Trouble the Water

by Frances O'Roark Dowell

  Thomas kept waiting to see what that old dog would do. He be acting like he know that Thomas and Jim was right there, but at the same time he act like he didn’t. Almost like the dog didn’t want to know. Which was fine by Thomas. He didn’t have no interest in dogs getting near him. Dogs all around the cabin that night they was running to the river, and Thomas could still hear their howling, growling voices. But the dogs couldn’t get in, not with that old lady shooing ’em away and telling the catcher men to get off her property or else she’d shoot ’em dead.

  Thomas wondered if the boy and the girl know they being followed. Not just by him and Jim, but by another boy too. He was on the other side of the street, staying back a little, but Thomas could tell he had an eye on them children. Mean-looking white boy. Maybe that girl a runaway. Maybe that hiding boy be a catcher man. Thomas wanted to yell to that girl to run, but he knowed she wouldn’t hear him. Besides, he didn’t want to worry Jim none. Jim had enough worries weighing him down.

  That’s my house, Jim said, pointing to a place off the road, back in the grass. He was up on his toes, almost like he might go ahead and fly there, he so excited about seeing it.

  You been back before?

  I’ve been trying, but this is the first time the fog didn’t come up.

  The fog?

  I don’t know how else to explain it. It’s just when I get close to certain places, everything turns all foggy and I can’t get any farther.

  How about now? Can you keep going?

  Jim shook his head, all sad and all.

  I want to. I can see all the way up to the front door. But I’m stuck right here.

  You wanna wait for them to come back? Thomas asked, and Jim nodded.

  Buddy come back first, and when he reached Jim, he stopped and sniffed the air. Jim turned to Thomas.

  He knows I’m here.

  He know something here. I don’t know if he know it’s you or not.

  Jim slumped a little bit, and Thomas could see he was starting to fade.

  I sure wish Buddy could know me again.

  Maybe he can, Thomas told him. Only it ain’t the right time yet.

  Jim looked at him hopefully. When do you think it’ll be the right time?

  When you figure out where it is you need to be. It ain’t here, and I don’t think it’s at that cabin. Some place else be waiting for you to get there.

  Without saying anything more, they started to follow the dog back down the street.

  Thomas turned around one last time to see if that catcher boy still be there. Yep, there he was, standing behind a tree, waiting for them children. Watch out, little girl, Thomas wanted to call, but he knew it wasn’t no use. Only person Thomas could help now was Jim.

  19

  Sooner or Later Comes Sooner

  Callie did her Monday-morning weeding fast as she could, though she was careful not to pull up anything that needed to stay rooted down. If Mama found gaps in her flower beds, Callie’d spend the rest of the week paying the price, and she had things to do, places to be. Callie Robinson had a story to write.

  The minute she pulled up the last pokeweed, she was scooting down the street toward the Advance office, the notes she’d written down Friday before in her pocket. Oh, she had the whole story of Jim Trebble, from facts about what he liked to eat—a good slab of his mama’s meat loaf was at the top of that list—to what happened on the day that he drowned. Jim Trebble hadn’t even wanted to go to the river that day, Mr. Robert Lincoln had reported. He’d wanted to go squirrel hunting instead, but his friends had laughed that idea away. You hunted squirrels in October. April you went fishing in the river.

  Callie thought she might write something about how a day can start out real good and then go in the complete opposite direction. That had been Mr. Robert Lincoln’s theme from when she and Wendell visited him Friday morning. He kept saying what a pretty morning it had been, the prettiest morning of the spring, the sun shining after a week of rain.

  “You know what my granddaddy told me the day after Jim drowned?” Mr. Lincoln said, leaning back against the trunk of a used Pontiac Chieftain. “ ‘Son, don’t never go to the river the first clear day after a long rain.’ I remember thinking, ‘Granddaddy, I wish you’d told me that two days ago.’ ”

  Mr. Robert Lincoln was the nicest white man Callie had ever met. Not that she’d met too many of them. There was Mr. Creedy, the superintendant of Kenton County schools, who always had a Very Serious and Important expression pasted to his face when he came to Carter G. Woodson Elementary School at the beginning of the year to talk to the children about good citizenship. She sort of knew the mailman, Mr. Simms, who hurried through his rounds in the Bottom like their letters had a stinky smell and he was getting rid of ‘em as fast as he could. That was about it for white men Callie knew by name and face.

