47

12

As soon as we were off the path John took me by the wrist and again we ran on the wind over boulders and through thick bushes, past trees that were ancient giants looming over dark forest undergrowth.

At one point we came to a field of wild strawberries. John stopped there and took off his new/old work shirt to gather the berries for our lunch. It was then that I remembered the molasses cookies Flore pinned to my shirt. We sat down on the grass and ate for a while. I was worried about Eloise but I was hungry too. Ever since I had been working in the fields I was hungry all the time, nearly starving. I wanted to help Eloise but I couldn't turn down a meal.

John told me that the forest we were in was very old and filled with spices and fungi that were wonderful for the human anatomy.

"What do gnats got to do wit' men?" I asked, trying to put together the strange sounds he uttered.

"Not gnat man" he said. "Human anatomy. That is the study of the parts of the human body."

"Who told you about gnat man meV

Tall John smiled and put a hand on my shoulder.

"I am not what I appear to be," he said. "I come from far, far away as I have already told you. This body of mine, though completely human, was created by what my people call science. Because of this I have a great deal of knowledge about the human body. I know all of the mechanics it is only the human heart that I fail to understand."

"And do you know what mushrooms will get the bugs outta Miss Eloise's brain?" I asked, unconcerned with his silly notions.

"Yes," he said. "There are a few herbs that will assist her healing. And also you need proper rest and nutrition after that infection in your hand and the burn on your shoulder. You need sustenance."

"I don' care about me," I said. "I just wanna make sure that Miss Eloise gets bettah. An' you shouldn't lie to the Master "

John held up a finger and I knew that he wanted me to remember his admonition.

"It don't mattah if you call'im Master or Tobias," I continued. "If he figures out that you jes' wanna run around an' eat strawberries he'll put you in the killin' shack and that will be all she spoke about you."

John smiled and said, "You love that little child Eloise don't you, Forty-seven?"

"She's like the angels that Brother Bob talks on and on about at his sermons."

"She's just a person."

"No," I complained. "She's the most beautiful girl in the world."

"Eighty-four is just as beautiful in her own way," my new friend argued.

"How can you say somethin' like that, boy?" I said. "Eighty-four's black and ugly with nappy hair and liver lips. She couldn't even hold a candle to Miss Eloise."

"Come with me," Tall John said.

He jumped up from where we were and led me a short way down an animal path to a wide, still pond.

"Look," he said. "Look at yourself in the water."

The water was absolutely motionless and reflective like a polished mirror. I could see my whole image from head to toe.

"Take off that shirt, Forty-seven."

I did as he told me, standing naked at the pond's edge.

When I looked down into the reflective pool I could see that my skin was very dark and that my body was like a man's but smaller. My hair was wild and every which way, but I looked like I imagined myself.

"You have a perfect face and body and the strength to run all day without aches and pains," John said. "You have big, inquisitive eyes and a heart that's open to the pain of others. You love Eloise and so she is beautiful to you, but Eighty-four needs your love too. And if you gave it to her you would see her beauty even as you see it in the white child."

"But beauty just is," I said. "I can't make somethin' lovely jes' by savin' so."

John waved his hand and my image in the pond changed into Big Mama Flore. She was just sitting there shelling peas and throwing them into a basket. My heart opened up when I saw Flore.

"Is she beautiful?" John asked.

"Oh, yes," I cried. "She's the most beautiful thing in all

the world."

"She has black skin and nappy hair," John argued. "She

has big lips and ashy elbows."

I turned away from the image in the water and asked, "Are you a angel?"

"No, Forty-seven. I'm just a helper."

"What you helpin'?"

"I'm helping you to save the universe."

"But I'm just a nig " I stopped myself in the middle of the prohibited word.

"All of my people," John said, "my whole race says a prayer for you every night. They have given you their blessings and their hope. A black-skinned, nappy-headed child who was born into slavery and who shall ride into the greatest battle in the history of the world."

When Tall John from beyond Africa spoke I almost believed what he said. There was so much confidence in his tone that you were compelled to believe him.

I took a deep breath and felt the weight of his words on my shoulders. I didn't even know where Universe was, or how big it was. I figured that it must have been at least as big as Georgia, and Georgia, I knew, was so big that it would take a strong man three weeks to walk from one end to the other.

"Boy, what you yammerin' about?" I asked. "I'm just a nigger, born a slave."

"No," John said. "You are Forty-seven. You are the hope of your world and mine and all that lies between."

"You is crazy, boy."

Instead of answering John laughed and pushed me into the pond. The shock of the cold water and of peaceful John pushing me made me laugh so hard that I couldn't climb out again. But then John held out his hand and made like he was going to help me. But the minute I pulled against him he pushed me in again. He stood there at the water line laughing at me.

"Help me out, fool," I said.

