“DON’T YOU THINK OF going into town,” said Miss Beulah, leaning nearly out of her rocker.
Frank put both hands out, palms forward, as if to push her gently back into her seat. “I’ll be careful, Mama-B. But somebody’s got to get the new journals out.”
Behind him, hidden beneath an old coat, sat a stack of the latest copies of the United Mine Workers Journal, hot off a UMW truck.
“You ain’t no paperboy,” she said. “Let one of them Union people do it.”
Frank crossed his arms. They were sized like country hams, but the left one was slightly smaller now than the right, welted with scars from that beating the thugs had given him last summer. His forearm had received a direct blow from a tire iron. If he hadn’t spent years with a pick and shovel in hand, said Doc Moo, the bone would’ve split clean in two.
“I’ve told you, Mama-B, I am one of them Union people.”
The old woman huffed through her remaining teeth. “You’re Hugham first, that’s what.”
“And you taught me Hughams don’t kneel to no masters but our own.”
“You seem awful close to kneeling to the Union.”
“I ain’t kneeling to it, Mama-B. I’m standing up.”
“Tell me one thing. You fought in that Battle of the Tug earlier this month?”
“I did.”
“You shot anybody?”
“I shot, but never aimed at nobody. We been stuck up here in these tents for a year now. We just trying to strike some fear in those scabs and mine guards. Make sure they know we’re still here and we ain’t going nowhere till some-thing changes. We can’t. Got nowhere to go and no money to get there. You’re the one once said the only things them thugs listen to are gunshots. Course, some people let things get out of hand.”
“Well, ain’t that always the way of a shooting match, boy.”
“I wish it ain’t come to that, Mama-B. I hope it don’t again. But it’s been twice now in the short life of this country that a bunch of shooting was the only way people got their freedom. Once for independence, once for emancipation.”
Miss Beulah set her hands on her knees. Just a night ago, they’d had a bonfire in the middle of camp, and she’d sat back in her rocker and watched the embers racing toward the stars, heaven bound like hundreds of souls. Thousands. Tens of thousands. She’d taken her grandboy’s hand and held it in both of her own, her thumbs working over his calluses and lumpy knuckles. She’d thanked God for bringing him home to her. Now she had to fear losing him again.
“I believe in the Union, son. I do. Solidarity forever, there’s a slogan to stand behind. I just don’t want it to be my boy’s blood spilt for it.”
Frank nodded. “Hell, Mama-B, that makes two of us.”
Miss Beulah nodded at the stack of papers. “Go on, then. But if you let something happen to you, I’m-a hold my breath till I die and come find you. You won’t hear the end of it for all damn eternity. Heaven will be some kind of hell. You keep that in mind.”
Frank nodded, hefting the papers under his arm. “I ain’t apt to forget it.”
“One more thing, boy.”
“Ma’am?”
“I love you.”