Alligator Bayou (15 page)

twenty-five

I
run the road out of town, but as soon as Frank Raymond’s out of sight, I turn and race back. The shortest way to the slaughterhouse is to cut through town. I’m slick with sweat and panting hard and the only noise I hear is my own heartbeat. I’ve got to get there fast. I run in the center of the road. Others are running, too. But not as fast as me.

I can see it now. The slaughterhouse is lit up so bright, it looks as if it’s on fire. Outside, people stand in the grasses in little clumps of three or four. Whites with whites; Negroes with Negroes. Everyone’s talking. Children race through the crowd playing tag. More people are coming. The people I ran past on the road, they’re coming here.

If anyone recognizes me …I race for the woods, expecting to hear a shout, maybe even a shot. I dash behind a pine and cling. The bark cuts my cheek. People are coming in buggies, like to the tournament. Coming for a show, all right.

Sheriff Lucas! Get here fast!

I hunch over, run to the closest window, and press myself against the rear wall. I pull up on the window ledge and look in.

Giuseppe and Carlo are on their knees with their backs to me. Their hands are tied behind them. Men stand in front of them, arguing, everyone talking at once. White men. I can make out faces. John Wilson, Mr. Rogers, Fred Johnson, and others. And, Lord in Heaven, there’s Frank Raymond and Mr. Blander.

“All of them did it,” says Wilson in a booming voice.

For a second everyone’s quiet.

“This ain’t no court of law,” says Blander in a flat tone. “They’s procedures to follow. Facts to gather.”

“We done gathered the facts,” says Wilson.

“No, you didn’t.” Frank Raymond steps forward, but Blander catches him by the arm. Frank Raymond shakes him off. “They have a right to defend themselves.”

“You want a trial?” Rogers turns to Giuseppe. “Who killed Dr. Hodge?”

“No one!” shouts Frank Raymond. “He’s not dead! Dr. Hodge is alive!”

Giuseppe mumbles in Sicilian. I’m not sure he even understands the question.

“And you?” Rogers leans toward Carlo. “What you got to say for yourself?”

If Carlo speaks, I can’t hear it. He keeps jerking his right shoulder forward, pulling against the rope on his hands. And I know, I just know, he wants to make the sign of the cross.

“All right.” Rogers juts his chin toward Frank Raymond. “They got their trial.”

“Hodge isn’t dead!” says Frank Raymond. “We’ve got to wait for Sheriff Lucas.”

“No more trouble from y’all, Mr. Raymond,” growls Rogers.

“Father May isn’t here. They’re Catholic. They need a priest.”

“Catholics. They swarm all over New Orleans and Baton Rouge, but we keep clean of them here in Tallulah. That priest ain’t even American. He’s as bad as these dagoes.”

A man whose face I can’t see points a gun toward Frank Raymond and Blander.

“No more wasting time.” Johnson throws a rope over the crossbar where beef carcasses usually hang. The end is tied into a noose. He fits it over Giuseppe’s head!

I scream, “No!” But the sound’s cut off by a hand over my mouth and I’m rolling on the ground, kicking and biting, and two of them are on me at once.

“Stop it, dumbhead!”

I’m pinned, shaking and staring through the dusk at Rock and Charles.

“Get up.” Charles stands and pulls on my arm. “We got to run.”

“No.”

He drags me toward the woods, but I rip myself away and run for the window again when a cheer comes up from inside the slaughterhouse. Something’s happened.

I stop still. The whole world’s gone crazy.

“Calogero.” The voice is right beside me. “Come on!” Patricia takes my hand.

I don’t know what else to do. They pull me along into the woods. Ben is waiting there. We go deeper and I can’t hear anything anymore. It’s like we’re underwater.

I stop in a small clearing, heaving.

“Come on!” Patricia pulls on me. “Hurry.”

“I can’t go with you.”

“You got to.”

“I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“You know why not. You go home now. With Charles. I’m leaving.”

She lets out a sob and holds me tight.

I put my hands on her wet cheeks. “I’ll come back for you.”

She shakes her head.

“I will. I really will. Sooner than you think.”

“I ain’t never going to forget you, Calogero. Never.”

“I’ll be back.”

“Hurry!” says Ben. “We got to run.”

“I’m going alone,” I say.

