the letter she bought some sweet animal crackers from the store for
supper. She had a good supper. She pressed them all to eat a-plenty,
and when they were done, she bustled about briskly, washing dishes,
straightening things; but she had nothing to say to a soul. What was
she thinking about, to stay so silent?
She and Breeze and Leah’s children sat by the fire for a while. It
burned low and dim, for the night was too hot to keep it bright. Nobody
talked. Now and then one of the flies sleeping on the newspapered wall
roused and buzzed. The leaves on the trees outside made a timorous
noise. Brudge darted glances at Breeze and cleared his throat again and
again, but everybody was polite.
One by one they went off to bed until only Joy and Breeze were left.
She got up.
“Come on, Breeze. Le’s go to bed. Me an’ you an’ de baby, we stays in
here.”
Breeze slept on a cot in the corner of the room and Joy in the bed
where Leah’s dead body had been. Where was Leah now? Breeze gazed at
the dark. He could hear things moving about in the yard. Something
fumbled at the door. The latch rattled. The steps creaked. Somewhere in
the distance a dog howled. Joy’s little baby cried out, but she patted
it and sang softly:
“Bye, baby buntin’
Daddy’s gone to de cow-pen
To git some milk fo’ de baby.
Go to sleep.”
Breeze lay open-eyed. Restless. The cabin was stifling hot. Fear had
him sweating.
* * * * *
When the long night, baked with heat, passed into a warm, dewy morning,
the baby woke and Breeze took him to see the men pass with the mules
and plows on their way to the corn-field, then to watch Leah’s children
and Joy stick sweet-potato cuttings into the ground. Time went slowly.
If one morning could be long as this, when would those cuttings ever
make a crop? The baby’s weight burdened his arms. His shoulders ached.
He’d go sit on the step and sing it to sleep, then he’d rest. “Bye
an’ bye, when de mawnin’ comes!” Breeze sang, and the baby’s eyelids
drooped. “Bye an’ bye, when we’s gathered home!” The eyelids closed
down tight. “We’ll t-e-l-l de story! H-o-w we over-come,” Breeze sang
it softly, the baby was ready to ease down on the bed. His tired arms
could rest a while. He might take a nap himself.
The day was so quiet when he sat on the step again and leaned his head
back against the door-facing that the old tree, bending its head across
the yard toward the cabin, whispered every time a breath of air stirred
it. A wood-pecker’s tapping made a tumult of sound. The twitterings
of a pair of wrens with a nest in a knot hole under the eaves made a
distinct clamor. Drowsiness glazed Breeze’s eyes, stopped up his ears.
The morning flowed on by.
When the noon bell rang he jumped, awake, with the bare shadow of a
gasp. Then he remembered he was living with Joy, not Big Sue, and he
stretched his mouth in a lazy yawn.
The Quarters soon bustled with people coming in from the fields. The
women, first, with hoes on their shoulders, then the men. Hens cackled,
telling of eggs they’d just laid. Ducks quacked. Pigeons wheeled in low
circles.
Joy arrived ahead of the children, her arms drooping, her steps lax and
careless, her eyes noting naught around her, not even Breeze, who got
up to let her pass. Then something on his head made her heed. “Wha’
dat on you’ head, Breeze! Who put em dere! Great Gawd, Breeze whe’ you
been?”
Breeze put up a scared hand and felt all over his head. There was
nothing so far as he could tell. “Wha’ e is, Joy? I ain’ feel nothin’.”
“Looka!” Joy lifted a white horse hair and held it in front of his
eyes. “Take em an’ drown em, Breeze. Drown em quick. I bet Brudge done
dis. De scoundrel! Brudge is tryin’ to scare you. Dat’s all. He can’
do you nothin’. No. Brudge don’ know how to cunjure nobody. But you go
chunk dis in de Blue Brook anyhow. Tie em on a rock an’ chunk em far in
as you kin. But don’ le’ Brudge know you done it.”
