Angels Make Their Hope Here Read online

  “As we discussed. I want a photograph made of my wife,” Duncan said.

  He’d pulled himself taller than his usual tall and straighter than his usual straight; had handed her down from the wagon with a formal grace; had guided her, arm entwined, knotted with his; had ushered her into the photographer’s office with a dancer’s demeanor and now spoke with a careful, authoritative voice. Dossie knew she was simply to do as she was told. She was to be looked at, to be gazed at, to be captured so that she would always be as perfectly pretty as she was on this day. Duncan had said this with his first cup of coffee that morning. He’d chuckled at her embarrassed smile, her lips hidden by her hand, her eyes startled by his words. He’d repeated it on the ride to town in order to make her smile again and not be dumb with shyness, but also so that she’d know what he wanted.

  He teased her saying that one day way far off, when she was forced to give up her claim to the crown of beauty, he’d have this to remind him of her glory. And, long after he had passed away, when her grandchildren asked her, she could show them she was not always bent and gray. Her face was taken over so quickly with expressions of dismay, with unconsidered consequences, with bewilderment, that he regretted joshing. Duncan vowed he would not show his treasure to anyone. He said he would not even show the photograph to her for fear she would become too taken with herself. He’d tapped her nose then and said, “Yes, that is a danger!” Yes, the ear jewels were her wedding present, and this portrait of her was his.

  The photographer was smelly, and Dossie wanted to squeeze tight on her nose and hide behind Duncan to avoid him. The man touched her elbow lightly, and she was startled. He led her across the room, placed her arm upon a pedestal, and commanded her to stand perfectly still. Dossie glanced at Duncan, and he reassured her with a pleasant yet formal look in his eyes. Accede. You are safe. I alone am watching you. Dossie saw that Duncan watched the photographer’s movements closely. He said he’d visited the studio and taken a measure of this man who fashioned photographs. He said he did not want a charlatan or bungler to capture his beloved’s photograph.

  The photographer was careful with his own face. He didn’t give away much surprise when he saw Dossie, though clearly Dossie was not what he had expected.

  He had never seen a real colored gal before and quite frankly had thought Smoot would bring in an ugly old crone whose sagging, wrinkled, hairy face he’d wanted to enshrine in memory. But Smoot entered the shop with a veritable doll on his arm. Carefully and stylishly dressed from head to toe, she moved across the floor with such grace that it appeared Duncan Smoot piloted her and that her feet did not touch the ground. When Smoot unhanded her finally—finally relinquishing her to be posed beside the pedestal—the photographer thought she might not be able to stand alone. But she stood erect on feet that, unshod, must look like two small loaves of Christmas cake if they were the same color as her hands and face and neck above the dress collar of shockingly white, stiff lace.

  Not until Duncan Smoot reiterated his request for a formal portrait of his wife did the doll raise her head, setting her earrings sparkling and illuminating the room with her arresting, piercing eyes. Her cap of hair aroused the photographer’s curiosity. How odd that a Negress wore no head scarf or hat! Her hair was pressed to the sides of her head, pulled away from her face and caught in ropelike strands that did not escape her arrangement at any place along her face or neck. It was, he imagined, held in place with some fragrant gloss and hidden device that was most likely bear grease and bone, though she had absolutely no aroma of bear about her.

  When he could break his eyes free of her face, the man observed that she was not so small in stature as he’d first thought. She was small, demure for a pure Negress, and she made him think of all kinds of edible delights. Perhaps his anticipation of the fee and the dinner he intended to buy with it accounted for his thoughts of cakes and compotes. He noticed with disdain that she was finely, carefully groomed. He decided she must be a working gal who’d hoodwinked an old man to make her honest. There was simply no such a thing as a true, honest matron so black as tar. He controlled his gaze and chuckled to himself when he operated his lenses.

  He posed her delicately. His fingertips never actually touched her. He hadn’t realized that a pure Negress smelled like Christmas cakes, like sacks of spice, or like flowers found in deep woodland. A pleasant whiff of spice fragrance that contrasted sharply with his wife’s milk-and-butter smell, that had a strong appeal to his nose, rose whenever Smoot’s wife rustled herself. The photographer cajoled her to be still, though he wished she might swan about and spread her spicy aroma around the room.

