Black Angels

by Linda Beatrice Brown

  Daylily turned over and murmured something in her sleep. Maybe if he was polite, she would be nice to them. He finally spoke. “Thank you, ma’am. My name Luke.”

  “In the morning they eat,” the woman said. She was mixing up something in a round bowl with a big stick. “Medicine for the girl. What’s her name?”

  He was so sleepy. It took him a long time to answer. He felt like a ghost to himself. Finally, he said, “Her name Daylily.” And then he fell over slowly on the floor into the deepest sleep he could ever remember.

  CHAPTER 15

  PROMISE AND APPLE PIE

  Betty Strong Foot wasn’t there when the dawn came. Luke woke up startled, thinking at first he had had a dream about a strange woman, but after his eyes were all the way opened, he remembered. It was true, it had really happened! He shook Daylily and Caswell. “Hey, y’all! Hey!” He was whispering just in case she was lurking around there behind those boxes. “Wake up!”

  Daylily stared at Luke and then at Caswell. “Luke,” she whispered, “where we at?” Caswell just looked at the older ones, waiting for an answer to this latest catastrophe.

  “We need to get gone,” Luke said, looking over his shoulder. “This here woman lives in this house. She gave me somethin that made me real sleepy. Maybe she a hoodoo woman. She fixin to. . . .” Suddenly he sensed she had come up behind him silent as snow. Daylily and Caswell each grabbed one of his arms.

  “Daylily sick,” said Betty Strong Foot. “To go is not good. Sit still. Your food is coming.” Caswell was so scared his eyes were as big as plates, and Daylily looked at Luke for help.

  “This here’s Betty Strong Fingers,” he said to Daylily.

  “Foot,” the woman corrected him.

  “Sorry, ma’am, . . . and she took us out the woods.” He could see now that she was as brown as he was. So, she wasn’t White, he wasn’t dead and she didn’t poison him. She had thick, long braids that were not straight but not kinky either. He still thought they should plan their escape, but he didn’t want Betty to know that. “And she give me some meat and . . .”

  Betty was holding a clay bowl. “You drink this medicine,” she said to the girl. “It’ll make you well.”

  It was full of some greenish water. Daylily looked at Luke for permission.

  He thought about the meat. “OK,” he whispered, “it’s OK.” Daylily made a terrible face, gagged and swallowed it.

  “Now we gonna eat,” said Betty. She motioned for them all to sit on the dirt floor. Caswell and Daylily crowded together, almost on top of each other trying to get next to Luke. They were all silent. Betty handed out bowls with some kind of meat and corn cakes. They all held their bowls, but nobody started to eat.

  Now that they were inside and it was day, Luke realized how poorly the other two looked, and he wondered if he looked as sick as they did. They really needed this food. He fingered his mojo and prayed silently that they wouldn’t all die from her breakfast. She ate out of the same big pot, so he figured it was safe. As Luke reached for his meat, Caswell began to eat. Daylily just looked at her food.

  Betty Strong Foot said, “Must eat to get well.” Luke nudged Daylily with his elbow, and motioned for her to eat. She took one bite of the meat, and one bite of the corn cake and chewed it very slowly.

  For three days, Betty made them wash their sore and blistered feet in the nearby river, smeared their feet with some kind of oil, and wrapped them in rags. She cooked soup and bread and told stories. She told them the name of this river was the Shenandoah and that it meant “sisters of the stars.” And if you kept going, the river got much bigger. She said her daddy was Black like Daylily and Luke, and her mama was a Seminole Indian. “White folks call me half-breed. But I ain’t half anything,” she said.

  And she listened to their stories one at a time. Luke talked about how he had run away to fight with the Union, and Caswell talked about his Mamadear. Betty rocked Caswell to sleep in her rocking chair, and after that, Caswell followed her around like she was his Gran Susie.

  Only Daylily wouldn’t tell much, and she didn’t want to stay there, even though she did feel better. Her chest had almost stopped hurting, and she didn’t have the misery in her head. By the third day, she stopped sleeping all the time, and she was eating almost all her food. But she didn’t trust this Indian woman who called her “Mouth-Stuck-Together,” and she was afraid of her.

