Song Yet Sung

by James McBride

  The man shrugged. Something about a colored prisoner, he said. Died in the jail.

  —What’s his name?

  —It was a woman died in there.

  Denwood’s heart skipped a beat and his face creased into a frown. Nine days of hunting and now this. His patience and money were just about gone, with nothing to show for it, either. He dismounted and led his horse to the side of the porch, where the colored woman Mary stood behind her missus. He motioned with his head and she approached, leaning over the railing.

  —Who’s the woman dead in jail. The Dreamer?

  —That somebody else they wrangling about, she murmured. Lady was in the cell with a sick child. Don’t know if the child was her kin or not. She got into a fight with Constable Herbie in the jailhouse some kind of way and died.

  —Who’s the lady? he asked.

  —Don’t know her, Mary said. Rumor is she’s Woolman’s wife.

  —Who’s Woolman?

  —Escaped slave from years back. Said to be living out near Sinking Creek with his alligator, name of Gar. Don’t speak a lick of English, so they say. This woman here, they say she spoke English fine. So maybe she weren’t his wife.

  She watched Herb and Travis arguing and said under her breath, I don’t know what she got to do with all this, though. They got to git to what they gonna git to. Start searching again! What they waiting for?

  Denwood understood it now. Herb and Travis were arguing about money. The constable’s department, supported mostly by the taxes of grumbling plantation owners who begrudged their taxes with no small amount of complaint, was chronically broke. A captured runaway who was not claimed by an owner could be sold. A dead slave, on the other hand, was cash out the window, plus the cost of burial. He glanced at Kathleen Sullivan, who had turned away in disgust from the arguing constables and seated herself on the only chair on the porch. She had recovered from the previous night, and while she still looked anxious, he could see her dark eyes carefully scanning everything about her: the boats, the other watermen waiting to put out to the bay. He took note of the shapely, full figure beneath the dowdy dress she wore. In her hands she clasped a Bible. Her gaze, fixed on the bay, suddenly turned in his direction and caught him off guard, standing at the edge of the porch railing, looking uncomfortable.

  She rose from her chair and approached.

  —No offense meant yesterday, she said. I wasn’t myself.

  Denwood found himself straightening his collar and trying to flatten his oilskin jacket, which had hardened as it dried in the morning sun. He was, in essence, a proud man, yet something about her made him bow down inside himself. He wished he could snap the tiredness out of his face the way one flaps a sheet in the wind. He knew what he looked like: Drawn. Raw. Uneven. He was rough-looking, a cur, even compared to the watermen around him. They were men who lived on the water chasing fish. He was a waterman who lived on land, chasing human chattel. Big difference.

  —None taken, he said. I just wanted to thank you for letting me sleep in your barn.

  He felt a sudden urge to gallop away from her, ashamed of what she might think of him. He’d retired from chasing coloreds. He’d given it up. He’d only come back to it because of his son, and the money—the peace he thought the money would buy for him. But so far there was none. And all of it was too hard to explain. He tried to decide whether it was his own knowing conscience that made him feel ashamed or if the sight of her was awakening something that had already been inside him, something that he thought he’d already lost, except now perhaps it wasn’t lost at all. He couldn’t tell. He only knew that looking at her had tapped open a vault in his insides that had for too long been locked tight, and further secured by years of travel, being alone, hearing excuses and sad stories of slave owners and slaves, all of them trapped by the Trade; and he, a policeman, a grabber, a hunter, a member of it, living amidst the walking corpses of it, more dead than alive. He was filled with disgust.

  He backed his horse away and wheeled around. He heard her speak over his shoulder: About your offer yesterday, she said. About looking out for my boy in your travels…

  He half spun his horse so he could see her. Standing at the porch railing, her face drawn, her lips pursed tight, she glanced down at her hands, clasping the Bible.

  —He’s a small boy, eight years old. Answers to the name Jeff Boy. Disappeared from that grove of pine trees yonder near the cornfield. If you see or hear anything, I’d…I’d appreciate whatever you do.

