"Yessir, I know it, and I did see some newspapers, but I can't read all of what it says—"
"What you mean you can't read it? You s'posed to be teachin' them how to read and write. Ain't that what y'all claim?" Beau was back to angry, glaring at Ruthie and Little Si.
"He is teachin' us, Beau."
"He just said he can't read."
"Not good enough to know all of what's in the newspaper," Jonas said, "but I can read some."
"He can read better'n us," Little Si said.
Beau grabbed his younger siblings by the shoulders, one each in each of his large hands as he turned away from Jonas and headed home. "You stay 'way from my family," he shouted over his shoulder. And to his brother and sister, "You stay 'way from that boy, you hear? He can't read his own self but he 'gon teach y'all somethin'? Don't make no kinda sense. We got to be the stupidest people in the world, take lessons from somebody don't know no more'n we do." Then he stopped and turned back to face Jonas. "And all them white people lynchin' Colored soldiers, mad 'cause they got on a uniform: You tell them I'm a hero, see what they say."
They crashed through the woods, the four of them, in opposite directions, their minds full of thoughts too complex for their understanding, their hearts full of emotions for which they had no words. Two of them, though, were in a hurry: Jonas Thatcher to reach the Crossing Café and to the box of leftover newspapers the owner kept in the storeroom and to find someone who could and would read the stories to him; Beaudry Thatcher to tell his parents of his intention to move to Belle City as soon as he could pack a bag. "I got to get 'way from here," he muttered as he strode through the woods. "I can't stay here no longer. I got to get 'way from here." He was practically running through the dense wood.
Ruthie and Little Si were moving at a pretty good clip too because their big brother was dragging them along and they had neither the strength nor, in that moment, the will to resist him. Both were thinking, though, and wondering—imagining—the impact that Beau's decision to leave would have on their family.
From the Recorded Memories of Ruth Thatcher McGinnis
Even after the passage of so much time, this is still difficult to talk about, the things that happened then. No...no...I want to. Perhaps it will help me to talk about it. After all, it's all dead and buried—except me. So—yes, Beau left us and moved to Belle City, and Toby went with him. He went, he said, to earn money, but Miss Isabelle Johnson's family had just moved to Belle City, and Mr. Tobias Thatcher was in love! Beau went, though, because he couldn't stand living in the country, in Carrie's Crossing. He could not tolerate rain or mud or bugs. I have, of course, read about the conditions on the Front during World War I, but back then, all we knew was that Beau had been deeply affected by his experience, and that he felt he had to leave. That was hard, especially on Ma. She'd changed after Beau came home without Eubie, but losing Toby, too... well... Anyway, there was a plus side to things: With both Beau and Toby working in Belle City, for the first time our family had money and the ability to go into a store and purchase things. We still grew the basics—greens and tomatoes, peppers, onions, corn—and we had the chickens and eggs and the fruit trees. But the farm never recovered after the flood, and it didn't much matter because so many people were leaving the country and moving to cities—and not just to Belle City but to Chicago and Detroit and New York—and without Beau and Toby and with Uncle Will finally showing his age, well, we didn't need such a large operation. And to tell the truth, it was a welcome change having the boys come over once a month bringing bags of flour and sugar and rice and coffee. So, as the calendar changed, the world entered a new era. Now we call it the Jazz Age, the Roaring Twenties, but then, especially for us out in the country, away from the trends, the politics, the excitement, it was just a new year and a new decade and the changes that came to us would have made the other things pale in comparison anyway...so it's just as well that we didn't know anything about them...what things? Radio. Women getting the right to vote. And I have to laugh at this because it's the one big thing we were aware of: Prohibition.
***
– 1920 –
Zeb was so mad he couldn't even cuss. He wasn't jumping up and down and waving his arms the way he usually did when he was red hot angry. Now he just seemed stunned. And wronged is what he felt. A terrible injustice was being done to him. "Arrest me? You gon' lock me up? Is that what you said?" He shook his head and his long, white beard waved, flag-like, from side to side. "If I'da knowed you'd do such a thing, Tom Fordham, I'da never put you up to be chief of police."
