“I will be,” he said.
“I enjoyed what we did, Ben, and Bonard isn’t very good.”
“He isn’t?” Benjamin said.
“Didn’t you know?”
“How does a man know about another man?”
“Women do.” She shrugged. “You didn’t guess?”
“He always talked like the king buck of Georgia.”
“That should have told you. It tickles you now, but later you’ll think it was hateful of me to say it.”
“Mean, maybe.”
“I am mean sometimes, when people deserve it. I don’t understand how Bonard instilled such loyalty in you. Because he was older?”
“It’s more men sticking together.”
“Women can too,” Frankie said, “but only in extremis.”
“When shall we meet?” Benjamin said as she stepped lightly into the buggy without using the hand he offered.
“Not soon nor often,” she answered. “I’ll think about it and let you know. We will both be careful. You don’t want to offend your family, and neither do I. It’s unnecessary and would be stupid. It would be equally stupid for us not to meet if we want to. Do you agree?”
“You know I do.”
She took up the reins as he untied the horse. “Stay for a while after I go.”
He came around the horse’s head to be beside her. When he put out his hand, she took it firmly in hers. He said, “Thank you, Frankie. You don’t know how good you’ve been for me.”
“Yes, I do,” she said. “Bonard told me what you confided about Priscilla and your having been without anyone for so long.”
“The devil he did!”
“He thought it a joke—you, who used to be such a lover of the ladies, reduced to asking him when you might again expect to enjoy the favors of your wife. Oh, he laughed. That’s what decided me to seek you today, though I’d had it in mind before. And that’s why I was so surprised to meet you at the school. I’d already planned to look for you when I left it. Why do you think I brought along a buffalo robe in this weather?” She turned the buggy neatly in the clearing and set off toward the main road. When she reached it, she lifted her hand for a backward wave, knowing he’d still be watching her.
Body and mind in harmony, Benjamin did not become aware of hunger until midafternoon. When Frankie left him, he discovered that his horse was standing in the sun, the sun having shifted. He moved him into shade and loosened the saddle belt before returning to the nearer woods where he and Frankie had been together. On his knees, with palms flat, he went over the ground as if to convince himself that it had happened as he remembered it. In doing so he discovered a plum, ate it, found another, another, found and ate them all. Then he lay on his back, knees up and head cupped in hands, looking through spiky pine to sky. He slept, woke thirsty, and thought the horse must be thirsty too. A search revealed a branch of the creek they’d passed earlier, and at a place where the water ran clear over pebbled sand, he watered himself and the horse. Squatting, he cupped hands and drank, then splashed his face. Hunger asserting itself at that instant, he turned his horse toward Beulah Land.
16
His grandmother met him in the hallway, and on seeing him expressed her relief as “Thank God.”
“What’s wrong?”
“You’re not to alarm yourself—”
“Aunt Nell?”
“It’s him.”
“Who?”
“He’s here.”
“Leon,” he guessed.
“I put him in Daniel’s old room. It’s near the kitchen but away from Aunt Nell and on the east side of the house. However hot the mornings, the afternoons are worse. He’ll be cool at night.”
“He’s sick,” Benjamin next guessed, starting toward the room his grandmother had indicated.
“Doctor Platt has been,” she said, following. “It’s malaria. An hour after you left, his mother brought him in her wagon and left him.”
“It’s too early for malaria.”
“Bessie says he had it last fall. Platt says he didn’t get over it but kept it in his blood.”
It was not one of the guest rooms. When Daniel and Jane married, it was kept as an all-purpose emergency or accident room, for such was useful on a large farm with many workers. At the bedside table Mabella was pouring lemonade into a glass. The boy looked pale as milk, and he stared at the serving girl as if she came from another world. Mabella stepped aside for Benjamin, who first bent over the bed and then dropped to his knees, the better to see and be seen.
“It’s me, Leon. Grandma says you’re sick. You’ll be all right. I had it two years ago.” There was recognition in the boy’s eyes but no more than that as the eyes closed on a private struggle. He trembled, then quivered, then shook violently. Touching his head, Benjamin found it burning with fever, and the boy’s teeth began to click like hailstones on a windowpane.
