Leaving Gee's Bend (15 page)

No answer. The doctor’s office was completely quiet. Didn’t need nobody to tell me she was gone. I reckon she didn’t want to see me go.

All I had to do now was put it someplace Mrs. Nelson was sure to find it. Then when she turned over all the donations she’d collected from the Red Cross drive, she could give ’em my letter. And they would send help.

I glanced around the room. Where should I put it? Then I remembered the pound cake Mrs. Nelson gave me when I first came into the doctor’s office.

The cake plate. Much as she loved her cake, Mrs. Nelson was sure to find it. But I wanted to be sure. So I folded the note one more time and wrote “To: Mrs. Nelson, From: Ludelphia.” That way there wouldn’t be no mistaking what it was.

Then I grabbed them bottles of medicine and slipped them inside the lunch sack with the blue handkerchief and spool of thread. I held that bag to my chest, and the little bell rang as I shot out of that door with its glass window and painted-on sign. I was going home to Gee’s Bend!

IT WAS EARLY YET, SO WASN’T NO STORES OPEN ON Broad Street. But there was three big wagons parked right in front of Camden Mercantile. Then half a dozen men rode up on horseback. Some of ’em was white, some of ’em black.

Was they gonna go hunting? What else could be going on this early in the morning? Then I saw her, Mrs. Cobb. Oh, dear Lord. Couldn’t mean but one thing.

As she walked from the store to the middle of the street, I could tell what she was fixing to do just by the way she was setting each boot so firm in the dirt. Then when she lifted her gun into the air, wasn’t no doubt in my mind.

I covered my head with my arms to block the sound of the shot. Didn’t help all that much. It still set my ears to ringing. I reckon it was loud enough to just about wake the whole town.

“See you in Gee’s Bend!” she said, waving the shotgun in the air.

No, I wanted to shout. Not Gee’s Bend. Now how was I gonna get there before Mrs. Cobb did? How was I gonna warn everybody?

As another horseman with a shotgun slung over his shoulder rode up, I ducked into the shadows. Didn’t want Mrs. Cobb or nobody else to see me. “Where are the others?” the horseman called out.

“Rounding up a few more that need the work!” Mrs. Cobb said as Patrick came out of the store. “Patrick will take one wagon straightaway, and I’ll be right behind in the other. Then we’ll meet up at Pleasant Grove Baptist Church and set out from there.”

The horseman tipped his hat. “That where we get paid? At the church?”

“No one gets paid until the job is done.”

Dear Lord. They was going to the church? Wasn’t no way for me to get to there before they did. Even with a head start them wagons would catch up to me in no time.

I hung my head and held tight to my bag. What was I gonna do now? I had to get there somehow. Because Mrs. Cobb wouldn’t be coming to Gee’s Bend if not for me.

When I lifted my head, the air was full of dust and Mrs. Cobb was gone. The only one left in the street was Patrick sitting tall in the wagon, and he was waving something colorful in the air. As the dust settled, I could see it was about the size of a flag, and it looked like he was waving it at me.

I stepped away from the building and into the street. Soon as I did, Patrick started waving that flag even faster. Wasn’t no doubt in my mind now that it was my attention he wanted.

“Yah,” Patrick said to the horses, and they began to move toward me. As they got closer, I could see the flag had blue denim and white burlap and calico.

It wasn’t a flag at all.

I wanted to jump and shout hallelujah! It was like a miracle, that quilt. I never expected to see it again. But there it was blazing in the morning light.

“It ain’t right what she’s doing,” Patrick said once he got close to me. “It ain’t right at all.” Patrick took a quick look back toward Camden Mercantile and pulled back on the reins. “Be quick, now. Hop up and hide yourself in this wagon.” He glanced toward the store and back again. “Got to keep yourself real flat. And not a peep out of you! You hear? If Mrs. Cobb finds out she’ll get rid of me for sure.”

I knew how much Patrick needed his job. Seven children. And here he was taking a chance on me?

Wasn’t a thing I could think of to say how grateful I was. Wasn’t no words for how I was feeling. So I just nodded. Then I gripped the lunch sack in one hand and pulled myself up with the other.

I got myself settled under a pile of rope quick as I could. Curled myself up into a ball with my face toward the back of the wagon so I could see the road.

