Of Ashes and Dust

by Marc Graham

  “I don’t want you to go,” she said.

  I stroked her dark curls and chucked her under the chin.

  “Well, I don’t really want to go,” I said. “But I’ll be back and picking on you before you even know I been gone. You be good, and help Ma out around the house. And if you ever feel scared, you just hightail it over to the Barneses’, y’hear?”

  She nodded slowly, and delicate lashes blinked away tears as I stood and turned to face Pa. He looked back at me through bleary, red-rimmed eyes.

  “I reckon I’ll be looking up at you next time I see you,” he said as he handed me my bedroll, burlap sack and boat ticket.

  I shrugged as I slung the travel things over my shoulder and accepted the ticket.

  “Barnes has gone to a lot of trouble giving you this chance,” he said. “Don’t go pissing it away.”

  “No, sir,” I mumbled, and Pa turned away with a sniff and a grunt.

  I watched his back for a couple of seconds before I headed for the boat. A plaintive bar-rar-roo made me stop, and I knelt as Argos bounded up to me. He put his paws on my shoulders and looked at me through soulful brown eyes, his tail slowly tracing from side to side. I ruffled his fur and hugged on him.

  “You can’t come with me, boy,” I said. “You have to stay here and take care of Becca.”

  The hound cocked his head and his tongue lolled out. He turned his head and looked back at Becca.

  “That’s right,” I said, “go with Becca.”

  Argos gave me a sloppy lick and scratched my knee with his paw, then turned and padded up the landing to take his place at Becca’s side. I wiped my face—now wet from more than the dog’s slobber—on my shoulder, turned and headed again toward the boat.

  “What was all that about?” Matty demanded as I caught up with him and Angelina.

  “He just wanted to say good-bye,” I said.

  “Not your mutt, dummy,” Matty said, and poked my chest. “I meant Pa. What’d he say to you?”

  “Oh,” I said. “He just wanted to wish me well. Told me to pay attention to Mister Rawls.”

  “Mm-hmm,” Matty grunted, then pushed his way through the crowd at the base of the loading ramp.

  “You’re a terrible liar,” Angelina said as she bent to pick up her valise.

  “What’s that mean?” I asked, and felt a pleasant chill as I took the bag from her hand.

  “Just that. There isn’t a dishonest bone in your body,” she said. “Never has been. Lies don’t suit you.”

  I blushed at that, mainly because I knew it wasn’t so.

  “Your ticket, miss?” The steward took the yellow slip from Angelina’s hand, and I chafed at the look he gave her. “Pleasant trip,” he said with a dip of his hat, then turned to me. “Ticket.”

  I handed him the plain brown form Pa had given me.

  “No, no,” he said. “You can’t board here.”

  “But this is my ticket.” I stammered the protest. “I’m on this boat.”

  “This is a passage-only ticket,” he explained, as to a three-year-old. “You board aft, with the niggers and the bums.” His tone made it clear that he esteemed me about as much as those groups. “That way,” he pointed, in case I misunderstood aft.

  “Oh, JD, that’s just awful,” Angelina said, and her regret sounded genuine. “But maybe we’ll see you during the trip.” She held her hand out to me, and it took me a moment to realize I still had her bag.

  “Let me get that for you,” the steward offered as I handed up the bag.

  “Why, thank you, Mister . . . ?”

  “Crawley,” he said, and his neck flushed above his collar.

  “Thank you, Mister Crawley.” Without a backward glance, Angelina took the sailor’s arm and let him escort her up the gangway.

  I clenched my teeth, and blood pounded in my ears in jealousy and humiliation. I headed toward the ass end of the boat and threw a scornful glance up the landing. Pa stood there with his hands in his hip pockets, hat pushed back on his head as he watched me.

  As I took my rightful place on the rear deck of the boat, the lesson hit me square in the face. Ma had said there was nothing I couldn’t do, if I set my mind to it. Pa was there to remind me, though, that there were some things I just shouldn’t set my mind to.

  I dangle from the tree branch and wave my free hand.

  It’s a familiar dream and, though I recognize it as such, I wait to see how it will unfold.

