Marching to Zion (6 page)

By the free bridge and even by the Eads, there’s a stream of people hurryin’ acrost with whatever they can carry, colored folk meanin’ to find rescue over there in Missouri. There must be ten thousand of ’em and where are they going to go? Who’s goin’ to have ’em? It’s quite a sight. The orange sky, the smoke, the fire trucks with no hoses and trucks with soldiers racin’ around not knowin’ where to go or what to do once they get there, the people leavin’, the dead burnin’ or hung from the lampposts and set on fire while they’re still twitchin’ with life.

For a moment, Bailey’s throat closed, he could not speak. He smacked his palm with a balled-up fist twice. Then he spoke in a rush of words as if anxious to get his story out and over with so that he could begin to digest it.

It’s the unions, mostly, he said. They out to kill Negroes, calling ’em the ones who drive down wages for everybody, foreigners and native boys alike. Truth don’t seem to matter to any of ’em. They’re out for blood. There’s white gals on the loose, pointin’ out women and children for their men to take down and if the men’s too slow, they’re doin’ it themselves. I saw a colored gang or two on the way over here. They’re beatin’ back the whites, and they don’t care if they’re fightin’ murderers or bystanders or their neighbors from two blocks over. So if you ask me, things gonna go from bad to plain evil on our side as well. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen some.

George? Do you know where George is?

No, ma’am. I don’t. But that’s one man I’m not worried about. He’ll turn up, I’m sure. He’s a smart man, your George. He wouldn’a rode straight into hell without a backward look. We’ll find him. Don’t you worry. More likely, he’ll find you.

Mags wanted to say, Yes! He would! He’d ride straight into hell at high noon to get to me! He would in a heartbeat! But if he’d done that, he’d have been home before Magnus Bailey crawled back. So she didn’t say it, in fear that the saying might curse herself and George and the baby altogether. Each hour that passed without her husband turning up brought her closer to despair.

Two days later, it was all over. An eerie peace settled over East St. Louis while officials and newsmen sorted out a version of the truth. Whole blocks smoldered while people searched for the missing and dead. Mr. Fishbein went to the stockyards, where recovered corpses lay under tarps awaiting identification. He went with little hope of finding George, even if George were dead. There were thirty-nine dead Negroes lined up on the ground, but hundreds of colored men and women were unaccounted-for. There was no way to tell if those lost souls were burnt beyond recognition of ever having been human to begin with, if their mangled bodies had been tossed in the river, or if they were alive but had fled. Thirty-nine was a pitiful number out of so many, but George McCallum was among them. How he died exactly was uncertain. There were ligatures around his neck, and his lower body had been burned. Although the cart he’d ridden to the railways was never found, the horse that pulled it returned to the barn of his owner a week later, three-legged lame. The liveryman put him down.

Magnus Bailey offered, but it was Mr. Fishbein who broke the news to George McCallum’s widow. He did the best he could to break it gently. He went to Miss Emily’s, where he had installed her until the funeral home could achieve proper repair. Miss Emily was glad to have her. Her establishment had escaped the carnage, but most of her other boarders were either out of work, unable to pay, or had moved on in the days just after the riots.

Fishbein sat in the parlor where the wedding had been, his walking stick between his legs. His hands rested on its knob and his chin on his hands as he muttered to himself, trying to find the words required. I should say I am so very sorry, he muttered. No, she’ll know right away. First I should tell her she looks so well and ask for the baby. Oh, dear me, I shall have to smile, then, won’t I?
Oy.
Mine Gott,
can I do that? And it was while he was practicing a stupid, pleasant smile that would fool no one that Mags came in with Miss Emily at her elbow, saw him, and shrieked. Luckily, Miss Emily kept her from falling hard to the floor in grief, protecting her unborn child from any harm.

The Widow McCallum had her child in her bed at Miss Emily’s. Chesty and Miss Emily performed as midwives. For them, bringing into the world little Sara Kate, named for George’s mama, who had passed decades before, was a great holiday. For the widow, it was an unfathomable sadness.

Look at that little face, Chesty cooed at her. Just like her daddy. Ain’t it a miracle?

