“You tell this anyway you want to, Jim. Tell ’em the truth. Tell ’em I kilt my own nephew. Probably make you into some big hero once ya figger the right angle.”
Dropsy Morningstar didn’t lay a hand on Jim Jam Jump. Just kept walking. Walking in the direction of Algiers, which lay across the river.
Chapter thirty-six. Typhus’ Dream
There are four children-two boys and two girls-all tied to chairs and sitting at the edge of a wide pit ten feet in diameter. Flames and smoke lick upward from the pit’s mouth. The children are sweating, their shins blackening and blistering in the heat. They are all about the age of eight or nine and bear a family resemblance to one another.
Typhus stands across the pit. He is untied, he is his father. The prison guard’s knife twitches in his back as if alive. His right hand is freshly severed-but where there should be blood there leaks only water.
An old woman is standing behind the children, her head and face wrapped tightly in chicken wire. The woman stares at Typhus-her eyes fill him with cold fear. He should run to the aid of the children but is paralyzed by the woman’s eyes. He knows she is capable of much worse than the mere harming of children.
“Hast thou come to kiss this child?” the woman asks him, pointing to the girl who sits between the two boys.
Typhus cannot form thoughts but hears himself say, “What child?” The sound of his own voice startles him; it is not his own voice, it is his father’s voice. Typhus looks down and sees his father’s old family bible in his left hand. It trembles in his grasp and is cold to the touch.
The woman responds, “I will not let thee kiss her.” She tips the girl’s chair forward, sending her downward into flame. The girl’s eyes are wide with terror as she plunges headlong. Her screams make no physical sound but reverberate through Typhus’ chest. A part of him recognizes the girl as she falls-it is his sister, Cholera. But the recognition makes no sense; Cholera died at only two months old-and years before Typhus was born. This was not Cholera.
He now recognizes the rest of the children, but the ages are all wrong. They cannot all be nine years old.
“Hast thou come to send him to sleep?” The woman points to the boy at her left.
“Wait!” Typhus bellows through his father’s throat. He opens the bible, searches its pages for answers. This is difficult with only one hand, and the paper is like ice. It takes a moment before Typhus realizes the pages are all blank.
“Uncle Typhus, please! I can’t find my buttons! Someone took my buttons! Help me!” West is squirming beneath the old woman’s hand.
“
Noonday Morningstar’s heavy tone rumbles through Typhus’ narrow throat, “No!
The old woman’s face contorts into a half-smile as she replies, “I will not let thee do him harm.”
She tips West forward and into the pit, leaving one boy and one girl. Typhus realizes the girl is a child-sized version of Diphtheria-and that she has just witnessed the death of her own son. Her screams issue with such force that her neck bulges then splits. Blood spatters her perfect yellow dress.
The old woman points to the bleeding girl now.
“I know you!” he hears his father shout.
She repeats,
The woman is a hoodoo mambo. She visits Doctor Jack two or three times a year to trade herbs. She has always seemed so timid and kind on her visits. Her name is Malvina Latour.
“Why are you doing this?” The voice of Noonday Morningstar trembles.
“I will not let thee carry her away.” The child-version of Diphtheria tips forward and down, but her eyes are no longer afraid and there is relief in them as she falls. She will now, at least, be with her little West.
“Typhus,” says the remaining child, a boy. His voice is calm, reassuring, unafraid. “Don’t feel bad. You done no wrong here. You can’t help that you lost your faith. People don’t choose to lose faith. Faith leaves them, not the other way ’round.” The child version of Dropsy Morningstar droops his head towards the pit, staring into smoke and flame with a grin. “I ain’t never seen a thing so lovely. Ain’t it pretty, Typhus? Pink threads, orange water, pretty music…”
Typhus’ eyes fill with tears as the woman deadpans through chicken-wire, “Has thou come to
“
“But you have,” says Dropsy with a smile. “It’s okay, now, Typhus. Let me go.”
Malvina Latour is screaming, “
Typhus searches the weird peace in Dropsy’s eyes for answers. He knows answers are there, answers to all the questions he could ever ask-but he can’t find them.
“Forsake me, Typhus. You have no choice,” says Dropsy. “Forsake me…please?”
Typhus Morningstar’ heart is breaking: “
The face of Malvina Latour is smoothing. Rage has vacated her eyes. Without another word, she steps forward and into the pit, her dress fluttering in flame as she falls. Dropsy remains seated and bound, his grin ever-widening.
“That’s right, that’s right,” Dropsy says. “Ain’t yer fault, Typhus.”
“I’m dreaming,” says Typhus, his voice now miraculously his own.
“Yes, you’re dreaming. But the dream means something.”
“What does it mean?”
Dropsy’s grin evaporates. “It means you are out of hope.”
Unable to accept this simple truth, Typhus opens the bible once more, searching. This time the pages are not blank, but are filled with gibberish. The same group of words are repeated over and over:
Nonsense words. Unpronounceable. Stupid. Useless.
He slams the book shut, looks down to see two small feet. No longer in the body of his father, he is himself again entirely. A man in the shape of a boy. Old of eye, older of body, oldest of heart.
Dropsy is teetering back and forth in the chair, tempting the pit to take him. Typhus looks into the eyes of his brother, wanting to say something, an important question at the tip of his tongue. He is only able to say:
“Dropsy…”
Dropsy smiles one last time before rocking forward and over; “Goodbye,” he says.
