The Handsome Road

by Gwen Bristow

  Corrie May shook her head slowly.

  “I ain’t never killed no children. I didn’t know your little girl died. I didn’t even know you had a little girl.”

  “Didn’t you know when you bought all the ice in town there’d be children who needed it? Children screaming for want of decent food in that horrible weather? While you were decking yourself with finery we were bleeding white to pay for—you with your satins and your peacock feathers and your champagne bottles spinning in buckets of ice!” Ann put the back of her hand against her forehead and the fingers closed into a fist. “Oh, you had a wonderful time, didn’t you, while my little girl was dying! And now you come out here asking me to feed you.” She began to laugh. Her laughter was dreadful; it made Corrie May’s flesh creep. Ann reached across and picked up the plate of muffins and threw it out of the window. Corrie May could hear the plate break as it struck the ground outside. “Get out of here,” said Ann. “I hope you starve to death.”

  For an instant the two of them faced each other across the kitchen table. Then Corrie May found herself answering. She gripped the back of the chair in front of her and spoke tensely and clearly, as if these were words that had been saving themselves up and now came forth without any need for direction.

  “You want me to starve to death, do you? Do you think what you want makes any difference to me? I could have starved years and years ago without it making any difference to you.” As she talked she felt her spine stiffen as if somebody had rammed a poker down her back. “I don’t know nothing about your little girl dying and I’m sorry she died but it wasn’t my fault—no more than I reckon it was your fault the soldiers shot Budge Foster for not wanting to fight your war.”

  Ann was hearing her with amazed anger. As Corrie May paused for breath she said,

  “Foster? I never heard of him.”

  Corrie May began to laugh back at her. “Of course you never did. I reckon a lot of things happen that we don’t know anything about and yet it seems like they’re our fault just the same. Oh, you make me tired,” she cried. “You with your pretty talk and your sweet ways. You did right by your husband and children and you was respectful to your elders and you had a nice disposition, and you think that’s all it takes to make the whole world run itself to suit you. Didn’t it ever enter your head that sometimes there’s a way of doing things that’s got to go, and the people that do things that way have got to go along with it? And you’re going, because times have changed and your way of doing things is gone.” She paused. Whether or not Ann was listening she could not tell, but Ann was staring at her with fury so intense that she must be hearing.

  “You got trouble and I got trouble,” said Corrie May, “and I ain’t concerned about whether we deserve it. I’m concerned about whether I myself personally can stand it. You can tell me to starve to death but I ain’t got no notion of doing it. I’m telling you, you with your veins full of blue blood and dishwater, if there’s anybody in this room gonta starve to death it ain’t gonta be me.”

  Ann had sunk back into her chair behind the table. Now as if her throat were tight she gasped out,

  “Will you for God’s sake get out of here?”

  “Yes,” answered Corrie May, “I’m leaving.”

  But at the door she paused, and as she looked back at Ann the stricken whiteness of her was too much for Corrie May. She added,

  “Miss Ann, I’m honestly sorry about your little girl. But it’s a shame in a way to have always had things, because then when you have to do without ’em you don’t know what to do. If there’s another bad summer and you get worried about your little boy, you put the milk in a bucket with a tight cover and put it down the well, and it’ll keep just as good as if you had ice.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  1

  When she had left Ardeith Corrie May walked and walked and walked. The road curved past the fields, shaded with moss-hung oaks that were still unchanged and magnificent like the river. She had no idea where she was going now. She just kept walking, afraid if she sat down she would not be able to get up again. Her outburst had left her with a drained-out feeling, unable to think clearly of anything except that she must keep on walking.

  She was so heavy. The burden of her weighed on her legs and dragged them back. Over her head the gray moss swayed and the wind in the leaves kept whispering. There was rhythm in the wind and the moss and her steps. She swayed on her dragging legs. The road began to sway before her. It moved, left, right, left, right. She felt herself going too, now on the left side of the road, now on the right. When she tried to stop the road moved anyway. Everything moved, back and forth, with rhythm and soft sound. She put her foot down and felt herself swaying. She put her other foot down and moved with her burden, back and forth. She couldn’t see straight. The moss moved, the road moved, the trees moved. Her knees began to bend. She was down on the ground. Her eyes were closed. But she was still swaying, though she caught at the ground with her hands to keep steady. But the very earth under her did not seem steady any more.