“Yah,” Patrick said, and the horses started walking. As they moved into a trot, I felt something soft flutter down onto my head.

All the pieces was there: the scraps of denim, the pocket from my dress, the strips I tore from Mama’s apron. Even the needle was there, tucked in at the seam just the way I’d left it. I could smell Mama and river water and Mrs. Cobb’s barn and my own sweat. I pressed it to my nose and sobbed.

For miles wasn’t nothing to see from the back of that wagon except blue sky and empty cotton fields. Mrs. Cobb and the others was far enough behind us that it seemed like we was the only ones on the road. But I didn’t dare poke my head up.

“You all right back there?” Patrick hollered over the noise of the wagon.

“Yessir,” I hollered back.

“Just passed the sign for Alberta. ’Bout halfway there now.”

Halfway? We was already halfway there? That meant we would soon be to Rehoboth. And after Rehoboth the road ended at Gee’s Bend.

Them horses sure was fast. Not as fast as Mrs. Cobb’s motorcar, but not slow like Delilah neither. Dear Lord, would I be glad to see Delilah.

I looked out the back of the wagon. I wish I’d seen the sign for Alberta. Was it white like the sign for Camden? Now I might never know. Once I got back to Gee’s Bend, I didn’t have no plans to ever leave again.

I bunched the quilt top and put it under my head. It helped soften the bumps, but I still felt like I’d been run over with the plow. Wasn’t a part of my body that didn’t ache from being bounced around in that wagon. But each roll of the wagon wheel, each bump and jolt, was bringing me closer to home. I could tell by the way the pine trees along the road was greener than they was before, the sky more blue. I sucked in the fresh-smelling air, and I knew we was getting close.

I kept a tight grip on the lunch sack. I pressed it against my chest so I could feel each of them medicine bottles. They was there, safe and firm.

Please, Lord. Let me get there in time.

As the cotton fields turned to cornfields, I saw a flash of yellow in the ditch. Yellow like the yellow on Etta Mae’s dress.

I real quick jerked my head up. “Etta Mae!” I said as the wagon kept moving away from her. Could it be?

As I pushed the rope off and got to my knees, the flash of yellow moved into the road. Something else moved with it.

I squinted my eye and looked hard as I could through the dust the horses and wagon was kicking up.

Not something, somebody.

“Stop the wagon, Patrick! We got to go back!”

“Ho!” Patrick called to the horses. “What’s that, Ludelphia?”

“Look!” I pointed to where Etta Mae and Ruben was running toward us.

I couldn’t keep from grinning. They had come after me. Etta Mae the witch and Ruben, who thought Gee’s Bend was the best place ever. They was worried and had come to fetch me.

“Hurry!” I called to ’em. “Mrs. Cobb is on her way. We got to hurry.”

As Ruben and Etta Mae scrambled into the back of the wagon, I told ’em about Mrs. Cobb. “She said we got to pay. That everybody in Gee’s Bend got to make good on our debts.”

Ruben looked at me hard. “Pay our debts with what?”

I didn’t have no answer. But I sure had questions. “Ruben, you got to tell me about Mama. Is she still coughing blood?”

I held my breath for his answer, but it didn’t come before Patrick started hollering. “Get low!” he said. Then he slapped the reins and the horses moved into a gallop.

“What’s he going on about?” Etta Mae said, her face just inches from mine.

“He’s talking about me. No telling what Mrs. Cobb might do if she knew he was carrying me in this wagon.”

A light came into Etta Mae’s dark eyes. “She think you a witch too?”

I nodded.

“Mercy, Ludelphia, I’m sorry to hear it! If baby Sarah hadn’t died . . . I swear I didn’t do nothing to make it happen. She just stopped breathing. Wasn’t nothing I could do.”

“Ain’t nothing wrong with neither one of you,” Ruben said. “Look, now. We got bigger things to worry about. You see?”

On the road behind us was a small cloud of dust that was getting bigger every second. Mrs. Cobb and the others was right behind us now.

Wasn’t no talking the rest of the way to Gee’s Bend. I still didn’t have no idea how Mama was doing. And there was so much I wanted to tell ’em. Like about the medicine bottles and the quilt I was making for Mama. And the Coke and the armadillo and the motorcar.

I had more questions too. Like, what made ’em both come after me? Was Daddy mad about me leaving? What did he say when Ruben told him I’d run off? But mostly I just wanted to know about Mama. I needed to know she was okay.

