Devil's Dream - Madison Smartt Bell [5]
“That hoss ain’t gwineter hold up forever,” Ginral Jerry said, turning meat with a chip of greenwood. “No matter what he do.”
CHAPTER THREE
August 1845
AS SOON AS HE had come to the riverbank Forrest understood that Ned would never get that buggy free, the way he was going about it. Ned was a sensible nigger, smart with a horse, but he couldn’t both push from behind and drive from the box at the same time, and the ladies in the buggy were not helping any. They rocked on the leather cushions whenever Ned heaved and the horse thrashed in the shafts, and the silk orbs of their parasols (one blue, one green) bobbed with the wasted motion.
On the far bank, two young gentlemen in their Sunday best sat their horses in the shade of a stand of water maples, waving now and then to encourage the ladies, waiting for the Sons of Ham to sort out the problem—those whose lot it was to labor in the muck. Rodham and Burke—Forrest knew them by sight, from Hernando and Memphis. He glanced at them once as he tied his horse to a low-hanging branch of a live oak and waded out into the stream.
“Well, Neddy, hit don’t look like ye’re gitten nowhar.”
“Nawsuh, I ain’t.” Ned flashed his teeth and ducked his head. He had a fine set of teeth, though up in his forties. A stout nigger for his age, though the job was too much for him. He was up to his waist in the slough. To Forrest, who stood nearly six foot two, it was no more than thigh deep.
“Let’s study a better way to set about it,” he told Ned. By then he had come to the buggy’s left door, and he held up both his hands to the passenger there.
“Ma’am, if ye don’t mind.”
The elder lady peered out through the shivering white fringe of her parasol. “What is it that you mean to do?”
“I mean to carry ye over to yonder bank.” He pointed with his long arm. “Then I’ll tote Miss Montgomery over thar after ye. Then we’ll git yore buggy loose and ye can git back on yore way.”
On the far bank a jay was chattering. Forrest turned his head toward the sound and saw the blue and white wing flash out of the maple leaves. Had the lady still not made up her mind?
“Ma’am,” he said. “Ye best fold up that brolly.”
She seemed to be mostly made of whipstitch and whalebone and weighed no more than a shock of hay. He held her chest-high, to be sure that her skirts would not trail in the wet. He climbed the far bank and set her down, supporting her shoulders till she was sure of her balance.
“Thank you,” she said. “I hardly know what we would have done …”
Forrest looked again at the two mounted dandies. Rodham made as if to touch his hat brim, but didn’t, quite. He had on kid gloves. Both of them wore knee-high calfskin boots which doubtless they didn’t mean to spoil in the mud.
He waded back toward the buggy where Mary Ann Montgomery was waiting. He had seen her a time or two on the streets of Memphis, where she went to buy her clothes, and the second time he had turned right around and watched her out of sight. After that he had learned that she was second of four children and that her mother was a widow who had lived for three years in the new Mississippi town of Horn Lake, where her brother had been appointed pastor of the church. He knew that Mary Ann had been to a finishing school in Nashville and lately had come home to stay with her mother. He knew it was not very likely that they would ever be introduced.
She folded her parasol and stretched out her arms to him with a smile. “Off to the