Breeze writhed with cold fear. That short white horse hair was a burden
to his shaking fingers. He shifted it from one hand to the other, until
he reached the Blue Brook’s bank. When a lizard scurried under a log to
hide, its light rustling made Breeze almost drop his load. But he found
a pebble, twined the hair around it, and after looking all around to
be sure nobody saw, he cast it into the water.
As it fell with a light plop a giggle broke in the stillness. Breeze’s
blood turned hot with fury. If Brudge had dared to follow him, watch
him, laugh at him, he’d get a stick, a rock, something that could kill,
and kill the scoundrel.
His eyes searched the surroundings, but nothing was at hand. Festoons
of trailing moss floated from the limbs of the enormous live-oaks,
making a weird canopy over his head; a cicada chanted shrilly in
a clump of vine-tangled shrubbery; huge coiling, writhing roots
spread around great rough trunks, then dropped out of sight, burying
themselves in the earth. No weapon for him to use was anywhere in
sight. He’d hunt until he found one. A narrow bit of a short blue skirt
flickered from behind a tree-trunk and disappeared. Emma’s! Maybe it
was she who had tricked him, not Brudge! He stopped short with a sharp
indrawn breath. He’d slip up on her, catch her, hold her--maybe push
her in the water!
Tipping stealthily forward, he went toward the tree, holding his breath
for fear Emma might hear him and get away. He’d make her pay for
teasing him, scaring him, making him believe somebody had put a conjure
spell on him with that white horse hair.
When Emma peeped out to see where he was, he grabbed her by the arm so
suddenly she gave a little frightened cry.
“I got you! Now I’m gwine drown you!” he growled, but instead of
pulling away, trying his strength, her eyes filled, her mouth quivered.
“I was jus’ playin’ wid you, Breeze--you oughtn’ to be mad wid
me--a-jerkin’ me----”
The moss waved softly overhead, the grass heads leaned sidewise in
the gentle wind, two round drops of water dreaned out of Emma’s eyes
and ran down her cheeks. They cut clean to Breeze’s heart, startling,
paining him. The small arm inside his fingers was soft as Joy’s baby’s.
He wouldn’t hurt it for the world.
“I ain’ mad. I’m a-playin’ wid you, too,” he explained.
“Enty?” Emma’s smile was so sudden, so merry, Breeze felt confused,
troubled.
The Blue Brook trickled on with a soothing purl, its surface shimmering
as the wind stirred it into rolling ripples. Roses and honeysuckles
added fragrance to the stench of decaying leaves and wood. A deep
stillness began spinning a web over them all.
“Oh--Breeze!” Joy was calling.
“Ee--oo! I’m a-comin’!” He answered, and Emma was gone.
Joy sent him to the post-office, and when he came back with a letter,
she snatched it out of his hand, but it was from the hospital and said
April was improving. He’d soon come home, and he sent messages to all
his friends. He craved to see them.
* * * * *
Dewberries were ripe, wild plums reddening, maypop vines had the
roadsides purple with bloom. The day drowsed with heat, the rice-fields
smelled sweaty, the sun, half-way between noon and sunset, drew out
perfume from the grass and flowers.
Breeze was in the pasture picking berries for supper when the
boat-whistle made a long extra blow for the landing. He stood up and
held his breath to listen, for he knew something unusual had happened.
It wasn’t long before Brudge came in sight, waving his arms and
shouting, “Sherry’s come! De boat fetched em just now!”
Breeze sprang up in such haste, he spilled every berry in the bucket
and had to stop and pick them up.
“How do e look, Brudge?”
Brudge made a face. “E look ugly as ever to me.”
“I got a good mind to choke you,” Breeze threatened.
“Come on an’ choke! I’ll mash you’ goosle flat! Wid one hand! Ha! Ha!”
Burning with hate for Brudge and joy over Sherry’s coming, Breeze flew
home by a short-cut. Joy sat on the steps, feeding her baby, but it
was plain she knew Sherry had come, for her words halted so she could
hardly speak, and her eyes were wide and bright.
