Belle City

by Penny Mickelbury

  They left as soon as the sun was up on Thursday morning, and Tom's worries that the woman would want to talk all the way to Belle City proved groundless. Nellie Thatcher, after she bid him good morning, said no more, and he was grateful because, as it turned out, he needed all of his concentration to keep the mule and the cart on the road due to the greatly increased motorcar traffic. The road was paved all the way into Belle City, and streets were paved even in the Colored sections of town, so they traveled quickly and easily. Tom knew exactly where Mr. First Freeman lived and he drove directly there, as instructed, because the old man himself wanted to take Nellie to the college and wait for her.

  "We'll see you back here at sunup t'morrow," Freeman said.

  Tom nodded. "Yessir," he said, though he had no intention of returning if he did well at cards that evening. But no point in telling them that; they'd find out soon enough.

  First Freeman had a small house on Ashby Street—Nellie had been there before—with a large yard behind it that extended back to the next street, and what he called a storage shed, that was larger than the house, where he stored and repaired the items that he picked up in his travels throughout the city. As was the case when she'd been there before, half the space was piled high with more goods than Nellie could have imagined existed, to say nothing of having been discarded. The other half was neat and clean and held three tables with benches. Tools hung on the wall behind two of the tables, and a woman worked at a sewing machine at the third. First Freeman introduced her as Mrs. Mason, a seamstress, who made the necessary mends and repairs to anything made of fabric—from shirts, pants and dresses to bed sheets, curtains and draperies, pillow cushions or bath towels—so that the items could be sold. Beau and Tobias, he said, worked at the other two benches repairing any and everything else and were making money "hand over fist. They can fix anything, those two."

  Freeman's small house was neat, clean and beautifully furnished. He'd already told her that "everything in here is somethin' somebody didn't want, I didn't buy nothin' but the house," but it still amazed Nellie that people could and did discard useful things. Maybe, she thought, it's because she was from the country that she couldn't imagine a thing not being useful. Even so, she'd never want to be the kind of person able to discard a thing simply in order to have a new or another thing.

  He took her to a room and put her bag on the bed. "You tired, Nellie? You need to rest?"

  She shook her head. "I feel just fine, Mr. First, and what I want to do is see." She'd been to Belle City before, had seen the college for Colored women, had seen the Colored hospitals and banks and insurance companies, had seen the houses where well-to-do, educated Colored people lived; but she'd seen these things with the eyes of wonderment. She now wanted to see where her daughter might be able to live, to see the schools where her grandchildren might be able to learn to read and write, and to feel what it felt like to walk and ride the streets of Belle City, to know if it really was possible to live day-to-day without fear.

  "The professor knows you're comin' and she's ready to write your letter."

  Nellie reached into her skirt pocket and retrieved a piece of paper. "Mack already wrote the letter for me, but he didn't know what to write to make it go all the way to France." She unfolded the paper and held it out to First Freeman, who shook his head at it: He couldn't read, so no point in looking at it. Nellie refolded the letter and returned it to her pocket. "What time do we see the professor?"

  He pulled a watch from his pocket and popped it open. "In 'bout a hour, but if we take the horse 'n buggy, it won't take long to get there."

  "Can we walk? Seems like I recall it's not too far from here."

  "Sure we can, it ain't far a'tall." He looked again at his watch. "We have to leave in a few minutes, though, if we gon' walk."

  Nellie nodded. "I'm ready, Mr. First." Then she said, "I can't really tell time, you know? I mean, if I look at a time piece and the little hand is on a number and the big hand is straight up at the top, I know what time it is, but when the big hand is in the middle, I'm just confused."

  First Freeman grinned at her. "That's somethin', ain't it?"

  "What's that, Mr. First?"

  "How some people is good with numbers and others is good with words. Like you: You can read, taught your chil'ren to read, but you can't tell time. And me, I'm good with numbers. I can count money, can tell time, but can't read a single word, not even my own name." He shook his head and laughed again. "If it wasn't for Mack McGinnis and his people, I wouldn't own this house, wouldn't have my name wrote on my wagons, nothin' like that."

  "He's a good man, is Mack McGinnis. I already think on him like a son."

