by Alix Hawley
I walk over slowly. When I am a few yards away I say:
—Brothers.
My skin pricks, alertness rises through me. The man on the horse points and says:
—Little Blue Eyes. How do?
He dismounts and offers his hand. He is tall, with that long rocky fall of a face. He splits it now with a broad closed smile and goes on looking at me.
I know him. Of course I do. I say:
—Well my old friend. Did you enjoy my gun, Jim?
I am pleased at remembering his English name. The Cherokee Jim gives a light coughing laugh and an easy salute. The other man is a stranger to me, but he laughs politely too. Jim holds out a pipe and says:
—Smoke?
We sit at the edge of the half-cleared field. The air smells of burning stumps and sweat. I call the boys over and they obey stiffly. They know to be polite and careful, though my bold Israel stares. Jemima is not to be outdone in boldness and runs up through the raw churned-up earth to stare also. The strange man grins and reaches to pull one of her black plaits. She scratches his cheek with her swift fingernails. I say:
—Stop that now.
—Daddy he—
The man gestures, it is all right. He touches his face, and seeing no blood, he rummages in his pouch and pulls out a lump of dark, hard candy. Jemima takes it, quick as a cat. The boys look over with interest.
—Not so old, ha.
Jim passes them all lumps of the maple candy. The other man nods, then takes out his tobacco. Flies cut through the air around us, scenting the sugar. Jesse sucks loud. My Israel pokes him and says:
—Slow down, they have more.
We sit chewing and smoking, talking here and there of the weather and the cropping. The Cherokee appear to be relaxed anywhere. They are easily still, like tools or guns set down. Our talk is broken and shallow, and yet I am queerly glad to see this Jim again with his easy manner. He reminds me of Kentucky.
Squinting against the pipe smoke, he asks how long we have been settled here. I say:
—A good while.
—You will stay?
The boys all look at me at once. Jemima too. I say evenly:
—For now.
Jim digs the toe of his moccasin into the yellowy earth. He says:
—A good place. Good water, good fields.
The other man is tweaking Jemima’s ear. Out darts her hand for another piece of candy. Jim chuckles and goes on:
—We saw your man.
I sit up and say:
—Which man? Name of Stewart? A big man, like this?
I point at Jonathan, who is tall. I set my hands apart to show Stewart’s greater width. Jim smiles in the direction of my boys. He shakes his head and says:
—Your ghost man. Your Blue Eyes.
—Findley. Ah. He still has his eyes then, he has not traded those away. You saw him in Kentucky?
The grey taste of smoke swirls in my mouth, and my heart leaps with the thought of Kentucky being a true place that still exists to speak of. I do not want others there, but I wish to speak of it. I say it again:
—In Kentucky.
Jim shakes his head and looks east, saying:
—Kentucky is Indian land. No whites.
—For now.
As I say these words again, we laugh, but it has a brittle sound. We know about the Iroquois giving up any claim to the land. But there has been no word of any Cherokee treaty, nor any Shawnee. The other man is snapping his fingers lightly, and Jim tugs a weed from the ground and rolls it about his thumb. I say:
—You have not given it up, then. But there is plenty of room there, plenty of game. Our man Findley might have some pretty things to give you in trade, would that change your mind? Though I do wonder if our Blue Eyes is dead. He was always white enough to be a ghost, and Kentucky is paradise.
I look at Jim. He smiles again but says no more. The flies are insistent. Jemima pipes up:
—Are you on a long journey? Where are you going? Where is your home?
Jim shrugs and widens his eyes to saucers at her but she does not laugh. I say:
—Then you have no home to get back to.
—Home is where we like.
—Kentucky, I suppose.
—If we like.
—You do just as you like. This seems to me a fine philosophy, it was my brother Israel’s too. One we might all abide by.
