On the crossing, I asked Geaxi what she might do. I knew she would eventually become restless at Carolina’s. She said she had heard of something new in aviation called “barnstorming,” and thought she might look into it. I said, “But you’re still only a twelve-year-old girl.” She said, “Exactly.”
Carolina told Daphne before we left to keep the black coupe until Caine was old enough to come back and drive it. Carolina and Opari talked constantly about everything and Opari and Star never stopped asking Carolina about America, even baseball, and they all became mothers to Caine. Willie took care of Nicholas and Eder. They were secure belowdecks and beneath the waves.
The voyage west to America was cold and wet and we kept mostly to ourselves, as always. Just before we docked in New York, I took a walk on the deck, alone, and stared out at New York as it came into view. I was leaning on the railing and behind me a voice said, “Excuse me, son, would you mind looking after my things while I step inside a moment?” I turned and there was a thin old black man in a perfectly fitted and pressed black suit. “Not at all, sir,” I said. “I’d be glad to.” He turned and walked quietly through the door behind him, never looking back. His “things” consisted of two books and a train ticket to Ithaca, New York, stuck in one of the books as a marker. The books were Leaves of Grass and a well-worn Bible. I turned the Bible open to the page that was marked with the ticket. It was Matthew and read, “Except ye become as little children, ye shall not enter the kingdom of heaven.” I thought about Sailor and wondered if that was true or could be true or was even relevant.
Just then, the old man came back through the door and smiled. “You religious, son?” he asked.
“Yes and no,” I said.
He laughed, and looked familiar when he did it. “Where’s home, kid?”
I hesitated for a heartbeat; I hadn’t thought of it that way since. since I’d asked an old Jewish man the same question, a stranger who was taking me there anyway. I could still hear his voice in my head, so I answered the old man the way Solomon would have answered. I said, “St. Louis, kid. St. Louis.”
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
STEVE CASH lives in Springfield, Missouri, where he was born and raised and educated. After an attempt at gaining a college degree, he lived on the west coast, in Berkeley, California, and elsewhere. He returned to Springfield to become an original member of the band the Ozark Mountain Daredevils. He is the co-author of the seventies pop hits “Jackie Blue” and “If You Wanna Get to Heaven.” For the last thirty-three years he has played harmonica, written songs, performed with the band, helped in the raising of his children, and read books. The Meq is his first novel.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.