Song of Slaves in the Desert - Alan Cheuse [185]
Ladies! Lady! I am a lady! Liza exulted to herself.
And then she threw up.
***
A few minutes later my mother peered out into the misty depths of Arkansas darkness. The soles of her feet touched free soil. Why go on?
The young Cherokee woman put that question to her.
“Doesn’t everybody talk about an ocean to the far west of us?”
“Yes,” the half-Indian woman said.
“That’s why I’ll keep going. To see that ocean.”
The woman gave her an odd look.
“That river we just crossed ain’t good enough for you?”
Liza shook her head.
“Somehow that fresh water doesn’t call to me.”
“And the ocean does? Why?”
“It must be the salt sea water,” Liza said.
“I never seen it,” the Cherokee woman said.
“Come with me and you will. The other big ocean is behind us. We can’t go back.”
“No, we can’t,” the Cherokee woman said in such a quiet way that Liza considered that she might be thinking about all this.
Liza started counting on her fingers. One, two, three…
“I have about seven more months,” she said.
“Before the baby comes?”
“That’s right.”
“Seven moons is a long time, but it’s supposed to be a big country out there,” the Cherokee woman said.
“Seven moons to reach the ocean,” Liza said, as though thinking out loud. “We can do it!” Death lay behind her, ahead of her all life!
***
Still, time was running out. In wet weather and dry, with sun, cold, wind, wind and fire, smoke and rain, it took them four months, sometimes riding, sometimes walking, to cross the plains, until eventually those majestic western mountains that seemed to rise higher and higher each day both beckoned and barred their way. One night under a sky stippled with stars she and her companion lay together in each other’s arms (as was their way to keep warm) and talked about what might lay ahead for them.
“I’ve heard about the city,” Liza said. “It sits on hills, surrounded on three sides by water.”
“I want no city,” the Cherokee woman said. “I want woods and streams, with here and there a clearing where I can farm.”
“African people, Indians, everyone is free there,” Liza said.
“You say you heard this,” her companion said. “Where? In a dream?”
“I hear people talk,” Liza said. “I’ve always listened.”
A breeze blew across them and they clung all the more tightly to each other. Warmth of desire trickled through their bodies. It had happened a few times before.
“We are kind of free here,” Liza said, kissing the woman on the ear.
“Free, yes, but you killed that man back in Memphis. His ghost may be following us. So you got to keep on going west as far as you can go.”
“You know it’s worse than that,” Liza said, thinking of the dead patrollers on the dark road near The Oaks as she touched her lips to her friend’s smooth cheek.
As if she could read her mind, the Cherokee woman said, “You mustn’t think about those things, they can hurt the growing child.”
“It’s not a child yet,” Liza said. “But I hope it will become one.” She drew back her hand and turned slightly, so that she could touch her belly.
“It will,” said the Cherokee woman. “Before you know it, it will be here.”
That same desiring warmth spread out through Liza’s belly and up into her chest. It was more than just wanting to love her friend this time, it was a desire for hope, too, and in its own way an unspoken prayer for the success of her journey. More than ever, so close to freedom beyond anything she had ever imagined, she wanted the small things to fall into place and make the large things possible.
“What should we do?” her companion said.
“Keep traveling,” Liza said.
“What about staying here? We could build a clay-house. We could live off the buffalo.”
“West,” Liza said.
“I just don’t know if I can go all the way,” her companion said.
“I want you to—” Liza stopped in mid-speech and drew back from her friend. The other woman sat up, listening to the same thing that had distracted Liza.
A great thundering noise rumbled across the prairie. Up they stood and listened to it again.
“A storm?