The Cole Trilogy: The Physician, Shaman, and Matters of Choice

by Noah Gordon

  Shaman lay in the dark and thought about what Alex had said, equally excited and worried. He didn’t like the eye-crossing part. Luke Stebbins had told him that if you played with yourself, you could go blind. Deaf was enough, he didn’t want to lose any more of his senses. He could already have started to go blind, he told himself, and next morning he walked around in extreme anxiety, testing his vision on objects near and far.

  The less time Bigger spent with him, the more time Shaman spent with books. He ran through books quickly and begged them shamelessly. The Geigers had a good library and allowed him to borrow. Books were what he received on his birthday and Christmas, fuel for the fire he burned against the cold of loneliness. Miss Burnham said she never had seen such a reader.

  She worked him mercilessly to improve his speech. During school vacations she received free room and board at the Cole house, and Rob J. saw to it that her efforts on behalf of his son were rewarded, but she didn’t work with Shaman for personal gain. His clear speech had become her personal goal. The drills with his hand on the piano went on and on. She was fascinated to see that from the beginning he was sensitive to the difference between the vibrations, and before long he was able to identify the notes as soon as she struck them.

  Shaman’s vocabulary grew because of the reading, but he had trouble with pronunciation, being unable to learn correct usage by listening to other voices. For example, he pronounced “cathedral” as “cath-a-dral”, and she realized that part of his difficulty was ignorance of where to place emphasis. She used a rubber ball to demonstrate the problem to him, bouncing it softly to show ordinary stress and harder to demonstrate emphasis. Even that took time, for the ordinary activity of catching a bounced ball gave him great difficulty. Miss Burnham realized that she was prepared to catch the ball by the sound it made as it struck the floor. Shaman had no such preparation, and so had to learn to catch by memorizing the exact amount of time it took the ball to reach the floor and rebound to his hand when thrown with a given force.

  Once he had come to identify the bouncing ball as representing emphasis, she worked out a series of drills with slate and chalk, printing words and then drawing small balls over syllables that received ordinary vocal stress, and larger balls over syllables to be accented: .

  Rob J. joined the effort by teaching Shaman to juggle, with Alex and Mal Howard often joining in the lessons. Rob had sometimes juggled for their entertainment, and they were amused and interested, but the skill came hard. Nevertheless, he encouraged them to keep at it. “In Kilmarnock, all the Cole children are taught to juggle. It’s an old family custom. If they can learn it, so can you,” he said, and they found he was right. To his disappointment, the Howard boy turned out to be the best juggler of the three, soon able to handle four balls. But Shaman was close behind, and Alex stuck to his practicing doggedly until he could keep three balls aloft with aplomb. The purpose was not to produce a performer but to give Shaman a sense of varying rhythms, and it worked.

  One afternoon, while Miss Burnham was at Lillian Geiger’s piano with the boy, she took his hand from the piano box and placed it on her own throat. “As I speak,” she said, “the cords in my larynx vibrate, like the wire strings of the piano. Do you feel the vibrations, how they change with different words?”

  He nodded raptly and they smiled at one another. “Oh, Shaman,” Dorothy Burnham said, taking his hand from her throat and holding it in hers. “You’re making such fine progress! But you need constant drilling, more than I can afford to give when school’s in session. Is there anyone who might be able to help?”

  Shaman knew his father was busy with his practice. His mother occupied herself with her church work, and he sensed a reluctance on her part to deal with his deafness, puzzling to him but not imagined. And Alex was off with Mal whenever freed from his chores.

  Dorothy sighed. “Whom can we find who is able to work with you regularly?”

  “I’ll gladly help,” a voice said at once. It came from a large horsehair wing chair that sat with its back to the piano, and to Dorothy’s astonishment, she saw Rachel Geiger rise quickly from the chair and approach them.

  How often, she wondered, had the girl sat undetected and listened to them at their drills and exercises?

  “I know I can do it, Miss Burnham,” Rachel said somewhat breathlessly.

  Shaman appeared to be pleased.

  Dorothy smiled at Rachel and squeezed her hand. “I’m certain you will do splendidly, my dear,” she said.

