The Beginning of Sorrows

by Gilbert, Morris

  He made this snuffbox and carried it until he died. He left it to his oldest son in his will, and then it came down to me, and I’m giving it to you, Jesse.”

  Jesse remembered that his father’s light blue eyes had seemed to glow as he spoke of his ancestor, long buried in the hills of Arkansas. “They didn’t give medals out much in those days, but he was a good soldier, and did his duty. Every time you hold this, you think, The Mitchells come from brave stock. ”

  A faint sense of pride stirred within Jesse Mitchell as he stood rubbing the worn surface of the silver box. It was his prized possession, and next to his .410 single-shot Remington he was more careful with it than anything else that he owned. Now his mind went back as he thought of that ancestor of his who had died so long ago and then he thought of his own father and of others who had crossed over. At the age of eighty-eight, Jesse had passed that stage where one thinks mostly of this world. Much of the time his thoughts and his reveries were spent on the past, the long-ago world he had once known. There had been warm flesh, loud laughter; the odors and the touch and the sights of those gone over were very real in his mind. He thought of his twin brother, killed at the age of twenty-nine in a hunting accident, and even as he held his great-great-great-grandfather’s silver snuffbox, he murmured, “Won’t be long, Jake, before we’ll be back together.”

  A shadow, quick and darting, crossed his face and he looked up to see a hawk sail by in the magically effortless way that he’d always admired. He watched the hawk wheel, muttering, “You’d better stay away from my chickens, Mr. Hawk, or I’ll teach you a lesson from which you won’t soon recover!”

  Stepping forward between the tall, fragrant rows, Jesse moved carefully, examining each of the green ears. He was a small man, no more than five feet five. Though he’d never had much size, he had always been sturdy, and was still wiry and strong. He could see as far as ever, too, although he needed the glasses a bemused pharmacist had finally found and dusted off to give to this odd little man who refused free vision-corrective laser surgery. Jesse Mitchell read his Bible, and the small store of books that he guarded carefully. His hair was silver and that tint was matched in the sweeping, broad mustache that drooped over his mouth. His eyes were hazel. There was a sharpness, an alertness about him, unusual in one his age.

  Beneath the faded overalls—he’d had two real cotton pairs of overalls for twenty years, as he despised Tyvek-cotton fakes—he wore a plain white cotton shirt worn thin as silk from countless washings.

  On his feet were a pair of deerskin Indian moccasins—illegal, though Jesse didn’t know it—made by one of the San Carlos Indian women. Before the plague had decimated the San Carlos tribe, this country where he now lived had been filled.

  But now it was empty and desolate with only a handful of the Apaches still hanging on to life.

  Each ear of corn was examined painstakingly. Jesse had not looked at more than ten of them when suddenly he stiffened. Yanking the green shucks back, he whistled between his teeth. “There you are, you imp of Satan!” He was staring at a worm that was burrowed comfortably between two rows of the plump kernels. Flicking the snuffbox open, he tilted it and doused the worm with the tobacco. He had grown the tobacco himself and used it as a pesticide to kill, for he himself did not use the weed.

  “Lord, kill this evil worm,” he said comfortably, and then began moving down the row. As he did, he thought of the many years he had grown a crop of corn on this very spot. They had melded into one another, those years. He had been a young man when he and Noemi had come to this place all the way from the Ozarks to minister to the San Carlos Indians. With a quick grin, as the past came to him clearly, he recalled that he had preached for nine years before he had seen a single convert. I always was stubborn, he thought. I don’t know if I could wait nine years for another convert now. But he could have, and he would have, if that’s what the Lord told him to do.

  Reaching the end of the row, he turned, pulled the worn black Stetson off of his head, and wiped his forehead with his sleeve. He studied the flotilla of crows beating their way across the sky and said conversationally, “Lord, I sure do appreciate all this good corn.” It was a way he had of praying, as if he were speaking to a friend standing right at his elbow. There were times, certainly, when he would cry out loudly to God, and weep, but those were times at night in the cabin with only Noemi to hear.