  I look down to see Angelina—Gina, I can call her in my dream. Cherry-red lips frame her pearl teeth as she smiles up at me. Her sparkling eyes are the color of early spring. Her gaze sends a chill up my spine. Goosebumps rise on my arms and chest. A heady warmth floods over me, and my neck and cheeks grow hot as my pulse pounds in my ears.

  Suddenly, the tree limb evaporates and my hand grips nothing but air. A flutter of panic rises in my stomach before I realize that I don’t fall. My eyes are still locked onto Gina’s, and it seems her smile has given my heart wings. I drift on the breeze that whispers through the boughs. Leaves and twigs part of their own accord to allow my passage.

  Encouraged, I will myself to chart my own course, tacking against the gentle breeze. With growing confidence, I begin to dart between the branches and around the tree. Gina’s laugh and the approving clap of her hands spur me on to more daring feats.

  After a while, my movements begin to grow sluggish and the air thickens around me. I try to kick and stroke, but my efforts only make things worse. I shoot a look at Gina, but her eyes are no longer on me. I follow her gaze to see a jet-black stallion strutting up the clamshell drive on long, slender legs.

  A uniformed rider sits astride him in a warrior’s pose, feet square in the stirrups, legs taut, back ramrod straight. Like Matty’s long-ago toy rider, one gauntleted hand holds the reins while the other rests on the hilt of a curved saber. A campaign hat casts most of the rider’s face in shadow, but his jaw is square and firm as chiseled granite.

  Gina sits entranced by the approaching figure, and the magic that held me aloft slips away. I plummet toward the ground. Branches race past me. Leaves and twigs tear at my skin and snag on my clothes. I scream Gina’s name, and she throws me a mocking sneer as a thick lower limb rushes straight for my head.

  I woke with a start, my ears echoing with a voice that sounded like my own. I looked around and found myself surrounded by grinning black faces.

  “Must’ve been some dream.”

  “Wish I could see that Gina girl of his.”

  “Not too shabby for a white boy.”

  I looked down to see the dream’s effect on me. I jerked myself upright and turned away to hide my shame.

  One of the older slaves came up to me and clapped a callused hand on my shoulders.

  “Ain’t nothing to be ashamed of, boy,” he said. “Why, half these fellas prob’ly wish they had half as good of dreams as that. Who that Gina girl, anyway?”

  I glanced up toward the rail of the boat’s observation deck and breathed a prayer of thanks that it was empty.

  “Ah, I knows the one,” the man said. “Pretty thing, hair full of fire. Gots plenty of beaus to take moonlight walks with.”

  I didn’t say anything, but the fire in my cheeks told him he was right.

  “Now, boy, why you want to go looking beyond your reach for?” he said. “She ain’t never gonna go for some poor boy what gots to go about with niggers. She too fine to dirty her hands with the likes of you. Best mind your place, you ask old Moses.”

  I hadn’t asked him, but I knew he was right all the same.

  The Franklin’s arrival in Little Rock was like nothing I’d ever seen. A brass band played at the end of the pier, and the mob that gathered to welcome the boat seemed to outnumber the stars. Not sure where to go, I waited at the bottom of the aft gangway until I spied Matty and Angelina, then pushed through the crowd of passengers and slaves and stevedores. I ducked beneath cases and bundles that swung from their handlers’ shoulders, and
hopped over those that had already been set down.

  “Oh, there you are,” Angelina said as I met them at the bottom of the ramp. “I was afraid we’d lost you.”

  For days I’d watched Angelina flirt with sailors or soldiers or dandies as she strolled the boat’s decks, and I despised her for it. All that melted away as she stood before me now.

  “No chance of that,” I said as evenly as I could. “May I?”

  “Thank you,” she said and gave me her valise, then steadied herself with a hand on my shoulder as she stood on tiptoes to look over the crowd. “There, up by the tobacco warehouse.”

  “I see ’em,” Matty said. He picked up his bag and plunged into the ocean of bodies.

  “I so hate crowds,” Angelina said, her lips forming a delicate pout. “But there’s nothing to be done about it. Stay with me.”