  Rob J. had heard not a word from any of the letters he had sent out regarding Makwa’s death. One night he sat down and transferred his frustration to paper, another letter with a sharper tone, trying to stir up the sticky mud.

  “… The crimes of rape and murder have been easily ignored by representatives of government and the law, a fact that raises the question of whether the State of Illinois—indeed, of whether the United States of America—is a realm of true civilization or a place where men are allowed to behave like the lowest beasts with perfect impunity.” He mailed the letters to the same authorities he had already contacted, hoping that the new sharpness of tone would bring some results.

  Nobody communicated to him about anything, he thought sulkily. He had dug the room off the shed almost in a frenzy, but now that it waited, he heard nothing from George Cliburne. At first, as days turned into weeks, he spent time pondering how word would be sent to him, then began to wonder why he was being ignored. He put the secret room out of his mind and gave himself up to the familiar shortening of the days, the sight of a long V of geese knifing southward through the blue air, the rushing sound of the river turning crystalline as the water grew colder. One morning he rode into the village and Carroll Wilkenson left a chair on the general-store porch and ambled to where Rob J. was dismounting from a small droop-necked pinto.

  “New horse, Doc?”

  “Just trying her out. Our Vicky is almost blind now. Fine for riding children in the pasture, but … This girl belongs to Tom Beckermann.” He shook his head. Dr. Beckermann had told him the pinto was five years old, but her bottom incisors were worn down so far he knew she was more than twice that age, and she shied at every insect and shadow.

  “Partial to mares?”

  “Not necessarily. Though they’re steadier than stallions, for my money.”

  “Think you’re dead right. Dead right. … I ran into George Cliburne yesterday. He said tell you he’s got some new books out at his place, and you might be interested to take a look at them.”

  It was the signal, and it took him by surprise. “Thank you, Carroll. George has a wonderful library,” he said, hoping his voice was steady.

  “Yes, he has.” Wilkenson lifted his hand in farewell. “Well, I’ll spread the word you’re looking to buy a horse.”

  “I’ll be obliged,” Rob J. said.

  After supper he memorized the sky until he ascertained there would be no moon. Thick, greasy clouds had scudded in all afternoon. The air felt like a laundry after a two-day washing, and promised rain before morning.

  He went to bed early and managed a few hours of sleep, but he had the physician’s ability to catnap briefly and by one o’clock he lay awake and alert. He gave himself leeway, pulling away from Sarah’s warmth well before two o’clock. He’d gone to bed in his underwear, and he gathered his clothing quietly in the dark bedroom and carried it downstairs. Sarah was accustomed to his going forth to deal with patients at any and every hour, and she slept on undisturbed.

  His boots were on the floor beneath his coat in the front hall. In the barn he saddled Queen Victoria, because he was riding only as far as the place where the Coles’ house track met the public road, and Vicky knew the way so well she had no need for good sight. In his nervousness he left himself too much time, and for ten minutes after he had arrived at the road he sat and stroked the horse’s neck while a light rain began to fall. He strained his ears to catch imagined noises, but at last sounds reached him that weren’t imagined, the
creak and jingle of harness, the hoof-falls of a plodding workhorse. In a little while the wagon took shape, heavy with loaded hay. “Is it thee, then?” George Cliburne said calmly.

  Rob J. fought the impulse to deny it was himself, and sat while Cliburne rummaged in the hay and a second human form emerged. Cliburne obviously had given the former slave prior instructions, because without conversation the man grasped the back of Vicky’s saddle and heaved himself up behind Rob J.

  “May thee go with God,” Cliburne said cheerfully, snapping his reins and starting the wagon on its way. At some past moment—perhaps several—the Negro had lost control of his bladder. Rob’s experienced nose told him the urine had dried, probably days before, but he inched his body away from the ammoniac stink behind him. When they rode past the house, all was dark. He had intended to place the man in the dugout quickly, see to the horse, and reenter his own warm bed. But once inside the shed, the process became more complicated.

  When he lighted the lamp he saw a black male perhaps between thirty and forty. With the fearful, wary eyes of an animal in a corner, a big beak of nose, uncombed hair like a black ram’s wool. Wearing stout shoes, an adequate shirt, and pants so ragged and holey that more cloth was gone than remained.

