Part 18

The sun began throwing long shadows and Big Sue kept him hurrying. Every single hog hair had to be picked up and saved to plant in the potato patch next spring. Every hair would make a potato.

The waste had to be thrown in the creek. Breeze cast it in, a bucketful at a time. Horrid filthy stuff. It made him shiver, but the water swallowed it down with scarcely a splash, then flowed on smooth and clear, reflecting the bright clouds in the sky, shimmering in the last sunbeams, rising with the incoming tide to water its banks, which were yellow with marsh daisies. The willows were almost bare of leaves, and the slim naked trunks and branches bent over, looking away down into the Blue Brook’s quiet depths.

Sunset gilded the earth and cabins and trees, and streaked the white sandy yard with golden light. Uncle Bill hoped that such stillness would not bring rain soon, for the hay was in shocks in the field yet, and the corn not all broken in. He looked up at the sky as he spoke, and at once a light breeze sprang up to tell him to-morrow would be fair. He laughed with relief, and the big trees bowed gently, saying that they knew the little breeze had told the truth. Even the frost-faded grasses nodded and waved!

To stay fair the weather must turn cooler, and that would be good for Big Sue’s fresh killed meat. It would have a good chance to take the salt well. Such big hams needed careful curing.

Breeze must clean up the pen to-morrow and scatter ashes all over it, so Uncle Bill could bring Big Sue one of Melia’s red pigs to grow and fatten into a fine shoat by late spring.

Each piece of pork was rubbed well with salt and stored in Uncle Bill’s small log barn. There, they’d be safe until the morning, when they’d be rubbed again with salt mixed with sugar, and packed into a barrel to cure.

Old Louder sat on his thin haunches, patient and polite. He knew better than to beg, but his long ears failed to hide the pleading, wistful look in his eyes. Breeze tossed him a morsel of meat now and then and before one could touch the ground Louder caught and swallowed it with a deft snap of his jaws. Big Sue fairly screamed out:

“Feedin’ a dog wid my good meat, enty? I seen you. I’ll learn you better’n dat to-morrow mawnin’.”

As a rule Breeze said nothing, but the falling dusk looked so mournful, his body felt tired, his legs sore, his back and arms achy with so much work. This was the time of day he gave Jeems his supper, after the chickens and guineas were gone to bed. Now the pen was empty. Jeems was dead.

Pity for Jeems and himself made a sob heave up into his throat. Big Sue must have heard it, for her big moist salty hand closed over his mouth, “Shut up dat cryin’. You ain’ nuttin’ but a gal-baby! A-cryin’ here an’ me fretted half to death ’bout Joy! Drop you’ pants. I’s gwine lick you.”

* * * * *

Next morning, not a streak of daylight was showing through the house cracks when Breeze heard Big Sue up, stumbling around, dressing. She fumbled with the door-bar, taking it down, then went outside. She wanted to see how her meat was. Breeze turned over, but his dozing was broken up by a long terrible shriek. Without putting on even his breeches, he hopped out of bed and ran out to see what was wrong. Somebody’s house must be afire. Joy followed him, her teeth chattering, although she had a quilt wrapped around her.

Never in his whole life had Breeze heard such screams as Big Sue was making. Everybody in the Quarter came hurrying, nobody fully dressed. At first all stood dumb, panic-stricken with amazement, while Big Sue wailed out, between body-wrenching sobs, Jeems was gone! Stolen! Not a hair nor hide was left! The iron hasps holding the chain and lock in the door were pulled clear out of the door-frame. Outraged shouts broke from the crowd. Who here was mean enough to do such a thing? They eyed one another suspiciously. Even fists were clenched, for no such thing was ever heard of. If a ham or a side or a shoulder had been taken, that would have been bad enough, but a whole hog! It was too terrible to think about.

They tried to find some trace, maybe some tracks on the ground around the barn, but nothing was there plainer than Big Sue’s own flat barefooted ones.

She shrieked and beat her breast by fits and starts, weeping bitterly all in between.

Jeems was the finest hog ever butchered! She had never seen one lined thicker with fat! His meat would have lasted until next summer! And now it was gone! Stolen!

