by Leah Pileggi
I was thinking out loud. “Do crazy men come in here or do men go crazy once they’s here?”
Mr. Shin answered me. “Some both, Jake.”
We three men walked to the far end of the yard and set down in the shade of the fence. Mr. Wu turned the pegs on the instrument, tuning up the strings.
Mr. Shin asked, “You learn to read, Jake?”
“Well, I for sure know my letters, and I can read a few things. How ‘bout you? Can you read English?”
He nodded. “But not good like Mr. Nance. I read some. I teach Mr. Wu. He know some English letters now.”
I asked, “Do you think Mr. Nance is gonna be all right?”
“We wait and see,” said Mr. Shin. And then he asked, “You want learn to play banjo, Jake?”
Mr. Wu set the instrument in my lap, its long skinny neck sticking way out past my shoulder. He showed me how to put my fingers on a string and then pluck. The note made me laugh, but it sounded kinda lonesome, too.
The men who usually played cards wasn’t playing. And the ones usually pitching quoits wasn’t pitching. I think we was all thinking ‘bout Mr. Nance.
I handed the instrument to Mr. Shin, and he played a slow piece of Chinese music. All the men listened. The notes floated up into the hills.
“Can’t y’all play something with a tune?” yelled one of the men. Some of the others told the man to keep quiet. But Mr. Shin got up and took the banjo with him. He talked to a guard, and then the two of them headed back into the block. Didn’t want no more trouble in that one day, I suppose.
Mr. Wu never said much, so him and me just kept setting in the shade, trying not to melt. Card game started up, and then some of the guys gathered up the quoits and started pitching.
I seen Mr. Shin coming back. He was carrying a piece of paper in one hand and the banjo in the other one. I could see the men was watching him walk on over and join me and Mr. Wu.
“Maybe now time to play America song.”
He tuned up the strings, plucking and picking at them. He handed the piece of paper to me, and I seen right away I knew some words, or at least some letters. “Doo dah,” I said out loud. “What is this, Mr. Shin?”
“Words to song,” he said.
And then he picked a simple tune that even I knew, called “Camptown Races.” The men all gathered round, and we sounded right good singing:
The Camptown ladies sing this song,
Doo-dah, Doo-dah
The Camptown racetrack’s five miles long,
Oh! Doo-dah day.
I come down there with my hat caved in,
Doo-dah, Doo-dah
I’ll go back home with a pocket full of tin,
Oh! Doo-dah day!
Going to run all night.
Going to run all day.
I’ll bet my money on the bobtail nag,
Somebody bet on the bay.
Mr. Shin played the tunes for “Oh! Susanna” and then “Yankee Doodle Dandy,” and the men just made up the words. They got to dancing, too. And then Mr. Shin just did some picking, sounding half American and half Chinese.
‘Fore I knew it, we was all back on the block. ‘Cept Mr. Nance.
THIRTEEN
September 2, 1885
White Beard come to visit ‘fore I was hardly awake. Henry let him in.
“Jake,” he said, setting down next to me, “have you been keeping up with your reading?”
I used my knuckles to wipe the sleep from my eyes. “Well, I got the primer here.” I dug it out and showed it to him. “Henry brung it to me after Mr. Nance got hurt.” What I didn’t tell him was that I had not opened the book even one time since.
White Beard cleared his throat. “Yes, well, Jake. I have some news for you about Brother Nance.”
“I hear stuff,” I said. “I know he cain’t see no more.”
“That’s right, Jake. We’ve had a doctor caring for him in the Warden’s Building, but I’m afraid there’s nothing more we can do to help him. He’s been pardoned by the governor. Mr. Nance is going home.”
As far as I knew, he was already gone.
“He’d like to see you, Jake.”
“But you said he cain’t see.”
“Well, now, I mean he’d like you to sit with him for a bit before he leaves. Would you do that, son?”
I pictured Mr. Nance’s face with no eyes. “How does he look?”
