I cooked a pot of nettles on Friday, hoping for Pa’s return. The bright-green broth simmered atop the stove as the June breeze slipped into the warm cabin, stirring the earthy scents, the long day beckoning the dusk.
I tried to read Jackson’s book, but I jumped up at every creaking board and rattling pane, and soon the uneasiness drove me out to the yard. Restless for Pa’s arrival, I searched the trees, startled at every falling leaf and acorn. Darkness was near, and I watched as the last bird hurried to its nest.
Unable to stand it any longer, I grabbed a lantern and rode Junia toward Troublesome.
In town, we circled around the Company store several times, the night sky cloaking us. I checked in back of the courthouse for Pa or any miners, and over at the post office, hoping I’d see him, then moseyed over to the old feed store.
Music and merriment spilled out. Surprised, I halted Junia, dismounted, and tethered her to a post. I’d forgotten about the Pie Bake Dance, that it was the first Friday in June. Slipping up to a side window, I peeked in.
The menfolk had slicked-backed hairdos and clean-shaven faces. Most dressed in city jackets and tall-waisted britches, huddled in small groups, eyeing each other and the women. It was a fancy to-do and only something I could touch in my books.
I marveled at the ladies’ tight-fitting dresses of bold prints with their big, puffy sleeves, pretty buttons, and smart-looking belts. I glimpsed a few Bette Davis–style hairdos like the big movie star wore in the magazines. Sitting in straight-back chairs, the ladies waited for the pie auction, tapped snappy heels on weathered boards, chatting nervously with each other and sneaking peeks to the men and pie auction table.
A long table brimmed with pies. Behind it, three men played the fiddles while another cupped a harmonica, their saucy tunes whisking lively around the smoky hall, escaping through cracks to the quiet streets of Troublesome. A few bold fellars picked partners, and the couples danced gaily on sawdust floors through wisps of tobacco smoke.
I spotted Constance Poole. Her sewing ladies crowded behind her, watching out of the corner of their eyes as she talked to the men. Tonight she wore a stylish pear-green dress, a silk sash drawn tightly around her slim waist, her perfectly coiffed hair swept back with a fancy matching ribbon. Constance chatted with two woodsmen, and I watched them lean in and dote on every word.
I glanced at the table of pies and wondered which one she had baked—how many would pitch for it. I thought of my own recipe with its hints of sweet, dark sorghum and buttery crust that I would sometimes make for Pa. For a moment I let myself fancy a man bidding on it, and then giggled at the thought and clamped a hand over my mouth. I hadn’t heard my foolery since Mama passed. To hear what had been silenced for so long felt like I’d stolen it from another. I tested it again, louder this time.
Junia snorted, collaring my vanity and falseness, and I cut a shushing eye at her and turned back to the window.
Harriett stood over in a corner hanging on her cousin’s arm, her new dress hemline boldly short, nearly naked leg to her knees.
A man struck out a verse from “Liza Jane,” and the fiddlers picked up the lively tune while everyone moved to the middle and formed two lines, the ladies on one side and the men on the opposite. The two at the far end stepped forward, greeted each other with a curtsy and bow, and hooked arms and began circling around each other, clasping palms, kicking up their heels down between the lines. Another took their spot and did the same to the claps and toe-tapping of others.
It was all dreamy, like a slick city magazine advertisement. Resting my chin on the sill, I pressed in closer.
The fiddlers slowed their tune to a soft, sweet melody, the notes bending into the raw warbles of the harp player as couples broke off from the line to dance in corners.
I felt the music in my hips, the light air sweeping into my singing hands. I wanted to twirl, dance again like Pa and Mama’d done on our porch when my uncle would stop by with his fiddle. At the end, Uncle Colton would slow down his tune, and Mama would sing an old French lullaby, “Au Clair de la Lune.” Her voice would lift softly into the damp night air, lose itself in the droplets of darkness. I’d join in to sing the beautiful French words, while Pa’s gravelly voice would pick up a chorus in English. Mama always had a tear in her eye when he’d finished.
“By the light of the moon,
My friend Pierrot,
Lend me your quill
To write a word.
My candle is dead,
I have no light left.”