Jim’s smile has gone stiff. He suddenly pushes the pipe straight at Jamesie, nodding. My boy sets his brow. He has avoided it so far, but now he takes a pull and coughs, trying to swallow the smoke, and then coughs harder, his face stained deep red. The Cherokees chuckle and clap. Jamesie suffers. He never could laugh at himself but he tries now, coughing still. Jemima pounds on his ribs with both fists. Cherokee Jim looks around slowly, still smiling. He says very firm:
—A good place. To stay.
Well. There are better.
I get restless all through again, my brains itch as though stitched up too tight in their casing. It is now a Sunday, and we all put on good clothes and sit about silent to take our ordained rest after my sister Hannah gives us a good talking- to about God and prays for her husband’s return. I listen, for Stewart’s sake, but I cannot keep my mind from wandering. As we sit outside the house, I remove one of my good black shoes, which is creased over the top and loose about the heel. My bared toes look white and sorry and blind. I am at once ashamed of my shallow roots here. So much for Rebecca’s happiness. I am sorry, Rebecca, but there is no help for it. We keep scratching at the ground and trying to dig ourselves in, but nothing is holding us here but stubbornness. And so there is no reason not to go on a space. I know of a space that I cannot forget in spite of what the Cherokee said.
I find myself wishing that the Cherokee would come back, and they do.
Rebecca huffs about my Indian tea parties and sends Susannah and Jemima out with seed cakes and rude stares. These occasions do feel thin, but we go along with them. We are attempting good will, as the Indians are. They always offer candy to the children and a smoke to the boys. Jamesie gets better acquainted with the pipe. Jim pulls the girls’ plaits lightly every time he visits, and after Susy cajoles him, he once lets his hair down out of his headscarf. He has only a scalplock, which falls down over the back of his skull and down his shoulders. Susy grabs it and laughs. Jemima will not touch it but she stares a good long time.
We talk of all manner of subjects. But I cannot think of anything but walking through Kentucky. All winter I think of it.
Again Fate reads my thoughts. Two broad shapes poke up out of the earth next spring as if from bulbs, all confidence. They are on horseback, and two slaves ride with supplies some distance behind. They are not Indians. One is William Hill.
—Here you are, Dan, we have heard much of your travels! And your woodsman’s prowess, your nobility of character. The first white man in Kentucky. I have spread the word, my old friend, are you glad to know it? The newspapers probably never reach you here. And I am still writing my book.
Dismounting, Hill bows low so that his forehead almost touches the ground. He has grown a small stiff beard and has the look of a broom when he springs up again.
I say:
—Hill, you are not telling the truth. I was not the first there, you know that.
—What does that matter? It is my book.
He snatches up my hand and pumps away, asking how I have been keeping, happy to see the family and all the dear Boone children.
The dear Boone children look for the most part perplexed. I will not let him near Jemima. She cannot be his child. Surely she cannot be. I look sharply at her face. Her eyes are not his. Even the thought makes my brains feel dirtied and sick all through. No. She is mine, or near enough now. I go stiff-necked, but before I can speak, Hill’s companion says:
—Everyone has heard of you now. Why do you make yourself so hard to find?
He is sleek, with the look of one who has lost all his edges. Even his head and shou
lders look coated in a layer of plump new fat. He is well-dressed, like Hill, and has shiny eyes that are kind enough but float about in a desire to see more of everything. He makes the cabin feel shrunken. Hill says:
—My friend William Russell, from Virginia.
Russell holds out his hand to me with the glove off and the palm up as if to show off its toughness and redness from riding such a distance. He has been much with Hill, it seems to me. He calls for one of the slaves to bring the horses round to the barn.
Hill has turned to Rebecca with a light in his eye. Russell is looking at her with a bailiff’s appraising flash. They turn their look on Susy, who is a pretty and lively girl, never still.
These two both here alive, and Stewart lost. I want to strike them dead. I stand, but Rebecca pulls herself up next to me and says in her best queenly manner:
—It is natural that everyone should have heard of my husband.
