“What’s wrong?” Mr. McGregor kept his distance.
“She’s always dramatic.” Clarissa stepped with Abbaseh back out of the car.
“That’s how show people are,” Iris said to Mr. McGregor, leaping by him too.
“What are you carrying on for?” Clarissa hissed in Redwood’s ears. “Your power has come back to you.” It took her, Abbaseh, and Iris to get Redwood standing back up. Mumbling something strong, Abbaseh brushed off the dirt and plucked tiny stones out of Redwood’s skin.
“We best be going on.” Mr. McGregor glanced ’round the dark alley. “People here have a hungry eye.”
“I’m fine.” Redwood pulled away from them. “I said I’m all right.”
Abbaseh and Clarissa reluctantly took their seats.
“Come on.” Iris said, slipping her arm through Redwood’s. “I know you can get to the other side of sad.”
“Show people?” Redwood hissed at her. “How could you talk such foolishness?”
Iris whispered too. “I was just trying to help.”
“Well, don’t. Not that way.”
“They don’t know what it mean to have the baron challenge you,” Iris replied, her lips trembling. “Miz Subie say, a conjure woman risk everything doing a death-defying spell.”
“No denying that.” Besting the baron should’ve put Redwood in a better mood. “Sorry, I don’t mean to scold you.” Iris got her onto the leather seat while Mr. McGregor cranked the motor. Without mentioning the blood she was dripping on the fancy interior, he sped away.
After several blocks of silence Clarissa said, “Speak your mind. You’ve given everybody a terrible fright, and they would sorely like to help you.”
“I’m sorry,” Redwood said. “I don’t know what to tell you.” There was a trick on her body, and she didn’t know how to get it off.
“Sister has a dark past, like Mr. McGregor.” Iris kissed Redwood’s bloody palm. “I wish I could do like you, heal with a kiss, but I can’t.”
“What good is power if you can’t save your ownself?” Redwood said.
Chicago swallowed time up. Everything in the city went too fast. A week gone, and what did Aidan have to show for it? A thousand miles from Georgia, and nightriders were still haunting him and Redwood both. Mountainous dark clouds rolled over the sun and turned daylight dull gray. Aidan didn’t usually read fortune from nature, but rumbling thunder and sharp wind set him on edge as he and Redwood marched through the gate of the motion picture factory.
“Hold up.” He set down a raw wood rocking chair and a painted altar and worked the circulation back into his hand. He had a bad feeling ’bout coming to see Mr. Payne. Rich white folks always thought he was trash — so what good would it do Redwood to have him along?
A tent blew over, and soldier-actors ran from their open-air battle scene to take cover. Enemies no more, they huddled together against the coming downpour.
“That storm come up out of nowhere,” Aidan said.
People stared at him and Red all ’cross Chicago town, and now they gawked here too. Aidan laughed in the pinched face of a young white actor made up like a wounded Union cavalryman. What could this fellow possibly be imagining that was so awful he had to scowl and mutter at them? Aidan had expected more from northerners.
Redwood didn’t pay the cavalryman — or any of them — no mind. She marched on like a Queen of Dahomey. She had on blue satin and silks that surged ’round her hips. A blue lace blouse rustled with each breath. Her hair was done up like a bouquet of flowers; her face was painted with the hues of sunset. Aidan wore a suit Clarissa had borrowed from George. It was the latest fashion for rich gents, fine cloth and a clean line. George had more bulk than Aidan, but Clarissa tailored it to fit him with a few stitches here and there. Fancy new shoes were light on his feet, giving a real bounce to his step.
“I guess we are a spectacle,” Aidan said.
Redwood stopped mid-stride and turned to him. He almost ran her over. “You sure you not mad at me?” She sounded mad herself.
“Your third time asking,” Aidan replied. “You want me to be mad? Would it help?”
“No. No. I just —”
“I’m a mean drunk with an awful temper. I can get so mad I don’t remember what I’ve done.” He pulled out Subie’s medicine tin and put a pinch of powder in his mouth. “You just ain’t seen it.”
“You don’t scare me.”
“Good. It’s mutual.”
“Besides, all that Crazy Coop nonsense is behind you, right?”
“Yes Ma’am.” He grimaced. The nasty medicine took the taste out his tongue.