She jerked off the white cloth that bound her head and threw it down. Howling with rage she beat her head against the side of the barn until the blows of her skull had it fairly quivering. The neighbors’ efforts to console her failed. Not even Joy could make any impression on her raving. Breeze was at his wits’ end. The sunny day itself got somber. The birds chirped low and sorrowfully.

Leah was the last person to come. Fat, wabbly, she strolled up, smoking her pipe, one arm akimbo, and beneath her red headkerchief, her eyes gleamed strangely.

“Wha’ dat ail Big Sue? E’s gwine on like e got in a hornet’s nest!”

They told her the news, but instead of grieving Leah sucked her teeth. Big Sue was just trying to make fools of them. Who’d take a whole hog? How could anybody do such a thing? Just as likely as not Big Sue had the hog right yonder in her shed-room.

They all looked in that direction, then back at Big Sue, who had paused in her wailing.

“Wha’ dat you say, Leah?” She was panting with rage, and only a narrow piece of ground lay between them, but Leah gave a taunting wicked laugh. “You hear me good enough. It ain’ no use to say all dat over.”

“You low liar! You varmint!” Big Sue’s voice was heavy. Her reddened eyelids, puffed with fat and tears, squeezed as tight as her clenched fist.

“Yunnuh hear Big Sue cuss me, enty?” Leah cried.

“Hush, Leah! You come on home wid me!” April stepped up and would have led her away by the arm, but with the fury of a cyclone, she shook him off and with a savage yell rushed up to Big Sue and spat in her face.

Like a flash they closed. Arms, fists, heads, bodies, whirled, staggered, fell, rose. All efforts to pull them apart were useless. Leah was the first to waver. After an awful blow in the face her arms dropped. She stood still, then tilted back on her heels trying not to fall. As she struggled for breath her mouth stretched wide open, gasping as fish gasp out of water.

April ran up and caught her and eased her gently down on the ground. Horrible fear rose in Breeze’s heart, for the glazed look in Leah’s eyes was the same that filled Jeems’ yesterday, when death struck him.

People crowded around her. Somebody ran for a bucket of water and poured it all over her head and face.

Breeze could hardly see for the mist in his eyes, but he knew Leah was dying for one of her girls gave a long piercing death-cry.

“You is sho’ ruint now, Big Sue!” Bina said distinctly.

“You spit in my face an’ I’ll kill you de same way!”

“Hush, Ma. Fo’ Gawd’s sake, hush!” Joy plead.

“Leah’s de one stole my hog,” Big Sue bawled, “Leah’s de very one!”

“Hush, Ma! Fo’ Gawd’s sake, hush! Uncle Bill, do come make Ma go home.”

* * * * *

Next morning Big Sue was too ill to get out of bed. Joy kept cool green collard leaves tied on her forehead, and rubbed the palms of her hands and the soles of her feet with tallow, but she groaned and complained with every breath.

Joy sent Breeze with some sweetened bread for Leah’s children to eat with their dinner, but he took a long time to get there. Dread made his feet lag. He slunk along the path, scared by every moving shadow. Ready to jump out of his skin at the crackle of a twig.

He felt relieved when he saw Uncle Bill in April’s yard helping make Leah’s coffin out of clean pine boards lately sawed at the saw-mill. As the sharp plane smoothed the wood, yellow curls fell on the ground. One string exactly Leah’s length and another her breadth, showed how to fit the box to her size.

Breeze finally had to go inside the house to deliver the bread and Joy’s message that Big Sue would not be well enough to attend Leah’s burying. He gave both to Bina, who had a wilted mock-orange bough in her hand, fanning flies away from the bed where Leah lay covered over with a sheet.

“Big Sue’s right to stay sick. You tell em I say so, too,” Bina said tartly. But in a more kindly tone she asked Breeze if he wanted to see Leah. When he shook his head, Bina said Leah looked mighty nice. Just as peaceful as if she was sleep.

