Silent Thunder (8 page)

I knew arguing was no use, though I tried. “But Mama, I'm—”

“Don't give me sass, Summer,” she snapped. “I'm a tired woman tonight. We've had enough bad fortune come to this plantation for one day, and we don't need no more. I told you to keep that book hid away, and I told Rosco the same about any books he gets his hands on. But Rosco, he ain't like you—he knows better than to be waving a stolen book around.”

I wanted to tell Mama that I had me a silent thunder, and that everyone—even her—had one, too. And that letters were beautiful, fancy things. But Mama wasn't hearing me, not tonight. I slid my book closer to me. “Mama, I'm not
waving
it around,” I said

But faster than I could blink, Mama snatched the book from my hands. Thankfully, none of the pages tore, though something inside me was ripping fast. Mama spoke her final words. “Child, this is the
wrong
night for talkin' back to your mama. This blasted book is gonna stay with me from here on. You ain't got no more use for it.”

“I
do
have use for it!” I snapped. “Why you gotta take it
now
?”

Mama spoke firmly. “I'm takin' it
now
so's we don't risk any trouble from here on in. With Gideon's heart-shock, there's gonna be all kinds of white folks comin' round here. Surely, we'll have visitors—friends of the Parnells—and just plain nosy people from town who want to see for themselves what's happening now that Gideon's sickly. This plantation is gonna be swarming with white folks soon as tomorrow. The last thing I need is for you to go around flauntin' a book.”

I was too churned up to speak. When I parted my lips to say something, to give Mama more of my protest, not even the squeak of a mouse came to my throat. But Mama must have seen the disappointment on my face. She said, “Wipe that pout off your lips and listen to me good. If I find you dabbling with letters again, I'll give you a true reason to be down in the mouth.”

I snuffed my lantern. I rolled to my side. I whispered to Walnut way into the darkness.

October 28, 1862

M
AMA'S CRADLING A TINY BABY
. I can see his little body wriggling in Mama's arms as she lets droplets of sugar-water drip from her finger onto the baby's suckling lips.

The baby lets out a whimper. Mama rocks him, coos down into the blanket, where he's bundled tight. That baby's whimper sets something off in me. Makes me want to cuddle that babe in my own arms. “Can I hold him, Mama?”

Mama shakes her head. “Best that I tend to him,” she says. “But come, take a look.” Mama loosens the blanket where it's tucked at the baby's chin. She peels the soft fabric away from the baby's face.

Soon as I peer in, I'm startled back. This baby's got the face of a grown man. The face of Gideon Parnell
!

Mama doesn't see what I see. To her, there ain't nothin' strange about the baby. She coddles him. Strokes his face gently. Wipes the spittle from his chin.

I look closer to make sure my eyes aren't playing a trick on me.
I turn back the blanket so's I can see even more of the baby. On the place where that baby's ribs would be, there's a fleshy, pink wound—a cattle brand, like the one me and Summer and Mama and all of us Parnell slaves got burned into our sides. But this half baby-half Gideon isn't branded with the letter
P.
He's got Mama's name—Kit—burned into him. And the brand is surrounded by the black body hairs of a full-grown man! I shudder and wince at the same time.

Mama don't notice the baby's brand, either. This baby is all sweetness to her. She folds his blanket back around him, double-checking to make sure he's properly wrapped.

Then something happens to make me holler. Mama and her baby rise from the land and float up toward the sky. Same way seed pods rise from a dandelion. The two of them are floating fast and far. Soon they grow smaller and smaller among the clouds. With a breeze blowing at them, Mama's dress billows up to reveal the brand on her thigh. I look away from shame, from not wanting to see my own mama's bare legs. I'm calling out, “Mama, Mama!” until I realize that I'm not dreaming no more, that I'm coming to wakefulness.

My eyes flew open. Twilight was creeping. “Mama's left for the main house,” Summer said in a sleepy voice. “You all right, Ros?”