"It don't matter who the chief of police is, Zeb, if you gon' break the law and rub everybody's face in it. I been tellin' you for three months that you couldn't keep sellin' whiskey." Carrie's Crossing Police Chief Tom Fordham shook his own head and looked as sad as Zeb was mad. He'd known this man his whole life and, despite his often crude behavior and language, Tom liked him. "Now, either you come peaceable or the State boys'll come and get you."
"I closed up my place, Tom, like the law said."
"The law says no selling whiskey, Zeb. Period. And you didn't close your place; all you did was black out the windows and bar the front door. You still got people comin' in the back door and you still sellin' whiskey and you still breakin' the law. I been lettin' you get away with it since January, but people gettin' mad with me now, talkin' 'bout runnin' Sam Croft 'gainst me come next election." He put one hand on the badge on his chest and the other on his gun. "I'm sorry, Zeb, but you got to go."
"What about my bizness?"
"Your bizness in good hands. Your three boys can take care of things."
"How long I'm gon' be gone, Tom?"
Fordham looked at the ground, then up at the man who'd been one of his Pa's best friends for more than sixty years. "A year, Zeb, at least...maybe a bit longer."
The old man wept then, and Tom wondered, as he often did, why people let things get so far gone before they'd do right, and then want to blame somebody else, like Zeb getting mad at him when this was his own stubborn fault. He saw it time and again and put it down to human nature: If people thought they could get away with something, even with breaking the law they'd give it a try. And most times, he knew, they got away with it—like Zeb had gotten away with selling his whiskey day and night for the last three months, flying in the face of the Prohibition amendment. So no, he didn't feel sorry for Zeb, his tears notwithstanding. If ever he felt sorry for anybody, it was the good, honest people. They got caught every time.
***
Ruthie was so glad to have her mother "back" that she wanted to jump and shout with joy. As it was, she couldn't stop smiling, couldn't resist hugging her parents and Uncle Will every time she was near them. She'd have done the same to her brothers, too, but, "Stop it, Girl!" was their response after the second hug. She only hugged First Freeman once and the guest he brought with him not at all, though, she thought, she'd have liked to, but grown women did not hug strange men and she was, after all, a grown woman.
Mr. First introduced his guest as Mack McGinnis, "and I brung him here to teach y'all the readin' and writin' you want." He pointed at Ruthie and Little Si, then added, "Y'all and all the Colored chil'ren 'round here what wants to learn."
Ruthie was so excited that she forgot she was a grown woman. She hopped from foot to foot then grabbed Little Si and they danced around a bit. Then she hugged Mr. First and thanked him, she hugged Beau and thanked him because she knew he was responsible, and she was about to hug Mr. Mack McGinnis, but the look on his face stopped her: He was grinning like it was his birthday or Christmas and somebody had just given him the best present of all. He extended his hand to Ruthie at the same time he gave her a slight bow.
"Pleased to meet you, Miss Ruth," he said.
Ruthie had never shaken hands with anyone before so she didn't know what to say or do, but she followed his lead, offering him her right hand. "Pleased to meet you, too, Mr. Mack," but the excitement was too much. "Do you like Mr. Mark T
wain?"
Still smiling, he said, "Yes, ma'am, I do, but I like Mr. Charles Dickens better, and I think you will too when you read his books."
Everybody was looking at them, waiting for more talk about books and reading, but Ruth didn't know what to say; thankfully, Beau did.
"Mack been to Chicago and St. Louis—on the train. He was tryin' out to be a pitcher on one of the Colored baseball teams." He held aloft two battered gloves and a ball fraying at the seams. "Let's go play some catch!"
