In the Terry, the colored district of Augusta, Georgia, Election Day meant next to nothing. Only a handful of Negro veterans of the Great War were registered to vote. To most people, it was just another Tuesday.
As usual, Erasmus was in his fish store and restaurant when Scipio walked in. Scipio got himself a cup of coffee to drink while sweeping up the place. His boss was setting newly bought fish on ice in the counter. Scipio said, 'What you think? De Whigs gwine win again?'
'Dunno,' Erasmus said with a shrug. 'Them or the Rad Libs, don't matter one way or t'other. Long as it ain't that goddamn crazy man.' He threw a crappie into place with more force than he usually used while handling fish. That Election Day meant next to nothing didn't mean it meant nothing at all.
'Dat Featherston buckra, he ain't gwine do nothin' much,' Scipio said.
'Better not,' Erasmus answered, and slammed down a gutted catfish. 'That son of a bitch win, everything's even tougher for us niggers. And things is tough enough as they is.'
Voice sly, Scipio said. 'You ain't got it so bad. You owns your house free an' clear-'
'I ain't stupid,' Erasmus said, and Scipio nodded. His boss had been damn smart there. He'd paid off his mortgage just when inflation was starting to ravage the CSA, when he'd had a pretty easy time accumulating the money he needed but before Confederate dollars became nothing but a joke. The bankers had taken the money, even if they'd been unhappy about it. A few weeks later and they would have refused him. 'I ain't stupid,' he repeated. 'I'm smart enough to know I ain't got it easy long as I's a nigger in the CSA.'
He was right about that. Scipio didn't need to be a genius to understand as much. He said, 'No, you ain't got it easy-I takes it back. But you has it worse-all us niggers has it worse-if dat Featherston, he win.' Working for Anne Colleton had given him a feel for the way Confederate politics worked. Again, though, he didn't need to be a genius to find the truth in what he'd just said.
'Not so many parades with them goddamn white men in the white shirts an' the butternut pants yellin', 'Freedom!' this year,' Erasmus observed. 'They ain't been tryin' to bust up the other parties' meetin's, neither, like they done before. They walkin' sof' again.'
'Don' want to remind nobody what that one buckra done,' Scipio said. 'But too many folks, dey recollects any which way.'
'Hell, yes,' Erasmus said. 'Thing of it is, Freedom Party, they needs the white folks to be stupid, or else to act stupid on account of they scared. Now, Lord knows the white folks is stupid-'
'Do Jesus, yes!' Scipio said, as if responding to a preacher's sermon.
'But they ain't that stupid, not unless they's scared bad,' Erasmus went on, as if he hadn't spoken. 'Things ain't too bad for 'em right now-money's still worth somethin', most of 'em's got jobs-so they ain't gwine vote for no Jake Featherston, not this year they ain't. That's how I sees it, anyways.'
'Way I sees it, you should oughta write fo' de newspapers,' Scipio said, not intending it as any sort of flattery. On the contrary-he'd read plenty of editorials about what was likely to happen that didn't sum things up anywhere near so neatly as his illiterate but ever so shrewd boss had managed in a couple of sentences.
Erasmus lit a cigarette. He blew out a cloud of smoke, then said, 'You bangin' your gums on all this politics so as you kin git out o' workin'-ain't that right, Xerxes?'
'Oh, yassuh, Marse Erasmus, suh.' Scipio laid on his Low Country accent even thicker than usual. 'Ah ain't nevah done one lick o' work, not since de day you hire me. Ah jus' eats yo' food an' drinks yo' coffee an' steals yo' smokes.' He held out his hand, pale palm up, for a cigarette.
Laughing, Erasmus gave him one, then leaned close so Scipio could get a light from the one he already had in his mouth. He'd just taken his first drag of the morning and coughed a couple of times when the first customer of the day came in, calling for coffee and ham and eggs and, instead of grits, hash browns. Erasmus got busy at the stove. Scipio got busier doing everything else. They stayed busy all day long. When Scipio finally went home, Erasmus was still busy. Scipio sometimes wondered whether his boss ever went to bed.
And when Scipio got back to his roominghouse, he heard splashes and squeals from the bathroom at the end of the hall. He also heard Bathsheba's voice, rising in ever-growing exasperation and wrath. He smiled to himself. Antoinette was going on two years old now, and an ever-growing handful to bathe.