  Denwood straightened his collar and tried to still his Adam’s apple, which seemed to be quivering on its own account. He was hardened by years of being alone and holding back, yet was so startled by the feeling of nervousness in this woman’s presence that he could not raise his eyes or even think of a response.

  Instead he nodded.

  —Thank you, she said. I’m Kathleen Sullivan. And you are…

  —Denwood, he said.

  —Denwood, she repeated. The name sounded like a thousand birds singing as it came from her lips, and at that moment he felt as if he were falling off a cliff. So this is what it’s like, he said to himself. This is what it’s like when they say you hear the thunder, see the lightning, get struck blind, hear the sonnet. And it comes out of nowhere too. God Almighty, I’ve got to leave.

  —I’ll be on the lookout for him, he managed to blurt out.

  He turned on his horse and fled, trotting past Herb and Travis and the other watermen, who parted as he passed among them. They were afraid of him, he knew, and it was just as well. He was afraid of himself, of what he might do. He could handle, he realized, any emotion but love. What he’d just felt, staring at that beautiful woman, was explosive and charged. He couldn’t handle it, didn’t know what to do with it. It was best to leave.

  He started out directly west, towards an old logging trail that led to the woods behind Sinking Creek. Then, while still in sight of the house, he changed his mind, turned around, and directed his horse back to the cornfield, trotting to the grove of pine trees where the boy had disappeared. He dismounted and slowly walked around, examining the terrain.

  From the porch Kathleen Sullivan watched him. She had been beside herself the previous night when he’d arrived. It was the fourth day since Jeff Boy had gone missing, and with the terrible storm and the bungling bluster of Constable Travis, in whom she hadn’t a shred of confidence, she had spent a bad night. But now, with the sun in her face and the terror of the incident receding, she was beginning to think clearly. There was something suspicious about the whole bit, and she was not sure who to trust. The constable worked for the plantation owners. The watermen, many of whom had been friends of her late husband, worked for themselves. She was sure they would stay and search for Jeff Boy until she gave the signal to stop. The constable, she suspected, would be gone in a day or so. After the fifth or sixth day, the chances of Jeff Boy being found on the water alive were, she knew, not good. She was uncertain about what to do. The watermen had families. Many were poorer than she was and had their own children to feed. The oystering season was almost over. The watermen needed to get back out onto the water and get what they could before the season ended, then home to start planting for the summer months. She needed someone now, a real man, someone decisive, not some half-assed braggart and his card-playing deputies, to help her direct the search.

  She had seen how the watermen had given this limping man a wide berth when he arrived; noted his calmness, the deadness in his face, and beneath that the self-assurance and patience. She would give anything, she thought, to have a bit of solidity right now, a piece of emotional land to stand on. As much as she was grateful to the watermen for volunteering to search, she hated them, every one of them. They reminded her of her husband, with his wide-eyed dreams, big talk, and foolish love of the Chesapeake, taking to it each season as if it were his mother, till it reclaimed him as every mother does, just as it would the watermen she found herself staring at absently. Yet, the man who slowly plodded around
the cornfield—this man with the long lines across his face, who staked his claim in each piece of earth he passed upon with the authority of the morning fog that drifted in from the bay each morning—seemed different from his counterparts. He was careful, deliberate, and most important, a hunter of men, colored men, a despicable practice, surely, but an important skill at the moment, she thought bitterly. One man is just like any other.

  She watched him walk the land where Jeff Boy disappeared, limping through each row of the cornfield, head down, reading the land. She saw him crouch over the hole where the kidnapper had hidden, then check the sun to see its position from the hiding place, then stare into the swampy forest where Wiley had chased the dreaded kidnapper. She saw him look up at the trees overhead, then drift slowly towards the swamp, his head moving back and forth, reading the ground, then the trees up above.

  She turned to her slave Mary and asked, Where’s he from?

  Mary shrugged. Mr. Gimp? Oh, he’s from Hooper Island, I heard.

  —He’s a full-time hunter of Negroes?

  —So they say, Mary said, trying to sound nonchalant.

  —And you offered him my barn?

