Brotherhood

by Anne Westrick

  Then he heard voices start up. Angry voices. He looked around but saw no other people. Hairs on the back of his neck straightened. His skin grew tight.

  Shoot. When Mr. O’Malley had said “all in the family,” Shad hadn’t thought anything of it. But now he understood—Jeremiah was in the back room.

  The voices got louder. They came from behind a musty brown curtain at the far end of the bar. Shad heard the sound of wood scraping along floorboards. Chairs moving. Feet scuffling. A thud. He couldn’t see anything, but he knew Jeremiah had just thrown someone against a wall. He plumb knew it.

  “Come on, fellath,” said Mr. O’Malley. Shad watched him go to the curtain, but before he got there, a shiny-headed man fell through.

  The man bumped into a square table and sent two wooden chairs helter-skelter.

  Jeremiah burst in, yelling, “And don’t you show your face to me again!” He came full-on toward the man, and Shad saw the glint of something in his hand. Jeremiah had pulled a knife.

  The man scrambled out the front door. The two old men downed their drinks and eased off their stools. “Good day,” one said to Mr. O’Malley without taking his eyes off Jeremiah. They left, patting their vest fronts and trousers, checking for coins, tobacco, a pocket watch maybe.

  Jeremiah folded the knife and slipped it in his boot. He nodded with a real satisfied smile. Then his eyes caught Shad’s and the smile went to a scowl.

  “What the hell you doin’ here?”

  Shad didn’t answer. Didn’t move. Didn’t breathe. He looked at Jeremiah straight on and waited.

  “I asked you a question, Shad.” Jeremiah walked toward the bar with his legs wide, each boot stomping on the sticky floor. He walked like he owned the place. He wrapped one huge hand around Shad’s mug, took it to his mouth, and guzzled half the root beer. Then he slammed the mug down, wiped his mouth on his white shirt, and narrowed his eyes.

  Shad’s hands went into fists. He wanted to pound his brother but didn’t dare. Jeremiah would bloody his nose in a second. Then he saw Clifton saunter through the back curtain. Shad felt his day go from bad to worse. He clenched his teeth.

  The last few times Shad had seen him, Clifton had been under a sheet or swigging whiskey in the dark. Today, there he was—skinny, blond, with a bulging Adam’s apple. He was eighteen—a year older than Jeremiah, and a year meaner. He looked sickly with his deep-set blue eyes and too-white skin with red pimples. But he wasn’t a weakling. Thin as a flint and strong as an oak, he was the fastest runner Shad knew. Shad hated thinking on all the times Clifton had treated him like a hog, chasing him down and wrestling Shad’s arms behind him.

  Shad said, “I thought you was working today.”

  “Yeah, well, that shows what you don’t know,” said Jeremiah.

  “How we supposed to work with all them coloreds out there, huh?” said Clifton in his too-deep voice. He plopped down on the stool beside Shad. He grabbed the mug and drained the rest of the root beer in a gulp. “Don’t gotta pay them coloreds nothing and they keep on laying bricks.”

  “Ain’t right,” said Jeremiah.

  “No, ain’t right at all.”

  From the corner of an eye, Shad saw Mr. O’Malley pick up the wooden chairs. He put them back at the square table and stood, watching and listening.

  Jeremiah sat and put an elbow on the bar. He and Clifton stared at Shad. It was only midmorning and Shad was sure they’d been drinking already.

  Clifton hit the side of Shad’s head with an open palm and smiled his crooked son-of-a-gun smile—one Shad took to mean, Hey, Klan brother. Then Clifton burped loud enough to call the cows home. “So, Shad,” he said, “tell me something. Rumor floating around—there’s a school for coloreds up Libby Hill.”

  Shad’s fingers gripped the edge of the bar. He froze.

  “You go up Perkinsons’ for tutoring, right? That’s what Jeremiah tells me.”

  “Yeah,” Shad said, not looking at either of them. “Yeah.”

  “They got a school or not?”

  Shad shrugged. “Miz Perkinson—she does tutoring in the house there—the, uh, front sittin’ room.”

  Jeremiah punched Shad’s arm. “Everybody knows she tutors, Shad. It ain’t what Clifton’s asking. You heard him.”

