When I was quiet for too long, Belle would tell me, “If you don't feel like talking, Samuel, that's all right, but my momma always said that silence invites the eternal rest, know what I'm saying? So I'm gonna fill up the air with words.” And then she would start into a long story about her family or August's family or old times.
In between, she tried to get me to talk about going on to Canada. “What is the first thing you gonna do when you get up there to freedom, Samuel?” she would ask as she wrung out another cloth for Harrison's forehead. “You thinking about how it will be up there in Canaday? What it'll be like to be free your whole life?”
I tried to think about freedom, but the only thing I could see in my mind was a big, empty field. And the free people wandering around in that field were holding nothing in their hands. If you were free of everything, what did you have left? That's what I kept on thinking. Freedom was just like being given a cornfield in winter, with everything green pulled up and taken away.
Even my momma was nothing but a shadow in that field. Only thing I could see was a far-off wagon with her sitting inside it, the same as Lilly said she looked like when she left.
“Don't you want to be free?” Belle would ask, giving me a strange look. “Don't you want to get away from your mean master for good?”
“Yes'm.” I nodded, trying to be polite.
Belle said that I would get up to Canada and I would be free to work the same as August worked every day, and I would get paid money for my hard work.
August worked on something called the cars. “Not carts,” he said. “Cars.” Every morning before sunup, he walked to the white town of Hillsboro with two other colored men from the Hollow. Sometimes I watched him leave. But it always seemed strange to me that no whitefolks followed behind him. He just puffed on his pipe, swung his lantern back and forth, and walked into the morning darkness. No whitefolks around at all.
One evening, August took me to see the cars he worked on. Harrison was restless, and Belle said I needed to look at something besides his suffering, day after day. “You been sitting by his bed, day and night, for almost a week now,” she said. “Go on with August and look at something else.”
So we cut through a wheat field that August said divided the Hollow from the start of the town of Hillsboro. It was getting dark, and August said we would have to hurry back.
As we came out of a small woods, I heard a low rumble. Sounded like far-off thunder, although there were no clouds above our heads at all. The only thing in the sky was the setting sun. As I looked up, a shiver went through me. How could thunder come from an empty sky?
The rumble grew louder.
My eyes darted back toward the woods we'd just walked through. “You hear something?” I said to August, trying to keep my voice as calm as water.
But August just leaned his head back and laughed. “You never heard the sound of an iron horse before?” he chuckled. “You in for a real su-prise.”
My heart pounded.
Lilly used to say that the Devil thundered through the sky at night on his big horse, looking for people's souls to steal away. “Just like that,” she would snap her fingers. “You do something bad, you sittin on the Devil's horse. Gone.”
“There,” August said. “Look.”
I pulled in all my breath.
Coming across the field in front of us was an enormous black cookstove, big as a house. Black smoke poured from its wide chimney. Parts and wheels on the side of the cookstove moved without any hands touching them, and a loud bell clanged back and forth by itself.
August shouted to be heard over the thunder. “Nothing to be scared of, right? Ain't this something to see?”
Behind the stove came a whole line of houses and sheds, flying on wheels. August pointed and hollered that those were the cars he loaded everyday. I could see whitefolks’ faces inside some of the rolling cars and my heart thudded. What would happen to those poor people? What had they done wrong?
And then the iron horse was gone.
Around us, the fields grew silent. August swatted at a cloud of white flies and squinted over at me. “You scared by that?” He grinned and smacked his big hand on my shoulder. “You scared. I can tell.” He waved at the place where the horse had been. “Nothing but a railroad. Same as riding in a wagon, only it runs with smoke and fire ‘stead of horses.”
Never heard of those kinds of wagons before. I tried to conjure up a picture of what kind of person would be foolish enough to ride in a wagon that ran on fire. Cassius Hackler maybe. He took the horses sometimes and rode them near to death.