“It ain't nothin',” I said. “Just askin' for Mama, is all.”

But this time, Mama wasn't there to chase away the haints in my dream. So I found comfort in just saying Mama's name.

My lips made a silent sound, more hushed than a whisper.

Mama . . . Mama . . . Mama.

I hugged myself and rocked and rocked, like Mama would if she knew demons had flung up in my dreams again.

Soon I felt morning sleep coming. Easy sleep that would let me rest a bit before I had to wake for good. As long as I kept up with my quiet call, I knew I'd feel safe.

Mama . . . Mama . . . Mama.

Near a month had passed since Parnell had taken ill. Near a month of changes and turmoil among all of us who call the Parnell plantation our home.

Most everyone at Parnell's had gone grim. For years, we'd been livin' under the same rules. Wake when the master said
wake
, work when the master said
work
, sleep when the master said
sleep.

Now we didn't have no rules. You'd 'a thought Parnell's sickness would've been the go-'head for slacking. For the crop slaves to let the fields go fallow, and for us house servants to loaf. But each and every Parnell slave worked just as hard as ever. It was all we knew.

If I'd come to Parnell's plantation for the very first time, I'd have sworn it was Missy Claire who was suffering from some sickness, not her husband. Missy looked more wilted than a thirsty lily. While Parnell was holed up in his study, refusing to come out, Missy
Claire spent most of her time perched near the parlor window. She poked nervously at a needlepoint sampler, making little progress on it. She had dipped into a frightful silence. Her squawkiness was all but gone.

It wasn't Rance, the overseer, who was running things. It seemed Missy Claire had given all the authority over to Mama.

Mama was always the one with the strong backbone and the ability for managing folks, and now she was ruling the roost. Ruling it with hands of iron.

Mama had become downright surly. Even little things riled her. She snapped a lot. It could have been that Mama felt the burden of Master Gideon's feebleness, and the heavy duty of having to keep the Parnell homestead going.

For every annoying bit of nitpickiness that had left Missy Claire, Mama now had it double:

“Rosco, child, mind me when I speak.”

“Rosco, don't drag them feet o' yours.”

“Rosco, make your fetchin' snappy.”

I just did like Mama said, and stayed out of her way.

Soon after Parnell's stroke, Missy Claire gave in to Mama's know-how for healing. For the first time ever, she let her use the cayenne liniment to help quiet Lowell's cough.

“Kit,” she'd said timidly, “maybe we ought to give your ointment a try. Now that October's come, we shouldn't take any chances with Lowell's well-being.”

Then, fanning herself with one of her hankies, Missy said, “We certainly wouldn't want Lowell to catch himself any kind of cold.”

Missy went on about how autumn always ushers in the threat of winter, and how Lowell was winter's sure target. (Missy Claire always thought she was an expert in the ways of weather.)

So I stirred the cayenne liniment, while Mama massaged it into Lowell's chest and back.

Oh, does that oil ever stink! It stinks worse than horse wind. But Lowell didn't seem to notice the smell. He stood obediently when Mama worked on him. He was bare from the waist up, his spindly arms held out at each side. For a moment, Lowell looked like the sack-doll I'd made for Summer. Arms stiff, body still, face blank. Even his cowlick stood at attention.

All that day I was stuck with the odor of the cayenne liniment. It had a way of clinging to my hands no matter how hard I washed them.

Mama was the one who'd been tending to Master Gideon, too. (Thea said Gideon preferred the sure-handedness of Mama's tending over Missy Claire's frail company.)

Mama served Parnell's meals to him in his study. And, with Missy Claire's go-'head, she prepared warm herb poultices, smelly concoctions Thea swore would restore the master's limp left arm and leg. (Two Sundays past, when Doc Bates came to check on Parnell, he told
Mama and Thea that even though Missy Claire gave her permission to use the poultices, they were not proven medical practice. After he left, Thea told Mama that the Lords good herbs didn't need no practice.)