  A sound came to him then and he looked up to see a plume of dust rising across the desert. The sight of it made him smile, for he knew that this was Little Bird coming on her Harley Davidson. Jesse’s best friend on earth was Cholani, chief of the Apaches. What was left of them, at least. It had taken Jesse Mitchell nearly forty years to win the chief to his own faith in Jesus, but he felt that it was time well spent. He had said once, “Some things take longer to grow than others, Noemi. If you want to grow a weed, it goes up right now. A pumpkin takes three months, but a good sound oak tree takes many years. That’s the way it is with Cholani. He’s slow growing but he’s strong.”

  As the red motorcycle crested a hill, he admired the way the young woman rode. It was not a horse, but it was the next best thing to it, he secretly admitted. Now as she applied the brakes and swung the back around so that the Harley came to a stop, he moved forward to greet her warmly, though a warning was sounding somewhere in his mind. Little Bird often came to see him, but rarely without her grandfather. “Come in out of the weather, daughter.”

  “There’s no time. Grandfather says for you to come.”

  Jesse stood stock-still. He had been anticipating this moment for a long time, but now that it was here the reality of it struck him. The young woman didn’t move. Jesse lifted his faded eyes and said, “Is it his time, Little Bird?”

  “Yes. He says bring Him-Who-Touches.” She hesitated for a moment, and then said bitterly, “He’s dying. I know you can’t do anything to stop that.”

  Jesse Mitchell did not answer. More than once in his life he had seen death rebuked and forced to wait for God’s timing. He had no thought that this might happen with Cholani; he felt in his soul that it was, indeed, his old friend’s time to die. But he knew that Little Bird would be angry, for she was a hard young woman. She had been misused and maltreated, by others and by herself. But now was not the time for Jesse to minister to Little Bird. Now he said only, “I will come. Let me hitch up the team.”

  “There’s no time. You’ll have to ride with me.”

  “All right.” Jesse turned and walked quickly to the house, stuffing the silver snuffbox in his hip pocket. He stepped inside the door and saw that Noemi had turned from the sink, where she was peeling potatoes. She was a small woman, ten years younger than he, and had sharp, far-seeing brown eyes. “Is it Cholani?”

  “Yes. I’ve been sent for.”

  “He wouldn’t have sent for you if it weren’t his time.”

  “I think that’s right. Well, Noemi, I’ll do the going and you do the praying.” He moved over to the rough old kitchen table that served as dining room, study, conference table, or for any other necessary activity in the small house. Picking up his Bible, he went to his wife and patted her shoulder affectionately. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  “You’re riding on that infernal machine?”

  “Yup. I wish it was a horse.”

  “Go careful, Jesse.”

  Jesse left the house, pulling the drawstring of the black Stetson tight under his chin. Hopping over the seat, he put both arms around Little Bird’s waist, holding the Bible right over her stomach. “Let her rip, daughter.”

  With a cacophonous roar the Harley shot out of the yard. Jesse felt the strong body of the young woman tense and his hat was snatched off to blow behind him, held on by the rawhide thong. His eyes were almost shut as the landscape flashed by. He was already praying for wisdom to speak to his friend, the chief of the Apaches.

  As soon as Jesse entered the room, he walked over and sat down on the rickety straight-backed chair by the simple
cot that was Cholani’s bed. Jesse’s face was covered with dust and he licked his lips and found them gritty. He was aware that Little Bird had entered after him and was now standing behind his back.

  Leaning forward, he placed his hand on Cholani’s brow and asked, “How is it with you, my brother?”

  “It is well.”

  “I have come,” Jesse said simply. “You’ll be in the presence of our God soon.”

  “Yes. It’s time to cross over.”

  The two men were quiet then. Jesse felt the life of the Apache flickering like a candle, waxing and waning in a wind. They said nothing for a long time, but he sensed that Cholani had held on to that brief flickering spark of life merely to see him. Leaning forward, he asked, “What is it, Cholani?”

  “I go to my God—and to your God.” The voice of the dying man was so faint that Little Bird, for all her acuteness of ear, could not hear it. Jesse put his ear down almost to Cholani’s mouth and listened carefully. “God has spoken to me and I have a word for you.” The words came out haltingly and grew fainter. Jesse didn’t speak; he held his breath. Then he heard the words, “Go back to the hills where you first breathed the air. The good Father—He says He will go before you. Go back to the hills that gave you birth. That is the word of God for you, He-Who-Touches.”