That day was as long as a week. The sun hung still for hours at a time. There was scarcely a breath of wind. Breeze was afraid to stay alone, and both Joy and Big Sue kept to their beds. Once he whispered, “Joy, is you sleepin’?” and she answered gently:

“No, son, I’m wake. Come lay down on de bed ’side me. I know you is lonesome. I is myself.”

Reaching her hand out to meet him, she drew his burning face down against her own soft cheek which was cold and wet with tears. He raised up and met her eyes, and the look in them was so sad, so sorrowful, it cut him clean through to the heart.

At last the sun dropped westward, setting in Leah’s grave. Curiosity made Breeze want to see what went on, but fear of death kept him in calling distance of Joy. He went up the road far enough to see the dust raised by the funeral procession, but the wailing death-cries ran him home.

Joy stood by the open window listening. When one lone cry rose high above all the rest, her full lips twitched, her sad eyes stared more gloomily and farther away, big bitter tears rolled down her cheeks.

Big Sue stayed in bed in the darkened shed-room, drinking root teas that smelled strong and rank.

At last night fell. Bedtime came. Breeze knelt down and tried to whisper his prayers. “O Lawd,” he began, but he got no further for Uncle Bill’s old hound, Louder, who had been resting and scratching fleas on the porch, suddenly lifted up his voice in a long mournful howl, and Breeze jumped into bed and covered his head.

* * * * *

Early next morning Bina came, pretending to ask about Big Sue’s health, but her eyes were round and her breathing quick with excitement. Had they heard the news? No? Everybody on the plantation was talking about it!

Somebody had put an awful conjure on April! Leah’s death-sheet had been folded and laid across the foot of April’s bed. When he woke this morning, there it was, tucked in at each side so it couldn’t slip off on the floor. Nobody knew who did it.

April wanted to throw it in the fire, but Maum Hannah stopped him. Burning a conjure bag, or a death-sheet, is the worst thing you can do. They have to be drowned. Maum Hannah sent for Uncle Isaac, and they both tried to make April drown the sheet in the Blue Brook, but he was too stubborn and hardheaded to mind them. Before they could stop him he dashed it on the red-hot coals. Uncle Isaac grabbed it out, but it was all blackened and scorched and burned.

Uncle Isaac took what was left of it and tied a rock up in it to make it sink. When he threw it in the Blue Brook the water splashed and bubbled and made a mournful groan, then turned green as grass! That sheet must have been loaded with conjure poison. Uncle Isaac stood just so and counted to ten like the old people used to do. Bina got up to show them. Holding out the fingers of her left hand she counted them over twice wuth the forefinger of her right, singing as she did it.

Dis-sem-be! Jack-walla! Mulla-long! Mullinga! Gulla-possum! Gullinga! Sing-sang! Tuffee! Killa-walla! Kawa! Ten!

“Uncle Isaac done it just so.”

Big Sue was glad. Anybody could see that. She got up and started putting on her clothes. She seemed to shed her worries. To get almost cheerful. Once in a while she sighed. “I’m sho’ sorry for April. Too sorry. E ought not to ’a’ scorched dat sheet.”

The day turned off rainy, dreary, the whole world was wet and blurred. Big Sue said rain always falls after a burying to settle the dust on the grave.

Joy’s head ached, and she went to bed. Big Sue dampened a cloth with vinegar and tied it on Joy’s forehead, then she went slushing toward the Quarters.

She had hardly got out of sight when Joy jumped up and began a hurried dressing. She put on a dark dress, and tied a white towel over her head.

Breeze cried out in astonishment. Where was she going?

“Nowhere!” answered Joy. “If Ma comes and asks where I is, you don’ know nothin’ at all. Nothin’!”

“Tell me whe’ you’s gwine, Joy.” Breeze begged.

With a sad little smile she leaned over and hugged him.

“I’s comin’ back, Breeze. I’m gwine be you’ mammy after to-day. Ma can’ lick you no more. But don’t you tell nobody. I’m gwine to see if de boat brings me a letter from Sherry.”

“Lemme go, Joy.”

“No, you stay home till Ma comes.”

