised their own food and the produce they sold to the truck farmers around the Lowcountry. Fanciful scarecrows tilted in the bare fields, doing nothing at all to dismay the flocks of cheeky black crows, and smartly mended rail and wire fences enclosed each plot. We could see the little lean-tos that housed goats and pigs and a few cows and the prized mules, but their occupants were inside like their owners, out of the strong wind. In all of Dayclear, we saw no one during that walk, but I felt the eyes of everyone. I wondered what they made of the elegant Sophia Bridges and her pale princeling.

  Janie had said that Ezra Upchurch’s aunt’s house was the last one in the row before the forest started again. It looked just like the others, except that there was a new paint job in progress; the dingy gray boards were turning a sharp blue-white. Ezra, I thought. From under the porch a pair of wicked yellow eyes regarded us.

  “Look, Mark, it’s a little pet goat,” I said before he could see the malevolent gaze and be panicked again. I hoped it was indeed a small goat, and a pet. Whatever it was, it did not leave its shelter to investigate us, and Mark did not shy at it. During the entire time we had been here, he had been silently drinking in Dayclear with his gray eyes, and they were as large and lucent now as small frozen ponds.

  The front door opened before I could knock, and Ezra Upchurch stood there. He was clean, and dressed in a tweed sports coat and gray flannel slacks, and looked in his shining, tailored blackness like the president for life of some ancient, affluent African state. Behind him, Luis Cassells stood, holding a tray of something so hot that it smoked. Both of them were grinning hugely, near-identical, feral white smiles.

  “I would have bet the farm you wouldn’t show,” Ezra said, “but Auntie said you would. Said she saw it in the dishwater this morning. She sent me out to pick collards and dig yams, and I went without a murmur. Auntie’s dishwater seldom fails her. Come in and meet her.”

  Ezra’s Aunt Tuesday Upchurch was so tiny as to be almost a dwarf, bent nearly double with arthritis and nearly blind with cataracts. I wondered how she could see the dishwater or much of anything else through the fish-scale films on her eyes. But she trained them on me intently when Ezra introduced me and smiled. She had few teeth, and one of those was gold. I thought she must be ancient beyond imagining.

  “You be Mist’ Gerald’s gran’girl, I ’spec,” she said in her tiny, piping wheeze. “You has the look of him, yes. Who you bring to see me this cold day, child?”

  I thought Ezra had probably told her about Sophia and Mark, but I presented them as formally and politely as was due her great age.

  “This is Mrs. Sophia Bridges, who is working for my husband, and her son, Mark. They’ve just moved to Peacock’s from New York, and wanted to see all there was to see in the Lowcountry. Thank you for letting us come, Mrs. Upchurch.”

  She cackled.

  “Hush, girl, I know you come to see this bad Cuban hire and my big ol’ nephew, but never you mind, you welcome in my house, and yo’ company, too. Come here, girl, and let me look at you, and bring that boy here,” she said, turning the s
ilvery eyes on Sophia and Mark. They came forward, Sophia pushing Mark ahead of her. Mrs. Upchurch put out her withered little claw, and after a moment Sophia took it.

  Mrs. Upchurch held Sophia’s hand for a long time, looking silently into her face. Whether or not she saw I could not tell, but I had the impression that she was taking Sophia’s full measure.

  “I’m glad to meet you, Mrs. Upchurch,” Sophia said in her cool, clipped New York voice, and the old woman cocked her head. Sophia made as if to withdraw her hand, but Mrs. Upchurch held it fast.

  “What your maiden name, child?” she said finally.

  Sophia was silent for so long that I thought she was not going to answer, but then she said pleasantly, “McKay. Sophia McKay.”

  The old woman nodded slowly, and then looked down at the boy. He stared back, a fledgling mesmerized by a snake.

  “I’m glad you bring this boy to Dayclear,” Mrs. Tuesday Upchurch said. “We don’t see many younguns here anymore. This boy be welcome. You bring him back.”

  Still Mark stared.

