Alligator Bayou - Donna Jo Napoli [19]
Joseph sits beside Frank Raymond, not even leaning on anything as he lowers himself. He’s agile for someone so old.
“Joseph, this is my friend Calogero.”
Joseph nods as I walk up to them.
“A pleasure.” The instant I say that, I feel stupid. Americans say hello, not a pleasure. I’m translating from the Sicilian, ’cause that gun made me so nervous.
“Calogero had never heard of an Indian before today.”
Joseph sits taller, his eyes on me. “Now you see the whole tribe. I am Joseph. I am the Tunica tribe.”
I sit beside him. “How can you be a whole tribe?”
“A hundred years ago they drove my tribe from the lower basin of the Yazoo River south into Louisiana. Near where the Red River comes closest to the titik—the big river—the Mississippi. People there still call themselves Tunica. Maybe fifty of them. But they are mixed breed. I am the only full-blooded Tunica left alive.”
“What does mixed breed mean?”
“It is your blood. They have names for different blood. If one parent is white, the other Negro, they call you mulatto. If one or both are mixed, they call you griffe or sacatra or quadroon or octoroon, depending on how much Negro blood and how much white blood you have.”
“Why? Who cares?”
“The French fools over in Cane River country. They are strict about who can do what—who can eat where, what people can walk ahead of what other people. But with the Indians it is just are you full-blooded, or do you have Negro or white blood in you—then, mixed breed. I am full-blooded Tunica. The only one. I am the Tunica tribe.”
“I guess that means I’m full-blooded Sicilian. Not the only one.”
“Sicilian?” Joseph shakes his head. “We do not let Sicilians off the boat in Indian ports. You brought the yellow fever.”
“We did?” What’s yellow fever? I look at Frank Raymond.
“That’s just putting blame where they want it to go,” says Frank Raymond.
“You sure about that?” asks Joseph.
“Yellow fever breaks out when people are poor and crowded together and dirty and hot and the bugs are biting like mad. It doesn’t matter what blood you have. Sicilians didn’t bring yellow fever.”
“So why would anyone say that?” I ask.
“If you don’t want people to like someone, just call him disease infected.”
“Lies.” Joseph clicks his tongue. “They tell lies about Indians, too. If I had stayed by the Red River, well… yaxci …”
“What’s that mean?” I ask.
“I would get angry. I would get sick.”
“Which one? Angry or sick?”
“It is one word in Tunica. If you are angry, you are sick. Too much ugly in that part of the world. I would have ended angry and sick; so the Tunica tribe would have ended angry and sick. That is not an honorable ending for an honorable people. I crossed the titik—the big river—back to our land, so the tribe could end properly. But Vicksburg people are nosy, and would not leave me alone. I had to cross the great titik yet again to find quiet.” He looks around. “This is my burial ground.”
He’s come here to die. I pull my knees to my chest, wrap my arms around them.
Frank Raymond goes over to Granni. He unties the rolled-up canvas from his saddle, and brings it to Joseph.
Joseph inspects the painting, and smiles. “Ya–deer. Are you hungry?” He goes into his shack and comes out with two blackish brown squares.
Frank Raymond chews on his. So I try it. Salty and tough and wonderful.
“Dried venison,” says Frank Raymond.
Joseph goes into the shack again and comes out with a bundle wrapped in wet cloth. He opens it. It’s a large lump of gray clay. He uses a thin sheet of bark to slice off a hunk for Frank Raymond, and another for me, and a third for himself. Then he wraps up the rest and puts it back away in his shack.
Joseph looks at me solemnly. “Every Tunica man knows how to make pottery.”
“Every single one?”
“I know how. So it is true.” He smiles.
He