Had I a Hundred Mouths

by William Goyen

“But tell how the letters started. Tell about the letters.”

  6

  “Well, then the letters started. First Son wrote and said, ’Aunt Perrie why did you have to let me find it out for myself that I am somebody’s son we never knew, probably a bastard’—he wrote that word. ’Uncle Ace has told me again what was first told to me on the Church Hike the Fourtha July.’

  “Perrie wrote back and said, ‘Son I never wanted to hurt you and you were too young to know, besides. If you hadn’t run off I’d have told you, or had Brother Riley at the church to tell you. But I have been your mother as good as any mother could have been; and your Aunt Linsie, too. If you had no mother then think how you had two mothers showering all their love and care on you, count your blessings Son, and don’t make light of me. For I done the best I could.’

  “Son wrote a letter back that said, ‘Aunt Perrie I am working in a lumbermill out of Memphis and like it; and if I had two mothers in Crecy Texas then I have three in all, but one to begin with and that one to end with, will you please do me the favor of telling me who my mother was, and where; and I’ll be much oblige.’

  “Perrie wrote back an answer that Son was to please not change his nature and his ways, that he was please not to hurraw about three mothers, that she would tell him now that who or where his mother and father were never would be known, and to send his things on home and come on with them. To just count her, Aunt Perrie, as his mother and go on with his life. ‘For I have raised you,’ Perrie’s letter said, ‘In this house and yard in Crecy Texas to the best of my gumption, under the shadow of the Church and in the name of God. You was a good child and now can be a good young man. I ask you to abide in the Lord who is our only Father.’

  “No answer.

  7

  “On the Fourtha July on account of the celebration at the Picnic Grounds all the heavens was aglow for two hours, just one solid blast, shook us all up, you’d have thought the world was coming to an end; and about nine o’clock I looked out and here was Son coming from the to-do and we could see something was wrong, that he had been hurt. He looked so hurt. Perrie said, ‘Son commere to me and tell me who or what it is that’s hurt you; I can tell when something has hurt you, and come and tell me.’ But Son wouldn’t say. And I thought, because he was so peculiar and so changed, what child is this? And I thought child o child what is ever going to happen to you in this world I wonder, oh what will your life be, if we could just put it into the right hands, see that it goes right and good and doesn’t get hurt or astray—who will ever look after you, you little thing. But I know we can’t help, no one can do that for nobody, have to go this way and that, find our ground and try to stand our ground, learn our wisdom and then try to be strong enough to bear our wisdom, O hep this little boy, child a mine, is what I thought.

  “Well, Son wouldn’t tell and so Perrie didn’t press him, he went to bed and I said, ’Perrie regg’n what’s the matter with him?’ and Perrie said, ’Let him alone, Linsie, he’ll tell dreckly.’

  “The next day he was so peculiar, we was so far apart, wouldn’t say much, face right peaked, until that afternoon Perrie said he come to her with the wildest face and said, ‘Aunt Perrie I’ve hurt myself and I’m scared, maybe we ought to call Doctor Browder.’ Perrie said, ‘Son what have you done to yourself, come talk to me, come let me see.’ Son said, ‘Aunt Perrie I can’t tell you or show you, ’cause you see I was climbing over a bobwire fence at the Fourtha July fireworks and I slipped and fell upon the bobwire. I didn’t look until we got in the light of the fireworks and then I saw blood on myself.’

  “Oh, I said, this is when he needs his Uncle Ace, but let Ace stay on away on the road, let him stay until Doomsday, we can get along without him (this boy was always trying to run away from where he was or from people he was with to be by himself, as if to still something rankling in him, as if to put something to rest within him or for some reason we could never know. But everytime he broke and ran away, and mind you this, he harmed or wounded himself in some way: it was the harm and the wound that brought him back, then, time and time again, so as to heal harm and hurt, it seemed). ‘Come let me see,’ I said, ‘Son.’

  “‘Nome,’ he said, ‘you can’t see, either, just call Doctor Browder.’

  “Doctor Browder come and he and Son went in the back room and closed the door, and we heard Doctor Browder say, ‘Son let me see you, let me see what have you done to yourself.’