  “Get off-a me. I don’t know.”

  Clifton leaned in so close, his nose touched Shad’s nose. He smelled rank. “Next time you go up there, you look around. You got that?”

  Shad leaned back. “Yeah, sure.”

  “You keep your ears to the ground, Shad,” Clifton went on, “and if you hear anything about a Negro school up there, you let us know.”

  Shad slipped off the stool. “Yeah, sure. Okay.”

  “We don’t need no Negro schools.”

  22

  Cat and Mouse

  SHAD GRABBED the packet of lace and the crate of chickens, and the hens started squawking like Shad wanted to squawk. Geez, he needed to get away from these boys.

  “Whoa!” shouted Jeremiah. “What you got there?”

  “Uh—chickens. Mr. Dabney done give us two chickens. I’m taking ’em to Mama.”

  “Well, I’ll be!” said Jeremiah. “Dabney, eh?”

  “Yeah, Mr. Dabney.”

  Jeremiah hopped off the stool. “Come on, Clifton. Let’s go. Listen, Shad, we’ll run by Kechler’s. See if he can spare some scrap wood. Whooee. We gonna build us a little chicken coop and get us some eggs.”

  The three of them ducked out of O’Malley’s together. Inside the light had been dim, but outside was blistering bright, and Shad squinted. The horses that had been hitched out front were gone now.

  They headed to Broad Street, and Shad paused by the maple tree. At this spot in Shockoe Valley, hills sloped up in three directions, and behind him the ground angled down to the river. He thought of the night he’d stood on the far side with skeleton bones in his hand. He tried to shake it off, but a glance toward Richmond proper brought back memories of shapes and shadows—of the colored men walking home from the Spotswood. Of the fear in the man’s voice when he’d yelled, “Lord!”

  Shad rubbed his forehead against his sleeve. There had been a time when he’d marveled at how grand Richmond was, how enormous. But today it struck him how small the town was. How very, very small.

  “Come on. What you waitin’ for?” called Jeremiah.

  Shad turned and shuffled behind Jeremiah and Clifton, up Broad Street toward Church Hill, then around the Twentieth Street hill to Venable. The whole way, he was cranked up, tight as a jack-in-the-box. He didn’t breathe easy again until Jeremiah and Clifton turned in the direction of Kechler’s—toward the Fairfield Race Course. Shad kept on out Nine Mile Road.

  “Whooee” over chickens? His head spun. “Whooee” was right. He’d have to think things through. As long as he was anywhere near Jeremiah, he’d need to keep his mind blank as could be so his face wouldn’t show a thing. He had to be extra careful.

  How had they learned about the school? Shoot, there wasn’t anything secret in this town anymore. If Jeremiah and Clifton learned not only that there was a school, but that Shad was teaching there—teaching the coloreds to tailor—he shuddered. He couldn’t think about it.

  Every day his reading was getting better. He wasn’t guessing anymore. No more memorizing and reciting what he’d heard. No more embarrassment like that time Daddy realized Shad couldn’t read a lick. His reading was slow, but at least he was reading.

  Someday soon Shad would pick up Daddy’s book and open to any story he wanted. He’d read it out loud for his Daddy up in heaven. He wasn’t stupid. Shad knew he wasn’t stupid, but—did Daddy know? Could Daddy look down on him and see him read?

  He didn’t want anybody messing this up. He didn’t want any Klan brothers getting wind of something at the Perkinsons’. He needed reading lessons more than any
thing else—even more than the chickens on his shoulder.

  It seemed like everything had gotten awfully complicated in only one month’s time. Between the Klan and the school, Shad figured the only way he’d handle all of it was to say as little as possible. No telling who knew what in this town. He had better keep his mouth shut as best he could.

  On Tuesday, June 11, at the crack of dawn, Shad didn’t take the alley. He knocked lightly at the Perkinsons’ front door, without touching the fancy-pants brass knocker.

  The heavy black door inched open and Caroline peeked out. “Mr. Weaver? Why, you’re supposed to be around back. They’ve started already.”

  The smell of bacon and fried eggs caught Shad’s nose and made his whole body smile. He leaned in and whispered, “Caroline, it ain’t right—uh—I can’t let nobody see me down the alley. Please? Can I please come through the house? I’ll go straight through—front to back—no questions.”