  4

  DOSSIE REMOVED HER APRON before sitting on the step near Duncan’s porch chair. He called her to sit close by him so that her voice could be soft. Likewise the soft fabric of her dress delighted him. Dossie ran through a set of birdcalls as the day faded, and Duncan sharpened his small knives. He seemed to like having her sit in a quiet, beautiful composure, though she was, on this evening, wearied from a long day’s work at tasks he had given her. Duncan asked her to read out passages from the Bible, and he queried her about the habits of certain animals, the attributes of specific plants, and the cycles of the moon.

  Dossie knew Duncan watched her and her body. It is important to note that he did both. She knew he watched her demeanor especially—the way she conducted herself about her work duties. She knew he had spoken to Noelle about her abilities at reading and writing and to Hat about her sewing and cooking instruction. He seemed to judge her diligence or deficiency at tasks and to be asking more questions and listening more closely than ever. This back and forth gave Duncan chances to look down at her, and Dossie felt the heat in his glances. There was a change, subtle yet verifiable. He no longer behaved like an indulgent father.

  She judged him, too. Perhaps Duncan knew it? Dossie watched him. He was a well-formed man in his face. The high regard in which he held himself was etched across his forehead. He never shied from looking at just what he wanted to gaze on. And to follow his gaze in a group of talking folk was to know what was what and what and who was important. His dark, piercing eyes validated, recognized. His body was formed handsomely also. His waist seemed to be the base of him as if it were a pedestal upon which the upper part of his body rested. He was well built—all above his waist was muscled and strong without being coarse and brutish. His legs, though, gave him the height—the vantage over the heads of others. This was what picture Dossie liked: Duncan standing straight up tall and looking over the heads of others.

  When she was a child she had considered her own body and wondered—considering herself as against Miz Hat or even Noelle Beaulieu—if she was up to scratch for a woman in Russell’s Knob. The women were so beautifully arranged, and Dossie worried that she wouldn’t come up to the snuff of that and would end up being just Duncan’s servant girl.

  His sausage and its biscuits were lovely, too. Dossie had seen them. One afternoon when he went for swimming and soaking in the stream she had followed unobserved. Dossie had been left in the kitchen at her duties when Duncan had sauntered off. A devilish tingle of adventure and shame had coursed through her. She found a place to hide that gave a clear view. She watched. It was a quirk that Duncan Smoot was fond of bathing. He enjoyed it, though it was not a habit of most men to dip themselves fully into a barrel or a stream. “You stink, boy. Take a wash,” Dossie had heard Duncan admonish Jan often, for the boy hated to wash himself all over. Jan boasted that it was unmanly to bathe and was chiefly the reason that women were so fragile. Their reliance on bathing themselves undermined their health. Duncan Smoot, neither fragile nor unhealthy, was an anomaly.

  That Duncan was unaware of her could only mean that he lost himself to his everyday when he came here. He plunged into the stream and cavorted in the water before returning to the rocks. He rubbed his skin to mash away pimples caused by chill air on his wet nakedness. His jasper did not emerge until he rubbed on it. He walked around with
his head down, rubbing absently at himself, then squatted and lit a cigar. When it caught he smoked it languidly. Leaning his back against a rock—sitting on the rock ledge in a place worn soft for naked sitting—he rubbed and stroked himself.

  Dossie felt the invisible ants of cold excitement. She put her fingers in her mouth to stop it up—so that she could make no sound. She pulled back farther from view and ducked her head. But she went back to watching him, and soon enough she worked her fingers inside her mouth in concert with the picture before her. She watched Duncan through it all until he climaxed himself, slipped back into the stream, swam about, then pulled himself to the rock ledge to doze with his hand over his groin. When she realized he was very deeply asleep, she slipped away.

  The next time she peeped on him her fingers wove under her chemise and she touched her breasts. Duncan Smoot was so beautiful, be it shameful or not to say so, it was so. His body was a nut of loveliness! Though Dossie remained a virgin, after weeks of watching, peeping on, tailing Duncan, and touching herself, she was no longer chaste.