  “After that we scarcely knew Son anymore, he was a stranger in the house. It was just a little after this that the letter came from Ace saying he was staying in Memphis and then Son left his message and left. [Child a mine, child a mine, something touched you and changed you all over. I know some hand touched that good boy Son and left him never the same again. Some hand led him away from pore Perrie (Lord hep me forget his face, his head of hair, let me forget him all over, the way he was all over, bless his hide, he was the only thing I ever had. I remember him in the garden counting the tomatoes for arithmetic, I remember him in the clothesyard bumping like a ghost through the wet sheets, I remember him in the pinegrove; child a mine.)]

  “And that’s the end of this story. Don’t ask me no more. Because I’m old, poor Perrie’s buried in her grave, and Ace, too—you know this—and Son is out somewhere in the world on the road like his Uncle Ace before him. There is no more to tell.”

  “But tell it all, Aunt Linsie, tell about the two Sons, the ghost and the flesh of Son. This is the time. Go on to the end, and then we’ll let it alone, the sad story, forever. By telling it true we’ll keep it straight and never tell it again. We’ll let it go.

  “Pore Perrie.”

  8

  “One summertime something made a ghost out of the Huis-ache tree—spun a web around the top of it—some treedevil that lime wouldn’t drive away; it seemed the touch of Satan. It was so hot and no Gulf hurricane would come, to bring a norther, the whole world stood still, trees hot and tired with their limp leaves hanging like a panting animal’s tongue, flowers in a trance; and us all fanning ourselves. At dark in the evenings a ghost would come. He would linger at the edge of the yard just when Perrie would be feeding the chickens or bringing in the clothes, and Perrie would come in the house white yet her calm prayerful self, but not to mention a ghost. Finally she told me one evening at the suppertable. ‘He is at the window,’ she said. ‘The ghost of Son. And next he will be in the house. He comes closer and closer.’ I sat still and told no lie by opening my mouth.

  “(Oh don’t ask me no more, ’cause I’m uneasy to tell it; don’t ask me no more. You’ve heard it—don’t beg me no more.)”

  ‘Tell how it wasn’t the ghost of Son, Aunt Linsie, tell how it was the flesh and blood Son. Go on, go ahead, make haste and tell it…”

  “It was no ghost atall but the genuine flesh of Son. I had known it for some time, had met him in the grove. He was dressed like a tramp and he said, ‘Aunt Linsie commere and don’t be afraid of me, I’m Son and I’m all right. I’ve come back to see you all, to see the house, to see the place, if everything and everybody is all right.’

  “‘Well come on home, come on in the house,’ I said, ‘Son, pore Perrie’s waiting for you, in her sickness, in her quiet Christian sorrow.’

  “‘Nome Aunt Linsie,’ Son said. ‘Never tell her I’ve been here. I’m going away again, after a little while. Just come to see everything for myself, and not in dreams or imagination, but everything the way it really is and was. Look by the Huisache tree and find some money I’ve left for you and Aunt Perrie. And cross your heart you’ll never tell her I was here.’

  “‘All right, Son,’ I said, ‘if that’s the way you want it, that’s the way it has to be. Except I wish you’d come on through the yard and into the house and have yew some supper with us.’

  “Then Son went away. I watched him go. He had that same walk.

  “But he’d be back again, I’d see him here and there on the place, got to looking for him, would see him behin
d the barn, in the field, and at the Huisache tree on a moonlight night—he was leaving his money again—and sometime by the chimney window, eyes between the green fringe of the velveteen curtains in the living room. Pore Son, Lord hep this boy; what child is this? I thought and prayed; he can’t stay and he can’t go away. Pore Perrie. Perrie would see him and say in a low voice her prayer, ‘Go away, ghost of Son, go ’way and let me be.’

  “Then he’d be gone again for a while, no sign of Son. I’d look and look for him, but he’d have disappeared, and for a long time sometime, no sight of Son. I’d wait for the flesh of Son and Perrie would wait for his ghost.

  “Perrie got weaker and weaker, and sweeter, like a lovely angel. She took to her bed. We had this ghost and this flesh between us, but we never mentioned it, never broached the subject, but it was between us, living and real. It bound us together and broke us apart—we’ll settle it one day.