  At night she would whisper to Luke about how she was scared of Betty’s house and that she thought it was full of haints. All those baskets and balls of old cloth, wooden boxes in the shadows, and clothes piled up could be hiding something. Daylily thought they should get out of there.

  Only Luke was not sure he wanted to go yet. He was glad to be warm and full, and he kept thinking about what it was like back in the woods.

  On the fourth afternoon, when Daylily was a lot stronger, Betty fixed her eyes on Daylily and said, “Come with me. We gotta get plants for your medicine. Good medicine for bad sickness in the woods.”

  Luke looked at Daylily. She was staring at her feet. “I’ll go with you, Miz Betty,” said Luke. “She don’t feel too good.”

  Betty shook her head. “Only girls can do this. Watch the little one.” She took an old basket off the back door and hooked it on her arm. “You come,” she said to Daylily, and started out the door.

  “Go!” Luke whispered fiercely. “She ain’t gonna hurt you if you do what she says.” She stuck her tongue out at Luke, but she obeyed, walking slowly behind the Indian woman, who was looking intently at plants growing low to the ground.

  It was a beautiful fall day, sunny and warm. Daylily felt stronger, but she didn’t want to be there with Betty. She thought Betty was creepy and she still missed Granny. It seemed like Luke and Caswell were just glad to be somewhere where they had food, but she had the misery all inside, deep inside, and she felt it.

  “Ah, for your cough,” Betty said. She picked three or four large pointed leaves off some plants. She found another plant, and pulled off some more leaves and some large purple flowers with red centers. “Soon you will be well, and then what will you do? I know you thinking about running away,” she said, looking more at the plants than at Daylily.

  “But you scared to run. And that is a good thing to be scared, because of this war. Not safe out there.” She bent over and picked another plant. “And this one,” she said, holding it out to the girl, “is for your chest.”

  “Those nasty drinks ain’t making me well!” Daylily burst out all of a sudden.

  “So, you have better medicine?” She walked at a faster pace. Daylily was now just barely keeping up with the woman. Betty had pulled up her skirts on one side to make it easier to walk in the woods. Her long gray braids were tied in the back with a piece of washed-out gingham. “So, you have a story to tell me?” she said over her shoulder. Daylily had fallen behind. She was having to run to keep up. Betty kept walking.

  “No, I don’t because you are walking too fast and you know I can’t walk that fast, and if you don’t stop, I’ll run away from you. I’ll just run away and you’ll have to find me in the woods! You know I’m sick! You know I can’t go that fast! Stop it!”

  “Oh, you want me to stop now? You have a story to tell me now, Mouth-Stuck-Together?” Betty’s basket swung back and forth on her arm gently.

  “No, I just wanna, I just wanna . . . keep up.”

  “Ok, so we gonna walk together,” said Betty slowly. She made her steps smaller.

  They walked in silence for a while, Betty stopping to pick some strange green raggedy leaves. She pulled them up with the roots. They found a small patch of late blackberries, and Betty reached under the sun-sprinkled leaves to find the best berries. She held out her hand with two or three blue-black berries in it, and smiled. “Now we have peace, Mouth-Stuck-Together?”

  Daylily said, “Thank you,” but her mouth was set in a line; she didn’t look peaceful, and she didn’t smile. She ate the berries, and then her eyes began to
get tears in them.

  “I ain’t sad,” Daylily insisted, sounding angry. “I just thought about my granny’s blueberry cobbler and I missed her, and I’s just wonderin what I’s doin here with you! I was wondering was I gonna wander forever in these here woods? I’s just wantin real bad to be home, to be home somewhere, only I think that ain’t ever gon happen again.”

  Daylily was really crying now. She turned her head to the side and wiped her face with the back of her hand.

  Daylily plopped down on the ground under a tree. Her soft, teary voice was hard to hear. “Will you let me go home if I tell you my story?”

  “Little Mouth-Stuck-Together, you not my prisoner,” said Betty, sitting down beside her. “We are both here because there is war. We both prisoners of the stupid men who fight each other. It ain’t safe to go or stay. What happened at your home?”