August paused and looked at me. “Runaways, they hide on the cars all the time and take them north. After I sneak you into Hillsboro at night, and slip you onto one of them railroad cars, you gonna be free and clear in no time. Can't travel no faster than that.”
I stared at August.
“You sayin me and Harrison gonna ride that way?”
“Well, now,” August said. He stooped over and pulled up a field-grass stem. “Might be. Could be.” He stuck the grass stem in his mouth and chewed slowly. “Or might be you gonna have to go by your ownself first. Might be we can send Harrison by the cars later, how ‘bout that?”
“Ain't goin north without Harrison,” I said over my shoulder. I started back toward the Hollow, as if August might be thinking of putting me on the railroad right then. “He gets well, we gonna keep walkin to Canaday We got things all figured out.
But when we got back to the house, Belle was waiting for us at the door. She held a melted-down candle in her hand and curls of brown hair stuck out from under her white cap.
“Harrison's been out of his senses,” she said in a tight voice. “I didn't know when you were coming back, and he's been going on and on something terrible.”
I flew past August and Belle, up the small stairs.
Harrison was lying in the bed, but his hands twisted and untwisted the quilt that covered him, as if he was trying to wring the stars right out of it. “That you?” he said, his eyes staring strange at me, as if he didn't know who I was. Running his tongue across his lips, which were split from fever, he whispered something.
I leaned closer. “What, Harrison?”
“Where's Belle?” he said slowly, looking around.
Belle and August were standing in the doorway, but Belle shook her head. “Don't matter what you tell him, he's not asking for me, he's wanting to talk to somebody else named Belle.”
“Belle and August Henry is taking care of you,” I tried to tell Harrison. “You been sick with the lung fever.”
But he just glared at me.
“I ain't sick,” he snapped. “I'm askin for Belle, you hear? Now, you tell me where Belle's gone to. Where they taken her?”
I tried to remember all the gone folks that Lilly used to talk about when we were working—her children, and the field hands that came through, and the slaves that used to work for Old Mas Hackler. I thought about the stones and markers in the little Negro burying-ground and Lilly pointing to each one and telling me who was who. But I didn't remember anyone being called Belle.
“I don't know nobody named Belle,” I told him. “Who you talking about?”
Harrison's eyes darted nervously around the room. “My wife, Belle,” he whispered. “We run away and was caught a few days ago. Ain't you heard? Me and Belle and the baby was caught in the hayloft when the baby started up cryin.”
I remembered how Harrison had talked about being caught in a hayloft when we were hiding in the woods. He had gone out of his senses when I had gotten us lost, and he started worrying about being caught. Had he talked about a woman named Belle then too?
Harrison reached over and curled his fingers around my shirtsleeve. “Where'd they go and take Belle? Tell me, child.” He stared at me, wild-eyed. “Tell me where they took her and the baby.”
“There, now. You got to settle down,” Belle Henry said, coming over and pushing Harrison's shoulders back to the pillow. “Who
's the baby you talking about? What's her name?”
Harrison leaned back against the pillow and closed his eyes. “Hannah,” he breathed. “My baby girl's name is Hannah.”
I felt myself spinning and falling through a red-star sky.
Hannah was my momma's name.
“Don't keep trying to make heads or tails of the things he's saying, Samuel,” August said. “He's all mixed up with the fever. Just come on downstairs and leave him to rest a while.”
And if my momma was one of Harrisons children …
“When he gets out of that fever and comes back to his right senses, you can sit down, talk all you want. Find out who Belle and the baby is then.”
All the breath squeezed out of me …
Harrison was my granddaddy
Harrison's Secret
That night, I sat in the chair beside Harrison's bed. Looked down at his tired, worn face, trying to find something that was the same as mine. Did he have the same eyes as mine? Or the same kind of chin? Or forehead?
But, truth is, no matter how hard I looked, I couldn't see a thing. He looked the same as always. Nothing like me.