“You ain’t got a chance alone in the dark,” says Rock.

“I’m going alone!”

Ben grabs my arm and spins me to face him. “All right. Where?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Take off your shirt,” says Ben.

“What?”

“Hurry.”

I take off my shirt.

Ben rips it. He ties half around his ankle and hands the other half to Rock.

Rock ties it around his ankle. “Which way you headed?”

A sudden memory comes of how free I felt that day Frank Raymond and I came out on open water. “The river.”

“Direct, or by the road to Delta?”

“Direct.”

“I’ll run the road,” says Rock.

“I’ll head to Milliken’s Bend,” says Ben.

“Are you crazy?”

“Don’t worry,” says Ben. “We’ll fool those hounds with your smelly shirt. But if they get too close, we’ll throw away the shirt and climb the closest tree.”

“No more talk,” says Patricia. She puts her hand in the center of my chest and pushes. “Run. All of you. Calogero, Calogero-run!”

twenty-six

I
run through the woods.

Panthers. If you run, they chase.

I have to run. So I should get out of the woods. I come out at the east edge of town and go past houses.

People might see me. A boy running. Suspicious. If a crowd comes after me, the people in these houses could tell what they saw. But I have to run.

My uncles. And Cirone. Oh Lord, Cirone. Cirone! Look what my forgetting did. Lord, save them. Save them. Make a miracle.

Run run run. Tears stream down my face. I can’t see anything. But I run. I’m past exhaustion, running as if I could go on forever.

I hear dogs bay. My skin turns to goose flesh. Sheriff Lucas’ bloodhounds. They’re tracking something. Someone.

Don’t let them get Rock or Ben.

I think of the dogs’ powerful legs and long muzzles and for an instant I go numb with fear. But I’m still running.

Are the dogs getting louder? They seem louder. And they’re coming from only one direction. They didn’t split up. They didn’t get fooled. I need a plan. But the only thing in my head is the river.

I race. Faster and faster. I stumble and cut my knee and get up and run. The ground gets soft. Now I’m slapping through mud. Cypresses surround me. Lord, I’ve headed into a swamp!

It’s all right. I’ll be all right. I slog on, trying to get back to firmer ground. Frank Raymond warned about this swamp. He said it was south of the path we took. So if I head north, I’ll find dry land. Only I’ve lost my bearings. And I can’t see the sky, I can’t see the stars, the trees are so thick.

A small swamp, he said. Small.

But Patricia said there’re ’gators in every swamp. I stifle a scream. There’re worse things than ’gators. Patricia said that, too.

The dogs grow loud behind me. I slog on. Mud sucks at my shoes, slops up my ankles. I look back. Through an opening in the trees I see distant lanterns. The dogs are running ahead of the men. So close.

A shriek. Someone shouts, “Stay back!”

I can’t help but look. A ’gator has caught one of the dogs. The ’gator’s shaking it and shaking it. The other bloodhound circles at a distance. The lanterns have clustered. The ’gator shakes till the dog’s belly rips open.

I’m flying. My feet find dryer ground. I’m running so fast, I’m not even sure I’m breathing.

Will they turn back now? There’s still one dog. I run and run till my body is doing it on its own, as though that’s all it knows. And I hear the dog bay again.

Something slinks across my path. I stop short, my heart thumping. Another follows it. Otters. Why, I’m already at the river, and the otters are slipping into the water, panic-stricken.

Dogs can’t smell through water. And I can swim. I plunge in. I’m only a few feet out when the current catches me, and sweeps me away, down river. I kick like mad just to stay afloat. I hear the dog over the rush of the river. Lanterns bob about in the blackness on shore. Then I’m too far downstream. I can’t see anything anymore. The only noise now is the water.

I fight and fight till I’m out of the current and back near shore. A bush branch hangs clear into the water. I catch hold and stay there.

In my head I see Carlo’s shoulder jerking; he’s trying so hard, so hard, to free his right hand, to make the sign of the cross. It’s all I can see; my head has room for nothing else. In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost.

Starlight glints off the moving water. And I realize the things hanging all around me aren’t just leaves; they’re closed up damselflies. I fall into a kind of woozy half sleep.

Something screeches behind me on the shore. Then there’s a high-pitched
eeeek
.

A woodpecker drums away.