  “Granny.” She closed her eyes and put her head on her knees. “My granny dead,” Daylily said.

  Betty could hardly hear her.

  “My granny dead and so is Buttercup and her babies.” The tears ran out of her eyes and down her chin onto her knees. She began to sob, and all the days she had lived since that horrible night when the soldiers had changed her life forever came spilling out. And Betty Strong Foot put her arms around Daylily and held on to her while she cried. When it was all out of her and Daylily was finally quiet, the shadows had grown longer and the blackberry bush was in the shade.

  Betty fished deep within her pocket and pulled out an apple and a pipe. “See this,” she said, holding up the pipe. “This here is a present from my man. He gone too. Lost forever. Sometime I cry, sometime I smoke, sometime I pray. Same thing. People come, people go. People cry. People get happy again. But I know somethin. I know he not so far away we can’t talk to each other, forever.”

  For a long time Betty was quiet, and they just sat side by side, leaning against the tree and listening to the afternoon sounds of birds and small animals that they couldn’t see, but heard in the woods. “I’m hungry,” Daylily said, breaking the silence.

  “I’m hungry who?”

  “I’m hungry, Betty Strong Foot.”

  “Oh, Mouth-Stuck-Together is now Mouth-Open! Ha!” She grinned at Daylily, who couldn’t help smiling back as Betty held up a green apple. “Let me see. How much can I get me for this apple?”

  Daylily looked at her feet. She shrugged. “I don’t have nothin. We need to go,” she said. “Luke be worried.”

  Betty put the apple behind her back. “Now let’s see. Maybe I can get me a promise for this apple.”

  Daylily’s eyebrows went up slightly.

  “Maybe I can get me a promise that Mouth-Open will talk to her granny every night and say prayers to the Great Spirit for Buttercup and her little ones too. And Mouth-Open will ask the angels to help her.”

  Daylily reached for the apple.

  “And,” she said, holding the apple just out of Daylily’s reach, “that Mouth-Open will be happy again someday soon. Promise.”

  “Promise!” said Daylily, smiling ever so slightly and snatching the apple. She ran off ahead of Betty, forgetting she didn’t know where to go.

  Betty caught up with her, dropping most of the leaves for tea on the ground and laughing. But she kept going in the direction of her house.

  “Wait!” Daylily sang out. “Don’t you want the leaves?”

  “Don’t matter!” Betty called back as she stopped to get her breath and wait for the girl. “You gonna get well now, no matter what kinda tea you drink.”

  During the next several days, Betty Strong Foot was away from home a lot. Luke told Daylily that he thought Betty was out working spells. He thought so because he heard her singing some strange songs one morning, and they were songs he had never heard and words that didn’t make sense to him. Once, at dawn, he peeked through the cabin window and saw her coming through the trees on her way back home. She often left after she thought they were asleep, and she came back before she thought they were awake. Sometimes she’d sleep for about four hours and get up, and then she’d give them their chores to do.

  One time she came back with lots of food, dried meat and flour and a bag of sugar and apples. She was wheeling it in her old wheelbarrow. Luke and Caswell saw the letters on the bag—U.S. That meant the United States. Luke knew that much. Caswell said he could recognize his ABCs up to G, but he couldn’t read it. Betty Strong Foot said White man’s letters did not matter as long as they were not hungry. Daylily didn’t say anything, but she looked at the letters a long time. Luke wondered why she was staring like that.

  That night they had apple pie. They stuffed themselves so much, they felt silly and laughed at everybody and everything. For the first time, Betty could see that Daylily had dimples because she smiled a genuine smile, and the sparkle in Luke’s eyes looked real.

  Daylily and Caswell had a secret. Daylily bet Caswell that Luke would eat so much he’d have a stomachache before the night was out. Caswell said, “What you got to put up for a wager?” They were whispering over in the corner, by the fire.

  “I got my tobacco can,” she said. “What you got?”

  He screwed up his mouth. “I got two Confederate buttons. Gold ones too. Found em on the ground when you found that tobacco tin.”

  “They ain’t no gold,” she teased him. “And anyway, what I gon do with some buttons?”