He let her go, out in the rain. He couldn’t help himself. For a while he pottered about the room, for there was no use to go out into the mud and rain. Then he crawled back into bed, and went sound asleep. Once he roused, and heard the boat puffing on the river. It blew for the landing and stopped, then went pounding on into the distance.

Big Sue came in at noon, vexed about something or other. She began abusing Breeze for letting the fire die, soon as she entered the cabin.

“Whe’s Joy?”

“I dunno, ma’am.”

“How come you dunno?”

“I dunno how come.”

“You ain’ got no sense, dat’s how come! Blow up dis fire befo’ I lick you to death!”

Fear put strength into Breeze’s blowing, and the fire soon blazed up, cheerful and bright, but Big Sue was bursting with gall which she vented on Breeze.

He ran about trying to please her, his mouth dumb-stricken with misery. But her bitter abuse stung him to the very quick and overcame him completely. He burst out crying, just as the soft mud outside sucked loud at somebody’s footsteps.

Uncle Bill called in through the door, “Is anybody home?”

Big Sue’s voice shifted into a pleasanter key as she invited Uncle Bill to come in, then upbraided Breeze for crying like a baby about nothing.

Uncle Bill took Breeze’s part, and with a big red pocket handkerchief wiped Breeze’s face and eyes with gentlest care, and stroked his hands and tried to comfort him.

“Don’ cry, son. You’ eyes is like scraps o’ red flannel. Joy’ll think you’s a baby fo’ true. She wouldn’ b’lieve you kin shoot a gun an’ plow an’ ride a mule good as a man.”

Uncle Bill slipped off his wet shoes to dry them, and sat in his bare feet. “Whe’s Joy?”

“I dunno an’ Breeze wouldn’ tell me whe’ Joy went. I reckon e’s yonder to Zeda’s house a-listenin’ at Zeda’s brazen talk.”

“Zeda’s talk ain’ brazen since Sherry’s gone,” mused Uncle Bill. “No, Zeda’s down-hearted as kin be.”

His shoes and feet steamed in the heat, and he drew both back to a safe distance. Then he showed Breeze how his ankles were marked with tiny scars. “See my snake-cuts? Uncle Isaac fixed me when I wa’n’t no bigger’n you. You ought git him to fix you next spring.”

He explained how the short gashes were made near a vein, and poison from a rattlesnake and a moccasin rubbed in. This was repeated until the dose no longer caused sickness. No snake could ever harm him again. They knew it. They kept out of his way. Yet snakes had him out in the rain now, taking a bucket of milk to April’s children. Snakes had been worse than usual this fall. They were not satisfied with eating all the eggs out of the hen nests, but they sucked the cows dry too. April’s cow might as well be dry so far as giving milk for the family to drink.

“April’s got a lot o’ hogs. Hogs’ll suck cows same like a calf,” Big Sue reminded him.

Uncle Bill was sure the hogs were innocent. And besides, April’s cow came from a fine breed. She wouldn’t let a hog suck her. But snakes are tricky. While the cow was dozing, in the night, they’d slip up and wrap themselves around her leg and suck her dry as a bone and never wake her. Hogs were too awkward to get all the milk. And a fine nice cow like April’s wouldn’t stand any foolishness from a hog.

“Maybe de cow is lost her cud. Dat’ll dry up de milk,” Big Sue suggested again.

Uncle Bill dismissed that with a shake of the head. Cows did lose their cuds. One of his own cows lost hers every time the hags rode her, and that was mighty near every young moon. Giving her an old greasy dish-rag to chew on helped her get it back for a while, but she got so bad off, even that failed. Finally he had to go to Uncle Isaac and get him to take the conjure off her. She was conjured, no doubt about that.

“Who you reckon done it?” Big Sue’s ears had pricked up with the word “conjure,” but Uncle Bill wouldn’t say. It was better not to talk too much about such things. When they come, rid yourself of them the best you can, but don’t talk about them after they go. The less they get into your mind, the better off you are.

“Cows suck dey own se’f, sometimes,” Big Sue went back to the old subject. “April’s cow might be a-doin’ dat.”