“Get quilts,” Sarah said to Mabella.
Benjamin lifted the child from the bed, swaddling the sheet about him and cushioning the shaking against his own body. Sarah offered two quilts Mabella had fetched from the corner cupboard, and without giving up possession of his son Benjamin managed to take them one after the other and swathe the fevered body in his arms. That accomplished, he sat on the side of the bed as still as he could.
“Freezing to death,” the boy said in gasps.
The quilts and the heat of Benjamin’s body had no apparent effect. The chill continued for five or six minutes before gradually subsiding, to return twice again and quicken and subside before the boy lay slack and spent. Putting his cheek against his, Benjamin whispered, “He’s sweating.”
Sarah nodded. “Bring a towel, Mabella, and clean sheets.”
Only when the boy’s breathing had become normal did Benjamin relinquish him to Mabella and his grandmother. He looked tired; his eyes were closed; and he made no protest when the women stripped the damp petticoat from him and dried him. Sarah laid him naked on the bottom sheet of the bed, and Mabella arranged a fresh sheet over him. His head rested on the pillow, and he slept. Kneeling again at the bed, Benjamin watched him until Sarah touched his shoulder and motioned him into the hallway. “Mabella will call us if he wakes.”
He followed her into the office, where Josephine had set out a pitcher of iced tea and a plate of cake. Benjamin took a piece of cake in each hand, but he did not sit as Sarah began to talk.
“I was studying last year’s corn figures but couldn’t keep my mind on them for turning over what we’d talked about this morning. Then, lo and behold, Mabella came running to say there was a woman in a wagon in the yard with a sick young’un, and could I come. It was like an answer, for they were the ones I’d been thinking of. Bessie told me he had chills and fever and they were too busy out there to look after him. Would we? Of course, I grabbed him. She didn’t come in, said she had to get back and knew we’d see him through and let her know anything, good or bad. I put him to bed. She had that old petticoat on him, one of her ma’s, I expect; but we’re making him some nightgowns. I’ve got Dorothea in the sewing room this minute. I sent Wally, because he loves to ride fast, to tell Dr. Platt if he didn’t get himself out here within the hour I’d skin him alive. He came back with Wally and said it surely looked like malaria and there wasn’t anything to do but give him quinine and calomel and wait. Platt gives calomel for everything the way Mabella reaches for lemons the minute she hears anybody’s down sick. I tried to get Leon to eat, but he wouldn’t or couldn’t, so I stopped fussing over him. I haven’t left him for more than five minutes. He’s a good boy, never complained or whimpered the way most children do when ailing, though I could see his fever was up and rising. Not knowing what to do, I waited. Then you came. You’ve eaten every piece of that cake. Didn’t you have any dinner? Sit down.”
“No’m.” He sat.
“Where’ve you been not to eat?”
“Round and about, the way you said do.” He told her of his visit with Roscoe and tha
t she was to expect a call tomorrow from Luck in a new pink dress. First she said she’d send word for them not to come, then that she wouldn’t, then that she’d decide later. Both lapsed into silence until Sarah broke it. “I’m ashamed to say it with the poor child suffering, but I’m glad he’s here even the way he is. We mustn’t scare him by doing too much. Will Priscilla be upset?”
“I reckon; don’t you?” Benjamin said. “Why you think Bessie brought him?”
Sarah frowned consideringly. “It was the way she said. Nobody there to look after him. Her mother is near blind; it’s the boy who takes care of her, not her of him. Bessie’s in the fields from sunrise to sundown when she’s not cooking or washing for them. I feel sorry for her, though I don’t like her.”
Benjamin rose and went to the tea tray. Pressing the remaining cake crumbs into a single ball, he ate it. “Benjamin, do you want Josephine to fix you something? She’d be tickled to death. She’s jealous of Freda, I don’t know why, except that she fed you for so long and now you look to Freda.”
“No, ma’am. I’d better go home and make my peace. I’ll just look at Leon on the way. I’ll be back after supper.”
“I’ll send one of the hands to tell Bessie the doctor’s been and Leon’s sleeping.”
