The Orphan Mother by Robert Hicks

Author:Robert Hicks
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Published: 2016-09-13T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 21

Mariah

July 22, 1867

Thanks to Evangeline, Mariah had an idea about the identity of at least one of the gang who’d slaughtered her son, so one late morning, after her morning tasks at Carnton were for the moment accomplished, she walked into Franklin and out again, heading north to where the Crutcher family eked out a rough existence. The man of the house, Mariah knew, was missing the last three fingers of his hand. She hoped her excuse for going out there would be convincing to them. They were, as Evangeline had put it, very rough.

She had not been welcome at the birth of Lizzie Crutcher’s daughter six months before, but she had been necessary. Lizzie and her husband—was he her husband? Mariah didn’t actually know—had not wanted her there. Bill Crutcher, one of the number of lumbermen who called the town home, had only grudgingly returned from the deep woods to attend the birth. He was not happy to see a Negro in his house when he got there.

“We ain’t need the houdou woman. Now get the hell out.”

Lizzie, who had called for her, was not much more welcoming, but she was in great pain and alone, except for the hulk in her corner who, when he wasn’t drinking, was cursing the nigger magic woman and her foul, dirty hands that would no doubt turn his child stupid. This child gone be stupid whatever I do, Crutcher, Mariah had thought. The cabin was cold, the chinking between the logs entirely crumbled away in spots so she could see the trees waving in the bright winter light, which streamed through the holes and gave Mariah more to see by than she would normally have expected from a backwoods cabin with no windows.

“Nigger, why? God, nigger, why this hurt? What the hell you doing? Do. Jesus. Do something, nigger!” Lizzie cursed her, but underneath the curses Mariah could hear her desperation, how she needed her. She talked hard, but mostly for the ears of the man in the corner who wouldn’t lift a finger.

The child lay across its path to the world, as if she knew what she was getting into and wanted no part of it. Nigger, fix it! This was the white woman’s first child, and she didn’t yet know that there were some mothering pains that couldn’t be fixed, that just had to be suffered. Mariah felt Lizzie’s stomach with her strong fingers, and got her hand slapped for it. The lumberman stood up. “Don’t be takin’ no liberties with a white woman, witch,” he said, before sitting back down. This was the world in which this white child would be raised and taught. Someday the child would taunt her and spit at her, Mariah was sure.

The black of the world had settled there in that room and had sucked up everything warm and welcoming. There was no sign of any decorations or handwork, no touch of a woman’s hand, no fire in the tiny stone hearth. Good things had been erased, if they had ever existed.

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