I’m shivering. The air is hot, but somehow my body’s losing heat. I don’t know how long I’ve been in the water, but I’m sure at least half the night has passed. I pull myself up by climbing through the bush and I hug the shore as I walk north now. If the dog comes back, the river is close.

North is where Joseph is. Joseph. I’ll find Joseph if I just keep walking. Or he’ll find me. He could shoot an arrow at me again. Or that musket.

Don’t think like that.

I sing inside my head. I sing in Sicilian.

I’m running again. Tiny creatures scatter and bigger ones scurry and I have no idea how far there is left to go. It’s barely dawn, so I can’t see well enough to recognize landmarks and I’m too crazy anyway and I’m crying again and I’m running.

“Pssst.”

I stop.

“Come, friend.”

“Joseph.” I practically fall against him. “Joseph. Help.”

“The Tunica tribe helps orphans.”

The word pierces. I wince. “I have to tell you something.”

“Come sleep.”

“You have to understand. I think they’re chasing me.”

“I heard the baying. They went away.”

“They could come back. Maybe someone saw me. Maybe you’ll be in danger, too.”

“Come sleep.”

“Joseph. They’re like the boys who buried you with stones.”

“Do you think I am afraid? You are wrong. Come, friend. Talk after you sleep.”

We go to his shack and lie down on the earth. I close my eyes. I can’t stop crying. “Joseph?” I whisper.

“I am here, friend.”

“I have to …figure out what to do.”

“You will.”

“No time. They’ll come after me.”

“Did you do something bad?”

“I’m Sicilian.”

“That.”

“My cousin. My uncles.” My words crack. Please, Lord, please let me still have a cousin, uncles. My head throbs as if it would split. “I have to get my … tribe.”

“The Tunica tribe is the friend of the Sicilian tribe.”

“I have to… I have to take them away from here. How far is New York?”

“New York is a terrible place.”

“What do you know?”

“I cross the river to Vicksburg. I go once a month. I read the newspaper.”

“New York …We could work making tunnels. Underground railway.”

“Do you know what a slum is?”

“No.”

“It is where you would live. It is dirty. It is full of disease. And Theodore Roosevelt is the governor. He wants to get rid of Italian slums. He wants to empty them. He does not like Italians.”

“Does anyone in America?”

“The Tunica tribe does.”

“We need work. How long would it take us to get to New York?”

“With much luck it could take weeks.”

“Too far.”

“Too far from what?”

“A girl.”

“A girl. Does she own a bowl with crisscrosses?”

“Yes. I know how to sell greens. We all do.” We. My family. Please, Lord, please. I roll my head side to side. Please. I push myself up on my elbows. “Wait. A whole town of Sicilians. Tangipahoa Parish. Strawberry farmers.”

“A big tribe. That is a good plan. Sleep now.”

I lie back and close my eyes. Cirone. Lord, please. A miracle.

I sleep like the dead.

When I open my eyes, Joseph is gone. The air presses on my chest. The shack is an oven.

I am alone.

Am I? Am I really?

The shakes start in my arms. My chest. My teeth chatter. I squeeze my hands together and try to clench my jaw, but I can’t. I can’t stop the shakes.

Maybe they got away. Just one small miracle, Lord—can’t You give me one?

I crawl out. It’s past midday. Joseph is nowhere in sight. I drink from the little pond. The water is clean, but it makes me retch. I stuff my fist in my mouth to keep from screaming, and I wait.

Joseph appears silently from the direction of the river. He carries a sack. He sits beside me and hands me a peach.

“I’m not hungry.”

“Eat. You need it.”

I take a bite. The juice fills my mouth. I’m crying, but I eat. And Joseph eats. We eat peaches and peaches.

I finally stop and wipe my chin. “Where did you get these?”

“I went to Milliken’s Bend.”

“So far?”

“It is close if you go through the woods. I got provisions for your trip. Everyone talks.” He speaks slowly. His eyes fasten on mine. “They are dead.”

My lips go tingly. My eyes feel like they will fall from my head. “All of them?”

“All five are dead.”

I hug my knees to my chest, but it doesn’t stop the shaking. I’m shaking all over, so hard I hear my bones. Cirone. My uncles and cousin—they’re dead. The people I love—they’re dead. Joseph holds me. I moan into the hollow under his collarbone. I want to climb inside there. I want to disappear.

