Markwildyr.com, Post #200
My pal Don Travis has guest posted snippets of our mutual pal Donald T. Morgan’s novel Miasma on his dontravis.com blog. Now, I would like to provide a platform for the book, as well.
This is a
long post, but I hope you’ll stay with it to the end.
* * * * *
MIASMA
By Donald T.
Morgan
Prologue
December 1837, Western Arkansas Territory
The old Cherokee’s phlegmy voice barely reached Bantu from the sled. “Stop. I gotta rest.”
“Not yet, Massa Elder.
Soldiers won’t let us. But I hear tell we almost there.”
Bantu knew no such thing. His
hearing, along with his strength, faded day by day. Weeks of walking over
mountains and crossing deep rivers in the dead of winter did that to a man.
Even a strong one. No longer aware of the crusted mud and fallen branches
beneath his heels, pulling the sledge without spilling his master into the
slick muck grew almost impossible in a steady drizzle of sleet and snow. His
eyelids stuck together.
The
muted resonance and spicy redolence of the familiar broad meadows and thick
forests of his southern African homeland momentarily enveloped him, bringing a
false sense of warmth. In the distance, a lion roared, a hippo grunted. A
vervet disappeared into the foliage. He blinked. There was no monkey, no lion,
no river horse. His mind wandered off sometimes like it was done with this
endless trek. Times that made it better; at times, tougher.
He longed for a loving voice
crooning his name. “Bakari.” The Cherokees hadn’t called him anything but
Bantu. He’d not heard his name in the four years since his own chieftain had
sold him to slavers for his lack of respect. He’d had a big tongue for an
eighteen-year-old warrior. He swiped gunk from his eyes with his upper arm,
cursing softly at the realization tears, not sleet, had frosted his lids. They
might of made him a slave, but he was also a man, and Bantu men didn’t shed
tears.
All around him, silent men, women,
and children shuffled along with stiff, gaunt faces, mute testimony to the
hunger and sickness and pain of the journey. He abandoned the path to go around
a frozen body in the snow—real or spirit—he didn’t know, didn’t care. The
Indians had a name for this road. The Trail of Tears.
Slogging onward, the weight of
a thousand… two thousand eyes staggered him. Countless wispy tendrils that had
once been red-brown arms plucked at him. Piteous, soundless pleas rang in his
frozen ears. “Take us with you. Join us. It makes no matter which.”
They’d once trudged this same
tragic path, reaching no farther than this spot or the next one before death
snatched them away. Ghosts. At one time, that would have terrified him. Now it
was of no import. He staggered onward.
This particular band of
Cherokees and their Black slaves—among thousands forced from their ancestral
homelands—started the long walk in Eastern Tennessee, and many had already
died. The old Indian on the sled, known to his tribesmen as Dull Hatchet, was the
last of the Elder family, save for a grandson who’d slipped past Andrew
Jackson’s troopers and fled into the hills before Old Hickory got his hands on
the family. The Whites coveted the land, Bantu speculated when he was in his
right mind. Especially the rich farmland of red men like the Elder family.
His master cried out again,
and Bantu laid down the shafts of the pony drag—nothing but two lodge poles
supporting a deerskin bed—to check on him. “Yassuh?”
Elder’s chest rattled as he
spoke. “Get me Tall Pine. He’ll make you stop. I need my rest.” The old man
rarely called his family by anything but their American names.
“Massa, yo boy is dead. He set
after a soldier and got stuck with one of them bayonets. And the missus passed
right after that.”
Elder fell back on the
deerskin sled and closed his eyes, his breathing syrupy. Bantu picked up the
poles and dragged the sled once again, as he had for the two days since the
mare died. Occasionally, he lurched past a long-stemmed plant he figured was
the Cherokee Rose. Come spring, it would open its five white petals to reveal a
gold interior. Massa Elder claimed it was born of women’s tears, but Bantu had
a more mundane explanation. Others before them had planted the medicine roses
along the way as a blaze for the trail they’d one day travel back home.
