The Orphan Mother

by Robert Hicks

  “He was just dead and that’s all I seen.”

  “What about the men in the black hats?”

  “I knew they were there, didn’t look too hard at them.”

  “Would you guess they killed your son?”

  “One of them, surely. And surely all of them were helping.”

  “Why would anyone kill your son?”

  “You’d know better than me.”

  “I’m asking you.”

  “Truth is, sir, I don’t know who killed him. I been trying all this time to figure out who, and it turns out, it don’t matter who.”

  A pause. Then from Dixon: “Mrs. Reddick, if you don’t have any relevant information, please remove yourself.”

  “I ain’t going nowhere,” she told him. Then to the bald man with the glasses, in the middle of the dais, she explained, “See, I’m afraid you asking the wrong question. It don’t matter who killed my son, because I know what killed him.”

  “Ma’am?”

  “It’s odd,” Mariah said, almost dreamily, and drifted off to silence again.

  “If the witness has nothing to say, she is dismissed,” Elijah Dixon put in again.

  She ignored him. “I know the truth about who killed my boy. I know names. I know faces. But knowing them wasn’t as simple as I hoped. It took a lot of men to kill my son. It took a lot of years for their hatred to be passed down, from daddy to son and again.”

  “The witness needs to step down,” Dixon insisted.

  And yet the other men kept listening. Something about her earnestness, the way she looked at them directly, through grief and rage and numb incomprehension, froze them and made them hear her.

  “I’ve heard some stories about that morning. They say there was a riot. Gunshot rang out. And my son just happened to be the Negro standing in front. They say it could’ve been any nigger standing there. Maybe they right. Those white men, wherever they are now, they beat my boy within an inch of his life and shot him, and for what?”

  She slammed her hands onto the oak railing.

  “Because they still fighting, and they mad some nigger wants to get up and talk the same way they do. You tell me, what do you think is going to happen if you let us speak? What are you so afraid of, you tell me?”

  “Who are you talking to, Mrs. Reddick?”

  “I’m talking to all of you. You killed a nigger ain’t got no name and no face. And now that he dead, how you feel? Is it over now? What if I told you the boy you killed was my heart and now he’s gone? Would it matter? Maybe I just as much a ghost sitting here now as my son. What killed my son is being strong when all around you is cowards, and they own everything even they don’t own you no more.”

  To Mariah’s appalled astonishment, she found she was weeping. Tears were sliding down her cheeks. She had to wipe them away to see the men sitting there, staring at her, unblinking.

  “Do you know who killed your son?” the bald man asked again.

  “I just said.”

  “Do you have names?”

  She drew a deep breath. “Yes, I have names. But they’re not the real culprits, don’t you hear that?”

  “What names do you have?”

  She repeated the names she’d heard, whispered from the maids and cooks and farmhands, from the smiths and bricklayers and carpenters, from all the black folk all over Franklin, some who’d spoken and some who hadn’t, but the names had made their way back to her, one way or another, and now she said them:

  Aaron Haynes. James Mayberry. Joshua Knight. Samuel Shaw. Daniel Whitmore. Bill Crutcher.

  Those six names she spoke, and when she was done she sat back and breathed.

  “How do you know it was these six men? Do you have any proof?”

  “There’s one more name,” she told them. And pointed. “Elijah Dixon.”

  There. It was done. The poor Negro woman accused the magistrate himself, in front of God and the tribunal and all of Franklin.

  She expected an uproar. She expected Dixon to leap to his feet, protesting. She expected weeping, and a rending of the heavens.

  Instead she found silence.

  “Mrs. Reddick, you realize that Magistrate Dixon was not even on the stage when your son was killed?”

  “I know it. But I know he ordered it.”

  “You are saying that the magistrate conspired with a group of men”—they consulted their notes—“these Misters Haynes, Mayberry, and so forth?”

  “Yessir. That’s what I’m saying.”

  “Conspired with these men to kill your son?”

