Mystery of the Dark Tower (2 page)

And now Papa was talking about leaving Mama. Bessie couldn't think of nothing to do to fix this. Then it was like she could hear Grandma's voice, saying “If anger come down on you so hard you can't think, then there ain't but one thing left to do. Let it go. Cry it on out.” Bessie whimpered into her hands. She cried for Grandma, Eddie, Mama, Papa, and herself.

Bessie finally wiped her face with the tail of her pajama top and sneaked back into her room. She got in bed and curled up around Eddie so they made an S shape together. She put her arms around her little brother and held back her sobs. At long last, she fell asleep.

Bessie woke in a haze of someone shaking her.

“Bessie. Bessie, get up now, girl. Come on.”

It was Papa.

Bessie squeezed her eyes tighter. Maybe he would leave her be.

Papa lit the bedside lamp. “Bessie, I need you to get up and get ready. Then get your brother ready. We got to go. Hurry up now.”

Bessie stretched her eyes as wide as sleep would let her. “What do you mean, Papa? Where we going?”

“We're going on the train. We ain't got much time. Come on, baby girl.”

This was serious. Papa only used “baby girl” when he didn't want to say what he had to say.

“Papa, what about Mama?” Bessie asked as Mr. Cannon's words popped into her head. “Is Mama going on the train, too?”

Papa's eyes filled with tears. “Baby girl, I ain't got time to talk now. We got to leave. The train, it don't wait for folks. Come on now.”

Papa yanked the quilt off the bed and bundled it under his arm. He began stuffing things into an old suitcase. He closed the worn suitcase and walked to the door with it.

“Mama's gotta pick out Eddie's clothes to wear,” Bessie said, tears coming to her eyes.

Papa said softly, “Your mama can't come right now, so you pick them out for Eddie. Now hurry up.”

Bessie stood very still. “I ain't leaving Mama, Papa. I just ain't,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

Papa turned around. With quick, long steps he walked back to the bed. “Bessie Carol Coulter,” he said, raising his voice, “you gonna do what I tell you. I said get dressed and help your brother. You both better be ready by the time I'm back.”

Bessie cried as she pulled on her clothes. She sniffled loudly as she helped Eddie get dressed. Eddie sniffled along with his sister. Bessie put on her socks and shoes and hurriedly pulled on her jacket. All the while she was thinking,
Papa can't leave Mama. They's married. Mama always say, “Papa the best man in the whole world.”

“What's h-h-happening, Bessie?” Eddie asked.

“Don't worry. I'll be with you.” Bessie clasped Eddie's hand and squeezed until the blood drained from their fingers.

Papa rushed back into the room. “Come on. Hurry. Mr. Cannon's taking us to the train in his truck.” He grabbed Eddie up.

“But Papa,” Bessie cried, “where's Mama? Ain't we gonna even say good-bye?”

Papa didn't look down at her. He took her hand and pulled her by the arm through the house, toward the grumbling truck outside. Bessie whipped her head around, looking for Mama.

“Mama?” Bessie called, trying to pull her hand out of Papa's grip. “Mama!” she yelled, louder.

Eddie struggled. “M-m-mama!” he called, tears streaming down his face.

Bessie jerked away from Papa and raced to the bedroom door. She yanked the door latch. It was bolted. She thought she heard a sob from behind the door. “Maaamaa,” Bessie cried again, frantic now. “Mama, come on out, please,” Bessie pleaded, wildly pulling on the door. “Mama, come on!”

“Here now, child,” Mr. Cannon said, snatching Bessie up by the waist. “Tour mama gonna be all right. Come on now.”

Bessie barely heard him. “Maaamaa. Maaamaa. Come with us, Mama,” she called, struggling to free herself from Mr. Cannon's clawish hands. Bessie felt as though her heart were breaking into tiny little pieces, like nuts cracked open at Christmastime. “Maaamaa. Maaamaa,” she screamed as Mr. Cannon dragged her out onto the porch.

