The Boarding House

Vinny’s Great Move, Asheville 1920s

Vincent Bossard, known to everyone as Vinny, lived at the boarding house for three reasons: it was near downtown, Miss Sophie’s food was superb, and she let him take a bath every day if he wanted to. He didn’t work at a public job because he didn’t have to. Every month he received a government pension that gave him enough money to pay Miss Sophie for room and board, which was essentially all he needed, and after he had paid that he still had twice that much money left over to spend or save. He saved a lot more than he spent. He was able to do this because he wore a suit of clothes for years, and what else was there to spend anything on? Miss Sophie washed and ironed for him for an extra three dollars a month, so after that anything that he spent his money on, he considered to be for luxury.

Vinny smoked five cigars every day the sun rose except on Sunday. But even this didn’t cost him anything because a tobacco company in Durham sent him three boxes of cigars every month because they said they especially appreciated what he had done for the country. Each box had fifty cigars in it, so he received one hundred and fifty cigars every month, which was more than enough for him given the fact that he cut back to only three or four cigars on Sundays.

Vinny smoked fewer cigars on Sundays because he didn’t smoke during church and Sunday School, but he actually smoked more tobacco on Sundays than on the other days. He did it this way: when he got down toward the end of each cigar that he smoked during the day, he took out his pocket knife, opened a blade, and stuck it into the cigar as close to the mouth end as possible. He was thereby able to hold the cigar with his blade and smoke it down to a smaller stub than if he held it with his fingers toward the end of the smoke because his fingers started getting burned when the cigar got down to about an inch not counting the ash. By using this method of completing his smoke, Vinny ended up with a much smaller stub than he would have otherwise. But even here Vinny practiced his innate frugality, for he did not discard this stub by throwing it onto the courthouse lawn, or even putting it in one of the nearby ash trays. Instead, after he had allowed the cigar to burn out, he carefully rubbed the ash off the end and placed it in a small goat hide leather pouch that he had acquired in Cuba in 1899 after the war. On Sundays, he took these accumulated stubs and chopped them into tobacco flakes and smoked this tobacco in his pipe. Uncle Vinny was both a cigar smoker and a pipe smoker, but all in all he preferred his cigars — he just didn’t want to be wasteful. When someone once asked him if this chopped tobacco from the ends of the cigars didn’t taste nasty, he said No, no man — these cigars are like life — they get better toward the end.

What Vinny had done for his country that the tobacco company in Durham especially appreciated was he left the lower part of his leg in Cuba in 1899. When the major army evacuated Cuba that year after they had won the war, the United States left the black Ninth Infantry Regiment there to support the occupation. They did this because seventy-five percent of the white soldiers got the fever while they were there, but the blacks seemed to be immune to it for the most part; by the time they left only 73 of the Ninth’s 984 soldiers had got the fever.

But Vinny hadn’t got his leg shot off in a real battle. He lost it when he was ordered to chase down one of his own colleagues who had moved into a house of ill repute in downtown Havana. He had gone after the errant soldier, who was actually a white man who declined to evacuate with the rest of the force because he preferred his current living conditions over those that he knew he would experience if he returned to his daddy’s farm in Alabama. After inquiring at the house of ill repute about the errant soldier, Vinny was directed to a small town several miles outside Havana where someone told him the soldier was setting up a new business. Vinny got to the town and someone alerted the soldier that a man in uniform was looking for him so he started running out of town. Vinny chased him and the soldier led him through a swamp where Vinny got snake bit right at his knee. He nevertheless continued and caught up with the soldier, who ended up having to tote Vinny back to town because by the time Vinny had finally caught up with him he, Vinny, had become so sick he could hardly move. Notwithstanding his current circumstances, this soldier was still a good man — he was just committed to ameliorating his living conditions and he believed that Havana and its environs constituted a prime location for doing that. He was scheduled to be honorably discharged from the army as soon as he set foot on American soil anyway. And he couldn’t let a comrade in arms just die without helping him, if help him he could.

The soldier enlisted the services of a mule wagon and driver and transported Vinny back to Havana and dropped him off at the first hospital that he came to. The medicos saved Vinny’s life but not his leg. They cut it off just above the knee, mended the stump, and took him to his bivouac as soon as he was well enough to be moved there. The soldier that Vinny had been chasing stayed in Havana and became a very successful businessman. The army put into his records that he had died in a swamp from the fever. As the years passed, the character of his investments evolved, becoming more conventional, and in 1919 he cashed in and returned to Alabama, where he bought three farms adjoining his daddy’s place, hired a farm manager to oversee the three tenant farmers who ran the farms, and placed his daddy in charge of the whole operation at a salary that was more than five times what he had ever made in a year of farming. After he got his daddy settled in and established as a serious farm operator, the former soldier moved to Durham and started a tobacco importing business, specializing in Caribbean, especially Cuban, cigars.

Vinny convalesced in Havana for three months after losing his leg, and finally made it back to New Orleans where he had grown up as Vincent Bossard among many siblings and cousins and other distant relatives who had paid him very little mind until he returned with his disabled veteran’s pension. This income was sufficient to sustain him, but because of the love visited upon him by so many of his relatives, Vinny was penniless by the middle of every month. So after the middle of the month he hobbled down to the Quarter with his crutches and harmonica — known as a harp by everybody south of the Mason-Dixon Line — and sat on a bench with his hat on the ground in front of his feet and played, and played. By the end of the day there were usually enough pennies and nickels in his hat to buy his supper and the next day’s food, but nothing more. This was not so bad though, for his relatives didn’t come by much during the second half of the month because they knew that Vinny was broke and wouldn’t be there anyway because he needed to work and earn a living.

Vinny carried on like this for a few years and his family grew and grew, and they spent more and more time with him during the first half of the month so that soon he was penniless after the first week of every month, which prompted him to hobble down to the Quarter now for three weeks or so every month and make music for money. During the fourth week of one month a few years after he returned to New Orleans, it occurred to Vinny that he probably had more relatives than anyone he knew and that somehow he needed to get away from them. Although he loved music, he hated making it for money. Music to him was part of his soul — it always had been, just as it had been for his granpappy who had taught him how to hold the harp and blow through it without spitting in it too much, and how to put the sounds together until you were making a song — your song — and using this as a way to tell people what was in your soul.

But doing this for money was kind of like prostituting — at least that’s the way Vinny felt at the time. And that’s what finally made Vinny decide to do something about his relatives, or more precisely about his financial situation. He had to leave this town.