The celebration that currently was underway, inside the house and out, was in honor of no particular occasion other than the presence, for the first time in many months, of the entire family, and no mention of the absence of Eubie. Beau, Tobias, Mr. First and Mack McGinnis had arrived the previous afternoon—Saturday—bringing so much food and other gifts there hadn't been a place to store it all. Nellie had been up and cooking since dawn Sunday—flapjacks with butter and maple syrup and bacon for breakfast, and now she was frying chicken and making pies and cobblers. Ruthie had snapped string beans and picked greens and shucked corn for what seemed like hours while the boys had swept the yard, repaired the lean-to and added a new awning of pine boughs, and cleaned what they called the outside kitchen—the plank table and tree stump seats they used for outside eating the half or more of the year when it was too hot to cook and eat inside. Better than all of that, though, was the fact of the return of Nellie's natural warmth and humor and kindness, all of which had been absent since Beau came home from the war without Eubie.
Uncle Will also was fully himself—not at all forgetful or looking and feeling like a frail old man. This fact so delighted Mr. First that he suggested that he and his old friend drive "up the road and fetch Maisy." This they did, returning with Maisy Cooper, her daughter, son-in-law, two grandchildren, two fried chickens, and a chocolate cake.
Big Si, too, was so grateful to have his Nellie back that he hovered in the kitchen, getting in her way, until she sent him on a mission. She'd pulled him down close so she could whisper in his ear, "Go talk to that young man Mr. First brought with him, see what he's like."
"What for?" Big Si said.
"Why you think he's here?" Nellie asked.
"To teach readin' and writin' to the chil'ren," her husband said. Nellie shook her head and gave her husband the look that told him he'd said or done the wrong thing. "What?"
"Mr. Mack McGinnis is here for Ruthie, Silas. Can't you see anything?"
It took several seconds but finally he did see, and then he couldn't catch his breath. A man was here for his baby girl? "No," he said. Then, "Not yet, Nellie. Not yet."
"It's time, Si."
"Not yet, Nellie."
"She's the same age I was when I married with you. She's a grown woman now."
Silas wanted to yell, "She's not a grown woman, she's my baby girl." but he knew he was wrong—on both counts—and it was the sudden memory of old Beaudry Eubanks, Nellie's Pa, that calmed and steadied him, for he'd had to prove himself in a hundred different ways before that old man would let him marry Nellie—who had, as she rightly reminded him, just turned fifteen herself. Now he knew and felt what old man Eubanks knew and felt: A man was proud of his sons, especially if those sons were good men, but what a man felt for his daughter, especially if he didn't have but one—Silas Thatcher wasn't much for words on any given day and he certainly didn't have the words to express this feeling. He gave his Nellie a kiss on top of her head and went out the back door. Good thing she was facing the stove, her back to him, or he'd have seen the river of tears streaming down her face and been more confused than ever.
That Mack McGinnis was a fine looking young man could not be disputed. He was tall—over six feet—and lean but muscular, leading Big Si to wonder what else he did besides teach. He also was the kind of man other men looked up to; he could see that from the way his own sons treated and reacted to him, including Beau, who probably was a year or two older, because on closer inspection, McGinnis wasn't as old as Silas had first thought. It was the man's bearing that gave him age, because he wasn't much older than nineteen or twenty. He was dark brown in color and had a head full of curly black hair and dark, deep-set eyes that never seemed still: No matter what he was doing, he was watching everything, but he paid particular attention to the road (Freeman no doubt had told him what happened on Juneteenth) and to Ruthie.
"Well bless my soul."
Big Si jumped, startled by the sound of his own voice; he'd not intended to speak his thought aloud, but he was so startled by what he'd just seen that he couldn't help himself: Ruthie was watching Mack McGinnis as closely as he was watching her and they caught each other at it; their eyes met and that's what Big Si witnessed, and that's when he knew that his precious daughter was a grown woman.
"What you think about him, Si?"
He didn't know how long First Freeman had been watching him watch McGinnis, but he knew Freeman was a watcher—maybe that's what drew the old man to the younger one. "I think it don't much matter what I think," he said, and both men chuckled. "But I reckon if I had any say in the matter..." Si hadn't taken his eyes off McGinnis, and he watched now as one of Maisy Cooper's grandchildren darted into the open area where the young men were playing catch. McGinnis saw the child and, with a laugh, bent to scoop up the little boy and swing him high into the air. "I'd say he's a good one, Mr. First, and I thank you. 'Course, I don't reckon a man can earn much of a living teaching poor, country Colored children how to read and write."
