Man in the Blue Moon (11 page)

Neither Lanier nor Narsissa joined the family for supper that night. Ella couldn’t help but think that the absences were blessings. The last thing her nerves needed was a repeat performance in front of Lanier. While Keaton and Macon sat at the kitchen table working on an arithmetic problem for Macon’s schoolwork, Ella wrapped two biscuits in wax paper and placed them in a basket along with a small jar of honey. “I’ll be back directly,” she said and put the work coat over her head as she stood at the door. “I’m going to run this out to Narsissa.”

The kerosene lamp that sat on a milk jug inside Narsissa’s cabin door flickered through the small window. As Ella ran past the sunflowers that drooped beneath the raindrops, she could see Narsissa walking around in the cabin. Ella ran faster and felt that the amber-colored light in the window was a beacon that could safely satisfy her longing to escape.

Inside the cabin, Narsissa sat down in a straight-back chair lined with the skin of a buck Samuel had killed when he was thirteen; she listened to Ella unfurl her feelings. Occasionally Narsissa ran the tortoiseshell comb Ella had handed down to her through her hair.

“I never would have believed that my own son would have said such to me. It’s as if . . .” Ella watched strands of black hair fall as Narsissa combed her hair. Then, fearing she was not being listened to attentively enough, Ella looked up toward a damp crack in the ceiling that had been filled with a gray plaster made from newspapers and oyster shells. “. . . as if he’s two people all of a sudden. He’s listening to what people in this town are saying about me. He’s believing them over me.”

Narsissa placed the comb in her lap and tapped her thick, nicked finger against the side of her cheek. She sighed and stared out into the rain that fell outside the window. “I gave up trying to figure out why the people we love the most can hurt us the worst.” Narsissa groaned as she stood up. She held the side of her hip and walked across the room to where a photograph sat next to her bed.

Ella took the picture when Narsissa handed it to her. She had seen it many times before. Inside the smoky glass frame was a photograph taken soon after Narsissa had married. Her husband, David, was a thin man with a widow’s-peak hairline and a sharp chin. He stood holding a silver-tipped cane in one hand, the other hand propped on Narsissa’s shoulder. She sat in a Victorian velvet chair, just as stone- faced as her husband and dressed in lace with a piece of pearl jewelry placed on her neck. The formality of the photograph had always struck Ella as foreign to the Narsissa she knew.

“I know all about scandal,” Narsissa said. She took the photograph back, dusted it off with the back of her hand, and set it in her lap. She looked down at it as if reading a book.

“My grandfather always told me that nothing good would come out of marrying a white man. You heard me say it before, and I’ll say it again. He was a wise man, that grandfather of mine. But I was too young to know better. Young and in love.” Narsissa snorted and shifted the picture sideways. “Whatever love is supposed to mean.

“There was nothing doing but to marry this white boy who hung on to notions of moving to Brazil, where his father’s people had run to before the War between the States. They didn’t fight, because their conscience got the better of them. They ran so they could keep living a way of life they saw passing away. They turned this little corner of Brazil into their own little world. A make-believe world, if you ask me.” Narsissa shook her head and then looked sideways at Ella. “You never knew this ole gal married into money. You never knew that, did you?”

Ella clutched her hands and placed them in her lap. Shame wrapped around her like a shawl, and she could only shake her head that she did not know. How could this woman who had helped to care for her children, work her farm, and nurse her back from pneumonia two winters ago be so unknown to her? Ella had relegated Narsissa to an extension of the store, a business item of Harlan’s that up until his undoing was of little interest to her. Ella’s aunt had always labeled Harlan as too self-involved to ever be devoted; now she realized that the same could have been said about her as well. Wanting to look away, Ella forced herself to stare into Narsissa’s eyes.

“White trash, my grandfather called David’s people.” Narsissa got up and put the photograph back on the nightstand. “This from a man who couldn’t be buried next to a white man, mind you.” She took a seat again, shifting her weight as if trying to find a spot of comfort.

“I thought you said they were people of means,” Ella whispered.

“You know well enough that money and decency don’t go hand in hand.” Narsissa stared toward the window that was now opaque with rainy mist.