  “One night at the end of this hottest summer in our memory, the saving storm came. The trees were nervious and jumpy, but all in the house was green and still. Then it hit. I was in my bed in my front room, next to Perrie’s middle one; and I said Lord let it come, it has been trying to come for so long, it has been so slow, let it come, our salvation. Son had not been around the place for some time, but I knew he was there, somehow I knew it. Then in a brightness of white lightning I saw him at my window, and I spoke out, ‘Hello Son, please to come in out of the storm.’ But the blackness of the night flashed on again, like black lightning, and took away his face. I knew pore Perrie would see him, her ghost, at her window, for he would be there next; so I got up and put on my kimona and using the lightning like a lamp, went to her room. I stood in the doorway and saw this in the lightning: Perrie was standing before her window, beautiful and white as a Saint, naked, the white voile curtains waving and falling and rising round her like the garments of an angel. She seemed young, like a vision of herself, frail and fleshly, and this vision was burned upon my sight, and upon the sight of Son, whose face was there at the window like a lantern; and it will be there till we both of us die, Son and me, I know to God.

  “That was the last of the life of pore Perrie, for I picked her up when she folded on to the floor and put her in her bed, a little bundle. I sat the rest of the night through by her side, both of us quiet, Perrie quiet forever—so small and so beautiful in her corpse, the storm raving round the house in great boots, sloshing in the muddy yard and road, and the trees wild and hysterical, Son somewhere outdoors in the storm, me saying, ‘Son, Son come on in, come on in and join us now’; and the night passed. When Doctor Browder came the next morning I said Perrie has passed away, into God’s Kingdom; and Doctor Browder said rest her weary Christian soul.

  “Pore Perrie was buried in her grave, you know it well, where it tis and what grave will hold her eternal neighbor, room for me, when I will come. And that Uncle Ace is not there beside her but over alone in a corner of the Crecy graveyard—how Son brought him back to bury him, how they had wandered all over three States together, two pore homeless thangs, Son writing me the letters to tell him again all about pore Perrie; he never could seem to get it all straight. This Noah’s bird that went forth from the ark kept coming back to us, coming back, with no place to rest his foot; until the last time he came with his burden, his pore homeless, childless, wifeless father; and then he went away for good, in peace, and never returned. He must have been put on this earth to rove about and nurse the wandering homeless, to find them graves to rest in, to bring them to that home again, yet he was homeless too and I wonder who will go out to find him and bring him back? He is aloose forever and in what world and on what way I wonder? The world is too big; we lose people in it. This weatherbird flies into all the four corners of the wind, Lord pity pore little suffering children, oh come on home Son and let’s cry together like we use to, even when you were little we would cry together… even if you were playing in the clothesyard I’d just run out to you under the shadetree and grab you and cry and you would cry with me. You little trembling thing you already knew (how did you know?) what breaks a heart; nobody ever had to tell you a thing you just knew. That’s your purpose you were placed in the world to cry with people, you were sent for grief, called to the grieving world. But I know you’re a gay little thing, too, and that’s why I know you’re meant for grief because you are so gay and are so good to laugh with, oh we’ve had our laughs, laughed until we cried… why don’t you send your clothes on home you said you would where are your things?

  “Go on now. That is all I will tell and I will never tell it again. Now I’ve told you it and I never will again. Go on now and hush ever thinking about it.

  “Pore Perrie.”

  9

  (The thing of it is, they say Son still comes to Crecy once in a while. That Linsie would see him at the edge of the grove and go out to meet him, after Perrie passed away, speak his name, “Son,” and say, “Commere Son,” only to find him not there at all. She would see him and then she wouldn’t. Had he come, or hadn’t he? Sometimes she would see a lantern going over the ground or hanging in a tree in the grove; sometimes it was just the light in the brooder. Was he there or wasn’t he? They say a Peeping Tom with a flashlight has been seen at windows of Crecy houses. That the ’Postolics say the Devil was seen walking in the pastures at night with a torch. That somebody has been living with the Gypsies up on the hill. That a Negro on the road saw Son and Linsie dancing naked in the pinegrove one night. And that Linsie’s seen Son all through the house, behind the beaded curtains between the hall and middle bedroom, his face at the frosted pane on the front door and called, “Son Son commere to me and tell me what is in your craw.”