  Just then Estrellita bounded into the room, followed by her grandfather, who had also changed into a jacket and slacks, though not so natty or well-tailored as Ezra’s. The child skidded up to me and threw her arms around my waist and hugged me hard. I went still. I had forgotten the feel of small arms just there.

  “Caro, Caro, can we go see Nissy and her baby?” she cried. There was nothing hesitant or unused about her voice today. I looked at Luis, and he laughed.

  “She hasn’t stopped talking since that day,” he said, ruffling the glossy black hair. “Either you or those horses are powerful magic. Not today, cara. Today is too cold for the ponies. We’ll go soon; it’ll warm up again, you’ll see. Maybe Mrs. Venable will take us. Meanwhile, say hello to Mark Bridges. He and his mother have just moved down here from New York City, and I bet you anything he doesn’t know any little Cuban girls yet.”

  Lita swung around to Mark. He edged back behind his mother. I could sympathize with him; on this strangest of days, in this strangest of places, surrounded by this eldritch old woman and the two big men, this small, dark dynamo must simply be one elemental force too many.

  “Let Mark get his bearings,” I said softly. “It’s hard to come to such a new and different place all of a sudden, when you’re still small yourself.”

  “I know,” she said sympathetically, and I winced. She did know; she of all people knew. “You’ll get used to it soon,” she said kindly to Mark. “It doesn’t take long at all. This place is paradiso.”

  “That means she thinks it’s a wonderful place, Mark,” Sophia said, and her son merely looked at her. Who was kidding who here?

  Mrs. Upchurch had cooked collards in a big black pot on the rusty old iron cookstove and baked sweet potatoes—she called them yams—in the ashes of the banked fire. We ate them at a rickety, immaculate, oilcloth-covered table, and the greens, redolent of smoky ham, and the potatoes, their jackets still dusty with ash, were as good as anything I have ever tasted. We ate hot crackling corn bread with them and drank strong coffee made in a spatterware pot on the stove. Mark had a glass of milk that, Mrs. Upchurch said, had come fresh from the cow that morning. His eyes bulged at that, but he drank the milk, glancing at his mother for approval. She nodded, but I could tell she would far rather it had come fresh and dated from the supermarket. She herself only picked at the sweet potato and left the grease-shimmering greens and the fat crackling bread untouched. She drank a lot of coffee. Ezra and Luis and I finished off two helpings of everything. I would have, even if I had not been hungry. Mrs. Upchurch nodded serenely, smiling a little, as if she were falling asleep, in her rocking chair by the stove, and did not seem to notice that two of her guests did not seem enthusiastic about her lunch. I would, I thought, speak to Sophia Bridges about this in no uncertain terms. She could not hope to accomplish anything in Dayclear if she did not observe the rudimentary rules of etiquette.

  After lunch I could tell Sophia was eager to be gone, but Mrs. Upchurch had moved over to a big armchair before the fire, and Ezra took his place at her side in a straight chair. We were obviously expected to stay, at least through whatever came next. Luis settled himself into a chair beside mine and Lita crawled into his arms and promptly fell asleep in the warm, dim room. Her small head lolled back onto my arm. Across from me, Sophia perched on a milking stool in her militant Armani, looking like a peacock in a hen-house, poised for flight. Mark, his eyes still huge and translucent, stood straight and still at her knee.

  Ezra cleared his throat.

  “Luis and I have a little business in Columbia, but before we go, Auntie thought you’d like to hear a story. In a Gullah home”—and he looked at Sophia and then at Mark—“the host or hostess wouldn’t think of letting a guest leave without a story. How about it, Mark? You know the story of Ber Rabbit in the peanut patch?”

  I saw Sophia frown and thought, If she says a word about not wanting Mark to experience the stories told in black dialect, I’ll snatch her bald-headed right here, but she fell silent. Her eyes were cast down, though.

  Mark’s shone. He nodded his head, staring up at Ezra.

  “Well, then. Here we go. Auntie, you’re on.”