  “Is too! Is too! They real gold. You’ll see!”

  “I see y’all,” said Luke. “Y’all up to some devilment. I can tell.” He faked twisting Caswell’s arm. “C’mon, tell!” he said.

  Caswell wasn’t really hurt. They could tell, but he played along hollering and laughing. “No! It’s a secret! Lemme go! Lemme go! I’ll never tell! Stop!” In the scuffle they knocked over some kindling Betty had piled up, and made a lot of noise.

  “I’ll find out,” Luke said. “Right now I got to finish this pie. If I don’t, y’all scalawags be eating my leftovers.” He went back to eat, and Daylily and Caswell doubled over with giggles.

  “See,” she said, “I don tole you. Les go outside and wait. He gon have some terrible stomachache.”

  “Good idea,” said Betty Strong Foot. “Y’all make too much noise. Go back there where the garden is. I can’t think.” She picked up her pipe. “I’m gon have a smoke.”

  Once they had gone to bed, Luke sat up on the dirt floor, and then rolled sideways and groaned. Daylily was about to burst with laughing, but she knew better than to wake Betty Strong Foot, who was snoring.

  “Caswell.” She shook him. “You wake? Luke got a terrible stomachache, jus like I said. Now you got to give me them buttons.”

  Caswell turned over and looked at her, and he didn’t look happy. His forehead was all wrinkled up in a scowl.

  “But I can’t,” he said. “I can’t, Daylily. My papa’s a soldier. Maybe those were my papa’s. Maybe he lost em. Those buttons . . . maybe . . .”

  “It’s OK,” she said. “Ain’t no way I could use real gold buttons anyway.” She patted him on the arm. “You sleep tight now.” In a few minutes Daylily was asleep.

  As the fire died down, Betty roused herself. She got up and checked the children to make sure they were sleeping well. She ate a small piece of leftover pie. Then she dressed and slipped out into the night.

  CHAPTER 16

  YONA

  Once they settled on being there, the days went by one after the other as easy as stringing Betty’s beads. Betty taught Daylily how to make a necklace of beads like her own mama had done back in Florida, like the the red and blue one Betty wore every day. Daylily reminded Luke how good it was to have food and a warm place to sleep, and most of all to be with somebody they could depend on. But Luke knew they were not going to stay with Betty forever. He never mentioned it, he just felt it. They had been with Betty for two weeks. Betty said October would be here tomorrow. Caswell had stopped staring at nothing, and Daylily was almost completely well. He couldn’t figure it out, but he knew th
at one day their good time would be over. It just kept bothering him. After a while he pushed it out of his mind altogether. It was too much to worry about.

  One night they went into the woods after supper to check the rabbit traps, and there was nothing in them. Betty said she’d have to take the dogs out tomorrow because they needed meat. As they got closer to their cabin, it began to rain. Betty said, “Stay put” and the dogs settled in as Betty tied them to their post in the lean-to.

  By the time they reached the door of the cabin, it was raining hard, and there was a chill in the air. Betty restarted the fire so they could all get dry. She made them wrap up in quilts and blankets and made some chicory coffee. She put the pot right on the hot coals so it would boil. Luke could smell the wet leaves and mud all mixed up with the smell of chicory. But he liked it. It smelled like home to him now.

  After tussling around about who was gonna sit closest to the fire, they got settled and quiet. Betty’s hair was wet from the rain, so she took her hair down and let it hang out so it would dry. Luke noticed her hair was grayer when she took it down. He wondered how old she really was. She said nothing for a long while.

  The fire and the rain made the only noise until Caswell said, “Miz Bet—”

  “I know what you gonna ask, and it’s comin. We goin to the dream lodge. That’s what my papa would say when he told me stories. We goin to the dream lodge.”

  They all squirmed around to get into the most comfortable position.

  “That’s where the bear lives,” Betty said. “Old Mother Bear live in caves in the winter. That’s her dream lodge. She knows where to go to be safe. When the wind whistles and shakes the trees, and the rain blows cold, and the snow comes and covers the grass, the water starts to freeze, and she knows she gotta go to the cave to have her babies until it’s safe to come out.