  “Yessir.” She paused, and thought. “Well, no sir.”

  “The witness will explain herself,” broke in the bearded man on the far right.

  “What did you hear, Mrs. Reddick?” the bald man with the glasses asked her again. “Are you accusing Magistrate Dixon of conspiring with these men you listed to kill your son?”

  “He conspired with the men to kill someone. Maybe not my boy, but that’s what they done.”

  “Who did Magistrate Dixon allegedly conspire to kill?”

  “I don’t rightly know. He got his own business, he crooked.”

  “Where did you hear all this? How do you know this?”

  “People talk. People tell me. I know it. Why don’t you just ask him?”

  The bald man looked sternly at Dixon. “Mr. Dixon, do you have anything to say?”

  Dixon had remained quiet till then, his face gone white, staring openmouthed at Mariah. Now he came to life, sprang up, pointed. “I haven’t the least idea in the world what this Negress is talking about. I think she’s made it up out of whole cloth. She wants to besmirch my reputation and destroy my life, and I haven’t a clue why—oh.” He paused, staring. “I do know why. She’s angry at me.”

  “What for?”

  “She’s the town midwife. A month ago my wife, Evangeline, gave birth to my son Augusten, fifth child. Evangeline had brought her in to assist, but I didn’t like how things were going and I called for the doctor.” Then, to Mariah: “That’s it, isn’t it? You’re jealous and spiteful, angry at me for bringing the doctor in to point out your incompetence.”

  “I saved your baby’s life!” Mariah told him. “He would’ve died if it wasn’t for me.”

  “If it wasn’t for Dr. Cliffe, you mean,” Dixon said.

  The bald man looked from one to the other of them. “This woman’s allegations will need some investigation,” he said.

  “Don’t be absurd,” Dixon sputtered. “This woman has lost her son and she’s looking for someone important to blame, so she says I’m responsible for her son’s death. She gets up here with a crazy story about me trying to kill someone, and she points at me because she thinks she can with impunity.”

  “That may be true,” the bald man said, “but we have to determine—”

  “You have to determine nothing,” Dixon said coldly. “You all were sitting here when she said I didn’t kill her son. She says I ordered it, but maybe not. She names six men, so call them. Call them! Where are they? They haven’t been seen for days, but I’m sitting here doing my duty. And I’m responsible? Do I act guilty? Go find those six, let’s talk to them.”

  Mariah could see the bald man wavering. “What about these other names? Mayberry and so forth?” He looked out in the crowd. “Where are they?”

  “Fled! That’s what they are.” Dixon began to relax. “And this one”—he pointed right back at Mariah—“this one bedeviling your investigation with libels and her Negro midwife houdou theatrics. I say enough is enough.”

  “I’m here for all the people I’ve birthed, white and Negro, so they don’t have to live in a world where men like Mr. Dixon here can cause chaos and kill people,” Mariah said quietly, knowing she had been beaten. She was not surprised.

  “You’re here because you’re a lonely Negro who has a grudge against your betters,” Dixon said.

  “That’s not true!” Carrie McGavock stood up with her hands on her hips. She glared
at Dixon. “And you know better, Elijah. Mariah is one of the smartest, truest people in all the world, and she bears no one a grudge!”

  The bald man banged on the table with the flat of his hand. “Madam, please sit down. We’ll call you if we need you.”

  Reluctantly Carrie sat.

  The bald man turned next to Dixon. “Elijah, how do you know those six have not been seen for days?”

  Dixon spluttered and had no ready answer.

  The bald man waved his hand. “Never mind, I’m sure this all can be explained. But we cannot have you on this tribunal. You are formally put on leave until we can determine if there is any merit to Mrs. Reddick’s claims.”

  Wordless, Dixon gathered his papers, turned, and left by a side door.

  “As for you, Mrs. Reddick,” the bald man said, “am I to understand that you believe these six men actually caused your son’s death?”

  “Yes.”

  “Is there anything further you wish to say?”