Last week, I heard Mama saying to Summer, “What I tell you—ever since Gideon's heart-shock, all kinds of official folks been comin' to this house. I spend half my day answering the door clapper.”

Mama was right about that. Aside from Doc Bates, Parnell had had visits from Robert Stearns, who owns the mercantile in town, from Andrew Wells, who calls prices at the slave auctions on the block, and, just yesterday, some white-haired man I ain't never seen the likes of showed up to see Master Gideon.

“Parnell owes the man money. He's stacked himself some hefty debts, and that man wanted to make sure Parnell was still alive and able to continue with his payments,” Thea had said

To keep Master Gideon presentable for visitors, Mama arranged for Clem to bathe the master and shave his face and neck every day.

Summer still worked 'longside Mama. But something had come between them two. Some kind of heavy silence. And Summer, she was holding fast to Walnut seemed like all the time. She hugged that doll to her like it was a real, living baby.

I'd taken to giving Summer her lessons in the early blue-black mornings, after Mama had left the quarters,
long before there was even a trace of sun. This was Summer's idea.

Summer now took her lessons without the lesson book I'd given her. She said Mama took the book away, for good! So, come lately, I'd been teaching Summer letters with a smooth patch of dirt and a sharp stick. I drew letters in the dirt while Summer held the lantern.

Not having a proper reading book hadn't hurt Summer any. In just two weeks she'd learned the whole alphabet. And, my addle-brained sister was more determined than ever to pay me her full attention when I insisted that we go slow with our lessons.

Ever since sickliness had taken over the master, Lowell had changed, too. His wheeziness was near to gone. If I was a firm believer in Thea's powers, I'd 'a sworn she'd put some kind of spell on Lowell—some kind of get-well spell.

He was still skinny as a whittled stick, but a flush of color had come to his cheeks. His speaking voice was still one peg up from a whisper, but he now stuttered only a little. I couldn't help but wonder if it was Mama's cayenne liniment that had done the trick, or if Lowell was somehow blessed with healing from knowing that his pa, who thought the worst of him, was sick.

Lowell and Miss McCracken were still studying “The Snow-Storm.” Miss McCracken now called that part of their lesson “oratorical expression.”

Lowell's “trumpets of the sky” never sounded so
good. And today, with autumn's chill starting to nip at the air, I kept those trumpets close while me and Clem worked in the toolshed.

We were supposed to be outside busting firewood to prepare for what Missy Claire had said was gonna be one of the worst cold-weather seasons Hobbs Hollow had ever seen. But clouds had painted the sky gray as flint, and, oh, were them clouds ever pouring. Outside the shed the rain slashed down in an icy, biting sheet. Missy had told us this was October's way of announcing a foul winter.

So Clem and me, we took to sharpening master Gideon's axes so's that when the rain cleared and the wood dried, we could bust and cord them logs the way Mama insists Missy Claire likes them—“twig size.”

I lifted each ax off its hook and set it next to Clem, who was sharpening the blade of Parnell's biggest ax. Clem worked without speaking, his brows bent, his expression focused. He didn't even let his eyes wander when the sky threw down a whopping bolt of thunder. When Clem finished one ax blade, he extended his hand to let me know he was ready for the next.

We worked in silence through three blades. Then Clem said, “You know the hearsay?”

I shrugged. “'Bout the master holed up in his study?”

Clem shook his head.

“'Bout the visitors that been swarming round here? That the hearsay you mean, Clem?”

No again.

Clem wiped his forehead with the back of his wrist. Even in the chilly shed, he had worked up a sweat. “Naw,” he said. “All that's
old
hearsay. I mean the hearsay that came to the quarters early this morning.”

I'd been with Summer that morning. Our lesson had gone overtime because Summer had insisted we keep on. Clem could see by the expression on my face that I didn't have a clue.