Part 2

Killdee could not see a single soul anywhere. He was the only man working to-day. Green Thursday.

Slowly, steadily, patiently, he walked behind his plow. Up and down the long rows. Back and forth. Thinking. Reasoning with himself. Was he right or wrong to work to-day? The day Jesus went back to heaven.

He watched indifferently the spurts of red dust that rose with each step his mule took. The ground was dry. Baked. Parched. The stiff clay broke into clods as the plow’s edge cut through its rigid crust. The lumps of earth that fell awkwardly away from each other were fettered with tough, jointed grass. Tense grass roots had burrowed deep. They had wound a strong net to choke and strangle the crop. They were sucking all the moisture out of the ground. They were eating all the fertilizer. They’d leave nothing but starvation for the cotton and corn.

The grass had to be killed. Every root must be torn up and cut. Every green blade must be turned under and buried.

The sun stood blinding white straight overhead. The sun was a friend in the fight against the grass. Its heat to-day would kill every root that was cut.

The long shadow that had started out traveling beside him early this morning had shortened and darkened until now it crept small and black right under his feet. It seemed to be trying to hide from the sun. It must be near noon. Time for Mike and himself to stop and eat and drink and rest.

With a low-spoken “Whoa, Mike,” he reined in the tall, bony beast that he plowed and cast a swift glance up at the sun. Yes, it was noon. He could tell, although the sun’s brilliance clouded his vision.

“Le’s go home, Mike,” he said, and he stuck the plow’s point deep into the earth to stand alone until noon was over.

The loosened joints of the old plow stock creaked with the strain and reminded him to be careful how he wrenched them. They were giving out in the hard fight with the grass. If they came apart, broken, no good, he had no money to buy new ones. He must remember to be easy with them.

He unhooked the trace chains from the singletree and tossed them over Mike’s back. As he slipped the frayed rope lines through the rings in the bit, Mike’s rib-marked hide swelled with a grateful sigh. Mike’s long, shaggy neck stretched and his cloudy eyes closed as he gave a long whicker of approval.

Killdee laughed. His strong white teeth gleamed through the soft sparse beard that covered his mouth and chin as he murmured:

“You hongry, enty, Mike? I is too. Come on. Le’s go home. You got sense like people, son.”

He smoothed the rough hair on the hollowed back and stroked the haggard neck while Mike nibbled at grass in the furrow ahead.

When Killdee started across the uneven ground toward the line of woods where a tiny, drab-colored cabin showed dim in the smoky distance, Mike stopped eating and followed him.

Killdee scanned the quiet fields. Not a soul was in sight. He and Mike seemed to be the only living things in the world to-day.

Small cabins scattered at intervals over the landscape showed no sign of life at all. Narrow red roads that ran by them were empty. Idle. The day itself was still. Stiller than Sunday. Green Thursday. Ascension day. The day Jesus went back to God.

Maybe it was a holier day than Sunday.

All Killdee’s life he had heard that to stir the earth on Green Thursday was a deadly sin. Fields plowed, or even hoed to-day would be struck by lightning and killed so they couldn’t bear life again. God would send fire down from heaven to punish men who didn’t respect this day. Yet here he and Mike were plowing. Risking the wrath of the great I-Am.

Everybody else on the whole plantation had gone fishing in the river swamp. Dry weather made the fish bite fast. Rose would have been trying her luck too if she had been able to walk so far. But it was near time now for her to “go down.” She wouldn’t risk walking so far from home.

* * * * *

Rose asked him to hitch Mike to the wagon and take her and baby Rose to fish for a while. Meat was mighty scarce and when a woman is pregnant, fish bite better for her than for anybody else. Rose wanted to go and try them. She wanted to go even if the crop was eaten up with grass. She was worried and hurt right now because he and Mike were out in the field plowing.