  Out of the dark came a slurry Negro voice.

  “Lawsy mussy, Liza! Dis here white girl—come see!”

  There was a sound of feet on the ground, and a woman’s voice answered.

  “Why Fred, I ’spect she’s drunk. Didn’t you see how she was walkin’ down de road?”

  “Drunk, you reckon? Dis time of day?”

  “Plenty folks get drunk in de daytime. You don’t nebber notice nothin’, you wid yo’ big empty head. Didn’t you see her jiggin’ from side to side?”

  Hands turned her over. Corrie May opened her eyes. Above her were two shiny black faces, grinning amiably. She could see them, though not clearly; it was as though they were blurred about the edges. She managed to speak.

  “I ain’t been drinking.”

  An odd tender look came into the woman’s face. “Lawd, Fred, she’s gonta have a baby.” She put her hand under Corrie May’s shoulders. “Can’t you walk, honey?”

  With a great effort Corrie May shook her head. “No. I just can’t walk no more.”

  “Where you goin’?” Liza asked.

  “No place.”

  “Don’t you live no place?”

  “No.” Corrie May tried to sit up, her fists pressing the ground behind her. “If I had something to eat,” she murmured, “maybe I could walk. I don’t know.”

  “You po’ chile,” said Liza gently.

  Corrie May turned to Fred. “Ain’t you got a cabin maybe?”

  “Yassum,” Fred returned dubiously. “But it ain’t no place for white folks.”

  Corrie May managed to sit up. The world had stopped swinging in front of her. “If I was right good,” she ventured, “if I helped you around the house and all, couldn’t you make out like I wasn’t white folks?”

  They looked at each other and back at Corrie May. “Ah, you po’ chile,” said Liza again.

  There was more talk between the Negroes. Corrie May didn’t listen. She couldn’t. But she felt Fred’s arms picking her up, and then she was lying on the floor of a wagon, her head in Liza’s broad lap. The wagon turned into the field. Liza held Corrie May as it rumbled over the ground. The next thing she knew she was being carried into a little whitewashed cabin and Fred was yelling at a crowd of black children, telling them to get along and mind their business. He put her down on a mattress by the clay-chinked wall. Liza held her up and offered her a slab of fat bacon. “Dis here’ll stick to yo’ ribs,” said Liza.

  Corrie May ate the fat and sucked the rind. Liza brought her a big cup of coffee.

  “Now you drink dis here, honey. It’s good coffee.”

  Corrie May began to gulp it down. “It sho is,” she murmured. It had been a long time since she had had a cup of coffee like this, strong and hot and invigorating. She looked over the thick mug to Liza, smiling. “I know sho ’nough coffee when I dr
ink it,” she assured her.

  Liza grinned at her appreciation. “You feel better?”

  Corrie May nodded. She alternately sucked at the bacon-rind and sipped the coffee, smiling meanwhile at the varisized pickaninnies who clustered around staring at her. “You sho got plenty children,” she remarked to Liza.

  “Sebm head,” Liza told her proudly. She was rocking back and forth in a cane-bottomed chair. “I declare to my soul,” she added, “ain’t nothin’ de matter wid you. You was just hungry.”

  “That’s right,” agreed Corrie May. She swung her legs off the pallet and knelt on the floor to put her arms around Liza. “You’s a good Christian woman,” she said. “You’ll go to heaven when you die.”

  “I’s sho prayin’ de Lawd, sugar,” said Liza.

  “I’ll pray for you every day I draw breath,” promised Corrie May.

  She dropped her head into Liza’s lap. “Oh, please let me stay with you. I won’t give no trouble. I’ll be all right soon’s I get some rest and some eating. I’ll work for you. I’ll help put in your cotton or I’ll watch your young uns while you’s out in the field. I want to stay with you.”

