Gullah Secrets

by Susan Gabriel

  The Gullah ways in her family have passed through the maternal line. It isn’t always so. There are male root doctors, too. Yet, Violet is becoming well versed in protection spells, healing elixirs, and where to find the different plants and roots needed for both. Not to be forgotten are the teas. Ginger root tea can cure all sorts of female problems. Dogwood root tea mixed with cherry root and oak bark cures muscular swelling. Cockroach tea helps cure coughs. And earthworm tea works on rashes if combined into a salve with lard. However, Violet imagines that most of these teas will never be sold in her tea shop, no matter how beneficial they are.

  Violet’s favorite customer, Marylou, enters. Her local customers usually come at the same time every day and order the same thing. Orders she begins fixing as soon as they walk through the door. They count on her to remember the teas and pastries they enjoy.

  Marylou is twelve years younger than Old Sally and walks with a silver cane. A colorful scarf is wrapped around her neck, her solid white hair in a pixie cut. She used to be a dancer and was quite famous at one time. Every morning, Marylou orders Earl Grey tea with a cheese Danish warmed in the microwave. Violet makes her tea, thinking again how lucky she is to be working at her very own tea shop instead of in Miss Temple’s kitchen.

  It is still early, just after nine o’clock, but it already seems a lighter crowd than usual. On a typical Sunday, the tea shop is busy. Queenie usually comes in to help with the lunch crowd, but not today. She is away on her honeymoon.

  It is probably Queenie’s presence that explains why they can barely catch a breath from 11:30 until 2:00 every day. Queenie draws people like bees to flowers with her laughter and folksy manner.

  Violet smiles, remembering when they left for Hilton Head last night, Spud’s car covered with the just married announcements that Tia and Leisha drew on the sides and back window.

  After Violet delivers Marylou’s tea and pastry, she stops by Heather’s table. The pumpkin bread remains untouched.

  “Everything okay here?”

  Heather says that everything is fine, but there is something ominous in the way she looks at Violet. Something in her eyes holds a secret.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Queenie

  Queenie and Spud walk along the waterway near the lighthouse on Hilton Head Island. A tower built for display, not necessarily function, but that has a lovely panoramic view if you take the time to trek to the top. A feat Queenie only did once, when she started coming here with Spud.

  Occasionally Queenie sees tourists looking at them. She imagines a plus-size black woman and an undersized white man wearing a bow tie aren’t a typical couple seen here. But diversity is what makes life interesting. At least that’s what Queenie tells herself whenever she’s being stared at. She would have thought judgment of this nature would be a thing of the past in 2002. Queenie must bite her lip sometimes to keep from saying what she is thinking, which is that people should keep their stares and smirks to themselves.

  “What were those men talking about in the restaurant?” Queenie asks her new husband, squeezing his arm to make sure he is real.

  “Evidently Hurricane Iris is building up speed and has turned toward the southeastern United States.”

  “That’s us,” Queenie says, her eyes widening.

  “Well, us, and a whole lot of other places,” Spud says.

  “Hurricane Iris.” Queenie scoffs. “Isn’t that just our luck, to be pursued by a storm named after you-know-who?”

  “Pursued may be too big a word,” Spud says. “She may still peter out.” But his eyes reveal how seriously he is taking this.

  Spud puts an arm around her, telling her not to worry. “No matter what happens, I’ll take care of you,” he says.

  Queenie giggles before she can stop herself. Since when is she someone who titters like a schoolgirl? She hates to admit that she likes the idea of being taken care of, but she can’t help thinking it comes at a cost. Doesn’t everything have a price, whether it’s independence or codependence? For a moment, she sounds like Oprah, and this pleases her. Spud Grainger has become one of Queenie’s Favorite Things. A gift wrapped in a bow tie just for her.

  More and more people are talking about the storm. When Queenie is paying for a colorful new scarf at one of the harbor shops, Spud tells her he thinks they should talk.