  "I reckon I feel the same way. I think on him like I do Beaudry and Tobias...like I do on my own boy..." He stopped talking and dropped his head and Nellie knew to change the subject and to do it quickly: She'd heard from Uncle Will that Freeman's son had just disappeared one day—he'd gone to work and had never come home.

  "Has he said anything to you, Mr. First?"

  "Mack ain't said nothin' to me 'bout his intentions concernin' Miss Ruthie, though I 'spect we all know what they are by now."

  "Well...I truly hope so...but he hasn't said anything to Silas or Beau or Tobias. And he hasn't said anything to me...Ruthie! You think he's said somethin' to Ruthie?"

  The old man threw his head back and cackled. "If he'd a said somethin' to Miss Ruthie we'd all know 'bout it by now. She'd a told ev'rybody."

  Nellie had to smile, for the man spoke the truth: If Mack McGinnis had ever spoken to Ruthie about anything other than teaching and learning, she'd have told somebody or, as First Freeman said, everybody. "I guess we oughta be going then."

  Freeman got his hat and opened the front door. Nellie paused to straighten her own hat and to smooth her skirt, to touch the pocket holding the letter to Eubie. She looked down at what she could see of herself and thought she looked like she belonged on Ashby Street in Belle City, for the dress she wore was one that Mr. First had brought to them in Carrie's Crossing, same for the hat and the shoes. I don't look too country, she thought to herself, though her confidence flagged as they drew closer to the big intersection of Hunter and Ashby Streets. She'd been here before, she reminded herself, she'd seen these sights. And yet. Colored women walking, holding parasols over their heads. Colored women riding in horse-drawn carriages—not mule carts. And Colored women riding in motorcars. She looked around at the paved streets and the stores and shops, behind her at the houses, and ahead of her toward what she knew were the colleges where only Colored children studied. She looked up and saw the lights that would brighten the streets once the darkness descended, and knew that inside the houses and the shops and the stores, a flick of a switch would deliver the same bright lights. I want this for my children, she thought. I want this for myself.

  "It's kinda noisy and dusty, Miss Nellie."

  "I think it's wonderful, Mr. First."

  Freeman looked down at her, looking for some aspect of the sickly, feverish woman who had passed out on her kitchen floor just five days ago, and knew that the fears that her husband and his good friend had hesitated to express were, indeed, honest and worthy fears, for if made to swear, he'd have to speak the truth: Nellie Eubanks Thatcher had, for all intents and purposes, left the farm and moved to Belle City. "You get used to it," he said. "Tell the truth, much as I like bein' back home in Carrie's Crossing, at times it feels too quiet."

  She nodded as if she understood exactly what he meant. And knowing Nellie, most likely she did. "There's all kinds of people here, Mr. First," she said. Her awe of the well-to-do, fine ladies had faded as she saw that more women were dressed as she was: Neatly and cleanly if not elegantly, and that most of the men were dressed like Mr. First. I don't have to be rich and educated, she thought to herself, and my Ruthie don't have to be rich and educated to live here. "You don't have to be rich and educated to live in Belle City."

  He stopped walking. "I been livin' here so
many years I cain't count 'em all and I ain't never been rich or educated. Is that what y'all think? That you got to be rich and educated to live here? Is that why Will'am and Silas won't bring y'all over here?"

  "That ain't all of it, but that's a big part of it."

  He grunted but didn't speak, and they continued their walk, having crossed the street at the intersection after waiting for the light to change. People walked briskly, as if in a big hurry to get somewhere. Or, Nellie thought, to get out of the way of the carriages and motorcars, for that certainly was the reason that Mr. First grabbed her arm and hurried her forward as a motorcar turned the corner too fast and too close behind them, and she giggled as she heard him mutter, "Damn fool."

  Mr. First, understanding why Nellie wanted to watch and see, walked slowly and pointed out places of interest—people, too, when he saw them. "You see that lady right there?" His urgent whisper grabbed Nellie's attention, and, looking where he indicated, she saw a small, quiet looking woman, unlocking the door to a small, quiet-looking building. She wore a skirt, blouse and jacket but no hat, and she carried two purses—one in the crook of her arm, the other in her left hand—and as Nellie looked closer, she thought that bag too large to be a purse.

  "That there's Dr. Dwelley. Dr. Anna Dwelley."

  Nellie studied the woman. "She's a professor at the college?"