Then my mind jumped to the very worst thing. What if the reason they came after me was because Mama didn’t make it? What if this very minute, Mama was dead?

“Ruben,” I said.

His eyes got small and he put his finger to his lips. When I peeked through the back of the wagon I could see why. There was three horsemen just a few feet behind our wagon.

In less than a minute, they was past us. Wasn’t much longer after that when the wagon began to slow. I could tell by the trees along the road that we was coming up on the church.

Dear Lord, don’t let ’em see us. Help us get ourselves out of this wagon with no more trouble from Mrs. Cobb.

“Ho!” Patrick shouted as he pulled the horses up next to the front steps of Pleasant Grove Baptist Church. My heart raced at the sight of them steps. The part that I could see through the slats in the wagon looked just like I remembered ’em.

I wanted to leap right out of that wagon. I wanted my feet on that ground. But Ruben’s hand on my arm stopped me. We had to wait for just the right time so we could get out without nobody knowing.

I curled my fingers around the lunch sack. Wasn’t no words for how bad I wanted to get out of that wagon. But we was surrounded on all sides by horsemen and wagons. Wasn’t the right time. Not yet.

“Mrs. Cobb,” Ruben mouthed, then jerked his head to the right. She was passing right beside us! I held my breath till I couldn’t see her wagon no more. After a few seconds, she started shouting out instructions, and judging by the sound of her voice, she was a ways in front of our wagon. I imagined her with her ledger in one hand and shotgun in the other, and I knew now was the time. The sooner the better.

I wiggled my hips out from under the pile of rope and eased myself out of the wagon. As Mrs. Cobb kept on with her instructions, Etta Mae and Ruben began to follow.

After all that bumping around in the wagon it was like my mind was all scrambled up and I didn’t trust my legs. I balled the quilt top in my fist and dropped down to my hands and knees. It wasn’t easy to crawl with the quilt top in one hand and that little sack in the other, but I did it. Then I hid myself in a patch of holly bushes that grew right alongside the road. When I looked back, Etta Mae and Ruben was right behind me. Wasn’t long before the three of us disappeared into the woods.

As soon as we was far enough from the wagons, Ruben pulled us up short. “Here’s what we got to do. Split up. That way we can warn more folks about what’s about to happen.”

“How much time do we have?” Etta Mae said.

“Looks like Mrs. Cobb’s planning to go cabin to cabin,” Ruben said, looking at me. “Which means it might take a little while for her to get all the way to ours.”

“But what if they split up too?” I said. “There’s so many of ’em, and if they split up the same way we do, then it won’t take ’em long at all.”

Ruben held out a hand to each of us, and me and Etta Mae both grabbed hold. “All right then,” Ruben said. “Etta Mae, you head toward the swamp, I’ll go toward the fields. And, Lu, you start with Aunt Doshie and head toward home. Then the three of us, we’ll meet up there.”

It made my insides warm the way Ruben took charge like that. It made me feel safe, like nothing else bad could happen. “See you at home,” I said, squeezing his hand. Then we was off, each of us running in different directions.

I stopped when I got to Aunt Doshie’s front porch steps. “Aunt Doshie, Mrs. Cobb’s come to collect on all the debts!”

“Mrs. Cobb?” she said, coming to the door with her long braid swaying and her mouth hanging open. “Here in Gee’s Bend?”

“Best hide what you can.” I made sure to look her in the eye so she’d have less to gossip about later. “She’s got wagons and men. Said she’s gonna take everything we got.”

I took off running, my feet falling sure and steady on that orange dirt footpath I’d been running on my whole life. I held tight to my quilting things and kept the lunch sack pressed against my chest.

Each cabin I came to, I shouted out a warning as I passed. But I didn’t stop running. I had to get home. I had to see Mama. I had to know she was alive.

NEWS SPREAD DOWN THE ROW OF CABINS FASTER than I could run. I reckon they heard me shouting, then took to telling one another themselves.

As I passed through the Pettways’ yard into mine, one of the hogs squealed and rushed toward me. I gripped the lunch sack tight and lifted my arms to scare it back.

“Stupid hog,” Mr. Pettway said, chasing it with a pitchfork. “It don’t know it’s better off in them woods.”