  Liza wonderingly raised Corrie May’s head between her black hands. “But sugar, you don’t want to stay wid me. You’s white. You’s gonta have a white baby.”

  “You’s a better Christian than any white woman I ever saw,” pled Corrie May. “If my baby’s as good a Christian as you I’ll thank the Lord on my knees. Let me stay with you!”

  “Ah, you lie down and get yo’ rest,” said Liza.

  When Corrie May woke up it was morning. She stretched luxuriously. She still had on all her clothes except her shoes; somebody had taken those off while she slept. She felt miraculously well. Turning over she observed two fat pickaninny babies asleep on the pallet beside her. There was a sound of shuffling feet and a moment later Liza, garbed for night-time in a chemise made out of blue checkered apron-gingham, came over to the pallet. “How you feel, honey?”

  “Fine,” returned Corrie May. She reached to the floor where her shoes were standing. “I’ll help you get breakfast.”

  Liza grinned. “Got to gib dis un his breakfast first.” Picking up the smaller of the two pickaninnies she dipped inside her chemise for an ample breast. “Lawd, Lawd, dese new-bawn sho can eat.”

  “Where you keep your breakfast things?” inquired Corrie May.

  “Fire done started,” said Liza. “Coffee pot on de shelf by de fireplace.”

  Corrie May had no time to kneel down to pray. But when she had put the kettle on to boil she paused a moment and covered her eyes with her hands.

  “Thank you, God,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

  2

  Fred was making a good crop. This piece of land had been put up at a tax-sale and he’d bought it on time. Just a little piece of land, he told Corrie May, just about big enough for a one-mule crop, but then he and Liza had been fieldhands all their lives on a plantation up near Vicksburg, so they didn’t find it hard to make a living here. They’d wandered down the river when the Yankees burnt up everything around Vicksburg. With seven young ones, four of them old enough to work, they were doing fine.

  Corrie May helped them the best she could. She didn’t know much about field-work, but she could cook and mind the babies. Fred and Liza said she worked more than enough for her keep. They were good to her, and didn’t pester her with a lot of silly questions about what was none of their business. Corrie May thought she had been misjudging Negroes all her life. She had never seen such genuinely good people.

  The day her baby was born Liza stayed in from the fields the whole afternoon to help her. When Liza brought her the baby, wrapped up in a clean piece of sheeting, Corrie May murmured, “You sho is a good woman. Remember I’m gonta pray for you.”

  “Ah now, you got a fine big boy,” said Liza. “You better pray for him.”

  So Corrie May obediently shut her eyes and prayed in her mind, “Please God, make my baby grow up to be a good man. Make him good as Fred and Liza.” Then she added a white folks’ prayer. “And please God, let him grow up to be somebody! Let him have fine clothes to wear and have folks speak to him respectful on the street.”

  After she had rested a little Liza bothered her to ask what she was going to name the baby. The pickaninnies had come in from work and they wanted to drink coffee to the new white boy. Corrie May hugged the little bundle in the sheeting.

  “His name is Fred.”

  Liza gasped. “You mean Fred for my man?”

  “Fred for your man,” Corrie May assured her. “His name is Fred Upjohn, for your man and for me.”

  Liza laughed and laughed with glee. She went over to where her husband sat and slapped him on the arm. “You no count triflin’ nigger, de white lady done name, her baby after you.”

  Fred laughed too, thrilled and embarrassed at the honor. He came over to the pallet and brought Corrie May a cup of coffee to help bring her strength back.

  3

  Not wanting to be a burden any longer than she could help, Corrie May moved back to town as soon as she was well enough to take care of herself. She got a room in a house near the wharfs, where the people needed money so sorely they would put up with a squalling baby. The house had a back yard where there was sun enough to dry clothes, so Corrie May tucked little Fred under her arm and went to the back doors of the houses on the better residential streets, asking for laundry.