“Really?” She grabbed the hand holding the tin. “I bet you want a drink right now.”
“Big difference between wanting something real bad and doing it.”
She let go of his hand. “Yes. Yes, there is.”
“I ain’t goin’ fight with you, Miz Redwood. Fighting won’t do us no good. Believe me, ’cause I done plenty of fighting.”
Drops of rain splashed her eyes. “I couldn’t bear his child growing in me.” She spoke in his ear. “Now maybe I can’t have nobody’s baby. Is that the woman you want?”
“No children?” Aidan shuddered in spite of hisself. “You certain?”
“No, but only thing certain in this world is death.”
“I only been here a week and you trying to drive me away?”
“I ain’t trying to drive you nowhere.”
“Yes you are. Why?”
Her breath sparked. She looked angry enough to catch fire.
“It’s that business with Jerome. ’Cause I didn’t get there in time, ’cause I didn’t —”
“Shame on you. How could you think I blame you for what he did? Or for what they did to Mama?”
Despite feeling shamed of this very thought, Aidan kept staring her in the eye.
“Don’t be using me to feel bad ’bout what you ain’t done in this world.”
“I tole everybody you run north with Jerome to get married in New York City.”
“I know you a conjure man to get ’em to believe that lie.”
“It was easier than you think.”
A tiny white ball whizzed over their heads and startled them apart. Behind Redwood, two Sioux men in war bonnets and battle regalia used round wooden paddles to bat a ball back and forth on a tabletop. Unconcerned with the weather, several other Sioux warriors watched the game with cavalrymen and two Russian Cossacks in dress uniform. An older Indian man in street clothes nodded at Aidan. It was the fellow he’d met at the train station coming into Chicago. Aidan nodded back.
“Walter Jumping Bear and them are shooting a stagecoach raid and a massacre,” Redwood said. “They gotta wait ’til the sun come back.”
“Who wanna see all that?” Aidan muttered.
Redwood balled up her storm hand. “What if I’m bad for you, Aidan?”
“Let’s go on in.” He couldn’t hear such talk. He’d rather fight with her. “Payne’s waiting for us.”
Inside a crammed office, reels of film, jars of chemicals, and broken cameras looked ready to fall on Mr. Payne, a tall, gangly white man with fierce Abraham Lincoln features. “An all-colored romance? Well, a pirate picture could be good.” Payne dodged Redwood to reach Aidan, who stood between the raw wood rocking chair and painted altar. Payne inspected his handiwork. “You’re a fine carpenter and fast, Mr.?”
“Cooper,” Redwood said. “Mr. Aidan Cooper.”
Aidan eyed Redwood. “Pirate loves the school teacher. It’s a grand idea.”
“Irish? Irish do good stage work.” Payne talked on top of Aidan. “The wood was knotty and warped, but you got around that.”
“Colored pay their nickel same as everyone else,” Aidan said.
“Don’t you think colored people are funny, Mr. Cooper?” Payne laughed ’til a cough wracked him. “You have to admit though, it is hard to take ’em in a serious story.”
“Well, sir, I think that’
s just what you’re used to. I read a lot of serious colored stories, and —”
“You’re a sharp fellow. I didn’t think you’d get it done on time.” Payne ran his finger along the altar. “What part of Georgia are you from?”
“I come up from Peach Grove. It’s kinda out of the way.”
“I’ll bet.” Payne chuckled. “Up here in Chicago and back East, folks got a taste for chicken coop comedies, for cowboys and Injuns, just like in Georgia.”
“Folks got a taste for a lot of things,” Redwood said, as if spitting out poison.
Payne sat heavily in the rocker. “What the hell can I do about that?”
“William Foster is going after all the colored vaudevillians. They’re happy to work with a colored director, but his picture ain’t ’bout adventure or romance or something grand.”
Payne snapped at her. “If that Negro Foster doesn’t want you, I hear Selig’s moving his operation to California, chasing sunny days where he can shoot all year long. He might have you.”
“Why fire me and Saeed? I had that she-lion in her cage, no call to shoot her dead.”
“Who said anything about that darned lion?”
Payne and Redwood glared at one another. Her silk and satin skirt turned to a torrent of blue-green water, streaming from her waist to the floor. Stunned, Payne reached for the flowing fabric. Aidan strode between them.
