In a Dark Season (19 page)

The Drovers’ Road VII

Driving Hogs

I confess, said the Professor, to an overweening curiosity. What did you, a simple—I beg your pardon, an
inexperienced
country lad, think of Mr. Patton’s fine hotel and its languid denizens? In those far-off and golden days when I was still in funds, I spent a month among the lotus-eaters at that hostelry, attempting to ingratiate myself with a wealthy widow.

At first, she was entranced with me, hung on my least syllable. But her meddling friends intervened. When I think that but for the calumnies of others, I might now be consort to Mrs. Rupert Radnor of Philadelphia and a valued member of Main Line society…But, alas! ’Twas not to be. The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune have brought me low, marking me as the prospective bridegroom of Miss Nettie Mae Nobody of Nowhere, North Carolina.

The Professor blew his nose loudly into a once white handkerchief, then waved a hand at his cell mate. Forgive my bitter garrulity, Lydy. Tell me your impressions of Warm Springs.

As usual, the young man had waited philosophically for the mostly incomprehensible soliloquy to end, seizing on those few words that had meaning for him and paying no more attention to the rest than he did to the maudlin singing issuing from the neighboring cell. When the Professor had carefully folded his handkerchief and resumed an attentive attitude, Lydy took up his account.

Well, sir, the folks at the ho-tel hired me on to help with the horses and mules they kept for folks to ride. And I hadn’t been there much more’n a week when the head man told me I was to be a groom and ride out with the rich folks when they went the next morning to see the sunrise from the top of Rich Mountain. Them furriners was a sight on earth. They changed their clothes three and four times a day. And oncet or twicet a day they would waller in them great marble tubs, a-hopin to git cured of everwhat hit was that ailed them. I tell you, Professor, they was as idle a gang of folks as ever I seen.

I will say for them that they was free with their money but, still and all, I was right happy when it came time for the droves to commence. As the air begun to cool and the leaves to turn, the rich folks packed their fancy clothes into great trunks and piled into the coaches so as to be out of there afore the roads was full of critters and the dust they raised and the droppins they left fouling ever inch of the way.

They kept us fellers busy there at the hotel for another few weeks as they had to have everything just so afore closing for the winter. But soon as my job there was done, I hired on with a great drove of hogs bound for Greenville, South Carolina.

Forgive me the solecism, but might I inquire as to your remuneration? Your salary?

The Professor’s question was met with a blank stare and he amended his query.

I meant to ask, what was your pay for this grueling journey?

Lydy’s face brightened. Well, sir, hit was thirteen dollars and found—meanin that the owner paid fer our meals at the stands. Hit was easy money, to my way of thinkin. Hogs is clever critters. They take some humorin but once they was on the road, they would move along at a right smart pace without offerin to stray. We had great long whips that we cracked right often to keep the beastes from loaferin but they weren’t much else to do most of the time.

They was a friendly, talksome feller named Shelton, took it upon hisself to walk near me and tell me all manner of things. He’d gone with many a drive and knowed the road well. And one of the first things he showed me, not a mile upriver of Warm Springs, was the place where a drownded man had been found some months afore.

Hit was a young feller, Shelton told me, and the spring floods had beat him about on the rocks of the river so bad that hit took a time afore anyone could put a name to him. They had laid him out in a shed a good ways from the tavern but when the weather begun to turn warm, the innkeeper said he would have to go in the ground as an unknown fer he’d not keep much longer. A man who had stayed at Gudger’s Stand allowed as how he thought from the hair on the corpus’s head that hit could be the Ramsey boy who had worked for Ol’ Luce and was said to be courtin his daughter.

One of the other fellers who was trampin along nearby ups and says, Naw, I heared hit was Ol’ Luce’s
wife
that boy was ruttin atter. Shitfire, that black-eyed piece’d make a preacher lay down the Book iffen he could lay—

But just then we come to a side-ford, where the mountain reaches down to the water so steep and rocky that the road has to run through the shallows. Hit took all the hollerin and whip-crackin we could do to push them hogs through the water and back onto the road oncet hit took up on land again. The river is fearsome strong and swift. Iffen a hog loses his footin in the side-ford or makes for the deeper water, he can be caught up by the ragin current afore you can hardly spit.

Keep them beastes close, hollered the boss. I’ll not have another lost in Sill’s Slough.

When we had got through the side-ford and the hogs was back in the muck of the road, Shelton sidled up to me. You ever heared of the Dakwa, boy?

There never was a man liked to talk as much as ol’ Shelton. Lydy caught himself and cast a sly look at his cell mate. Reckon you and him might be kin, Professor?

And what is this Dakwa? the Professor asked, ignoring the gibe.

Shelton said that hit was some kindly of great fish that the Cherokees talked of. Hit was supposed to live under a big rock there at Sill’s Slough and hit would grab a man or a beast and suck hit under.

Last year, said Shelton, when we struck that side-ford they was a big old spotted hog got into the deep waters. That hog struck out for the other shore, swimmin like one thing and then all to oncet he commenced to whirl around in the water, a-squealin and sputterin like maybe something was bitin on him.

