Bittersweet

“Mary Beth,” she whispered, stroking the girl’s cheek with the back of her hand. “No. No, Bethy.” Jerking back the covers, she pressed her ear to the girl’s chest.

When she looked up, her face was like slate. Her nostrils flared slightly, two white dents appearing on either side of her nose. The midwife still poked drunkenly at the whimpering baby, trying to diaper it before the cord had been tied off or the blood and afterbirth washed away.

“Get out,” Imogene said quietly. The woman looked up stupidly, focusing with difficulty. She pawed the hair away from her eyes.

“You git,” she said thickly. “Nobody tellin’ me my business. You git! Cow.” She snorted and a thin line of mucus ran from her nose.

Imogene was around the bed in three strides. She clamped her hand on the woman’s wrist and the midwife cried out, dropping the diaper pin on the bed. Imogene jerked her away from the baby, slamming her into the wall. Her fingers clenched into a white fist, Imogene raised her arm.

“You got no call to go hurtin’ me,” Mrs. Sankey blubbered. Her flaccid, puffy face quivered and crumpled. Imogene dropped her hand and, grasping the woman by the dresstail and the back of her neck, ran her from the bedroom.

Melissa and her mother crowded the narrow steps, peering in. When they saw Imogene, stonefaced and bloodless, drag the midwife from the bedroom, they scattered like chaff before a storm. They were just in time. Imogene wrenched back on the woman’s hair and the seat of her dress, hauling her just off the floor, and hurled her though the door. She landed in a bawling heap at the bottom of the steps.

Imogene caught sight of Melissa and her mother cowering in the twilight.

She pointed at the Negro woman. “You! Get me some warm water and soap. Send that girl for clean linens.” She yanked a leather coin purse from her pocket and flung it toward them. “Clean. Do you hear me?” The woman picked the purse out of the dirt and handed it to her daughter.

“You do like she say, Missy. You git yourself to old Julie’s, she get laundry from white folks, she have somethin’.” Melissa ran off, clutching the purse. The woman planted her fists on her ample waist and glared at the darkened doorway where Imogene had been. “Eunice is gettin’ that water,” she said, “but it ain’t fo’ you. It fo’ that baby an’ her baby.”

Eunice carried the pail of water into the Ramseys’ house, setting it down in front of the bedroom door. “You in there?”

“Come in.” It was a command.

The big Negress pushed the door open. The bedroom was dimly lit by a lamp and two candles. Imogene sat stiffly beside the bed, her bodice and skirt streaked with blood, the baby lying naked in her arms. “Bring it here,” she demanded.

Eunice brought the bucket over and set it down hard, slopping the water onto Imogene’s dress. Then her eye lighted on the still figure in the bed and she let out a long, low moan.

“It too much fo’ that baby.” She laid her hand, black and strong, against the narrow white brow and murmured a prayer, tears welling up in her eyes and coursing down her cheeks to drop unheeded on her wide bosom.

Imogene mechanically dabbed water from the pail and flicked it onto the inside of her wrist. “Water’s too cool.”

The black woman turned from the bed. “She dead an’ don’t need no doctor, so I got no use for you.” She jabbed a finger at Imogene. “Eunice is goin’ to take care of that baby. Here, you holdin’ it all wrong.” She scooped the sticky bundle off Imogene’s lap and examined it deftly, crooning all the while. “You a fine baby, fo’ all you bein’ so little.” She turned to Imogene. “You move yo’self. Find me somethin’ big enough to wash this child in.” Imogene stood slowly; she was unsteady on her feet and clutched at the back of the chair. Eunice looked at Imogene’s stricken face and softened. “Honey, you just sit.”

There was a clatter and Melissa appeared, peeking timidly through the bedroom door, an armload of white cloths pale in the dark. Eunice took the bundling from the little girl. “Fetch y’ momma the tub.” She tweaked the round chain. “You bein’ such a big girl today, your momma be surprised if you ain’t wearin’ long dresses tomorrow mornin’ when she get up.” Melissa vanished noisily into the dark.