Hours later, as the soldiers
called a halt for the day, a three-striper tapped him on the shoulder. “Boy,
how long you gonna haul around a dead man?”
He put down the drag to check
his master. The soldier was right; the old man was gone. Bantu stood puzzling
over how he felt about the death of the Cherokee. He was unable to come up with
an answer.
While others ate and tended
sores and wounds, Bantu hacked a hole in the frozen ground and laid out Massa
Elder best he could before sorting through the bundle of belongings that had
ridden on the sledge with the old Cherokee. He needed to salvage what he could
for his new master.
Bantu froze. Who was his
new master?
A shiver stronger than
anything the winter had laid across his back shook him. The muscles in his
exhausted legs trembled. Should he run before someone realized there was no one
to claim him? Run where?
His insides felt like hot lava
while his skin shivered and puckered in the cold. Whatever the future, he’d
need what the old man carried. Most of it, Bantu abandoned, but he hid a small
bag holding silver and copper coins and one big gold piece—as beautiful as
anything he’d ever seen—inside his ragged jacket. An English pound, the old man
had once told him.
Fretful and avoiding the
others, he ate what little food remained and picked an isolated spot to settle
in his blankets, the cold, damp night made a smidgeon more bearable by adding Massa
Elder’s covers to his own.
Early the next morning when
the soldiers roused their flock of human sheep, a tall African warrior called
Bakari rose and marched westward with the others toward an uncertain destiny.
Chapter 1
Colored section of Horseshoe Bend, Oklahoma, Wednesday, May 31, 1944
Miasma Elderberry wasn’t afraid. Not exactly. But every time she set out for Honky Town her nerves played tricks, making her go all jerky at times and giving her a million pinpricks down the back. Little Colored girls was about as welcome downtown as head lice. And it never got no better, no matter she had to go every two or three days to check for mail down at the post office. It didn’t have no Colored entrance, so she always had to take to the alley and knock on the back door. That was better than standing in line with Whites, even if she could of. She kept a sharp eye out for boys. They was the nastiest. The big folks mostly didn’t even see her unless she got in their way. Little girls looked at her like she oughta be in a zoo or stuck out their tongues, but the boys? They’d trip her if she wasn’t sharp. Them curling their lips at her was worse. Seemed like a promise of something to come.
On top of that, all they talked about was the big war going on
across the ocean. Didn’t hear as much about it where she lived, even though
some of their Coloreds was over there fighting in it. She shuddered to think
about them bombs falling down on folks, blowing them into little pieces like
chunks of meat in a rabbit stew. They couldn’t all be bad people, even if most
of them was White.
She glanced up the gravel road to the top of the hill. Two blocks
up and three down right into a world where you don’t say nothing and your feet
don’t make no noise. Did White folks feel the same way when they come to
Colored town? She wrinkled her nose. Never know, ’cause none of them ever set
foot there, less’n it was the police.
Today, she didn’t mind any of it, up or down. Today was her tenth
birthday, and she had a shiny nickel in her pocket, enough to get five whole
jawbreakers if the store had any. Sometimes they was hard to find. Sugar
rationing, her mama said. Funny how a nickel was way bigger than a dime, but
that thin little dime bought twice as many jawbreakers as a five-cent piece.
Should she have one piece of candy a day or one a week or one a month…
so they’d last longer? Or maybe she oughta share them with her friend
Tizzie. Miasma frowned. A birthday present ought not bring a problem along with
it. Her scowl deepened. She didn’t like giving her money to Whites, but doggone
it, Mr. Dinkins’ little neighborhood store was plumb out of jawbreakers.
Claimed sugar couldn’t be wasted on foolishness like that. But somebody said
Whitten Grocery downtown had some big, juicy gobstoppers. She sure hoped they
didn’t ask for ration stamps, ’cause she didn’t have none.