  But Mr. Robert Lincoln, he greeted Callie and Wendell like old friends the minute his daddy pulled him out of the back office. Wendell had been right—Lincoln’s Used Cars was Robert Lincoln’s daddy’s place. Robert Lincoln was the one who did all the paperwork, as far as Callie could figure. That was probably the reason he was so happy to see them, get himself a chance to get out of that crampy little old office and out into the fresh air.

  Of course his face got all sad and crumpled up when Wendell explained why they were there, but when Callie said, “Mostly we just wanted to know what Jim was like growing up and that sort of thing. What kind of boy was he?”

  That question seemed to lift Mr. Lincoln’s spirits. “Oh, he was the best friend you could ask for. Kind of quiet, but funny, and real nice. I mean, if Jim had two of something, he’d give you one, and if he only had one, he’d split it in half. Loved baseball and collecting things—arrowheads, rocks, snake skins. Loved that dog of his too—Buddy. I’ve heard a couple of folks say they’ve seen Buddy down by the river lately, but I wouldn’t know about that.”

  “How come?” Wendell asked.

  “I’ve never been back down to the river since that day.”

  Callie concentrated hard while Mr. Lincoln was talking so she could remember every last thing. She wanted to write it down exactly right when she got home. After her story got published, she’d take a copy to Mr. Lincoln, and she wanted him to feel like she’d done a good job representing his thoughts and feelings.

  “So you said you’re writing an article for the Gazette?” Mr. Lincoln asked Wendell when they were done, and Wendell had started to say yes when Callie stopped him.

  “Actually, it’s me who’s writing the article,” she told Mr. Lincoln. “For the Weekly Advance.”

  “That’s the colored paper, right? One of the mechanics we got working for us, Lester Davis, he brings it in sometimes.”

  “You got a colored man working for you?” Callie asked. She hadn’t seen anybody when they walked in.

  Mr. Lincoln leaned forward. “Between you and me, he’s the best mechanic in northern Kentucky. Everybody knows it too. But we keep him behind the scenes, in case anybody’s got a problem with it.”

  Now, walking up Marigold toward Lexington Street, Callie thought about this. Why on earth, if you’ve got the best mechanic in northern Kentucky, would you try to hide it from folks just because that mechanic happens to be colored? Sometimes it amazed her how stupid people could be. You got the best mechanic in this half of Kentucky, you advertise it, you don’t hide it. You put up a sign that says LESTER DAVIS WORKS HERE.

  Soon as Callie turned right onto Lexington, she saw a crowd throbbing around the front of the Advance office and quickened her step. She’d never seen more than one or two people other than Mr. Renfrow in the newspaper office, and usually it was Marvin Booker and Sheldon Keyes, Mr. Renfrow’s delivery boys. There must be some big news going around, Callie thought, and started running.

  When Callie reached the office, Miss Shirley from the grocery was standing at the curb, fanning herself with a copy of Friday’s paper. “Oh, Lord, girl,” she said when Callie asked he
r what the fuss was. “Orin gone and done it now. He’s calling for the mayor to integrate the town pool and stirring up all kinds of trouble that we don’t need. Just look at that window. Who you think done that?”

  Callie turned and saw that the Advance’s plate-glass window had been shattered. “How’d it get broken? Somebody throw a rock through it?”

  Miss Shirley nodded. “Mmm-hmmm. That’s exactly what happened. Nobody knows who done it, though. White folks don’t read the Advance, so how would they even know?”

  Callie thought Miss Shirley had a point, though she couldn’t imagine anyone in the Bottom throwing rocks at the Advance office’s window. Folks might grumble and complain, the way Mama had been doing all weekend, saying that Mr. Renfrow was stirring up a hornet’s nest, but throw rocks? Callie had a hard time believing that. No, word must have gotten out somehow. Everybody had their copy of the Advance by Friday at noon, which gave folks plenty of time to talk over the weekend—and to be overheard by the wrong people.