And it was true; Sara Kate had the same sharp nose, the same dark caramel skin, the same small black eyes. Only her mouth, plump and pouting, was her own. Otherwise, George McCallum was stamped all over her, down to her quiet, steely temperament. Even as an infant, the child rarely cried. Her small fist with its long, thin fingers gripped whatever it could with uncommon strength. All of which broke her mother’s heart.

Take her away, please, I can’t look at her, Mags said whenever they brought the child to her. The women tried to change her mind, telling her she was just tired from the birth, and once the healing and the pain was over and done, she’d come to want the baby at her teat. They put the girl directly on her mama’s chest. Look at her, they said, look how cunnin’ she is. Mags pushed her off.

She’s like him, just like him, and that makes her a plague to me, she said. Tears ran down her cheeks and her voice was flat cold. Why would he visit me like this? As a tiny, squirmin’, helpless little thing? I don’t want her. I don’t want her.

A few months later when her blood settled, Mags warmed up to the child, but by then it was too late. The damage was done. Sara Kate grew up reserved, suspicious always, looking without respite for a love that could fill the deep loneliness she felt from the cradle on.

The Road to Memphis, 1918–1924

No matter what she
went through later on in life, and there was plenty, Aurora Mae always said that one of the strangest sights she ever saw was the caravan that brought Mags Preacher McCallum and little Sara Kate home to the family colony at the old plantation south of St. Louis. It was getting on in the day. The light had begun to fade. Aurora Mae rocked on the porch of the big house, watching shadows gambol at the edge of the dark wood. She was wrapped in a quilt, as the air got crisp that time of year soon as the sun made a fare-thee-well. All at once, before she saw or heard a thing, the three mongrel dogs that kept her company took off and yelped down the road with hell on their heels. She knew those three well enough to get to her feet and watch for whatever approached. The big house, where the Stanton siblings lived, was set at the top of a hill bordered by cultivated fruit trees and, beyond them, dense thicket on three sides. The Stanton home was the vanguard of the family colony and its first line of both welcome and defense.

Horace, you best come quick, she called out to her brother. And bring the shotgun. I don’t know what-all this is a-comin’.

On the bottom road, churning up an enormous amount of dust, was a covered mule-drawn cart, a gypsy caravan. From each end of its cab, long poles crowned by flickering lanterns swayed back and forth casting yellow beams of quivering light. The mules’ fittings were of wildly colored wool braided with leather from which flowed a rainbow’s worth of streamers. A more sedate ornament, the tall black plume of a funeral cortege, fluttered at their polls. Driving the team of two was a big black man in a striped suit and tall beaver hat, a man who looked somewhat familiar, and beside him sat a young, redheaded white woman in a long heavy coat. She wore a pale-blue feather boa around her neck. Two such humans together was a strange enough sight in those parts in that time, with or without their remarkable conveyance. The mules walked up the lawn and stopped twenty or so feet away from the front porch. Now that it was close by, Aurora Mae realized who was come for a visit. Her brother descended the porch stairs to shake the hand of Magnus Bailey, who’d already disembarked from the wagon to assist Miss Minnie. Aurora Mae waved them toward her and moved to enter the house to get a pitcher of sweet tea ready, as the two looked severely parched, when it occurred that the dogs were still barking. She looked back to the road. Another vehicle approached, a motorcar.

A motorcar on that lonesome country road in that day was as rare as a mixed-race gypsy caravan, but this car would have turned heads on the streets of any city between New Orleans and Chicago. It was a Packard funeral bus, built to house a coffin, pallbearers, and up to twenty mourners. Its exterior was of wood carved with bas relief columns alternating with archangels, heads bowed and leaning on their swords. Statues of kneeling seraphim sprang from its roof. There were large side windows, but these were draped in a heavy gold cloth hung to shield the dead and their loved ones from the turmoil of the living world. Aurora Mae and Horace could not see who drove the bus, except that a stooped creature was hunched over the cab’s wheel. Then it hit them both.

Lord, Cousin Mags and the baby are in there, ain’t they, Horace said to his sister.

Yes, Magnus Bailey said, they are.

