A Cry of Angels (2 page)

Fine, said jaunty little Mr. Rampey, cocking his derby, that answered for Jayell all right. Hell, it was just like Jayell to get carried away in the heat of the moment. That's the way he had joined the Marine Corps! But what about the girl? Unless she was too ugly to walk the streets in daylight, or too dumb to read a newspaper and know that a truce had just been signed in Korea and pretty soon the place would be swarming with eligible young men, what kind of girl would latch onto Jayell . . . give up what Atlanta had to offer to move to Quarrytown?

That stumped them all.

Quarrytown was a granite-producing center in Georgia, a cluster of bleak buildings around a town square on a southern finger of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It drew its life from profitable holes sunk in the profitless cotton fields of the surrounding county. Once the town's economy had depended almost entirely on Roe Cotton Mill on the Little Iron River, and a sprawling mill village had grown in the hollow north of town where the boardinghouse was now located. It was here in 1855 that a pair of half-mad Italian brothers named Poncini sunk the granite quarry that put the town in the tombstone business, and eventually made paupers of them. That quarry never did produce enough tombstones to pay, and only caused them disruption. Although the Civil War started the Poncinis on the road to bankruptcy, it was the poor-grade granite that actually finished them off. But during Reconstruction other entrepreneurs began to cast a speculative eye toward the foothills' higher outcroppings, and by the turn of the century the county was pockmarked with the straight-sided holes, and the town had found itself an industry.

Given the somewhat higher-paying jobs in the quarries and finishing sheds, white people began moving out of the settlement to suburbs south of town, and left their shacks and mill jobs to the blacks who were pouring in from the country. Eventually, with the industrial boom following World War Two and newer, ultramodern textile plants crowding in from the Carolinas, Roe Mill began losing money. When old man Morgan Roe finally died, his heirs sold the mill to the wealthiest man in the hollow, a black undertaker named "Doc" Harley Bobo, who had already managed to acquire most of the other property in the hollow. Under Doc Bobo's ownership, and near-slavery wages, the mill had not only survived but flourished.

So by that August of 1953, the hollow, long since populated mostly by black people, had become a dismal, shadowy world the people uptown referred to as the "Ape Yard," with only a handful of whites, in addition to those of us at the boardinghouse and Jayell Crooms, still living there. Up to that time Jayell was the only voluntary resident, the rest were just too poor to move anywhere else.

"
Breakfast
!
Breakfast is ready
!"

One of the chores I enjoyed least at the boardinghouse was ringing the breakfast bell. Since most of the old people were up before dawn, it was a useless ritual. And on this particular morning, the sound was unkind to the ears of someone who'd been up half the night wrestling a drunk Indian. But Miss Esther insisted on it for formality's sake, so, starting at the top of the stairs, I made the rounds, swinging the small brass handbell and stopping to make sure each boarder was awake before moving on.

"Breakfast, Mrs. Porter."

"Thank you, Earl."

"Breakfast, Mrs. Bell."

"Thank you-u-u . . ." Mrs. Bell always sang it out. She had a nice, musical voice.

"Breakfast, Mrs. Cline."

"I'm up! I'm up!
Been up
!"

"Breakfast, Mr. Rampey."

"Yeah, sport, comin' right down."

"Breakfast, Mr. Burroughs." Wait. No answer, of course. Open the door and give a quick rattle. "Mr. Burroughs—breakfast!"

"
What
!?
Oh—oh, great God
!" Hurled upright on the quivering bed, blinking, working his white moustache—"
Oh—great—merciful God
. . ."

Mr. Burroughs was our newest boarder. His children had taken him away from the farm out in the Four Forks community because they worried about him living alone. Then they'd sold the homeplace, robbed him, he said. Bandits. And once a month he went to them to reap vengeance, preparing for those visits as though girding for battle, methodically brushing his hair and cursing softly into the mirror.

"Breakfast, Mrs. Metcalf."

"Good morning, Earl."

I opened Mr. Woodall's door and shook him awake. He was too deaf for the bell.

The last door on the hall was Mr. Jurgen's. I stopped and got ready. Look sharp here or get a cracked skull.

