squinted, trying to accustom to the light. When he finally widened them, I was reminded that they were green as emeralds. They were the only part of him that seemed alive. His reddish black complexion, odd combination of freckles with kinky, red hair gone gray, made him look like some kind of gnome from a book Mrs. Canerton had loaned me. I couldn’t imagine when Mose had gotten so old.
“Missuh Jacob, I’m sho glad to see you,” Mose said. His voice was like a crippled man trying to rise up on crutches.
As Mose shuffled toward us, something dragged and thumped against the ground, stirring up dust. It was a chain and it was attached to a cuff of metal around his ankle, just above where his small foot poked sockless into a worn-out shoe. The chain was attached to the barn’s central support post.
“Goddamn,” Daddy said, then turned on Bill. “You’ve chained him.”
“I owe you, Jacob. But like I said, I got a family. Girls. Mose always seemed a good nigger to me, but a favor only goes so far. He stays here, he wears the chain. Hell, he’s got it all right. He eats good cookin’ and shits in a can over there. I have it emptied every day. And he don’t want for water.”
I could see Daddy was exasperated, but he sighed and said, “All right. Let me talk to him, just me and my boy.”
“Your boy can know what I can’t?”
“If you don’t mind, Bill.”
“I mind, but I’ll do ’er. Jacob, you get this nigger out of here pretty damn quick.”
“That’s the plan,” Daddy said.
Mr. Smoote left out, leaving the barn door slightly open. Daddy went over and touched Mose’s shoulder.
“I don’t unnerstan’, Missuh Jacob,” Mose said. “You knows I didn’t do nuttin’ to no white womens. No coloreds neither.”
“I know,” Daddy said. “Let’s sit down.”
Daddy sat on the hay bale and Mose dragged his chain and sat on the other side of it. I went and leaned against the post that the chain was fastened to. From that angle, way the light was slicing in, I could see Mose’s ankle had been bleeding. There was a brown cake of blood below the metal cuff, just above where his shoe started.
“I didn’t mean for this, Mose,” Daddy said.
“Yessuh,” Mose said. “I ’spose not.”
“I’ll get you out of here.”
“Yessuh. Missuh Jacob?”
“What, Mose?”
“How come you done me like this?”
“The purse, Mose.”
“I fount it, Missuh Jacob. I tole you that.”
“Yeah.”
“I wouldn’t hurt no white womens. I wouldn’t hurt nobody ’cept a fish, a coon, a possum. Somethin’ to eat. And I don’t eat no white womens. Coloreds neither.”
“I know.”
“You know, Missuh Jacob, but here I is.”
Daddy looked at the dirt floor.
“I could have run off that firs’ night, but I stayed here ’cause you asked me to, Missuh Jacob. Next day, him and a boy came put the chain on me.”
“I thought you having the purse was evidence. Not that you did it, but that it was some kind of evidence.”
“You done got that purse, Missuh Jacob. You don’t need me.”
“Wait a minute. Boy? What boy helped chain you?”
“Jes some white boy.”
“Okay, Mose. Listen here. I’m gonna get this chain off of you, and I’m gonna let you go. We’re gonna take you home. Hear?”
“Yessuh. I’d like that, I would.”
Daddy got up. “Stay here a minute, son.”
Daddy went out. Mose looked at me. He smiled. “You ’member that ole grennel you and me caught?”
“Yes sir.”
“Had them teeth like a man. It really scart you. ’Member that?”
“Yes sir.”
“I cooked it up fer us. ’Member that?”
“Yes sir.”
“It was good too. You don’t cook ’em right, they taste jes like cotton. But I done it good. We ate it on a stump down by the river. My boy was little, me and him used to do that. Sit down by the river and eat.”
I started to ask him about his son, but considering all Daddy had told me, I thought it might not be the best idea. No use dredging up more bad things for Mose to think about.
“You still got that coon dog?” I asked.
“No, Missuh Harry, I don’t. That ole dog done gone on to his rewa’d. He was nigh on fifteen year ole when he done up and died. He couldn’t see none last year of his life. I had to hand-feed ’im. He couldn’t eben smell no mo.”
Daddy and Mr. Smoote came in. Mr. Smoote had a hammer and chisel. “Get that off of him,” Daddy said.
“You takin’ him away?” Mr. Smoote asked.
“I am. And don’t mention he’s been here. Just keep on keepin’ it a secret.”
“We even then?”
“Yeah. And Bill, you tell that boy you hired to help put this chain on not to say nothin’ either.”
“I done told him that.”
“I mean it. I told you not to let no one know Mose was here, and you done told a boy.”
Mr. Smoote made a noise in his throat like a hog makes when it pokes its nose into slop and snorts. He went over to Mose, put the chisel against where the cuff had been squeezed shut and pinned. He struck off the pin with one whack of the chisel and hammer.
Daddy helped Mose up from the hay bale. “Let’s get you on home,” Daddy said.
From our house it’s no big problem to walk through the deep woods, hit Preacher’s Road, take the trail down by the river to Mose’s shack. By car it took longer. We had to travel some distance. At first Mose and Daddy just sat, but after a while they talked fishing. It wasn’t until we were on the Preacher’s Road and nearly to the trail that the subject of the murder came up again.
“It gonna be okay now, Missuh Jacob?” Mose asked.
“You just go on about your business, Mose. I got the purse. You told me what you know. I’m sorry I bothered you.”
“Well, I guess you had to do it.”
“I’m sorry you had to stay at Bill’s.”
“He done all right by me. ’Cept that chain. He fed me all right, but he didn’t empty that ole mess can much as he said.”
“I didn’t figure he did,” Daddy said.
We drove onto the trail that led down to the river. The trees were close and limbs lapped over the top of the car and bathed us in shadow. Daddy had to drive slow and careful because the trail was full of washouts and slippery with leaf mold.
We drove down a good ways, parked, left the car, and walked down to the river with Mose, over to his shack. A cool wind was blowing off the brown churning river and it felt good, but carried with it the faint aroma of something gone to rot.
“You need to come fish, Missuh Jacob,” Mose said.
“It’s been a while.”
“Sho has. You ’member when them ole Davis brothers down the river there poisoned the water with all them
