Ray stops. “Well, when Henry gets back in here, we gon’ search every room.”
“Look, Cynthia,” Bobby Lee say. “We can go room by room, upsetting whatever you got going on here ’til we find her, or you can just bring her out and we can leave you alone. No bother. It’s your choice.”
Cynthia throws her legs up on the bar. “How ’bout we play a game, instead. Ray, you like games? Bernadette tells me you do.”
Cynthia picks up her pistol and points it at Ray’s head. Bobby Lee raises his pistol to Cynthia, say, “I won’t let you shoot.”
Slowly, she opens her pistol’s barrel and dumps out all the bullets on the bar top. “I said I was gon’ play a game. Didn’t say nothing about shooting him,” she say and puts a single bullet back in the chamber and closes it. “Unless he wants me to.”
SISSY ROCKS IN her chair, not talking to nobody, the children play coin roll on the floor and Jackson’s holding the bread above Josey’s head making her leap for it, laughing.
I circle the room, don’t know what to do. I can stay here and do my best to protect mine, or go out and face that pack and maybe stop one of ’em. I cain’t be everywhere at once.
Rachel gets up and asks Josey if she can scrape the skin off a potato for the stew. Josey rolls one to Rachel and says, “Let me show you how to slice it off without losing too much.”
Squiggy swats an onion off the table to the floor and chases it while Jackson puts salt and pepper in a pot of water on the stove. He tastes the broth, adds a last bit of chopped garlic. Tastes it. “That’s what it needs more of,” he say, wiping his hands down his shirt.
“So you’re a regular cook now?” Josey laugh.
“You just watch my pot,” he say, smiling. He kisses her on the way to the door. “You’ll see what a fresh clove’ll do.”
Jackson opens the front door, stops when he sees the soldiers emerge from the tree line three hundred yards away. They’re on top of their horses, swaying toward us. Colonel’s up front.
Jackson slams the door closed, locks it.
“What’s wrong?” Josey say.
“We gotta get outta here,” Jackson say, frantic. “Right now. All us. We got to go.”
Sissy sits up.
He pushes Josey and the babies to the back of the house. “Come on, Momma,” he say. “Open this pantry.”
Hearing the tone in his voice, Sissy takes the key and its chain from around her neck and gives it to Jackson. He unlocks the door, throws it open, and they all crowd inside. All but Sissy. He lifts the toilet seat cover and the smell of the rotten food they’ve been pitching down the hole wafts up. He moves the whole seat over.
“Go on!” Jackson say to Josey.
Josey sits on the floor and lowers herself down the hole, standing on rot. She reaches up for her children.
Jackson lifts Squiggy first and fumbles him down the hole to Josey’s waiting arms. He grabs for Rachel.
“Daddy, I don’t want to go down there,” she say. “It’s dark.”
“There ain’t nothin to be afraid of, baby.” He puts his hands around her waist.
“And it stank,” she say. “Daddy, I don’t want to go.”
He lifts her. “Nothin to be afraid of. Your momma’s right there. And Squiggy.” He eases her down.
“No, I don’t want to go!” she cries. Kicking now.
“Just help her down,” Josey say.
But Rachel climbs over his shoulder, digging her feet in his stomach, stepping up him, falling over him, screaming, her face red and sweaty now. He yanks her away from his shoulder like a kitten caught on a blouse, but she keeps screaming, scratching, her teeth clinched, her face shaking. Jackson stuffs her down the hole with her legs in splits. Josey pulls Rachel through the rest of the way, holds her arms, puts her hand over Rachel’s mouth.
“Go!” Jackson say. “Back to the old slave quarters.”
Josey hesitates.
“I know . . . I know,” he say as calm as he can, apologizing. “I know it’s hard for you to go through them woods but you got to. For our children. For me.”
Josey takes Squiggy’s hand and carries Rachel, running with ’em toward the unfinished trail.
Jackson turns to Sissy who stands at the cupboard opening. “All right. Come on, Momma. I’m gon’ lower you down and we gon’ go together. I’ll carry you if I have to.”