And then ol’ Shelton he pointed back at a place in midstream where the water seemed to run kindly contrary around some jaggety rocks. Hit was right there that hog went under, says he, and, though we waited and watched for the better part of an hour, hit never did come back up. Reckon hit was the Dakwa what et that hog.

The Professor waved aside the tale of the river monster. A fable, Lydy, a story to amaze and entertain children. Press on. I would hear of your return to Gudger’s Stand.

Well, sir, first I must tell you of the place we stayed that night. Hit was at the Flores Stand we put up and there I come to learn of the Melungeons. The Melungeons and Mariah of the Flowers.

Chapter 22

Troll Trove

Saturday, December 23

S
o you ladies are interested in my honored forebear, the man who drew this map? If you like, I can show you an article he penned for
Harper’s New Monthly Magazine
in 1858.”

With a courtly flourish, Blake motioned them to a sagging leather couch that bore the scratch marks of countless cats. He moved to a low bookcase, ran a finger lightly along the spines of the books on the top shelf, and pulled out a tall leather-bound volume.

The Troll, as Elizabeth persisted in thinking of him, had not appeared surprised to find the three Goodweather women at his door but, on being shown the copy of the map, had even invited them into the old store building that was his home to see the original and to answer their questions. He had immediately recognized Laurel, asking what she was currently working on, and, though his breath was redolent of alcohol, his manner was impeccable.

Elizabeth had dismissed her previous suspicions and, resolving to learn what she could from this odd individual, followed her girls through the door of what had once been Wakeman’s Mercantile & Supply.
We’ll chat about the map and whoever it is Blake’s named after and then I’ll try to get the conversation around to the bones in the silo and whatever it was that went on down here eleven years ago.

Beyond the door lay a large, high-ceilinged space, evidently the main living quarters of the Troll.
A curious room,
Elizabeth thought.
Something between an old-time general store, an artist’s loft, and a museum. With touches of Grandmother’s living room.

Deep shelves lined the walls, but the assorted merchandise of a general store had been replaced, for the most part, by books and storage boxes. A gaunt yellow cat reclined languidly on a high shelf near the woodstove, while a pair of white-pawed tabbies shared a dilapidated basket tucked between stacks of paperbacks. Two glass-fronted display cabinets heaped with antique tools and farm implements formed a divider between the front two-thirds of the long room and the kitchen area at the back. If, as seemed likely, there had been counters, they had been removed to allow for the motley assortment of furniture.

“My great-grandfather was fascinated by the people of this region. He wrote numerous vignettes that found publication in the periodicals of his day. This has always been one of my favorites.”

The ancient hickory bark seat creaked as Blake seated himself in the high-backed chair opposite them. He opened the book to a page marked by a yellowed envelope, adjusted his glasses, and began to read.

“We proceeded with all dispatch along the Buncombe Turnpike but were forced by Old Sol’s departure from the heavens to arrest our voyage at Flores’ Stand. Though less commodious than most inns or ‘stand houses,’ it is an hostelry far surpassing all others in wild beauty and Lucullan fare. The innkeeper, Ish Flores, is a swarthy man of a somewhat forbidding countenance but his gentle nature becomes evident whenever his dark eyes rest on his wife, the lovely Mariah.

“Our first glimpse of this dusky beauty was as we filed into the long low room filled with rustic tables and benches for the entertainment of travelers. Through an open door at the back of the room, we could see a spacious garden, a veritable cornucopia of fruit and flower. Beyond it lay a snug stone house, the living quarters of our hosts, as I learned later. A wide path led from the house through the garden, and down this path came a veritable vision! Taller than many men, she carried a willow basket laden with rosy-cheeked peaches and her waving black hair cascaded unconfined almost to her knees. There were white flowers at her brow and a smile of transcendent beauty welcomed our weary company.”

Blake passed the open volume to Elizabeth. Engravings decorated the printed pages—one titled
Mariah of the Flowers.
The woman was just as he’d described her: smiling, stately, with an exotic beauty that seemed totally incongruous with the time and place.

“She’s lovely,” Elizabeth murmured, lingering over the illustration before handing the book to Rosemary, who peered intently at the portrait.

“Does your great-grandfather say where this Mariah and her husband were from?” Rosemary asked, offering the book for her sister’s scrutiny. “Flores seems like a strange name to encounter at that time in western North Carolina. And she’s so unusual looking—not Native American, with that wavy hair; not African-American either. Where was their stand?”

Blake answered with smug satisfaction. “Just a few miles downriver, as a matter of fact. The little stone house he describes still exists, though the stand is gone. My ancestor was evidently fascinated with the Floreses. He made frequent visits to them after his marriage. The Flores people were Melungeons.”

Elizabeth frowned. “Melungeons…I think I’ve heard that term but—”

“They’re a people of mixed race; the name may come from the French word
mélange.”
Thomas Blake removed his glasses, breathed on the thick lenses, and began to polish them with his shirttail as he continued his explanation.

