Song of the Shank

by Jeffery Renard Allen

  He hires a local printer to design a seal bearing an image in Tom’s likeness, a sparsely detailed oval that finds Tom seated at the piano, the words Blind Tom Exhibition encircling him. Also has the printer produce several reams of watermarked stationery with the same image. From this point on all promotional documents he sends out in public or private will bear the inked-in oval, just as all business-related correspondence will be scripted on the letterhead. He’s in control of what he does and what he wants. The difficulties—the lies, the put-downs, the accepting and accommodating, the laughter and complicity, the money spent or promised, the numerous rejections he has suffered in his efforts to secure a venue for Tom’s debut—he has had up to now don’t seem unfair to him any longer. His head is fully above the water, something definite bobbing into view, the surface part of the whole pattern that was once too far removed for him to bear any true conception of it, that he is only now beginning to see. (Perhaps he has always seen it?)

  That afternoon a letter that he has been expecting for weeks arrives by courier. Return receipted to General Bethune, the letter is a deposition signed by a panel of medical experts, native and foreign, attesting to Tom’s mental and physical makeup. Between us we have arrived at a scientific evaluation of a Negro boy who goes under the name Tom, a slave boy who is approximately seven years of age and fraught with all of the handicaps of his race, but who can also demonstrate elevated and refined musical sensibility at the piano. He possesses the muscular ability to reproduce by hand and voice many of the finest selections from the European catalogue. This is in and of itself remarkable since the Negro’s thought-organ generally is a lifeless and submissive receptacle with no power of specific reaction to anything challenging or demanding that might be introduced to it. So much so that the Negro’s imitative abilities are usually little better than those of a parrot. Said fact, however, does not hold true for this Negro boy, Tom. What is even more incredible is that he is, in most respects, a far reduced physical representative of the Negro specimen, for his Maker has singled him out for direct burdening with a number of crippling afflictions—Blindness, Imbecility—ailments characterized by symptoms the full range of which a respectable member of the Anglo-Saxon language is both too chaste and too weak to describe in detail. It is material law that there exist points of reference the Caucasian and the Negro do not share and never will. Still, we, as men of science, shut our eyes to the known and accepted qualities and endowments of the Negro before we began our examination so that we would be fresh and unprejudiced in our deliberations. And we, one and all, agree that we are as perplexed now as we were before we began. We know of nothing out of the ordinary in this boy’s upbringing, his parents being largely addicted to the culture of cotton. So we are left to ask—Is this Negro boy, Tom, the product of Nature or intentional design, and if the latter, whose? Medical science can draw no conclusions. In fact, this Negro slave, Tom, age seven, defies the laws of medical science. Dr. Hollister is among the signers.

  In this town, Culture manifests itself in a single structure, Hibernian Hall, a splendid neoclassical building, all sculptured stone and painted glass, with figures of the Greek (Roman?) gods carved in deep clefts hollowed out of the facade, summer light giving the hard pale muscles the color of flesh, and a smattering of green- or wine-colored bills positioned in such a way as to cause the viewer to lower his face from the celestial sights above and take in the terrestrial fact below, a gilded glassed-in cubicle where one may purchase tickets. The venue maintains a busy schedule hosting fund-raisers and temperance meetings, policemen’s balls, fashion displays of the latest in clerical and mortuary designs, and soirees and barbecues put on by the rich. Perry Oliver finds a keen satisfaction in knowing that the operators rarely book an appearance that might be categorized as pure entertainment, niggers—minstrels—providing what little pure entertainment there is. So some might have expressed more than a bit of surprise to learn that it didn’t take much convincing to get the operators to agree to put on an evening that differs radically from their usual fare, that Perry Oliver had completely won over Mr. Scowcroft, the venue’s director, with a terse summary of Tom’s history (supposed) and talents (actual), a booking fee of five dollars, an advance of another five, and promises of a full house, the director taken in by both the actual fact of the money and the supposed facts of Perry Oliver’s promised words.

