“Black man day come.”
That was why Denmark Vesey was scowling at Gullah Joe today, as the old witchy man carried the basket of name-strings through the knotwork that guarded the place. All these happy slaves. Was Denmark Vesey the only Black man in Camelot who lived in hell?
Gullah Joe pulled the net open and started to pour in the new name-strings. At that moment, cords along the bottom of the net began to pop open, one by one, as if someone were cutting them. Name-strings dropped out, at first a few, then dozens, and then the whole net opened up and the name-strings lay heaped on the floor.
“What did you do?” asked Denmark.
Gullah Joe did not answer.
“Something wrong?” asked Denmark.
Gullah Joe just stood there, his hands upraised. Denmark walked through the hanging junk, circling around until he could see Joe’s face. He was frozen like a statue—a comic one, with eyes wide and teeth exposed in a grimace, like the minstrels in those hideous shows that White actors did with their faces painted Black.
This wasn’t just a net giving way. Someone or something had broken open the net and spilled the name-strings onto the floor. If it had the power to do that, it had the power to hurt Gullah Joe, and that’s what seemed to be happening.
What could Denmark do? He knew nothing about witchery. Yet he couldn’t let anything happen to Joe. Or to the name-strings, for that matter, for the name of every slave in Camelot was spilled here. Yet if Denmark walked within the charmed circle that Joe had shown him, wouldn’t he be in the enemy’s power, too?
Maybe not if he didn’t stay long. Denmark ran and leapt, knocking Joe clear out of the circle. They both sprawled on the floor, leaving a dozen large charms swaying and bumping each other.
Gullah Joe didn’t show any sign of being hurt. He leapt up and looked frantically around him. “Get up by damn! A broom! A broom!”
Denmark scrambled to his feet and ran for the broom.
“Two broom! Quick!”
In moments the two of them were standing just outside the circle, reaching the brooms inside to sweep the name-strings outside in great swaths.
“Fast!” cried Joe. “He take apart you broom you go slow!”
Denmark hadn’t thought he was going any slower than Joe, but then he realized that the end of the broomstick nearest his body was holding almost still as he levered the broom to sweep out name-strings. No sooner had he thought of this than the broomstick rocketed straight at him like a bayonet, ramming him in the stomach just under the breastbone. Denmark dropped like a rock, the breath knocked out of him. And when he did manage to take in a great gasp of air, he immediately vomited.
A few minutes later, Gullah Joe was bending over him. “You got you air? He not hurt you bad. He no see you, or you dead man.”
“Who?” asked Denmark.
“You think I know?”
“You talk like you know everything,” said Denmark.
“When I know, I say I know. This one, he a bad devil. He wander like stray dog, come passing through, he see all the names, devil eat name like food, like cake, taste him sweet. He come in my circle and now he get caught, he no come out. So he mad, him! Tear up net. Tear up name, kill me if he can. But I stop him.”
“I helped.”
“Yes, you knock me down, very smart.”
“Why you holding still like that?”
“See me knotty hair? She wiggle, he get inside, he break me in bits.”
Denmark had long wondered why Gullah Joe had braided his hair with ribbons and scraps. It wasn’t decoration, it was protection—as long as the knotted braids weren’t wiggling.
“So that hair keep out the devil?”
Joe flipped his braids boastfully. “Hair, she keep him out of me.” Then he pointed at the dangling charms that used to ring the net of name-strings. “These charm, they keep him in my circle.” Joe grinned. “It got him.”
“What you want him for?” asked Denmark. “Can you ask him for wishes or something?”
Gullah Joe looked at him like he was stupid. “You live White too long, boy, it make you strange.”
“I thought maybe it was like a genie or something.”
“You no ask devil help you, he help you be dead, that be his help you.” Gullah Joe began walking around, looking at the dangling charms hanging elsewhere in the room. “You get me that one, that one, that one.”
