In the time since I had last seen Luke Sawyer, I had given much thought about working with him again full time. If I did work with him, at least I could get the money I needed for the monthly payments. But I had held back from that because I didn’t want to leave the responsibility of the place to Caroline. If I left, she would have to make sure the timber was cut and the fields were tended. I knew that she would take it on, but I couldn’t put that responsibility on her, not with her health and Mitchell’s child at stake. In addition, if I were to leave, that would mean having to ask more work time of Tom Bee and Horace Avery. As things stood, I wasn’t even sure how much longer I could keep them on. I certainly couldn’t ask them to trust me for their money until I got the monthly payments out of the way, finished my obligations to Filmore Granger, and sold the forty. They had their folks to think of too. I wanted to tell Caroline all these things, but I couldn’t.
“Paul-Edward, I want you to know somethin’,” Caroline said when I had given her no answer. “I know you been worried ’bout a lotta things, and that’s includin’ me and this baby. But I want you to know I ain’t worried. Mitchell, he put his faith in you and I do too.” Her eyes studied me. “So what is it? You worried ’bout gettin’ these trees cut in time to meet Filmore Granger’s deadline? If you worried ’bout that, then don’t be. What with Mister Tom Bee and Horace Avery, Nathan, you, and me, we’ll get ’em down in time.”
I smiled at her reassurance. “You really think so?”
“Course. Don’t worry ’bout it.”
Caroline’s words, as so often, were spoken as fact, and I took consolation from them. Still, though, I did worry, and I gave further thought of going to Luke Sawyer. I knew that if I did go, I would have to tell Caroline why. I put that off and as the days toward meeting the next note to J. T. Hollenbeck dwindled to within a few, I decided upon selling two of the mules and the wagon instead. Somehow we’d make do without the wagon and just the one team.
“Where you goin’ with them mules?” Caroline asked the dawn I hitched the mules to the wagon.
“I’ve got to go to Strawberry,” I said.
“You takin’ them mules there, you gonna bring them back again?”
I looked at her. “What do you mean by that?”
Caroline glanced out at the rising sun, then back at me. “Where your tools?”
“What?”
“Your tools. You ain’t used ’em in a spell.”
“Haven’t had time.”
“Sent Nathan out to get your hammer other day. He done said he ain’t seen yo’ toolbox.”
“Well, Nathan knows he’s not supposed to use tools in that box for anything but woodworking.”
“Maybe so, but he still ain’t seen yo’ toolbox.”
I shrugged. “Maybe he overlooked it.”
“S’pose he did, seein’ it ain’t there.”
“What do you mean by that?”
She didn’t answer my question as she went on with her own. “Where’s yo’ watch?”
“My watch?”
“Ain’t seen ya lookin’ at it here lately.”
“Don’t have time to check it.”
Caroline grunted. “Then where’s it at?”
“In safe keeping.”
“You sold it, ain’t ya?”
I gazed at her, stupefied.
“You sold it, ain’t ya, Paul-Edward? Your tools too.”
“Caroline—”
“What else ya sell?”
I tried to gather myself. “Whatever I sold, it’s my business,” I said finally. “Nobody else’s.”
“’Ceptin’ mine,” she retorted.
“Not yours either. You’re not my wife,” I reminded her.
“Yeah, but half of this here forty, it’s mine,” she returned. “And if you sellin’ things, then that means you got a mighty need for money, and the only reason I can figure you t’ need money is for that Hollenbeck note and to pay these men choppin’ these trees. You don’t finish choppin’ these here trees in time, we lose this place. We lose this place, then you can’t get that Hollenbeck land, so you sellin’ even what’s most precious t’ ya to keep that from happenin’. That’s all I can figure.”
I stood there in front of her, holding the reins to the mules and not knowing what else to say to her. I wouldn’t lie, I couldn’t lie to Caroline, and there were no other words but the truth, which I couldn’t speak.
Caroline saved me from that. She dug into her apron pocket, then pulled out her hand, clutched into a ball. With her other hand she took my hand and placed her balled fist into it. “Here,” she said. “You take this.” She opened her hand and placed two bills in my palm.