Hill laughs, all good cheer. He says:
—Naturally! Naturally everyone has heard that we have been into the fair country of Kentucky. They will read my book when I have finished it. When we have completed our tale, that is to say. Your husband, Mrs. Boone, is the man to lead a party back. We are the men to make it pay.
When I am able to speak, I say:
—You plan to return to Kentucky in person? In spite of its insect life?
I puff out my cheeks and Hill laughs from the bottom of his lungs, full of his old joy at a new prospect, the hornets who near killed him now a joke. Touching his beard, he says:
—Now I have this to protect me, and we have the land company registered.
My heart falls within me. Hill carries on:
—You might do the surveying once you get us there. We will pay you. You cannot say you will not go back. I know the cockles of your heart!
—Do you indeed?
—I do! And you may choose the first lot. Any land your cockles fancy.
Slowly I say:
—There is no stopping you, Hill, is there.
—Never.
—You are going to sell it—Kentucky—to all takers?
Hill’s grey eyes brighten, his face softens. He says:
—Not to all. No border trash. Only to good people, the best people! We will make a proper place of it. Big plots, plenty of land, and no need to see anyone if you do not wish to, Dan.
I feel him waiting for my answer. I say:
—Perhaps I do not give you enough credit.
—Your credit, Boone, is not your strength, but I will not remind you of old debts now. Only old times.
Hill touches my arm and juts out his jaw in a grin. Hill, arranging my life for me again. It seems to me at this time that the rich always carry a happiness that they do not know they have. Not to need money is a happiness that must go down to the marrow. I see it in Hill’s and Russell’s posture and their ease. For a moment I wish deeply to be like them. Unhappiness wells up in me. I smooth my face and I say:
—Land is the way to my heart, is it?
—I know all the hidden paths of anatomy. Every twist and secret turn, I have made quite a study—
He glances sidelong at Rebecca and the girls, then curbs himself and bows slightly.
I also look at Rebecca. My unhappiness boils. Staring at her, I say:
—Well, all right. We will go. We can settle there. I can look for Stewart, for Hannah’s sake. Why not?
Rebecca is keeping herself very still, her black eyes do not twitch. Little Jesse snuffs over her shoulder and chews her ear, but she does not move.
I pass my hand over my mouth. I say:
—Did you hear this? Some excellent land of our own, my girls and boys. Easy cropping, and no stump-clearing in those meadows. And a job at that. Here is a chance.
Surely speaking these words will make it true. Surely Russell and Hill and their money have the power to make it true. So bright and golden is their luck, I count on it to rub off on mine. Susy gives a little leap and a laugh.
Russell puts out a smooth plump hand and says:
—Women and children will make a home of the place. Land and game enough for everyone, just as you say. Houses on the creeks, corn and wheat in the fields, orchards in the clover. Silver in the ground, too, some say, once we open it. For myself, I have plans for peach trees first.
Hill barks:
—Barmaids, a round of peach brandy for all!
He pulls himself up and bursts out in song:
Chickens, sweet chickens,
See them take the morning air,
See them drop eggs without care.
In my mind I see my brilliant sea of grass reaching out to the far hills. Teeming with chickens, spattered with eggs.
Russell says lightly to me:
—Other parties have already set out surveying since the Iroquois treaty.
He looks again to his slaves. One nods as if set to go this minute. I have to stop my throat from tightening and closing entirely. I have to stop my eyes from moving back to Rebecca or the children.
My Kentucky is all I can see. And chickens might as well be game as any other bird. In my mind I shoot them all from the picture.
ANYONE WOULD hear us coming, our clanking parade through the bush, cracking branches and flattening saplings. The cows and hogs moaning as the boys whip them along, complaining worse than the littlest children packed into the creaking baskets tied on each side of the horses. The children bawl: Out out out, no no no, Mama. And some only bawl on and on without words. I do not like to hear them.