And when he stuck out his hand I grabbed on and let my weight go, pulling him in with me. He started sputtering and trying to jump out of the pond. But every time he got his footing I pushed him back again. We were laughing so hard that finally we climbed up to the shore and fell down in the mud.

That was one of the happiest moments I've had in the nearly two hundred years of my long life here on Earth. Before that day I never knew what it was to laugh without worrying that somebody might hear and come and thump

my head. I never knew what it was like to lie there next to your best friend in the whole world and not have a care.

I had eaten strawberries and cookies and went splashing in a forbidden pond.

It was forbidden because all things that were fun or free were forbidden to slaves. I didn't know exactly who owned those strawberries but one thing for sure it was a white man.

But none of that mattered because there I was, alone in the woods with the most wonderful person I had ever known. When he looked at me he liked my black skin and dusty hair, he thought that I was a hero and who was I to say no?

After a long while lying in the mud I waded out into the water to wash my skin and rough blouse. When we were ready to go John looked up at the sky and scowled.

"Clouds," he said. "We may have to find shelter."

Him saying the word shelter reminded me of something.

"How did you know where that tree trunk where we sat down on was?" I asked. "I mean you walked right to it just like you knew it was there."

"You see, Forty-seven?" he said as if I had just proven a point. "You notice things and you don't only notice but you ask why. Those are only two of the reasons why you are destined to become a great hero."

"You ain't answered my question, John."

"I've been hanging around the plantation for almost a week," he said. "Looking for you."

"Me?"

"I could sense you, hear your music among all of the music that men make with their blood."

"Music in they blood?" I said, suddenly afraid that John might be some kind of devil that drinks men's blood.

"Yes," he said with a smile. "Every living being has their own song thrilling through the strings that hold them together. I knew your song. I just had to make sure I really heard it playing in amongst the others. And once I knew you were here I had to meet you to make sure that you were up to the task."

"What task?"

"Saving the universe."

"Where's that?"

"Everywhere," he said, "all over the world and up to the stars."

"Like a ocean?"

"Something like that," John said.

"If you was free an' lookin' fo' me den why'd you let 'em make you into a slave?" I asked.

"Because of a creature named Wall," John said seriously.

"Who's that?"

"He's the one who might destroy everything unless we stop him. He found out that I had been on the Red Clay Plantation "

"What was you doin' there?"

"Looking for you. All I have done for the past three thousand years is look for you. That's because I knew that you would be but I didn't exactly know where and when. That's why I was on the Red Clay Plantation, because someone with a song almost like yours was there. But when I realized that it wasn't you I ran away. After I left Wall caught my scent and he took over Andrew Pike's body and came looking for me."

"And so Andrew Pike is under a spell?"

"Pike is dead and Wall walks the earth in his flesh."

"And who is this Wall?"

"He is, as far as you are concerned, the devil."

These words shook me to my soul. I didn't want to ask any more questions. I didn't want John to tell me any more.

Again he looked at the sky.

Again he said, "Clouds."

"Maybe it'll rain," I said, grateful for mundane conversation. "That'll be good for the gardens."

"But I can't carry you if the sun isn't out."

"Why not?"

"Because my powers, such as they are, are derived from solar energy. My body is like a battery that converts power of the sun into action. If I were to attempt to carry us home without the sun shining my energy would run out and I might even die."

"How far is we from Corinthian?" I asked.

"Sixty miles at least."

Before I could voice my dismay John grabbed me by the wrist and we took off. We ran for a short time and finally came to one of the big trees we'd passed earlier. Fat raindrops had started to fall and the sky was dark with rain clouds.

"We'll have to stay here until the sun comes out again," John said.

"What if it don't come out?" I asked.

"Then we will have to wait until morning."

"Mastuh'll kill us we do that," I wailed.

"As long as you see him as master he may very well," John said. "But if you see that you and he are equals and you realize that he needs you more than you need him then, just maybe, you will be reprieved."

My heart was beating fast and my guts were churning.

"Let's try to run back," I cried.

"It's at least thirty miles away, Forty-seven, maybe forty. We would never make it in time."

"But he'll kill us."

"Kill us and he kills his precious Eloise."

I wanted to beat the smug slave's face in. Here he had shown me the best time of my whole life and now he was going to get me killed. Why did I ever go with him?

The rains came down hard but the thick foliage of the ancient tree kept us mostly dry. The ground was mulched pretty well by dead leaves and so the space was like a big, carpeted room. When the night came on it became very

dark. John and I leaned against the bark, shoulder to shoulder. The dark and the sound of the rain, and maybe the fear of Tobias, made me very tired. I nodded and almost fell asleep.

"Do you want to see where I'm from?" I thought I heard him say.

"Might as well," I said, "seein' as it'll prob'ly be the last story I hear 'fore Mastuh tie me to that wagon wheel an' have 'em whip me till I'm dead."