As usual, when she took her first step out of Colored Town on the
way to the White part of Horseshoe Bend, she broke into song to ease the
tension. “Onward Christian Soldiers” seemed right because she was passing the
Baptist Church with its stubby white spire rearing up in the air, pretending to
hold a bell that never was. Without thinking about it, she lifted her knees
high and took to marching to the beat of the hymn ’stead of walking. Her clear,
strong voice stayed true to the tempo but played with the notes. She liked
making each song her own.
As she neared the top of the hill, her eyes went to the big house
to the left of the road. Sometimes the old White man who lived there came out to
watch her pass. He liked her songs, probably. Sure ’nough, there he was,
standing at the fence under the oak tree at the back of the house.
She raised her voice as she switched to “The Old Wooden Cross,”
and took pleasure in his wide smile. An old smile but a good one. He raised his
hand in greeting; she wiggled the fingers of her left hand in return and kept
on walking and belting out the hymn. After another block, she closed her mouth
and kept her eyes focused on the road ahead of her. The closer she got to town,
the more her skin puckered, the slower her steps became. “Ain’t nothing bad
gonna happen,” she muttered beneath her breath. Done it a hundred times, and
nothin’ had happened yet. Don’t mean it never would. Stay sharp, you’ll be
okay. Done with arguing with herself, she squared her shoulders and scooted on
down the road.
Some of the downtown stores had signs about “No Negroes Allowed,”
and there was one a block to the west that went all the way. “No Dogs, Indians,
or Negroes.” Whitten’s just had a side entrance labeled for Coloreds. That was
better’n standing in the alley to buy what she wanted.
Miasma eased inside and took in the high, white ceiling and lime
green walls stretching clear to the far side of the store. Couldn’t see no
people, but that was because they wanted it that way. Tall shelves made it look
like this was a separate store so White folks didn’t have to put up with
Coloreds. Wasn’t of course, but that’s what they was aiming for. That was all
right, the shelves facing her held a gazillion things to buy if a body had the
money.
She studied the goodies in a glass counter for five minutes
before a man sauntered over and exchanged her nickel for six jawbreakers. She
thought the clerk counted them wrong and started to hand one back until he
smiled and winked at her. She returned the smile and left with enough candy for
six whole months if she just had one on the last day of each month. Problem
solved. And they looked as sweet as they ever did, sugar shortage or no sugar
shortage.
Whenever Miasma was in her own neighborhood, she skipped most
everywhere she went, usually busting out in song, but downtown, all she wanted
was to be invisible. She oughta of gone up the alley, but she walked straight
up the sidewalk covered by an overhang that kept the sun out when there was
one, and the rain off when there wasn’t. The stores sure looked more
interesting than they did from the back. Why’d they need so many stores? One
looked like it didn’t sell nothing but clothes. Another one was for hammers and
nails and stuff like that. Farther up, one had a sign saying “Five and Dime
Store.” What did that mean? Some didn’t have windows, so she didn’t have no
idea of what they was. And why was there so many cars parked with their noses
edged up the sidewalk? Head-in parking, she’d heard someone say. Lordy, she’d
heard a new car cost something like eight-hundred dollars. Was there that much
money in the world?
At the corner alongside of the drug store, she crossed the street
and began the hike home. She couldn’t sing because she had a whole month’s
worth of candy tucked in one cheek and didn’t want to risk spitting it out
without meaning to. The jawbreaker was still there—although considerably
smaller—by the time she passed the white house on the hill. Didn’t matter if
she was singing or not. The old man was nowhere about.
After two more blocks she ran into Tizzie right in front of the
Baptist Church and hammered her plan by handing her best friend a jawbreaker.
That was all right, it was the extra one the clerk give her. She still had a
four-month supply.
