Dance on the Wind

“Spit out your piece—I said me what?”

“Call’t yourself a Negra.”

The stranger’s brow knitted up a moment, quizzically working that over in his head; then he suddenly rocked forward, roaring in laughter again. “I’ll be go to hell right hyar an’ let the devil hisself chaw on my bones. If’n that don’t take the circle! I call’t myself a nigger, mister.”

“That’s what I said—just what you called yourself.”

Leaning forward even more, the man came closer to Titus. Now Bass could see that one big upper tooth protruded outward like a hound’s unruly fang. Likely from force of habit come of many years living with his affliction, the stranger constantly worked his upper lip beneath that shaggy and unkempt mustache, sliding the lip this way, then that, doing his very best to hide that large yellowed fang that poked its way out into broad daylight despite some of the stranger’s best efforts.

Around it the man rasped his explanation. “An’ a feller what calls hisself a nigger ain’t in no way calling hisself a Negra. A Negra got him black skin, black as charcoal in that forge o’ your’n. An’ a nigger … well, now.” He scratched at the side of his beard, then pushed some of his long hair back over his shoulder, shrugging as if his tilt on things made all the world of sense to him. “Niggers come in all colors. No more’n that. Yest a word fellers I know come to use, s’ali.”

Bass licked his dry lips, then croaked, “W-where in God’s earth you come from?”

“God’s earth, eh? That’s purty good, mister. Fer that’s yest whar’ I come from.” He sighed. “Yessir. I yest come hyar from God’s earth. Say, ye look thirsty thar’. Bet ye could do with some water?”

Titus watched him drag the red cedar piggin close and pull the dipper from it.

“Hyar. Drink up,” the man commanded.

He did so, greedily too: savoring the cool, sweet taste and smooth texture of the water sliding like silk across his parched membranes.

“That ought’n limber up that talkin’ hole of yer’n,” the stranger declared. “My Lordee—what ye gone and done to yerself? All cut up the way ye are?”

“A fight over to a tavern last night,” Bass replied, his stomach suddenly feeling very empty with the slosh of water he had just poured into it. Maybe his stomach rolled only from the smell of the stranger’s food—the mere thought of eating made his belly curl up in protest.

“I see’d wust myself, mister. Blackfeet mostly. Though them Rees do a fairsome job on a nigger. When their kind get done workin’ over a man—he ain’t left near as purty as you. An’ it ain’t be all that long ago I see’d fellers wus’n yerself.” He clucked, sucked his lips sideways to hide that snaggletooth, and wagged his head. “Leastwise, as hangdown as ye might feel, looks to be yer movin’ and talkin’.”

“Don’t mean I ain’t half near death,” Titus grumbled with self-pity, his mind of a sudden feverish on something to eat after his fast of nearly twenty-four hours, despite how his stomach might protest. Then he remembered the food Troost said he’d brought in. Rocking unsteadily onto that one elbow, he craned his neck, searching for the plate in the shadows of his smoky quarters.

“Don’t ye take the circle now!” the stranger exclaimed suddenly, as if it had taken more than a moment for Bass’s words to sink in. “Why, if this coon ain’t got him a sense of humor.”

“You damn well got me wrong—I ain’t much at funnin’,” Titus admitted, growing impatient with his search. Troost had said he’d set that plate nearby, towel and all. “Never have been much at funnin’. Say, you see’d a plate around here? Had it a towel laid over keep the bugs out?”

“Towel, an’ a plate? Like this’un hyar?” the man replied, bald-faced and innocent as could be—producing the large pewter platter, complete with a striped towel covering it all.

“Likely that’s the one.” Bass took it from the man, immediately sensing just how light the whole affair was. Collapsing to his side, he flung off the towel, finding the plate empty. “What … the hell?” he screeched two octaves too high.

“Was them yer victuals?” the stranger asked. “Pardon the bejesus out of me. When I come on in here while’st back, I nudged ye. Spoke at ye too. But nary a move. Figgered ye wasn’t dead, way ye was breathin’—but had to be laid out black as night till the peep o’ day. Feller in that condition surely didn’t want him no victuals, so hungry as I was—I weren’t about to leave ’em go to waste.”