“He has a beard again. And his face is mostly healed. Will you do it?”
I knew that I would, right when he first asked, no matter what Mr. Nance looked like.
“Can we go now?” I asked.
So off we went, me and Henry and Warden White Beard. We left the block, crossed the yard, and walked on into the Warden’s Building. The first door on my right stood open. I started in.
“That’s not where he is, Jake,” said the warden. But before I turned and walked out of that room, I seen a table and chairs. And I seen a wire coming through a hole in the outside wall and hooked up to bells.
I stepped back into the hall, and Henry closed the door. We kept on and walked up a set of steps. “Here he is, Jake.”
And there was Mr. Nance, setting up in a real bed, his hands together in prayer. His beard was sorta growed back, kinda mixed-up black and white. His eyes was closed, and the one looked cockeyed and crooked where it come close to his nose. But the rest of his face just looked like a kindly old-man face.
“Is that you, Jake?” he asked.
I shouted, “Yes, sir.”
Mr. Nance laughed. “I can’t see you, Jake, but I can still hear you.”
I felt kinda stupid. “Well, sure,” I said.
“Come on and sit here.” He reached out to touch a chair beside his bed. I set down. Henry and White Beard stepped outside the room and half closed the door.
“I understand that you have possession of the primer.”
“Yes, sir, I do.” We set quiet for a minute. “I ain’t opened it since …”
Mr. Nance sighed. “I thought as much.”
“It’s not that I don’t like readin’, Mr. Nance. I just don’t like readin’ without you.”
His mouth kinda tightened up. “You can do it without me, Jake. You just need a new teacher.” He adjusted hisself against his pillow. “I was likely going to leave this place before you anyway. I should have let you know that.”
Had a bad feeling in my gut. Then it hit me that the only other man interested in teaching reading was Mr. Hawkes. “Not Mr. Hawkes. Please not him.”
“Brother Hawkes is a good man, Jake.”
“Not like you. He’s got a mean old face.”
We set quiet again. I traced a circle on the floor with my boot.
“You were making progress. And Jake, it’s so important to learn to read proper.”
Before I had a chance to think, words just rushed outta me. “Mr. Shin can read some.”
I heard shuffling sounds from Henry and White Beard outside the door.
Mr. Nance said, “I don’t know if Mr. Shin knows any more than you do, Jake.”
“Oh, he does. He can read way more words than me,” I lied. But then I added, “He’s real smart. He learned to play American songs on a Chinese banjo.”
“Well, now, that’s something,” said Mr. Nance.
We both set quiet again, a big old clock ticking away on the wall.
“Would you do me a favor, Jake?”
I knew what he was gonna ask.
“Try to work with Brother Hawkes. He’s a good man and a good reader. Will you do that for me, Jake?”
I nodded my head, but then I remembered he couldn’t see that. “Okay, Mr. Nance. I’ll try him. I really will, ‘cause you want me to.” Then I faced to the door with them ears hiding behind and said real loud, “But if it don’t work out, me and Mr. Shin can work together.”
White Beard come on in the room. He said, “You’ll have to give it a real try with Brother Hawkes, Jake.”
“I will. I promise.” I
was turned such a way as nobody could see my fingers twisted behind my back.
FOURTEEN
September 24, 1885
Mr. Nance was gone.
I give it my best shot, reading with Mr. Hawkes. That first day, I went on in there all set to learn me some new words.
“What we gonna learn today, Mr. Hawkes?” I asked.
“You do not talk unless you’re addressed, Jake. Do you understand what that means?”
I stood looking.
He said, “I just addressed you, so you may answer.”
“Oh.” I couldn’t get my eyes to look anywhere solid. “What was the question?”
This time, he did the looking around, in a mad sorta way. “Do you understand that you will not speak unless I ask you a question?”
“Oh. Yes, sir.”
And that was ‘bout as good as it got. He opened a book he called a hymn book. It had lines and musical notes with words underneath. He asked me what I could read. I seen some words I knew, but I told him, “It’s just a buncha letters, sir. I cain’t read no words.”
