“Ask him,” I said.
“Papa?”
If anyone knew the untapped power in Santos’s top-heavy body, it was the man who had hired him. He never got sick, couldn’t get drunk, no matter how he tried, and had such a high tolerance of pain he often injured himself accidentally. With each step his man took, Papa backed toward the corner behind his table, and was now squeezing himself against it, as if literally trying to force his way through the wall into the next room. “All right, lissen. Let me put my cards on the table. I made a mistake. Anybody kin do that, right? At first I didn’t know that ship was carryin’ anything more’n vegetables and hides. You got my word on that. Zebediah Singleton come to New Orleans to play at one of my tables, and told me ’bout a business investment he said was straight-up legal — an opportunity for a cullud man closed out of the shippin’ industry. I thought it’d be a good thing for me’n my people, a chance to diversify, get a foot in the door, go up one more stairway into somethin’ legitimate instead of bein’ stuck in the kinda business — gamblin’ and gun-runnin’—I been limited to all my life.” Papa’s scalp was rivering a screen of perspiration over his brow, causing him to rub both palms over his eyes. “I didn’t mean no harm. But once I got in that was it. You kin see what I’m sayin’, can’t you? Sometimes the biggest curse in the world kin be getting exactly what you want, or think you want, ’cause there’s no way to see all the sides when you sign your name or give a handshake. You don’t always know what yo’ business partners are doin’, if they plan to cut yo’ throat, or use yo’ money — unbeknownst to you — for purposes that’ll make you wish you was dead. Calhoun, if I’d known up front the real freight we was smugglin’, I wouldn’ta had anythin’ to do with it.”
“I don’t believe you, Papa.” I turned, pitching my voice toward Santos. “And the Africans who survived this business venture of yours won’t either. They only number three, all children ranging in age from eight to eleven. As cute as they can be too, like Santos here. You could ease your conscience a little, I guess, if you provided something for them — a full endowment, say, for each — until they come of age.”
Santos said, “Damn right.”
“Done!” The muscles in Papa’s face fell loose, hanging in folds. “And you’re gonna destroy that book, ain’tcha?”
“I’d rather keep it as insurance.” I did not want to hear any more. Possibly, he was lying to me about his involvement in the slave trade. Possibly, he still had deep pockets and a web of criminal connections in Louisiana and planned to have me and the logbook conveniently disappear once we were on shore (I decided it would be best for me to return to southern Illinois); but possibly, too, his equating of personal freedom and racial pride with fantastic wealth and power had gotten the blighter in over his head. Needless to say, I had little sympathy for him. I wanted to give him a good drubbing, but I felt too weakened after learning that Santos might be Baleka’s distant cousin, and that meant he might be my in-law and come to visit for family reunions. Santos, though, who knew nothing of these backroom dealings, seemed eager to volunteer for the chore. “You bought slaves, Papa? After all I told you ’bout how Ruffner treated me, you did that?” I had to stick out my cane, like a tree limb, to keep him on our side of the table. But yes, it felt good to have his 280 pounds on my side for a change.
Papa had one hand mashed over his heart. “What else is it you want from me, Calhoun?”
“For now, that you leave Isadora and me alone.”
He stood glaring at the logbook, and I put it behind my back, thinking he might leap any second to grab it. Suddenly, the point of my proposition struck home. “Wait a minute.” His eyes snapped level with mine. “That’s blackmail!”
“Bloody right,” says I. “I’m sure you’re acquainted with the technique, Papa.”
I was also sure he had no alternative but to accept. Because there was no reason for me to hear his reply, I closed the logbook and limped toward the door. His man tossed me the key. Neither Papa or Santos had changed position. However, as I closed the door behind me, I did hear, ever so softly, the former dirt-pit wrestler say, Papa, I’ma kick yo’ natural ass.
Squibb, hearing this too, shipped a smile. “Musta gone all right, eh?”
“Aye.”
“Whatcha gonna do now, Illinois? The captain tells me he kin use a coupla hands fer his next voyage. He’s makin’ a run to the South Seas. You interested?”
“Depends,” I told him, looking aft to where Baleka, brandishing a pot, was chasing a cat; I wondered where the animal had come from. “Might go back to Makanda and look for some land to settle on — solid ground for once, you know?”
“Aye, but if yuh plan to raise kids ’n’ chickens, it’d he’p if yuh had a wife, wouldn’t it?” I could not have agreed more.
Five turns around the deck, intended to walk off my worrying and my tendency to hiccup during times of stress, brought me to Isadora’s door, in my hands a brilliant bouquet of roses I’d “borrowed” from Papa’s arrangement in the messroom. My hands trembled. I felt precariously balanced between my old life in New Orleans and the first rung of another with Isadora, if she would still have an old, broken-down sea dog like me. But why should she, I wondered. She did not know me, as I was now. What was worse, I could not explain myself in a single day. Telling her all I’d endured since I’d seen her last would take a thousand more nights than Scheherazade needed to beguile King Shahryar. Darkness was coming on, the sea trembled as evening shaded down gently over far-reaching waves. I took a breath, then knocked, and Isadora called out, “Come in. It’s unlocked.” Anger flared in me again. Hadn’t I asked her to keep her latch bolted? Entering, I was prepared to scold her, but when I saw Isadora, there from the doorway, I was certain I had come into the wrong cabin, and rubbed my eyes. Seated on her bed, she wore only a thin cotton gown designed for sleeping. I don’t mind telling you this was a shock. I was even less prepared for the birdcage, two smelly dogs, and a cat, lightweight and doubtlessly warm, stretched across her knees like a comforter. The cat and dogs all wore mittens and mufflers. All watched me like bored deck hands waiting for something rich to happen. Quickly, as I shut the door so no one might see her, I realized she had prepared herself not for the man I was now but for the rogue in need of reforming I had been months ago.
“I asked you to lock this. Are you expecting someone?”
“Just you.”
“But you look ready for bed. Are you feeling well?”
“Oh, a little tired, I suppose.” She smiled. “Until you showed up I was worried, but I feel good now.”
I started to ask her to let me feel some of it too, then stopped, knowing that was what the old Rutherford would say. I struggled for a few seconds, feeling my former ways tugging at me. This was the me Isadora remembered, that she was responding to, but in a way that struck me as contrary to her nature. Truth is, she simply wasn’t all that good at acting seductive. Her model, now that I think about it, was a temptress in a play we had seen a year ago, and as Isadora tried to imitate that actress’s come-hither expression I could only answer by covering my lips to smother a sudden urge to laugh. But I thought, God bless her for trying.