“David’s mother took to the marriage about the same as my grandfather. She cut off the purse strings when he married something dirty like me. David always was petted by her. Especially after his father died when he was just a boy. I knew that much about him when I met him at the cane grinding down at the Summerville place that night in January. Some of my people told me he was touched in the head. They warned me, but I didn’t believe . . . couldn’t believe it. I didn’t even want to believe it when he jumped out of bed that night, claiming that Moses had come to him, telling him to go find his father’s people back in Brazil. Said that’s where we’d find the Promised Land with the milk and the honey and the gold and the . . .” Narsissa waved her arm and fluttered her fingers as if there was such a thing as magic. “He even described the homes his people had built down there . . . described them right down to the brass doorknobs shaped like hawks. ‘Dreaming,’ I kept saying. ‘You’re just dreaming.’ But he was already gone, in his mind at least. It was two months later when he left for good.” Narsissa wrapped herself with her arms. The chair creaked when she rocked.

Ella reached out to touch Narsissa, but when her hand brushed against the side of her shoulder, Narsissa shifted away from the embrace.

“I kept hoping that the note David left would tell me how to find him . . . tell me to sit tight until he was ready for me to follow behind him. But all that note amounted to was gibberish, symbols and numbers, with that old hawk from his family’s crest printed at the top. I interpreted it the way I wanted. I told so many people that David was setting up a new life for us and would send for me, that after a while I started believing it.”

The rain beat down harder on the roof, and a slow drip began to fall from the plastered spot on the ceiling. “What about your mother or your father? Couldn’t they have helped?” Ella asked.

“Father . . .” Narsissa grunted out the word and coughed. “He died a drunk, and then my mother headed out west. She was good enough not to take me with her. After my grandfather died from the TB, the woman who sold herbs next door didn’t mind telling me that I could find my mama selling herself in San Francisco. Went out there chasing the men who found gold. Whichever way it went, who’s to know?” Narsissa shrugged and rolled her shoulders back. “But don’t you feel sorry for me. I didn’t tell you all this so you’d be favoring me.”

“No, of course not,” Ella said, pressing her back against the chair, wondering if Narsissa could tell that she was lying.

Narsissa lumbered over to the side of the bed. She pulled back the woven rug that she had first brought to Ella’s home when she claimed she could work twice as hard as any man. Pulling a knife out from underneath the mattress, she used the tip to lift up a piece of wood from the floor. Narsissa withdrew a small croaker sack tied at the end with frayed string.

“You told it to me straight that day back at the spring,” Narsissa said, looking Ella straight in the eye. “I’ve been hanging on to notions that I need to let go of.”

“Now, I had no business saying such.” Ella fanned the air, trying to dismiss the charge as much as cut the tension. “That was just me being melancholy. You know how I can be.”

Narsissa handed the sack to Ella. Rain rattled against the rusted tin roof of the cabin, and Ella clutched the bag, not knowing what she should do.

“I’ve been hanging on to pipe dreams that ain’t nothing but rust now. All this talk about the bank taking over made me realize that if we lost this place, where would I go? Huh? Brazil? And what would I do once I got there? Hunt down a husband who probably wouldn’t recognize me if he was to lay eyes on me? Even if he had a piece of his mind left . . . even if he’s still alive. No . . .” Narsissa shook her head. A piece of bark fell from her hair and onto the bedspread. “For all his faults, Harlan Wallace was good enough to give me a place to stay. No matter what . . . I’ll always be grateful. He let me turn this smokehouse into a home, more or less.”

“Yes, I know,” Ella said, turning her rigid head to the side and raising her eyebrows. “I’m the first to agree. There’s good and bad in everyone. Even in those who forge your name and gamble away your possessions.” Her words hung in the air. Drops of rain kept tapping at the roof. Finally slumping forward, Ella deflated with a sigh. “Truth be told, there are parts of him—parts of us, I should say—that I can’t let go of even though I know I should. I’d only say this to you, but some mornings I drag out of bed and peep out from the curtain, thinking he might’ve come to his senses. I look out that window half-expecting to see him walking up the drive, coming back for the sake of my boys if for no other reason. I guess there’s enough fool left in me to believe he’ll be cured or something and find his way back home.”