Aurora Mae ran down the steps and to the car, her long legs closing the distance between in remarkable time. The car stopped or it would have run into her. She leaned over on the passenger’s side seeking with little hope a breathing Cousin Mags, but the mother was in the back nursing her child. All her gaze met was the perpetually despondent expression of Mr. Fishbein. They’d not got up that close at the wedding. Aurora Mae could not recall sharing more than a word or two with him. She remembered him the way she might a brown wren in a flock of bluebirds. Now she saw the pain in his eyes, which sent a shock through her chest—a small one, but sharp. Terrible things flew to her mind. Her fists pounded against the window.

Where are they? What have you done with them?

By now she was certain Cousin Mags and the baby were laid out in there. The Spanish fever was all over East St. Louis, folk said. In the next moment, Mags reached forward from the back to give Sara Kate to Mr. Fishbein so she could come out and embrace her cousin. The sight of the saddest man in all the world holding the squirming child struck Aurora Mae dumb, which was not a common occurrence. Then Mags’s arms were around her. They held on as tightly to each other as they had the day Mags left home two years before.

Miss Minnie had already entered the house to look it over without so much as a by-your-leave, but the scene on the lawn held the attention of the others, and no one noticed. From the porch where he stood with Horace, Bailey said, Well, that’s a picture, ain’t it?

Horace shook his head. It was true. Delicate, brown Mags looked like a child pressed against the bosom of a deity. Aurora Mae was a woman tall as their warrior ancestors. Her glorious, impossible hair was loose. It sprang out all around her and to the backs of her knees. Her limbs were lean and fierce, her face a queen’s image carved from obsidian, harmonious and severe. Her eyes were laced in happy tears that caught the light to grace them with sparks of fire.

Watching her, Bailey thought, Someday, I will have me some of that.

Horace caught the scent of his ambitions and did what he could to break the mood. ’Rora Mae finds most of her love with family women, he said, as if his sister’s emotional life was a common subject. Big as she is, she’s young yet. I believe she would break in two the man who tried to take her afore she’s ready.

Aurora Mae and Mags got to fixing a supper together of pole beans and rice cooked with onion, peppers, and chicken livers, as Mags said Mr. Fishbein would not eat the pork. While they washed beans and chopped peppers, they talked old times and caught up with the new. More than a few times, they spoke of George McCallum, and stopped to weep awhile in each other’s arms.

Meanwhile, Minerva Fishbein took a nap with the baby in Aurora Mae’s bed, and the men sat on the porch. Bailey let Horace in on all their plans, all the war news, and the state of the city since the riots, confirming that yes, the Spanish fever had arrived, which made Horace wonder why Mr. Fishbein would choose to leave town just when business should be hopping good. Horace was an uncomplicated man with the good manners of country folk, unaccustomed to the company of white men of substance. He worried if he did not do or say the correct thing that things could turn ugly on a pauper’s dime. Curiosity got the better of him. With such cautious deference he might as well have held a hat to his chest and gazed at his feet, he asked, Is this true, Mr. Fishbein, you’re moving to Memphis?

I am.

That’s a ways downriver, ain’t it?

Yes.

There was a long pause while Horace determined whether he could ask a more personal question of the man tasting the night air on his porch, whose daughter slept in his sister’s bed.

And what do you find recommends it?

Nothing. Nothing special.

Despite his concerns, Horace could not help himself. He leaned in close to Mr. Fishbein as he might with Magnus Bailey or any other of his own when he wished to determine the sincerity of a speaker who had just said an astonishing thing.

Then why are you goin’ there?

Fishbein sighed. The drawn-out, ragged sound bore the ruin of a horde of troubles.

Several matters impel me, my friend. The first is that George McCallum is dead. I cannot manage my business without him. I am feeling aggrieved enough by his murder not to hire another to take his place. And aggrieved enough to want to leave the town that has caused this fresh sorrow both to a woman—your cousin, of whom I am most fond—and to myself, who has had enough of sorrow altogether. I would start over elsewheres doing somethings new.

Yes, but why Memphis? Why there?

Why not? I am a wanderer, Mr. Stanton. Do you know where I have wandered?

No.

I’ve wandered through the desert with Moses …

Fishbein extended his hand in a languid gesture as if he held a baton and conducted an orchestra. Horace was enthralled by his guest’s manner of speaking, his lilting phrases executed in an accent that forced him to listen closely. It didn’t matter that Fishbein made no sense. He followed the graceful arc of the man’s movements while unexpectedly his chest swelled with pleasant feeling.