All five, dead. Five. Slowly the number means something. I pull myself away. I’m not shaking anymore; I’m limp. I whisper, “The two in Milliken’s Bend—alive?”

“Buck Collins took them to Vicksburg. He has a skiff.”

“Buck Collins?”

“A human being. No one knows about it. Buck will not tell.”

“He told you.”

“Telling me is not telling.”

I lick my bottom lip. “I am alone.”

“You are free to become anything.”

“No! No! I don’t know anymore. I don’t know anything.”

“That is not true. Let yourself know.”

“I didn’t tie up Bedda, I know that. Francesco’s goat. It mattered, what I didn’t do, it mattered.”

“To you.”

I stare at him.

“You were there. You know what happened. Tell me.”

“Goats don’t explain what didn’t matter. It didn’t matter that Carlo never owned a stiletto. It didn’t matter that Dr. Hodge shot first. And that he didn’t die.” I’m crying again. My chest heaves. “They were waiting. Waiting for their chance.”

Joseph holds me again.

“Cirone,” I sob. “Cirone was thirteen. All he wanted was to be American. He was thirteen. Joseph, he was thirteen. He was…he was…”

Joseph rocks me. “But there is good, too. Try to think of that. Can you think?”

There’s Patricia. Rock. Charles. Ben.

“Think,” Joseph says.

There’s Frank Raymond. Joe Evans. Mr. Blander. Miss Clarrie.

There’s Joseph.

Rocco! My brother, my brother. I pull away and look at Joseph.

He tilts his head. “Do you want more peaches?”

“No.”

“Come.” Joseph picks up the sack and I follow him through the woods to the river. He puts down the sack and pulls a giant log out from under thick bushes. How can he be that strong? But the log is hollowed out. It’s a dugout boat from a cypress log. A long paddle lies in the bottom.

Joseph sets the sack in the boat. “Food. Make it last.” He takes a wide hide pouch from around his neck and puts it around mine. “Coins. One dollar.” He pats the pouch. “Do not lose it. Also a pipestone bowl. Tunica. People in cities buy pipestone bowls. They think our work is quaint. They will pay high. Make them pay high.”

“Cities? Where am I going?”

“When you see a settlement, lie flat. People will see only a log. The river will take you to Baton Rouge. Sell the bowl. Then walk east to Tangipahoa.”

“The Mississippi goes straight to Baton Rouge?”

“The great river, the
titik
, does nothing straight. It twists and turns. A sandbar can flip you. A rough patch or sawyer can wreck you.”

I shake my head. “I can’t do this. Tangipahoa Parish. I can’t get there on my own.” My body shakes; I walk in a circle. “What’s going on? This can’t be! I can’t—I can’t.” I lean forward with my hands on my knees.

Joseph grabs me by the arms and his fingers are strong. “You are free. You can choose. You can become what you choose.”

He chose to become Joseph.

I stare at the boat. I want to scream. But I hear myself say, “Teach me how to use this.”

“The
titik
teaches you. Go to shore at bad spots.
Huri
is light. You can carry it.”

“Huri?”

“It means ‘wind.’ It is the name of this boat.”

“How long will it take me?”

“In high water I used to do it in five days. But now is the middle of summer. The water is slow. I will push
Huri
into the water. You get in. Move soft, but quick. The current will wash you away.” He pushes the boat through the undergrowth.

I can’t do this. “Wait. Wait. How will I return
Huri
to you?”

“You will not.”

“But how will you go where you want?”

“I do not travel the
titik
anymore.”

“You go over to Vicksburg.”

“Buck Collins can take me.”

He has all the answers.

I can’t stall any longer. Men could come looking—any moment. “Joseph, how can I repay you?”

“By letting me help you.”

“Thank you, Joseph.” I don’t want to get in the boat, I don’t want to leave Joseph.

We look at each other.

Huri
is in the water. And now I am in Huri. Joseph pulls, then steps to the side and lets go. The current takes me. I wave goodbye.

Then I face forward. The banks slip by.

My cousin and uncles are gone.

But Rocco waits for me. We’re family.

I hear Patricia in my head: “Every human being got his race to run.”

I’m running. But I’ll be back. Someday.

I will be back.