Virginia Hamilton (6 page)

Thomas wore his favorite hat, a purple toque with a large pink ostrich feather stuck in the band. The feather fluttered in princely style, as fragile as a puffball. He appeared feverishly eager, yet confident behind a set of huge copper kettledrums.

Levi observed his brother, whom he called Tom-Tom, so much a reflection of himself, and his sister, Ticey, trying her best to keep up with the both of them.

Why must she be so excitable? And why couldn’t she find girls her age to be friends with? Poor Ticey. It wasn’t that she couldn’t find any, it was that he and Tom-Tom couldn’t keep her away from what they were doing or planning to do. And he supposed it was normal for younger ones to tag after older brothers and sisters.

Levi caught a warm stir of air full in the face. He would have liked to be in the cottonwood tree on the east boundary. He could hear a breeze high up in the brittle osage branches. It might be cooler over in the cottonwood. Yet he remained where he was. Patient and ever alert, he waited for Tom-Tom to tell him, all of them, what was to be.

Behind their field was a high wood fence with a gate in it. The fence separated the field from their backyard. The yard was overgrown on one side with planted beds of flowers—sweet peas, gladioli, hollyhocks, roses—and stubborn, blooming weeds which made that whole side a place wildly beautiful. On the other side of the yard, away from sundown and shade, grew a large, neat vegetable garden. Here Mr. and Mrs. Douglass often spent time when they came home in the afternoon. Hoeing rows of beans, tomatoes and cucumbers was for them a sure way to relax.

Now, after supper, they were on the far side of their white house with black trim, away from the enclosed yard and the open field. Over there was a screened-in porch facing north. It overlooked the front lawn of snowball bushes, evergreen and fruit trees. The Douglasses delighted in sitting on the porch, talking, having tea, after the dishes were washed and put away. And it was not unusual for them to doze a bit there on the porch glider.

Thomas and Levi, with Justice, delighted in the field. In the whole neighborhood, no family had as much open space as they. The acre and a half of field planted years ago in Kentucky bluegrass was kept mowed to an inch of springy turf by Thomas and Levi, taking turns struggling with their rattling gasoline mower. Endlessly, they talked over whose turn it was to mow this time; finally, they divided the field in quarters—one quarter, Thomas; one quarter, Levi—until the whole field was mowed.

The field had naturally become the sports arena for the neighborhood. It was the football field on one day and the soccer field or gymnasium on the next. Although Thomas and Levi rarely played sports these days, they were quick to supervise and referee all manner of games. This early evening into night, the field would become the gathering place for the Pickle and Cream Gang. The name was a secret of Justice’s. She was Pickle. Levi and Thomas were the cream of the crop, better than other boys.

The field looked vast and empty in the growing shade as the three of them faced it, their backs toward the fence.

Thomas squinted down the field at backyards, some with low hedges, whose houses fronted on the wide Dayton Street. He clutched four felt-tipped kettledrum sticks, two in each hand. Momentarily, his face seemed trapped behind the sticks as he turned his purple toque hat this way and that. He peered at Levi, his mirror, searching for the proper angle for the hat. When he had the slant at which the tall feather caught the best of any moving air, he lowered his hands. And struck the calfskin drumheads with the sticks in a low, trembling sound.

The tone was so deep and sudden it startled Justice. She moved closer to Levi. But he, in turn, stepped aside and somewhat away from both Thomas and Justice. She was left alone, glancing anxiously from one brother to the other. Thomas’ kettledrums were the “instruments of torture” for her, more so than his regular set of snares and bass drum. They were like witches’ boiling cauldrons from which powerful sound bubbled and overflowed.

In just a few minutes, Justice would be the only girl and the only eleven-year-old in the entire field. Thomas wouldn’t allow other girls around—not to say that they were much interested. And he tolerated Justice because his folks made him.

Sound from one kettledrum began to build into a bass roar that rolled down the field and on through the hedges to hit houses. He could almost see that sound bounce away and sail over front lawns to escape into Dayton Street. He kept up the unholy racket until Mr. Buford Jefferson came out of his back door to see what was the commotion. Mr. Jefferson must have been on his way out, in any case. For he carried his black lunchbox and wore his green-and-orange baseball cap pulled low over his eyes. Jefferson was night watchman at the GE plant about eighteen miles up the highway. He was also one of the Little League coaches with an awful sour disposition. Maybe because his son, Dorian, refused to play baseball. Right now was about time for Mr. Jefferson’s team practice before he went off to work.