Last night he lay awake and thought it all over. He made up his mind. He would fight the grass this year to the end. He would make a crop. God ought to know Rose hadn’t been able to hoe a lick since the crop was planted. And how old and slow Mike was! Mike couldn’t step fast like the grass. He never had plowed on Green Thursday before. Never. But this year he was too far behind to miss a day. God ought to know how it was.

Clear drops of sweat trickled down Mike’s thin flanks and down Killdee’s lean black face. Killdee’s faded patched shirt was blotched with wetness. It clung to his shoulders and outlined his strong, straight back. Its unbuttoned, open neck let the hot breeze reach his big throat and breast.

Ragged overalls turned high at the bottom slouched along with each step he took and laid open their torn places for the sun to shine through on the firm black flesh of his narrow hips and sinewy legs.

He stopped where a path divided. Instead of going straight home, he took the path that dropped down the steep hill behind it.

The trees made a cool, dark shade. Leaves fluttered and let bits of white light fall on the ground. The path became even and wet and comforting to his hot, bare feet.

He trampled on ferns and white violets as he hurried forward and dropped on his knees to drink from the spring that bubbled out from under great brown rock. Water ran smooth for the length of an old rotting trough, then fell with a bright splash on its bed of white sand and clean pebbles.

When a spring puppy clung to the side of the trough not far from his mouth, Killdee laughed.

“You better be glad dis is me ’stead o’ Mike, son. I kin see you. I ain’ gwine swallow you. Mike ain’ got good eyes like me. You’d be ruint ef you got een dat big, ol’ mout’ o’ his’n. It ’ud sen’ you down dat big ol’ t’roat an’ Mike wouldn’ know nuttin’ ’bout it.”

When his own thirst was quenched, Killdee sat and watched Mike’s shaggy throat forcing the water up until Mike raised his head and looked at him with gentle, somber eyes. He was ready to go home and eat dinner.

Man and mule suddenly paused stock-still while a snake writhed through the green shadows. Tufts of grass and slender vines with satiny leaves almost hid its silent, stealthy slipping.

Killdee watched with serious eyes, then spoke to the reptile.

“I know I ought to kill you an’ hang you up on a limb to mek it rain. De groun’ is awful dry. De plow can’ ha’dly cut ’em. But I ain’ got de heart fo’ kill nuttin’ to-day. I gwine le’ you go home to you’ fambly.”

As Killdee got to his feet a strong-smelling he-goat rustled through the bushes and stopped to look.

“Hey!” Killdee called to him.

“How-come you dis close to water, ol’ man? You better come wash. You smell powerful rank to me. I don’ see how lil Nan kin stan’ you. No, my Gawd! But ’oman is strange. Nan t’ink nobody ain’ fine ez you. Nobody. An’ you know dat, too.”

Killdee picked up a pebble and threw it and the goat scampered away. Killdee laughed. Preachers say sinners are like goats and Christians are like sheep. He’d a lot rather be a goat than a sheep. Goats have sense.

Old Bill yonder went home to sleep with the other goats at night. He was afraid of the dark. But in the daytime he ran around by himself and went where he liked and ate what he pleased and had a good time. He was too smart to huddle with others of his kind. Bill was a sinner maybe, but he was better off than the foolish, scary sheep that stayed in a flock all the time.

Mike’s head was close to his shoulder. Killdee looked at the quiet, smoky eyes. One of them was covered over with a milky film and the other was dim and cloudy. Soon Mike would be blind. Good, faithful, old Mike. God ought not to make Mike blind. Not a good fellow like Mike.

Mike’s ribs stuck out bold too, and the corn pile was low, and the new crop didn’t promise much. If it didn’t rain soon, everything would dry up. The corn’s hands were shut tight to-day. The corn’s feet were scorched till they were yellow. The cotton leaves were hanging limber.

Maybe that was the way they all prayed for rain. And yet--if it rained, the grass would eat them up.

Killdee looked at the path leading up the hill to his cabin. He was tired. Rose would be cross, vexed with him, because he had plowed Green Thursday. He’d lie down and rest here a little while in the shade. He took Mike’s bridle off and dropped it on the ground, saying sadly:

“Pick roun’, Mike, an’ git a lil fresh grass fo’ taste you mout’. You teeth is too bad fo’ chaw cawn anyhow.”