  Caroline looked him up and down and raised her eyebrows. She made an odd face, then opened the door all the way.

  “Thank you, ma’am.”

  Caroline pointed down the back hall, and Shad scurried through and past the kitchen, pausing for the briefest of moments to eye the bacon popping in a clear puddle of grease in a large, black cast-iron skillet. What he’d give for a piece of hot bacon melting on his tongue! But no, he darted out the back, down the steps to the yard, and into the shed.

  “Ah, Mr. Lourdaud has arrived,” said Rachel with a smirk. “What’s the excuse for your tardiness this time?” Without waiting for an answer, she launched into a nursery rhyme and raised one hand, inviting the children to chime in. A chorus of singsong voices pummeled Shad willy-nilly.

  It’s raining, it’s pouring,

  The old man is snoring.

  He went to bed and bumped his head,

  And couldn’t get up in the morning.

  Rachel tapped one finger on her chin. “Is that it, Mr. Lourdaud? Bumped your head?”

  Shad’s eyes caught hers and held them there, strong and steady. The children were giggling, but he kept his mouth flat. “I needed to come through the front this morning. And—and every morning. And I’ll need to go back out through the main house, too.”

  Rachel put hands on hips, narrowing her eyes, puckering her mouth. “What happened?”

  “Nothing,” he said a little too quickly. He scanned the children’s faces, and when his eyes caught Maggie’s, he wanted to hide. He turned back to Rachel. “It’s a matter of . . . of propriety. Uh . . . appropriateness.” His choice of words surprised even him, and he scratched at his scalp. He sounded like Rachel. Like Miss Elizabeth!

  Rachel gave him a sideways look.

  Eloise pointed at the burlap sack Shad carried.

  “Uh, yes,” he said. “Pockets today.” He gestured toward the east window and moved in that direction, his presence commanding the room. The Tailoring Teacher has arrived! “I already showed you topstitching, and you’ll need that skill to set your pockets. Today I’ll show you blind stitching. But don’t think blind stitches can be any less straight just because no one will see them. Blind don’t mean crooked, you hear me?”

  The children nodded, swarming around him, hanging on his every word. Through the lesson, Rachel stood by the west window, arms crossed, jaw tight. Shad had the distinct impression she could see through him—read through him—somehow read his mind. She knew something was wrong, but he couldn’t tell her a thing. Wouldn’t tell her a thing.

  His running with the Klan—that was the other Shad. The Shad who was learning to stand up to his brother, make his mother proud, protect widows, grow up, be a man. That Shad wasn’t this one—the Tailoring Teacher and struggling student. No, they weren’t the same at all, and he’d do everything he could to keep them apart.

  That afternoon, the sky was fixing to rain. Shad had stopped by Weaver’s Fine Tailoring and run a delivery to Doc Moore in Richmond proper. Now he was headed up Broad when someone called to him from the alley between Eighteenth and Nineteenth Streets. He glanced that way and was surprised to see little Maggie leaning over a picket gate. The gate led to a grassy patch behind a big, white two-story built a hundred years ago as a plantation house. Shad knew the house—such a fine one with three chimneys. He’d always liked the way the front sat diagonal to the corner at Nineteenth and Grace.

  “Mr. Lourdaud!” Maggie waved.

  And lookee there—behind her stood Rachel. Shad wanted to wave, but he stopped himself. Broad Street was full of people. The market, two blocks over, was always slow on a Tuesday—there would be double this many people on the streets by Friday—but the market was open nonetheless, and business was steady. People were coming from the farmers’ stalls. He heard a horse whinny. Carriage wheels clattered up the brick street. Church bells clanged the top of the hour.

  No, Shad didn’t want a conversation with any colored girls. He looked at his feet, pretending he hadn’t heard Maggie. Let her think the bells had drowned her out. He picked up his pace.

  “Sir! A moment, please, sir.”

  Shad slowed. Sir. This voice was older—not Maggie’s. It had come from Rachel, and she’d called him sir. What was it she’d said to George Nelson—that on the streets of town he’d encounter “an ignorant Negress”? Well, here she was, calling to Shad proper for all the world to see. He had to pay her mind. He’d treat her like an ignorant Negress—that’s what he’d do.