  She darted after Matty into the writhing crush. With no choice but to follow, I dove in behind her. I found I made better progress when I forgot any manners and just barreled broad-shouldered into the mob until I emerged near the warehouses. Though still crowded in comparison to anything Britton, or even Van Buren, could muster, the docks outside the warehouse seemed a desert compared with the lower landing.

  I followed Matty and Angelina until they stopped beside a carriage. The driver was a slave of about forty, whose finery made my clothing look little better than rags.

  The carriage’s owner stood beside the rear wheel. He was of average height, about a half-inch taller than me. A thick mane of black hair, streaked with wiry, grey strands, was brushed back from his forehead and ended in a rolling curl just below his starched collar. A thick beard and moustache, the negative image of his hair, hid most of his tanned face but did little to disguise the firm cut of his jaw. His high forehead was free of creases, the only lines a set of good-humored crow’s feet at the corner of each eye. The lines deepened when he laughed— which he did frequently—and accentuated the twinkle of his soft, brown eyes.

  His wife stood beside him and, other than her height—which was nearly equal to her husband’s—the pair was a study in contrasts. Where he was beefy and powerfully built, she was gaunt with a sharp, angular face etched with worry lines that her tightly pulled-back hair and severe bun did little to smooth. Thin eyebrows, the same colorless tint as her hair, were raised in perpetual arches above deep-set, black, brooding eyes. Blue veins showed beneath her translucent skin, and a beaked nose roosted over pursed, wrinkled lips that relaxed into a frown when not tightly drawn.

  As we approached, one set of eyes brightened over a wide grin, while the other set narrowed and squinted, accompanied by a deeper pursing of the lips.

  “Angelina, my dear,” the man boomed, and wrapped his niece in a warm embrace while planting kisses on each cheek. “You’re lovelier than ever. And, Matty,” he turned to his nephew. “Or is it Matt, now? Why, you’ve grown into a man since I last saw you.”

  Matty shook the man’s hand and gave the hint of a genuine smile as his back straightened a little. “Matt,” he repeated, as though trying it on for size. “It’s good to see you, sir.”

  “Where’s Cassandra?” Angelina asked, referring to the cousin I’d heard her and Matty mention.

  “She’s resting, but you’ll see her at dinner. Of course, you still eat too much,” came a greeting from the skeletal half of the pair. “And you,” she said, and clamped a talon under Matty’s— Matt’s chin. “Your mother never could make more than a rat’s nest out of your hair. We shall see what we can do about that.”

  “You must be James,” the man greeted me, and extended a mighty paw in my direction.

  “Yes, sir.” I stretched my hand to wrap around his. “They call me JD or Jimmy.”

  “Pshaw. Jimmy’s a boy’s name, but I suppose JD will do. I’m Cyrus Warren,” he said, still pumping my hand. “From what Ben tells me, you’re practically a brother to these two, so you can call me Uncle Cy. This is my wife, Helen,” he added as he released my hand.

  I opened and closed my fist to restore the blood flow.

  “Ma’am,” I said, unsure how to greet the cadaverous woman. I didn’t want to be rude, but I shuddered at the thought of touching those gnarled, bony hands. I settled on a slight bow.

  “You may call me Missus Warren,” she cawed. “And family or no, you are here to learn and to work.”

  “Yes’m.”

  The peaks of her eyebrows rose slightly, and I thought the strain of her furrowed brow must surely cleave her hair from her scalp.

  “What was that, young man?” she said.

  “Uh—yes’m?”

  “In this place, we use proper grammar,” she informed me. “ ‘Yes’m’ is not a word. I defy you to find it in Mister Webster’s lexicon. We will not even deign to consider such mumblings as ‘uh’ or ‘um.’ Since this is your first offense, we will not mete out any punishment. Judging from your appearance and your speech, it is clear that you have not had the advantages of proper learning, but we shall correct that failing directly, is that clear?”

  I bristled at the scolding and the implied insult to Ma’s teaching, but I choked back my pride.

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said.

  “And you.” The crow directed her attention to a sniggering Matt. “You have no excuse for crude behavior.” She delivered a cuff to his ear, and he yelped in surprise.

  “Well, now,” Mister Warren said, “that’s enough for now. We can get reacquainted back at the house.”