Denmark, being tall, had no trouble unhooking the charms Joe indicated. Soon they had a new circle created, just like the other one, only when you looked close there were no two charms alike. It seemed not to matter. In a few more minutes they gathered the name-strings from the floor, piled them in another net, and hoisted them off the floor in the midst of the charmed circle.
“Now nobody see them again, they safe, they don’t get lost, they don’t get found.”
“So we beat the devil this time,” said Denmark.
Gullah Joe shook his head sadly. “No, he tear one up. He pick that one, he tear her up, he break the string, she name be fly off somewhere.”
“Lost?”
“Oh, she name try to get home, she try so hard.” Gullah Joe sighed. “Some name she strong, but she blind, no find the way. Some name see the way, but she no fly, she fade away. This one, she strong, she bright, maybe she get home.”
“Which one was it?”
“You think I tell she name? Call that name to me? You think I be so bad? No sir. I no say she name, I be pray that name find that girl, she a good one. Why he pick her?”
“Don’t ask me,” said Denmark. “I don’t know why anybody picks anybody.”
“No, he go to her, he know her. He know her. That devil, he been walking Camelot street, him. That devil, be maybe him a man. Be maybe him a White man.” Gullah Joe smiled. “Be maybe him soul fly, get caught here, but he body be somewhere.”
Denmark thought about this. A White man somewhere with his soul trapped outside his body. “You thinking maybe we ought to find him?”
“How much him I catch here?” Gullah Joe asked. “Black people soul, I take name, I take anger, I take sad, all the rest stay body. But the White man, how much he send out, how much he give me?” He went to his table, where a hundred secrets sat in jars and little boxes. He opened one, then another, rejecting each until he found a box with a fine white powder in it. He grinned and picked up a pinch of it between his fingers. Then he walked to the edge of the original circle, where the devil-man was trapped. He parted his fingers as he blew the powder sharply. The fine grey dust quickly filled the exact dimensions of the circle, swirling right up to the edges but never drifting out. Denmark saw a tiny light, like a mosquito with a firefly’s tail, changing colors as it darted about within the cloud.
“That’s him?” asked Denmark.
“He got him power,” said Gullah Joe, his voice filled with awe.
“How can you tell?”
“You so far off, you see him, right?”
“Sure, I saw him. Like a firefly.”
Gullah Joe laughed. “You so blind! He like a star. Bright star. We got trouble in this circle. He be find a way out! And then he be mad.”
“Then let’s get out of here,” said Denmark. “I don’t want him clipping me open like that net.”
“No problem,” said Gullah Joe.
“You mean you can keep him from getting out?”
“I got my best circle hold him. She strong enough? I don’t know. But I don’t got no better, so... maybe we dead, maybe we safe.” Gullah Joe shrugged. “No problem.”
“Well it matters to me!” cried Denmark.
“Be maybe you better go,” said Gullah Joe, grinning. “You go find out what house got him a man, him eyes open, nobody inside.”
“White man?”
“You think Black man break a name-string?” asked Gullah Joe contemptuously.
“Not all Black men be good,” said Denmark.
“Black men all be on our side,” said Gullah Joe.
Denmar
k laughed rudely. “That the stupidest thing you said since I know you.”
Gullah Joe looked at him oddly. “I know what I know.”
“Oh, they on your side now, Joe, cause you got their name-strings in a bag, you keeping them happy. But that don’t mean they on your side, you fool. White master got them all so scared they want to please him, like little puppy dogs. They not telling now cause what if the White man take their soul? But they ain’t on your side. They on their master’s side.”
“You think you the only smart man?” asked Joe, annoyed.
“I seen it a thousand times. Blacks betraying Blacks, each time hoping the master will like them better than the other slaves, treat them good. You watch.”
“I be do this long time, lots of year now,” said Gullah Joe. “Black people know what I got here, they never turn against me.”
“Then how did this White devil find out where you were?”
Joe’s eyes grew wide at the question. Then he grinned at Denmark. “You show them the way.”
