Free Sons from Afar by Cynthia Voigt Page A

music, but he could hear in the chords the notes he was supposed to sing, the tenor part. “So sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell,” he read, because Maybeth started on the refrain again when he joined in. “Hourly ring, hourly ring” the line repeated, in that irritating way old-fashioned songs had. Sammy sang along, getting impatient for it to finish. “Ding-dong bell, ding-dong bell.” Ding-dong bell, he thought, kitty’s in the well. He knew James didn’t care about the ding-dong bell part of the song; James liked the father part, the bones turned to coral and pearls for eyes, the water-changes.
    â€œLet’s sing a real song,” Sammy said when they’d finished.
    â€œThis is Shakespeare,” James protested.
    â€œSo what.”
    Maybeth just waited for them to be through arguing.
    â€œThe Tempest.”
    â€œNever heard of it,” Sammy said. “Sing something I like. That was for chorus, wasn’t it?”
    â€œYes,” Maybeth said. Then, taking her hands off the piano, she started. “Oft I sing for my friends.” That was more like it. James and Sammy joined in. Sammy didn’t feel like singing the loneliness of that song, although he knew why he liked hearing it, why they all liked it. In the kitchen, Gram would have lifted her head, to listen too. “When I come to the cross of that silent sea, Who will sing for me?” James and Maybeth sang. The sad and lonely song reminded Sammy of Momma; it was a simple melody that flowed along, a good singing song. When they sang it, he always thought they were singing it for Momma, answering her question, if she was wondering who would sing for her. They would. He would.
    Sammy went to the desk. James didn’t even notice. With his face turned up, he was singing away as if he was sending his song out among the stars. His eyes were closed and he looked happy enough, listening to his sister’s voice, listening to his own. Sammy opened the side drawer, just humming now.
    The birth certificates were in a manila envelope, with medical records and old report cards. He emptied the envelope out onto the desk. The birth certificates were big sheets of paper, with a red wax seal at the bottom right-hand corner. They were prettyfancy. Each one, except for the name of the baby and the date of birth, was the same. Sammy picked James’s out and folded the rest. He put all the papers back into the envelope, put the envelope back into the drawer. James was sure going to be surprised.
    Sammy just stepped up beside James and put the folded thick paper into his brother’s hand. Then he sat down on the bench beside Maybeth and, before she could start another song, he sang in her ear: “There’s a hole in the bucket, Maria, Maria.” While he finished his lines, she turned around to face him, happy because she knew how much he liked this song. He could never sing his part of the last verse of the duet, without breaking out laughing. That about ruined the joke of the song, but he couldn’t keep from laughing, at the step-by-step logic of the verses, at the patient, plodding Henry character and the quick-tongued, impatient Maria. He liked it best when he could talk Dicey into singing the song with Jeff, because Jeff had a way of waiting, as if Henry were thinking and thinking, scratching his head and wondering why Maria had forgotten, before he started in on that last verse. “There’s a hole in the bucket, Maria, Maria.”
    Sammy deliberately didn’t pay any attention to James, but when they finished singing, he turned around. James was back at the desk, just staring at the paper. He held the paper flat, with one hand at each side of it. The desk light fell on his dark narrow head as he studied the writing on the paper.
    Sammy got worried. But it was just a birth certificate. What was there that would be on a birth certificate that would bother James? Maybeth went back to the