The Amalgamation Polka

by Stephen Wright

  Then, after an eternity of not looking, she allowed herself one tiny glance, and there he was, still staring quite openly at her, only now no longer smiling, and even as she watched he rose and began striding purposely toward her. Refusing to be embarrassed or intimidated any further, she remained frozen in her chair, face set, shoulders squared, and awaited his approach.

  “Excuse me,” he said, removing his hat and bowing slightly. “I’ve come to tender my apologies. I hope you’ll forgive me for staring so openly, so impolitely, but I simply found myself quite unable to do otherwise. I know that’s no excuse for such rude behavior, but it is the truth. At first, you see, I thought you were someone else, someone I knew back in the city, but then I realized my error, though now, interestingly enough, standing here before you, I can see that, yes, perhaps I do know you.” And the smile appeared again. Then, noticing the oddly fixed expression on her face, he stopped talking. “There, I’m sorry again. You must think me an absolute madman, accosting you here in public, babbling on like an idiot, and we haven’t been introduced.” He extended his hand. “Thatcher Fish,” he said. “Yes, I know it’s an odd name. Some people mishear it and think I’m referring to a business—hatch fish—but it is a name people remember.”

  Roxana waited a moment just in case there was more, and when convinced he was finally done, she smiled up at him and said, “Pleased to meet you, Mr. Fish. I’m Roxana Maury.”

  “Not the Maurys of Charleston?”

  “Why, yes,” she answered, brows lifting in surprise.

  “I believe my father does business with your father. Textiles,” he said. “Fish and Sons Textiles.”

  “Perhaps he does, but I wouldn’t know,” replied Roxana, not unkindly. “I’m not permitted to know. I’m a girl, you see.”

  Thatcher flashed that smile again which, appearing now up close, forced her to look away. “I do see,” he said. “Do you mind?” he asked, indicating a nearby chair.

  “Oh no, not at all. Please do.”

  “I assume you are here with your family,” he asked, seating himself. “A vacation?”

  “Yes,” Roxana replied. “We’ve been coming every year since before I can remember. At the moment, though, it’s just my mother and I.”

  “I’m here with my family, too. My father is sick. He comes for the water.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  Thatcher brushed the comment aside with his hand. “It’s nothing, really. He’s always sickly. Digestive problems. He needs to get away from the business more often.”

  “I understand. But up here at least you don’t have to contend with the summer sicknesses we are subject to.”

  “You know,” said Thatcher, “and please do not think me too forward, but I must say you have the most beautiful voice. I’ve never heard anything quite like it before.”

  “Thank you,” said Roxana, unable to think of a single additional word to say.

  “So,” asked Thatcher, “what’s it like growing up on one of those big old southern plantations?”

  “Quite pleasant,” she said. “As long as you don’t mind keeping your eyes strictly closed.” She couldn’t understand what was happening to her. In the presence of this stranger the internal barriers that usually moved into place in the company of eligible men had seemingly dissolved away, leaving her feeling disturbingly open—a sensation she didn’t believe she had ever experienced before.

  “I imagine you must have witnessed some terrible events.”

  This is a rather bold gentleman, she thought, but just as she could not look too long directly into his face neither could she refrain from answering whatever question he posed. “Yes,” she said simply. “I’ve witnessed.”

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to pry. It’s just that up here we hear so many shocking stories you can’t help but wonder how true they are. I’ve often thought about one day taking a trip down there. See for myself.”

  “Then you should.”

  “Yes, and the notion is even more inviting now that I know someone who actually lives there, someone I might possibly visit.”

  “Mr. Fish, you are always welcome to pay a call at Redemption Hall. I think you’ll find our hospitality as satisfactory as any.”

  They sat quietly then, side by side, gazing off in opposite directions. Finally, Thatcher turned to her and asked, “How long do you and your mother plan on staying in Saratoga?”

  “I don’t know,” replied Roxana. “And, frankly, I don’t much care. We are here, you see, for my health.”

  “Are you ill?” asked Thatcher, obviously alarmed.