I turned on my side and I'm pretty sure that I fell asleep.

I opened my eyes on a beautiful day in some far-off and wonderful place. Not only was I awake but I was running down an open road.

Somewhere in my mind I worried that I might be seen by some white man who would beat me like the slave laws demanded. I worried, but the road was broad and straight so I figured that if I saw somebody coming that I could run away before they could catch me and bring me back to the plantation.

But when I looked around I realized that I didn't need to worry. The plants on the side of the road were red and purple, without leaves, not at all like proper trees. And the sky was pink and red and the road was paved with something like glass, and there was no sun in the sky but it was still bright and clear.

"This is where I am from," a voice said.

I stopped running and turned to see my friend was standing there next to me.

It was John and then again it wasn't. He had the same

voice and his eyes were deep and kind as they had been on the Corinthian Plantation. But in this new place he was a head taller, quite a bit thinner, and his skin was more orange than brown. And above his head I could see a shimmering light that moved when he did.

You can imagine that I was amazed by the events unfolding around me. The last thing I remembered was being under a tree in a rainstorm. Now all of a sudden I was in a strange new land and my friend had grown a foot and changed colors on me.

"What the hell you doin' to me, niggah?" I said.

He pointed at me and said, "Neither master nor nigger be."

In this new place his words took on a new meaning. They brought about a vision: I saw Tobias and the cowering Pritchard in my mind. The slave master was holding a whip and the abject slave was writhing on the ground, begging our master for mercy.

I didn't want to be either one of them. I reached out in my imagination and pushed their images away. Then I turned my attention back to Taller John and his lecturing finger.

"That's right, Forty-seven," John said as if he knew what had been going on in my head, as if he saw the tableau of master and slave in my mind.

"Go beyond it," John continued. "Just because they treat you like that doesn't mean that you have to believe in them."

As the images faded from my mind I was once again aware of the strange land around me.

"You live here?" I asked.

"No," Tall John, the orange being from beyond Africa, said.

"But you were born here?"

"Yes," he said. "My ancestors were born here many millions of years ago. It is a planet called Elle and it is so far from Earth that it is as if it doesn't really exist."

"Far beyond the dirt?" I asked. The only time I had heard anyone use the word earth they were talking about the soil beneath our feet.

"Earth," he said again. "It is the planet you come from. Like the moon only larger and crowded with life."

"An' this place "

"My planet Elle," he interjected.

"Yeah. This place Elle is a earth too but so far away that you cain't get there?"

Tall John nodded and smiled. He was even taller now and his orange skin was tinged with purple. The light above his head brightened and I was beginning to think that he wasn't a boy at all.

"An' why couldn't we bring our real bodies here?" I asked.

"Because if I spent the rest of my life trying to get here I would hardly be any closer than I am now under that tree in my sleep."

"You as far from yo home as I am from my freedom," I said, surprising myself with the thought.

John smiled and nodded. He put his hand on my shoulder and we walked on in the strange landscape.

As we walked he spoke to me in his commanding tone.

"But I could bring us here because all I have to do is remember and the great mind delivers me."

"Like if I remembered the river you brought me to?" I asked. "I could go there just by rememberin' it?"

"Yes," John said. "Behind all of existence there is one great mind. And every single living, thinking being is a part of that mind. Once you learn to connect with it you can always return to a place or a thought that you once had."

"Like make-believe?" I asked.

"No. We are really here at this moment but as wraiths."

"Ghosts?"

"Someone ignorant of the Great Mind might see us as ghosts but no one on Elle would make that mistake."

As we walked the red and purple forest gave way to a wide plain made up of what looked like piles of stones. The stacks of rock were gray and red-brown and none were piled higher than a man. The piles were all shivering. They looked like rock-studded cocoons ready to release their butterflies.

"That's right," John said as if he could hear my thoughts. "They are living things, creatures of the Calash."

"These are your people?" I asked.

"No," the taller and taller boy said. "Not really. I mean, once we were all one people but that was so long ago that there are very few records that survive to document our relationship."

As he spoke one of the shivering piles of stones exploded outward, disgorging an albino creature that was made up of a great head, from which hung a dozen limbs that seemed to work as both legs and arms. The creature (which was about the size of a wild boar) climbed to the top of a nearby pile and shook itself, throwing off the water of its birth. Then it moved its head around until great blue wings sprouted from the back. The beautiful creature let out a terrible scream and then flew aloft on its blue wings.

"Where's it goin?" I asked as my friend and I watched the winged thing fade into the pink-and-red horizon.

"To seek the God-Mind and kill it," he said. "To rend the universe open and feast on its heart."

Up until that moment I wasn't truly troubled by the sights I beheld. Even the physical changes to John's body didn't seem so strange to me. I already knew he was different on the inside from the way he talked. But John's words about destruction set off a deep agitation in my heart. I had no idea what a God-Mind was but I had heard the word God before and I knew that killing was bad no matter who it happened to.