“Some ethnologists call the Melungeon people tri-racial isolates—a mix of African-American, Caucasian, and Native American who’ve maintained a distinct identity over the years—but there are other, more romantic theories—a hypothesized connection with Portuguese explorers or shipwrecked Carthaginians intermarrying with Native Americans.”

Laurel looked up from the picture of the dark-haired woman. “Awesome! And they lived near here? Are there any people like that still around? I’ve sure never heard of anyone called Flores in Marshall County. And I’ve never heard of Melungeons.”

“The people who identified themselves as Melungeon seem to have been concentrated in east Tennessee. The Flores couple evidently came to Marshall County from that region by a rather circuitous route. It speaks well for the tolerance of the region that these two who were, after all, people of color, should have prospered as landowners and innkeepers. I’ve tried to learn more of them but there’s very little—and I haven’t been able to trace any descendants.”

He held up the yellowed envelope he’d taken from the book. “This is a transcript of a letter my honored ancestor sent to his brother after his marriage to a Ransom girl. It contains the only other reference to Ish and Mariah Flores that I have discovered.”

Blake resumed his glasses and unfolded the closely typed pages. He quickly skimmed the first page, moving his lips slightly as he read. “Hmm…no…this first part isn’t relevant—suffice it to say that he was resigned to his marriage and equally resigned to the fact that he and his untutored mountain bride would be an embarrassment to his wealthy family in Charleston.”

The Troll’s eyes twinkled behind the thick lenses. “The Blakes seem to have been of some consequence in that fair city before the War Between the States. The fact is, my esteemed progenitor was a remittance man—as long as he stayed away from Charleston, he received a quarterly allowance from his family.”

The thin onion-skin pages crackled as Blake turned them over. “Yes, here it is. He refers to ‘
a Melungeon family—those strange dark people of mixed race who insist that they descend from the intermarriage of early Portuguese explorers with indigenous peoples. The Flores, whose stand is just downriver from Gudger’s Stand (of which more later) is owned by the swarthy Ish Flores, a self-proclaimed Melungeon. His equally dusky wife, Mariah, is a noted herbalist and bee mistress. She makes fragrant, clean-burning, beeswax candles, a vast improvement upon the tallow candles and bear oil dips that most households employ. Mariah is also renowned for her honey wine—a potent libation that must be identical to the metheglin of Olde England.

“‘The comely Mariah is a veritable Pomona—her vegetables, fruits, and flowers are horticultural marvels. She says that these all derive from seeds and slips given her by an old man she and Ish encountered in their travels before coming to this county.

“‘I give you Ish’s own words: “We come out of Tennessee along a trail the Cherokee used, just us and our old piebald mare, heavy-laden with our household goods. Up on the bald some call Max Patch the weather turned wicked and Mariah was took bad with a fever in her lungs. She would surely have perished had not a man called Suttles, a true good Samaritan on a white mule, found us there and made us welcome at his place, the warmest snuggest cabin-house you ever did see. We stayed with this fine man for quite a little time and when Mariah was better and able to travel, he gave her seeds and starts of some of the plants we have here. Hit seems like they always bloom fuller and their flowers are brighter and the fruit sweeter—” ’”

“Excuse me, Mr. Blake, what was the name of the man on the white mule?” A jolt of recognition had shot through her at the mention of Max Patch; Elizabeth once again felt the dizzying sensation of being on the other side of the mirror.
Even this room, a jumble of old and new, and this man, Thomas Blake, reading to us the words of Thomas Blake of a century and a half ago.

The present-day Thomas Blake looked up from the typescript. “Suttles—a not uncommon name, I believe. Interestingly enough, some of those very fruit trees mentioned here still survive around that little stone house. I hike down there occasionally to, as it were, commune with the spirits.”

He folded the pages carefully and returned them to the envelope. “That’s the sum of what Great-grandfather Thomas had to say about the Floreses directly. But from passing references in his writing, I am led to believe that he saw their place as an idyllic refuge from family life. He and his wife had thirteen children and they all lived on the upper floor of this very building, after his father-in-law erected this establishment and put him in charge.” The Troll gestured at the venerable oak rolltop desk behind him. “That was his, as were many of the volumes in the bookcase beside it. I wonder what kind of shopkeeper he made. I suspect that my great-grandmother Nettie Mae must have been the business mind of the two—I have some of the account books from their time and they are in a precise feminine hand—not the dashing scrawl of his writings.”

“That’s so cool—that you’re living in the same place where your great-grandfather lived—I’ll bet you feel really close to him.” Laurel’s look of wide-eyed wonder glanced over the framed photos on the wall, groups of dark-garbed, unsmiling individuals. “Do you write too? This is an awesome place for a writer.”

Thomas Blake was silent for a moment. Then, his eyes fixed on nothing in particular, he said, “I tell myself I’m writing a great antiwar novel, the next
Red Badge of Courage
or
Catch 22,
but I fear—I’m very much afraid that what I’m really doing is drinking myself to death.”