Rebecca rides our mare with the bald patch, holding the youngest to her, willing herself to look at the future and like it. I have told her she and the girls can be the first white women to dip their toes in the beautiful Kentucky River. She is very quiet. Well, I suppose I have won entirely.
I look back a few times from where I am leading once we have ridden beyond sight of Ma at the last Yadkin house. Jonathan and Jesse stood alongside her. They said they would stay and be with her. My Ma weeping, too old for this journey, clutching at the back of her cap. Even now I can see her outlines but not her features. All my days I will wish for a likeness of her face, even one of her as a little Quaker girl in grey, anything to turn over in my hands like a coin. But in my memory I see only her arms holding herself in as she watches us all setting out for Kentucky, whose beauties and terrors are beyond her capacity to imagine. I know that she did not wish to imagine them. We fired a salute and I called out goodbye only once, my voice falsely bright, anyone would hear the tinniness. Oh, Ma, I hope your face will be the first I see when I leave this life. Ma, yours will be a happy face then, I pray, and not the weeping ruin it is at this time.
In my mind I say goodbye to Israel too, and to all my ghosts. But Daddy appears that night when I am dreaming to frown and look puzzled and say:
—Well Dan, there must be a newer world.
When I wake I beg him to return and say more, but there is no more. My sleep for some time thereafter is as blank as an O. It is odd that we wish to know what the dead think of our doings. All my life I will wonder what my Daddy thinks. Daddy, I wonder still.
We move very slow along the narrow path. Horses are always going lame or sore-backed, children are always falling out of their baskets, boxes are always tipping off the pack animals. Hill and Russell have rounded up eight families aside from our own, Callaways and Mendinalls and others from Virginia, some slaves also, and a few lone men. Some of the Bryans have decided to go along. All have paid Hill and Russell for the privilege and also for the land they will have in Kentucky. They are game to settle. They have enough baggage for ten cities.
The way feels steeper and sharper than it did my first time through. At this slow pace my limbs do not work. My feet feel not my own, I stumble more than once. I have to laugh. With Findley leading it felt easy enough. Irish magic, he would no doubt say.
Rebecca’s rocking chair rears up from the back of an ox like a weird double spine. Granddaddy’s old black cabinet from
England is balanced between two more beasts. We have some comforts. I know I am whoring myself to Hill for land, but Hill is fond of whores, as I know well enough. Besides, he is happy at this time, enjoying the noise and slowness and the feeling that he has helped me. He acts the chief of a royal progress, riding along with his reins slack, surveying in all directions, sending the slaves off here and there, though they are not his. Russell dismounts and walks ahead a little now and then, turning his agreeable face and his bright eyes everywhere. He catches me up and says:
—This is the original Indian warpath, Boone? I do not know how you know it. No one like you for finding a trace, for seeing signs no one else alive could see.
You do not know me: so I think. But I nod and carry on. My boys are happy enough, walking with their guns and looking out for any game. Susannah and Jemima dart back and forth along the queue, dragging the cat and two of the younger girls. Their arms are scratched and dotted with blood from it and the heavy bush. They run to me:
—Daddy, can Tibby have a drink of your water?
—Daddy, can I walk with you?
—Daddy, can I—
—Yes, all right. Anything.
The cat Tibby stares into the woods, its eyes burning green. The trees are thick here and the undergrowth thicker. In many places we have to chop it away to get through. The infants in the baskets squall like gulls as the branches press them. But the forest has a powerful silence and a beauty in spite of all our noise.
Russell approaches with two of his boys as I am taking out my axe for more felling. He sits on a stump and says:
—This is really a ridiculous procession.
—It is so.
Hill appears also, sniffing, and says grandly:
—Like herding wild buffalo along.
I say:
—When was the last occasion you did so, Hill?
He laughs, touching his beard fondly, and says:
—I remember when we shot buffalo together, Dan. Do you not remember that time?
—No such time, Hill.
Russell interrupts to say:
—The weather has been good to us. No frost yet. There is no such thing as frost in Kentucky, now, is there?