“I did not,” said Denmark. “I wore that memory net you made me, nobody find anything about you from me!”
“He no look in your head, my net make it empty in there. This devil follow your feet till he come in right behind you.”
“How do you know that?”
“I know what I know,” said Gullah Joe, for about the thousandth time since Denmark had known him. “I see him come in.”
“You’re lying,” said Denmark. “If you seed him come in you would have told me.”
“I feel him. I feel him hot eyes looking. I feel them charm dance, I feel them charm shake.”
“Then why didn’t you stop him?”
Gullah Joe grinned. “Be maybe I think he no find name-string. Be maybe I think circle keep him out.”
“Be maybe you full of shit,” said Denmark. “You didn’t know he was here till the net started popping. He probably followed you inside the circle.”
Gullah Joe thought about that. “Better us find him body.”
“So you ain’t going to admit he took you by surprise,” said Denmark testily. “You got to keep pretending you see all, you know all.”
“I no see all,” said Gullah Joe. “I see more than you.”
“Sometimes.”
“You see so good? Then you go out and use you eyes and you mouth and you ears, you find out where they be this empty White man body without no soul.”
Denmark laughed bitterly. “That be every White man I know of.”
Gullah Joe ignored his remark. “You find him, and then we make him soul go back in him.”
“You can do that?”
Gullah Joe shrugged. “Maybe.”
“So what if it doesn’t work?”
“Then he body die,” said Gullah Joe. “Body him not last long time it got no soul in.”
“What the hell did you just say?” asked Denmark. “All these slaves, they be dying without their souls?”
“Black people still got they soul!” said Joe impatiently. “Only White man put him soul out like this. Soul no come home, he body, she think she dead, she be rotting.”
“So if he don’t find his way home, his body’s going to die?”
“No, she don’t die, him body. That body rot, she turn to bone, she turn to dust, but she still be alive cause that soul, she can’t find that body no more, she never go home.”
“So he’s walking around dead already,” said Denmark. “All right then, why look for him?”
“Body rotting alive, that too slow. He do mischief.” Gullah Joe grinned and held up a huge knife. “Better us get him out of here.”
“How, by killing his body?”
“Kill?” Gullah Joe laughed. “We got to bring him body here, put she inside the circle. Soul go back in body, then he leave my house.”
“Won’t that make him stronger, to have body and soul together again?” asked Denmark. “You want him out wandering around, knowing what we got going here?”
“Maybe that happen if we put him whole body in the circle,” said Gullah Joe, laughing.
“I thought you said—”
“We put in just him head,” said Gullah Joe. “Then we all be safe. That soul got to go into that head. But he go in, he drop dead!”
Denmark laughed. “I got to see that.” Then his face grew grim. “Course you know, you talking about killing a White man.”
Gullah Joe rolled his eyes. “They plenty White man. You find him.”
In the early evening, Margaret took a turn around the block. Hot as it was, she couldn’t have hoped to get to sleep tonight if she hadn’t taken some exercise. And the air, though at street level it was charged with the smell of fish and horse manure, was not as stale as the air inside the house. Alvin had assured her that most of the time smelly air was still just air and it did no harm to breathe it. Better the smell than the mold indoors. When he tried to tell her all the nasty living creatures that inhabited every house, no matter how clean or well-swept, Margaret had to make him stop. Some things were better not to know.
She was coming back down the long side of the house when she heard the sound of someone whimpering off in the garden. There was but one heartfire there, one she knew well—the slave called Fishy. But Margaret almost didn’t recognize her, because her heartfire had been transformed. What was the difference? A tumult of emotions: rage at every insult done her, grief at all that she had lost. And deep down, where there had been nothing at all, now Margaret found it: Fishy’s true name.
Njia-njiwa. The Way of the Dove. Or the Dove in the Path. It was hard for Margaret to understand, because the concept was a part of both. A dove seen in the midst of its flight in the sky, which also marks the path of life. It was a beautiful name, and in the place where her name was kept, there also was the love and praise of her family.