Before going home Benjamin saw Zadok and Daniel, both of whom knew of Leon’s arrival. Anything of consequence that happened at the big house at Beulah Land was relayed immediately to all who lived and worked there. The youngest child and the oldest granny knew the sick boy had been brought to stay with them, and they knew who he was. Approaching his own house in the Glade, Benjamin unreasoningly expected to find it changed, because so much had happened to him since he’d left it that morning, but all was the same. Bruce was well and happy. Freda had fretted at his not returning for noon dinner and welcomed his assertion that he was close to starvation. He found Priscilla in her room sitting by an open window with a piece of embroidery on her lap. She was the exception to those who knew about Leon’s presence at Beulah Land. No one had thought, or dared, to tell her.
Benjamin hadn’t seen her since their quarrel the night before. When he knocked at the open door, she glanced up calmly and bade him enter. They exchanged polite greetings, and he told her that “various matters” had kept him from home at noon, an explanation she received without comment or any appearance of caring.
“Did you know that my son is ill, and his mother has brought him to Beulah Land?”
Her fingers paused at their work, but she did not look up from it. “I did not know. So that is where you have been.”
“Only for the last hour. He has malaria. A chill seized him when I was there.”
She said with uninflected gravity, “Her bringing him is an imposition at best and at worst an impertinent reminder of old scandal.”
“It was right for her to bring him. She couldn’t take care of him.”
“You may say so, but you cannot expect me to.”
He said sharply, “You take little notice of your own child. I don’t ask that you concern yourself for mine.”
“It is all unfortunate,” she replied, ignoring his reproach.
“Yes,” he said.
“It would have been proper for Mrs. Troy to refuse him.”
Benjamin stopped the words that came to his mind. “She does not see it so, I’m glad to say.”
“She would do anything to please you.”
“That says nothing for the goodness of her heart.”
“Charity need not be indiscriminate.”
“A convenient belief.”
She flushed but still did not look at him. “I do not ‘believe’ anything for ‘convenience,’ Mr. Davis.”
It was the first time she had so addressed him, although it was not uncommon for certain old-fashioned wives to refer to a husband thus in conversation with others and even on formal occasions to so address him. Stung, he said, “I saw Frankie again today.” She resumed her embroidery. “She was at the school when I stopped to see Roscoe Elk.”
“It gratifies her, no doubt, to enjoy your admiration on two occasions within a day’s duration. Will you take supper at home? If not, I’ll instruct Freda accordingly. She cooks too richly for my taste.”
“I’ll be here, and I’ve told her to cook everything in the house. After supper I’ll go back to stay with Leon.”
She held her work up from her lap, searching it against the light for flaw. “I shall pray for his recovery. Nevertheless, he is a child of sin, and no amount of your irony against me will change that.”
Although she came to the dining room when Freda rang the dinner bell and even ate a little from two or three of the dozen dishes on the table, Priscilla held no further conversation with her husband. He ate hugely and with extravagant compliments to Freda, who basked in his praise. He also maintained a conversation of sorts with Velma and Bruce, who were present according to his fixed request. It was largely one-sided, however, Velma being too bashful to answer freely with Mrs. Davis there.
After supper Benjamin took Bruce from Velma and walked in the Glade, the nurse following. When he gave the baby to her after half an hour and wished them good night, explaining that he was leaving again, Velma said, “I hear your boy’s sick, Mr. Ben. If they’s anything I can do, you say.”
“Thank you, Velma.” Benjamin touched the baby’s chin with his forefinger. “Do you think she knows me?”
“She do, sir. She talk about you all day long.”
At Beulah Land, Benjamin was told that Leon had eaten a gruel Mabella made for him and that there had been no return of fever, no further chill. Sarah accepted his determination to remain the night, doing what she could to make him comfortable and retiring with Casey when Benjamin promised her he would knock on their door if he needed anything.
When they were alone, he tried talking to the boy, but Leon was exhausted, and soon Benjamin turned the lamp low, setting it away from the bed. Leon slept. After a while so did Benjamin in his chair. Leon woke twice to ask for water, which Benjamin gave him from the pitcher Mabella had provided. At five o’clock Sarah entered to find that Benjamin had stretched out on the bed beside the boy. They were both asleep as she tiptoed away.
