Walter Mosley - 47

Even though I was weak and hurting I felt something grand about her including me in her dream. All John had to do was give her a few nice words and she changed from a sullen bully into a woman filled with hope.

"How are you, Forty-seven?" John asked then.

We both turned and saw him emerge into the orange light. He was walking upright and full of strength. It was as if all of Mr. Stewart's tortures had amounted to naught. John winked at me and I knew that he had done some powerful magic.

"Was you listenin' to us?" Eighty-four asked warily.

"Only a little bit, Tweenie. I was happy to see you and I didn't want to interrupt."

The slave-girl bowed her head. I knew that she was embarrassed at what she had said. I think she was more worried about him knowing what she felt than she was about the white men that had to be after us.

Just as I had this thought I heard the braying of Tobias's

hounds. There was a yip and then a loud howl. And we all three knew that the white men were hunting us down.

"Put out that light, Numbah Twelve," I said.

"No one can see us as long as this light shines," he replied calmly. "They can't see us while we remain within the light of this disk."

I had no idea of what his words meant. And even though I trusted him I knew that he was capable of making mistakes. After all, him thinking that saving Tobias's daughter would keep the plantation master from hurting us is what got my friends beaten and killed.

The hounds were getting closer. I could hear each one barking and calling for black blood.

"We got to get outta here, baby," Eighty-four said to her man.

"Forty-seven is too weak," he answered. "And if we move away from my little machine the dogs will run us down."

"They'll smell his blood if we stay here," she argued.

"No," he said. "You have to trust me, Tweenie. I know what I'm doing."

"You didn't know so good when you got yo butt tied up in Mr. Stewart's shack," she said.

"If you run Tobias and his dogs will tear you to shreds," he said. "But if you stay, and I survive, we will be married in a church and Forty-seven here will grow into a man who will save the whole world."

"If we run we can do that."

"If we run Forty-seven will die and the world will pass away with him," John said.

Eighty-four gazed at me with an emotion in her face that I could not decipher. Maybe she hated me for standing in the way of her happiness. Maybe she wondered at the deep connection between me and her man. I had no answers for her. John and his war with the being called Wall was just as much a mystery to me as was the sun in the sky or the secret to how birds learned to fly. All I knew for sure was that he was right about my wounds. I couldn't have risen to my feet if an angel flew down and bade me to follow him to the Pearly Gates.

Just at that moment a dog bayed not ten yards from where we sat. Eighty-four and I turned our heads to see, at the furthest extreme of orange light, the snout and tail of one of Tobias's hounds! The dog was tinted orange by John's glowing apparatus. It seemed to glance at us, or at least in our direction, but then he turned away, howled, and ran off into the night.

For a moment I saw one of Tobias's men come into the glow but he just looked through us and then went on after the dogs.

We all sat silently for long moments after the hunters had gone. The dogs' braying faded into the distance.

I was so tired that when I closed my eyes I couldn't open them again. But I wasn't quite asleep. I could still hear John and Eighty-four talking.

"What we gonna do if'n we cain't run?" she asked.

"When the sun comes up," he said, "I can take you and Forty-seven one at a time to a special place."

"An' we just gonna wait till then?" she asked.

"I guess."

"Then why don't you come ovah here an' sit next to me t'keep me warm?"

I heard a rustling and then I passed over into the darkness of sleep.

When I awoke I was laying face up upon a large flat stone. The sun was hovering above the level of the pine trees. I could see its red glow beyond my feet. The pain from the whipping wasn't as bad as it had been before but I was still very weak. Even the morning sun couldn't warm my bones or brighten my eyes.

"Forty-seven," John said.

"Yeah, John?"

"I'm sorry but you are dying."

"I am?" I could hear Eighty-four crying but I couldn't see her.

"I'm sorry," John said. He was standing to my right, looking down on my demise.

"It wasn't yo fault," I said. "I was the one wanted to go back and save Eloise. I'm glad we did it but I feel terrible about Mud Albert. If I die will you bury me next to that river we saw? The one where the bears was."

"You won't die," John said. "At least not today."

"But you said "

"I said I was sorry. I wanted to wait a while before we became brothers. I wanted you to grow into a man and learn the heritage of your race. A young man like you will find it hard to wage the kind of war that is bound to arise between you and Wall and his agents."

"His agents? Like sheriffs?"

"Something like you will be for me," John said.

And even though I was dying I got exasperated by his riddles.

"What you tryin' t'say, nig " I stopped myself from using the insult and my friend smiled.

"I am going to perform a ritual that my people have been doing since before any man walked on the earth," he said. "I am going to put my cha into yours. You will still be you but you will begin to know everything I know and everything my people have known. You will have power that no human being has ever dreamed of. And with that knowledge and that power you will save the world."

It was as if I were in a dream. I saw John in that morning light even though darkness seemed to be descending. I heard his words, but they might have just as well been a memory.

John nodded and Eighty-four came into view. She sat next to me on the big stone and took hold of my shoulders. And then John sat on the other side of me. The light of morning seemed to gather around his head and his visage became saintly like the pictures in Tobias's illustrated Bible that Big Mama Flore used to sneak and show me.

John brought his hands behind his neck and grabbed hold of the light. He lifted it up above his head. It looked something like one of the Calash though not hard and angry but gentle. The appendages wrapped themselves around John's fingers in a friendly caress. Then my friend placed the living light upon my chest. The insubstantial tentacles released him and wrapped themselves around my body and my head. I felt a sense of joy so intensely that I couldn't remain still.

"Hold him down, Tweenie," John commanded.

Eighty-four tightened her grip.

He grabbed hold of me too.

I didn't want to fight them but as the creature of light pressed itself into my heart and mind I pushed hard to free myself. I kicked and screamed and bit and shouted. I twisted and knocked my head against the stone below me. As the light filled me I had the desire to fly, to rise above the world and see the oceans and the continents. Continents? How did I know about continents? I wondered. How did I know the names of oceans and constellations and phrases in languages both human and inhuman?

I screamed and threw Eighty-four and John off of me. I rose to my feet and raised my hands to the heavens. All around me were lights of every hue, many that have no names in any human tongue. A billion billion little rainbow people tittered in a place far away and long ago and even far into the future.

And then everything went black.

"Forty-seven," Tall John from beyond Africa said in a booming voice.

I was lying on the ground next to the stone bed where I had lain. I was naked and confused. I wanted to rise but there were so many thoughts going through my head that I couldn't manage to get my legs working.