  Duncan opened the window on the idea of Dossie being his woman by saying that he guessed her pretty nipples must be like two blueberries upon a bush waiting to be touched.

  “What you say? Are they ripe yet?”

  Dossie’s mouth came open in surprise. She dropped the pan of beans she held and bolted out the door.

  When she returned, Duncan was seated at the table with his coffee. He looked up at her as if he were puzzled about where and why she’d gone off. He worked at rolling a cigar. “You get los’ on the way to the shit hole?” He laughed as if genuinely tickled by his own jest. “I know you been pinching those blueberries lately. Maybe I’m better at it than you.”

  Later Duncan stood in the doorway of her bedroom. She saw him and was shocked and turned away. His hammer jutted out before him, and he stood and rubbed on it and looked in at her. Dossie closed her eyes and pretended to be asleep. He did nothing more than stand and watch her.

  Later he said that he simply crossed the stream. He saw a flower whose beauty startled him and he crossed to it. Its beauty drew him. In this way Dossie came to think that she was responsible for all that came of the seduction.

  Duncan surprised Dossie when he came to her bed in the early morning. His mouth was sour and scratchy and he put it all over her. He said, “My blueberries,” when he pulled up her gown and put his lips on her breasts. Dossie giggled. He moved her into his arms and held her like he needed the warmth from her body. But he didn’t need it because his skin was hot enough to boil, and his sweat made moisture on her nightdress.

  “Do you want me, Dossie?” Duncan asked. She was puzzled—caught by surprise. She remained quiet. She said nothing to him, nor did she move from the bed.

  It seemed like a silly question. Dossie had never shrunk from Duncan. She had only wanted him; had attended upon his wants since she had come to his heaven; had always and only been waiting for his call. So it only mattered now if he wanted her.

  And here he came into her bed without any of his clothes on and she didn’t scream out or tell him to stop it and he asked her if she wanted him. His swollen hammer was making his head swim, Dossie thought. Duncan was certainly silly-talking this morning! Animals were making their morning noises and she wanted to laugh out loud.

  “Yes,” Dossie said in a urgent whisper because she got frightened that he would be put off by silence. “What mus’ I do, Duncan?”

  Duncan took a turn at surprise. He was flummoxed to hear his name called so intimately.

  Dossie tried to wiggle away from him because she got to thinking that she was not clean and wanted to get up and wash.

  “Come here an’ be tol’ wha’ to do,” Duncan said and straightened Dossie’s nightgown. He fixed coffee with a shot of whiskey for them both, though she could drink very little of hers, and he finished it as well as his own. He brought her a shawl and her moccasins and walked off. He turned only once to see that she followed.

  When the day’s sun got higher and was getting ever hotter on the rocks of his bathing place, Duncan patted Dossie’s hind parts. “Go to the henhouse and get some eggs and fix me a good breakfast, woman.” He stood, stretched his long, naked body, and went into the water.

  When his heat was taken away and only the sweat and sauces of their bodies were left, Dossie was cool. She watched Duncan’s face to gauge his mood. Yes, he was pleased! She felt a tick of triumph in that. She smiled up at him when he left the water, and he leaned down and planted kisses on her shoulders and her back. She sucked in her breath and shivered under the drops of water. He chucked her under the chin, nudged her with another pat to her butt.

  “Gwan,” he said.

  In late afternoon Duncan walked away from the house at a sauntering pace. He wore soft shoes and took no shotgun or fishing pole. He held his arms behind his back and let them dangle unoccupied. He looked like an odd bird, one who is uncomfortable walking along the ground.

  He felt peculiar in himself as he left the house. He’d fucked Dossie because he couldn’t resist it no more. But he hadn’t thought it through. Ha! Think about it? His jasper had done all of the ruminating. What was he going to make of it? Had he trespassed? He had asked her. Ha! She wanted him, she had said, and seemed to. He knew damned well he had a sway with her. He’d counted on that. Little Bird was so obedient to him now that he was afraid of himself. What was a man s’posed to do when a lucky coin cross his path? He will close his hand around it. He will praise his good fortune.