  “No sir.”

  “You may leave, then.”

  She looked out onto the courtroom and couldn’t get anyone to meet her eye. She recognized them, white and black, and felt them turned to stone. She stepped down off the platform and looked up one more time. Now she saw April and May in the Negro section and they were smiling and pointing and beckoning her. George Tole was there, too, but he slipped away as she drew closer.

  It was done. Mariah had spoken. But had she been heard?

  Chapter 39

  Letters

  Letter, unsigned and undated, slipped under the door of the offices of Elijah P. Dixon, magistrate, city of Franklin:

  You has lots more to loose then I do. You gots a nice family and lots of moneys. I seen all five of yor chilren. You lay one fingr on her and I will take erithing from you. You stay away far away from her.

  * * *

  Bliss,

  I found them papers. You got to come here to get them. Bring my money too.

  GT

  Chapter 40

  Mariah

  August 6, 1867

  Outside the courthouse, people shuffled down the steps, looked around, and went off in every direction, down the several streets that radiated outward from that center. The town seemed to recede before Mariah’s eyes. Windows were shuttered here and there, doors closed quietly, awnings rolled up. In the quiet the town seemed solid, immovable and ancient.

  The verdict had come down, and it had come down as they’d expected: regrettable chaos. Two men accidentally killed, thirty-two wounded, no one responsible, everyone feeling very guilty and very sorry.

  The magistrate Elijah Dixon on leave, pending further investigation.

  Mariah, for a moment, was a hero—swarmed by friends and colleagues congratulating her. This was a victory, they knew. Today history had been made: a Negro ex-slave had pointed her finger at one of the wealthiest men in town, and she was not (yet) dead. Whether or not there would be long-term consequences, no one could know. But for the moment, a victory. Whites might listen to Negroes with some respect, there might be peace, there might be hope. Or something bloody was coming. It could go either way. In that moment euphoria reigned.

  After the throng had thinned, Carrie made her way through. “Do you want to come back to Carnton with me tonight? I think you should.”

  Mariah looked questioningly at her.

  “You embarrassed Elijah Dixon today. I’m worried that he’ll act out. Better that you’re out in Carnton, with our people around you.”

  Mariah nodded. But she could not spend her life hiding at Carnton, could she? And in the meantime, all of the U.S. Army, it seemed, was flooding the Franklin streets. Was she really in any danger?

  Still and all, she was exhausted, and Carnton seemed very welcome right then. “We going?” she asked Carrie.

  “Yes.” Carrie moved toward the horse hitched at the post.

  “You, too,” Mariah said, pointing at April and May. Carrie didn’t say a word when all three of them climbed up into the trap and the horse began to pull them down the street, through the Bucket, on the way out to Carnton.

  When they passed the sisters’ tavern, Mariah signaled for Carrie to stop, and she couldn’t help marveling when the trap really did stop. Carrie and the sisters exchanged pleasantries as they climbed down. Then Mariah climbed down, too.

  “Where are you going?” Carrie asked, frowning.

  “Have some business.”

  “Will it take long?”

  “Not this kind of business.”

  “I’ll wait,” Carrie said.

  It would not normally have been good for the tavern’s business to have the widow of the South perched on her trap outside the house, but there was already a little crowd inside. Hooper had let them in and was running the pouring and the taking of money for the till. Ain’t a thing that man can’t do, Mariah thought. April know it, too. She watched April slide behind the serving table and poke at the man and bump her shoulder into his.

  They were all there, standing around or sitting on the benches that lined the big room. Country people and people who shined their shoes and polished their watches. At one time they had all been the same in one crucial way, bound and trapped, but since that moment Mariah had watched them all split off and transform, each becoming stranger and more intriguing, an infinite number of butterflies from similar plain cocoons. One of them, or maybe several of them, would be the next to stand up and try another run for office. Maybe April and May would start a hotel. Maybe they would all do something. Not everybody. Some would flutter and sink.

