The Known World - Edward P. Jones [103]
“I don’t want it,” Barnum said. “I won’t have it.” He handed the gold piece back to Travis.
“You’ll take it and you’ll like it,” Travis said, taking out his pistol and again aiming it at Barnum. “You takin the nigger side now? Is that it? You steppin away from the white man and takin the nigger side? Thas what it is?”
“Yeah, thas what it is,” Oden said. “Takin the nigger side against the white man?”
“I just don’t want it, is all,” Barnum said.
Travis rode up beside Barnum, heading south while Barnum was heading north. They were so close their thighs touched and the horses, uncomfortable being so close, began to twitch. Travis put his pistol to Barnum’s temple. “I said you’ll take it and like it.” He put the money inside Barnum’s shirt. “Happy Christmas happy Christmas,” he said.
Barnum rode away.
“And not a word a thanks, huh, Barnum?” Travis shouted after him. “I should report you to Skiffington for not carryin your patrollin duties through to the end. Not a word a thanks, Oden.”
“No,” Oden said, “and not a good night either.”
“We may as well shut the night down,” Travis said. “We have found, tried and punished the one criminal out here tonight. The one true runaway out and about. We may as well shut down the night, Oden.”
“May as well,” and then Oden started up. “Give a greetin to Zara and the chaps for me, willya? Say I’m thinkin bout em.”
“Yes. And a greetin to Tassock and them chaps for me,” Travis said. “I’ll see to the nigger’s wagon. Good night.”
Oden said, “Good night.”
Travis watched him go away and after a few minutes he dismounted and used the fire from Augustus’s lantern to set ablaze the straw in the back of the wagon that cushioned furniture on its way to new owners. When the fire was good and strong, Travis picked up kindling from the side of the road and threw it into the wagon. Then he mounted again and looked at the fire and did not move. He was determined to see the fire through to the end. The horse backed away as the fire grew hotter and Travis let him do it. After nearly an hour, Travis got off the animal, and walking with the reins in his hand, he stood at the fire. His horse was slightly uncomfortable but he turned and reassured it that everything was good and the animal calmed. It was the smartest beast he had ever known. He had taught it to back away when he said the word “Fire.” And at the word “Water” it knew to come forward again. Now the horse stood silent behind him and Travis thought he could hear its heart beating in the quiet with just the crackling of the fire and the insects communicating with one another as the only other sounds in the world. Every now and again the breath of the horse would blow Travis’s hair all about.
He stayed to the end with the fire, watched as the metal on the wagon dropped as all the supporting wood gave way. About one that morning, the fire began to fail, then, nearly an hour later, it went to its dying side, with just a few strong embers here and there. He dropped the reins and took up dirt from the road and poured it over what was left of the fire. Smoke rose, gray, feeble, almost pointless because it went up only a foot or so and then dissipated.
He had first come to know Augustus Townsend many years ago through a chair Augustus had made for a white man in the town of Manchester. The man weighed more than 400 pounds. “Over twenty-seven stones” was how the man put it. He was a bachelor, but that had nothing to do with his weight. Harvey Travis had gone to see the man one day about a woodcutting job. In the man’s parlor was Augustus’s chair, plain, not even painted, but smooth to the touch, and when the man sat in it, the chair did not complain, not one squeak. It just held up and did its job, waiting for the man to put on another 300 pounds. When the man left the room to get Travis’s money, Travis examined the chair, looked all about it trying to discover its secret. The chair gave nothing. It was a very good chair. It