Vinny’s veteran’s payment came on the second day of every month, or on the last day of the month if that was a Friday. The month after he made his decision was one of those Friday months, and this helped him a bit. His closest relatives would usually begin to show up during the afternoon of the second day of the month to check on Vinny’s welfare and this would usually continue for about a week. He had never told his relatives that his money came early if the last day of the month was on Friday. The government had made arrangements for Vinny to pick up his money at a bank on the date that it was to be paid to him. This month he had laid his plans carefully. For the last two months he had even cut back drastically on his eating and had saved every penny he could from playing his harp.

On Friday morning when he got out of bed he put everything he had except his crutches into his army duffel bag and set it by his door. He took his crutches and made his way to the bank and collected his payment for the next month which began the next day, Saturday morning. He walked back toward his room and along the way he stopped a carriage and hired it to take him to the train station by way of his residence. The driver took him back to his room and fetched his bag for him. Vinny went to his landlady and paid the next week’s rent just in case he needed to come back for some reason. He told her he was taking a little vacation up in the mountains. She told him that was fine by her and that she hoped he enjoyed himself and maybe he could bring her back a little something from the mountains because she had never been able to get away to the mountains. Vinny said sure.

He arrived at the train station and the driver took his bag to the baggage room. Vinny thanked him and paid him and then bought a one-way ticket to Asheville, North Carolina, and boarded his train. When he arrived in Asheville early Monday morning he asked a Negro porter if there were any boarding houses near downtown that would welcome a man of color from New Orleans.

—You got any money? the porter asked.

—I do indeed, said Vinny. He showed the porter the wad of bills that he had just received from the government, and a little leather bag that was full of silver and copper coins.

—I’d say Miss Sophie would be glad to take you on, but you better let me walk you over there and take that bag for you. And you better not be showing that money around or you won’t have it long in this town.

Miss Sophie’s Room & Board was only a little over two blocks from the depot. The porter hoisted Vinny’s bag onto a small wagon and invited Vinny to sit on it for the two block trip to the boarding house.

—No thanks. I’ll take these here crutches and walk right along with you.

Thus it was that Vincent Bossard moved from the Quarter in New Orleans into Miss Sophie’s Room & Board in Asheville, North Carolina, where he lived the rest of his life.

Settling In At Miss Sophie’s, Asheville 1920s

Vinny settled in to his room at Miss Sophie’s, and the first morning there he wrote a letter to the tobacco company in Durham informing them that he had moved to Asheville and provided them with his new address. He then spent about a week getting used to Miss Sophie’s cooking, which was not hard to do. She didn’t cook cajun, but she knew how to cook. At every noon and evening meal she put out at least two meats and three or four vegetables. The boarders ate at one long table family style, and filled their plates family style. In fact, as the days passed, Vinny began to feel like he was part of a family at Miss Sophie’s place. There was another colored person there, a young school teacher, and she was one of three females that stayed at the boarding house. There were five men.

Miss Sophie made some modifications to the house so that there were nine rooms to let which meant that each boarder had a private room. She installed a sink in each room to take some pressure off the three bathrooms that were available to the boarders. She had her own separate two-room apartment just off the kitchen and her own bathroom. The two full bathrooms upstairs were designated for the three ladies, and the five men shared the full bath downstairs and the water closet. She provided a chamber pot with a lid to each resident for use in each room. Rent included a weekly change of bed and bath linens and the laundry of these items. In cold weather Miss Sophie put what she called a feather bed in each room. This was what many in the north called a comforter, which might be described as a huge pillow — way bigger than the bed — that was stuffed with feathers which one could hardly stand to sleep under except in the most frigid weather. If the weather was not below zero — and it rarely was — most residents put a sheet on top of the feather bed and slept on it instead of under it. This is probably how it came to be known as a feather bed in the south.

If a renter wanted Miss Sophie to do his or her laundry she provided that service as well at a price that was competitive with the local laundries, and included ironing. Her residents were well fed and quite comfortable in their living conditions.

Miss Sophie made it clear when she interviewed an applicant that there were plenty of good boarding houses in the area, and that if one was uncomfortable eating at the same table or living in the same house as a person of another color, or even a Cherokee, then they should seek room and board elsewhere. Her boarding house was open to anyone she chose and that was that.

As far as Vinny could tell, that was fine with everyone there. Her rooms were always occupied, and there appeared to be a waiting list. The only complaint that he ever heard about the arrangements at Miss Sophie’s was that it was almost impossible to keep from putting on weight if one stayed there for any length of time. In fact, the food was so good that she put in a second long table in the dining room and accepted day boarders for breakfast and dinner, essentially doubling her clientele except for supper. It may not have been a restaurant officially, but it was a fully integrated southern eating establishment as early as the 1920’s.

Vinny began to get fat. Every morning he ate a breakfast that consisted of eggs and sausage and ham and fried pork chops and fried chicken, and often fried tenderloin chips and grits and some of the best biscuits that he had ever tasted. Miss Sophie had a Negro lady, Jamie, that helped her cook and she made the biscuits. She made these with lard and buttermilk and white flour, and occasionally delighted the guests with biscuits that had copious amounts of hog cracklins mixed in. These were the solids that remained in the bottom of the lard vat when chunks of fat were thrown into the cast iron pot and rendered over fire into lard. In Vinny’s opinion few experiences in life were as sublime as biting into a hot biscuit that was filled with cracklins and slowly chewing it, and then washing it down with hot black coffee. After breakfast he either settled into the parlor and listened to the conversations of those who remained at the house — which were few because most had some kind of daytime occupation — or went to the front porch and rocked the morning away, watching the world go by.

By noon he could not truthfully say that he was hungry but the aromas coming out of the kitchen coupled with the arrival of the noon eaters urged him back to the dining room table. So he went, and he ate, and then he rocked the afternoon away on the porch and watched the world go by some more. And then he went back to the table at supper time and ate his evening meal. Vinny was happy, and getting fatter.

What more could a man want? His room and his board and his laundry consumed barely a third of his monthly payment from the government. His cigars cost him nothing because of the nice tobacco company in Durham. He had already received his first shipment of these at his new address because he had notified them of his change of address as soon as he got to Asheville. They had even thrown in some extra cigars with a note congratulating Vinny on his move to North Carolina.