  Freeman shook his head. "Not a professor kinda doctor, a doctorin' kind a doctor."

  Nellie stopped in her tracks. The woman had the door open, and all the people Nellie had thought were just standing there followed her inside. The door closed and Nellie saw the writing on the glass: ANNA DWELLEY, M.D. She inhaled deeply. "A Colored lady doctor! Oh, Mr. First. I heard tell of such things but I didn't know...I never thought...now I can tell Ruthie what a Colored lady doctor looks like. Why, Mr. First, she looks just like...a Colored lady."

  The loud claxon of a motorcar horn right beside them froze his reply and, just as quickly, the angry look on his face softened into a surprised smile. "Beaudry! Boy, what you doin' in that motor vehicle?"

  "Ma! Mr. First! I was lookin' for y'all."

  Nellie, still recovering from one shock, received another: Her son at the wheel of a truck, smiling and waving for them to join him. Freeman wrestled the door open, lifted Nellie up and in, jumped in himself, and slammed the door. "Whose truck is this, Beau?"

  "Ours, Mr. First."

  "We ain't got no motor vehicle."

  "Yeah, we do. Since first thing this morning. And here's the best part. I got a license to drive it, too." He waved a piece of paper with his right hand, then dropped it as he needed that hand to shift the gears. The groaning, screeching sound made Nellie cringe. "It's not a brand new truck," he said, having noticed his mother's response to the shifting of the gears, "but we sure can haul more stuff, Mr. First—haul more and haul it faster."

  "Well I do declare," the old man said, wearing a 'now I've heard everything' look.

  Beaudry quickly explained how it happened that between sunrise, when he left with the mule wagon for work, and now, a little past the noon hour, he came to own a truck: "I went by Mr. Allen's place, just like always, and back behind his house he's got two desks and two chairs, telling me to haul 'em off. I tell him I can't 'cause they're too heavy for my cart, and I just hate havin' to say that 'cause I promised Doc Dwelley I'd find her some office furniture and these are some really fine pieces of furniture. Wait til you see 'em, Mr. First."

  "You got 'em here in the truck?"

  "Yessir," Beaudry exclaimed.

  "You gon' take this furniture to the Colored lady doctor?" Nellie asked.

  "Yes, ma'am," Beaudry said, and his mother beamed at him.

  "So...you tole the man the furniture was too heavy for your wagon..."

  "And that's when he told me I needed a truck. I told him even if I could find somebody to sell me a truck, I couldn't get no license to drive it. And he looked at me—y'all shoulda seen how he looked at me. Like I was...I don't know what. 'What are you talkin' about, boy?' he says to me, and he looks and sounds mean and mad. 'Mr. Allen,' I said, 'a Colored man can't buy a motorcar without a license to drive it, and the police won't give us the license 'less we a doctor or a professor or a preacher, somebody like that.' Well, he looked at me some more then told me to follow him, so I did, and goes back in his yard to this shed and opens and this here truck is in it. 'You think you can drive this?' he says, and I told him I can drive anything with a motor. 'How's that?' he wants to know, and when I told him I learned how to drive trucks and buses and tanks and everything else in Europe during the war, he looks at me some more, then he grabs my shoulder. 'You were over there?' I told him I was, for two years. Then he looks at me some more and he says, 'Take that truck, son. It's yours if you want it. And I'm calling the chief and tellin' him to give you a license or he can find a new job.' And that's what happened."

  "Well I do declare," First Freeman said again, just as they turned into the front gate of the college campus.

  "You want me to go with you, Ma?"

  Nellie hesitated, then nodded. "I b'lieve I do, Beaudry."

  "I'm gon' stay out here with this truck," Freeman said, walking around it and patting its rear as if it were an animal. "By the way, where's the mule and the cart?" he asked Beau.

  "I gave it to Mr. Allen's yard man. He was pushin' a cart with wheels on it, his rakes and tools sticking up out of it. I figured since I moved up to a truck from a mule cart, he could move up from pushing his cart to ridin' in one."

  His mother hugged him and Mr. First clapped him on the back, and for the first time since he came home from the war, Beaudry felt like he had a chance to be a man.