I stared at the money, then at Caroline.
“You ain’t the only one got things t’ sell,” she said.
“Caroline . . . I can’t take this.”
“You keep forgettin’, Paul-Edward Logan, this here’s my land too, and whatever worry you got ’bout it, they my worries too.”
“What did you sell?”
“The hogs. They was mine, and I done chose t’ sell ’em. Got a good price too. Don’t forget I learned bargainin’ from my daddy. And don’t ya go tellin’ me t’ go get my hogs back, ’cause I done already made my bargain. Anyway, they probably sides of bacon and ham hangin’ from a smokehouse by now. Rest of that money is what I brung with me from my daddy’s house. It’s all the money I got, but if I need to, I’ll sell that cow too. But you can’t go sellin’ the mules, Paul-Edward. We need ’em too much.”
I didn’t have further words to say. I took Caroline’s money and paid J. T. Hollenbeck. I vowed to pay her back.
“Nathan!” exclaimed Caroline on an evening a few days later. “Why don’t you break out that harmonica of yours? Know you been itchin’ t’ play it.” It was after supper, and Caroline was washing the dishes outside the cabin door. We hadn’t yet burned the brush.
Nathan looked a bit apprehensive. “Ya sure, Caroline?”
“Yes, suh, I’m sure. Right sure. Been hearin’ ya playin’ it afar off, down by the creek. And don’t be playin’ no sad music. I wants something happy round here!”
Nathan grinned, sat down upon the stoop, and pulled out his harmonica from a shirt pocket. He lit into a lively tune. Caroline laughed and soon began to sing along. I watched, feeling the love and family they shared, then picked up the buckets and headed for the creek. Tom Bee and Horace Avery had gone to their own homes, and we still had the brush to burn. We needed water to dampen the ground around the brush, and even though hauling water was mostly Nathan’s chore, I let him play. I was enjoying the music too.
When I came back, Caroline had finished the dishes and was seated upon the stump, where she always sat at the outdoor fire. She had a tin cup in one hand and a bowl in the other. “Put them buckets down, Paul-Edward,” she ordered, “and come on have some of my tea and blueberry cobbler ’fore we get started with the brush.”
I nodded and took the buckets over to the pile of brush. It was Caroline’s custom to serve her dessert about an hour after her supper, once all the household chores were done. On the nights we burned the brush, she always had something for us to drink afterward. It seemed her way of bringing in peace for the night.
“Nathan, you put that harmonica down now and come on too. Got yo’ favorite.”
“In a minute,” said Nathan, and went on playing by the stoop.
I took my seat opposite Caroline. She handed me the cup and bowl, and I took a sip of the tea, then set the cup on the ground. I spooned up the cobbler. As always, it was perfect to my taste, and I told her so.
“I’m glad,” she said. “It was Mitchell’s favorite.”
“I know.”
“Course now, sweet-potato cobbler wasn’t too far behind.”
I laughed. “Know that too.”
She breathed deep of the night air. “This feels good,” she said. “Sitting here talkin’ easy on an evening, like we do.”
I nodded, knowin
g exactly what she meant.
“Always figured this here’d be how Mitchell and me would spend our evenings.” Suddenly she laughed. “Course, Mitchell wasn’t never one for talkin’ low and readin’ and such, like you do. Still, he had hisself a way . . . yeah, he had hisself a way.”
“I know you’re missing him.”
“Know you is too.”
She was silent, her eyes lowered; then she looked at me and I saw her eyes against the fire glow. “Ya know, Paul-Edward, I’m so sorry I ain’t married Mitchell right away when he asked me. My papa, my mama too, they wanted me t’ wait t’ marry, but I regret I ain’t followed my own mind and gone on and married Mitchell when he wanted. We wasted so much time.”
I had never seen one tear well up in Caroline’s eyes, not even when Mitchell died. Whatever crying she’d done, she had done to herself or with her family. But now I saw the sparkle of tears, and I took my time before I said anything further to her. I finished off my cobbler, then set the bowl down. I looked at Caroline and spoke quietly. “You want to know what I think?”