I took the roll of gray yarn out of my pocket and thought about my momma in Canada. I wondered if I saw her, if there would be anything that was the same as me. “Gingerbread skin,” Lilly always said. “She had the same kinda skinny-long bones you have and gingerbread skin.”
Or maybe I wouldn't know her either.
Around me and Harrison, the room changed from evening gray to night black to the blue shadows of early morning. Sitting there, thinking, I was afraid to close my eyes. Seemed like if I did, Harrison and my momma would get up and leave me altogether. Would slip through my fingers like water and disappear.
And then, as the first sun came into the room, Harrison opened his eyes.
Just like that.
He turned his head, looked over at me, and said sharp and clear as a bell, “Where we at, Samuel?” He waved his arm toward the little window. “This Canaday?”
“BELLE! AUGUST!” I hollered.
They came running up the steps still in their nightclothes. “Oh, Lord, Lord, Lord!” I heard Belle saying to August. “What we gonna do now?” She came into the room with her hand pressed against her mouth and her hair stuck out all over her head. And August came in with his head bowed down in his palms.
You coulda knocked them both over with a feather when they saw that Harrison had his eyes open and wasn't dead.
That very same day, Harrison sat up and ate three spoonfuls of soup by himself. And the next day, he ate a whole corn cake and a bowl of stew. But I waited one more day before I asked Harrison about his wife and the baby in the hayloft. Belle Henry said I should have known better than to ask him questions, even then.
But he was sitting back against a pillow, eating a bowl of ham soup. Looked almost like his old self. And so I said real quiet, “You ever have a wife called Belle?”
That stopped the spoon right in front of his mouth, and he looked at me.
“Who tol’ you that?” he said sharp.
My heart thudded, and seemed like all the words I had thought of saying dried up in my mouth. “When you had the fever, you was calling out for people and your wife, Belle,” I said low, keeping my eyes down. “Only, I didn't know you had a wife called Belle.”
“You ain't s'posed to know, that's why.” Harrison glared at me. “Ain't no secrets no more, I guess.” He circled his spoon around and around the bowl, fast.
“Well, I does know,” I kept on.
Harrison sighed loud. “My wife, Belle, she worked in the kitchen with Lilly,” he said. “Years and years ago. Way before you was born.”
“Someone took her away?”
Harrison looked hard at me. “You want to know what happened to Belle?” he said. “She was lost in a card game. Old Mas Hackler, he come into the kitchen one night and told her, ‘Belle, you belong to Master West now. He won you in the game of cards we were playing, fair and square, and he's gonna take you with him tomorrow. To Virginia.’ “
Harrison stared over at the window. “That night, me and Belle run off.”
His voice got quiet. “That was a long, long time ago. We hid in that same tree you and me sat in. And the next day, we run to the hayloft of an old barn. And that's where we got caught. In that hayloft.”
“That when they took Belle away?”
Harrison closed his eyes and nodded. “Old Mas Hackler, he brought me home and beat me ‘til even Lilly figured I would die. And the other master took Belle away, and I never set eyes on her again, never heard of her again and—” Harrison's eyes snapped open. “So that's who my wife, Belle, was,” he said sharp. “Long, long time ago. Now, I ain't talkin about that old past no more. Take this bowl downstairs.” He smacked the soup bowl on the bed table and waved his hand toward the door. “ ‘Fore the room is full of flies.”
Downstairs, I could hear August and Belle talking, and the rhythmic thump of the spinning wheel. Truth is, I shouldn't have said another word. But just before I walked down the stairs, I turned around and said quick, “Was there a baby when you run off, too?”
Harrison leaned forward and fixed his eyes on me. “I didn't say nothin about a baby,” he whispered, his eyes crackling fire. “Did I?”
I looked down at that empty soup bowl, not daring to say another word.
“Know how MANY I lost in my life, Samuel?” Harrison hissed. “I lost as many people as there is stars on this quilt.” Poking a finger at each star, he recited names I'd never heard before. “Mary Epps, my birth momma. Sold. My father, James Johnson. Whipped to death. Emeline and Rebecca, my two little sisters. One sold. One sent off as a wedding gift. My three brothers, Abraham, Charles, and James …” He jabbed a finger at three stars. “All put in irons and sold south, same time they sold me north to Old Mas Hackler.”