“Sherry’s come!” Breeze panted, all out of breath. “I’m gwine to see
em.” She stroked her baby’s fat little legs, then clasped both small
feet together.
“Tell em--tell em---- No, don’ tell em nothin’. I’ll go tell em myself.”
She laid the baby face down across her lap and began unfastening him in
the back. “Go git me some clean clothes fo’ em befo’ you go.”
She leaned quickly and kissed the back of the tiny neck where the head
joined the plump body, leaving a hollow shaped just right for her mouth.
She slipped his one garment off his soft rolly body, slipped the clean
one on over his head, laughing at the way his head wabbled, then
suddenly cuddled him close in her arms. She held him so tight, his
restless arms and legs squirmed to get loose.
Breeze hurried to Zeda’s cabin so fast he had no wind left to tell
Sherry how glad he was to see him. Sherry gave him a hand-shake, then a
mighty hug that squeezed Breeze into a happy laugh.
“Lawd, boy, you is growed! How’s Clara? Did e kick you yet?”
Breeze could do nothing but grin. How much bigger Sherry looked! How
much finer! He was a town man now, with shoes and cravat and a white
straw hat, and presents for everybody. Breeze was so happy blowing his
new mouth-organ he didn’t see Joy until she asked, “You don’ know me,
Sherry? Is I changed dat much?” Her words shook, her smile trembled.
“No, Joy, you ain’ so changed. No---- But I didn’ know you had a
baby----”
“Sho’ I is. Look at em. Ain’ e de fines’ t’ing you ever see? E kin
’most talk, enty, Breeze?”
Breeze could hardly take his eyes off Sherry long enough to answer her,
but the baby cooed and his wabbly head bobbed back and forth against
Joy’s arm. His toes stretched out in the hot sunshine, and both tiny
balled-up fists tried to thrust themselves into his small drippy mouth.
He gnawed at them, then let them go, and a disappointed wail suddenly
wrinkled up his small face and made it so funny-looking, even Sherry
had to laugh.
“Wha’ e name, Joy?”
“E name Try-em-an-see, but I calls him Tramsee fo’ short.”
“Whe’ you git dat name?”
“Maum Hannah helped me to make em up. It’s a lucky one, too.” Joy
turned away suddenly, and her full short gingham skirt twirled about
her thin legs. They were bare and matched her small wiry body well,
and her face had been greased until its black skin shone hard with
glints of blue in the sun. Her ripe breasts strutted full under her
tight-fitting dress. Her bare head had its wool wrapped into tight
cords with white ball thread. She looked very different from the
stylish town-dressed Joy who came home just before Christmas. No wonder
Sherry stared at her.
All her town airs were gone. She was as countrified as Zeda. Sherry
gazed at her so hard, Joy dropped her eyes. Her lips twitched and the
hollows at the corners of her full mouth deepened.
“I’m sho’ glad you come home, Sherry. Whyn’ you bring you’ wife?”
The slim fingers of one hand plucked at a button on the back of the
baby’s dress. Her voice, raised and strengthened, sounded clear and
hard.
“E wouldn’ come South, Joy. But I thought you had mo’ sense dan to go
take Leah’s husband. You’d sleep in dat house fo’ Leah to hant you? You
kin rest dere?”
Joy’s eyes flickered and shifted in a side-glance toward him, then
beyond him, where trees fringing the rice-fields shimmered blue like
trees in a dream.
“Sho’, I kin rest dere. April’s a fine man, Sherry. E treat me white
too. I wish to Gawd e didn’ got sick. De crop has been a-needin’ him
bad.”
“Whe’ e is now?” Sherry’s eyes were cloudy, his voice dull.
“To de horspital.”
The china-berry tree full of purple blossoms cast a pool of hot shade
at Joy’s feet. Reddish scions, sprung up around the root of the crêpe
myrtle, gave out a sickly scent as Sherry’s restless feet trampled and
bruised them. The yellow afternoon glare stressed a stern look in his
eyes and marked a swift-beating pulse that throbbed with tiny strokes
in a vein of his thick strong neck.