  With that, he handed his wife up into the carriage while the driver leapt nimbly down to put our bags in the boot. The carriage leaned dangerously on its axles as Mister Warren climbed up behind his wife.

  “I’m afraid we’ve only the room for four here,” he said. “One of you boys will need to ride up front with Timothy.”

  “That’s fine, sir,” I said as Matt leapt to the step of the carriage and settled into a deeply cushioned seat.

  I held the door open with one hand and steadied Angelina with the other as she stepped up to take her seat, then closed the door behind her.

  “I’ll get that, sir,” Timothy said as I fumbled with the door’s latch.

  I turned away, embarrassed, and climbed up to the high bench of the driver’s seat. Timothy climbed up beside me and gave me a friendly wink before settling in and taking up the reins.

  We left the busy port behind us and set out on the main thoroughfare and across the Broadway Street Bridge. I marveled at the monstrous thing of iron that spanned more than a thousand feet to join the banks of the Arkansas River. As we moved into town, buildings towered five and six stories over my head, and I gaped at the four-columned portico of the statehouse.

  At last, we passed through a wrought-iron gate between two large stone columns, wended up a tree-lined path and drew up under a lofty colonnade. I realized I’d been fingering the wooden totem around my neck, and fumbled to tuck it back under my shirt before anyone noticed. I glanced at Timothy, who gave me a curious look but said nothing.

  “No need to dismount, Mister Robbins,” Missus Warren said as the slave hopped down and the others climbed out of the carriage. “Timothy will take you to your quarters.”

  “Uh,” I started to say, and a warning glance from the beady eyes froze the word in my throat. “Yes, ma’am. Thank you.”

  The forbidding brow relaxed slightly and the head nodded just a little, in the barest gesture of approval.

  “You will bathe and change into proper clothing,” she said. “Dinner will be served promptly at six.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I replied, but she had already turned and was screeching orders to the household staff even before crossing the marble threshold.

  “How shall I call you, suh?” Timothy asked as he climbed back up beside me, his diction relaxed in the absence of his mistress.

  “Folks back home call me JD,” I said. “That’s always worked well enough.”

  “JD,” he repeated, and the word was almost a single syllable. “I wondered if
it was you.”

  With a grin that raised more questions than it answered, he flicked the reins and directed the carriage toward the outbuildings behind the grand house.

  “You’ll bunk up there.” Timothy pointed toward the upper window of a small clapboard workshop. “They’s a bath drawed up for you, and fresh clothes set out. Best get yourself cleaned up right quick. Miz Warren don’t abide with no tardiness.”

  “Now why doesn’t that surprise me?” I said as I dropped down from the driver’s seat and retrieved my bag.

  Timothy chuckled at that, then headed the team toward the carriage house.

  Inside the workshop I dropped my bag, latched the door, stripped and sank into the steaming water of the large metal tub. I drifted and soaked and dreamed, letting the images and thoughts of the past few days sort themselves out in my head.

  The cooling water roused me, and I hurriedly soaped and scrubbed myself. I took care with my neck and behind my ears, as I guessed Missus Warren would be an even harsher critic of my cleanliness than Ma ever was. I dried myself with a towel that was thicker and softer than I imagined possible, then grabbed my things and climbed the narrow ladder to the loft.

  The space was smaller than the loft back home, with room for little more than the necessities. Those necessities, however, included a writing desk topped by two shelves loaded with books. Homer, Plato, Hume, Smith, de Toqueville and a host of others lined the sagging boards. Other than Homer and Smith, I’d never heard such names, and I was eager to learn what they had to tell me. I reached hesitant fingers toward the bindings, and stroked the smooth leather and gilt embossing as I read each name and title.

  I had to squint to make out the last one—Essay on Man by Alexander Pope—and realized my trouble seeing was due to the fading light outside. I rushed to the clothes stand at the foot of the bed and donned the new suit and boots laid out there. In my hurry I barely had time to notice the fineness of the materials and snugness of the fit, or even to wonder how the clothes happened to be there in the first place. I glanced in the mirror and ran a brush through my hair, then raced down the ladder.