  Callie hated that someone had tried to do Mr. Renfrow harm, but as a future private investigator who had just solved one mystery, she was glad to have another mystery at hand. She’d get to the bottom of whoever had thrown a rock at the Advance office, and that would be one more story for her to write. Plus, it would make her the hero of the Bottom.

  “I best go see how Mr. Renfrow’s doing,” she told Miss Shirley. “I’ve been working some for him this summer, you know.”

  “I thought I’d seen you around. And did I see you Friday walking up the street with a white boy?”

  “He’s a friend of Carl Jr.’s,” Callie said, telling the same lie she’d told Mama and Daddy on Saturday when they got the news. Man alive, news in this town spread faster than butter on a hot piece of toast. “From when the colored Scouts and the white Scouts got together to play ball during Jamboree Days.”

  Miss Shirley took to fanning herself again. “What was he doing in the Bottom?”

  “Lost his dog. Thought he might have come down this way.”

  “That old yellow dog his dog?”

  “You might could say so,” Callie said, and then she turned to push her way through the crowd so that she wouldn’t have to pile any more lies on top of the ones she’d already told.

  Mr. Renfrow was sitting at his desk, typing away as if nothing unusual were going on.

  “You working at a time like this?” Callie asked as she walked around behind the counter. “You practically got a riot outside.”

  “That’s what I’m writing about,” Mr. Renfrow explained. “I like to get the news reported while it’s still fresh.”

  Callie pushed some papers off the chair across from Mr. Renfrow’s desk and sat down. “It’s fresh, all right. Think you know who threw the rock?”

  “Some hooligan, I’d hazard,” Mr. Renfrow said, still typing. “Probably a boy who overheard the household help talking about my editorial. I can’t imagine anyone in our community doing such a thing.”

  “Me either,” Callie agreed. “You think it was a boy, not a grown-up?”

  “That’s what I suspect. I’ve written other editorials that have caught the attention of white folks, and there’s never been any violent response. A few phone calls maybe, a letter or two. But nothing threatening, particularly. No one in Celeste wants trouble, white or colored.”

  “’Cepting you,” Callie pointed out. “Everybody’s fussing over your editorial, even my mama.”

  Mr. Renfrow paused in his typing. “I hope she’s not too upset.”

  Callie shrugged. “She’s a little upset. She don’t like white folks getting mad. Says it causes more trouble than you could ever imagine.”

  “Sometimes you have to trouble the water, Miss Callie.” Mr. Renfrow resumed typing. “If a broken window is the price you pay, then so be it.”

  Callie pulled her notes from her back pocket. “You mind if I use the typewriter in the back room? I got my story about Jim Trebble right here, and I aim to write it in time for Friday’s paper.”

  Mr. Renfrow waved in the direction of the door. “Be my guest. I look forward to reading—and editing—your article.”

  Oh, it won’t need no editing, Callie thought, heading toward the back room. Every word in her article would be important and necessary.

  Taking a seat at the dusty, note-covered desk, Callie began pecking at the typewriter. “Everybody’s seen that old yellow dog by now,” she began. “Well, I am going to tell you the story of who that dog is.”

  She leaned back in her seat, thinking about what the next perfect words might be. Should she start with a description of the dog and why folks might know him, or should she start with a little bit of Jim’s background? What would grab folks’ attention the fastest?

  The part of the story she had to be exactly right with was the part about the cabin. Mr. Robert Lincoln had said them boys would treat that cabin like a clubhouse sometimes, going up there after they’d spent a couple hours fishing at the river.

  “I don’t even know if that old place is still around,” he’d said, and Callie and Wendell had looked at each other, deciding in one glance not to update Mr. Lincoln about the cabin. “Jim carved his name on the wall using my pocketknife. Ruined it, if you want to know the truth.”

  Callie had had to keep from shouting out. She knew it. She’d known from practically the beginning that Jim Trebble had been in the cabin. Man, oh man, was she a natural-born private investigator or what?

  But she had mixed feelings about including that news in her story. Folks in the Bottom might not think too kindly of Jim if they knew he’d used the old cabin for a hangout. That old cabin was like a church to folks in the Bottom. Sure, it was a church nobody went to, and one that most folks couldn’t find on a map. But it was part of their story, and nobody wanted no white boys tramping over their story.