At this point none of his funds were diverted to any of the Bossards in New Orleans, who he knew must be experiencing a dearth of funds for their daily needs, but he could not concern himself with that. They would just have to make do themselves, perhaps even go to work. Here he was happy, the residents liked him and were friendly to him, and most of them called him Uncle Vinny, which pleased him immensely. He had turned fifty a few weeks after he arrived at Miss Sophie’s, and she had thrown a party for him after supper on his birthday. All the residents were there and each of them gave him a little something. And then he gave each of them a fresh cigar, including the women, and invited everyone to join him on the porch for a smoke. Two of the ladies politely declined, but to his utter amazement and joy, the young Negro teacher lady said sure she’d love to smoke a cigar with him on the porch, and she did. And then Miss Sophie came out to the porch with a tray that had a decanter and several small glasses on it and proposed that everyone serve themselves and raise a toast to Uncle Vinny, which they did, including the teacher lady, who sat in a rocking chair next to Vinny. When everyone exclaimed how good and how smooth the whiskey was, Miss Sophie explained that she had received it as an offering from one of her early suitors up in Murphy — or actually way up in the mountains outside of Murphy, and that it was at least fifteen years old and that she couldn’t think of anyone she would rather share it with than Uncle Vinny and his friends on this very special evening. With a twinkle in her eye she said that she doubted that its makers had paid taxes on it, but what did that matter — it was delicious, taxed or not. Uncle Vinny was happy, and because he was getting fat just sitting here on the porch, he determined that beginning the next day he would take his crutches and make his way to the courthouse lawn and sit on a bench for the morning, weather permitting. This would give him some exercise that he was not getting at the moment. He explained this to the teacher lady and she told Vinny she thought that was a great idea. When she told him she needed to turn in because she had to deal with twenty-five teenagers all day the next day she didn’t call him Uncle Vinny — she just called him Vinny. He thanked her for smoking the cigar with him and she said she was the one that needed to thank him and that maybe they could do it again sometime. She went back in the house and Miss Sophie poured him another glass of that delicious Appalachian Mountain nectar, and Vinny was happy. He was home.

One morning about three months after moving from New Orleans to Asheville, Vinny left the breakfast table at Miss Sophie’s Room and Board and went to his room and loaded a little sack that he usually carried slung over his shoulder. He made his way down the front steps and the path to the sidewalk and headed for the courthouse which was about four blocks away.

He had already made the trip three times, but did not tarry there on the earlier trips. Today would be different. He decided he needed to spend more time away from Miss Sophie’s front porch. He moved along at a nice pace with his crutches and arrived at the courthouse lawn a few minutes later. There were several benches on the lawn. Vinny picked out one that faced south. It was under a big oak tree which would provide him shade in the summer time and a warming sun during cold weather. During his earlier surveillance trips he noted that this bench was never occupied, so he decided to claim it today by possession and use.

Vinny’s first visitors were some pigeons and squirrels who came claiming some offering or another for use of the bench. He crumbled one of the biscuits in his bag and tossed the crumbs to the pigeons, and to the squirrels he tossed a handful of unshelled peanuts that he had taken from his personal stash. He liked to watch them go through the shelling process before eating them or stuffing them into their cheeks.

These visitors drifted away after Vinny finished feeding them, and Vinny sat and watched the world go by. At about nine o’clock a string of jailhouse inmates dressed in black and white striped jail attire hobbled from the jail on the other side of the square to a side door on the ground level of the courthouse. One deputy sheriff led them, and one followed with a shotgun. No one tried to escape and it appeared to Vinny that most of them seemed to enjoy being outside for the brief walk to the courthouse. Some of them even waived at Vinny and he smiled and waved back. You might say these were Vinny’s second visitors, although they were not able to draw near to him at the time because of their chains. But that would change for some of them.No one else came that morning, and shortly before noon Vinny left his bench and crutched back to his room. He joined the regulars in the dining room and ate a big lunch and then made his way back to the courthouse for the afternoon. He was determined to set up a schedule and follow it as long as the weather permitted, for he knew he would need some time to get acclimated to the weather in the North Carolina highlands as opposed to the mild winters in New Orleans.

His bench was still available so he made his way over there and claimed it. The pigeons and squirrels immediately came over to demand the afternoon rent, which Vinny happily paid.

About half an hour later a deputy walked over from the jail. He was a big white man — tall and muscular — big.

—Howdy.

—Howdy Sir, said Vinny. He touched the brim of his hat.

—Ain’t never seen you around here before have I?

—I doubt it — today’s the first time I’ve been here to sit and stay awhile, although I’ve walked downtown a few times.

—Where ya comin’ from?

—I moved up here from New Orleans about three months ago.

—And you ain’t been in jail yet?

Vinny laughed. —Naw, and the good Lord willin’ I don’t plan to visit your facility any time soon.

—Don’t be sayin’ nothin’ bad about our jail. We feed’em good in there. We even got some that won’t stay out. They come in and do their ten days and when we turn’em loose and make’em leave they walk two blocks down the street and steal a pouch of tobacca right in front of the store owner and sit there til one of the city boys gets there. He brings’em back and books’em and they ain’t missed a meal. How’d ya lose ya leg?

—Lost it in the war in Cuba in ‘99.

—You sleepin’ on the streets?

—Naw, I’m staying at Miss Sophie’s Room and Board.

—Ah, Miss Sophie’s — the only intergrated place in town. I reckon you got a pension of some kind? We got a loiterin’ law here.

—That’s right. I been blessed with a small pension that gives me way more’n I need.

The deputy nodded.

—I’ve et over at Miss Sophie’s a time or two. Don’t matter to me if there’s Negroes or Cherokee in there. The food takes care o’ that. If ya let’er know a day ahead of time ya want to eat dinner there, she’ll feed ya, for a quarter. A man cain’t do better’n that.

—No Sir Sheriff, you got that right. Would you care to join me for a cigar? He reached into his bag and extended a cigar to the deputy.

—Naw, I gotta get back. The sheriff just wanted me to come over and check on ya and make sure nobody’s messin’ with ya.

—Well here, take this one and take one to the sheriff and tell’im I said I sure appreciate it. He handed the two cigars to the deputy.

—Thank ya. I’ll tell’im. What’s yore name?

—Vincent Bossard, but everybody calls me Vinny.

The deputy stared at him for a moment.

—Well I’m gonna call ya Uncle Vinny if that’s alright by you. You look like you’re about twicet my age, and that’s the way my family raised me, don’t matter what color ya are.

Vinny smiled.

—I would be honored. And what’s your name if I may ask?

The deputy looked at the ground and kicked a dirt clod with the toe of his boot.

—Vincent Sewell.

Vinny smiled again.

—And what do people call you?

The deputy waited a moment and then kicked another dirt clod and looked off toward the jail before answering.

—Vinny, he said, and then they looked at each other and both broke out laughing, knee slapping, belly wrenching, lung wheezing hard.

Thus it was that Deputy Vinny and Uncle Vinny bonded with each other. The deputy was Uncle Vinny’s third visitor, and the first who had a philosophical exchange with him on the courthouse lawn. From that moment forward, deputy Vinny would have taken a bullet for Uncle Vinny.