He crumpled the corner of the quilt in his hands. “And my only wife, Belle, worth more than all the stars in the sky—took away from me and never heard from again.”
He raised a trembling finger and pointed at me. “I don't know what you heard, Samuel, but I ain't answering no more of your questions. It's better to be all alone in this world, you just remember that. You can't lose nothin then. After your momma was sold, I told Lilly that the Lord Almighty could strike me down, but I was gonna raise you as if you was all alone in this world. ‘Maybe someday if we git free, maybe I'll tell him then,’ I said.”
I knew it sure as anything. Harrison was my granddaddy.
“Why you standing there, staring at me?” he snapped. “Go on downstairs and leave me be.” Then he closed his eyes, folded his arms across his chest, and wouldn't say another word.
Didn't matter, though. Word went around the Negro Hollow that snow was on its way that night, and there was no more time for talking anyhow.
Snow Coming
“Snow?” Harrison said, sitting up fast when August told us.
But August said the snow wasn't coming from the sky. It was riding up from the South. On whitefolks’ horses. August said he'd heard in town that some whitefolks would knock on all the doors of the Hollow that night and sift through the cracks. If you didn't want to be caught, you had better be ready with your free papers. Or take to your heels and run before they got there.
“They after us?” Harrison asked sharp, and I thought about Master Hackler and Cassius still looking for us more than two weeks after we had gone. There'd be no kind of punishment terrible enough to meet the trouble of that. Not if they caught us.
August shook his head. “Could be after anybody. Could be a master tracking down his runaways, or patrols rounding up what they can find, or one of the constables from town just nosing round. All we know is they got white skin.”
Me and Harrison didn't have any choice but to run. “Gotta put you on the railroad tonight,” August said. “Nothin more me and Belle can do.”
In the kitchen, Belle put together a sack of food for us. While Harrison got
ready, I stood by the table and watched her hands fly, folding a piece of cloth around a turnover pie and a half-dozen biscuits. “You just take care, Samuel, you hear?” she said, keeping her head down. “You just keep your eyes open and help Harrison along the way, as much as you can.”
I thought about how Belle had stayed up with me night after night, soaking cloths for Harrison's head and fixing brandy and egg, trying to keep him from dying of the lung fever. Had we gone and brought them trouble too?
“Something gonna happen to you?” I asked. “From the whitefolks?”
Belle shook her head. “Me and August and the rest of the colored folks just lay low. Mind our business. Could be they cause a little trouble—trample some of our gardens or steal something—but we own our free papers, so they can't take us nowhere we don't want to go.”
Maybe if me and Harrison got free papers, we could come back and live in the Hollow. That's what my mind said. Bring my momma and Lilly too. And if Master Hackler came looking for us, we could just hold up those papers like they were some kind of powerful big wall between us and him.
“You ready?” August came into the kitchen and lifted the old pistol out of the clay pot by the door. “Don't have no time to waste.”
Belle leaned over and gave me a quick hug, her hands dusting my shoulders with flour. “Good-bye, Samuel,” she whispered. “Watch your step, now.”
My mind felt stuck. Seemed like the words I thought of saying were too small and what I wanted to tell August and Belle was too big. I looked down at my feet. “Yes'm, thank you,” was all that came whispering out of my mouth.
Harrison waited for us outside. He was leaning on his walking stick and staring out into the night. Seemed strange to see him standing there on the steps, same as when we first came to the Hollow. “You hear something?” August said as he pulled the door shut.
“Maybe,” Harrison whispered. “Let's git a-movin.”
The night air was warm and still, and it smelled like a smokehouse was going somewhere. Over our heads, the moon was already bright in the sky. I squinted up at it.
Trouble Don't Last Page 14