… through Babylon and all of Europe, through the Russias, and through America.

And now to Memphis? Horace asked, just to keep him talking.

Yes, now to Memphis. A place, I am told, with much difference from East St. Louis. It has not the factories spewing smoke, not the railroads everywhere with crowds constantly coming and going, and I am hoping not the brutes.

Well, I wish you good fortune there, Horace said without telling him he considered there were likely brutes in equal number everywhere. The man’s long, riven cheeks and red-rimmed eyes informed him his guest already knew.

I thank you.

What Fishbein did not say was that he had chosen Memphis on the recommendation of Magnus Bailey, who had his own reasons for traveling there. They were a strange couple, those two, bonded since the day, years before, when Fishbein disembarked at St. Louis from a riverboat carrying the child Minerva, all of five years old, who slept in his arms. The girl’s knees pressed against the right side of his chest and her head nestled against his heart. Her red hair fell in long, tangled waves over the crook of his arm. Fishbein looked so thin and bent, his burden appeared bigger than she was. Bailey worked the dock nearby, making book for a swarm of dockhands on a coming horse race of consuming local interest. He stood surrounded by calloused black hands clutching banknotes when Fishbein stumbled, falling to his knees, nearly dropping the child just a few feet from the spot where Bailey traded notes for chits. The dockhands stepped back. Maybe they feared being charged with making a white man carrying a child fall, Bailey didn’t know, but he saw a need and stepped forward to offer the man assistance, tipping his hat with one hand, placing the other around the man’s waist, slender as a woman’s, to help him up. Fishbein ascendant was dazed. He swayed on his feet. The girl, only half drawn from that impervious sleep children enjoy, looked in peril of her father falling yet again, so Bailey did the sensible thing. He took her from her father’s arms and bore her himself down the few remaining steps of the gangway. Minerva blinked and studied him with intense curiosity. Her little hands wound about his big, thick neck to bring her face closer to his that she might regard him more thoroughly.
Der shvartser has grine oygn,
she said. The blackie has green eyes. Fishbein steadied himself on the gangway’s ropes.
Der mensch has grine oygn, mine kind,
he replied, indicating she must call this helpful Negro a good man to show respect. Bailey had no idea what they were talking about or what language they employed, but the way the girl grabbed the hair of his head and boldly kissed his cheek, giggling,
A mensch, a mensch
! made him smile and cradle her with a sweeter grip.

Where are you going? Bailey asked.

The Clairmont Hotel.

And your luggage?

Already it’s been sent.

The Clairmont was not far from the river, claiming water views from nearly every room. Bailey led the way there, carrying the child, while Fishbein walked behind. The docks and streets were crowded. Heads turned in their direction as they passed. Hostile, suspicious glances followed them. Bailey guessed they thought he had stolen the child or that Fishbein had sold her. He fought an old anger rising up in his throat.

When they arrived at the Clairmont, Fishbein said,
Gevalt
. My luggage, it is outside the door. Why is this?

Light and swift as a bug, he grabbed his bags, stuck them inside the door, then made directly for the front desk. Bailey followed behind, carrying the girl. He stood at a discreet distance while Fishbein puffed himself up with indignation to demand of the clerk why his luggage was left outside the door where any thief might make off with it. This required an explanation or he would not remain with this establishment another minute.

The desk clerk, a short, red-faced bald man with shiny apple cheeks, looked up from his work, his mouth tight and twisting. What he was about to do was not his favorite duty, but rules were rules.

I regret to inform you we do not take your kind here. Please leave without a fuss.

Magnus Bailey put the child down. With difficulty, he smiled and tipped his hat while his heart pounded.

I’m sorry, he said. The two small words seared his throat. I was just helpin’ the man. I wasn’t stayin’ on.

Not you, the clerk said. Well of course you, but what I meant was them. There’s been a misunderstanding. They will have to leave.

Bailey was perplexed. Flamboyant, slick, at twenty-two a man of the world to whom others came for practical advice, Bailey was not by nature bold outside his own community. There were lessons a black man in 1906 America learned almost from the cradle. He’d learned his painfully at as young an age as any. But the child and her father were clearly white and moneyed. This was new social territory for him, and he meant to understand it before strolling on.