  “No, not really, only insomuch as morally objecting to a brutal system of involuntary servitude is an illness.”

  “Give me your hand,” said Thatcher, and cradling it in his palm he gently kissed the back.

  “Mr. Fish—” she began.

  “No, no,” he answered. “It’s all right.” As their eyes met Roxana found herself gazing into something so alive, so astonishingly real, she momentarily forgot where she was.

  They spent the rest of the afternoon in the lobby conversing upon the fateful “subject.” Thatcher, too, had alienated himself from the affections of his family through a too vigorous questioning of the issue of human bondage and his father’s financial implication in it. Some years before, Thatcher had met a young Quaker girl who had attended many meetings devoted to the cause, seen Garrison himself dragged through the street with a rope around his neck, the remandment of Anthony Burns, and she began to educate Thatcher on the scourge of slavery. They became engaged to be married but several months before the ceremony she contracted cholera and after much painful suffering she died.

  “I’m sorry,” said Roxana, tears gathering in her own eyes.

  “No,” said Thatcher. “I’m the one who should apologize yet again. I should not have burdened you with my past.”

  “But we all have pasts. That’s who we are.”

  They saw each other every day after that, meeting first in the lobby, then taking long strolls through the town. All these hours spent in the company of a strange man, a strange northerner at that, quite alarmed Mother.

  “Who is this person?” she demanded to know, unconsciously pleased that she and her daughter now had a topic other than politics or religion to discuss.

  “His name is Thatcher Fish. He’s studying to be an attorney. His family are merchants. They’re all rich. And he’s a staunch abolitionist.” The word fell between them like a bloody knife and Roxana waited, unblinking.

  The reaction, however, was not what she expected. “Sit down,” said Mother calmly. “I want to talk to you.”

  They sat facing one another, Roxana’s countenance grim and implacable.

  “Roxana,” her mother began. “You know your father and I both love you dearly. Since your sister died you have become even more precious to us. So we’ve been most concerned with this recent behavior of yours. It seems your intention is to deliberately provoke as much dissension as possible within the family. You seem to wish to separate yourself from the care of your father, your brothers and myself. Unhappiness roosts in our house and you have called it in. And I want to tell you that personally I do respect your beliefs. All I ask is that you also respect mine.”

  Before Mother could continue, Roxana broke in with, “But I cannot. Does it not say in Psalms 2:3 ‘Let us break their bonds asunder and cast away their chains.’”

  “Don’t start quoting Scripture at me,” said Mother angrily. “I can quote passages right back at you.”

  “Slavery is wrong,” argued Roxana, her own voice matching her mother’s in emotion. “It is not only wrong, it is evil, and to participate in it, to profit from its fruits, is to make one an accomplice in evil.”

  Mother sighed. “Are you suggesting to my face that I and your father and brothers are evil?”

  Roxana didn’t answer.

  “Are you also suggesting that you, too, are evil. Because this trip and this room we’re
sitting in have been paid for with money earned from the products of our fields, of our hands. So, too, has the food you’ve eaten, the clothes you’ve worn, the clothes you’re now wearing.”

  Without a word Roxana rose in fury from her chair and, seizing her dress at the collar with both hands, began to pull frantically at the cloth until it started to tear. Then, her hands working now in a frenzy, she yanked at the material, opening the tear down to the hem, and, pulling her arms from the sleeves, she stepped out of her dress and stood before her mother in white undergarments that, after a pause, she began to pull from her body.

  “Roxana!” her mother shouted. “Stop! Stop this instant!”

  Glaring fiercely back, she refused to stop until she was completely naked and her mother, in a single swift motion, rose up and slapped her across the cheek and, as though it were all part of one continuous movement, Roxana’s hand flew up and slapped her mother across her cheek.

  “How dare you?” Mother asked coldly, her eyes searching the room.

  “What are you looking for? Your cane?”

  “One more word from you and—”

  “And what?”

  “Put on some clothes. We’re leaving this wretched place today.”