It was a relief to hear Joy say coolly, “April’ll be glad you’s come.
De boll-evil is swarmin’ in de cotton.”
And Sherry answered, “I’m glad to git back, Joy. Yonder up-North ain’
like home.”
“Stay an’ eat supper wid us, Joy. You an’ Breeze all two,” Zeda invited
cordially.
Breeze looked at Joy and waited for her answer. “You stay, Breeze,” she
said. “But don’ stay late.” And she walked on home to April’s cabin.
Sherry slept a good part of each day, but at night the big poison
machine hummed over the cotton-fields, puffing out clouds of white
poison dust until every stalk was covered, every leaf silvery. The dry
weather was a help. No rain came to wash the poison off. Plows kept
the middles of the rows stirred and the fallen squares buried. After a
week’s rest the poison machine ran all night again. The cotton throve.
The stifling nights were perfumed with the honey of cotton blooms.
Already bolls were showing, some as large as hickory nuts! April
himself could have managed no better than Sherry.
Joy bustled about working hard all day, but she sang at her work and
night found her unwearied. Brudge got more and more sullen and surly.
He was often impudent to Joy, but she paid him no attention. One night
when the supper things were washed and put away she slipped out of the
door and walked off in the darkness alone. When the others had gone
to bed Brudge barred all the doors so she couldn’t get in. As if she
were not April’s wife and the mistress of the house. But even then she
laughed and treated it as a joke.
The next day her baby lay on the bed sleeping. Brudge walked up and
looked at it and called it an ugly name. Joy heard and before Brudge
had time to catch his breath, she grabbed him and gave him such a
beating he yelled for mercy.
After that Brudge spied on her all the time, even jumping out of bed to
see if anybody came home with her at night. And Joy drove him to his
work every day as if he were a lazy mule. They quarreled constantly.
The cabin became a wretched place to Breeze, except those times when
Joy sat on the steps in the dusk and talked to him and told him how
much she thought of him and of the help he had been to her.
With her face wreathed in smiles and her eyes bright with gladness,
she’d look up at the stars shining through the tree-tops and Breeze
would hold his breath and listen at her voice and sigh with love of
her, and forget that life was ever painful or burdensome.
One night Sherry walked home from meeting with Joy, but when they
reached April’s house she didn’t ask him in. He stood by the step and
rolled a cigarette, lit it and walked away. Brudge watched him with
eyes full of cunning and when he was out of hearing laughed: “Sherry
t’inks he’s somebody. My Gawd!”
“Sherry is somebody,” Breeze defended. “Sherry is de foreman now.”
“You wait till Pa gits home. You’ll see who de foreman is den. Me
an’ Uncle Bill is gwine to town to git Pa befo’ long. I bet a lot o’
t’ings’ll change den. You’ll see it too.”
The moon glittered thin and sharp in the sky. Crickets chirruped.
Katydids droned long shrill cries. A whip-poor-will called and called.
Breeze was so fretted that he forgot Joy sat on the step beside him. He
jumped when she spoke, although she spoke quietly: “Sherry an’ Uncle
Bill is gwine to town on de boat to fetch Cun April home. You is not
gwine, Brudge.”
Joy’s voice was husky, perhaps from the dew or from singing so long at
meeting. Brudge made no answer, but in a little while he got up and
slunk off to bed without even saying good night.
* * * * *
The people met the boat to welcome April home just as they met it when
he brought Joy, a bride. All except Joy herself. She stayed to have
everything ready for him at the house. She knew he’d be hungry and the
soup must be kept hot, the chicken nice and tender but not too done.
Unwatched rice is easy to scorch. And besides, the chicken’s raw heart
had already mysteriously disappeared! Out of the pan! After she had
washed it and salted it! She told Breeze this in a whisper.