  Shad stopped and raised his chin as if to ask what she could possibly want. He didn’t let his face show any sign that he knew her. No telling who might be Klan. Why, half a block behind him was a farmer with a bin of something—kale and collards—on his shoulder. Across the street Shad saw the blacksmith—what was his name?—carrying two horseshoes, one in each hand, and waving to a man in a black suit and stovepipe hat. Beyond him three ladies in spring bonnets walked with woven reed baskets that looked to be full of greens.

  “Sir,” Rachel said again, and she slipped through the gate into the alley. She hurried to Broad Street, stopped a polite distance from Shad, and lowered her voice. “Maggie and her mama made you some corn bread. Just something to thank you for lessons.” Then darn if she didn’t bend her knees quickly—the littlest bob of a curtsy—and put a funny smirk on her face. She whispered, “Mr. Lourdaud, sir,” in an awfully slow and pointed manner.

  Shad wanted to roll his eyes. He wanted to call her a nincompoop—to smile, to laugh! But instead he bit the inside of a cheek and said quietly, “She can give it me in the morning, Rachel. Not here.”

  “But it’s hot. Fresh from the oven. She saw you and wanted you to have it. Isn’t that sweet?”

  Shad glanced toward the farmhouse. “She live there?”

  Rachel nodded. “Maggie’s mama is the cook and laundress. Well, actually, she handles everything there but the tailoring, and one day Maggie hopes to handle that piece, thanks to you.”

  Then Shad saw Maggie jump up and down, waving wildly with one hand and holding a bundle in the other arm. She beamed to beat all, and even though Shad sensed that it wasn’t a good idea—that he shouldn’t pay this little girl mind—he strolled down the alley to the gate. Maggie pointed to her dress, thrusting her flat chest upward so that the green gingham bodice came first.

  Shad smiled. Lookee there—right in the middle of the bodice was a pocket. “Did you sew that yourself?”

  “Yes, sir. All by myself.”

  The pocket was a mess of crooked stitches and puckered lines. For the pocket to lie flat on the bodice, she’d need to rip it out, reset it, restitch it, and take a hot iron to it. But today Shad wasn’t about to tell her that she’d sewn it wrong. He said, “I’m proud of you.”

  Maggie up and glowed from the top of her little head to the tip of her chinny-chin-chin. Ha! The fairy-tale words popped into Shad’s head and the next thing he knew, he was glowing, too. He reached over the gate
and took the cloth bundle. “Thank you, Maggie.”

  Then Maggie dashed to the brick outbuilding and Shad strutted through the alley, back to Broad Street. Rachel walked a few paces behind him, and when they got to Broad, she said, “Thank you. That’s all, Shad. I just wanted to say thank you.”

  He nodded, sensing she wanted so much more than “thank you.” She wanted a better explanation for his tardiness, for his insisting on coming and going through the house. But he was learning to keep his mouth shut.

  He started up Church Hill.

  Rachel said, “We’ll see you in the morning.”

  Shad didn’t look back. He walked away, but with each step a sense of worry grew inside him. After four or five steps, the worry turned to dread. It was more than a sense of uneasiness over keeping information from her. Something told him to look back, and he slowed. He glanced over a shoulder, expecting the worrisome feeling to go away when he saw that everything was fine.

  But everything was not fine.

  A figure was coming fast up the alley from Grace Street. Shoot! It was Jeremiah, tugging on his goatee. Then Shad saw him slam a fist into an open palm. Again and again, whack, whack. He walked with such a tall and menacing manner, it was as if he owned the block. He made it to the gate before Rachel did, and set his feet solid, smack-dab in her path.

  Shad froze. He wanted to run Jeremiah off, but his feet wouldn’t let him. He stood glued to the gray-brick street, his eyes on Rachel.

  She stopped in front of Jeremiah. She had to stop. There wasn’t any way for her to go forward without running into him. She couldn’t get through the gate without going around him. She kept her head down and took a step to one side.

  Jeremiah stepped to the side.

  She stepped the other way.

  Jeremiah blocked her again.

  She moved right. Left. It didn’t matter which way she tried—he was there, blocking her path. Cat and mouse.