"He's a carpenter by trade, Silas, and one of the best I've ever seen." He looked toward the house. "His granddaddy the one helped Will'am put that house up."
"Well I'll be." Silas had heard the story of his home's construction many, many times over the years, the carpenter becoming almost mythical in the telling, the man's profession becoming his name: They all called him Carpenter and the man never corrected them. "Life is somethin', ain't it?"
"It surely is that," First Freeman said.
The meal they shared was as wonderful as a Juneteenth celebration—not as much food, and certainly not as many people, but the laughter and joy and fun—including lots of storytelling, embellished in the way only family and close friends can enhance the particulars of an event or occasion—elevated this Sunday dinner to celebration status. The presentation of the chocolate cake for dessert, however, stopped all conversation. Everyone looked toward Nellie, and she laughed and pointed toward Maisy, who gave a delighted whoop.
"Y'all think I got flour and butter and eggs and sugar? And some chocolate? That's me: The rich queen of England. Y'all bow down!"
First Freeman hopped to his feet and bowed to Maisy; Big Si, Ruthie and Little Si followed suit. When the laughter subsided, Maisy pointed to her daughter and said, "Sue baked it at work and brung it home for our Sunday supper."
Everybody looked at Sue, the youngest of Maisy's nine children. All of the grown-ups knew her, but she was a stranger to the younger people. She was a pretty-faced, brown, round woman who smiled easily and just as easily wore the warm thanks and admiration of her dinner companions, the way the well-loved baby of a family wears love and admiration. "Mr. Pace lets me cook whatever I want for myself," she said in a light, sweet voice—a voice that, if voices could be said to fit a person, fit Maisy's Sue to perfection. Her smile changed, though, when she saw the looks of confusion that met her explanation and, like the family's baby, she looked to her mother for assistance.
"Sue is the cook at the café," Maisy said proudly.
"The Crossing Café?" Beau asked, then, before anyone could reply, said, "Zeb Thatcher told me Colored couldn't work in town. He ran me out when I went to look for a job."
"Mr. Pace don't care what Zeb Thatcher says," Sue declared with a sniff.
"Zeb Thatcher's own kin don't care what he says." This from Sue's husband, Joe, who also was brown and round but who exuded strength to his wife's gentleness. And when confused eyes turned his way, he explained that he was the butcher in Thatc
her's Market which was run by one of Zeb's daughters and her husband. "I butchered at a meat market in Belle City just like Sue cooked in a restaurant, and when we come here, they was happy to have us 'cause we know how things is done over yonder, and those folks in the Crossing want things done 'xactly the way things is done in Belle City."
"'Cept for Zeb Thatcher," Sue said.
"Zeb Thatcher's in jail, so it don't matter what he thinks," Joe said and was startled at the reaction his words drew. "Y'all didn't Zeb was locked up?" He laughed, then grew quiet and shook his head. "I'da felt sorry for him if he wasn't so mean and evil. And stupid." He looked from Uncle Will to First Freeman. "Y'all know him, right?" Both old men nodded. "How come he so bull-headed stupid? That man truly did believe that on his say so, he could just keep on sellin' whiskey no matter what the law said."
"Selling whiskey?"
"What law?"
"What jail? Ain't no jail in Carrie's Crossing."
"Who locked him up?"
The general hubbub created by the news of Zeb's arrest—along with the sense of relief at the fact of his absence—provided an opportunity for Mack McGinnis to speak without feeling so much like an outsider, for as kind and welcoming as Ruthie's people had been toward him, he was not a part of this community and he knew it and knew to tread lightly and carefully. "You mean the Prohibition," Mack said, a statement not a question.
Joe nodded. "That law means everybody, everywhere, but Zeb said it didn't mean him in Carrie's Crossing, Georgia."
"A lot of people everywhere, not just in Georgia, didn't think it would really happen," Mack said, looking around the table, meeting eyes—especially those of Nellie and Silas and Will Thatcher—and avoiding Ruthie's. "The U.S. Government passed the law and the president put his signature on it. Cain't nobody in the United States of America sell or drink whiskey."
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