* * * * *
Sherry picked April up in his arms and brought him ashore. April was
not much longer than Joy’s baby, now, and tears poured down his cheeks,
but he seemed not to care at all who saw them. Lord, he was so glad to
get home! There was no place like Blue Brook!
The close-packed crowd listened, motionless and hushed, for April’s
voice was low and broken and his words like somebody else speaking.
Lord, how the man was changed! His lean body with its broad bony
shoulders and long thin arms was a shocking sight. No matter what
wrongs he had done, he had been punished enough. More than enough!
Uneasy and curious, but filled with respect, they pressed around him.
They fed their eyes on his terrible plight. April was no longer a man.
Poor soul! God’s hand had fallen hard, heavy, upon him.
A grave silence held most of them, but April, so full of joy at getting
home again, called out cordial greetings to every one of them by name.
He was so glad to hear the crops were good, so glad Sherry was back, so
glad for the dry weather.
When he paused to take breath, their sorrowful pitying words fell:
“Do, Jedus!” “I too sorry fo’ em!” “My Gawd!” “I ain’ never see sich a
t’ing!”
Breeze’s heart shrank smaller until it felt no larger than the heart of
a mouse in his breast. Old Louder gave a long sad howl. The birds sang
no more. The sun in the west hid under a dark drab cloud.
April was the only cheerful person in the whole crowd.
“How yunnuh likes Sherry fo’ de foreman?” he asked brightly.
No answer came at first, then Jake cleared his throat and spoke out:
“Sherry does de best e kin, but e ain’ got no time wid you, April. No.”
Then many other answers chimed in, “Shucks, nobody livin’ could make de
foreman you was!”
“Dat’s de Gawd’s truth!” Sherry’s voice praising April as loud as any.
Uncle Isaac had Julia hitched to Uncle Bill’s buggy to take April home,
and when the old mule became terrified at the boat’s whistle, April
laughed at the beast’s lack of sense. Poor Julia! So old and so foolish!
Breeze had never realized how much April loved everybody. “How all o’
yunnuh do?” he asked affectionately. “How’s all home?” He had to choke
back a sob as he looked into their serious faces.
Sherry put him on the buggy seat beside Uncle Isaac, who held the
reins, but April couldn’t keep his balance, and Uncle Bill had to get
in and hold him steady.
April excused himself by saying he was weak and nervish from lying flat
down on his back so long. A bed draws a man’s strength in a hurry. Even
a chair will do it.
Over and over he said how good everything looked. He breathed deep of
the smell of the woods full of bay-blossoms. The splash of Julia’s feet
in the shallow branch made the water come into his eyes. Everybody who
walked alongside the buggy could see it.
When they got in sight of the barnyard, Julia broke into a trot. It
was her supper time and she was in a hurry to eat. April laughed at her
sudden willingness to go. “No, Julia. You can’ stop at de barnyard, not
dis time. You got to pull me home. You don’ know I can’ walk, enty?”
But his voice broke, and Uncle Bill began telling about the crop, how
fine it was, how loaded with fruit. When he got stronger, April must
take Julia and the buggy and ride everywhere. Sherry did very well, but
he was young and needed advice about a lot of things.
Joy and Leah’s little children stood waiting out in front of the cabin
to meet him. A quiet awed group. April was the only one who felt at
ease.
“How you do, honey?” he said gently to Joy, who came forward first, but
she looked uncertain what to do or say. “I reckon I is look strange to
yunnuh. But I’m thankful to git home widout comin’ nailed up in a box.”
The children huddled together watching April as if he were a perfect
stranger.
“Come speak to you Pa, chillen,” Joy bade them, and they came forward
slowly, shyly. Brudge snuffled and sobbed right out loud, so moved was
he, but one of the littlest boys looked at his father’s shortened body
and giggled. Joy grabbed his shoulder and shook him soundly and sent
him behind the house, just as she did when he laughed at April months
ago.