  Things were easing up a little and there were a good many families now who could afford to put their work out, so she got promise of enough laundry-bundles every week to pay the rent and buy food. She had to work hard and Fred was a lot of extra trouble. It was heavy walking with him on one arm and a laundry-bundle on the other. But somehow she found it was different about working when you had a baby. She had always thought a baby would be a nuisance, and so he was, but she didn’t really mind, not as long as he kept well, and Fred was gloriously healthy. He shot up like a weed in the summer time. He was a fine boy. You could tell it by the way he strutted around even when he was just a little morsel of a child. He looked like a fellow that was just naturally born to be somebody.

  Corrie May was so delighted with Fred that she did not have room in her mind to be more than slightly resentful when she observed that the great folk of the plantations were becoming prosperous again. They were raising bigger crops, and steamboat trade was increasing on the river. Sometimes Corrie May saw Ann, driving about in a new carriage with her little boy, who was very stylish in neat dark suits and striped stockings. Now and then she wondered if Ann ever saw her. Probably not, and that didn’t matter. She had no wish to speak to Ann. Nobody needed to tell her more than once to starve to death. She wasn’t starving, which in itself was something of a victory, and besides she had Fred, who was going to grow up educated and respected. As she went along the street, dragging him and toting the laundry, she reminded him that now the country was fixed so a man could get just about what he wanted.

  “Carriages and horses like them folks?” Fred asked her.

  “Sure,” said Corrie May with confidence.

  Fred measured his growth by the fireplace. When he got big enough to reach over the mantel, he said, he was going to work and get rich, and she would have a carriage to ride in like those ladies he saw around the park. Already he could run errands for her and help her carry bundles that were not too heavy. But when he was eight years old Corrie May told him it was time he was learning to read. A house near the wharfs, formerly a residence, had been turned into a school. It didn’t cost anything except for the books.

  Fred protested about going to school. “They keep them boys in all day,” he said.

  “But it’s fine to go to school,” said Corrie May. “You can’t get along without knowing how to read.”

  “You told me you didn’t know so much about reading,” he countered.r />
  “Yeah, and you see me, don’t you?” she retorted. “Taking in washing, and me a white woman.”

  “You ain’t got no money to buy a book.”

  “I got a dollar and thirty cents coming Saturday from a lady,” said Corrie May. “I reckon that’ll buy you a book and a slate.”

  So that fall Fred started to school. Corrie May got up early every morning to cook him a big breakfast of hominy grits so he’d have something to stick by his ribs through all that learning. Pretty soon Fred could recognize every letter in the alphabet, and one afternoon he brought her his slate, where he had printed his name “FRED UPJOHN” in big letters. Corrie May was so proud she thought she’d break right open in the middle, and him such a little boy too.

  But one day in the winter time when she came in from taking laundry home to her customers, she found Fred huddled up in the corner by the fireplace and he was crying. He wiped away the tears with his sleeve when he saw Corrie May coming in, but she rushed up to him and asked if he was sick or what.

  No, Fred said, he felt fine. He wouldn’t say what was the matter. But she insisted he must tell her, and finally he confessed.

  She made his shirts out of flour-sacks, and the one he had on today was a new one. The lettering identifying the brand of flour hadn’t washed out of it yet. The boys at school had laughed at him when they saw “DILLON’S BEST” printed right across his back, and he wasn’t going to school any more.

  Corrie May tried to cuddle him up, but he was too big to submit. She made him eat his supper and go to bed. After he was asleep she got into bed by him and cried a little bit too into the pillow. The next morning Fred just wouldn’t go to school. No matter what she said, he wasn’t going, not with “DILLON’S BEST” across his back.

  Corrie May remembered there was a lady named Mrs. Price who owed her for two weeks’ wash, two dollars. The ladies often made her wait for her money when it wasn’t convenient to pay her, for they felt pious about giving her work anyway since she needed it so. Corrie May was too used to this form of Christian charity to be very critical of it, but today she went to Mrs. Price and begged for the two dollars, saying she needed it for something very special. After saying she really couldn’t spare it this week Mrs. Price finally gave her half what was owing to her, along with a little speech about how Corrie May should be grateful to be working for nice people, seeing she had a child of sin and all.