The Boarding House Receives an Unusual Guest

Sophie rose for the day at four-thirty and walked up the stairs of her boarding house to check the four rooms on the second floor. All four doors were closed and the bathroom was empty. She went back down the stairs and checked on the five rooms down there that she rented to her male guests. All appeared to be well. Miss Sophie’s foremost concern was to make sure that her guests were comfortable in their rooms, that they were well fed in the dining room, and that they paid their rent in advance on the first day of the month without fail.

Sophie kept one room upstairs, the fourth room, that she would not rent long term because she wanted to be able to provide lodging to ladies passing through town, or passing through a difficult moment in their lives, who needed a room temporarily. The other three rooms upstairs she was willing to rent long term if that’s what the guests wanted. They usually stayed occupied, and if a lady who had rented the temporary room needed to make her stay more or less permanent, Sophie would move her into the first permanent room that became available upstairs so that she could free up the temporary room for ladies who urgently needed a place to stay for a few nights for whatever reason.

There were several boarding houses in Asheville, but Sophie’s was the only integrated one at the time. Sophie maintained good relations with the proprietors of these other establishments, and when a young lady appeared at her front door needing lodging, and Sophie’s fourth room was unavailable, she could almost always make arrangements to place the young lady in a nearby room.

When the fourth room was available, Sophie was not nearly as strict about rent when a woman needed the room. She would discreetly inquire about the woman’s financial situation, but her decision to accommodate the applicant was not based on her ability to pay. If the woman was penniless, Sophie always assured her that she could earn her keep for a few nights by assisting in the kitchen and with other tasks around the house.

Another concession that she made with regard to the fourth room was that she would allow two guests to occupy it at a time. And she made this clear to everyone who asked to rent the room for a few nights. She had two beds in the room, so the guests didn’t have to share a bed. This enabled her to keep the rent lower for that room, and to accommodate more ladies who needed her assistance for temporary lodging. Sophie had been doing this for years, and she had never had a real problem with ladies taking advantage of her. She accomplished this by making it clear from the start that rental of the fourth room was temporary, and by maintaining a working relationship with various agencies and churches and others who would assist women who needed their assistance.

Over the years Sophie had lodged some unusual ladies in the fourth room. One time a few years back, a lady in her late twenties rang the doorbell at nine o’clock in the evening. Sophie came to the door and led her into the parlor. The young lady explained that she needed a place to stay for about a week and then she would be heading out to Abilene where her brother had assured her that she could find work. Sophie told her that the rent for the room would be six dollars for the week and that if she wanted board as well that would be another four dollars. The young lady retrieved a coin purse from her bag and took out 10 silver dollars.

She left before breakfast a week later, explaining to Sophie that she didn’t have time for breakfast because she had to catch an early train. Sophie quickly packed her some ham biscuits to take along, for which the young lady thanked her. A half hour later when Sophie went to the fourth room to fetch the bed linens that the young lady had used, she found a pile of twenty dollar bills, fifty of them. A note was pinned to the top bill:

Thank you for your wonderful hospitality. It‘s been a very long time since I have experienced family as I have for the past week at your place. I leave this offering with the request that you use it to assist persons in need who may come your way. I trust your judgment in its use.

There was no signature. Since that day, every year on the first Monday in November, which was the day the young lady had caught her train to Abilene, a local lawyer has rung Sophie’s front doorbell and handed her one thousand dollars in twenty dollar bills with a nice note in the handwriting of the young lady who had written the first note. After Vinny arrived, the note always inquired about him. This puzzled Sophie to no end, until she realized that this generous young lady must be sending a spy in to check on the place from time to time. Each year Sophie sent one hundred dollars to each of four other nearby boarding houses whose proprietors she knew assisted people who needed help. She never kept a penny of the yearly thousand dollars for herself, never paid any of it to herself as rent or board, but rather stuffed it into the pockets of her temporary guests as they left, based upon her perceptions of what they might need during the next stage of their journey, wherever that might be leading them. Many young ladies were surprised to find a twenty dollar bill with a note pinned to it in their pocket or purse after they were miles away from Miss Sophie’s place. And this generosity was not limited to women. Sophie used the fifth room on the first floor for the same purposes as the fourth room upstairs, and when a young man, or an old one for that matter, who had stayed with Sophie for a few days while looking for work took his leave, he also often took a twenty dollar bill in one of his pockets or in the top of a paper bag in which Sophie had packed him some lunch, without knowing it until he was long gone from Miss Sophie’s.

The high that Sophie experienced when she sent someone along with twenty dollars that he or she didn’t know about was far better than anything she had experienced when pulling one of her long mountain drunks, or likkerin’ up as they called it up in the real high country, before her granddaddy saved her by moving her to Asheville and setting her up with the boarding house.

It hadn’t been easy getting to now. She had pulled a few drunks in Asheville too, but granddaddy had sent with her Jamie, the Negro cook who still lived with her and helped her run the boarding house; Jamie nursed her through the drunks, kept grandpa informed of her state, and kept the boarding house running while Sophie climbed back out of the black hole. After about six months of this Sophie decided to quit getting drunk, and she never got drunk again. That was behind her, and now she was experiencing a high that made the highs of the past pale in comparison.

Vinny’s Next Door Neighbor

Vinny’s next door neighbor at Miss Sophie’s was a man who called himself a half breed because his mama was a full-blooded Cherokee and his daddy was full-blooded Scotch-Irish. He was a funny-looking fellow who looked distinctly Cherokee except that he had a tightly curled head of hair. He had a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. One night during the fall that Vinny arrived in town, this neighbor, George Barnes, who had occupied the room right next to Vinny’s for three years, completely upset the equilibrium at Miss Sophie’s by coming home toting a basket with a baby in it.

George had been working as a librarian for several years at various venues, including the new junior college that had just been started up in Asheville. He made a decent living as a librarian, and his room at Miss Sophie’s was his home. Over the last year or so he had spent most of his weekends away from the boarding house. He had missed the supper call this evening so he took the baby straight to the kitchen. The men who were sitting on the porch smoking and talking immediately got up and followed him into the kitchen to see what the baby was about. The ladies who had been sitting in the parlor talking, and two of whom were also smoking, got up and followed the men and George and the baby into the kitchen to see what the baby was about. There had never been this many people in the kitchen at one time, at least since Vinny got there because Sophie didn’t permit the crowd to come into the kitchen. She would occasionally invite someone to step into the kitchen to sample some dish or to inquire about their day or some other event, but otherwise the kitchen was off limits to the crowd. Tonight when the baby came in she was not in the kitchen, but from her rooms next door she heard the commotion and went to see what was happening. She and Jamie got to the kitchen door at the same time.