He sighed so big I thought all his air was gone outta him. But I was wrong, ‘cause he talked up a big storm: “This here is this word and that there is that word and you put them together and you got word word.” Made my head hurt.
Every day, I kept going on over there, putting on a good show of trying to learn something. I made sure I was polite when I answered his questions with a string of words that didn’t make no sense. He give up after ten days, and that was that.
Me and Charles kept at each other every chance we got, but never loud or mean enough to get in trouble again. Had us a pissing contest the one day. I woulda won, but the wind changed.
One time I was waiting around for Henry, and Charles was just plain waiting around. I had to ask, “So it don’t much seem like you want to go to school.”
“What would you know about school?”
“Well, had me my own version of school, I guess.” And then I told him ‘bout Mr. Nance and then Mr. Hawkes.
Charles thought ‘bout all that for a minute. Then he said, “Well, I’m sorry about Mr. Nance. But all you did was just reading. I have to do math and such.”
Couldn’t think of anything to match that, so I just said, “I have to sleep in a cage.”
That pretty much shut him up.
Mr. Criswell’s cat kept on following me and Henry home almost every day. And every time, I’d say boo and he’d turn and run back to the hogs. Crazy cat.
One day as I was mixing up a batch of slop, the cat slithered on by. “That old scrawny tomcat got a name, Mr. Criswell?”
“Nope,” he said. “Just call it Cat. Been living around here for years.”
“Don’t suppose you know he follows me home most days.”
He was mixing up his own slop recipe. “You don’t say.”
“What you suppose that cat wants, Mr. Criswell?”
I was used to looking at the top of his head by then. Right then he looked to me at first like he was thinking. But he took so long, I wondered if he hadn’t gone to sleep standing up.
I said, “Why’s that cat follow me, do ya think?”
“Well, Jake, maybe it just likes to look at new places.”
Made sense to me. I liked looking at new places, mostly.
When Henry showed up, Mr. Criswell sent me to fetch something while they did some talking. On that walk home, I asked Henry, “What was you and Mr. Criswell talking ‘bout?”
“Nothing important, Jake.”
And then he changed the subject to one I was hoping for.
He said, “Warden Johnson has decided that you can work with Mr. Shin on your reading.”
“Is that right?”
“But the warden will test both of you in two weeks and see if you’re making progress.”
Me and Mr. Shin would have to work real hard. No way I was gonna get pushed back on Mr. Hawkes.
Right after dinner, Henry come and led me over to Mr. Shin’s cell.
“We got to work fast, Mr. Shin. If I don’t read good in two weeks, Warden White Beard is gonna fire you.”
Mr. Shin had his hand over his mouth, but I could see his eyes laughing.
“What?”
“Jake, you have funny words.”
Being all business, I said, “Well, if we don’t get a move on, I won’t have no new ones.”
I handed my primer over to Mr. Shin. He took a good long time looking it over. Seeing as there weren’t much light to read by, even in the bright afternoon, I let him have it for a while.
Finally he looked up. “We start with alphabet,” he said.
“I already done the alphabet,” I said.
Mr. Shin said, “Show.” He handed the slate and chalk my way. I did a fair job, A to Z, while Mr. Shin watched.
“Good, Jake.” He opened the primer. “Now this,” and he pointed to the alphabet lesson. “We start here.”
A wise son makes a glad father,
but a foolish son is the heaviness of his mother.
Between us two—and Mr. Shin done the most—we got, “A wise son makes a glad __, but a __ son is the heavy of his ___.”
“It’s somethin’ ‘bout a couple sons,” I said. “But what’s it mean he’s heavy?”
Mr. Shin kept on staring at that line like the lost words was maybe gonna jump right in his ear.
He turned the page. “We try this.”
Better is a little, with the fear of the Lord,
than great treasure, and trouble therewith.