  Roxana pulled a sheet from the bed. “Considering where we are I suppose this is somewhat less sinful to wear since it was probably woven by free labor, even if the bolls it was made from were probably splashed with blood.” She wrapped the sheet around her body and walked out the door.

  “Roxana!” called her mother. “Roxana!”

  Not until she had closed the door behind her did she allow the sobs to come, but she kept moving, her bare feet marching down the carpeted corridor, hair askew and cheeks wet. She could feel the eyes upon her, hear the gasps, the startled whispers, but she stared straight ahead and kept on down the hall, then down the stairs to the next floor and the door whose number she had involuntarily memorized after hearing it spoken just once, and she rapped timidly, once, twice, and when the door was opened and she saw Thatcher she felt herself begin to fall and it was not entirely unpleasant, this falling, as she gave herself up to the sensation and thinking before thought ended that she didn’t care where she landed.

  She never saw her mother or her father or her brothers or Ditey or Sally or Eben or Redemption Hall ever again.

  Once, after an absence of some three days, Liberty returned home with a blackened eye and a cut across his chin. He refused to admit where he had been or to explain how he had received his injuries. He went up to his room while the family sat in the parlor, discussing their wayward son.

  “I told you,” declared Aunt Aroline. “I’ve told the both of you for years and no one paid any heed. I said the boy lacks discipline, he wants the correcting hand, but no one listened, no one minded what poor old Aroline had to say.”

  “That’s not true,” argued Thatcher. “Your contributions to this household are received with gratitude and respect and I will not have you going on like this.”

  “All I’ve ever asked,” said Aroline, “is that I be shown the scantiest hint of appreciation for what I do to help hold this fragile house together. God knows we’ve had enough strife in this family and I simply don’t know if I can endure watching this precious branch of it falling into splinters.” She extracted a flowery handkerchief from her apron pocket and held it firmly clenched in her fist as she gazed dolefully around the room, daring the others to just try to make her cry.

  “Honestly,” said Roxana, impatience harshening her voice, “you act as if the issue before us today is you. The issue is not you, Aroline, and I would take it kindly if you did not always carry on as though it were.”

  “I have as much right to an opinion as anyone else in this room.”

  “Certainly you do,” said Thatcher, “but we seem to be straying from the topic at hand.”

  “I was not the one who strayed,” said Aroline firmly.

  “I never suggested you did,” said Thatcher.

  “She appears to have difficulty hearing clearly what anyone says,” offered Roxana.

  “I heard that clear enough,” snapped Aroline, “and I don’t like it.”

  “That’s quite all right. Is it absolutely necessary that you personally approve every word spoken under this roof?”

  “If we could get back to the question of Liberty,” interjected Thatcher.

  From the refuge of the sofa where he had been half-reclining with his brandy and his cigar and listening with detached amusement to this charming family colloquy, Uncle Potter cleared his throat, waited until he had gained everyone’s attention and said, “Give the boy over to me for a few days. I can show him what he wants.”

  “Nonsense,” said Aroline.

  “Thinking of taking a jaunt down to the big city,” Potter continued. “Boy’s got the wanderlust, same as his old uncle. He might enjoy the sights, get his eyes filled up good.”

  “I wouldn’t trust you to walk that child into the next room,” Aroline announced.

  “He’s no longer exactly a child,” Thatcher reminded her.

  “Child or no, any soul delivered to the custody of this reprobate is certain to be placed in jeopardy.”

  Thatcher eyed his wife, who had remained strangely silent. “What do you think, dear?”

  “I trust Potter,” said Roxana. “I’d prefer he accompany him than run about the countryside alone.”

  “Capital,” said Potter, taking a huge gulp directly from the bottle. “We depart on the morrow.”

  “Please, Potter,” asked Roxana, “keep a close eye on him. I wouldn’t want—”

  “Tut-tut,” declared Potter, waving his cigar dismissively. “I’ll cleave him to me as if he were my very own.”

  “God help us,” commented Aroline.