Killdee stretched himself out on the damp ground. It was good to lie here in the cool, green shade. There was scarcely a sound but the water flowing over the pebbles.

It sounded so fresh. So cheerful. Not tired a bit. All day, all night, it ran like this. Creeping out of the earth like a living thing. Weak. Small. Yet too strong for anybody to hold it back. It was like life itself.

Two years ago this very month his little baby Rose was born. As soon as the moon changed, another baby would come. His baby too, the same as baby Rose was his.

Maybe this next child would be a boy-child. He hoped it would. Every man needs boy-children. Wants them.

Not that he didn’t love baby Rose. He loved her better than life. God, yes! He would do for her what he’d do for nobody else in the world. He’d slave and sweat and struggle for her. He’d do anything to provide for her.

Yes, he’d plow on Green Thursday for her. He’d go to hell for her if he had to do it!

Funny how he felt about her at first. When Maum Hannah first told him a girl-child was born his heart fell. He wanted a son. But when the teeny little fingers closed tight over one of his big ones as he slipped it inside them that morning, his heart mighty near broke with joy. He shook all over, and laughed. He cried a little bit too.

That baby knew then he was hers. That they two were the same flesh. She was so like him. He could see it. Her little hands, her little feet, even her face, were all shaped like his from the very first.

The wonder of it made him feel humble and helpless and weak, yet it fired his pride and courage. He made up his mind to fend for her. Work for her. Suffer for her if it came to that. And he would. He was no poor fool of a sheep. No. He was a man. He’d plow to-day and not be afraid. If God was, He was fair. Kind. God would like a man better if He saw him doing his best.

He must soon go get Maum Hannah to come stay with Rose. He must take a bushel of corn over to Daddy Cudjoe and swap it for a quart of whiskey. Rose would soon need it. Maum Hannah said it helps a woman to “birth” a child better if she has a little whiskey to deaden the pain.

Rose wanted a bottle of castor oil from the cross-roads store, too. There was no money to buy it with. He’d have to take corn for it too. The corn pile was low. He and Rose and Baby Rose had to eat. Mike too. Grass got the crop last year. Mike crept too slow to keep up with the grass. But this year, he’d kill that grass or die trying! Plowing every day was the only way. Let lightning strike where it pleased!

Fire burned a house in Maum Hannah’s yard yesterday. Nobody knew how it caught. Maum Hannah said Jesus burned it. How could fire know Jesus wanted it burned? And yet, the little baby that was coming would know when the moon changed. It would come then. Baby Rose came on the change of the moon.

How do things buried deep know when the moon changes? Seed in the ground know. The water in the river knows. The weather knows. The wind knows. All know more than men. Maum Hannah said Jesus tells His children a lot of things.

Killdee lay on his back and a spot of sunshine fell right in his eyes. The noon hour was passing and neither he nor Mike had eaten dinner. What a fool he was to lie here thinking!

He got slowly to his feet and looked around. Mike had wandered away to find grass that was tender and sweet. Killdee called him.

“Come on, Mike. You got to go home and eat some cawn. Grass won’ gi’ you de strengt’ to pull de plow t’rough da tough grass. Come on. You too greedy. You gwine miss an’ eat a pizen weed ef you don’ mine. Den you’ll hab belly-ache.”

While Mike came, Killdee knelt beside the spring and with cupped hands dipped up water and cleansed his dusty face, then he trudged up the hill with Mike following behind him.

Once he stumbled on a root in the narrow crooked path. Thinking had made him unsteady. He had plowed on Green Thursday.

Already the sky was darkening. Thunder rumbled far over the river. It had a threatening loury sound.