“You ate my god … goddamned supper?” Titus shrieked. The effort hurt, his sudden flare of hot anger shooting through every bruised scrap of tissue in his body as he rocked off his elbow, the plate clattering beside him.

“I’ll go fetch ye some victuals on my own, straightaway,” the stranger declared, starting to rise. “Ain’t used to St. Louie City, but I’ll likely find something in this’r town, even this time of night.”

“What time you figure it to be?” Bass asked weakly, his brain hammering with great slashes of pain once more as he closed his eyes, laid an arm over them as he sought a soft place for the back of his head.

“Hell if I know what time to make it out to be ’cept nighttime, mister.” He pointed off generally toward the rafters overhead. “From looks of the moon out there ’mongst all them clouds when I come in, had to be some past midnight.”

“Jumpin’ Jehoshaphat!” Titus growled nearly under his breath. “You come in hereto rob a sick man of his food this time of night? Cain’t you just leave a sick man to get his sleep?”

“Look who’s gone an’ got hisself techy,” he snarled back. “Mayhaps I best find me ’nother blacksmith do my work for me tomorry an’ ye can yest ferget me rootin’ ye out some victuals this time of night!”

Titus wasn’t doing a damn bit of good against the steam-piston throbbing that rocked his head. As quietly as he could, he said, “Don’t … please don’t go nowhere. Troost’d have my balls if I run off any business, mister.”

“Troost?”

“My boss,” Titus replied. “Man what owns this place.”

“That mean … yer saying ye ain’t the blacksmith?”

“I am. But I just work here.”

“Ye any good?”

“You damn bet I am,” he growled back, angry at the man. The thought of it: to be awakened by a stranger who had just eaten his food in the middle of the night, then turned around and insulted him too.

“So tell me,” the man said. “Ye gonna be worth a lick to work on my traps tomorry?”

“I doubt it.”

“Then I’ll wait,” the stranger said, smacking his lip around that fang the color of pin acorns. “’Sides. It’ll gimme time to have my spree. Come down hyar to St. Louie to have me my spree. So I got me time till ye heal yerself up.”

Titus grumbled, “That’s mighty kind of you.”

“Ye still hungry? Said ye was hungry. I’ll go fetch ye some victuals.”

“Least you could do so I can consider us even,” Bass replied, wagging his hammering head slightly.

The stranger slowly got to his feet and began pulling on a long blanket coat, well-greased and dirtied, blackened by the smoke of many fires. “Yer sure as sun a techy sort, ain’t ye?”

“Ain’t you touchy if’n some feller come in to eat your food and wake you up from a dead sleep?”

He clucked a tongue against that big front tooth, then said with a nod, “S’pose yer right, mister. I owe ye for yer hospitality. I does at that.”

Titus rolled his thundering head away, easing it over onto the elbow he crooked beneath his puffy cheek. “Supper would be a damn good start at showing your thanks.”

“If’n ye don’t take the circle, my friend! Fer a man what’s been beat as bad as ye surely be, I got to hand it to ye,” the stranger said with a nod of certainty. “No matter how yer painin’—ye sure don’t mind making use of that there mean mouth of yer’n, full of stupids the way it is.”

“Mean?” Titus snapped, trying to rise off his blankets, straining to hold his head up and bring the stranger’s face into focus. “You dance on in here the way you done, and you go off telling me I’m mean?”

“The way yer acting,” the stranger replied, “yer gonna be yest fine, I can see. Got lots of fight left in ye, yessirree! No matter that I find ye layin’ hyar lickin’ yer wounds arter someone nigh onto kill’t ye … but I don’t make ye out to be the sort to whimper an’ moan like a bitch ’bout to pup, is ye? Hell, no—ye still got ye sand enough in yer goddamned craw to bark at me like a bad dog.”

“Bad dog? Barking at you?”