  Rob J. wanted to ask his name, where he’d run from, but Cliburne had cautioned: No questions, against the rules. He lifted off the boards, explained the contents of the burrow: covered pan for nature’s needs, newspaper for wiping, jug of drinking water, bag of crackers. The Negro said nothing; he stooped and entered, Rob replaced the boards.

  There was a pan of water on the cold stove. Rob J. laid and lit a fire. Hanging on a nail in the barn he found his oldest work trousers, which were too long and too large, and a pair of once-red braces now gray with dust, the kind of suspenders Alden called galluses. Rolled-up trousers could be dangerous if the wearer had to run, and he cut eight inches off both legs with his surgical scissors. By the time he’d seen to the horse, the water on the stovetop had warmed. He took off the boards again and transferred water, rags, soap, and trousers to the hole, and then replaced the boards, saw to the stove, blew out the lamp.

  He hesitated before leaving. “Good night,” he said to the boards. There was a rustling, the sound of a bear in a den, as the man washed. “Than-keesuh,” the hoarse whisper came finally, as if somebody was talking in church.

  The first guest at the inn, Rob J. thought of him. He stayed seventy-three hours. George Cliburne, his greeting relaxed and cheerful, his manner so polite it was almost formal, picked him up in the middle of another night and took him away. Although it was so dark Rob J. couldn’t see details, he was certain the Quaker’s hair was combed neatly across his bald pate and his pink jowls were as closely shaved as if it were noon.

  About a week later, Rob J. was frightened that he, Cliburne, Dr. Barr, and Carroll Wilkenson were all going to be arrested for abetting the theft of personal property, because he heard that an escaped slave had been apprehended by Mort London. But it turned out the man wasn’t “his” Negro, but a slave who’d escaped from Louisiana and hidden himself on a river barge without anyone’s knowledge or help.

  It was a good week for Mort London. A few days after he received a cash award for returning the slave, Nick Holden rewarded his longtime loyalty by getting him appointed a deputy United States marshal in Rock Island. London resigned as sheriff at once, and at his recommendation Mayor Andreson appointed his only deputy, Fritzie Graham, to fill the office until the next election. Rob J. wasn’t fond of Graham, but the first time they ran into one another, the new acting sheriff wasted no time in indicating that he wasn’t interested in carrying on Mort London’s squabbles.

  “Certainly hope you’ll become active again as a coroner, Doc. Real active.”

  “I’ll be glad to,” Rob J. said. It was the truth, because he’d sorely missed the opportunities to keep his surgical techniques honed by doing the dissections.

  Thus encouraged, he couldn’t resist asking Graham to reopen the case of Makwa’s murder, but gained only a look of such wary disbelief that he knew the answer, even though Fritzie promised to “do whatever I can, you may be sure of that, sir.”

  Thick, milky cataracts filled Queen Victoria’s eyes, and the gentle old mare could no longer see at all. If she were younger he would have operated to remove the cataracts, but her work-strength was gone and he saw no reason to inflict pain. Nor would he put her down, because she seemed content to remain in pasture, where everyone on the farm sooner or later stopped by to feed her an apple or a carrot.

  The family had to have a horse to use when he was away. The other mare, Bess, was older than Vicky and would have to be replaced soon too, and he continued to keep his eyes open for likely horseflesh. He was a creature of habit and hated to depend on a new animal, but finally in November he bought a general-use horse from the Schroeders, a small bay mare neither young nor old, for a price reasonable enough so that he wouldn’t feel the loss if she wasn’t what they wanted. The Schroeders had called her Trude, and he and Sarah saw no need to change her name. He took short rides on her, waiting for her to disappoint, but deep down he knew Alma and Gus wouldn’t have sold him a bad horse.

  On a crisp afternoon he rode her on his rounds, house calls that took them all over the township and beyond. She was smaller than either Vicky or Bess and seemed bonier under his saddle, but she responded well and wasn’t a nervous animal. By the time they came home in the dusk of early evening, he knew she would do very well, and he took his time rubbing her down and giving her water and feed. The Schroeders had spoken only German to her. Rob J. had talked to her in English all day, but now he patted her flank and grinned. “Gute Nacht, meinegnadige Liebchen,” he said, recklessly expending his German vocabulary all at once.