Raising his eyes, he looked at his home. The low roof was half-hidden with smoke that rose out of the red-clay chimney at its side. Rose had a fire trying to keep his dinner hot for him there on the hearth inside. He was late to-day. As he hurried forward, a flick of lightning was followed by muted thunder. What if lightning should strike that cabin--burn it--burn all he had within it! God, what a thought!

Shucks! Thinking had made him a coward. When had he ever feared lightning? He was no woman. No. He was a man. Hadn’t he promised himself he’d be like a goat? Not a sheep. Not a frightened, huddling, scary fool. No.

The crop needed rain and it was coming. He’d feed Mike first, then eat himself. He had let the snake go, but it would rain anyway. The cloud was rolling nearer every minute.

As he got further up the hill, he could see that the back door had been whitened with some of the clay from the gully down near the spring. The wooden blinds, half open on each side of the chimney, were whitened inside and out. How nice it made the house look!

Rose had done it all since morning. She liked to have things clean. She was getting everything ready for her venture. Childbirth. Poor Rose! Soon pain would wrench her!

Some of these days he would build Rose a better house. If the crop made anything this year, he would “wash-white” the house all over and maybe build another shed room there at the back.

When he opened the door of Mike’s stable, a shed room added to the log barn, streaks of light shone through the roof. Mike must have a better stable before next winter. Mike was old, but he was faithful.

If the crop was good, it might seem hard-hearted, but he must try to arrange somehow to get a better mule. The thought made Killdee feel guilty.

He shucked a few ears of corn and put them into the trough and watched Mike’s feeble efforts to bite the grains off.

“You teet’ ain’ no count, not no mo’, Mike. It make me sad fo’ see you strive fo’ chaw.”

He’d have to take a sack of corn to mill and get it ground up for Mike. Mike’s old teeth were worn out. They couldn’t crack corn any more.

Killdee sighed as he closed the barn door and walked toward the cabin. The sun shone out with a sudden, dazzling flash of brilliance. The china-berry tree beside the doorstep made a round, thick spot of shade. The wild-cherry tree cast light, leafy shadows that played up and down over the red-clay chimney.

Rose called out of the window:

“How-come you so late to-day? You been to see Maum Hannah? I know you didn’ plow so long an’ it Green Thursday.”

Killdee shook his head wearily and walked inside.

“Yes,” he admitted, “I been plowin’ sence sunrise tell twelve o’clock. I lay down by de spring fo’ res’ a lil while.”

Rose shook her head dolefully, then leaned to dip his dinner out of the pot. Her brows were knotted with a frown. She dropped a few peas on the clean hearth as she helped a pan for him. She was cross. She thought he had done wrong.

“Somet’ing bad’ll happen to you sho as Gawd’s een heaben. People ain’ fo’ plow to-day.”

“Somet’ing bad’ll happen ef I don’t plow. Grass is got de crop now.” Killdee answered meekly, but Rose’s anger was not easy to quench.

“I know you mean I didn’ he’p you none wid de crop, but I ain’ able fo’ do nuttin’----” She began crying.

“Now, now,” Killdee went forward and petted her shoulder, “I didn’ say nuttin’ ’bout you. You mus’n fret, honey. No. You fo’ be happy. Look wha’ a nice lil gal we got. Mebbe dis time nex-week we would hab a nice lil boy. ’Member how de people say when we was ma’ied: ’I wish you joy, a gal an’ a boy’? We gwine hab all two.”

Rose drew away from him. She was not to be appeased so easily.

Killdee went and stood by the bed where Baby Rose, covered over with a patchwork quilt, lay asleep. Flies crawled over the child’s delicate features. They rose and buzzed and crawled again.

“Whyn’t you git on off!” Killdee growled angrily at them. He waved his hands violently to frighten them off.

“Do don’ wake em, Killdee. Le’em sleep. Da chile ain’ been still all day. ’E keep me busy watchin’ ’em. I done tired. Le’em sleep. You come on an’ eat you’ dinner.”

Killdee took the pan of food from Rose’s hand and sat down in the doorway to eat. He looked at the cow-peas and bacon and cornbread and stirred among them absent-mindedly with his spoon.