Sissy backs away.
“Momma, we gotta hurry.”
“Why? For what, Jackson?”
“There’s soldiers coming.”
“None of us did nothing wrong.”
“Men like them only mean to harm.”
“To you? You a deserter, Jackson?”
“You got to trust me, Momma. These cavalry men.”
“Nobody makes me leave my house,” Sissy say, and takes another step back.
“Momma, I promised you I wouldn’t leave you again. And I won’t leave you here.”
“Cain’t you?” she say. “You got a new family now. Don’t need me. You just gon’ throw me out like I’ve always been thrown out. I shoulda taught you better, Jackson . . .”
“Momma, please.” He reaches out for her arm, pulls at her.
Knocks burst at the front door. Jackson’s eyes widen. “Momma! We got to get outta here.”
Sissy takes a step toward Jackson, pushes him hard into the cupboard. He stumbles all the way back to the hole in the floor, one of his legs fall through.
Sissy shuts the door as he fights his way back up. She locks it from the outside before he can get to it. It’s too late for him to turn it open now. He hunches down inside the door, looking through the key hole. “Momma?” She turns her back to him and shuffles to the front door.
CYNTHIA SPINS HER pistol’s barrel; the single bullet inside is lost now. The other bullets that were on the bar top roll across the counter and one falls on the wood floor, thuds when it hits—my signal to get across this room and out the door. When the chamber stops, Cynthia lays her head on the side of the pistol like it’s a pillow. A hush falls over the room.
“Put the gun down, Cynthia,” Bobby Lee say.
“Or what?” she say. “You gon’ shoot me, Bobby Lee?”
“I can’t let you hurt nobody,” Bobby Lee say.
“What is this game?” Ray say.
“I call it, ‘Who’s The Asshole?’” Cynthia say.
Ray laughs. His noisemaking gives me the cover I need to take my first step.
I stick my foot out toward the plank closest to me and hold my belly for balance, touch my big toe to it, slowly lean forward, and ease my weight on it. Slow . . . slow . . . the squeak is loud. Only twelve, thirteen, fourteen steps to the side door.
The front door in the saloon swings open and Henry comes barging back in. “What the hell’s goin on in here?”
“She gon’ shoot her brains out!” Ray say.
Henry rushes over, happy to see.
The board squeaks under me and the men look down. I hold still and Cynthia croons. “Just in time, Henry. You love games, too.”
Bobby Lee say, “Just put the gun down, Cynthia.”
“It’s just a game, right, Bobby Lee? Just a job?” she say. “Surely, you of all people have nothing against it.”
“Come on, Cynthia,” Bobby Lee say. “You ain’t faster than a bullet.”
“Yours or mine?” she say. “I ain’t got to be faster than your bullet, just faster than your trigger finger.”
I reach out my next foot. Run one, two, three quiet steps and suddenly, my whole body burns. Stabbing pain is shooting up my body and around my belly.
I cringe, hoping it’s false labor pain. Cynthia told me these false ones ain’t nothin compared to the real ones coming in three or four weeks. But this pain is winding up worser and worser. I hunch over, grunting, look up through the floor boards in tears.
Ray say to Bobby Lee, “Let her do it.”
“Yeah,” Henry say. “Don’t ruin the fun, Bobby Lee. I want to see.”
> Cynthia smiles. Spins the barrel again.
THE FOUR SOLDIERS—FATTY, Skinny, Snooper, and Colonel—line the porch in front of Sissy’s opened door with their hats in their hands, like they polite and friendly. Fatty stands on the last step, watching their backs. Colonel say with a smile, “How do you do, ma’am?”
“How do, suh,” Sissy say.
“We was told we could find Jackson and Josephine here.”
Sissy don’t answer.
Skinny looks over Sissy’s shoulder trying to see in the house. Colonel say, “They haven’t done anything wrong, ma’am. We just need to check on ’em. Are they here?”
“Check ’em for what?” Sissy say.
“Well . . .”
“Did—did Jackson run from his service?”