Narsissa looked away from the bag and halfway smiled. “Well, now here I am. And no matter what anybody says, this
is
my home.” She reached down and pulled open the string on the sack. “Here’s what I’d been setting aside along and along. There ain’t much, but you take this money and put it—”

“Now, Narsissa, I can’t take your—”

Narsissa squeezed Ella’s hand and leaned down lower until Ella could see the dark hairs that grew from the corners of her lips. “Don’t make me tell you twice, Ella. Now you take this money, and put it toward keeping our home.”

Ella sat stunned, holding what would amount to a fraction of what was owed to the bank. Her aunt had taught her that servants were to be considered, even valued, as distant kin, but never adored. Up until now Ella had held the notion that Narsissa fell into that category. For the first time Ella spoke the words that she had been too guarded and protected to offer. “I love you, Narsissa. You know that, don’t you?”

Narsissa stopped straightening the rug back over the secret spot. She turned, and the amber light from the lantern caused her weathered face to soften, to appear almost youthful.

Ella stood at the door holding the bag, fighting the urge to run out the door and hide the tears that burned her eyes. An emotional cocktail of shame and guilt spilled inside of her. When she spoke, her voice cracked. “Narsissa, you’re braver than me.”

Narsissa picked up the photograph once more and studied it. “Somehow and someway, we’ll still be here long after that bank shuts its doors.” She ran her finger down the side of the picture frame and then turned it facedown on the table.

During the early hours of the next morning, right before the sun broke out across the sky, Samuel stood at the door of the house before any of the others inside had awoken. He pulled the small red tin of snuff from inside his boot. He used his fingers to delicately pinch out a bit from the can and tucked the grainy snuff inside his mouth, behind his lower lip.

Lanier watched him from the barn door and wondered how long the boy who thought he was a man would be a problem. Torment and burden had become tattooed on the boy’s face, with lined creases between tired eyes that would be better suited to a man three times his age, one who had been ravaged by misfortune and lost love. Samuel reminded Lanier of his dead wife, Octavia. The boy was twisted in a spell of anger and confusion. Lanier was satisfied that Samuel was a dangerous threat. He could imagine Samuel winding up like Octavia, a victim of circumstances.

An owl called out one last time from within the trees, and Samuel turned. He walked to the edge of the porch closest to the barn. Lanier stepped to the side, hidden by the barn door. He picked up the end of an axe nearby and wondered if Samuel would trouble him at the start of a new day. A rabbit hopped through the sunflowers, and when it did so, the branches rattled. The animal stopped long enough to look up at Lanier and then ran off underneath the porch where Samuel stood. The boy’s weight landed against the oyster shells that were scattered on the ground, and he kicked a shell toward the barn.

Lanier gripped the handle and felt a burning sensation snake from his fingers to his groin. His heart began to race with the familiar click that always caused him to think he would break free and give way to the generational curses put upon him by having his father’s blood in his veins. The rabbit now sat at the edge of the house on its hind legs, its ears twitching. In the darkness, the animal would be the only witness to the justice Lanier was going to serve Samuel once and for all.

When Samuel got to the pen, the oxen turned toward the entrance of the farm. A wagon being pulled by a Clydesdale horse with a tangled, yellowed mane rattled toward him. Samuel stopped and turned toward the road.

The wagon was covered with a moss-colored tarp with foxtails dangling from each of the four corners. A colored man wearing tall leather boots, a jacket with a checkered patch sewn to the pocket, and a floppy felt hat drove the wagon. He pulled up right next to the oxen pen and nervously rubbed the graying beard on his chin.

“Bonaparte,” Samuel called out. “What’s the matter?”

“I’m sorry to show up so early like this but I got serious trouble.” He jerked the reins, and the horse stepped to the right. “Is that man still ’round the place?”

Clutching the axe tighter, Lanier moved closer to the wall of the barn.

Samuel reached down and pulled a weed from the ground. “How come you’re asking?” He took the end of the weed and stuck it in the corner of his mouth.

“It’s my baby girl. My wife was blanching some sheets last night out in the yard. My baby girl fell backwards into the pot. Like to have burned her legs off. Doctor’s over in St. Joe for the night tending to a woman with pneumonia. Folks said . . . said that man here can heal people.”