“Miz Redwood couldn’t just stand there and let that she-cat run rampage.”
“Exactly!” Payne said. “The lioness was a rogue even back in the cage. A rogue is no use to us. Better off dead.” With no warning, he hurled the rocker out the window. It landed one story below in front of two cowboys, unbroken.
“Damn,” Aidan said. Redwood claimed Payne didn’t have no sense, but —
“Damn indeed!” Payne hoisted the altar over his head.
The cowboys below shouted and cussed, then hushed when they saw Payne fuming in the window. They dodged the furiously rocking chair like it might bite ’em. Even after such harsh treatment, not a screw was loose. Take more than a short fall to bust something Aidan made.
“See. I can do pretty and sturdy.” Aidan gritted his teeth.
“We don’t need sturdy, Mr. Cooper.” Payne dumped the altar. It fell on its side intact. “We need things that look good and break easy.”
Redwood rolled her eyes and sucked her teeth, but she did settle down. Her skirt was satin again, yet still cold as storm water when it brushed against Aidan’s fists. She put a cool hand on his clenched shoulders. Aidan wanted to slug Payne, wanted to feel his face break under his knuckles, wanted to slam into his gut and take his last stinking breath. Fighting would sure feel good, even if it wouldn’t do no good.
“Mr. Cooper can build it any way you want.” She slipped her arm through Aidan’s, cozier than she’d gotten in days.
“Is that so?” Payne lifted an eyebrow.
“Yes, sir.” Aidan wasn’t flying off the handle like a broken axe head over this fool.
“I’ve hired more woodsmiths than I know what to do with.” Payne had the nerve to sit down behind his desk and grin at them. “I’m jealous, Mr. Cooper.”
Aidan scowled, ready to hurt him for sure if he thought of laying a finger on —
“Sequoia says you’re an actor too.” Payne grinned. “You’ve got a bushel of talent.”
“I’ve, I’ve done some time singing for folks, and I guess I could act if I had to.”
“You’ve got the right look, wild, dark, handsome. You got a lot of spirit too, I can see that. A moment ago you were ready to slit my throat with that knife on your hip. It was all over your face, don’t deny it. I guess I got Sequoia to thank for the blood still in my veins.” He laughed. “That’s a bit of an exaggeration.”
Aidan didn’t deny wanting to murder him. “I heard tell you were coughing yourself to death, ’til Sikwayi pulled the chill out your lungs.”
Payne sighed. “You have a face for the camera, Mr. Cooper. You could play a half-breed Injun or a robber who ain’t so bad. Robin Hood’s a story I’d like to make. Have you heard of Robin Hood?”
“Stealing from rich lords to give to the poor,” Aidan said.
“I never believed that story,” Redwood muttered.
Payne ignored her. “How are you with a sword, Mr. Cooper?”
“I can handle a shotgun and a knife. I never had cause to pick up a sword.”
“Are you good on a horse?”
“He can ride anything,” Redwood said.
“Real Wild West Injuns can’t do a character. Got to have an actor for that.” Payne chortled. “Give the audience a handsome rogue dashing about.”
“I guess they don’t want a Seminole farmer riding the rail to his ladylove.” Aidan stared at Redwood.
“Is that another harebrained story idea?” Payne looked confused. “I thought you wanted to do pirates.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Redwood said. “You know what folks want to see.”
“I do.” Payne winced. “The way of the world is against us, Sequoia,” he said softly.
“Us?” Redwood let go of Aidan and strode close to Payne. “What us?”
“People are running shy from working here. I’m in a bad fix. I lost two actors last night in a brawl. Both shot and killed, over a…woman.” He escaped Redwood and sidled up to Aidan. “I pay thirty-five dollars a week,” he said and then whispered, “forty if you can get Sequoia to call the hoodoo spell off. That’s generous.”
Aidan turned to Redwood. “I could get us a piece of land and farm. You could heal folks. We don’t need to do this.”
“A man could take care of a family in high style with that money. Tell Mr. Cooper he won’t find a better deal.” Payne laid a week’s salary in a clear space on his desk. “That’s forty-five dollars I’ll give you in advance. Fifty a week if you work out.”