The soldiers look at each other, confused.
“To the contrary, ma’am,” Colonel say. “We want to reward him for his honorable service.”
“My son? Honorable?”
“Yes, ma’am,” he say. “A medal with his name on it. Good conduct and bravery . . .”
“Ain’t no ceremony you coulda summoned us to? So everybody could see?” Sissy say.
“We thought we’d deliver it personal,” Colonel say. “A hero’s service just for your son.”
“Then why y’all want to see Josey?”
“We don’t have time for this!” Colonel say. “Where is he? We saw your son with that white whore.”
“White? Josephine ain’t . . .”
“Ma’am,” Colonel say. “There’s no point in protecting ’em. How much is a woman like you willing to give up for somebody else’s mistake?”
Sissy shakes her head, “But . . .”
“People like your son don’t care who they hurt, what the law is,” Colonel say. “What about the children that come from it? It’s selfish, that’s what it is. Those like your son take whatever they want, just like these damn Yanks.”
Sissy say, “But . . .” A gun shot. Sissy’s body jerks.
Colonel has his pistol back at his side before she hit the ground. Blood spreads around the new hole in her heart and through her dress.
“I told her we didn’t have time for this,” Colonel say.
I HOLD STILL as best as I can under the floor of Cynthia’s cellar. The weight of my belly is tipping me forward, but I fight it. My nose is running ’cause mildew and dust got in it, making it drip on my yellow dress. I quit breathing through it so I don’t sneeze.
“Cynthia, don’t play at this,” Bobby Lee say.
Click. That’s her first pulled trigger.
Outside, a noise like a birdcall comes through the gaps around the door.
And again.
It’s one bird, no . . . two. A hoot of an owl, a screech of a falcon. But they don’t sound natural—two birds of prey, close enough to be on the same branch?
“We only here to do a job,” Bobby Lee say to Henry. “You and Ray search the rooms.” But they don’t go.
She pulls her trigger again.
Click.
COLONEL STEPS OVER Sissy’s body saying, “Come on out, Jackson. We just want to talk to you.”
Fatty searches the room. He draws his pistol, opens the cupboard door. No Jackson. He sees the opening in the floor, kneels down to it, yells back to the front door, “He’s a runner!”
Colonel and Skinny run out to the front door. Far off to the left of the porch, Jackson leaps into the woods, his head is bobbing up and down like one of them white-tailed deer, going in the direction of the Grahams’ house away from Josey and the children.
“There he is!” Snooper say.
Skinny runs down the porch. Colonel pulls out his rifle, prepares to fire at Jackson. His rifle jams. “Dammit!” he say.
He and the men race to their horses.
EVEN THOUGH IT’S quiet, I take a chance at another step.
It starts the dogs barking out front.
I shut my eyes. Hold still again. Gon’ pee myself. I put my hands between my legs, stop my bladder.
Henry rushes to the front window to see what the dogs is getting after.
“Henry,” Cynthia say. “You wouldn’t believe how many lives I have.” She holds the gun to her head and pulls the trigger twice. Click. Click.
“Goddamn!” Henry say.
“Fine, I’ll go look for her myself,” Bobby Lee say. “Can’t believe y’all want to watch this.”
Over the loud barking, I take two, three running steps across the floor.
Almost there.
The unnatural birdcalls start again. This time, flashes of light come through the door’s gap, too. Quick-like. Flickers in the dark. One flicker. Stop. Then a second and third flicker. A whistle. The Railroad north to freedom.
There must be a dozen of ’em out there, black men and women, children, risking their lives waiting for other negroes to join ’em.
I RUSH OVER small trees and skim tall grasses, up and down the lane of Jackson’s cut-down trees searching for Josey. For Rachel. Nothin. This is the only path here.
A quarter mile to the old slaves’ quarters from Sissy’s and Jackson’s path is blocked by trees that have grown back and made a wall. There’s no way forward, only back. They cain’t go back. There’s killers there.
I wait here at the wall, confused. There’s no way around it and Josey wouldn’t have gone through it. Even with Jackson and a blanket over her head.
