Passage to Natchez

by Cameron Judd

  Clardy turned to his companions. “I’ll go speak with him now. I’ll come back to tell you what he says.”

  Celinda and Japheth seated themselves on a bench near the front door of the hospital. Japheth smoked a cigar and seemed nervous. Celinda sat smelling the stenches peculiar to a hospital and thinking of how she hated this place and the illness and death it represented, and how she hoped she and her husband could leave Natchez and find a better, healthier life in Kentucky, where the grief of her lost baby would not haunt her so readily, and where Japheth could again become the man he had been before.

  Clardy returned a few minutes later, looking somber. “He is conscious, but weakening,” he said. “I told him you had come to see him, and at first it seemed to anger him … but then he changed his mind, all at once. I don’t know why. He wants you to come.”

  Celinda trembled as she moved through the oppressive milieu of the Natchez Hospital. Going to see a man soon to die … not the kind of thing she was normally inclined to do. Celinda hated death. She had learned to hate it while seated in the corner of her childhood home, watching her mother die of rabies. She had learned to hate it more in a cavern beside the Ohio River, where Trenton Ames had left her, with nothing to bequeath to her but loneliness, fear, and admonitions to be strong. And now she hated death more than ever when she sensed it lingering like a shadow above her husband, waiting to engulf him whenever his weak heart finally tremored its last. Death was like a stench in this building; Celinda prayed that if her husband did die, it would not be here.

  Willie Jones lay in a small bed near a back corner of a big room lined with beds. His bed was segmented off from the others by a dark curtain only partly drawn back. Celinda cocked her head to one side and caught her first look at him. He was on his back, his head turned away.

  Clardy went to him first, his form coming between her and Jones so that her view was cut off. He said, “Willie, they’ve come. Can you hear me, Willie?”

  No answer. Celinda felt a chill. Had the man died already?

  Clardy turned. “He’s not conscious. I believe he’s—” He turned again, back to the bed. “Wait … he’s coming around. Willie? Do you hear me now?”

  “Yes.” The voice was raspy and soft. The voice of a rapidly weakening man. Celinda caught a weak but odious smell, like decay. She remembered the nurse’s talk of how Willie Jones’s wound was beginning to fester.

  “Here they are, then, Willie. Here’s Japheth Deerfield. And his wife, Celinda, is here, too.”

  Clardy stepped aside. The man on the bed turned his face toward Celinda. She took one long, astonished look, then leaned weakly against Japheth, fearing she would faint. Japheth looked at her with an expression that said he was as surprised and shocked as she.

  The man on the bed was Jim “Junebug” Horton.

  Celinda felt a dull, mounting pain in her stomach, as if she had been kicked. Then a burst of quick anger—Clardy Tyler had set this meeting up maliciously!—followed by a realization that of course that wasn’t the case. Clardy’s own bewildered look at the moment was enough to let her know that he didn’t yet realize who Willie Jones really was, nor understand why both she and her husband looked so pale.

  Horton’s weak-looking eyes looked at Celinda’s face a few moments, then shifted to Japheth. He spoke weakly. “I can see by your looks you didn’t know it was me,” he said. “I had wondered, Mr. Deerfield, if you had knowed the man whose freedom you put in for in New Orleans really was.”

  “No,” Japheth said. “No, I did not … and if I had …” He said no more, but his meaning was clear. Horton looked toward the ceiling, his red eyes looking sad.

  “If you had, you would never have spoke for me going free,” Horton said. “I’d wondered about that. All these years, I’ve wondered. Didn’t want to go to my grave not knowing the answer.”

  “Is that why you decided to give your audience to us after all, Horton? You put my wife—and me, too—through the shock and displeasure of having to see you, just to satisfy your curiosity about whether I had realized who you really were? Well, you devil, now you have your answer!” Japheth took Celinda’s arm and looked at Clardy. “Clardy, we’re leaving. If I had known who this man was, I would have never come here. And to think I, of all people, petitioned for this man’s freedom!”

  Clardy said, “Wait … Japheth, what’s all this here? I don’t understand what’s happening.”