  “I don’t want to upset you,” he begins, “but I think we should head back to the island. The others may need us if this hurricane takes the course they think it might,” he continues. “We may need to prepare the house for the high tides and high winds.”

  Should have known Iris would ruin my honeymoon, Queenie thinks, but what she tells Spud is altogether different.

  She says they can leave, sounding more submissive than she feels. But the truth is she doesn’t want her mama to go through a storm without her, no matter how many other people are around.

  “We can continue our honeymoon after the storm passes,” Spud says.

  She agrees, hiding her disappointment. “I’ve waited this long. I can wait a little longer,” Queenie says, which is actually true.

  He opens the car door for her in the parking lot near the harbor. They will return to his condominium and pack up to go back to Dolphin Island less than twenty-four hours after they arrived. Queenie admires the elegant red-and-white lighthouse again. It couldn’t be more different from the one on their island that has been abandoned for years. A structure that may have been helpful at one time, now bolted closed and dark.

  A gust of wind shakes the car door as she is getting inside, and Queenie can almost hear her dead half sister laugh. The same half sister who insisted at every opportunity that Queenie wasn’t a true Temple but a watered-down version, and who treated Queenie with scorn for thirty-five years.

  It’s not funny, Iris, Queenie tells the wind, wondering if she will ever escape the woman who haunts her memories at every opportunity. Iris was larger than life while alive and is perhaps even bigger in death in the form of a hurricane.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Old Sally

  You best be waking up now, little girl, her grandmother says. Things need to be done to get ready for what’s coming.

  Like what, Granny? Sally asks, half-asleep.

  You got to build the courage fires to keep everybody safe.

  Courage fires? Sally asks. She loves her grandmother more than anyone, but this doesn’t make sense.

  The water going to get high, over your head. You remember how to swim, don’t you, little girl?

  Yes, Granny, Sally says.

  Don’t forget now. Sally’s grandmother looks at her with so much love, tears spring to her eyes.

  I won’t, Sally says.

  Promise me, girl.

  I promise.

  * * *

  Old Sally startles awake, putting her hand on her chest to calm her racing heart.

  “Granny?” she says aloud, wishing the spirit to return. Old Sally’s grandmother died ages ago, yet in the dream she was as alive as anything and passing down her wisdom as she was prone to do. Things like the past, present, and future travel together, like three sisters who refuse to be separated. She also told Sally that everything alive grows on top of something that was before. A live oak can grow right on top of another fallen tree and be nourished by it.

  But what does any of that have to do with courage fires? she asks herself.

  Gullah people have an intimate relationship with nature and spirits. Spirits are benevolent ancestors who are not forgotten. Unlike the Temple ghosts who shocked and scared people, her ancestors try to help. They pass on wisdom to those who will listen.

  It isn’t always that way. Spirits have different personalities. Some want to do good, and some don’t. Whenever her grandmother shows up, Sally knows she wants to help.

  Old Sally thinks again of the dream. She’s never heard of such a thing as courage fires. And why would her grandmother ask if she remembers how to swim? A tingle travels the length of her s
pine. Her old bones know something she doesn’t.

  Old Sally doesn’t need a weather forecaster in Savannah to tell her that a storm is coming. She has been studying these things since she was a little girl. She can smell a storm on the wind and feel it in her body. If that isn’t enough, the birds act differently. They start preparing long before anybody else. But that doesn’t mean it will be a hurricane. They do the same thing before a significant rain.

  Old Sally gets out of bed and shuffles toward the kitchen, surprised by how late it is. She usually gets up by sunrise, and here it is almost noon. The house is oddly quiet. Tia enters the hallway, Violet’s youngest.

  Such a pretty girl, she thinks, a lot like Violet was when she was this age.

  “Mom is at the tea shop. Can I make your breakfast?”

  “That be awful nice,” Old Sally says, thinking again of the dream. “You girls know how to swim, don’t you?”