  Mary tried to look casual, but knew Kathleen saw past it.

  —Well, Missus, I didn’t think he could put his foot in the road, the way it was raining.

  —Why was you frettin’ on him?

  —Why, Missus, I wasn’t frettin’.

  —Surely you detest him.

  —I do not.

  Kathleen eyed Mary warily. There was logic in Mary’s madness, Kathleen was sure. Her Negroes were bright beyond comparison. Whenever she gave them a job to do, even if she didn’t have the tools for them to do the job, they figured out some way to get it done. Their solutions weren’t always pretty, but they always came up with them.

  —It’s Amber, ain’t it? Kathleen said.

  Mary’s eyes dropped to her feet. I know you’re angry with him, she said. But I don’t…If he knew Jeff Boy and Wiley was missing, he’d be here in a jiffy. I’m afraid he’s…

  —Run off?

  —No. He ain’t run off. He’s in trouble somehow.

  —What kind of trouble?

  —I can’t say, Mary said, looking away. But if Mr. Gimp there is good as they say he is, he’ll find Amber. Dead or alive, he’ll bring him home. I asked him to look into it, and he said he would.

  —He’ll likely do no such thing, Kathleen said. He’s working for somebody else. He’s paid to bring somebody home. That’s the only way he’ll do it.

  Mary nodded her head, but as she watched the Gimp poke in and out of the grove of trees, she silently disagreed. She cared about the missus, and it was all well and good that they were in the same boat, having lost husbands together, and now both of their sons were missing too. But nothing in the world would make her confess to Kathleen or any other white person about the Dreamer. It would only complicate matters. The white men fussing in front of the house would move heaven and earth to find Jeff Boy. They would not, she was sure, do the same for her son. The Dreamer was her only hope. She had no plans on surrendering that hope to Missus or anyone else. So long as the Gimp kept his word, she had hope. She had prayed on it and felt sure there was hope. Yet, she could not contain, despite her best efforts, a feeling of betrayal, as the Gimp sniffed around the spot where Jeff Boy had vanished. It didn’t escape her that now that Miss Kathleen had asked him to, he might feel inclined to lean more towards finding Jeff Boy than Wiley.

  She stared at the Gimp, lost in thought, trying to keep her frayed nerves in check. She’d had plans for Wiley. She knew he and Amber had planned to run off. Wiley had never said it; it didn’t need to be said. It was one of the millions of things that were better left unsaid. Wiley was her son, and she was his mother, and she knew him as instinctively as any mother would know a son. As a slave, she had prayed for his freedom. As a mother, she had prayed against it. After her husband, Nate, and Mr. Boyd died, she knew it was just a matter of time before the missus would lose it all: the farm, the slaves, the crops, everything. She saw the books each month. The missus was a hard worker, a good woman, good to her colored, God knows it. But without Nate and Mr. Boyd hauling in oysters, her debts were running her over. It wouldn’t be long before she’d be forced to sell them all.

  She realized that Kathleen was staring at her.

  —So? Kathleen said.

  —I’m sorry, Missus, I forgot what you was asking me.

  —What makes you think he’s gonna look for Amber?

  —I got a feeling, Mary said. On top of that, I begged him to do it.

  Watching Denwood poke around the grove, Kathleen remarked, I don’t know that his type is easily moved.

  From his vantage point, Denwood could see the two women observing him from the porch, and he felt embarrassed. He owed them both, but not that much, he thought. He would be beholden to Mary, of course, if her information proved correct. As for the pretty missus, well…they were both, he reckoned, dependent on what he could accomplish. He didn’t like the feeling.

  He had positioned himself in the grove to check the position of the sun in relation to the place where the assailant had hidden, then checked the area around it to see what it told him. The ground bespoke someone who knew how to hunt and move. He wondered, vaguely, if anyone had bothered to check whether the woman and child in jail whom Travis and Herbie were fussing about had anything to do with the two missing people out here. He doubted it. Travis was as dim as a dead candle on any given day, and most white folks, he knew, did not fully grasp the range of Negro emotions, which were, as far as he was concerned, as great as if not greater than any white man’s.