Mr. Jurgen was the type who would say, all right, he was awake, then roll over and go back to sleep. Then he would grumble the rest of the day about not being waked for breakfast. So I had strict orders from Miss Esther to get his feet on the floor before I left. A dangerous assignment, but one I secretly relished. It almost made the early rising worth it. Mr. Jurgen, an old-maidish retired bookkeeper, behaved as if age had distilled his faults alone, and he had arrived a nuisance, a bother, a tattler, and a snippity nag. He and I never got along.

"Breakfast, Mr. Jurgen!" I gave the door a kick and started the bell in a hard, steady rhythm.

Finally a muffled voice said, "All right, I'm awake."

I kept the bell swinging. "Breakfast, Mr. Jurgen. Time to get up, sir."

"I heard you! I'm awake!"

With my unemployed hand I took up a knocking on the door. "Get up, Mr. Jurgen. Time to
rise and shine
, sir."

The voice was a screech. "I said I'm awake, I'm awake for Christ's sake!"

Phase three. Propping a knee against the door, I let my toe alternate with the knocking of the fist, both still backed by the full orchestration of the bell.

"
Get-away-from-that-goddamned-door
!"

Aha! Backing off now, keeping an eye on the doorknob, I matched my voice to the Salvation Army persistence of the bell.

"Break-fast! Break-fast! Don't want-a miss your break-fast! Breakfast! Break . . ."

The door jerked open and his metal trash can scored another dent in the opposite wall. I was already taking the stairs three at a time.

I had forgotten to ask Farette which of the empty downstairs rooms had been assigned to the new girl, but I had no trouble finding it. She was leaning in the doorway in a white and gold kimono, her arms crossed, staring at me.

A strikingly beautiful, red-haired girl, she was a glorious sight to come upon in the dark, cavernous hallway of our boardinghouse.

She leveled cool blue eyes on me. "Don't tell me. It's
Midsummer Night's Dream
, and you're Puck. Right?"

"Ma'am?"

She snapped her fingers. "No, it's some kind of initiation for me. You don't really do this every morning."

"Yes, ma'am, every morning. Miss Esther's orders."

"Well, I may get used to it, but I doubt it. Morning's not my best time."

"Some don't," I said, smiling. "There was one lady said she'd sooner take a room at the asylum and commute."

She didn't laugh.

"I'm Earl," I said. "I was supposed to get a taxi and meet you at the bus station last night, but something important came up."

"I understand. It's all right, I managed to get a cab all by my little self—although it wasn't easy convincing the driver that this was where I wanted to come. He seemed to think I was crazy."

I shrugged. "Don't mind that, people uptown have funny ideas about the Ape Yard. It's not so bad after you get used to it."

"I couldn't see much at night, but what is that awful smell?"

"Oh, that's the old Poncini quarry down the hill, but you'll get used to that too. Those of us that have lived down here awhile don't smell it at all."

She lifted an eyebrow. "What a strange kind of community pride."

"Jayell says you'll be teaching eighth grade. I'll be in your class this year!"

"Oh . . . really."

I nodded. "I'm only thirteen. I guess you figured me to be a little older."

"No, not really."

"Oh. Well, I know I'm
taller
than average. I've got this friend, Tio, and I'm taller than he is. Tio's about average. I guess bein' skinny makes me look smaller."

"Tell me, are you always this talkative?"

"No, I'm usually pretty quiet," I said. "Oh, I almost forgot, Jayell said to tell you he couldn't meet you himself because he got tied up out at the Fundeburk place and couldn't get away. They're tryin' to get a roof on and this rain is giving them a fit."

"Oh, well," she said, "as long as it's something—really important . . ."

"Ma'am?"

"Yes?''

"Are you really going to marry Jayell?"

She looked at me. "What do you mean by that?"

"Ah, well—it's just hard to picture somebody like you coming all the way from Atlanta to marry Jayell, I guess. You know, a lot of folks figure old Jayell to be a little—looney."

"Oh, do they now?"

"You know, the way he is, and the houses he builds. People say, the houses are crazy, he's got to be a little crazy. 'Course, I don't think so at all."

"My, what a comfort to have your confidence in my fiancé's sanity."

"No, I was talking about the houses. They're sound as a dollar. I help him build 'em sometimes. Jayell is a little crazy, and no doubt about it, but everybody thinks a lot of him."

She put her fingers to her temples. "I'm still asleep, that's what it is."

