Jeffery Allen - Song of the Shank

The good thing, she always knew that Thomas would be returned to her that same evening. (She is not making excuses.) She understands that her separation from him was always temporary, could never be anything more (glad to have him with her, back where he belongs), and not something that she either wanted or willed. But suppose that she in fact secretly desired longer periods of separation, that she wished somehow to prolong the displacement? Could anyone blame her? Knowing as we do that in the course of normal activity, on those days when the transfer didn’t occur, the Bethune girls and Thomas formed part of the weight of her day. She and Domingo would dress quickly at first light, bright and clear-headed to do their sweat-drenched work. Their paths would rarely if ever cross during the day. Her husband — tending to the acres of gardens and lawns, tending to the stable of horses, sharpening the axes and knives, varnishing the General’s spare (backup) canes, blacking boots and shoes, drawing water, cutting wood, making repairs to or fixing up the house (every week, Miss Toon or Sharpe wanted one room or another completely altered), leading a cow to the shed and butchering it. I feel like eating meat. (It fell to her to knife chickens and the hogs and to shape the meat.) Then curing the leather. Hides hung up and drying like linen. Service the carriage and when called to, take it and drive on an errand to town or a neighbor or up-country. It often fell to Domingo to drive the General and his wife and bundled-up Thomas to the town hall, where he would wait outside with the carriage, while Thomas performed on the stage inside — an old piano, a rotting splintery thing, badly tuned — for some unidentified strangers Domingo had spied arriving in his carriage and entering the hall, always well-dressed travelers.

And herself: open out the curtains in every room of the mansion so light falls clean over and brightens objects (an array of familiar shapes) and skin, prepare the bathwater, prepare the stove, set the table, cook breakfast, clear the table and wash the dishes, polish the piano (rubbed shine), scrub and hang the laundry (they will dry quickly in the sun) , scrub the floors, prepare the stove, set the table, cook dinner, clean the table and wash the dishes, tend to the mistress, remove the bright laundry from the line (they dried quickly in the sun) , iron the next day’s clothes, fold the clothes and put them into their proper drawers, prepare supper for the family, clear the table and wash the dishes, and see the family off— Anything else, ma’m? — to the evening, sometimes even to bed, tucking and kissing. Time finally to go to your cabin, barren of those things (possessions) most people surround themselves with, attachments to the past, sentimental items endowed with emotional richness. Your lopsided door resistant to shutting, especially on humid days. Feed your family. (Food makes you happy for a time.) Get your children off to sleep then settle into your small bed next to your husband. A man is some comfort. Then the steady rise and fall of his chest beside you, two nestled under the mess of blankets sharing sleep, his head heavy beside yours in the low space — their bed stunted, no right to rise far from the floor — a ripe full day coming to term followed by an appalling night — in the dark where do all the painful noises, sighs, and creaks come from? — to look forward to after the day’s exertions. Wake at the line of light glowing up at the bottom of the misshapen door and dawn entering through cracks between the poorly fitted planks of the walls and floor. Rise, touching ground gently like a migratory bird landing after a long pauseless flight. One day just like the next. Come Sunday, you have to remind your body to keep to the bed. Hey, fool, it’s Sunday, the day God rested. She and Mingo would drowse for as long as they chose, relegating the breakfast, laundry, dinner, and such, the usual maintenances of family, to her oldest daughter, she allowing Mingo to be the first to rise, her husband off to trap, hunt, or fish — cage, rifle, cane pole — always cleaning and cooking (supper) catch and kill himself.

So it was. When the Bethunes purchased a second girl, Antoinette, to assume her chores, while assigning her a new single duty — she was to accompany the General on his daily visits to the printing office and attend to whatever needs he had there — she welcomed the purchase and transfer of responsibility with a sort of silent celebration, as it brought a fundamental change to what had been a life of unvarying routine. Her time at the office freed her of constant responsibility for Little Thomas. (It was not a question of renunciation, of love, that permanent resident in her heart.) And it brought something else she might not have expected. It raised her in the eyes of others. At the office or in the street, woogies rich or poor greeted her as Miss Charity — some even slipped up and called her Miss Bethune — according her a position of respect, finding something admirable in her constant service to the General, her presence in his privileged company. And she had to admit that their acknowledgment made her feel favored and charmed, would encircle her in a bubble of light-headed pride that floated her through the next hours. The General often spent much of the day receiving visitors, prominent men, magnanimous men with loud voices who talked out their ideas and plans, devised plots and election schemes. He usually heard it all while seated behind his desk, one black cane unashamedly placed in full view along either side of the desk. He often seemed bored with it all, murmuring in irritation and making no attempt to disguise it. Men of lesser status called upon him too, an ant heap of travelers from all the regions round about, filling the office and rushing up to his desk, here to consult him, each one with his troubles. (White folks and their troubles.) General Toon seemed to take greater interest in these men, the desperate and needy, while she performed her duties — on call, standing off to the side or in a corner, observing, listening, or moving but keeping to the edges of the room as the men complained or conversed — feeling a measure of detachment from the matters at hand, her attention drifting along the factual edges, hearing but not really listening, seeing without really observing, other and apart from the General and his visitors but also miles and years removed from whatever might be happening back at Hundred Gates.

When can I get a look at that boy of yours? How come you stopped bringing him down to the office?

On occasion the General would send her down (belowdecks) to relay a message (an order) to the man in charge of the Negroes operating the big noisy machines, or upstairs (the nest) to one of the men cramped over a square of board with ink and pen, usually a notice to hire or fire. Quiet days too when it seemed he had no true reason to keep her around, no visitors calling upon him, nothing to do but sit reading a big book at his desk, rapidly flipping through the pages at times, she seated not far from him, in one of the chairs normally occupied by a guest. They took dinner at his favorite restaurant down the street, she waiting out back and eating her meal there while he stayed inside for as long as he wanted. (She could live with the waiting, although the food could have been better.)

This new life uneventful by comparison to the old one, so much so that she had to fight to keep Little Thomas in her thoughts. The one drawback, the office required her constant presence before the General and forced her to give up the one good thing labor at the mansion had rewarded her with: a few minutes of privacy thickening in the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee, big cup little spoon, or to slip undetected into an unoccupied room, the steadiest satisfaction of her day.