Eunice laid the cloths and the baby down on the bed. “You hold that lamp close.” Imogene picked up the lamp and crowded near the bed as the black woman dug through the few implements the midwife had left behind and found a serviceable knife. She soaped it thoroughly and sluiced it in the pail.

Imogene stepped between her and the baby. “What do you mean to do?”

“I’m goin’ to cut that cord an’ tie it off neat.” She shouldered by Imogene. “I delivered more babies than you can shake a stick at. An’ most of them live just as robust as you please. They was most nigger babies and they hardy, but this baby, she want to live, too.”

Mrs. Utterback and the doctor arrived as they were bathing the baby. Doctor Stricker formally pronounced Mary Beth dead and commended Eunice on her care of the infant girl. Mrs. Utterback said a quiet prayer for the dead woman and pulled the cover over her face. The doctor left soon after and, because Imogene asked it of her, Mrs. Utterback left as well. Eunice took the baby.

Imogene stayed alone with the dead girl. She pulled the tangled bedclothes straight, and tenderly cleaned Mary Beth’s face with a damp cloth. She brushed the light hair until it lay smooth over the pillow and lifted the fine-boned hands, pressing them to her as if her body could warm them. On the girl’s left hand, with her wedding band, she wore a simple circle of jade. Imogene slipped the dark ring off and onto her own ring finger; it wouldn’t be forced over the joint, so she put it on her little finger. Folding the dead girl’s hands, she laid them carefully on the silent breast.

When the room was tidy and the floor swept, she knelt by the bed, resting her head near Mary Beth, and wept.

A raucous shout snatched Imogene from a doze. The candles had burned down, one guttering near extinction. She looked wildly around the room until she saw the composed face on the pillow. There was a crash, and Imogene hurried to her feet. Laughter and shouting poured into the house. The flimsy door to the bedroom rattled as a heavy hand pounded on it.

“Hey!” More pounding. “Hey, in there! My boy here bred himself up a son yet?” Laughter and another crash. Imogene jerked open the door and Darrel Aiken all but fell into the room.

“Drunk.” Imogene’s teeth clenched on the word.

Darrel clung to the doorframe. “My baby sister made me an uncle? Where’s that goddamn midwife I got?” Leaning dangerously, he narrowed his eyes and squinted into the room, then shouted over his shoulder to the shadow of another man standing in the dark, “No nigger woman for my sister!”

“No nigger!” the shadow echoed.

Darrel noticed Imogene for the first time. “We’ve been celebrating.” Recognition crept into his eyes. “Jesus Christ! If it ain’t Miss Grelznik. Im-o-gene Grelznik.” He sobered up a little and his lips curled back from his teeth. “I ought to kill you. Sneakin’ in here to make love to my sister when her man-man, goddamn it, not you, layin’ on her like you was her man-that got a son on her’s out celebratin’. You better not’ve had your hands on her. If you’ve so much as laid a finger on her, there’ll be hell to pay.” He peered drunkenly into the darkness over her shoulder and raised his voice. “You’ll get the beating of your life! You hear me, Mary Beth?”

“Mary Beth is dead.” Imogene pushed him away from the bedroom door and pulled it close behind her. “Please leave.”

“Ramsey!” Darrel shouted. “This is your house or ain’t it?”

Kevin Ramsey stood stock-still, his arms loose at his sides. “Dead?” he asked dully.

“Ramsey,” Darrel growled.

Kevin Ramsey started to sob, huge gasping cries squeezing out of him. He sank to the floor and, supporting himself on his hands and knees, vomited, permeating the room with the stink of regurgitated whiskey. Imogene grabbed Darrel by the arm, taking him off balance, and escorted him to the front door. He lurched helplessly along beside her, flailing. She let go and he lost his footing, tumbling down the steps. The door slammed behind him and the bolt shot into place.