all the ruckus in here? Someone finally woke up?”
“Joe! Joe!” I shout—
“There’s no Joe here. My name’s Patrick, and you, what should I call you?”
“Why you take me here?” I pick up broken bottle, I jab him—
“Whoa, whoa, lass.”
I jab bottle closer—“You tell me where’s Joe? What did you do with Joe?”
He twists my hand, bottle crashes. “Now, we’ll have none of that, there is no Joe here. My name is Patrick.” He pushes me towards chair. Where am I? Heaven hell heaven—
“You must be hungry.”
He brings me a piece of bread and cup of water. I grab it and shove it in my mouth squinting at this blue-eyed man.
“Now, now, slow down, slow down, it will go down easier.” He gives me another piece. My mama warned me of the blue-eyed devils. He takes a puff on his pipe, smoke rises above us, is he praying to the ancestors? “Now what do you call yourself?”
I eat the bread—should I run and find Joe? Maybe Papa will find me.
“So, no words?”
“Where’s Joe! Where’s Joe!” I get up, go outside on porch—“Papa! Joe! Papa, Joe! Where are you?” He holds me down—I fight him, I fight, I fight. My body goes limp. I stop. I can’t move anymore.
“There, there.” He leads me back to barrels and bottles room. He brings me more bread. He makes tea, singing as he makes it. I sit. I eat. I drink. I don’t know where Joe is I don’t know where I am I am lost. I miss my mama. I can feel her soft dark hand on my cheek. “Mama?” I reach out for her, she gets up to leave.
“Mama!” She vanishes. What world have I entered? Papa speaks to me.
Let me tell you how I met your mother. She came to me in a dream first—as a sick deer with big eyes. She showed me the plants that heal. I helped her dig them out and fed them to her. She got better and never left me.
Two black women came to my door, Aunt Julia and Mary. Mary was leaning on Aunt Julia barely able to stand. Mary had the same eyes as the deer in the dream, I recognized her, and she recognized me.
“They say you are a healer.” Aunt Julia approached me. “They won’t take blacks at the hospital. I’m Julia and this is my sister Mary. She’s got TB, I don’t have much, this is what I have.” Julia gave me a small purse. I couldn’t take my eyes off Mary. “Wait,” I said, and I ran out the door into the forest. I ran to the woods in the dream. I offered the plants tobacco, thanked them first and dug them out. I ran as fast as I could back home and boiled the herbs for Mary to drink. Slowly your mama regained her strength, and her coughing stopped. She came to the forest with me, to offer tobacco to the plants. She helped pull up the roots. She stayed with me and learned the ways of the medicine.
We had a wedding, and she was my wife. She helped people who came for medicine, some Indian, some black, we helped whoever came. And you little one was born, and then Joe. The sickness came back, this time it was too strong. I prayed for a dream and fasted in the forest waiting to find the medicine that would save Mary, my love. It rained, sharp, cold rain, the coldness too strong, it took your mama, it was time for her to go. It was her time.
His voice stops, I reach out my hands to catch him—gone. “Papa!” Father Sun rises—I run outside to catch it, to the edge of the river. Across the river is a great bear, he stands on his hind legs. “Papa!” I rush into the river my arms outstretched—he turns around and walks into the woods.
“Lass, you’re going to catch a death out here!” Bird Man’s voice startles me. The river is cold, I want my papa. “Come on, love, come here.” He picks me up, carries me back to the house, gently places me on the bed and pulls the blanket over my shivering body.
Back to sleep. I don’t know how long I sleep, a day? Birds are talking in the house. Walk into bottle and barrel room, there he is making bird calls out of his mouth, he stops.
“Well, there she is, awake now? There’s a potato for you to eat for we’ve got a long journey.” Empty bottles, full bottles with clear liquid cover the floor. “Come on, lass, get going.” I sit down at table and eat. Bird Man makes his bird sounds as he rushes, filling bottles, screwing in wood corks on top. “We are taking a journey down the river, yes, we are going to sell these spirits.” I finish potato. “Come here now and fill this bottle.” He hands me bottle and shows me how to fill it. It smells sharp to my nose. I liked how it made me feel in the canoe, warm, light, like I was floating. I fill bottles and put cork on top, we put in a box. Many boxes. Many bottles. He starts bird calling again even dances some jerky motion, knees in air. I laugh, laugh so hard at this strange dancing Bird Man.
“So now I know you laugh, eh?” He stops his silly dance. “Come, let’s load the canoe.”
He wraps potatoes in sack, puts on his hat and we carry boxes to canoe. In canoe I am surrounded by boxes of spirit bottles. The river talks its familiar sound, this river I know. We follow it a long time. Sometimes I take the paddle, Bird Man sings and we eat potatoes. I start to recognize the land; this river Papa and the men would fish in—I’m going home? The strange Bird Man is taking me home?
“Well that’s about it,” he says. We pull canoe to the side of the bank, at a pier with ships. We hide the canoe. He gives me basket with bottles covered with a blanket. He slips bottles in his boots and walks funny, slow like an old man. We walk up bank to dirt street. Smell of fish, rotting fish, a factory, sardine factory, men and women swarm out of building. We stand in dirt street. Bird Man moves his feet nervously—men know him, they come and ask for a pint, give him money, he reaches into his boot and hands them a shiny bottle. More and more men come by, stop to talk with Bird Man, they laugh—give money, get bottle. They all talk like Bird Man, same bubble stream talk—all white men. Most of them hairy, they happy to see Bird Man, happy to get their bottle.
We run out of bottles and walk back to canoe to get more. Bird Man whistles. “Not a bad day, lass, not a bad day at all.” He fills the basket and his boots, we walk back to our spot. A few men come to buy some bottles. A man in a blue suit with stick comes towards us—is he an agent? I freeze—Bird Man hands a man a bottle. Is the agent going to take me back to the school? He takes Bird Man’s arm, men scatter.
“What are you selling here?” The man in blue suit carries a stick, like the stick that beat Papa down. Bird Man tries to slip bottle in his pocket. Blue suit man catches him, Bird Man raises bottle up. “Just an elixir, just an elixir, sir.”
“Is that right?” Blue suit man is a big man, wide shoulders and a barrel stomach.
“Yes sir.” Bird Man’s hands tremble.
“Well, let me see.” Blue suit man takes bottle, opens cork and sniffs. “This is no elixir.”
“I can explain, sir”
“It is against the law to sell alcohol in Maine.” Blue suit taps his stick.
“Yes sir, yes sir, let me explain.”
Maybe I should run. Blue suit gets real close to Bird Man and whispers, “I tell you what, you give me three pints and I’ll forget the whole thing.”
“Sure,