George had set the basket with the baby in it on the work table and was inquiring about where he might find some milk for the baby. Jamie moved everybody aside and lifted the baby out of the basket. The baby looked like a little Cherokee baby — especially with its thick black hair. Jamie looked at George and then back at the baby, and then whispered into Sophie’s ear. Sophie looked at the baby’s thick black hair, which was tightly curled like George’s, and nodded.

—Where’d you get this baby, George?

—She’s my baby, Miss Sophie.

Everybody hushed and listened.

—It’s a girl?

—Yes ma’am.

—Why didn’t you tell me you had a baby?

—It was kind of private and her mama still had her.

—What do you mean her mama still had her?

—She still had her till she got killed yesterday.

—Her mama got killed yesterday?

—Yes ma’am.

—Where?

—Up in Murphy. She was staying with some friends. That’s where I’ve been goin’ on Saturdays these last few months. We got married about a year and a half ago and we ended up with this baby. We even got married the county way. Her family said we didn’t have to since we were Cherokee but we went through a Cherokee and a county ceremony anyway and we’ve got a certificate filed over in the Cherokee Records and at the courthouse. I’ve got a copy of the marriage certificate right here in my room. We were going to rent us a place here in Asheville as soon as I got enough money put away to start out on our own.

—How’d she get killed?

—A gang of boys jumped her and when they had all finished with her, they stabbed her. I got a telegram at the library today telling me to come get the baby before the law takes her. They haven’t found the boys and nobody’s sure they could identify them.

Everybody looked at George and then back at the baby, who appeared to be perfectly content in Jamie’s arms.

—So this baby’s how old?

—About five months. He swallowed hard. I’ll find someplace else to stay; I can start looking tomorrow, but I need to feed her something now. If it’s all right I’ll just keep her in my room tonight. If I take her to any of the churches they’ll call in the law, and I’m not going to let the law take my baby from me.

Everybody looked at Sophie and Jamie and the baby. Nobody said anything as they waited for Sophie’s decision.

—What are ya’ll starin’ at? Get back out there where you’re supposed to be — we gotta figure out what we’re gonna do with this baby. George, you’re not goin’ anywhere for now — this baby needs her daddy right here with her. You got any diapers in that basket?

—They told me there were two extra ones in there, but they said they didn’t have any milk to send. Her mama’s been nursing her.

—Who’s they?

—The Cherokee family that were lettin’ her mama stay with them till we could get us a place here in Asheville.

—Well she very clearly needs a clean diaper now. I’ll send Jamie for some in the morning and we’ll make do tonight with what we have. I’ve got some soft dish towels that’ll work just fine ‘til we can get some diapers tomorrow. I’ve got some nipples in there that we can put on a juice bottle, and we’ve got plenty of canned milk. She’s not gonna starve before mornin’, and we’ll decide then how we’re gonna handle this. The law may come lookin’ for her whether we like it or not. You make sure you can put your hands on that marriage certificate fast in case any of the state people come nosing around.

She reached for the baby and Jamie handed it to her.

—Yep, she definitely needs her diaper changed. George, she can stay here in your room with you, but I think you ought to let her stay in Jamie’s room tonight. Jamie knows how to take care of these little ones, and you’re gonna need some sleep. And as far as tomorrow goes, you go on back to work. This baby’ll be safe right here ‘til you can come back home to her.

—Yes ma’am. Thank you Miss Sophie.

She pressed the baby’s head into the crook of her neck and turned away from the crowd for a moment. Then she handed the baby back to Jamie and brushed the tears from her cheeks.

Jamie took the baby and held it against her neck just like Sophie had done.

—George, if you need to see this baby anytime during the night you just come knock on my door, you hear me?

—Yes, Jamie. Thank y’all so much. You may not know it, but my baby is the most important thing in the world to me. I loved her mama, and it hurts so much.

And that’s when he broke down crying, and that’s when Jamie and Sophie broke down crying, and after a few moments Sophie told him he should go on out to the parlor to settle down for awhile before bedtime, or if he wanted to maybe he ought to go ahead and settle down in his room.

—We need to take care of this baby now and us standin’ around crying is not helping much. Jamie’ll bring the baby in there so you can tell her good night before she puts her to bed.

—Thank you Miss Sophie. I believe I’ll just go on to my room now. You got a chicken leg or a pork chop I could take in there with me? I’m kind of hungry now that I’ve got the baby here.

—Oh my! I forgot about you needin’ to eat too! I’ll fix you a whole plate. You want to eat in the dining room?

—No ma’am, I don’t believe I could handle the company right now. But I would appreciate it if you’d tell everybody out there what you decided. You know we’re all kind of one big family here and they’ll want to know.

—I’ll go out there and tell’em. They’re probably listenin’ through the walls anyway, but I’ll tell’em so we can all get some sleep tonight.

She started toward the parlor and then stopped and turned to George. —What’s her name?

George hesitated and looked at the floor before answering. —We named her Sophia Adsila Barnes the night she was born at the hospital. We wanted her to be the kind of person you are Miss Sophie. I had told my wife all about you. That’s the name we told the doctor to put on the birth certificate. Adsila means blossom.

Sophie turned away from him. After a few moments she turned back to George and looked him in the eye. Then she went back into Jamie’s room and told her to go out there and tell everybody what they had decided to do with the baby for now. She just couldn’t face that crowd in the dining room.

The Day After The Baby Arrived

The next morning everybody got up a little earlier than usual. They all looked down the hall toward Jamie’s room and stuck their heads in the kitchen to see if the baby was up and about, and then took to their normal morning routines. Cold weather had not set in yet, so some of the men turned on the porch lights and sat out there for their first smokes of the day. This caused the neighbors on each side of Miss Sophie’s house to stick their heads out their front doors to see what was going on, what with everybody being on the porch a half hour early. Upstairs, the ladies stirred early too, and one could hear the clinking of the little bottles in their toiletries and soon the air was mixed with the smell of their perfumes and the aroma of the cigarette smoke from the smokers who had remained in the parlor, and the morning was alive.

Each morning Miss Sophie or Jamie rang a little bell when they were ready for the residents to come to the breakfast table. They rang the bell a little early this morning and everybody hurried into the dining room. As they ate, everybody kept looking toward the kitchen door to see if Jamie or Sophie would bring the baby in so it could join everyone for breakfast. After everyone had settled in and begun to eat, Jamie walked into the room with a bundle in her arms, and as she set it in George’s arms a big black mop of curly hair began to stir and she let out a loud yell.

—What’s wrong with the baby? they all asked.

—Ain’t nothin’ wrong with that baby, said Jamie, She’s just tellin’ y’all good mornin’!

