"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.
14.
Sunlight glittering through the leaves roused me. I sat up, rubbed the sand out of, my eyes, and realized that I was alone. Looking around for my friend I saw that there was a young doe at the edge of the empty space created by the tree. Timidly it looked at me. It was equally afraid and curious and so moved forward and back, keeping its place but at the same time still ready to flee. A mother deer emerged from the bushes then. She cast a wary eye on me and then nuzzled her little fawn. Instantly the young deer calmed down. I could see that there was a berry bush where the two stood. They were eating the sweet fruit and so dared the danger that I represented.
Even though I was afraid of being alone and scared of what Tobias would do when he caught me, I was still enthralled by those deer. I wondered what it would have been like if my mother, Psalma, had lived. Would she have stood over me, protecting me while we ate sweet berries?
While I lamented the loss of my mother Tall John strode
into view. Not the tiny orange and violet John with flames above his head but the colored slave boy with the skinny chest and coppery skin. I wondered then if my dream was real. He stepped in between the mother and child, stroking their flanks and saying something I couldn't hear. They pressed their snouts against him in a friendly way and then went back to eating. John then turned toward me.
In his right hand he carried the napkin that Flore had wrapped my cookies with. He held the big handkerchief by the corners like it was a sack.
"Good morning, Forty-seven," he said upon reaching me. "Did you sleep well?"
"They gonna kill us, Numbah Twelve," I replied.
"Would you like to flee to the north?" he asked.
"I ain't jokin' wit' you, fool."
"I'm not telling a joke," he said. "If you wish we can head north right now. By day after tomorrow we'll be in a place that doesn't have slavery and doesn't return slaves."
"Ain't no sucha place," I said.
"There are many lands that don't have slaves, Forty-seven. Canada, Vermont."
I could tell that he was serious, that he was willing, with no more than a shrug and a nod, to take me away from all the chains and chiggers and cotton. All I had to do was say yes and the misery of my daily existence would have fallen away.
"What you got in that napkin?" I asked him.
"I went back to my bag in the tree and got a chemical that will kill the virus in Eloise's brain. I also collected various fungi that will carry the serum through her blood."
"So if we run away she'll die?"
"Probably."
"But if we wait and run away later can we take Flore and Champ and Mud Albert with us?"
"No," John said. "Only you."
If I ran Miss Eloise would die, and my friends would remain slaves no matter what I did. I couldn't imagine a life where Eloise was dead and where I'd never lay eyes on Big Mama Flore again. The only choice I had was to go back to Corinthian, and I knew that I would at least get bull-whipped for running away.
I could feel the lash on my back even as I stood there in that primal paradise. Fear of the whip brought tears to my eyes. But the thought of leaving my friends and the thought of the Master's daughter dying was too much for me.
That was the way it was for the short while that I knew Tall John from beyond Africa. Everything he said to me was both a test and a lesson. Being his friend was my first experience with the responsibilities of freedom.
"We bettah get back," I said.
"But you said that they would kill us," John argued. "Wouldn't it be better to run?"
"But that girl is dyin'."
"But she's related to people that make Negroes into
slaves. Wouldn't it be better to let her die? Wouldn't it be better for Tobias to feel like you do about the suffering of your people? Anyway, Flore and Mud Albert will be slaves if you go back or not."
I looked up at the strange boy who had befriended me. At first I thought that he was making fun of me. But when I looked into his face I saw that he really expected me to have no feelings for Eloise and even the other slaves.
"No," I said. "I wanna run. An' I sho nuff don' wanna die. But I'd be lonely without my friends in Canaland and I don't blame Miss Eloise for my sufferin'."
"One day you will have to leave the plantation, Forty-seven. Your destiny is far from here."
"Come on," I said. "Let's get back before I change my mind about runnin'."
The sun was out and John was able to move fast again. So it wasn't too very long before we got to the plantation. I wanted to go right out in the fields and start working, pretending that nothing had happened. But John ran us right up to the front porch of the Master's home and knocked on his door.
Fred Chocolate answered. I knew we were in trouble when a worried look came into his sour face. I knew we were dead.