  He took the lantern and started to leave the barn, but as he was framed by the door there was a loud report. He hesitated, trying to identify it, striving to believe that any other sound could be similar to a rifle shot, but immediately after the powder clap there were a simultaneous thud and a snicking as a hickory sliver was knocked from the barn-door lintel by the slug, not eight inches above his head.

  Returned to his senses, he stepped quickly back inside and blew out the lantern.

  He heard the back door of the house open and slam, heard feet running. “Pa? You all right?” Alex called.

  “Yes. Get back in the house.”

  “What—”

  “Now!”

  Steps retreated, the door opened and slammed. Peering out at the gloom, he took note of his trembling. The three horses moved restlessly in their stalls, and Vicky whickered. Time froze.

  “Dr. Cole?” Alden’s voice approached. “You fire a shot?”

  “No, somebody fired and hit the barn. Damn near hit me.”

  “You stay in there,” Alden called crisply.

  Rob J. knew the way the hired man’s mind worked. It would take him too long to get to the goose gun in his own cabin; instead, he’d fetch the hunting rifle from the Cole house. Rob heard his steps, his cautionary, “It’s only me,” and the door opening and closing.

  … And opening again. He heard Alden walking away, and then nothing. A century passed in maybe seven minutes, and footsteps came back to the barn.

  “Nobody out there now that I can see, Dr. Cole, and I looked pretty good. Whereabouts did it hit?” When Rob J. pointed out the slivered lintel, Alden had to stand on tiptoe to examine it. Neither of them lit the lantern to see it better. “What in the world?” Alden said shakily, his face pale in the gathering darkness. “Never mind that he was poachin on your land. To hunt that close to the house, and without proper daylight. If I ever find that fool, he’ll be a sorry marksman!”

  “No harm done. I’m glad you were here,” Rob J. said, touching his shoulder. They went into the house together to soothe the family and to put the near-accident behind them. Rob J. poured Alden a brandy and joined him, a rare happening.

  Sarah had made a supper he loved, gre
en peppers and young squash, both stuffed with spiced ground meat and stewed with potatoes and carrots. He ate with appetite and complimented his wife’s cooking, but afterward he sought solitude in a chair on the porch.

  It wasn’t any hunter, he knew, to be so careless near a house, and to hunt in poor visibility at the end of the day.

  He considered a possible connection between the incident and the dug-out room, and concluded there was none; anyone who wanted to make trouble because he helped escaped slaves would wait until the next Negro arrived, and then have foolish Dr. Cole arrested and collect bounty money on the slave.

  Yet Rob J. couldn’t escape a growing awareness that the shot had been a warning somebody wanted him to think about.

  There was a high moon: a bright darkness, not a night to be moving hunted people. Sitting and staring out, studying the sudden leaping moon shadows of wind-tossed trees, he acknowledged his certain intuition that at last he’d been sent an answer to his letters.

  36

  THE FIRST JEW

  Rachel feared the Day of Atonement but loved Passover because the eight days of Pesach more than made up for the fact that other people had Christmas. On Passover the Geigers remained in their own home, which seemed to her to be a haven filled with a warm light. It was a holiday of music and singing and games, of frightening biblical stories with happy endings, and of special food at the seder, with matzos shipped in from Chicago and her mother baking a series of sponge cakes so tall and light that as a child she believed her father when he told her to watch hard and she would see them float away.

  In contrast, for Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur, every autumn the family packed up, after weeks of planning and preparation, and traveled for most of a day, by wagon to Galesburg, then by train to a wharf on the Illinois River, and down the Illinois by steamboat to Peoria, where there was a Jewish community and a synagogue. Though they came to Peoria only for the two holy weeks out of the year, they were dues-paying members of the congregation, with seats reserved in their names. During the High Holidays, the Geigers always boarded at the home of Morris Goldwasser, a textile merchant who was a prominent member of the shul. Everything about Mr. Goldwasser was large and expansive, including his body, his family, and his house. He wouldn’t accept payment from Jason, pointing out that it was a mitzvah to make it possible for another Jew to worship God, and insisting that if the Geigers paid for his hospitality they would deprive him of a blessing. So each year Lillian and Jason worried for weeks about a suitable gift that would demonstrate their appreciation.