Everybody said good morning back to the baby, and George looked proud and happy, this even though he had lost the baby’s mama two days before. He wondered about the feelings he was having. He had loved the woman. They could sit quietly for hours and not talk and yet feel peace in each other’s presence. And they had made this child together, and had told each other that it was their child and that they would always take care of each other and the child, and the monsters had killed her and now only he had the baby, and when he thought about her mama he felt empty and angry. The young mama would not see her baby flower into the person that George had determined that he would help her become. And so he held the baby, and at the same time that he felt this deep, empty sadness and anger, he also felt an inexplicable joy and happiness as he rubbed his hand over the little girl’s mop of thick, black, curly hair.

Everybody had forgotten about their food. Sophie stood at the head of the table next to the kitchen door as Jamie touched George on the shoulder and reached down and took the bundle from him. The bundle yelled again, and Jamie and Sophie smiled and said she was just telling everybody she was just as hungry as they were, so everybody needed to get on with their breakfast and they would feed the baby in the kitchen. So everybody got back to their breakfast and coffee and began to comment about what a fine baby that was and what a head of hair she had and where was she going to stay, in George’s room or in Jamie’s room? Or maybe she should have her own room. They could switch rooms around some so that the baby could have the little room next to Jamie’s and George could have the room next to that so that the baby would be in a room between George and Jamie. There was already a door between Jamie’s room and the baby’s, and they could easily put in a door between the baby’s room and George’s new room. One of the ladies suggested that maybe the baby should stay upstairs since she was a girl and that’s where the females stayed, but that didn’t go very far. The consensus was that the baby was still George’s baby and that she should stay by him. And thus the crowd at Miss Sophie’s Room & Board spent the rest of breakfast time determining what changes would need to be made there at the house for their new baby. Every time they heard a yell from the kitchen, they moved ahead with greater resolve.

Vinny’s New Leg

About the time the baby arrived, another major change was taking place in town: the government was giving Vinny a new leg. He had gone for years without an artificial leg, partly because he didn’t want one and partly because the army people down in New Orleans didn’t push for it. After all, they were costly.

But the situation in Asheville was different. The government fellow who took care of Vinny’s records here and who made sure he received his pension payment every month had convinced Vinny that he ought to give the leg a try. And so he had agreed, and today, the day after the baby arrived, Vinny went to the medical office that would fit the new leg on him and coach him and teach him how to use it until he felt comfortable and balanced with the new appliance. He spent the morning there getting the leg fitted and then walking around the walls of the room holding a handrail on the wall. Although his stump was perfectly healed — it had had years to heal — it was very tender and sore by the time he finished his first exercises with the staff at the medical office. He had expected to take his leg home with him, but they told him it would be a few days before he could do that because he needed the practice and he needed to toughen up the fleshy part of his stump that came into contact with the leg so that he would no longer feel any soreness.

After three hours at the clinic, Vinny crutched back to his room in time for dinner, where the baby was still the center of attention. The non-resident regulars who took their noon meal at Miss Sophie’s now found themselves to be additionally differentiated from the residents by this unusual fact: no matter how intrigued they were by the new baby, since they didn’t live at the boarding house, they couldn’t claim this baby as their baby. The language of the residents was full of the first person plural — We’re gonna cut a door between his room and her room; we’ll keep her in diapers, you don’t need to worry about that; we’re not gonna let anything happen to our baby — the law ain’t got no right to come take’er from us.

And so by this attitude the baby was incorporated into the family immediately. Everyone respected the fatherhood of George, and the rights attendant to that status, and not a one of them would have attempted to block George from taking the baby from the house and going elsewhere. But that issue had been settled by the matriarch of the family and her helper. The baby was staying here, and so it was their baby, to be cared for by them, to be financed by them, to be guarded by them from the impositions of the outside world.

Vinny knew nothing of Sophie’s charitable account, or of her blessings to certain sojourners at the house — even the sojourners didn’t know about it until they were long gone. And so he had no idea that the baby’s financial needs were already met. But something in him stirred and made him commit then and there to use whatever funds he needed from his growing savings account to make sure this baby lacked nothing. And so it was with everybody else at the boarding house. Not a one of them was rich, but they were all — men and women — wage earners who had a little margin in their finances. Without consulting each other at all, they all allocated in their spirit a portion of their cushion to their new baby. They did this without even thinking about it. It was just there, this commitment — unreferenced, unspoken, undefined: this baby was not going to go hungry, no sir. And although she no longer had a breast to suck on, she’d have plenty of bodies there at the boarding house to keep her warm and happy. And she was going to have clothes as good as those of any other baby in town, and if she got sick there was going to be money to pay the doctor’s bill, yessiree.

Something welled up in the women at the house, making them want to hold the baby and cuddle her against their breasts and feed her and keep her clean and warm; and something made the hair rise on the necks of the men because they felt mad and protective when they imagined various harms that some outsider might wish to visit upon their baby. Somebody could get killed if they tried to come in here and hurt this baby. Such was the commitment of the residents of the boarding house to Sophia. It was immediate and it was not reasoned. It sprang from within their usness, and it was just there, and it was not in the outsiders, in those who did not reside in their house.

Vinny’s stump was sore. He had spent almost three hours that morning wearing his new leg and putting weight on it as he moved around the training room. But he was determined to go back this afternoon and practice some more; his goal was to begin wearing his leg all day within a few days, and to lay aside his crutches within a month. The doctor had told him that he was going to have to completely relearn how to balance himself when he walked, because he didn’t have toes on his stump side and that’s one of the main functions of toes, besides stinking. This tickled Vinny when the doctor said it, and he determined that he was going to relearn balancing with his artificial leg as quickly as he could. So that afternoon he went back to the clinic and spent another two hours walking on his new leg. He was making progress. They told him he could take his leg home with him the next week if he wasn’t too sore, but that he should count on using his crutches for another month or two along with his leg until he was totally comfortable with his balance. Today Vinny left his leg at the clinic after another two hours of work there, and crutched directly to his bench on the courthouse lawn, where he paid his rent to the squirrels and pigeons and lit up a well-earned cigar.

So Vinny’s life changed that fall in two significant ways: he obtained and learned to use an artificial leg, which he came to like, and he became an undeclared protector of a new person in the household, a baby named Sophia.

Nobody Could Sleep

Nobody could sleep. It was already ten o’clock and the neighborhood was dark and the evening sounds had waned and the night had settled outside, but not here inside Miss Sophie’s place. Sophia the baby wouldn’t stop yelling. This was disconcerting not only to George but to the whole household. George had essentially relinquished the charge of his baby to Jamie, who was now in the room next to his trying to comfort the baby, but nothing was working. And by now every person in the house had developed a kind of parental relationship with the baby, and so its cries tonight kept them awake not by the noise but because of their protective instincts and urges toward the infant.