  “Sure,” Tia says. “Daddy taught us when we were young. Why?”

  “No reason,” she says, although there are plenty of reasons.

  In the kitchen, Tia makes Old Sally a bowl of her usual oatmeal, adding a little butter and brown sugar on top. Old Sally could fix it herself, but it seems necessary to let people help her these days. Not only for her benefit, but for theirs, too. After Old Sally is gone, they will know they were helpful to her, and that will comfort them in their loss.

  Leisha comes in and gives Old Sally a hug. Violet’s two girls are as different as the sun and the moon. One is shy, the other is outgoing. Tia is tall and athletic like her father, Jack. Leisha is more petite like Violet and into making good grades at school. But both are strong in integrity like their parents. Soon they will go off on their own. They are at the beginning of becoming who they are, while Old Sally is at the end.

  “Where’s your daddy?” Old Sally asks Leisha.

  “He and Max are returning the rental chairs,” Tia says.

  All those wedding preparations now be reversed, Old Sally thinks. Life is a constant building up and breaking down. Ebb and flow. Rise and fall.

  Tia and Leisha stand in the kitchen like Old Sally used to stand and wait on the Temple family, meeting their every need. Old Sally eats her oatmeal, thinking how strange it is to be catered to.

  “When I was your age, I was living on this island with my mother and grandmother just like you are,” Old Sally says.

  Tia sits next to Old Sally as if knowing a story is coming. Leisha pours herself and Old Sally each a small glass of orange juice before sitting, too. Old Sally thanks her.

  “Back then, cars hadn’t been invented yet, and no one on the island had a telephone,” she begins. “My grandmother worked for the Temple family and made seven cents an hour. It felt like a step up to be paid at all. Before that, my family had been Temple slaves.”

  The girls’ attention doesn’t waver. Old Sally thinks again of the dream. Courage fires. They will need to call on all their strength soon. The last foretelling dream Old Sally had was before Edward started the fire at the Temple mansion. Old Sally dreamed that Queenie was in danger. Now, this new dream is pointing to something, too.

  “Anybody home?” Queenie calls from the front door as Spud carries in the bags. They join them in the kitchen.

  “What happened to the honeymoon?” Tia asks.

  “We thought we should be here to help out with that hurricane coming,” Spud says.

  “A hurricane is coming?” Leisha asks, her wide eyes begging it to be so.

  “Well, not officially,” Spud says.

  “You okay, Mama?” Queenie asks Old Sally. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

  “A dream has me riled up,” Old Sally says, relieved that Queenie and Spud are here. If something big is going to happen, she wants to have all her family around her.

  “Where are Max and Jack?” Spud asks. “I thought they’d be boarding up windows by now.”

  “They’re returning the rental chairs in Max’s pickup,” Leisha answers.

  “I thought you said it isn’t officially a storm,” Queenie says.

  “It isn’t,” Spud says. “There is absolutely no reason to think we may get a hurricane.”

  According to Queenie, Spud is a person who likes to be helpful. Sometimes too helpful, as far as Queenie is concerned. Last September Queenie had to talk him out of going to ground zero in New York City to help with the recovery effort. Perhaps he would have been more in the way than helpful, but it was an impulse Old Sally admired.

  “Mind if I change clothes in your bedroom?” Spud asks Queenie.

  “You can change clothes in my bedroom anytime, handsome,” Queenie says, and adds a wink.

  “Gross,” Tia says, which makes everyone laugh.

  “Just wait,” Queenie says. “Someday, you’ll find yourself a handsome hunk of man like this one, and you’ll say things you never dreamed of saying, too.”

  “Doubtful,” Leisha says, kidding her sister.

  Despite the playful banter among the people she finds dear, Old Sally’s concerns deepen. An ill wind is blowing in. She is sure of it. Or near certain. But what do courage fires have to do with anything? She hates a riddle she can’t figure out.