Tizzie’s real name was Letitia, but nobody called her nothing but
Tizzie, and it suited her right down to a T. Miasma figured a person’s
name ought to fit. Her friend’s mama had done her hair in a long pigtail right
down the back of her neck. Miasma’s braids ran down behind each ear and rested
on her shoulders. Tizzie’s head mop tended to frizz, but Miasma’s didn’t. Kids
sometimes claimed she had made hair, but she never used nothing to straighten
it. Most likely some of the Elderberrys’ Cherokee blood showing up.
Tizzie shifted the big jawbreaker to the other side of her mouth
and wished Miasma a happy birthday before handing over a cut-out book of paper
dolls. Miasma recognized it as Tizzie’s favorite toy and half the figures was
missing, but she didn’t mind. They always played paper dolls together, so it
wasn’t no matter who owned the book they came out of. They found a patch of
grass struggling to survive the Oklahoma heat and settled in the shade of a
live oak beside the church to choose new dolls to play with.
Getting them out of the book without tearing them was sometimes a
problem, but the big husky man and the girl with a teasing look cooperated and
came out whole. They were White, but that didn’t matter. Nobody made Colored
paper dolls. One time, her and Tizzie took crayons and painted the faces black,
but that wiped out all the features and made it look like two shiny, black
balls sittin’ on somebody’s shoulders. So they’d quit doing that.
An hour or so later, James
Hugh Dinkins wandered over and plopped down beside them. “What you two birds up
to?”
“Mindin’ our own business,”
Miasma said.
She didn’t particularly like
James Hugh even if he was awful cute. He was bigger than them—not much older
but way bigger. And he played rough. Sometimes he used words the church
wouldn’t like. Of course, so did Mama, but it wasn’t Miasma’s place to judge
her mother. James Hugh was another matter. The first time he said “shit,”
Miasma told him straight off not to talk that way. The second time, she pinched
his arm. He jerked away and scrambled to his knees, wild-eyed.
“Hey! You stop that.”
“Will when you stop talking
that way.”
“Ain’t none a yo business how
I talk.”
“Is when you talk it around
girls.”
“Well, don’t flip your wig.”
She figured he wanted to hit
her, but if he did the other boys would claim he fought girls ’cause he wasn’t
tough enough for boys. Wasn’t true. James Hugh was bigger and meaner than any
of them. Funny how what others thought put a halter on a boy. Still… best not
pursue the matter. James Hugh’s old man owned the only store in Colored Town,
and sometimes he shared things his daddy give him. That was funny too. How a
boy could be onery one minute and cut the next.
James Hugh took out his
frustration by snatching the paper dolls out of their hands and ripping them in
half before stalking away. To keep from using up two more cut-outs, Miasma put
the bottom halves out of sight, stuck the torsos in the sand, and played like
the two was swimming and flirting in a lake. Tizzie griped it didn’t seem real
because they wasn’t in swimming suits, but Miasma had her way. After all it was
her birthday.
A few minutes later, James
Hugh sneaked up on them and tossed something on the ground before running away.
Tizzie yelled “Peckerwood” at him, but Miasma snatched what he’d left, another
cut-out book, smaller and thinner than hers but a paper doll book all the same.
As Miasma ripped off the cellophane cover and thumbed through it, she gasped in
surprise. One of the figures was a Black boy in a spiffy Army uniform. There
wasn’t no colored girl to go with him, but he was handsome and smiling and
favored her dead daddy’s picture on the table beside their ratty old couch.
Right on
the spot, Miasma decided to take a crayon and color a girl for him. But she’d
do it better this time. Maybe a brown or gray crayon instead of black. But she
had to do something. She sure couldn’t have that humdinger of a Colored man
running around with a scrawny White girl. Even if it was just paper dolls, that
wouldn’t be right.
* * * *
Ah, that brought
a rush of memories from my childhood. Some of them good, some of them not so
good. But it was what it was, however socially blind many of us were… or
perhaps chose to be.
Website and blog: markwildyr.com
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