“E don’ mean nothin’, April. E ain’ got so much sense. E’d laugh if e
was a-dyin’ himself. His mammy must ’a’ marked him so.”
Joy spoke kindly, but April’s face changed. His mouth quivered; a
strange weary look wrung all the life out of his eyes. His own child
had made sport of him. Laughed at his shame. The last time it happened
he had reared and pitched, but this time his bosom heaved and he wiped
his eyes with his sleeve.
Joy helped Sherry to take him inside the cabin and lay him on a bed in
the shed-room. It did look inviting. The feather mattress was puffed up
high and covered with a clean white spread. April sighed deeply as he
sank in its soft depths, and he closed his eyes in enjoyment.
His head was too low to see well, and he asked Joy to get him another
pillow. She looked at the long empty trousers that twisted about
foolishly over the white counterpane. April whispered to her that she’d
have to cut them off shorter for him, or pin them back. Joy didn’t
answer, but she got a quilt from another bed. When April saw what she
was going to do, he protested that it was too hot to lie under a quilt.
But something he saw in Joy’s eyes made him change his mind, and he let
her cover him up.
Big Sue came to see if there was anything she could do for April’s
comfort. She spoke kindly to Joy and told Breeze he looked well and
grew fast. April hardly heard Big Sue’s offer, for his friends had
crowded into the room and called to him from the open windows. They
meant to be kind, still no one of them could conceal astonishment and
horror that April had no feet, no legs, at all. There were gentle
murmurs of:
“God bless you, son, how’s you gwine do widout legs?”
“I’m sho’ glad you lived to git home, but what’s you gwine to do?”
April’s pleasure at being home was somehow chilled. He kept saying he
thought two or three times he’d never see them again and he had to pull
hard to do it, but his cheerful tone had faded into gloominess.
Uncle Bill suggested that the people had better leave. April had had a
long trip. He was tired. He had been very weak. He wasn’t strong enough
to stand much excitement. They were all good-mannered about it. They
passed out of the door with little to say, and their tones were subdued
when they spoke.
When the last one had gone, April burst out crying. He held Uncle
Bill’s hands and blubbered out he was nothing but a baby! He had no
manhood left at all! He couldn’t even stand kindness! Everything made
him cry! Everything!
Joy came back into the room and stood by the bed and looked down at him
and he reached up a long arm and took her hand uncertainly and called
her by name. No eyes were ever more appealing, no voice in the whole
world ever plead for tenderness as April’s did then.
“Joy, you don’ mind me bein’ dis way, enty? I’m gwine git wood legs
befo’ long.”
Joy stood silent, a shudder ran through her, her fingers lay limp in
April’s. April groaned and let her hand go.
Then Joy tried to smile bravely and say she didn’t mind. She had
fretted herself half to death about him and now she was happy because
he had come. But it was too late. She couldn’t fool April. He had seen
how she felt; and he drew away from her as from a stranger.
She turned and went briskly out of the room, and April turned his face
to the wall. His thin breast lifted, while one deep bitter sob after
another shook him. He had fought a long hard fight with Death, and now
he was sorry he had won! If he had known how things would be, how Joy
would feel, he would have given up, but it was the thought of Joy that
made him try to live.
* * * * *
April stayed on the bed in the shed-room day after day, looking out
over the rice-fields where the tides rose and fell. Breeze’s work was
changed from minding Joy’s baby to staying with April, keeping the
flies off him, handing him water to drink.
Few plantation sounds could reach this shed-room at the back of the
cabin and when staying by April became unbearable, Breeze would go
outside and walk as far as the water’s edge, or stand by the window
watching cranes and kingfishers. One old bald eagle spent much of his
time on a branch of an old dead tree and when a fish-hawk dived and got
a fish the eagle took it from him.
* * * * *
April complained little. Once when the night was damp and the sound of
the poison machine louder than usual he got very restless. He said it
was hard to lie helpless. Without legs. Flat on his back. Most of the
time alone. While another man took his place. But except for sighs and
a few moans, that was all.