  He mounted his old gelding and, instead of taking the old logging trail that ran along the creek at the back of the property, decided to push through the swamp to the Indian burial ground. He pointed the horse into the dense thicket and slowly worked his way in, ducking beneath the low-hanging beech and cypress branches, vanishing from sight. As the two women watched him disappear, both prayed to God for the same thing.

  The tiny bungy splashed gaily across the wide expanse of Church Creek under the morning sun, the water gently cradling the boat and rocking it from side to side. Sitting in the stern, Liz reached into the water and doused her face. She had washed the oyster juice out of her hair and discovered that, like most bodies of water on the eastern shore, this one had its own particular smell. It was better than the one that clung to her before.

  Facing her, old Clarence, who had seemed feeble and slow while working in Franz’s store in town, rowed with precision, moving the boat with the power and ease of an experienced waterman. His shabby bearing, stooped posture, and sober expression were gone. The face she saw now was stern and serious, that of a leader of men. He regarded her with no small amount of caution and even, she suspected, a bit of disdain.

  After several minutes of rowing, Clarence raised the sail, then tacked easily towards the Chesapeake, staying wide of several oyster boats that were anchored, their inhabitants busily tonging the bottom of the bay.

  —You know much about boats? she asked.

  —Surely do, Clarence said. Worked on ’em all my life. Till I got too old.

  —How old was that?

  —Twenty, he said.

  He looked at her, expecting to see a smile, but none appeared. Liz stared at the bottom of the boat. The open air, sun, and gentle bay breeze had given her fresh strength, but still she was worried. Her head had never stopped hurting. She was, she feared, seriously ill. Her sleeping bouts, once frequent, were now unstoppable. She’d fallen asleep in the old man’s cart and awakened to find herself coughing blood, so much that the old man and his wife had to hastily wash her blood off the oysters once they’d pulled her out of the wheelbarrow at Clarence’s house, where she’d hidden while he finished his morning deliveries.

  —Where we going? she asked.

  —Time for you to leave this country, he said. I’m taking you to a delivery point.
And I’m mighty glad to do it.

  —You working the gospel train?

  —I’m working to the Lord’s purpose.

  —What’s that mean?

  —It means it ain’t the song, it’s the singer of it. The song not yet sung.

  —What is it about you people? she asked. Why can’t anyone talk straight? First Amber. Then the blacksmith. Now you. Why’n’t you just say what you are?

  —I know what I am, the old man replied. The question is, who are you?

  —What’s that mean?

  —It means exactly what it says, the old man said. You come round here staking a claim to being this, that, and the other, yet I can’t tell if you’s got the straight of a woman who knows who she is or not. Honest, I know folks pretty good from seeing ’em, and I don’t know you from Adam—and don’t wanna know you, neither. But I reckon you must be special, for Amber to stick his neck out for you the way he done. Time for you to leave this country, though, that’s for sure.

  —I wanted to repay Amber, she said, for helping me. But I can’t do nothing for him. I brought nothing but trouble to him.

  —I reckon you did, the old man said. He’s likely going to prison. Or get hung, one.

  —He’s done nothing wrong, Liz said. His missus will forgive him for being gone two days. He said it.

  —It ain’t the missus I’m concerned with. It’s his nephew, Wiley. And his sister, Mary.

  —What they done?

  —We all connected. You know that. White folks round here is riled. Bunch of niggers done cut free from Patty’s and now there’s a white boy missing. They don’t know who done it. Likely Miss Kathleen’s child ain’t never gonna be found. Probably got drowned, or bit by a water moccasin snake, and then drowned. Somebody got to pay for it. Who you expect?

  She stared at the floor of the boat, her head hanging low.

  —No need to fret about what’s done, Clarence said matter-of-factly. It’s God’s world. He washes you clean. He makes you whole. He puts rain in your garden and sunshine in your heart. Just pray when you get free, child. Pray for what you done, and what you gonna do. Lotta folks around here believe in you. I don’t, but lots do. You got some kind of purpose, they say. It’s got to be.