We managed the first part of the sentence, up to “Lord.” But them big words at the end, well forget that. And then the sentence didn’t make no sense.
I took the book from his hand and flipped to a page that Mr. Nance showed me many times. “The Ten Commandments,” I said. “I seen these before.”
“Yes,” said Mr. Shin, “I hear, too.”
I read, “‘Thou shalt have no more gods but me. Before no idol bend thy knee.’ You hear how that rhymes? ‘Me’ and ‘knee,’ they sound the same.”
Mr. Shin nodded. “Read together.” I didn’t want to admit to myself that I remembered some of them words instead of reading them. But they was starting to feel like faces I seen every day. Like friends.
When Henry come back, I flipped the pages in the primer and asked, “What’s these here words, Henry?”
He squinted up his eyes. “That first one’s ‘father,’” he said. “And that last one there is ‘mother.’”
Both me and Mr. Shin said something like, “Ohh.”
“That word is ‘foolish,’” he said, pointing. Then he read the whole sentence and said what he thought it meant. A smart son makes his parents happy, but a foolish son is like a heavy weight on his parents. I figured then I must be one of them foolish sons, ‘cause it sure seemed I was a heavy weight on my pa. So heavy that he just dropped me and took off.
I felt awful low right ‘bout then. But the rest of those two weeks me and Mr. Shin kept on with that reading stuff, with a whole lot of help from Henry. And soon as a blink, it was the day of my reading test.
FIFTEEN
October 18, 1885
Maybe Henry was teaching me and Mr. Shin more than we was teaching each other. So what. We was all learning and filling up our days.
After dinner me and Mr. Shin, with Henry in the lead, stepped out into a cloudy afternoon and crossed on over to Warden White Beard’s office. Mr. Norton seen us coming down the hall and knocked on the warden’s door.
“Gentlemen,” said the warden as we walked in.
I was carrying my primer, and Mr. Shin had the slate and chalk.
“Jake,” said White Beard, “I’d like to see you write the alphabet.”
I took the slate and chalk and started writing. I had to spit on my shirttail and erase some here and there, but I done a right nice job. “Here you go,” I said, handing it across the desk.
The warden nodded and then handed the slate to Mr. Shin
.
“Shin Han, do you write also or just read?”
“I write letters,” said Mr. Shin. And he did. His looked more like birds and pretty things than letters. He handed the slate to White Beard, who nodded again.
“You have your primer, Jake?” he asked. And then me and Mr. Shin read what we could while White Beard tugged at that beard. And then we was done. I sure hoped it was enough.
“It looks like you’re both benefiting from your reading time, Jake. So we’ll just let that continue.”
I ‘bout grabbed him around the neck and give him a hug. Instead I said, “Yes, sir.” But my ears tugged the corners of my mouth into a big old grin.
White Beard said, “I understand there’s a cat that sometimes follows you from the hog pen, Jake. Is that right?”
“Sometimes.”
“Well, Mr. Criswell and I discussed it, and he said next time that cat wants to make this place its home, it can stay.”
I couldn’t hardly believe what I was hearing.
“It’s good to have a mouser around,” he said. “It’ll live in the yard. You just make sure it stays out of trouble, Jake.”
And by then my face was almost stretched in two. “It won’t be no trouble, Warden, I promise.”
“Well, that’s fine.” He turned to Henry. “Now I’d like a word with Jake alone, Henry. You and Shin Han, please wait in the hall.”
Mr. Norton musta been glued to the door, ‘cause it opened right that second and they all went out.
I figured things was going too good. Musta been time for a licking of some kind.
“You’re going to have a visitor, Jake.”
“A visitor?”
“A lawyer.”
I didn’t know if that was a good thing or a bad thing. I guessed bad, ‘cause of my do-nothing lawyer at the trial.
“He’s a representative of the governor, and he’ll be checking on your well-being.”
I said, “I’m bein’ pretty well, sir, seein’ as I get that dinner every day, and I get out to work the hogs. And now I’m gonna have my own cat.”