Swept up in the wonderment, the gussied-up folks, the music, and the exciting might of it left me awestruck. In my nineteen years I had never witnessed such, couldn’t imagine the splendor of the Pie Bake dance that Eula and Harriett spoke of, much less it happening in Troublesome.
Glued, I didn’t see him slip up behind me until it was too late. His whiskey breath was hot on my neck, and his big arms circled around, grabbing my breasts. My scream rippled across Junia’s.
The man pushed himself into my back and slurred drunkenly into my ear, “Now, why’s a sweet thing like yourself outside here all by your lonesome, sugar?”
“Leave me be!” I tried to move, but he tightened his hold. The terror rose in my throat, thick and bile-tasting.
“That ain’t no way to treat a friendly fellar wanting some pie.”
“Let me go. Please!” I tried to push away from the brick and escape. But he had me pinned hard against the building.
Out of the corner of my eye, I watched Junia strain and buck, trying to break free of her post, her cries climbing into the music. She’d kill him if her tether broke.
Again, I screamed out and struggled against him. He shoved my forehead into the brick, cutting my head, his clamped hand over my mouth, snaking his other one downward. “Give ol’ Allen some of that tasty pie, sugar.”
A loud thump sounded, and the man went limp and fell to the ground. I spun around and saw him wriggle in the dirt, cradle his head.
Sheriff Davies Kimbo stood over him, holding his gun.
I backed up into the shadowy wall.
“Allen Thompson,” the sheriff called, “you got one minute to get your sorry drunk ass back over to Cut Shin. I catch you ’round here again, you’ll be spending time in my jail.” He kicked the man hard in the side and smacked the butt of the gun against his palm. “Git.”
Junia’s cries carried into the night air, low and quavering.
Turtle-like, the man rose, unsteady, holding a hand to the back of his head, the other to his gut. He wobbled and tumbled into me. Then his mouth flew open when he got a look, and his red-mapped eyes rounded big and ugly. “You!” The drunken man stabbed a finger. “Gotdammit, you’s a circus freak!” He spit at me, and the dribble landed on my chest. I raised my arms over my face, backed into the wall, trying to escape.
Cursing, the sheriff grabbed the man by the shoulders and threw him into the street. The drunk scrambled away.
Sheriff turned to me and I tucked my head, moved deeper into the shadowed lip of the building.
“Who’s there?” Sheriff took a step. “Bluet”—he squinted—“that you, girl?”
I mewed out a weak “Yes.”
“Why are you in town?” Sheriff holstered his gun.
“I, uh—”
“Does Elijah know you’re here?”
I cast my eyes down.
“You on book business? What are you doing here, girl?”
I tried to think up a lie. Before I could, he pointed to the feed store door. “The Pie Bake. You trying to go to the dance? Is that it?”
“No! I… Oh, no, sir. I just wanted to see what it was like.”
He shook his head and frowned. “Now, Bluet, I got myself a daughter ’bout your age who used to go to the dance before she wedded, but rules are rules. I can’t have you breaking the law, offending these folks on their big to-do night.” He poked his heavily whiskered chin to the NO COLOREDS sign. “I got a bunch of rowdy imbibers in there who I’m responsible for. And I can’t do that if I’m tending to your kind. Get on home to Elijah, girl.”
“Yes—no, sir. I’ll be on my way. Sorry for the trouble, Sheriff. It won’t happen again.”
I turned toward Junia and took two steps before Sheriff called out, “By the way, Bluet, you seen my relation anywhere up there on your book routes? Ol’ Vester near your part of the woods? That ol’ boy’s been lying low.”
I paused, the question nearly toppling me. Lying six feet low. My mind rattled and looped around the horror.
Sheriff went on, “Preacher man’s nowhere to be found, and as much as I don’t miss that, I’m hoping the ol’ boy didn’t get himself into trouble.”
“Preacher Frazier?” I asked casually, keeping my eyes parked on Junia, forcing myself to keep walking toward the mule and not look back at the lawman. When I reached Junia, my hands pressed into her fur, stroking, petting, drawing a strength. “No, sir, Sheriff, I never see a living soul on my book route—nary a one but my patrons.”
Oh, but I’d seen the dead ones, and I know’d if Sheriff could see my eyes in the dark night, he’d see them in there too.