17
The thing Leon found strangest was the activity and the noise. Not having known anything but the little farm, he was at first astounded by what appeared to him vast numbers of people, white and Negro, coming and going. Kept in bed his first day, he could see his father through the open window with two men he heard him call Dan and Zadok, as well as what he overestimated as “a hundred” Negro men, women, and children, all of whom used each other’s names, joking, jostling, working, and idling. He’d never seen so many Negroes all at once. He recognized Mabella, who had been with him steadily since his arrival, and Josephine, who came in occasionally to ask if he liked blueberry pie or to observe scoldingly any arrangements Mabella had made that did not suit her. Sarah was there frequently.
Midmorning, Jane Todd brought him a glass jar of Cape jasmine fresh from her garden and said he was to call her Aunt. With her were Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis, who were comfortably younger than he and who had to be restrained from jumping on the bed, which made him feel superior. They were permitted to remain when their mother went off to see someone she called Aunt Nell in another part of the house. When Mabella left them for a few minutes, Davy and Bobby Lee promptly pulled out their penises and ordered him to show his, which he did briefly and with a blush, his mother and grandmother having told him it was a thing to keep hidden. Satisfied that they were alike, the boys dismissed their parts and began to tell him stories about Beulah Land, gratified to find someone who knew nothing of its history.
Benjamin came at noon before going home for his dinner, praising Leon for having had no chill or fever. He returned in fresh clothes at the end of the day after a swim in the creek. With him came the Todd boys and their father, whom he was told to call Uncle Daniel. On their second visit Bobby Lee presented Leon
with a few of their toys on the understanding that they were only being lent. There was a tiny wagon with wheels that spun and a wooden tongue that moved up and down and sideways. There were half a dozen marbles, each a beauty in itself and a hazard for adults when they rolled off the bed and two could not be found. There was a metal windup darky, painted like a minstrel man, who danced a jig when set on the floor. Best of all, there was a picture book of lions and tigers, ostriches and apes.
Dorothea had not been idle. A word to the seamstress was like a sermon to another servant. Used to sewing for the Todd boys, she produced three pairs of cotton pants with blouses to match, in addition to the nightgowns Sarah had ordered. He’d need them, she knew, because malaria kept its victim in bed only during the fever and chills. A written description of Leon’s condition was sent by Sarah to his mother, allowing him to be feebler than he was, to discourage Bessie’s coming for him too soon. She, evidently, had no such thing in mind. He was there; he might stay a while, for he was no use to her until he was well and only another mouth to feed. Such was the verbal message returned by Sarah’s courier with an admonition for Leon to “mind them.” Every hour, and then every day when he could count the time in days, was felt by Benjamin to be something won.
All was not, however, progress.
On his second full day at Beulah Land, Leon again had fever followed by a hard chill. For six days the pattern was constant: chills and fever every other day. Then four days passed with no active recurrence of the disease, and then, triumphantly, an entire week.
Every hour that he was free of bed was one of new experience. Fetching the mail from town, Benjamin brought gifts: a paper of peppermint sticks, a rubber ball with a good bounce, a picture book of animals that was his to keep, a pocketknife that Sarah took away and said she would give him when he was older, a Jew’s harp, and a cloth sack with a drawstring that held two dozen marbles, each different and all as fine as anything Davy and Bobby Lee owned. He was allowed to visit the venerable Aunt Nell. She announced that he was the image of her beloved husband Felix Kendrick, whose face she had not the faintest recollection of, but Sarah told her it was a nice family thing to say. Casey Troy took his picture alone, and with Benjamin, and with Benjamin and Sarah, and with Mabella. The Todd boys showed him everywhere they were allowed to go, which did not include the woods unless they were accompanied, so Mabella was designated guardian, a role she had already assumed, and kept a lenient eye on Leon most of his waking hours. Josephine grumbled when Sarah told her to use another girl in the kitchen as long as Leon stayed, but she was soon as bossy kind with him as she was with everyone else, in the way of good cooks everywhere.
The Legacy of Beulah Land Page 10