Aidan never had anybody try to bribe him out of his good sense. “I don’t know.”
Redwood circled Payne. “I can’t tell you what to do, Aidan, but, save enough and we can make our own picture. White folk got adventure and romance. Why’re we stuck in the coon academy?”
She turned to Aidan, looking like a young fearless gal on a rainy hilltop, reaching out her hand to grab the lightning. Hadn’t he promised to believe in her? Even with her heart torn up, even hurting bad, wasn’t she holding on to him?
“If it mean that much to you,” Aidan mumbled.
“Don’t you just love her?” Payne shook Aidan’s hand. “I need you to start today.” Sunlight streamed through the window. “Storm’s over. We got several good shooting hours left. I’d appreciate you getting us back on schedule, Mr. Cooper.”
Before Aidan knew what he was doing, before he could register how bad it’d make him feel, he was half-naked, sitting on a horse with a painted face and feather headdress ’bout to ambush a wagon train of white settlers. Behind him was Walter Jumping Bear and a band of similarly ferocious savages. Nicolai nodded from above his camera. Aidan whooped, raised a spear, and charged.
Twenty
Chicago, 1911
Stumbling out the backdoor of George’s house, Aidan snorted bad air. The Chicago night stank, even after smelling it for a year. A lot of bluster and too many factories farting poison, too much meat rotting on the hoof — Aidan wished he could close his nose with a lid against the stench.
“We’re not really related.” Thirteen-year-old Frank sneered at Iris. Wearing long breeches, a fancy hat, and Sunday-going-to-meeting shoes on Tuesday, he swaggered through lilacs, smacking plump blossoms.
Iris tugged an ill-fitting dress. “Everybody’s related!” She stomped her feet, splattering him with dirt and worms. “That’s what it mean to be alive. Master of Breath give everybody a piece of spirit…”
“Good grief! My real father would have a proper lady for a sister, not some backcountry fool full of superstition and lies!” Frank shoved her.
Iris shoved back. “Biology ain’t lies. Mr. D
arwin say everybody be in the human race together.”
“What do you know? You can’t even speak properly.” Frank took off at Aidan’s approach.
Aidan squeezed her shoulders. “How ’bout a story or a song tonight?”
“I’m too tuckered out from school.”
“I’ll only be a minute in the shed.” He banged it open. “You too tired to listen?”
“They make fun of you too.” Iris bounded over George’s vegetables and slammed the kitchen door.
“Damn it!” Aidan hoisted the chair he’d made for Clarissa. Hurrying out the shed, he stumbled over boxes, tools, and a rolled up Persian rug — a present from Prince Anoushiravan who was riding the rail to California and everywhere else. Thinking of all that open country, Aidan was jealous. “Good for him.”
Aidan rubbed a bruised thigh. Never enough room to move in Chicago. Always so many stacks of this and that; so many shopkeepers, factory workers, hucksters, and day laborers; too many trolleys and autos coming and going, speeding to nowhere. Funny languages shouted at you, weird faces screwed up in disgust or god knows what. Folk pressed together too tight, but nobody touching. Aidan couldn’t hardly stand it. Walter Jumping Bear told him he’d get used to it soon enough. That was several months ago. Soon didn’t seem to be coming.
“Watch where you’re going, Chief!” George shouted.
Aidan halted by a patch of kale. “You the one tramping in the flowers.”
George snorted and stalked from the lily of the valley on into the street. He was working late tonight, again.
Aidan set the new chair in the kitchen. Clarissa broke into a smile. “Why, you shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble.” She squeezed Aidan’s hand. “I’m surprising George with a late supper. Man won’t stop to eat otherwise.” She dashed off.
Aidan trudged toward Redwood’s back parlor room. After making a fool of hisself in front the camera all day, he was stiff and aching, like he’d been behind a plow, breaking rock-hard soil. Redwood was in Clarissa’s modern bathroom, soaking in a tub after finally hunting down a show that would have her. Months of begging, and it was just more darky wench and chicken foolishness — made Aidan want to spit and cuss. Redwood had Iris laughing at Saeed playing an ornery mule and even got a harmony out of her on a show tune. Aidan fought envy. Cooning didn’t tarnish Red’s spirit and Iris was too shy, too something to sing with him anymore.
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