“Njia-njiwa,” said Margaret aloud, trying to get her mouth and nose to form the strange syllables: N without a vowel, as a syllable by itself. Nnn-jee-yah. Nnn-jee-wah. She said it aloud again.
The whimpering stopped. Margaret stepped around a bush and there was Fishy—Njia-njiwa—cowering where the foundation of the house next door rose out of the earth. Fishy’s eyes were wide with fright, but Margaret could also see that her hands were formed into claws, ready to fight.
“You stay away from me,” said Fishy. It was a plea. It was a warning.
“You got your name back,” said Margaret.
“How you know that? What you do to me? You a witchy woman?”
“No, no, I did nothing to you. I knew your name was lost. How did you get it back?”
“He cut me loose,” said Fishy with a sob. “All of a sudden I feel myself go light. Down on a breeze. I can’t even stand up. I know my name’s flying only I can’t call it home cause I don’t know it. I thought I was going a-die. But it do come home and then it all come back to me.” Fishy shuddered, then burst into tears.
Margaret didn’t need an explanation. She saw it now in Fishy’s memory. “Every vile thing that your master has done to you. Every insult by every White person. The happy life with your mama that got taken away. No wonder you wanted to kill somebody.” Margaret stepped closer. “And yet you didn’t. All that fire inside you, and all you did was come out into the garden and hide.”
“When she find out I didn’t do my work she going a-beat me,” said Fishy. “She going a-beat me bad, only this time I don’t know if I can take it. She not so strong, ma’am. I take the stick outen her hand, I beat her back, how she going a-like that, you think?”
“It wouldn’t feel good, Njia-njiwa.”
The girl winced at the sound of her name and wept again. “Oh, Mama, Mama, Mama.”
“You poor thing,” said Margaret.
“Don’t you pity me, you White woman! I clean your filth just like all the rest!”
“Good people clean up after the people they love,” said Margaret. “It isn’t the cleaning that you mind, it’s being forced to do it for people you don’t l
ove.”
“People I hate!”
“Fishy, would you rather I call you by that name?”
“Don’t you go saying my true name no more,” said Fishy.
“All right, then. How about this? How about if I say I had you helping me today, and I pay your mistress a little to compensate for having taken you away from your duties?”
Fishy looked at her suspiciously. “Why you do that?”
“Because I do need your help.”
“You don’t have to pay for that,” said Fishy. “I be a slave, ain’t you heard?”
“I don’t want your labor,” said Margaret. “I want your help.”
“I don’t got no help for White folks,” said Fishy. “It be all I can do not to kill you right now.”
“I know,” said Margaret. “But you’re strong. You’ll contain these feelings. It’s good to have your name back. It’s as if you weren’t alive before, and now you are.”
“This ain’t no life,” said Fishy. “I got no hope now.”
“Now is when your hope begins,” said Margaret. “This thing you’ve done, you and the other slaves, giving up your names, your anger—it makes it safer for you, yes, it makes it easier, but you know who else it helps? Them. The White people who own you. Look at the other slaves, now that you have your anger back. See what they look like to the master.”
“I know how they look,” said Fishy. “They look stupid.”
“That’s right,” said Margaret. “Stupid and contented.”
“I ain’t going a-look stupid no more,” said Fishy. “She going a-see it in my eyes, how much I hate her. She going a-beat me all the time now.”
“I can’t help you with that right now,” said Margaret. “I’d buy you away from her if I could, but I haven’t that much money. I might rent your services, though, so you don’t have to spend time with your mistress until you’ve got these feelings under control.”
“I never going a-control these feelings! Hate just going a-get bigger and bigger till I kill somebody!”
“That’s how it feels now, but I assure you, slaves in other cities, in other places, nobody takes their pride and hides it away, but they learn, they watch, they wait.”
“Wait for what? Wait to die.”
Heartfire: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Volume V Page 22