  “That men there, his name isn’t Willie Jones. That’s John Horton.”

  “Horton …” Clardy blanched. “That’s the name of the man who—”

  “The man who ill-used my wife so badly, the man who tried to pass himself off as my own late brother to defraud a church. God help me! And to think I petitioned for his freedom using the very name of the good man he once impersonated! I’m damned if I would have put my wife through such a trial as having to face him, without so much as a warning, if I had known who this was.”

  Clardy said, “Japheth, I didn’t know. I swear to you, I didn’t know. If I had, I would never have let this happen.”

  “I don’t blame you, Clardy,” Japheth said. “It’s this bastard who has my contempt. Even while he lies dying, he has the rancor, the effrontery, to weasel my wife into a situation designed to slap her in the face with his miserable presence.” He tugged Celinda’s arm again. “Come on, Celinda. Let’s leave this place.”

  “Wait, Japheth,” Celinda replied, pulling her arm free.

  “What … but there is no reason for—” He grasped at her arm again.

  “For God’s sake, Japheth, I can decide for myself when to leave! And do you not think that after all I’ve been through in my life, I can’t abide the mere sight of a dying man, no matter who he is?”

  Japheth sputtered in astonishment. “You want to see this—this piece of human refuse??”

  “No,” she replied. “I want to see this man.” She removed her arm again from her husband’s hand, took his arm in its place, turned him to face Horton and said gently: “Look at him.”

  Horton had closed his eyes, tears streaming out from beneath the tightly shut lids.

  “Look, Japheth. The man is dying. He can’t harm me anymore, or you, or anyone else.”

  Japheth had been tight and stiff, but slowly he wilted. His demeanor changed. “You are a wise and perceptive woman, Celinda Ames Deerfield. And a tender one.”

  She went to Horton’s bedside, knelt there and put her hand on his. “You are dying,” she said.

  Horton opened his moist eyes and looked at her. “Yes. And before I do, I want to tell you, to ask you …” New tears came. “I want to tell you that I’ve been an evil man, and I was wicked to you.”

  “Yes, you were.” Celinda was following her instinct now, feeling that nothing worthwhile would be achieved here without forthrightness. But she spoke softly, not wanting to upset a man who clearly had not even a full day’s life remaining in him.

  “I want to tell you that I know how wicked I was, and that I shouldn’t have treated you so. Shouldn’t have tried to force myself on you like I did. Shouldn’t have treated you like something I could own, like a treasure I’d found in that cave where your pappy died.” He paused, then said, “But you were a treasure. Best and finest treasure I ever run across then or since. But I didn’t know how to handle a treasure. You were something beyond me, girl. All I knew how to do was treat you ill.”

  “I was afraid of you,” Celinda said. “I feared you would harm me. Maybe kill me, in the end.”

  “You was wise to get away from me,” he said. “Because I would have hurt you. I’ve hurt every person I’ve run across in my life, and you would have been no different. But I’m different now. I am. I’ve been trying my best to do good things, instead of bad.”

  “That’s good, then” Questions filled Celinda’s mind. Perhaps Horton would be too weak to answer them, but she felt compelled to ask. “Junebug, what happened with Ajax McKee the night I fled from you? Is he dead?”


  “Yes. Yes. I killed him that night. More by accident than purpose. He ran onto my knife in the dark.”

  Celinda remembered the horrible moment when Timothy Rumbolt had done a nearly identical thing up in Beatrice Fine’s room, and shuddered. “And what did you do then?”