"Ma'am?"

She swung her head slowly. "None of this is really happening. I'm dreaming. It's the result of a wild send-off party, a long bus ride, the ghastly specter of this dismal town looming up at me out of the dark, and a restless night in this barn of a house. That's what it is, right, Puck?"

It was my turn to look at her. Maybe I was wrong about her. She sounded just like Jayell.

Her eyes drifted to Mrs. Cline's crippled fern across the hall. "I just need time to absorb it all: what I've done, what it means . . . the change from Atlanta, the new life, the town, moving from a sorority to this place . . ."

"Sure, it'll take time. It was hard for me to get used to it too. But you'll get to like us. You know, you were kind of a pig-in-a-poke for us too."

Her shoulder came off the doorjamb. There was a hard, flat edge to her voice. "As for you, I've had just about enough. Now you listen to me. I know Jayell has some strange affinity for this place, but I only came here to humor him, and only until I can get him out of here. Personally, I find nothing romantic about living in a slum, with Negroes for my neighbors. This house is utterly depressing, and old people get on my nerves"—she leaned so close I could tell she smoked—"but not merely so much as nosey kids who chatter about things that don't concern them!
Do
we have an understanding!"

"Ye-yes, ma'am."

"'Ma'am' is a professional Southern term that is outdated, shopworn and phony. My name is Gwen at home, Miss Burns at school—preferably neither, whenever you can manage it. Do you have that too?"

"Yes—Gwen."

"Then-why-are-you-still-standing-there?"

I started away, then came back. "Uh-well, there was something . . . oh, I know what it was. Farette said to be sure and ask how you wanted your eggs."

She sighed. "A piece of cinnamon toast will be fine."

"I don't think Farette knows how to make that."

"Is that it, then? Eggs? Have we no other choice?"

"Well, you get to pick bacon or sausage, and there's other things like grits, fritters, sliced tomatoes . . ."

"Please, I have a weak stomach in the morning. Just plain toast. Plain toast and coffee, okay?"

"We don't have loaf bread. Farette makes drop biscuits."

She pointed a red fingernail at my nose. "One egg! Poached!"

I shook my head.

"She doesn't know how to do that either."

I nodded.

"Help me, Earl!"

"Well, you can get it scrambled or fried. Most people take fried."

"All right! My God, I wouldn't want to completely disrupt the household. Tell Farette I will happily accept a fried egg and be most grateful! Now, if you will kindly disappear from my sight I'll get dressed and try to start this day!"

She closed the door and I started away, then stopped. I came back again and knocked. She peeked out, clutching her robe.

"Hard fried or gooshy?"

Her mouth tightened into a fine white line, and she slammed the door in my face.

"Ear-r-r-r-l!" Miss Esther's voice crackled through the ceiling. I dashed into the kitchen and gave Farette the teacher's order. "Hard fried," I ordered for her, "definitely hard, with crinkledy edges," and I looked around for Miss Esther's coffee. Miss Esther had to have a cup of coffee in the morning while she dressed. Farette stood at the stove sullenly stirring a bubbling pot of grits.

"Farette, where's her coffee?"

Farette rapped her wooden spoon on the edge of the pot. "Ain't had time to be studyin' no coffee. I been on my knees wipin' up the mud I just foun' on that floor that
somebody
tracked in here last night!"

Ay, Lord. I forgot.

One of my great-uncle Wylie's last acts of drunken extravagance was to buy Farette a new kitchen linoleum, a white one with cabbage-sized roses she picked out herself. And no one, not even the immaculate Mrs. Bell, approached it from outside without carefully scrubbing their feet.

"Farette, I'm sorry. I was so beat after I got home I guess I just forgot. Please, just give me the coffee. I'll mop the whole floor tonight, I promise."

Farette grudgingly pulled down a cup and poured the coffee. "Don't see why we don't just bring in pigs to raise and be done with it."

"Ear-r-r-r-r-l!"

I dumped in sugar and gave it a stir, splashing the hot liquid on my fingers in the process.

"G-d-d . . ."

"Watch now, you don't cuss yo'self out of breakfast! You know I don't feed no blasphemous mouth."

I grabbed the coffee and ran for the stairs.

Miss Esther was sitting up in bed, waist deep in her bulbous feather mattress with pillows shocked up behind her.