  Jesse heard truth in the dying man’s words, and calmly he said, “Yes, I’ll go. You’ve never failed to hear the truth from God, my brother. And now you must go to our God, the Lord Jesus Christ.

  And I will be obedient to the command that has been given me.”

  Suddenly Cholani’s eyes opened wide and he stiffened. With a strength that none of them could imagine was left in his aged, wasted body, he pulled himself upright. He reached out his hand and Little Bird came and took it. He said, “You have been true, Little Bird.

  You are bitter now, but God is good. You will find Him.”

  Those were the last words of the last chief of the Apaches. He turned his eyes upward and gave one loud cry of victory, a faint echo of the triumphant war cries of his ancestors. Then the strength left him and he fell back. His chest heaved twice and then he was still.

  Jesse stood up and bent over Cholani to fold his hands and gently close his eyes. Quietly he said, “We will bury him in the old way.” He saw that this pleased Little Bird, for though she disdained the old ways, she had honored her grandfather’s belief in them.

  “He was a good man, the best I’ve ever known,” Jesse said sadly.

  “Yes. He was good,” Little Bird sighed. “We will bury him in the old way . . .”

  “Well, Jess, is he gone?”

  Jesse came in and tossed his hat on the table. He pulled the cane-bottomed chair out and slumped down in it, for he was weary. The funeral had taken two days; he and Little Bird had tried to gather the remnants of the tribe from the nearest co-op cities of Albuquerque and Santa Fe. Many of them couldn’t be found, and most of them wouldn’t come. Finally he, Little Bird, and just eight other Apaches had buried their last chief.

  Jesse had slept little and the wild ride back on the Harley had felt as if it were dislocating his bones. He sat there, a shadow in his eyes, as Noemi hurriedly prepared a quick meal. He ate absently but drank the coffee thirstily, holding his mustaches back until he lowered the cup.

  “Cholani had a word for us, Noe.”

  “I guess I’m not surprised. He was strong, Cholani was, and of the Lord’s mind.”

  “So he was. What he said always was truth, you know. You remember in the Bible it says you know a prophet if what he says comes to pass.” He leaned forward, put his pointy elbows on the table, and held his chin for a moment. Weariness made his old muscles weak, his eyes were gritty from lack of sleep. He stared blankly at the wall covered with pictures of old friends, mostly those with coppery skin. “He told me to go back to the hills, Noe. Back home to the hills . . .”

  Noemi Mitchell was a strong woman, though at seventy-eight she suffered from some arthritis. Even the touch of her husband and his anointed prayers had not taken it all away. She was a smart woman, too, and had learned many years ago, with only a little rebellion, that when God spoke to Jesse Mitchell that ended the argument. Now she sat down beside him and studied his weathered face. She saw the truth, and the end of the argument, there right now. “So when will we be leaving, Jess?”

  “Tomorrow, I think.”

  It came as no surprise to Noemi that Jesse would act so promptly and surely. “David’s going to worry. Especially since we’re not sure exactly where we’re going.” David was their grandson who was stationed with the 101st Airborne (Air Assault) at Fort Carson, Colorado.

  “I know; you’d better write him a letter, Noe. Tell him that as soon as we get settled we’ll send word.”

  Noemi Mitchell turned in a slow circle and said casually, “I don’t care about most of this stuff, but I’d like to take my mother’s chair.”

  “‘Course you would, you’ve had that all your life. So you write the letter to David, and decide what you want to take. I’ll take a little nap. When I wake up, we’ll get packed.”

  “All right, Jess.”

  Jesse went to take a nap, which turned out to last the rest of the afternoon and most of the night. He woke up with a start. Beside him Noemi, immediately awakened when he was, said, “You were just too tired, Jess, so I let you sleep. We can still get on our way today.”

  They were eating breakfast, and the sun had not fully risen over the western hills, when they heard the unmistakable growl of a Harley Davidson approaching. Little Bird, dusty and sad, appeared in the open kitchen door. “Hello, Sister Noemi; hello, Brother Mitchell. May I come in?”

