Page 49 of The Reformatory

“I already seen three,” Robert said. Four if he counted the fire. Five if he counted Mama. And then the ones in the Funhouse, too many to count. He settled on the three who’d looked real.

“In one day? That’s a lot,” Redbone said. He wanted to say more about the haints, but he wouldn’t. As if it might be bad luck. “So, you scared?” Redbone said after a long wait.

“Of haints?” Robert said. “No.” It wasn’t even a lie. Not anymore. He was only scared he’d be like them, trapped.

“Good thing, ’cuz they may not let you alone.”

“Why?”

Redbone shrugged. “Some people draw ’em like magnets. That’s what Blue says.”

Maybe Blue could teach him everything he’d learned about haints. Robert might have to forgive Blue for talking so freely about runaways hiding and ducking his whipping.

“Two of them… at least two,” Robert went on softly, “they were killed. Murdered.” Redbone raised his eyes and gave a small shake of his head that meant Shhhhh.

“I guess they want someone to know,” Robert said quietly. “That’s all.”

“Better worry about your own self,” Redbone said. “ ’Fore you’re a haint too.”

That sounded like something sensible Gloria might have said, and Robert missed his sister, his life, so fiercely that he could hardly catch his breath. Haints must miss their lives too.

A new Negro woman appeared in the doorway, and his heart jumped. She was Mama’s height but a bit thinner, her skin darker. Mama had worn her hair pressed and long down her shoulders, but this woman’s hair was pinned in a high, tight side bun. Robert stared, wondering if her features would change and she would become Mama. But, no, her cheekbones were smoother. Her forehead was higher. She was a bit younger than Mama, dressed in a gray skirt and prim white blouse Mama never would have worn because it looked too much like a uniform she had vowed never to wear even if she was doing wash. Was she a haint too?

“You see her?” Robert whispered to Redbone, to be sure.

Redbone turned and quickly hid the playing cards under Robert’s sheet; he saw her.

The woman was wearing heels instead of soft soles like the nurse, and her feet made polite clicks on the floor as she walked closer. She seemed as surprised to see them as they were to see her.

“Oh,” she said. “This is the infirmary? I was looking for the school.”

“School’s down the path a ways, closer to the cornfield,” Redbone said.

“I’m all turned around, then,” she said. “No matter. You boys all right?”

She asked the question with care. Robert wanted to blurt out an inventory of his pain and troubles, but instead he only nodded while the others mumbled, “Yes’m.”

She smiled at them. And what a smile! Mother, aunt, sister. But then she took her smile back just as quickly, turning to walk back out the way she’d come.

“Who’s that?” Robert said.

“I ain’t never seen her,” Redbone said. “Maybe they got a new nurse.”

Rattling came from the hall, and the woman returned with a large cart packed with musical instruments, still shiny through their dents. A large round drum was alone on the bottom shelf, painted GRACETOWN BOYS’ SCHOOL in faded red. On the top shelf, Robert recognized a trumpet, a saxophone, a tambourine, a flute, and a sticklike black instrument he couldn’t name. The three younger boys flocked to her cart.

“No touching,” the woman said firmly. “They’re not toys. Who’s twelve or older here?”

Robert and Redbone looked at each other, not sure they should volunteer. But Robert wanted to touch the trumpet, so he raised his hand. Redbone followed his lead.

While the younger boys complained, the woman wheeled her cart to the foot of Robert’s bed. For the first time, Robert learned that instruments had a smell: brass and oil and maybe spit.

“All right,” the woman said, and took a breath. “My name is Mrs. Marian Crutcher Hamilton, and I’m the new band director for the Gracetown Reformatory Negro Boys’ Marching Band. Did you know the Reformatory has an award-winning band? For the past five years, it has marched in the Gracetown Christmas Parade.”

Robert shook his head. Every word out of her mouth was more amazing than the last. A Negro woman was leading a band at the Reformatory? Negro boys marched in a town parade? Negro families were not welcome to attend the Christmas parade, shooed away by deputies.

Negro children who were willing to wait could gather by the trees at the end of the street, where everyone in the parade was tired of putting on a show. But you could see the pretty costumes.

“You kin to Mr. Crutcher, ma’am?” Redbone said.