The stacks of birthing stones spread out as far as the eyes could see. Here and there albino members of the

+7

Calash race were rising up from their cocoons and taking flight.

"There must be more of'em than Mud Albert could count," I said.

"They are as plentiful as the stars," John agreed, "and yet there is but one."

"What's that mean?" I asked. "You will see," he said.

Another stack of stones burst open nearer to us. The big-headed white creature with its dozen limbs crawled out and shifted and turned until it had wings. But this one, rather than gliding off into the sky, turned its one great black eye upon my friend and me. The creature screamed as did the previous newborn, but instead of leaving he dove at us. John and I ducked down to keep from being battered by those blue wings. As we arose the eerie bird-like thing wheeled in the sky, obviously intent on attacking again.

"Let's skip this part," John said.

He waved his orange and purple hand through the air and suddenly we were standing on a black platform in a wide, glassy sphere. There was no sky above or ground below us, only thousands of small black platforms that jutted out from the sides of the globe. When I looked around the sphere I realized that we were in the largest place that I had ever been, even larger than that valley where I saw the she-bear and first imagined being free.

While I watched, a small creature walked out up the ledge nearest my eye. He was no larger than a baby chick but the same proportions as tall, lean John. He was bright yellow in color and when he saw my face he smiled and nodded. The light above his head lengthened like a candle reaching its highest flame.

"Hello, hero," he said.

"My name ain't hero, it's Forty-seven, but hello to you too, little yellah man."

As I spoke these words I noticed tiny little men and women were climbing out onto the thousands of ledges around me. They were every different color of the rainbow and all of them so bright that the big sphere got as clear as midday.

"Who are all these little people?" I asked.

"They are my people," Tall John said in my ear.

I turned to ask how we got from one place to the other. But as I did so I found myself facing another small ledge, and on that ledge I saw a tiny little Tall John standing there and smiling.

"Is this what you really look like?" I asked.

"Yes," he said.

"And is this your home?"

"This is Talam the primal hive," small Tall John said. "It is where we fled when the Calash tried to steal our technology and use it to tear open the fabric of the world."

I had no idea what his words meant but I knew that it couldn't be good.

"As I told you before, there is a higher place," John said.

"The Great Mind," I added.

"That's right. It is the place where all mind resides. You are there and I am too, but we are also in the physical world with our bodies and with each other. In the physical world every being is different, but there, in the higher place, we are all the same."

I didn't know what he meant by all that. It sounded like when Brother Bob would deliver a sermon but here there was no podium or cross. Without those things to secure my eyes I realized that I had never understood those sermons.

"And so you and them Calash things are really the same?" I asked.

"Yes," my diminutive friend said, "and no. In the upper reality we are all the same, flowing in one direction, with one eternal plan. But here in the material world the Calash believe that they can break the barrier between mind and matter and feast upon the pure energy of the God-Mind."

"And that's bad?"

"They will never succeed, but in trying to do so they could throw the whole universe into turmoil. They will never be able to conquer the walls of heaven as they wish, but they can destroy all life and therefore strangle the spirit until it is warped out of all understanding."

All around me thousands of thousands of tiny bright-colored men and women began to weep.

"What do you want me to do?" I asked, intent upon helping those wee folk if I could.

It was the most important decision of my long life and I didn't even stop to think about it. Tall John, my first true friend, said that there was a battle brewing between him and the wing-heads called the Calash. Well, then, I would do what I could to defend my friend and the universe whatever that might be.

There came a tittering among the uncountable elfin citizens of the great hive. Then they all cheered. They had small voices but there were so many of them that the sound came like a roar.

"I told you," John said, addressing the unlikely congress of elves. "I told you that he was the one."

"But will he have the ability to stand against Wall?" a thousand voices asked.

"Victory can never be assured," John replied. "But at least he is willing."

"You could destroy the planet," a thousand thousand voices bellowed. "Destroy Earth and Wall will die."

"How would we be able to distinguish ourselves from the Calash if I were to do such a thing?" John's single voice asked. "There are plants and fish and insects…" at each mention of a life form the image appeared before the great congregation. And every time the little people beheld the beauty of life on Earth they tittered and cooed. "… there are men and bears and eagles flying," John continued, "and we will not end them because that would mean that we would be doing the Calash's work for them."

"N'Clect is right!" a thousand thousand thousand voices proclaimed. "Let the one called Forty-seven go forward and do battle with Wall. Let us put our faith in Life."

And there I was, a small slave boy from the Corinthian Plantation, being cheered by a number that added up to a billion. And even though I couldn't count nearly that high I was loved and applauded by them. John leaped on my shoulder and shouted out my name. And then the name Forty-seven was on the lips of the whole hive.

I didn't know it at the time but N'Clect was John's real Talamish name.