  Maybe the best thing to do was write the whole thing out and then decide which parts should stay in and which parts might best be left undiscussed. Callie nodded to herself. That’s just what she’d do. She started tapping on the keyboard again: “First, you have to know a thing or two about a boy named Jim Trebble.”

  The front-door bell jingled, and the noise of the crowd raced into the room. “Mr. Renfrow!” a familiar voice called, sounding urgent, and Callie jumped out of her seat. What on God’s green earth was Carl Jr. doing here?

  “Hello, Carl Jr.,” came Mr. Renfrow’s calm reply, and when Callie burst into the main office, she found him still at his desk, as though Carl Jr. ran yelling into his office every day of the year.

  “The woods is on fire!” Carl Jr. panted. He was leaning into the front counter like he was trying to push it over. “Somebody set fire to the cabin out there, back of the Jerichos’ place.”

  Mr. Renfrow was up out of his seat like it, too, were on fire. “Did you see it burning?” he asked, pulling on his coat jacket and grabbing his hat.

  “No, no, Wendell told me—this white boy—well, Callie knows him, is how I know him,” Carl Jr. explained rapid-fire, pointing over at his sister. “Anyway, he went there a little bit ago and found it up in flames, so he ran over here to tell me and Callie.”

  “Did he have any idea who started it?” Mr. Renfrow asked, heading for the door, Callie right behind him.

  “He said he don’t know. He just come up on it burning.”

  Mr. Renfrow pushed through the door. “Cabin’s on fire!” he called out, and his words raced through the crowd, one person repeating them to the next person, even though everyone in earshot had already heard.

  Well, here all along Callie had been thinking that the cabin was some sort of secret, something folks only whispered about and half believed in, but looking around the crowd, she realized that cabin had never been a secret, not really. It had been protected by keeping it underground in the day-to-day talk of the Bottom. Because it was clear as day that everybody knew exactly where it was.

  “Bucket brigade!” somebody shouted. “Run and fetch your b
uckets and head down to the river!”

  Why not call the fire department? Callie wondered, but then she tried to imagine a truck getting through the woods and realized there was no way. And no place to plug in the hoses, even if a truck could get out there.

  Everybody scattered at the same time, and Callie didn’t know who to follow—Mr. Renfrow or Carl Jr. But then Carl Jr. made the decision for her, calling out, “Come on, Callie, let’s get some buckets, and Regina, too!”

  Running after Carl Jr., Callie heard the pounding of her own feet on the sidewalk, and turning left onto Marigold, she heard more feet pounding behind her. Must be Sheldon or Marvin, she thought, but when she turned to look behind her, it wasn’t either of them two. In fact, it wasn’t anybody Callie Robinson would ever have expected, even if you’d given her a hundred dollars to make all the guesses in the world.

  No, running behind her was Wendell Crow, busting in out of nowhere, flying as fast as he could to catch up.

  20

  The Story Comes down the Hill

  It was a sight Wendell Crow would remember all of his days. A line at least forty people long stretched from the bank of the river up through the woods to the cabin, buckets filled with water going up, empty buckets coming back down, everybody yelling, little kids crying, and Wendell right in there with them, the only white face in a sea of colored ones.

  It wasn’t any place he’d ever expected to be, and what he was feeling wasn’t something that he expected to feel: that the cabin burning down was his fault, for trying to claim it for his own. Listening to the pieces of talk coming up and down the line with the passed buckets, Wendell was putting the puzzle together. That cabin wasn’t his, and it wasn’t his dad’s or his uncles’, and it sure as heck wasn’t Ray Sanders’s. The only person ever to have officially laid a claim on it was named Mary Barnett, and she had used it to help runaway slaves on the way to the river.

  Miss Mary. The name traveled up and down the line. Meanest old white woman that ever lived, somebody said, and somebody else said, They say she started out Catholic up in Cincinnati but switched over to the Quakers ’cause them Quakers against owning slaves. Say her family kicked her out, so she crossed the river and built herself a cabin.