“What’s that?”
“Your folks were right. Mitchell, he needed that year. He always got every woman he wanted. He needed to wait on you.”
Caroline frowned. “You think he was glad he done that?”
“I know he was. Things come easy in this life aren’t very much appreciated, and Mitchell certainly appreciated you. He cherished you. You’re worth waiting for.”
The tears fell without sobs or sound of any kind, and Caroline did not wipe them away. Nathan joined us, and Caroline handed him his bowl of cobbler. Then she said to me, “You know, Mitchell done thought the world of you, Paul-Edward. He said he done figured you his family.”
“Figured him the same,” I said.
“Y’all was good friends.”
“No,” I said. “Not just friends. Brothers.”
Caroline nodded to that, and we smiled at each other across the fire.
Later, Nathan played and Caroline sang, then we rose and tended to the brush. I lit the fire myself. As the fire burned, we threw on more branches. Nathan brought more water. We kept the fire in check with long poles whenever branches fell too close to the edge of the circle. There was a bit of wind rising, but we didn’t worry about it. The fire was well within the circle. On most nights it took us a couple of hours to burn all the branches we’d cut during the day. This night seemed no different. As the branches became ash and the fire lowered, Nathan ran off to the outhouse. “Boy, we need more water!” Caroline called after him.
“Gotta go!” he cried.
“Boy—”
“I’ll get it,” I said, and took up the buckets.
Caroline shook her head, as if at the ways of men, then she laughed good-naturedly. “Well, go on,” she said.
Once again I headed for the creek. As I filled the buckets, I heard Caroline scream. I looked back up toward the brush and saw the flames rising, just as Nathan came running from the outhouse. Then I saw Caroline.
She sprang from the other side of the circle, running toward the creek. Her skirts were on fire. I leaped from the bank and raced toward her. I reached her before she was midway to the water. I pulled her to the ground and rolled her fast over the dirt, smothering out the flames. Then I tore off the long skirt she wore and the cotton petticoat beneath, so that her legs were bare. I picked her up and carried her quick to the creek, with Nathan hurrying behind. I immersed Caroline in the water, and she moaned with pain.
“Nathan,” I said in a steady voice, “go get Ma Jones.”
“But Caroline—” mumbled Nathan.
“Now!”
Nathan ran off. For several minutes I kept Caroline in the water, then took her back to the cabin, and carefully laid her on the bed. She continued to moan, and when I called her name, she could only look at me. The pain in her eyes frightened me more than I could have imagined. I couldn’t lose her. “I think the baby’s all right,” I said softly, trying to comfort her. “We got the fire out before it got above your knees. Your baby wasn’t touched.”
Somehow I think my words must have reached Caroline, for her hands went to her stomach and she stroked it before she closed her eyes again. I got some of the salve Caroline had made for our many cuts and scrapes when she first had come to the forty, and rubbed it over her legs. Caroline cringed, but I managed to cover her legs with the salve. Then I waited.
When Ma Jones arrived with Nathan, first thing she did was put her hand on Caroline’s stomach. She waited, and Nathan and I did too. Ma Jones nodded. “Good. Baby still kickin’.” She asked me what I had done for Caroline. I told her. She nodded, then she ordered Nathan and me to leave the cabin. “I’ll take care of her now,” she said.
Outside, Nathan and I sat on the stumps. Fortunately for us, the wind had died and the fire from the brush had burned itself out. “What ya think, Paul?” Nathan asked fearfully. “Caroline, she gonna be all right?”
I looked at him and tried to reassure him. “She’s strong,” I said. “She’ll be fine. She’s got to be.”
Ma Jones stayed on in that cabin day after day as Caroline fought back her pain, and all Nathan and I could do was keep on working and pray we didn’t lose Caroline as well as her baby. Tom Bee came, and Horace Avery, and we kept on cutting trees and praying. I saw Caroline each day before I set out to work at the dawn. I checked on her when I came from chopping, and each night before I went to the shed I looked in on her once more. But each time I did, she looked at me with glazed-over eyes without recognition. Each night when I settled upon my straw cot, I said a prayer for Caroline and her child, and she stayed on my mind until I fell asleep, then filled my dreams. Finally, one day, Ma Jones called me to the cabin and she said to me, “Look like she comin’ outa it.”