  The thing of it is (and then I’m through, this story is done), when Linsie is buried in the family plot next to pore Perrie, these two sister-mothers will have this to settle between themselves there under the dirt. Linsie has a message for pore Perrie, and it won’t be long, now, before she takes it to her. They have this Son between them, until Doomsday, ghost and flesh.

  And now I’m moving on (oh hear my song); this is the story as it was told to me; and as I go on, on the road, with a message to deliver, I want to get it all straight. There is this Son’s pain to understand and tell about and I look for tongue to tell it with.

  Pore Perrie.)

  GHOST AND FLESH, WATER AND DIRT

  Was somebody here while ago acallin for you.…

  O don’t say that, don’t tell me who… was he fair and had a wrinkle in his chin? I wonder was he the one… describe me his look, whether the eyes were pale light-colored and swimmin and wild and shifty; did he bend a little at the shoulders was his face agrievin what did he say where did he go, whichaway, hush don’t tell me; wish I could keep him but I cain’t, so go, go (but come back).

  Cause you know honey there’s a time to go roun and tell and there’s a time to set still (and let a ghost grieve ya); so listen to me while I tell, cause I’m in my time a tellin and you better run fast if you don wanna hear what I tell, cause I’m goin ta tell…

  Dreamt last night again I saw pore Raymon Emmons, all last night seen im plain as day. There uz tears in iz glassy eyes and iz face uz all meltin away. O I was broken of my sleep and of my night disturbed, for I dreamt of pore Raymon Emmons live as ever.

  He came on the sleepin porch where I was sleepin (and he’s there to stay) ridin a purple horse (like King was), and then he got off and tied im to the bedstead and come and stood over me and commenced iz talkin. All night long he uz talkin and talkin, his speech (whatever he uz sayin) uz like steam streamin outa the mouth of a kettle, streamin and streamin and streamin. At first I said in my dream, “Will you do me the favor of tellin me just who in the world you can be, will you please show the kindness to tell me who you can be, breakin my sleep and disturbin my rest?” “I’m Raymon Emmons,” the steamin voice said, “and I’m here to stay; putt out my things that you’ve putt away, putt out my oatmeal bowl and putt hot oatmeal in it, get out my r
ubber-boots when it rains, iron my clothes and fix my supper… I never died and I’m here to stay.”

  (Oh go away old ghost of Raymon Emmons, whisperin in my ear on the pilla at night; go way ole ghost and lemme be! Quit standin over me like that, all night standin there sayin somethin to me… behave ghost of Raymon Emmons, behave yoself and lemme be! Lemme get out and go roun, lemme put on those big ole rubberboots and go clompin.…)

  Now you shoulda known that Raymon Emmons. There was somebody, I’m tellin you. Oh he uz a bright thang, quick ’n fair, tall, about six feet, real lean and a devlish face full of snappin eyes, he had eyes all over his face, didn’t miss a thang, that man, saw everthang; and a clean brow. He was a rayroad man, worked for the Guff Coast Lines all iz life, our house always smelt like a train.

  When I first knew of him he was livin at the Boardinhouse acrost from the depot (oh that uz years and years ago), and I uz in town and wearin my first pumps when he stopped me on the corner and ast me to do him the favor of tellin him the size a my foot. I was not afraid atall to look at him and say the size a my foot uz my own affair and would he show the kindness to not be so fresh. But when he said I only want to know because there’s somebody livin up in New Waverley about your size and age and I want to send a birthday present of some houseshoes to, I said that’s different; and we went into Richardson’s store, to the back where the shoes were, and tried on shoes till he found the kind and size to fit me and this person in New Waverley. I didn’t tell im that the pumps I’uz wearin were Sistah’s and not my size (when I got home and Mama said why’d it take you so long? I said it uz because I had to walk so slow in Sistah’s pumps).

  Next time I saw im in town (and I made it a point to look for im, was why I come to town), I went up to im and said do you want to measure my foot again Raymon Emmons, ha! And he said any day in the week I’d measure that pretty foot; and we went into Richardson’s and he bought me a pair of white summer pumps with a pink tie (and I gave Sistah’s pumps back to her). Miz Richardson said my lands Margy you buyin lotsa shoes lately, are you goin to take a trip (O I took a trip, and one I come back from, too).