  But still in all, this ain’ the same as triflin’ with a grown woman, Duncan argued with himself. He was looking at a responsibility with Dossie. If it were Jan or Pet who had done this—started fucking Dossie—Duncan would have chastised her and beaten the boy and made them marry and built them a house. Now what would he do?

  He wanted to run off. Perhaps he would drop a line and fish and think. But he’d left the house with empty hands. He wanted to sweat some and ponder it. Dossie bird! Dossie flower! Dossie girl that is as sweet as a berry! Oh, touching her had pleased him so deeply that he, a practiced fucker, had been quaked. He could still feel his own excitement. He went off to a sweat lodge kept by some old men and sweated, then ended by drinking with them and bragging on his conquest.

  When Duncan came back he stood at the stone wall. He held three rabbits and looked at his house from a distance. Dossie watched him from her always place on the porch. Duncan had come to notice that she stood in the same spot whenever she waited. She positioned herself where she could grab the porch post and wave and hold as if a storm might come to sweep her off. Duncan smiled to think there was so much naïve joy in her. He raised his arm, showed her the string of rabbits, and she made gleeful noises.

  After supper Dossie smiled expectantly and asked, “What mus’ I do?”

  “Gwan to sleep,” Duncan replied out of confusion. She stood still, hesitating. The sweating had made Duncan’s skin soft, and all of his hairs were slicked from the oils the old men slathered on him. Dossie was curious about the feel of the hair pressed to his head and face. She wanted to put her hands on him. She wanted to continue what had begun, and her face fell at his words.

  Yes, it was trespass, Duncan thought. But he hadn’t been able to govern himself. “Quiet, old man,” he whispered. He wanted to go for another sweat. Noelle kept a sweat lodge, but he didn’t want to be in a tangle with her just now. Duncan did not sleep much.

  Dossie woke and listened for Duncan. He was not about the immediate area. There was no smell of coffee or tobacco. She lay still. The bird chatter became very loud. Dossie got up from her bed and built up the fire, made up the day’s coffee, and visited the chickens. She was surprised to feel that she was glad he was not about. She enjoyed the absolute privacy to think about him—to thoroughly enjoy revisiting the events.

  Some days later Dossie chose a call—a name for her mouth for him. She began to call him Uncle like Jan and Pet did, but with a certain turn that changed t
he word. It came upon a happy expulsion of her breath when he put his hand between her legs. “Uncle,” she whispered in surprise at first, then with satisfaction. “Uncle,” she said, meaning man to whom all things belong. She caught at his hand and slowed it and looked up into his face. She whispered, “Uncle.”

  Was it the women’s or the men’s blather that would be worse? Duncan did not want Dossie to be discussed. He couldn’t decide if he wanted to keep secret about his loving her up or not. The boys knew, that was certain. If they hadn’t smelled it on him they could tell by the look on Dossie’s face. Duncan wanted to brag to them, to show off. He wanted to tell them in detail just how sweet it was to fuck her. But if one of them started to talk about her like they usually talked about their girls, then Duncan might not be able to say what he’d do next.

  “I’m stuck on her, Pippy,” Duncan declared when he confessed it to Hat. “I don’t want no other gal than her.”

  “Ha,” she replied and stood with her arms folded across her breasts, looking into her brother’s face. Yes, the People believe a loud, frank confession of sin mitigates it. Proclaim yourself, own up to your weakness, and who but a churl will not forgive you? Who but God has not already been there?

  “Punkin, what possessed you?” Hat exclaimed and stuck her fists into her sides.

  When Hat broke the news to Noelle she served her sweet cakes and coffee and honey. For Noelle, Duncan was a love habit of long standing. Ever since he’d convinced her not to leave for the West with her family, she had been his tuck-up woman. But a woman who does not seal the bargain with marriage or children or land can’t expect permanence.

  “Well, she’s a fine woman then. She’s clipped the old turkey’s feathers,” was all that Noelle said. Clearly, Noelle had missed the point all these years, Hat thought. Punkin was a man and not a turkey or a rooster or a wolf, and Noelle, for all her spells and conjures, hadn’t handled him deftly.