  The feeling intensified at dinner that night. Nellie cooked, just as if they were at home in Carrie's Crossing, and Tobias brought Isabelle Johnson, so Nellie almost felt as if she had a daughter present along with her sons, especially when Isabelle was appropriately amazed, awed and impressed when Nellie recounted meeting Dr. Anna Dwelley. After dinner, Beau took turns giving everybody a ride in the truck, telling and re-telling the story of how he came by it, feeling more and more whole within himself with each telling.

  Then Tobias had news to share: "Isabelle says she'll marry with me," he told them, and all the men clapped and laughed and shook his hand and hugged Isabelle—while Nellie wept and hugged Isabelle.

  "But I'm not going to tell your Pa or your Uncle Will. That's for you to tell."

  "I will," Tobias said, then added, "and by that time, I can tell something else: That me and Isabelle gon' have us a place of biz'ness of our own."

  "What?" Nellie exclaimed.

  Tobias grinned and looked from Isabelle to Mr. First to Beau, his grin growing wider. "A place on Fair Street. I'm gon' cut men's hair on one side and Isabelle's gon' press and curl ladies' hair on the other side and we gon' call it TOBY AND BELLE'S."

  Nellie was speechless. It was enough to think that the first of her children was about to marry—and, she expected, a second wouldn't be far behind—but that a child of hers would own a business...it was too much to consider. Then the realization struck that her eldest child already was married and that she, perhaps, already was grandmother to a child she most likely would never see. Her eyes filled again. "I'm proud, Toby. And so is your Pa and Uncle Will and Little Si and Ruthie. And Eubie would be too..."

  Beau and Tobias looked at each other, the message they telegraphed clear: Do something. "Beau's gon' help us buy the building," Tobias said, "and he's gon' live in it, upstairs."

  "For as long as I can stand the smell," Beau said, holding his nose, and everyone laughed.

  "Then me and Belle, we gon' buy a house down the block from Mr. First," Tobias said, "so we'll all be close together, just like in Carrie's Crossing."

  "That's good," Nellie said, "real good. Y'all stay close like that, always."

  "We will, Ma," Beau said and got ready to drive Isabelle home. "Come on, Toby, let's teach you how to drive the truck so you'll b
e ready when your time comes."

  Nellie was up early the following morning making breakfast for the men after having not slept very much the previous night, but her restlessness was caused by too much happiness, not the opposite, as was the case in the previous weeks and months. Good fortune was coming to her children, and her letter was on its way to her son in France, and she had no doubt that once he read it, he would come to his senses and come home—with or without his wife and child—for his true home was with his true family in Georgia.

  Beau and Tobias left for work, Beau driving the truck, Tobias a horse-pulled wagon that was larger than the mule carts. Nellie and Mr. First sat on the front porch to wait for Tom Jenks and "watch the world go by" as Freeman liked to say. He spoke to or waved at practically every person who walked, rode or drove past his house. The third time that he pulled his watch from his pocket to check the time, he said, "If that boy ain't here in a just a few minutes, I'm gon' be drivin' you over to Carrie's Crossing myself."

  "Isn't that him?" Nellie asked, shading her eyes as she looked East into the rising sun.

  Tom Jenks was walking toward them but it was more of a stumble than actual walking. His coat was slung over his shoulder, his hat was set at a crooked angle, and he seemed to be experiencing difficulty picking up his feet, one after the other. As he drew closer, Nellie thought he looked sick. Freeman thought he looked drunk, and he stood up and strode down the steps to his walkway to meet the young man, prepared to send him away if he smelled whiskey.

  "You late, boy."

  "Yessir. I'm sorry. I thought I'd get a ride, but I had to walk."

  "From where?"

  "Over by Auburn Avenue," Jenks said.

  "Why didn't you ride the street car 'stead of walkin' all the way here from all the way over yonder on the East Side?" Freeman demanded to know.

  Jenks shrugged; he was too tired for a discussion of any kind, especially one that focused on the fact that he'd lost every dime he had in a card game that had gone on all night long and had just ended with the dawn, leaving him literally penniless. He'd certainly rather have ridden the trolley car or the street car from the East Side of town here to the West Side, but that hadn't been an option. Neither had not keeping this appointment, for driving Nellie Thatcher back to Carrie's Crossing was the only way he'd be able to get back there, and he needed to return so that he'd have a place to sleep and food to eat. "I'll hitch up the mule," he said.