I went in, and Caroline turned her head to me. I went closer and knelt beside her bed. “Maybe you’ll listen to me now,” I said softly. “Told you a long time ago, Caroline Perry Thomas, to stop doing all this hard work. I won’t have you dying on me. I can’t hardly carry on for both you and Mitchell.”
Caroline’s eyes smiled at my chiding, and her lips did the same. Then she put out her hand and took mine.
It was more than a month before Caroline was up again. Her baby was expected in less than five weeks, but once she was able to walk, she insisted on being up and doing, even though we could tell she was still in pain. Ma Jones had sent her grand-daughter to stay with Caroline during her healing time, and once Caroline decided she was able to do for herself, she sent the girl home along with several bushels of corn and other vegetables from the garden, as well as two of our chickens. She didn’t ask my permission about sending any of the vegetables with the girl; she did ask, however, about the chickens. She’d planted and worked most of the garden herself, so I guess she figured the vegetables were hers to give; the chickens she must have figured belonged in part to me, since hers had bred with the ones I had bought. I was happy to give the girl the chickens. Fact, if Caroline had asked for them, I would have given the girl all the chickens.
September had come, and with Caroline doing better and the baby soon due, I looked forward to receiving my ownership papers on the forty from Filmore Granger, for all the trees I had agreed to cut had been run down the creek. As soon as I had title to the forty, I could get my money from John Lawes and seal my deal with J. T. Hollenbeck. In the meantime, Nathan and I had begun to pick the cotton. We had started picking in August, and I had sold a bale of the cotton along with the plow to pay the last monthly note. I intended to sell the rest as soon as I could. Whatever cotton was left unpicked, John Lawes had agreed to purchase. He had also agreed to purchase two of my mules, and I had found another buyer for the third mule I intended to sell. Soon I figured to have all the money I needed to own the land. We were within two weeks of seeing all our hard work pay off when Filmore Granger came to see me. I figured he had brought the papers to the forty.
I found out differently.
“Paul,” Filmore Granger said when he had dismounted, “I hear you trying to buy land J. T. Hollenbeck’s selling.”
I wasn’t sure where this was leading. “We have a contract,” I replied cautiously.
“J. T. Hollenbeck bought that land from my daddy, land my daddy had to sell for taxes after the war. Now you’re trying to buy it?”
I didn’t say anything. I just waited for him to get on with what was on his mind.
He looked around. “You’ve got yourself a lot of land cleared here. Sizeable amount of cotton planted.”
“As we agreed,” I said, taking note of Caroline, who had come from the garden and stopped near the cabin with a basket loaded with vegetables. “Any land I cleared, I could plant.”
Filmore Granger ignored my words, looked back at me, and went on. “Heard you planning to sell these forty acres of mine to help pay for that land Hollenbeck’s selling. That right?”
Now, I didn’t figure that was any of Filmore Granger’s business, what I was doing with land that was now rightfully mine, but I couldn’t say that to him outright. I knew I had to watch my words. “Well, you know, Mister Granger, our agreement was that after I’d cut all the trees for you, the land became mine. That means I can sell it, if I choose.”
“Ah, naw! Not as you choose!” he thundered, the soft words now gone. “This here is not your land yet! Now, I told you the first day you come riding up here that I wasn’t going to stand for any pilfering of my trees, but I see you been helping yourself to them anyway! You’ve been helping yourself to plenty of my good trees not on this forty acres!”
I stared at Filmore Granger, then I glanced over at Caroline, watching, and I tried to hold on to my temper, to do what was best for her. I didn’t want to let my words spew out like I felt like doing. I thought on my daddy. “Mister Granger,” I said, meeting his eyes, “I was very careful about the tree line we marked. All the cutting was done on the forty. We never stepped a foot off it.”