  “Of course, daughter. You know where the plates and cups are.

  Join us.”

  She shook her head, the gesture weary and defeated. She did, however, sit down in one of the cane-bottomed chairs. “I got you a flight out of Santa Fe tonight at eight-thirty. Did you know that you and Sister Noemi both have over eight months of diversionary time accumulated?”

  Jesse laughed. “No, I didn’t, and I was kinda hoping that the old red-eyed monster everybody worships nowadays had lost us, or forgotten about us.” Jesse had never had a Cyclops in his house, and never would.

  “They don’t lose or forget anyone, Brother Mitchell,” she said, slumping down and staring blankly into space. “It is kind of funny, though. You’re still recorded as living in Santa Fe. The address is the old Mission House. That thing hasn’t been standing for twenty years.”

  “Then just leave it be, daughter,” Jesse said complacently. “The less that old Cyclops knows about me and Noe, the better.”

  Little Bird shifted uncomfortably in her chair, and focused on Jesse Mitchell’s aged face, his white hair and sweeping mustache. “You’re still bent on doing this? It doesn’t make sense to me. I don’t think it’s too smart to let the wanderings and wonderings of a dying old man upset your whole life.” She spoke defiantly, with the hard edge of a voice veiling tears.

  Noemi Mitchell patted Little Bird’s gritty brown hand. “The Lord Jesus Christ is our whole life, Little Bird. And your grandfather was a man of God, who often took on the mantle of a prophet. He spoke God’s word, and God’s truth. We wouldn’t be happy—in fact, we couldn’t live if we didn’t obey God’s word.”

  Little Bird refused to meet Noe’s eyes as she spoke. When Noemi finished, Little Bird said carelessly, “Well, anyway, you know you could only get permission for a two-week visit. If you wanted to relocate, that could cause some real problems. Especially to Hot Springs, Arkansas. Evidently that’s on the edge of a biosphere, and the Sixth Directorate is trying really hard to clear it out, get everyone moved to Little Rock, which is the nearest co-op city.”

  “I don’t understand all that,” Noemi sighed. “It’s so hard to understand how a television could decide where we live or how long we vacation.”

  “What’s a television?” Little Bird asked, with dull curiosity.

&n
bsp; “A long-dead and gone machine,” Jess said quietly. “Now we have Cyclops.” He got up and went to his satchel, in which his Bible and some of his favorite books were already packed. Pulling out a map, he laid it out on top of the table and pointed, showing Noemi. “Look, Noe, you see the color coding? This is an ecosphere map, put out by the Man and Biosphere directorates. The vice president paid for every American citizen to have one of these nice maps,” he said, barely concealing his disdain. “Anyway, you see the little white dots? Those are the co-op cities. They’re the places where the directorates want to move everyone.”

  “Looks like a lot of wasted space to me,” Noemi remarked mildly.

  “Would seem so,” Jess responded shrewdly, “but then I guess it’s a matter of who you think is a waste of time and space. If you think animals and plants and air and rocks and dirt are more important than people, then I guess you don’t think the space is wasted. The green parts, that’s for all of nature to live in. No people.”

  Noemi pursed her lips, an expression of disapproval, as she studied the map. “So we’re going here, Jess?” She pointed to Hot Springs, which was just on the edge of a big green blob.

  “Yes. At least, that’s where we’ll start from.”

  “But where are the mountains your family is from?”

  With a gnarled old finger he made a light circle on the map. “Right here. The Ozarks.” Little Bird sat up, now alert, and frowned.

  Noemi looked up at him. “But that’s all colored green. Didn’t you just say the vice president doesn’t want anyone to live there?”

  Jess grinned, his eyes sparkling like stars. “That may be what the vice president says, but that’s not what God said. God told me to go back to those hills. So I guess the vice president will just have to put up with me and you being right in the middle of his little green things.” He sat back down with finality.

  Little Bird looked first at Jess, then at Noemi. “You’re loco,” she said succinctly. “You’ll never make it, and you’ll probably get picked up by the commissars for trying.”