Eddie banged his fists into Papa's chest, trying to get down. Mr. Cannon plopped Bessie onto the truck seat. He jumped in and revved the engine. Papa, still holding Eddie tightly, leaped in on the passenger side. Bessie could see her brother's face turning red as he yelled. Bessie screamed and yelled with him.

As the truck lurched forward, Bessie spotted Brownie at the edge of the fence. The mare kicked up dust and whinnied as if she knew what was happening. Bessie felt as confused as a bumblebee trapped inside a jar. She squirmed to look back out the truck window as they rumbled up the dirt road. The truck took them past their cornfields and the rows of string beans and watermelons. They rode out past the pig trough and the field where their two milk cows grazed and along the edge of the pond toward town.

Bessie was afraid she might be smelling the sweetness of the apple orchards and the honeysuckle for the last time. She cried as she listened to the distant call of a whippoorwill singing them a good-bye song. Finally, exhausted, she cried herself to sleep.

When Bessie woke up, they were in town. She peered out the truck window and saw the man who sat high up in the little wooden house beside the railroad tracks. His job was to put the wooden arm down or up, to let people know if it was safe to cross the train tracks. Bessie usually loved seeing the man in his little house and always waved to him. But not tonight.
I
wish the man would make the train stay right here and never leave Burlington, North Carolina
, she thought as Papa lifted her up on one hip and Eddie on the other and carried them crying into the colored section of the ugly iron train.

Bessie wiped her tears with her sleeve as she heard the rumbling of the train on the tracks and the whistle blowing. The bouncing vibration of the train's wheels reminded Bessie of riding Brownie. She wondered if Brownie had knocked down the fence to follow her. But Bessie knew she hadn't. Papa built sturdy fences.

Bessie finally sat up straight and looked around the car. A few people were eating from shoeboxes as though they were having a picnic. Some people were asleep, and others read from Bibles.

“Where we going, Papa?” Bessie asked weakly, choking back tears. But even as she asked the question, she knew. This had to be the Southern Crescent. It came through Burlington in the wee hours of the morning, five days a week. The whistle always
whooo
ed when it got into town. After picking up a few passengers, it pulled out, singing its whistling song.

This was the train Mama told her about, the one that connected the South to the North. Bessie had never been on a train before. She'd always dreamed of riding on the mighty Southern Crescent, but not like this—not without Mama.

Papa whispered to her, “Bessie Carol, I promise everything will be all right.” He added weakly, “It'll be fine. Honest.”

Bessie laid her head back in the crook of Papa's arm. Papa rubbed her head gently, the way he did when she fell asleep on him at church while the choir sang the words of her favorite song, “Amazing Grace.”

Bessie raised her head just a little, enough to see where Eddie was. He lay sleeping on the seat next to them, leaning against Papa.

“But what about Mama? Where's Mama?” Bessie whispered.

“Your mama's home,” Papa said. “Your mama can't come just yet. But she gonna come. Soon.”

“Why didn't she say good-bye?”

“Mama needs to stay in her room and rest,” Papa said.

“Where we going? Where we going without Mama?”

Papa turned his head toward the window. For a minute he sounded like he was choking. Then, still gazing out the window, he said, “We're going to Harlem. Harlem, New York. We're staying with your Aunt Esther and Aunt Nellie for a spell. Aunt Esther won't be there when we get there. She's in Boston seeing about her daughter. Aunt Nellie is expecting us, though.”

“I don't want to go to Harlem, Papa,” Bessie said. “I don't want to be in New York.”

Papa hugged Bessie close. “You gonna love New York. You'll see. It'll be all right. I promise.”

Bessie laid her head down on Papa's knee. She gently touched Eddie's hand and laced her fingers in his. Eddie slept on, but Bessie knew he felt her. It was their sign that no matter what happened, they would stand together.