Not a person in the house would have tried to prevent George from taking his baby and moving somewhere else if that was what he determined to do. But that was not on the table. This was George’s family. The baby had been in the house now for several weeks, and everybody who lived there had developed a relationship with her that caused them to have urges to succor — to surround and protect and nourish this baby that was now their baby, at least for a time.

George tapped on the door.

—Come on in George.

Jamie was holding Sophia and rocking her in her arms.

—You reckon she’s hungry? he asked.

—No, we’ve fed her and she took a whole bottle. And she had a good burp. She may have a little colic, but I don’t think so. Sometimes babies just need to cry.

A Government Lady Comes To The House

About two months after the baby arrived, Sophie’s grandpa and grandma came for a visit. Sophie had written them about the baby, and her letter had been full of excitement. They decided to come down and visit Sophie and see her new boarder.

Just as they drove up and parked in front of the boarding house, about mid-morning, Deputy Vinny pulled up in his patrol car and parked right behind them. He greeted them and followed them up the steps to the front porch. They went in, and he lingered and after a moment he rang the front door bell. Sophie came to the door and greeted him.

—How’s it goin’ Vinny? Don’t tell me you’re wantin’ to eat dinner here today?

He laughed. —Naw, I just need to speak to Uncle Vinny for a minute if he’s around. But how about tomorrow?

—I’ll set a place for you. Let me go see if Vinny’s in his room. Come on in.

A few moments later Vinny came out and the deputy suggested they go out and talk on the porch.

—Uncle Vinny, I need to tell you something. We got a call this morning from the Social Services people up in Murphy asking about the baby.

—What’d they want?

—I’m not sure, but it sounds like they think the county should take custody of her.

—Why would they think that?

—I don’t know. I heard the sheriff tell’em the baby’s staying with her daddy and that they’ve got a good comfortable place to stay. He told’em George has a full-time job and they said that’s the problem — she don’t have nobody to stay with during the day while he’s at work.

—That’s crazy! She’s got Miss Sophie and Jamie here all day every day during the week, and her daddy of an evening and on the weekends. Them two ladies are not going anywhere what with having to cook three meals a day every day.

—I know. I just wanted to let you know there may be some trouble. You might want to warn George and Miss Sophie before them Social Services people come down here and start pokin’ around.

—I will. Is that all you know about it?

—Yep, that’s it for now. I’ll letcha know if I hear anything else.

~~~

He couldn’t imagine this happening in New Orleans, especially among his people. If a parent died, the other parent took care of the child, and family and friends stepped in as needed. Unless there was clear evidence that the baby was being mistreated or neglected, the people felt that who raised the child was none of the state’s business. This baby clearly was not being mistreated or neglected. She was happy, fat, comfortable, and loved by a houseful of people that had suddenly become her family.

He found Jamie in the kitchen.

—Where’s Miss Sophie?

—She’s back in her apartment with her grandma and grandpa. You need to talk to her?

—I think so. The deputy just told me that the state people from Murphy called and asked about the baby and wanted to know where they could find it. Sounds like they’re talking about putting the baby in foster care until George can prove that he’s fit to take care of her and is making sure she’s being taken care of while he’s at work.

—George don’t have to prove nothin’! snapped Jamie. He’s that baby’s daddy and he’s taking good care of her. But she knew that Vinny was right to be worried. George was a nobody to the state. Over the last years the state had built up its bureaucracies to the extent that they had to go out among the people looking for problems, so they could find work enough to justify their continued existence. For the most part these bureaucracies and their bureaucrats were worthless, fulfilling no valid social function whatsoever. Their concern was not the welfare of this baby but rather the power they could exert in the circumstances. She could feel this in her bones.

—I’ll tell Sophie to step out here for a minute. You want to talk to her folks too?

—It don’t matter. I’m sure she’ll tell’em if I don’t.

Jamie stepped out of the kitchen and in a few moments came back with Sophie and her grandparents. —Vinny, tell’em what you just told me.

Vinny told them. The old man and his woman nodded. Sophie stepped into the baby’s room and came back with Sophia in her arms. Grandma reached for the baby and took it.

—If they’ve gone this far they’ll try to take this baby, said Jeremiah. Not that they care about the baby or her daddy — they don’t. But they’ll follow their policies. That keeps’em funded.

—Miss Sophie, I think we better call George at the library and tell him what’s going on, said Vinny. For all we know they may be on the way from Murphy right now. We know for sure they’ve already called the sheriff asking where they can find the baby.

—I’ll call him, said Sophie, but I think maybe the baby better take a ride for a little while, like maybe for a routine checkup at the doctor’s office. I’ll take her and let Jamie take care of dinner and supper today. It may take me awhile to find a doctor that can see her, so I wouldn’t be surprised if I’m gone pretty much the whole rest of the day.

~~~

Not ten minutes after Sophie drove away with the baby a black sedan parked at the curb in front of the boarding house, and a woman dressed in dark blue business attire got out of the car and came to the front door and rang the bell. Jamie came to the door.

—May I help you?

—I need to speak with Mr. George Barnes.

—I’m sorry, he’s not here right now.

—But he lives here?

—Yes, he does.

—And does he have a baby?

—Yes he does.

—And the baby lives here with him?

—Yes, the baby lives here. May I ask the purpose of your visit?

—I’m with the Department of Social Services over in Cherokee County and I have an administrative order authorizing me to take the child into protective custody. Please take me to the baby. She stepped closer to the door.

Jamie didn’t move. —The baby is not here.

—Where is she?

—I don’t know, said Jamie. The owner of this boarding house took her for a routine medical checkup, but she said she was going to have to look around for a doctor, so I can’t tell you where she is.

—I don’t believe you. Step aside, I want to look inside.

Jamie still didn’t move. —I don’t think that would be appropriate. I’ve told you the baby is not here.

—It doesn’t matter what you think. I have a legal authorization to take that baby into custody and I am going to take her to Murphy with me this afternoon. Step aside.

Jamie blocked her way.

—If you don’t move, I am going straight to the sheriff and have him come back over here with me and enforce this authorization.

Jamie still didn’t move.

—Very well, I shall be back shortly. She turned and walked briskly to her car.

Jamie went to the phone and called the sheriff’s office and asked for deputy Vinny.

—You were right. She’s here to pick up the baby. I wouldn’t let her in, and I told her the baby is not here right now. In fact I told her the truth but she didn’t believe me, so now she’s on her way to your office to get someone to come back over here with her and take the baby.

—Did Miss Sophie take her to the doctor? I heard her say something about that awhile ago.