Uncle Bill was certain that wasn’t so. Somebody would have seen her. Cows did it, he knew. He once owned a fine one that did it and her mother before her did it. Every daughter she had did it too. They had to wear pens around their necks, but nothing could ever break them from the ugly habit. It was born in their blood, just as some dogs are born gun-shy. It’s in the breed. People and dogs and cows are born to be what they are. They may cover it up for a long time, but it will come out sooner or later.

Big Sue nodded, agreeing, “Dat’s how come I went clean over de river to Sandy Island when I wanted a boy to raise. I knowed Breeze come f’om good seed. E’s good stock.”

“You’s right. Sho’! If you want to raise corn, plant corn seed, not cotton seed.”

“April ever was a mighty rash man, Uncle Bill.” Big Sue hinted at something dark, and Uncle Bill slipped a look at her, then turned his eyes to look out in the rain, where a mocking-bird was whistling exactly like a young turkey. Big Sue got her sewing and sat down to talk.

“April wouldn’ rest not till e pizened dem boll-evils. I couldn’ hardly sleep in de night all las’ summer fo’ dem machines a-zoonin’. Everybody was scared to look out de door whilst April an’ Sherry was gwine round de fields. De pizen dust was same as a fog. Lawd! I slept wid my head under a quilt ev’y night. April better had left dem boll-evils right whe’ Gawd put ’em. I don’ kill no kinder bugs exceptin’ spiders. Not me! Fightin’ Gawd’s business’ll git you in trouble. April’s got off light so far, but e better quit tryin’ to do all de crazy t’ings de white people says do. E sho’ better! Bad luck’s been hangin’ round ever since dat radio-machine at de Big House started hollerin’ an’ cryin’ an’ singin’ year befo’ last. People ain’ got no business tryin’ to be Gawd. Not black people anyways. Let de white people go on. Dey is gwine to hell anyhow!”

She took a fresh thread and moistening the tip of a finger in her mouth made a fat knot in its end. But before she stuck it into the cloth, she looked at Uncle Bill with bright points of light in his eyes. Her words troubled him.

“You is talkin’ mighty fast now, daughter. I been workin’ wid white people all my life an’ I ain’ got no complaint to make of dem. No. Ol’ Cap’n raise’ me to have respect fo’ everybody.”

“Whe’ you reckon Ol’ Cap’n is to-day, Uncle Bill?”

The old man pressed his lips tight together until they puckered, and shook his head.

Big Sue laughed, “You don’ want to say, enty? I don’ blame you. But between you an’ me I spec’ e is whe’ I hope e ain’t; a hoppin’ in Hell dis minute!”

“Shut you’ mouth, gal! Gawd’ll strike you dead first t’ing you know!” Uncle Bill gave her a hard look. “Ol’ Cap’n had his faults, but e was a man! Yes, Gawd! A man!”

Uncle Bill wasn’t listening. He had gone back to the past, “Lawd, I kin see Ol’ Cap’n now. High an’ straight. Slim till de day e died. His eyes could go black as soot an’ flash wid pure fire when e got vexed, but dey could shine soft as gal-chillen’s eyes too.” Uncle Bill’s own eyes brightened as he talked.

“Dat man could ride horses dat would ’a’ killed anybody else,” he boasted. “An’ Uncle Isaac, yonder, used to be a man too! E drove de carriage wid a pair o’ coal black horses. When dey’d pass you in de big road dem horses’ breath was hot as pure steam. Dey nostrils was red as any blood! De gold an’ silver on de harness would blind you’ eyes same as a flash o’ lightnin’! You’d have to stop an’ stand still an’ cover up you’ face. Dem was de days! You young people don’ know nothin’! Not nothin’!”

A merry laugh crinkled up his eyelids, and filled the hollows in his thin old cheeks. It tickled him when he thought about the case Ol’ Cap’n was. He was a case. A heavy case! Sometimes his company would get drunk and reckless with pistols. Cap’n would always caution them to be careful not to shoot any of his servants. He’d always brag that he had the best stock of niggers and dogs and horses in the state, and he didn’t want any of them hurt.