Rose didn’t look right. She was vexed because he had plowed to-day, but she didn’t look well. Maybe he was wrong to worry her.

He glanced toward her heavy, bulging body, at her swollen ankles, and pity for her stirred him.

How could she breathe like that? Of course she couldn’t hoe. No. Yet she had struggled up and down the hill bringing water to scour the floor. How clean it’s bare boards were!

She had whitened the windows and doors. Getting her house ready. Poor Rose. She needed help here at home. Baby Rose was a frisky baby. The hill was long and steep. Bringing up water was hard work. After this he must bring it for her before he went to work in the field.

“Come set heah by me an’ le’s talk,” he suggested kindly.

“I ain’ able fo’ set low ez dem steps, not now,” Rose said with a wistful sigh.

“I haffer set high een cheer now.”

As she drew a chair to the door a flash of lightning lit the cabin and a peal of thunder crashed close behind it. Rose shivered and put up a hand.

“You see, enty!” she whispered. “Lightnin’s gwine strike you field!”

Lightning flashed again and Rose’s eyes shone white in the glare as she quavered.

“Git up out de do, Killdee. De wedder is too cross. ’E might miss an’ strike you. I so faid em, Killdee....”

Killdee wiped his mouth on his sleeve and got up. He put an arm around her and led her to the bed where Baby Rose slept peacefully.

“Lay down by de baby an’ res’, Honey. Don’ be faid. Nuttin’ ain’ gwine hu’t you. No. Rain’ll do de crop good. De cawn an’ cotton’ll grow. Next fall I gwine buy you a fine dress and shoe an’ hat. I’ll git a wagon an’ harness an’ hitch up ol’ Mike an’ tek you to Mount Pleasant Church. De people’ll say: ’Who is dat dress’ up so fine comin’ yonder?’”

Rose’s fingers rested on the strong thews of Killdee’s forearm. With him close beside her like this, she felt comforted. Dress--shoes--hat--she smiled to think of them all.

But the heavy cloud darkened the cabin. Lightning blazed in through the open windows and door. Thunder clapped savagely.

“Do shet de do, Killdee--an’ de window----”

As Killdee got up to do it, there were muffled bangs from Mike’s stable. He listened, then ran stumbling down the steps. Had Mike gotten fastened in a crack of the stable?

Hot stench filled his nostrils when he opened the stable door. Flies sung over the moist dung where Mike lay kicking, groaning, rolling with pain. Mike’s belly was puffed with colic.

Bad corn. Bad teeth. Or--was it because Mike stirred the earth on Green Thursday? Something must be done. A mule can’t last long swollen up like this.

Killdee shouted through the wind:

“Rose! Rose! See ef a kerosene is lef’ een de bottle! Fetch em quick!”

Rose came hurrying across the yard, panting, trembling, ashy, with a quart bottle in her hand.

The wind twisted her skirts and blew the stable door shut with a bang. Killdee opened it and took the bottle from her shaking fingers.

“Jedus,” she sobbed, “Ef Mike dead, wha’ we gwine do!”

Killdee knelt and pulled the mule’s great black lips open. He forced the worn, yellow teeth apart and poured the kerosene down the unwilling throat.

“Git up on you feet, Mike!” he called sternly.

“You can’ leddown wid colic. You mus’ walk ’em off. Das do only way.”

Mike lay prone. Moaning, rolling. Killdee got the bridle and put it on him. He shook the bit and coaxed:

“Get up, Mike. Don’ mek me git a whip. You mus’ git up and walk, son.”

Lightning blazed, and wind, mean and wet, sung through the cracks of the log barn. Rose whimpered and clung to Killdee’s arm.

“You mus’ go back to de house, Rose. De lightnin’ know good you is faid em. Dat mek em do wusser. Go on een de house. I can’ lef Mike fo’ go wid you. Go leddown on de bed side de baby. Kiver up you haid. Try fo’ go sleep tell I come.”