  The old lady closed her eyes and began rocking, a gentle, hypnotic movement. Her lips curved in a beatific smile. She rocked and rocked. Then she said, “I gon’ tell a short story.”

  “Uh hummm. Tell ’em.” Ezra Upchurch chanted. He was rocking, too, and the bright black eyes were closed.

  “Tell about the rabbit and the…the man…”

  “Uh hummm! Ber Rabbit! Ber Rabbit!”

  “Now one day the man catch the rabbit in his peanut patch. Trap ’im in the peanut patch. And he say, ‘Now, Ber Rabbit, you always sharp! You always got a lot of scheme! But now, you know what I gon’ do with you? I gon’ punish you! I gon’ throw you in dat fire!’”

  “Yeah, the fire!”

  “Ber Rabbit, O Lord! I tell you what he do. He say, ‘Old man, throw me in the fire!’

  “And the man say, ‘No, you too free!’ Say, ‘I ain’t gon’ do that! I tell you what I gon’ do with you. I gon’ throw you in that river!’”

  “Yeah! The river!”

  “Ber Rabbit say, ‘I tell you what you do. You throw me in that river. Let me drown in there. Just throw me in the river. I want a dead anyhow.’”

  “Uh hummm!”

  “Man say, ‘No-o-o. I ain’t gon’ throw you in there ’cause you too free! You too sharp!’ And he say, ‘I know! You know what I gon’ do with you, Ber Rabbit?’

  “Rabbit say, all unconcerned-like: ‘What you gon’ do? What you gon’ do?’

  “And the man, he carry ’im to the briarwood patch. And boy! That briarwood been about high as his head.

  “Say, ‘Ber Rabbit, I gon’ throw you in that briarwood patch.’

  “‘OOOoooo Lord!’ say Ber Rabbit. ‘Pleassseee don’t throw me in there! Dem briarwood stick me up!’”

  “Ummm hummm! Stick ’im up!”

  “And the man take Ber Rabbit, say, ‘Oh, I got you now, Ber Rabbit!’

  “‘Ohhhhhh, don’t throw me in there! I rather you kill me!’

  “So he take the rabbit and throw ’im in the briarwood patch. The rabbit say, ‘You fool you! This where I born and raise!’”

  “Born and raise! Ummm hummm!”

  They both fell silent. Mrs. Upchurch’s head nodded down on her chest. I thought she slept but could not be sure. No one moved or spoke. I looked over at Sophia Bridges. Her face was closed and still, and she had pulled her body slightly backward, as if to remove herself as far as possible from the story and the storyteller. I looked at Mark. He was rapt, his mouth in a perfect O.

  Ezra Upchurch was looking at him, too.

  “Good story, huh, Mark? You’ll have to come back soon. She knows all the old stories there are to know. All the old games, too. Lita knows some of them; she can teach them to you.”

  Sophia Bridges sti
rred and started to speak, but he broke in over her.

  “Now, before we all go, I want to sing you my auntie’s favorite song. She always sings it for visitors before they go, but she’s a little tired, I see. She’ll jerk a knot in me if I don’t sing it for her, though.”

  And he stood, as easily as if he were alone in the room, shining like a basalt cliff in the gloom, and threw back his head, and began to sing. His voice rolled and caromed in the little room, as full and complex as deep winter water.

  “Honey in the rock, got to feed God’s

  children.

  Honey in the rock, honey in the rock.

  Honey in the rock, got to feed God’s

  children,

  Feed every child of God.”

  Luis Cassells came in with him:

  “Oh, children, one of these mornings I was

  walking long.

  I saw the grapes was a’hangin’ down.

  Lord, I took a bunch and I suck the juice,

  It’s the sweetest juice that I ever taste.”

  The deep male voices climbed in the frail afternoon light slanting through the little panes, filling the house up to the rafters, spilling out into the clear air.

  “Satan mad and I so glad.

  He missed the soul that he thought he had.

  Oh, the devil so mad and I so glad,