  It was not proper, she knew people would talk about it, and April would think about slapping her face for it, but Mariah leaned over and wrapped Hooper in her arms and kissed him softly on his right cheek. Even after kissing him she wouldn’t let go. She had known him forever, and she wished Theopolis had followed him and done what he did, and become a man like Hooper, quiet and easy, able to make do, able to fit in. But people would be what God made them to be, she thought to herself. Hooper could only be himself, and Theopolis could only be himself. Finally she let him go.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “You can hug me like that anytime.”

  “No she can’t,” April hissed, having slid over to listen. But she blew Mariah a kiss, too.

  “I’m leaving,” Mariah said. The words had no weight in that air, filled with singing and shouting and laughing. They nearly stuck in her throat, too heavy to raise up, but once they were out, they just floated off and disappeared. There was nothing more to say. “But I’ll see you all right soon.”

  Outside, Carrie sat straight, reins in her hands, studying the poplar in front of her. If they had still been children, Carrie would have told her all about how the leaves shivered and spun, and about the orange ring on the poplar blossoms, and how there were fairies standing in the crook of the tree way up there, can’t she see them? But now they were old, or older, and such things a woman like Carrie McGavock, mistress of Carnton, did not say aloud to a Negro, even Mariah Reddick. Not in public, anyway. Mariah wondered if that would ever change. Not before we dead, she thought, climbing up and sitting on the bench of the trap, to Carrie’s right.

  Soon the Bucket was far behind them, and they followed the road through the woods, up and down two hills, off to the side of the old trenches, and onward toward the house. It had become a gray day, and in that light, Carnton seemed smaller. They came up the front drive, where Mariah spied the brief flash of blue from the underside of the front portico ceiling. She was a little surprised when Carrie didn’t stop at the house but continued on down the hill past the smokehouse to Mariah’s cabin.

  She was even more surprised when Carrie got down from the trap there, at the base of the steps up to her quarters.

  “What you doing?” she asked, joining her.

  “I have something to show you,” Carrie said. She began to float, to walk without bobbing or swaying in that strange way she had whenever she felt possesse
d of ancient knowledge. Mariah clunked up the stairs behind her.

  At the top of the stairs, leaning against the wall to the right of the door, Mariah saw a large rounded piece of finished stone on which some words had been carved:

  Theopolis Reddick

  Beloved Son, Free Man

  1842−1867

  Mariah had not been able to afford a proper headstone for Theopolis. She thought she might be able to afford one for herself if she saved her midwifing money for a year or so, but found herself quite willing to accept the gift.

  She turned to Carrie. “Thank you.”

  “You don’t need to thank me. He had a name. He wasn’t just your ‘Dead Son.’ He was your Theopolis. And now the whole world can know.”

  Had he known he was a beloved son? she wondered. She hoped he did.

  “Anyway, it’s not a gift, it’s just something I thought you should see. But there’s a gift inside,” Carrie said, pointing toward the door.

  “Why you giving me gifts?”

  “Gift. One.”

  “And?”

  “Because I know you’re leaving, and that’s what you do when you’re sorry to see someone leave. You give them a gift.”

  “I didn’t say nothing about that.”

  “What else would you do, now? You’re a changed woman, Mariah Reddick. People who sit up in courtrooms don’t live in slave cabins. And this won’t ever be anything more than that. You weren’t going to stay here, I knew that. You did, too. And anyway, we didn’t buy that house for you so no one would live in it.”

  They stood on the threshold for a moment more, considering the way the words they had just exchanged had reordered the universe. And then Carrie walked down the steps, got into the trap, and rode it back up the hill until she had disappeared around the corner of the house.

  Mariah wanted to call out one more thing, but didn’t know what to say. There are no good goodbyes.

  She pushed the door open, went in, and lit her lamp. On the bed was a padded leather box. She sat down on the bed beside it. The black leather nearly shone, and it dimpled where it had been tacked down to the box. A simple brass latch kept it closed. She flipped it open.