  Perry Oliver signs the agreement and waiver, surprised that Scowcroft has given in so easily, that Scowcroft hasn’t even requested an audition, the last thing he expected.

  I hope you and your nigger will make them marvel, Scowcroft says, sounding quite sincere. Wind him up good.

  Perry Oliver leaves Hibernian Hall, bearing away with him an acute awareness of his achievement and stunned by his sudden luck. (A date. A venue.) Everything falling into place. The biggest barriers are down. He is even further along than he had hoped. No longer that impoverished notion of chance. Can it really be this easy? He justifies himself to himself. A man moving at first with the force of idea purely. And now so much lies far behind. And still moving. Much ahead still. (Not as far perhaps.) The comprehensive gaze. “Blind Tom Exhibition” reduced for the first time to its true dimensions. The loneliness and emptiness of those short streets by which he returns home. Low-roofed houses spaced far apart, set in their appointed places, self-contained in misery and monotony. Cast in late summer light. Unsparing of his merriment, he purchases a freshly issued Paul Morphy medallion daguerreotype that he will present as a gift to Seven in celebration of Tom’s (pending) premiere. Set in a wood frame, the daguerreotype is a clever series of images, an arrangement of ovals showing varied positions of the chess master’s head against dark and light backgrounds. Eight small ovals circling a large one. A lunar cycle. A rising of planetary proportions.

  He takes Tom into the tailor’s shop. Needles in her mouth, the tailor measures Tom with ruler and string. A nigger woman sits at the sewing machine. Tom can hardly keep still, keep his arms outstretched, for listening to the sound, the click and clatter.

  Mr. Oliver has decided on two designs. The first a collarless jacket with a row of white (bone) buttons down the front, breeches and stockings in accompaniment. The other an Eton jacket with coordinated vest and striped pants. Both jackets in black.

  The tailor puts her fingers under Tom’s shirt. Lifts one pants leg then the other. Squeezes his biceps. Kneads his chest. Touches his back, hands circling into the cotton. Tugs at elbow and sleeve. Looks at Seven in sober outrage. Can the nigger keep still?

  This nigger can’t keep still.

  Keep your nigger still.

  She can’t quite fix his dimensions. Tries again. Now her every touch startles Tom.

  They wander down one long aisle after another lined with shelves reaching all the way to the ceiling where logs of cloth are piled up. Huge spools of thread like squat trees down another corridor. Now don’t let that nigger go off and poke himself. The sound of one sewing machine after another filling the high room.

  Final fitting, Tom stands before the tailor to slip into his new clothes, test them for comfort, give and grab. The usual cursing complaints. The finished product is something to behold. Two fine suits, life glistening in each button.

  Everything is moving. Silent, watchful, and mobile contentment. A sense that the thing he has been waiting for is about to happen. That all the limits he needs to exceed he can and will. Now, all he has to do is open up the channels of communication. Get the word out. Get people talking on the street. Seven begins to take Tom out each day in the surrey, canvassing the city. In this way, word of Tom’s talents slowly circulates, drifting images half-developed half-finished, increasingly distorted as they pass from one mouth to the next, each witness diminishing or exaggerating the details in accordance with what his ears thought they heard and his eyes thought they saw, or as the independent heart and mind see fit. Truth often has to masquerade as falsehood to achieve its ends.

  The patterns reverse. Now
Perry Oliver stays home, while Seven and Tom venture out each day. Perry Oliver listening to them climb the stairs, setting their feet down softly, making an effort not to creak, stamping their shoes clean in the hall before they enter. Glad to be indoors after a long day.

  Seven offers the silly suggestion of loading the piano onto a wagon. We’ll stop and collect it from Mr. Oakley, he says in a loud and confident voice, as though there can be no doubt of Perry Oliver’s answer. The idea takes firm hold of him—we could rent a buckboard—and Perry Oliver listens while Seven talks himself breathless, hoping the boy will realize on his own the absurdity of his idea. Seven is not lacking in self-assurance when a happy inspiration puts the right word in his mouth. They’ve paid for the piano but never collected it. (Where would they put it in this small apartment?) Seven believes that now’s the time to make the most of it.