—Yes, but I have no idea which doctor.

—I’ll put out an all points bulletin on the radio and see if we can find her or her car. It shouldn’t be too hard. Everybody here knows Miss Sophie, and every deputy knows her car. Half of’em are lustin’ after her. We’ll take our time sending somebody back with this woman. As understaffed as we are today it could easily take an hour and a half before we can send anybody over there with her. We’ll let Miss Sophie know what’s going on as soon as we find her. One of us will be over there in a little while with this woman, so we’ll try to make sure Miss Sophie doesn’t come home any time soon.

~~~

Sophie drove around town trying to figure out what she should do. It certainly would be a good time to take the baby for a medical checkup but it might be more important to get the baby to her daddy and let him decide what to do. She could drive out to the college library and talk to him there. She could get a student to go in and tell him to come to the car.

She drove to the next corner and just as she turned, a city police car pulled behind her and turned on his flashing light. She pulled to the curb and the officer pulled in behind her. She recognized him when he walked up to her car.

—Miss Sophie do you have the baby with you?

—I do.

—There’s a woman here in town from social services who says she has an authorization to take the baby into custody.

—Did you pull me over to help her do that?

—You know better than that Miss Sophie. I just wanted to tell you that one of your tires looks a little low.

—Thanks, Tim.

—And if you don’t mind tell Jamie to set me a place for dinner tomorrow if you have room.

—I’ll do it. Thanks again.

She pulled back into the street and headed toward the college. She knew she had to talk to George. They were going to have to figure some way to keep this baby away from the boarding house and get her out of town, today, unless George just wanted to let the state take custody of her. She doubted that was the case.

~~~

George trotted out to the car and got in. Sophie drove as she told him what had happened.

—It’s your call George. You’re her daddy.

George was nervous. —I better go tell the boss I need to take the rest of the day off. He’ll let me do that I’m sure.

She took him back to the library and George spoke to his boss and then they drove into the countryside on the east side of town.

~~~

—We’ll do whatever you want George. We can even get you out of the state if we need to. We can be in Tennessee or South Carolina or even Georgia by this afternoon.

Sophie had the baby on the seat between them. George looked at her. His guts were churning.

—They’re not gonna take this baby if I can help it. She’s never been mistreated, she’s never gone hungry. Look at her — look how fat she is! And she sure doesn’t lack for company. Everybody at the house holds her and feeds her, and all the girls there change her diapers. I even saw Vinny change her diaper the other day.

—George, sometimes people that work for the government get too much power and they start liking it and it drives’em. Then they start believing they’re right. And that’s when we start having trouble.

Sophie pulled up to the gas pump at a country gas station and the owner came out and pumped gas, checked her oil, and cleaned her windshield. She paid and pulled back onto the road and kept driving.

—It’s your call George. The tank’s full and the road’s wide open. I’m sure that woman is still waiting at the sheriff’s office. Or we can go back to the house if you want to fight it here in Asheville or Murphy.

He sat quietly for a minute or two as they continued along a country road. He clearly didn’t know what to do, but he had decided that he was going to keep his baby. The decision was made. He must focus now on how best to do that. The solution came as a complete shock to him.

Sophie pulled over onto a wide shoulder and stopped. She turned toward George.

—George, it’s early in the day. We can be in Spartanburg in three hours. I’ve got a solution that will be good for this baby, and it will be good for you and me.

—What’s that?

—We’ll get married.

Silence…

—Married? He was stunned. He looked at her with his mouth hanging open.

—Yeah. My grandma and grandpa met on Monday and got married that Thursday. You and I have known each other a whole lot longer than that. And this baby will be our baby, and she’ll have a daddy and a mama, and that should take the steam out of the social services people trying to take her. We’d make about as normal a couple as anybody could ask for. You’re thirty-two and I’m twenty-nine. You’ve got a good job and I’ve got a good business. The house is paid for. I think they’d lose interest in trying to get her real quick if we’re married. And even if they do keep coming after the baby, I don’t believe there is a judge in the state that would allow it if we’re married. And all I’ve heard so far is that there’s an authorization. Nobody’s said anything yet about an order from a judge commanding anyone to take the baby.

—Married? What about love?

—I already love this baby!

—No, I mean me.

—You know what, George? You’re a good man, you’re honest and hard-working, and even though you’re highly educated you’re not hifalutin. I’ve known you for years now. I really like you. I’m not sure there’s a whole lot of difference between liking and loving. Right now liking is good enough for me. Do you like me?

—Of course I like you. What am I supposed to say — No I don’t like you? Look how you’ve taken care of my baby over the last few weeks. But I’m having a hard time processing this. Half the bachelors in town would like to be sittin’ here right now listenin’ to you propose to’em, and how do I feel? I feel like I’m about to pass out! I’m losing my breath!

—Don’t do that. We can turn around and go straight back home if that’s what you want.

—I didn’t say that. I just don’t know what to say. Are you talking about this afternoon?

—Yes. We can be there in three hours, and in South Carolina we can get a marriage license and get married the same day. I think we can be in and out of the courthouse in less than an hour.

—I can’t believe this.

—Do you want me to turn around?

—I didn’t say that. I’m just having a hard time getting my head around this.

—I understand. The fact is, though, the authorities in Murphy are trying to take this baby, and this would throw up a barrier that I think would stop them. And I think it may have some nice side effects. That would include you and me spending the rest of our lives together.

He almost smiled. —You really like me? He was incredulous.

—I really like you.

He stared into the nearby woods. Maybe there was something to this notion that liking is more important than loving. He had seen couples who loved each other but who clearly didn’t like each other. He had never thought about that before now, but it was clear that there was little happiness in those marriages. And he really did like Sophie. She had been good to him, had respected him, from the moment he had moved into her boarding house. She had a good heart. She was not afflicted with the racism that permeated society, and he had never heard her say anything that would indicate that she thought herself to be superior to others. That was something he admired.

He turned back to her. —You know I’m half Cherokee, right?

—You know I’m half wildcat, right?

He chuckled. —I’m beginning to see that. You know, don’tcha, that half the single guys in Asheville would give their eye teeth to be where I am right now?

—I have absolutely no interest in any of them. The only man I’m interested in is you.

—And that’s because of my baby?

—That’s a big part of it, yes. But I’ll say it again, I really like you, and that’s special for me.

—Should I still ma’am you and call you Miss Sophie?

She laughed. —No.

He looked down the road. —And you figure it’s about three hours from here?

—I know it is.

—And what happens when we walk out of the courthouse?

—You’ll be my husband. I’ll be your wife. Use your imagination.

His head was spinning and his chest was pounding. He couldn’t believe his ears.

—Let’s go.