Walk on Earth a Stranger

I watch him walk away, the hole growing wider and deeper. Sunshine falls onto his shoulders, lighting him up like a torch, and for a moment I can hardly breathe.

He pauses. Turns. Sadness tugs at his eyes as he says, “Seems like I’ve been waiting for you to come around my whole life, Lee. But a man can’t wait forever and stay a man.”

And with that, my best friend in the whole world is gone.

Chapter Six

I’ve hardly closed the door on Jefferson’s retreating back before another knock sounds. I smooth down my hair and check my hairpins before opening it again. It’s Mrs. Smith, wife to the judge and mother of Annabelle.

“Oh, Leah dear, I was worried something had happened to you.” She frees one spindly, gloved hand from its fur muff to pat my cheek, but her gaze moves beyond me, roves the interior of the house. Looking for untidiness to gossip about, I’ll wager. Or hoping giant sacks of gold will magically appear on the kitchen table.

“Everyone is waiting for you graveside,” she explains at last.

She’s wearing a funeral-appropriate black gown with velvet panels, but it’s her locket that catches my eye and makes my throat buzz a little. It’s gold, like Mama’s, and etched with interlinking hearts. It contains photographs of her husband and Annabelle, taken when the Smiths visited Charleston on holiday. I know this because Annabelle told everyone at school about it when they got back.

Mama would never have allowed such an expense. The locket I now wear contains a tiny tuft of my baby brother’s hair.

“Aren’t you coming, dear?”

Does Mrs. Smith realize how lucky she is to have a whole family? “Yes,” I say to the locket. “I . . . I just needed a moment to myself.”

“Of course.” Her tone holds a whiff of disapproval. “I’ll walk with you.”

“Thank you.”

She grabs my hand and yanks me out the door. Judge Smith waits in the walkway, and he tips his hat as we descend the stairs. “Glad to see you, Miss Leah,” he says.

I mumble something polite as the Smiths take up posts at each shoulder. They are both long and lanky, and they walk with unerring purpose and perfect posture, certain of their significance in this world. I am towered over. Hemmed in. Imprisoned.

Jefferson’s words return to me like a clanging church bell. I’ll wait for you in Independence.

When we arrive, others are already gathered around the snow-dusted mounds that mark my parents’ graves. The air smells of freshly turned earth. Almost everyone wears black. They huddle in groups, bundled against the cold, their breaths frosting the air. It’s more people than I’d like to see right now, but less than my parents deserve.

Annabelle Smith is the height of fashion, even in mourning black, with a rabbit-fur cape and a poke bonnet with blue silk flowers and long, trailing ribbons. Her young slave, Jeannie, stands a pace behind her, shivering in a thin muslin dress. Reverend Wilson has already taken up his post behind the twin wooden crosses, his huge Bible in one arm and his huge wife under the other.

I’m surprised to see Jefferson’s da. He wears his buckskin coat over stained trousers, and he stares dolefully as I approach, his red nose brighter than ever. Does Mr. McCauley realize Jefferson has run away?

Beside him is Free Jim Boisclair, the richest Negro in Lumpkin County and a great friend to my daddy. He speaks in hushed tones to a few others I recognize from our infrequent visits to the Methodist church. He points to something in his hand. A leaflet, with writing I can’t make out. Several others are clutching leaflets too. There’s a buzz in the air, like when everyone is worked up to hear a new preacher. I can’t shake the feeling that the leaflet is the main attraction and the funeral a mere afterthought.

Upon seeing me, the reverend clears his throat. Conversations die around me. My face warms under the scrutiny of silence, and I’m almost relieved when he launches into his eulogy.

To my dismay, it turns out to be a sermon. He speaks of the toils of this life and how sometimes our troubles make us want to escape to far-off places instead of standing strong in the Lord’s grace. He says the love of gold is the root of all evil and we should be storing up treasures in heaven instead.

Tears prick at my eyes. No one would blame me for shedding a few, but I hold them back anyway, because I don’t want to let rage tears flow when my parents deserve grief. It’s not right, the reverend using their deaths as an excuse to give us all a talking-to.

I’m in a bit of a haze and grateful for it when Annabelle Smith—who wrongly thinks she has the voice of an angel and always sings loudest in church—barrels through all six stanzas of “Amazing Grace.” Everyone comes to shake my hand and tell me how sorry they are and that God is looking out for me as one of his sparrows and do I need anything?

Mr. McCauley hangs back. Gone is his angry scowl. He wrings his hat in his hands and glances around as if searching for something. Finally, he approaches.

“You seen Jefferson?” he asks.

I echo his own words back at him. “Dunno where that boy run off to.”

My mockery is lost on him. “Sorrel mare is gone. And my rifle. I found this by his bed.” He shoves one of the leaflets in my face. “Dog’s gone too.”

I snatch it from his hand and look it over. It’s an advertisement for the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, promising to take passengers to California, beginning in the spring, for the sum of two hundred dollars. This is what everyone’s so excited about. This is what the reverend is speaking out against.

Mr. McCauley says, “You think he went to catch a boat?”

I pin him with a gaze, and he shifts uncomfortably.

My heart starts to soften toward him, but then I remember Jefferson’s busted eye. “He’s probably halfway to Savannah,” I say. “If you leave now, you can catch up.” Keeping the leaflet, I turn my back on him.

Annabelle Smith finds me next. She clasps my hands and says, “I’m so sorry, Lee. I wish . . . I mean . . . I’m just sorry.” She can’t meet my gaze, but her words have a ring of sincerity.

“I’m glad you came,” I say automatically. But suddenly it’s true. I watch her back as she walks away, wondering what it would be like to have a girl for a friend.

Free Jim is next in line. His dark hand closes around my cold, pale one—too tight and too warm—and I blurt, “I’ll make good on Daddy’s credit, Mr. Boisclair, I promise. I just need a little time to—”