  Seven gazes at Perry Oliver with a look of shy entreaty that gives him a touching air beneath his Paul Morphy hat. (More than Perry Oliver bargained for: Seven never takes the hat off. Would sleep in it if he could. Has tried to more than once.) Stuck in the middle of a sentence, Perry Oliver finally concedes. Let them think as one mind and act as one body. (A house divided against itself cannot stand.) His wishes and Mr. Oliver’s form alloys of two instincts. Perry Oliver doesn’t even see Seven as someone separate from him. What Perry Oliver expects of himself is what he expects of Seven. He is part of him and Perry Oliver requires that he give himself with the same completeness that Perry Oliver gives.

  To instruct Seven in the proper method of negotiating a deal, Perry Oliver had told him the story of how he acquired the carriage. Several years ago he had purchased it at ten cents on the dollar from a destitute cotton farmer passing through town, headed west. The bank foreclosed on my niggers. Hell, six months ago I had already lost half of what I owned when that cholera made them shit back to the earth all I fed them. If I had only done what my accountant had told me to do. Now this man, his advice was consistently good, told me to take out insurance on them, at least the pickneys. Never told me wrong. But a fool can’t hear wisdom. At least I’d have a bit of something. Now look at me.

  They agreed on a price based upon the age and make of the carriage. Perry Oliver withdrew the exact number of bills from his pocket. But before laying out his money, he asked the farmer where he had come from and the man told him.

  How far is that?

  About two hundred miles, give or take. Mostly take.

  Perry Oliver returned some of the bills to his purse and handed over the rest. The man was understandably confused. Perry Oliver explained that it was only right that he deduct a few dollars for two hundred miles of deterioration.

  Along with bills and posters, Perry Oliver gives Seven a map, not knowing if he needs it. Seven seems to possess his own means of orientation. Seven and Tom patiently cross every ward of the city. The power of movement. Seven gains in being as he drives. The rush of things or their slow passage. Tom seems alert, smelling and listening, all of it interesting to him. His breathing even and careful. Curves and grades, major avenues streets and boulevards, dirt roads and gravel roads, beaten paths and those less beaten, logging trails and back roads. Mud on the wheels some days. Sheen on others. They put up bills on every clean and free space, bills printed on stiff paper that can withstand the weather. (Sight is never lost.) Out early, Seven rolls his sleep up as he drives, Tom seated beside him, sipping from a mug of tea laced with milk. He seems (almost) happy as the countryside spins by. They come out of the long silence for Tom to start singing abruptly, even before Seven draws the carriage to a stop. Tom sings on the busiest street corners and in any saloon, club, or watering hole that will allow them in, from the most fashionable to the least. Taking their meals where they can, whatever they can. Each evening, Perry Oliver hears them return, tired, not much strength, climbing the stairs very slowly, pausing for breath at each landing, or so it seems. Surprised him at first, as he has rarely seen either boy tired. Boundless energy. They take seats at the table and Seven begins to relate the tremendous happenings he (they) have witnessed, passionate and often confused and contradictory accounts full of detailed and persuasive description. Still enough there to allow Perry Oliver to reduce the material to an impassioned picture in his head, the story behind the story. A street-corner shyster dressed like an Oriental philosopher in turban and silk robes who hawks a broadside containing the “suppressed wisdom of the East.” A doll that talks when you pull a hoop attached to a string coiled in its back. Two niggers playing chess under an oak tree. A large grassy square where dozens of preachers assemble to outsermon one another. Preaching done, they auction off their Bibles for charitable causes, pages blessed with holy water and angel’s breath. One man of the cloth takes Seven aside and tells him, without any demonstration, that Tom’s talent was preordered.