There was no way to make going to Harlem be all right, no matter how many promises Papa made. Bessie was not even impressed when they changed trains in Washington, D.C., to the Pennsylvania Railroad. It didn't matter to her that now they could sit in any car, not just the one for coloreds. The truth was, Bessie hated Harlem already. Nothing could ever be all right again—not without Mama—and never, ever in old, stinking, ratty Harlem.

C
HAPTER
2

H
ATING
H
ARLEM

From the moment Bessie stepped off the train in New York's Grand Central Station, she struggled to remember how angry she was about coming to Harlem and to feel the pain of missing Mama. But she had to admit, she'd only seen one other thing in her life that made her so excited—a kaleidoscope in the general feed store back home in Burlington. When she'd picked up the long cylinder and placed her eye where the man showed her, her heart had burst open with joy—so many colors, so many shapes, so wonderful! That's what Bessie saw when she first laid eyes on New York City.

Papa hustled them out to the street. He put his fingers into his mouth and gave a shrill whistle. A colored man driving a car swerved over to the side of the street and hopped out.

“Good afternoon, sir,” he said. He helped Papa put the bags in the trunk, and directed them into the backseat.

“Who is he, Papa?” Bessie asked.

“He works driving people in this taxi,” Papa said, holding Bessie and Eddie close to him.

As they drove, the taxi driver pointed out statues and buildings. Bessie stared out the window in amazement. Iron posts with white bulbs attached to them stood along streets that were paved. The streets even had places for people to walk. Papa said they were called sidewalks. People rushed along the sidewalks, going in all directions. Cars bunched together like metal cows, honking their horns instead of mooing. The buildings were all brick. Some were so tall they looked as if they were pushing up into the clouds. It sure wasn't like the dirt streets of Burlington, where Bessie had lived all her life.

After riding for a while, the driver announced proudly, “This is the famous Lenox Avenue in Harlem.”

Bessie was surprised to see a colored police officer directing traffic in the middle of the street. He looked important in his crisp uniform with shiny buttons. And he was telling the white drivers which way to go, too!

Bessie's grandma used to say, “Ain't nothing worse than wanting to be mad and feeling glad instead.” That's just how Bessie felt when she, Eddie, and Papa pulled up in front of the stone house at 124th Street in Harlem. Bessie had never imagined that her aunts lived in such a fine house. Green ivy climbed the tall building, like wisteria vines on an arbor, and other houses crowded it on both sides. Steps led to two doors, and over the doors were pale stone arches that looked like crowns.

When Papa knocked on one of the doors, a woman not much taller than Bessie appeared. Her hair was completely straight and hung down past her ears.

“Lord,” she said, grinning. “Come on in. If you ain't a sight for sore eyes!” she continued loudly. “This must be Bessie, and this is little Eddie. Why, I ain't seen you children in a month of Sundays. Get on in here and give your Aunt Nellie a hug.”

Bessie and Eddie hugged their papa's sister.

“Go on,” Aunt Nellie said. “Look around at your new house while I talk to your papa for a spell.”

Bessie and Eddie held hands, their fingers laced together.

“Go on. Have a look around,” Papa said.

Her aunts' house had four spacious rooms with mantled fireplaces, plus a kitchen. The walls were covered with what appeared to be flowered satin. When Eddie and Bessie finished looking at the pretty rooms, they stopped short near a set of stairs that led up. They could hear their aunt whispering. But even her whispers were loud.

“You right, Big Ed,” Aunt Nellie was saying. “It's a shame about your wife. A real shame.”

Bessie held her finger up to her lips, so Eddie would know not to make a sound. She motioned with her hand for him to stay put. Bessie tiptoed toward the room where Papa and Aunt Nellie were talking.

Aunt Nellie said, “Lord, you got to be glad there's a roof over her head. But ain't nothing you can do. You had to leave your wife, Ed. And now, you've got to think about the children.”

Papa broke into tears. Aunt Nellie hugged him.

Bessie had never seen her papa cry. This was even worse than she had thought. Were her parents truly separated? Is that why Mama wouldn't say good-bye?