“Hey, Lee,” Thomas yelled across to Levi. The overwhelming drumroll he made would keep anyone down the field from hearing him clearly. Levi couldn’t hear him, either. “He didn’t have to come out the back like that,” Thomas yelled.

“What?” Levi shouted back.

“Jefferson!” Thomas hollered. “He could’ve gone out the front to his car—I said,
HE DIDN’T
HAVE TO COME OUT THE
BACK.”

“Oh,” Levi said. He didn’t feel up to yelling above the kettledrumming. Since the beginning of the summer when Tom-Tom borrowed the drums, he had grown gradually accustomed to their powerful strength of sound. But if they went on too long, he would feel light-headed and forget what he was doing.

“Jefferson wants to let me know he’d like to kill me!” Thomas yelled.

“Maybe he’s just curious,” Levi was forced to yell back. The drums rolling and vibrating on air were deafening.

“Yeah, sure!” Thomas yelled.

Justice realized that shouting at the top of his lungs was something Thomas did with little effort. And Levi was just starting to feel dizzy when Thomas changed the drumming to a foreboding pom-pom on one kettle, to a pom-pom-uh on the other, pitched to a fifth tone of the first. He alternated this pounding on the drumheads; he swayed from side to side. The ostrich feather jumped and leaped as though charged with electricity.

“Look at that old fogey staring!” Thomas shouted. “Sure glad Dad ain’t fifty years old!”

Their dad was forty-one, which was old enough. But Mr. Buford Jefferson was fifty going on a century, Thomas was sure of it. And mean to his kid, Dorian. And at times mean to his wife, Mrs. Leona Jefferson. To Thomas, she looked to be at least one hundred and sixty-seven years ancient, and
really
strange.

“You’ll
be an old man one day!” Levi thought to yell back.

“Aw, you read too many books!” Thomas shouted.

Mr. Jefferson stared up the field. The outline of him was coiled in a fierce resistance to the noise. Abruptly, he sprang to his right. Defiantly, he disappeared around his house. Right after he had turned the corner, they heard the sound of a motor starting up.

It was then their gate swung open and their dad stepped through into the field.

Mr. Douglass was not a tall man, but he had an assurance about him that was commanding. Justice had his exact build and she would be lucky if she grew to average height for a woman. Mr. Douglass’ brown skin was tanned a deeper hue, caused by working out-of-doors as he did a good part of the time. His people had been stone-carvers, and he himself was one of the best stonecutters in the area. He was always in demand, even when construction work was slow. And he could size fieldstone into any shape for a fireplace or chimney. With a steel mallet and a chisel, he would break a heavy stone in half. He’d chip away at half of the stone until he had the jagged shape he needed. Whatever the shape, it would fit perfectly.

Mr. Douglass glanced from Justice to Levi, then steadied his gaze on Thomas. A slight irritation, a bristling seemed to come over him.

“People don’t want that kind of noise,” he told Thomas. “Stop it now, and bring those drums inside.”

Thomas seemed to pale, then turned dark with anger. Hands still drumming, he said through his teeth, “It’s not
noise!
It’s …” Suddenly, he ceased drumming. Levi had caught his eye, and his voice trailed off.

Lee knew it would never do for Tom-Tom to start in arguing with their dad. Not if he meant to put on a show with the drums this evening. Lee could tell by his brother’s expression that Tom-Tom had been thinking about taking a stand.

So Levi walked over to his dad and stood before him with that way of planting his feet together as they do in the military. He had his father’s full attention. Standing still, respectful, he captured his dad’s interest.

Justice listened as Levi explained how Thomas felt he was ready to play kettledrums for all of the kids. Tom-Tom had learned some new things about drumming this summer, Levi said. The kids were always coming over to the house throughout the day, bothering Tom-Tom to teach them. Boys were just so fascinated with the way the big drums worked, he explained. Sure, neighbors heard, but they didn’t get angry. They understood, Levi said, that Tom-Tom was truly a drummer. And now the boys would be coming to the field and Tom-Tom would teach them.