  Preordained, Perry Oliver says.

  No, sir. Preordered.

  It is not so much the foolish wording that troubles Perry Oliver but the sentiment implied behind. The belief. Is Seven catching Religion? Happy to report, after that day Seven makes no further mention of the matter. How pleased Perry Oliver is.

  Each return home revives the sense of possibility that he feels at the sight of a face whose details he has somewhat forgotten already since that morning.

  How are you today, Tom?

  I’m getting there.

  The days stretching out in front of him, single and yet alternative. His room is dark and Perry Oliver stands at the window waiting for lights to appear in the sky. Summer wheels slowly toward its end, but it’s not done with them yet. How much longer? He doesn’t know if rain is falling or if leaves are crumbling or if the wind is breaking branches. The upcoming performance fills his mind so completely, an all-day, all-waking wideness, he can think of nothing else. So much catching up. So much to do. He will wake abruptly in the middle of the night—in sleep each man turns to a universe of his own—with the idea that he has some task to carry out, that some matter has slipped his attention, but without any understanding what it might be.

  Tom is asleep, gentle weight against Seven’s shoulder. An echo in his skin. Outside the moon is a giant lantern burning in black air. It’s all the same to Tom, for he does not know how to distinguish time in his existence. Not so for his other. At night the road replays itself in his mind. The fine excitement he feels as they drive through the streets, and people gathering round to hear Tom sing. Even when they fail to draw a large crowd, he feels a curious charm with all the people moving steadily about, worldly contact. So this is what it means.

  The swiftness and ease with which Perry Oliver has accomplished these preparations give him a high he has never experienced before, possibly the peak point of fulfillment, causing him to wonder if and fear that the performance itself is destined to be a letdown. Worrying in the wood frame of his window, he tantalizes himself with varying mental pictures of its outcome.

  Howard hands Perry Oliver a list of songs, a meager sampling of Tom’s repertoire, nicely and brightly inked out. Only this limited sequence of selections—every concert must tell a story, beginning, middle, and end—that he has worked out for Tom’s concert tomorrow night, including three encore pieces, should Tom need them. Perry Oliver raises the sheet to his face, muttering lines. The hall empty of people with the exception of Howard, Perry Oliver, Seven, and Tom. A single rehearsal because Perry Oliver wants it such. Isn’t this simply a way for him to manage his panic, to try to clear up gaps in his understanding of the “Blind Tom Exhibition,” notice what’s missing? An opportunity for him to shop among a host of possible mistakes, mischances of mouth and body, miscalculations of time and energy? “The Manager of the Performance” curious to see if he has what it takes to carry him through a long evening. Who is aiding whom? Perry Oliver does an excellent job of pretending he knows what he is doing, no hesitation whatsoever. Indeed, he is showing presence of mind in asking Howard to be here now, exactly twenty-four hours before the scheduled co
ncert, a single rehearsal. Reminding himself of his own power.

  Howard answers whatever questions Perry Oliver puts to him, fresh anger and regret in his voice, trying his best to mask his feelings, and doing a lousy job of it. He is a man like any other. (If a prince be outraged, can his being a prince keep him from looking red and looking pale and grinding his teeth like a madman?) But Perry Oliver is the one who will benefit from his hard work with Tom. All Perry Oliver will have to do is call out the title of each song. And now, ladies and gentlemen, Blind Tom will play for you … Howard has received triple his lesson fee to come here today. The sight of Tom onstage had on first appearance aroused the exciting thought that Perry Oliver would ask him, Howard, to guide the audience through the performance. A dream that refused to leave him even as he began tuning the piano. He regrets that he won’t be the one to introduce Tom to the public, to the world. (The planting and the cultivation are over. There remains but the harvest.) Perry Oliver has promised him free entry to the performance. No offense, he has already decided that he won’t be in attendance, come what may. To listen would be already too late. But he likes the preparation, a chance to be wrapped up in the calm that comes over Tom whenever the boy is before a piano.