  “I went on to Natchez. Walked, hitched rides on wagons, finally stole a horse and rode in the rest of the way. I asked about you, found out folks knew of you, were saying that you had been saved from terrible things by a miracle. They said a lawyer named Deerfield had took you under wing and was likely to marry you. Deerfield, they said … they told me he was brother to a preacher who had been bound for Natchez but had died. I knowed then that the hand of God was on you, Celinda. I knowed he had sent you safe into the arms of the brother of the man I was pretending to be. I knowed then I could never have you, that you was protected. I left Natchez, headed down to Orleans, took up the name of Willie Jones. I finally wound up in prison for helping steal gold from a church … and then your husband came, right as I thought I was going to die. The very husband of the girl I had treated so wrong, he came and got me my freedom, and I couldn’t understand why. Why would he, of all people, be the one man who wound up doing good for me? I had never knowed goodness like that, Celinda. In all my days, I’d never knowed such a goodness. It’s haunted me ever since then, that goodness has. And now I lie here dying, and all I can say is God bless you, Celinda Deerfield. God bless you and your good husband, even if he does hate me now that he knows the full truth. I don’t blame him for hating me.” He touched her hand. “I’m glad now he got you instead of me. Truly glad. I’ll die knowing that things turned out for you like they should have.”

  Celinda wiped a tear from her eye. “Maybe you won’t die. Maybe you’ll live.”

  “No,” he said. “I’m dying. And even if I lived, it wouldn’t be for long. This world will end soon. I know that for a fact. I believed I’d be alive to see it, but I won’t. I’ll be dead before the end comes. I’ll be in hell before this day is out, suffering for the sins of my uncle, and my own sins besides. The end has come for me, and I can’t escape it. That same weight in my chest, that weight of sin—God, it’s so heavy now that I can hardly bear the press of it. I’d hoped I could make it light by doing good things ’stead of bad, but it’s still just as heavy as before. My uncle’s sins and my own, all mixing up together in me, choking the breath from me.”

  “You will not suffer for your uncle’s sins,” Celinda said. She remembered very well the remarkable “sin-eating” story Jim Horton had told her long ago. “You’ve been wrong to go through life believing that foolishness you were told by your mother and some foolish old witch woman. They had no power to put your uncle’s wrongs on your account. I know of only one time in the history of this world in which one person has carried the sin and wickedness of others. If you want to die in peace, it’s in his hands you ought to put yourself.”

  Horton said, “That door is closed to me. It’s far too late for religion. There’s nothing for me now but punishment. My mammy told me forgiveness was shut off to me, and so it is. God will not forgive Junebug Horton.” He sank back, wincing, apparently stabbed with pain. His voice was weaker when he spoke again. “But you can forgive me, Celinda. If I can’t die with God’s pardon, I’d at least like to die with yours.”

  Celinda looked at the pitiful man before her and thought of how deeply she had despised him. Though since her marriage she had managed to substantially shut out the memory of Jim Horton, being near him now revived it all with terrible clarity. She remembered his body pressing against her as he attempted to violate her in the most intimate way possible. She remembered the rough feeling of his hands holding her hair as he hacked off her locks and forced her to take on the guise of a boy. She remembered his threats, the way he had looked so hatefully at her when Queen had stepped in as her protector. Now he was asking for pardon. No man deserved it less. How could she forgive him? The words would surely catch in her throat and refuse to come out.

  She looked up at Japheth. He didn’t look angry now, or inclined to play the protective husband. He had stepped back, leaving this matter in her hands. It was up to her alone to decide whether Jim Horton would die with or without her forgiveness. He didn’t deserve it … but wasn’t the very heart of pardon to give not what was deserved, but mercy that was undeserved? What else was pardon, if not that?

  She was trembling, and almost in tears herself. Maybe she could forgive him … but the words wouldn’t come. Instead she asked, “If my forgiveness was important to you, why is it that you told Clardy Tyler that you didn’t wish to come to Natchez, or see me and my husband?”

  “Because I was too ashamed. And because I wasn’t dying then. Now I am. Everything is different to a man when he’s dying. Everything.”

  She thought then that maybe, as her old abuser was dying, it made sense to let a part of herself die, too, the part that had carried the scars of her ordeal and the lingering hatred of the man who more than any other was responsible for it. To let that part live on and on did no good to her, to her family, to anyone. Let it go, she thought. Let all the hate and hurt die with Jim Horton.

  He was very weak now, struggling to maintain consciousness. He looked at her, waiting, saying no more. Celinda lifted his hand and squeezed it softly. “I forgive you,” she said. “I forgive you for everything.”