  Mother and Father exchanged a look, and though she managed to produce a smile it was an expression that seemed to have been laboriously constructed from the flimsiest of materials. Roxana had always known a day like this would eventually come, but not so soon. Nevertheless, she had promised herself long ago that she would be strong, she would not protest, she would not cry. She was determined that the circumstances of her own traumatic departure from home would not be repeated in any family of her own. She couldn’t bear to think that her own child might feel imprisoned within the walls of his natural home. So however much the decision pained her, she believed that allowing Liberty the freedom to go when he wished might assure that he would also come back when he wished.

  New York. A fanciful realm where all the noise and heat and general untidiness of desire unfettered was allowed full and natural exhibit in a daily frenzy of banknotes. People were different here, Potter had instructed his young nephew, money was as an elixir to them, their health, their mental harmony dependent upon a vigorous regimen of the stuff. So should you happen to spy a nearby chap suddenly erupt into a sweat, eyeballs a-dancing, limbs a-twitching, quickly stand aside ’cause likely you’ve come unknowingly between the slathering habitué and his dose of corrective tender. And never look a stranger in the eye, as he will believe you might be preparing to rub him down with a knuckle towel. Don’t talk to anyone, Jack or Jill, for they ever seek to pick your heart’s pocket. Keep your own coin in your boot, along with a well-whetted sticker. These metropolitans were a cagey lot.

  As the packet from Albany approached the unimaginably crowded docks, ships from all nations moored nearly hull to hull into the receding distance, an excited Liberty strained to catch a glimpse of the notorious city through the intervening leafless forest of masts, spars and rigging, and his initial impression was this: bricks and people in equally astonishing numbers and though the masonry was more or less uniform in size and color, the circulating citizens were not. Here seemed to be contained every shape and hue the human animal was capable of attaining and, apparently, dressed in every costume the human brain was capable of devising.

  A brief rainstorm had moved off shortly before they disembarked, leaving the gu
tters running with a thick black gruel of garbage and bodily waste, and the odor was, as Potter grimly remarked, “absolutely tremendous.” Gulls cried, dogs barked, goats bleated, herds of insolent pigs rooted boldly through the congested streets. The rattle of wagon and carriage wheels, the clopping of hooves, the tramping of uncountable feet was near deafening. Liberty felt thrillingly disoriented. A scarlet and yellow omnibus clattered dangerously by, heads poking animatedly from every window, passengers hanging precariously from the sides. A small girl in layers of calico rags, pushing a steaming cart before her, chanted in high singsong, “Hot corn! Hot corn here!” A gang of filthy urchins dashed deliriously through the crowds, bumping aggressively into startled pedestrians. Around the corner a fat man in a stained butcher’s smock and brandishing a long carving knife chased another man into a saloon. Impudent women, young and old, in various states of dishabille, lounged in doorways and windows, calling out to passing gentlemen, one even addressing Potter by name. “Not today, Pearl,” replied his uncle good-naturedly, “I’ve got my nephew with me.” The woman looked Liberty over in a manner he had never known before. “Bring him up, too,” she said. “He looks plenty old enough to me.” Potter laughed and they walked on.

  “So, Liberty,” inquired Potter, “what think you of our fair city here?”

  “It caps the climax,” he replied, eyes glittering.

  Potter squeezed the boy in a suffocating hug, then led him on through the tumult that was New York to a mammoth building on lower Broadway with architecture so fantastic, columns and gargoyles, towers and turrets and domes, even gilt-framed portraits, it resembled the most elaborate wedding cake Liberty had ever seen. Streams of people were entering, streams of people were exiting. A huge sign the length of the front façade announced that this establishment was the famous P. T. Barnum Museum and Hall of Wonders and Oddities from around the world.

  Potter, who announced proudly that he had visited this grand edifice several times before, bought tickets from a woman in a caged booth at the entrance. She was wearing a turban on her head and jeweled rings on her fingers and she barely glanced at either of them, ignoring Potter’s comment about the natural loveliness of her face.