A small figure walks out of the brush. Squiggy.
He’s alone.
I trace his steps back to where he came from and find Josey there covered in the tall grasses, frozen from the touches of shadows. Her knees are pressed against her chest. But Rachel is missing.
Squiggy squats beside her now, “Ma-ma,” he say, calling her name for the first time. She shutters. But only her eyes shift toward him. Her gray lips tremble.
BOBBY LEE HEADS for the hallway, annoyed and yelling, “This is a sideshow!” and stops short. “You comin, Ray?”
“We’re just getting started,” Cynthia say, and Ray’s attention is fixed on her trigger finger.
Bobby Lee cocks his pistol and turns into the hall. I freeze where I am. Cain’t think what to do. And now I cain’t remember if I shut that trap door that leads down here. God, let him pass by this bathroom for someplace else.
I count Bobby Lee’s steps and hear him walk past the first door—the linen closet. He takes enough new steps to pass the second door, third, and me in the fourth, I think. I don’t know what’s taking him so long.
He opens the door. “Get out!” Bernadette screams. “Get out! And tell Cynthia I’m not leaving. I just finished decorating this room and I’ll be damned if I can’t have this one, either.”
Please, God, make my door like the linen closet so he pass me by.
An urging rises up from inside me—not the baby—an instinct, maybe. A voice. It tells me, “Go!” and I tiptoe around the edge of this cellar, blocking out the noise from my head that might stop me.
By the grace of God, I make it to the under-porch door and pull.
RACHEL WASN’T AT the house.
Only Sissy was there, unmoved.
The soldiers left too fast to have met Rachel when they gave chase to Jackson and I didn’t see her along the path to the Graham house. Jackson must have circled back and got her. And now I’ve beat him here.
I’ll wait for a minute.
This house looks different since the war. Weary. The perfectly rounded rosebushes that once lined the drive like watercolor moons are bushy now. A chunk of wood plank is missing from the painted porch—a tan patch in all the white. But the acres of green field out front still roll and dip as they always have ’cause God’s still tending to it.
Heavy footsteps run up behind me. Jackson racing to the house. He don’t have Rachel.
He runs around to the back, peeking through windows. He could have had enough time to bring Rachel here and hide her. Not wishful thinking. I follow him around and go ahead of him, find one w
indow unlocked before he do. I sail through it, coast inside the room—Annie’s new library.
Nobody’s here.
Books are on shelves around me and the broken oak table from the kitchen that slaves used to chop and sort on is here, too. But no Rachel. Pamphlets are spread across the tabletop.
I pass through the only door in this room and it leads to a connected room, a study, where Missus Graham is sitting at a desk in a plain blue dress, her hair pinned into a bun. She tilts her teacup to her lips, sips, and sets it down before writing in her notebook.
The scribbles of her pen start and stop and point. Start and stop and point, and start again. I look over her shoulder . . . a letter to her cousin.
I whisper, “You should go upstairs.” But she keeps writing.
A thud in the library calls her attention. “George?” she say.
She gets up and I rush back to the library ahead of her, find Jackson inside searching the room. Ain’t no way out except straight to where Missus Graham is or back out the way he came. She walks in the room, already talking, “I thought you wouldn’t be back until this evening.”
Jackson holds his breath from under the chopping table.
She looks around the room, surprised she don’t see George. Only the window gapping open. She goes to it and looks out of it, pulls it closed. It sticks before it finally shuts. Jackson’s already slipped behind her, through her study and out into the house.
Jackson stops in the hallway in front of Annie’s wood and glass cabinet where her rifle is. He reaches inside the cabinet, grabs the rifle, closes the door with a soft click.
He stops.
In the glass’s reflection, standing behind him, is Annie. Terror rises on her expression.
THE WARP OF a floorboard under this door has swelled. I step on it. Put all my weight on top of it. Pull again.
No use.
Try harder. It squeaks but don’t open.
Air whooshes in the bathroom above, rattling the trap door. Bobby Lee walks in.
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