  An hour later, as they emerged from the Natchez Hospital into the light of a clear, slightly chilly day of a world that had been home to Jim Horton but was no longer, Japheth took Celinda in his arms. “You are a most remarkable and strong woman,” he said. “Most remarkable and strong indeed.”

  After the burial of Jim Horton and the payment of all expenses related to his medical care, death, and interment, Clardy made final arrangements with the Deerfields, solidifying the plan they had agreed upon: Clardy would go on to New Orleans, continue his search for Thias—a search that seemed much less likely to succeed now that his guide had died—disinter the bones of Isaac Jones and place them in the sealed coffin on a northbound sailing vessel. When that vessel reached Natchez, the Deerfield family would join him, and in the end wind up in Kentucky.

  Clardy said his farewell and set off. As the coffin-bearing wagon rumbled away from Natchez, Clardy found that he actually missed Willie Jones … having come to know him by that name, it was hard to think of him as Jim Horton. What a life the man had led! Celinda had told him about Horton’s belief that he was doomed to be punished for the sins of his wicked uncle, and how that conviction helped steer his course into all the worst channels. Jim “Junebug” “Willie Jones” Horton had been a most superstitious man, obviously. It made sense of certain cryptic comments Clardy had heard the man say along the way from Kentucky. It was no wonder a superstitious-gullible man had been so quick to believe that a dream could forecast the end of the world.

  Clardy was secretly happy to have a justification now for discounting all the apocalyptic talk he had been exposed to for hundreds upon hundreds of miles. He was embarrassed to admit it, but it had begun to eat at him. In those mentally vulnerable moments before sleep came, he sometimes wondered if somehow the “dream of rev’lation” that his old partner had talked about really could have been prophetic. What if the ground really was going to open up and swallow the wicked, and the great curtain was going to fall on the final act of the world? Now he was free to put aside such fearful bogeyman notions. If Jim Horton’s dreams had been revelatory of anything, it was merely his own impending death, not the death of the entire world.

  Clardy traveled without incident until he neared New Orleans on a day when clouds were growing thick. Lightning was striking in the distance and drawing nearer with great heralds of steadily louder thunder peals, and the possibility of the world’s end seemed a little more believable than it would on a sunny day. When a lightning bolt splintered a tree not a hundred feet from where Clardy was driving the wagon, he let out a yell that was itself of apocalyptic proportions, and
realized that the bolt would certainly have been sufficient to bring an end to Clardy Tyler’s world if none other. Immediately he began searching for shelter.

  He was ill-fixed to find it. The area he was in was remote and wooded with twisted, tortured-looking trees, a macabre kind of place where no one seemed to live. As the storm grew closer, the wind colder, the horses more skittish, Clardy began to believe he would not find shelter at all. He was about to give up hope, free and hobble the horses, and crawl under the wagon, when he saw a distant light in the dusk and heard the sound of a large group of people singing.

  “I’ll be!” he said. “Must be a meeting house yonder, or some such.”

  Happily, he made his way off onto a narrow side road and toward the lighted place. He saw not a church meeting house, as he had anticipated, but a large barn standing beside a burnt-out house whose blackened walls and vacant windows seemed appropriately ghostly in this wasted region. The interior of the barn was lighted by lamps and torches and held about two dozen people gathered to face a very tall, wide man in odd clothing. As Clardy drew closer, he saw that the man was barefoot, wearing some sort of Indian clothing, had long, white hair and a beard trimmed down to the skin everywhere except at his chin, where the whiskers grew in thick twists all the way to his chest. He was pacing back and forth on a makeshift platform made of boards laid side by side across a square of barrels.

  I know that man, Clardy thought. That’s the same man I once saw preaching in the street at Natchez. Older now, but the same man.

  Someone had spread a large, heavy tent cloth over pole supports along one side of a horse pen filled with the mounts of the people inside the barn. Clardy parked the wagon under a tree, turned his own horses into the pen, and entered the barn as inconspicuously as possible, hoping to find an unnoticed seat on the ground against the rear wall. It was not to be. The man at the front, who was waving a Bible in one hand and some sort of twisted vine scepter in the other, paused in his oration and pointed the scepter at Clardy as he came through the door.