  While the others talk, Old Sally is deep in thought. Both Queenie and Spud can swim, she’s seen them out in the ocean. Rose can, too. In fact, Old Sally taught her one summer when she was five or six. She taught Violet, as well, and she has seen Jack swim with the girls. But Max? She will ask him the next time they have a moment alone. Although she isn’t sure why she is so concerned about swimming.

  High water. That’s what Old Sally’s grandmother said in the dream. But maybe that will only happen if Old Sally doesn’t heed her warning.

  What are you trying to tell me? she says to her grandmother.

  Her grandmother doesn’t answer, but Old Sally imagines she will find out soon enough.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Rose

  Rose drives over the Talmadge Memorial Bridge into Savannah, the key from Old Sally’s table sitting on the passenger seat. A key Regina gave her from the overlooked package Iris sent her son, Edward. At the time it seemed odd that Regina would give it to Rose. Perhaps she hadn’t intended to, or maybe she just wanted to get rid of it. Rose had not planned to go to town today, but with Heather showing up and after the strange dream Rose had last night, it felt important.

  Living with Old Sally has her paying attention to her dreams. Old Sally is convinced it is how their ancestors communicate. Rose isn’t so sure she wants to hear from her ancestors, but at the same time, if it prevents her from doing something unwise, she is all for it.

  In her dream, Edward was searching for the second Temple Book of Secrets and wanted to find it before Rose. She has a feeling something inside that second book will change everything.

  As if things haven’t changed enough, Rose thinks.

  Maybe Heather is after the second Book of Secrets, too. She seems to be after something. Rose still can’t believe there are two ledgers. Until her return to Savannah, she had forgotten all about the Temple’s lifelong obsession with collecting secrets. Secrets that helped leverage the family’s power in Savannah. This is not a game Rose has ever played, but she wants to make sure the books don’t create further damage. She still has no idea where the first Book of Secrets ended up after Edward shocked Savannah with it around the time her mother died. He released a secret a day in the Savannah newspaper for weeks. An act of revenge to get back at their racist mother. At least that’s what Regina said the day she and Rose met for the first time.

  When the weather report comes on the radio, Rose turns it up. The storm has taken a turn over the Atlantic and is now heading toward the southeastern coast. After living in Wyoming all those years, severe weather has become routine. Blizzards happened every winter, with tornados in the spring and summer. But she has never experienced a hurricane before. Not even in her first twenty years of life living here in Savannah.

  At th
e bank entrance, Red Mason waits for Rose. His hair has never been red; the nickname is short for Redmond. Red’s hair has turned gray, and he wears a pair of gray slacks with a light blue shirt and loafers without socks.

  “I didn’t know you were back in town,” he says to Rose, flashing the same smile he gave her from the varsity basketball court as she sat in the stands back when they went to school together.

  “My husband and I moved back to Savannah after Mother died,” she says, unsure why she feels the need to tell him she is married, except that the high school crush he had on her was intense.

  “I heard you married a cowboy,” he says.

  “I did, indeed.” Her face momentarily warms. She never knows these days if she is embarrassed or having a hormonal surge. She changes the subject. “Do you think that hurricane will amount to anything?”

  “Iris?” He smiles again, as if the irony isn’t lost on him, either. “Much ado about nothing,” he says, from the high school play they were both in.

  Rose pauses, wishing she had thought to bring Max along. “Thanks again for meeting me.”

  “No problem,” he says, glancing at his loafers as though they could use a polish.

  Rose’s mother would like that the Temple name can still get a banker to come into work on a Sunday. It is unusual for Rose to take advantage of that fact. But something about it feels urgent.

  “You mentioned finding a key to a safe-deposit box of your mother’s?” Red asks.

  Rose hands him the old key, and his eyes widen.

  “That’s from the original bank, the oldest section,” he says. “I didn’t think there were any of those left anymore.”