Maybe boys did come to the house, Justice thought. But if they did, she hadn’t seen them. Most boys were a little shy of coming right up to the front door, and, particularly, of Thomas. It was easier for them to come into the field. Levi had lied smoothly. She suspected all of it was a lie. Not like Levi at all.

“Well. You see he keeps it down most of the time,” Mr. Douglass was saying.

“I will,” Levi said.

“And see he doesn’t go on too long.”

Levi nodded. He felt dizzy and slightly headachy. He was having trouble recalling what he and his dad had been saying only a moment ago.

Justice was happy that the fun would continue. She skipped over to her dad, grinning from ear to ear.

Mr. Douglass caught her around the neck, eyes softening as he looked down at her. “Why don’t you come on over to the porch?” he said to her. “Tell us about what you did today?”

Laughing, thankful for his asking. “Maybe in a little while,” she said, and then: “Can I have a tomato from the garden?”

“In a little while,” he said, joking. “Ticey, curly-top,” he added, brushing his hand through her tangled ringlets.

She knew she was her dad’s favorite. She could tell by the way he was always so kind to her. He had a joke for her each and every day, and he let her have her way.

Levi knew their dad protected Ticey because she was small. And because not only did she have two older brothers, but brothers who were identicals. He wondered what it was like for her to be a singleton. And it eased his mind somehow, knowing his dad would be there each night for Ticey.

To put things straight, he thought. To make it all come out even.

After her dad had left the field, Justice turned around and around in terrific circles until the earth spun in a rush of flowing color and she fell to the ground in a crumpled heap of laughter. She lay giggling, with a sensation of wind rushing in her ears. By the time she was on her feet again, Thomas was staring her down with the purest, meanest expression she had ever seen. While her dad had been there, she had forgotten about Thomas. He had a way of making himself unnoticed when he needed to.

I’m awful glad you can still drum, she thought of telling him. But then she thought better of it. No need to cause him to say something mean. I won’t be silly again, she thought, her earnest face pleading with him.

Whyn’t you just disappear? his eyes seemed to say.

For protection, Justice hurried to the fence, where Levi was standing.

Right then, Dorian Jefferson came sprinting around the left side of his house into his backyard. He came to a halt at the back hedge, back-pedaled to his porch and made a solid forward run for the hedge again.

He made a perfect leap over, Levi observed. But he fell, skidding on his hip for ten feet into the grassy field. He rolled over on his stomach and pounded the earth in a silent tantrum. Thomas let go a mighty roar of the drums—too late for the action—and they all had to laugh.

Dorian could be the most comical boy, Justice knew, with jiggles of energy that caused his arms and legs to never stop moving. As Thomas’ drums rolled smoothly on, she pulled herself up as straight and tall as possible, the way Levi was standing.

They watched Dorian leap, zag and cartwheel his way up the field. Thomas was quick to match the bounding movement on his drums. And the whole land—trees, sky and field—boomed and crashed, shaking the birds out of branches. Blackbirds sprang up to the high, hot air and, wheeling, winged their way west to open country.

Other boys began to appear now, as if by signal. They came off the street, through backyards and around property lines into the Douglass field. Some ran all of the way. And these Thomas greeted with a rush of rolling beats that seemed to come in waves. A few boys took their time coming in, trying to ignore the hypnotic roar of the kettles. Thomas matched the lazy, halting rhythm of their strides. With arms folded, two boys made a show of whispering and laughing loudly. Pretending that Thomas, his drums, so out of place in the field, and even Justice and Levi were the worst kind of show-offs.

Thomas gave them a few snide beats:
DA-RUM, DA-RUM! POM PA-RA POM-POM (OH, WHAT A FEELING!)

These two boys were the last to find their way into the shade, where they faced stares and snickers from the rest of the boys already seated in a semicircle around Thomas’ copper kettles.

Thomas tipped back a foot pedal, lowering the pitch of one drum. He toned both drums down to the sound of waves washing ashore, perhaps heard through closed windows.

“You guys wanna come play, you come on time!” he yelled at them. “Don’t be coming like you got something better to do—’cause you know you
ain’t.
Not unless you wanna do something like hittin’ a dumb ball with a foolish stick a
wood.”