A few minutes later, Bathsheba carried the baby into the room. Antoinette, swaddled in a towel, saw Scipio and said, 'Dada!' in delight. Scipio's wife looked wetter than the baby did. She also looked a lot less happy.
'What de matter, sweetheart?' Scipio asked. 'Givin' 'Toinette a bath ain't dat hard. I even done it my ownself a time or two.' He spoke as if that were some enormous accomplishment. In his mind, it was. He hadn't heard many fathers talk about giving their children even that much in the way of care.
But Bathsheba's baleful stare made him stop with his mouth half open. 'The baby shit in the damn tub,' she said bleakly.
'Oh,' Scipio said. 'Aw… golly.' The first expression of sympathy that came to mind wouldn't have been to Bathsheba's liking, not just then.
Instead of saying anything, Scipio went to a cupboard and pulled out a bottle of moonshine. Georgia was officially dry, but contraband liquor wasn't hard to come by. He poured his wife a stiff drink, and a smaller one for himself. Holding out the glass to Bathsheba, he said, 'Here you is. Reckon you done earned dis here.'
'Reckon I did.' She poured down half of it. Then she puffed out her cheeks and exhaled violently. 'Whew! Dat's nasty stuff.' Scipio was inclined to agree. He'd always preferred rum even to good whiskey, and the murky yellowish fluid in his glass bore a closer relationship to paint thinner than it did to good whiskey.
Antoinette saw her parents drinking something, and naturally wanted some, too. Bathsheba fixed her a bottle. Then she started making supper. Since the room had only a hot plate for cooking, everything took a while. Scipio was glad for the chance to sit down and play with his little girl and talk with his wife and drink the moonshine and let it relax him.
'Buckra ladies I was cleanin' for, they all talkin' 'bout the election today,' Bathsheba said. 'Dunno why. They can't vote any more'n us black folks kin.'
Bills allowing women's suffrage showed up in the Georgia Legislature almost every session. They got tabled or voted down with monotonous regularity. Even so, Scipio asked, 'Who dey say dey husbands vote fo'?'
'Whigs, mostly.' Bathsheba knew why he was worried, and added, 'That Featherston fella, don't reckon he gwine go nowhere much.'
'Do Jesus, hope you right,' Scipio answered.
Bathsheba took lamb chops out of the pan and started frying potatoes in the grease they'd left behind. 'Got me somethin' more important to tell you, anyways.'
'What dat?' Scipio asked as he stuck a little bite of lamb in Antoinette's mouth. The baby made a face, but ate the morsel. Scipio gave her another one.
Bathsheba pointed at her. 'Reckon she gwine have herself a little brother or sister come summertime.'
'I was wonderin' about dat my ownself,' Scipio said as he got up to give her a hug. 'Didn't t'ink you monthlies, dey come.' Her breasts had been tender lately, too, and she'd started falling asleep early in the evening.
As if to prove he was right, Bathsheba yawned. She laughed a moment later. 'Better sleep now. When the new young 'un come, ain't never gwine sleep again.'
'We gots to find a bigger place, too,' Scipio said. The room they had was intended for one. It was tolerable for two, provided they got on well-which Scipio and Bathsheba certainly did. With three in it, there wasn't room to swing a cat. With four… Scipio thought about that. With four people in this room, there wouldn't have been room to bring in a cat, let alone swing it.
'What you reckon Antoinette make o' the new baby?' Bathsheba asked.
'She ain't gwine like it,' Scipio answered. 'Young chillun, dey don' never like no new baby in de fambly. But she git over it. She have to. Dey allus does. Jus' sometimes take longer, is all.'
Bathsheba nodded. 'Reckon you's right.' She yawned again. 'I gots to get to sleep. Come here, 'Toinette. Time we both go to bed.'
The baby didn't want to. She was convinced she'd miss something. Some evenings she was right, others wrong. Tonight, she fussed and fumed-and then got up the following morning not just ready but eager to play. Scipio was the one who, yawning, went out to face the day.
He paid his five cents for a copy of the Constitutionalist on his way to Erasmus' place. Newsboys shouted of Burton Mitchel's victory as president of the Confederate States. 'President Mitchel reelected!' they yelled. A Confederate president wasn't supposed to get reelected, but the Supreme Court said this didn't count. No matter what the Supreme Court said, the newsboys knew what was what.
