by Lee Smith
Mama Marie sat smiling at everybody, while Aunt Mitty glowered and ate each helping of food on her plate up separately before she began on the next one.
Now the passage is empty and cold and dirty where we have been tromping in mud with the snow. Selena does not appear to notice. She says it is all she can do to keep wood in the house and food on the table. She says anybody who wants Christmas dinner this year can damn well get it off the stove in the kitchen. Squirrel stew. No gifts. Liddy is cooking the stew right now in the big black pot on the tripod over the fire outside. Tomorrow morning Washington and me will take some of it over to Mama Marie and Aunt Mitty along with some roasted quail and a pound cake. Arent we having carols then? Blanche asked, for she loved to sing as Fannie taught us, but Selena said, Not hardly. Victoria grinned. She is not so bad after all. I hope Selena will let her go over there with us tomorrow.
December 26, 1872
Dear Diary,
Washington came to wake me and Victoria at first light. Liddy gave us some coffee and johnnycake to eat in the kitchen, ham biscuits to put in our pockets for the long walk to Mamma Maries. Victoria was sleepy and sullen but I was excited, after all it is always an adventure, like Gullivers Travels and Robinson Crusoe and the Odyssey. All the books are about somebody going someplace. Liddy wrapped us up in all the old clothes she could lay her hands on. It is real cold right now. We set off across the yard and through the woods under a low gray sky, it was like walking under a blanket. There was only a couple inches of snow. Washington carried the pot of stew. I went last. Ahead of me Washington and Victoria looked like snowmen, their arms stuck out from their bodies because they were so bundled up.
We walked through the big pine forest and came to the sandy spring now covered by solid ice. I imagined it gurgling underneath, biding its time, as Victoria said. We walked along the stone fencerow past the old homestead. Animal tracks were everywhere. When we came to the place where the negro had hung, there was no way to tell it, just a big tree with a long limb and the old road passing underneath in a stretch of unbroken snow, as if nothing had ever happened there at all. But it DID happen, I thought. It did, I remember, I remember everything. I said nothing.
We went on but the sun never did come out. Victoria kept complaining. I kept thinking I saw Mary Whites red coat ahead of us through the trees. I knew this was not true, but it made me happy to think so. By the time we got to the mill, we could hear distant pops in the air as people shot off their guns the way you do on Christmas. The sky stayed dull and low. Morning never came.
At the big tree Victoria said Frankly I cannot go one more goddamn foot. We sat down on a rock to eat our biscuits. I gave her my second one. So Victoria ate three biscuits and I ate one and Washington ate two. The dim gray woods were very peaceful.
Its nice out here, isnt it? I said.
No it is not Miss Fancypants, Victoria said. What is the matter with you? Its too dark out here. You cant see anything. I want to SEE what I am doing. I am sick of snow. I am sick of mud. I am sick of being poor and everybody dying. I want a city, she said, with streetlights and paving stones. I am tired of working my fingers to the bone. Work work work. Thats all they know around here. It was even worse at the Bledsoes. They prayed all the time too. Well there is a lot more to life than this. I want some pretty clothes and a pretty boy like Declan Moylan and there aint no reason in the world why I cant have it.
Washington and me sat looking at her. I bet you gets it then, he said.
She looked over at me. What do YOU want, Molly? she asked in a different voice.
I dont know, I said. But I’ll know it when I see it, and I’ll want it the worst in the world. What about you Washington?
He looked away. I aint saying. He stood up. Less get on then, he said.
We saw lots more tracks, wagon and horse and foot, when we got to the public road. They continued under the big stone arch and into the Four Oaks lane.
Something going on, Washington said.
We walked faster. The huge trees spread their black arms out across the snowy yard where three or four wagons were parked helter skelter, mules and horses stamping their feet in the snow. People stood on the porch. A man drank from a bottle then put it back in his pocket and stared at us. Spencer stood out in the sideyard all wild-haired and wild-eyed smoking a cigarette. We went over there.
Spence, I said. Whats wrong? What is happening? Wheres Rom?
Spence grinned his big grin at us. Miss Marie up and died in the night, he said, and now Miss Mitty gone too.
What? Victoria and I looked at each other.
You going to eat that? Spence was looking at the food we carried.
Come on, I said. We went over to the porch and climbed up the steps and walked through the people. Two rough looking men in black coats and hats were trying to talk to Susie through a crack in the door. One of them waved a sheet of paper.
Yankees, Victoria said into my ear.
You will have to speak to Mister Junius Hall, he owns this place now Susie was saying. She had big dark circles under her eyes.
I am telling you, I now own this property! said the fat one with the mustache.
You will have to leave now, Susie said.
Madam, if you will allow us to come inside for a moment—
At that point Spencer picked the man up like he was a stick of firewood and threw him off the porch into the yard where he landed all spraddled out like a child playing angels in the snow.
I am hurt! I am hurt! he cried, then cut loose in a string of language such as I have never heard. Everybody moved over to the edge of the porch to get a look at him. The other man walked down into the yard.
Why good Lord, looky here at you children, where did you come from? Get on in the house, Susie said. We went in with Spence following us all the way back to the big warm kitchen where Susie put the pot on the stove and we sat down and Spence started eating the quail one after the other.
What he had said was true, all of it. Mama Marie had died in her sleep with her Bible in her hand and a smile on her face. Nobody could have gone more peacefully, Susie said, adding that somehow Aunt Mitty had known it, that she had got up in the night and gone upstairs and got on the bed beside Mama Marie to keep her warm as she was passing. When Susie came into the bedroom in the morning, Aunt Mitty got up, straightened her nightdress, then kissed Mama Marie on the mouth. Good bye Marie, Aunt Mitty said. Then she went back downstairs and took a little sponge bath and dressed herself in her good black bombazine dress, calling Susie in to put up her hair. By then, Susie said, Mrs. Goodnight and two other women had already arrived to start laying out Mama Marie.
Susie gave Spence a bowl of the squirrel stew.
Now Mrs. Goodnight appeared in the kitchen door. Miss Marie is ready, she said. Mrs. Goodnight is a thin sour looking woman with moles on her face.
I did not want to see Mama Marie. I have already seen enough dead people to last me the rest of my life. But it was clear that we had to. So we all got up and followed Susie straight back into the hall and up the stairs and into Mama Maries bedroom where she lay with her hands folded together as if in prayer. Now Mama Marie herself had gone off to the world of light. Susie started crying.
Dont she look nice? Mrs. Goodnight said.
Susie put her hand over her mouth and turned away stumbling, Spence caught her before she fell. We went back downstairs where Mrs. Goodnight set Victoria and me to lighting lamps in the parlor. Then Spence and Rom carried Mama Marie down there on a board and placed her between two straightback chairs.
And how is your dear uncle? A woman who used to be Fannies friend was pinching my arm.
Come on, I told Victoria.
Aunt Mittys door stood open as always. A big fat woman named Maude Lear was telling the tale— how Miss Mitty had got all dressed up, how she had said, Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, then climbed into her coffin. Well I knowed better than to try and stop her, Maude Lear said. She laid herself down in that coffin and said M
aude, come over here and fix my dress, and so I fixed it, and then I got up my nerve and I ast her, Miss Mitty do you expect to see God?
I expect to see Marie, she said, but we shall see what we shall see.
She closed her eyes and died within a hour, bless God. Maude Lears voice and her chins were quivering. We went over to the coffin to look at Aunt Mitty whose mouth turned down like a shovel as in life. She wore the black dress and her accustomed lace cap which looked sillier than ever above her stern dead face.
All of a sudden I got tickled. Lets go. I jabbed Victoria. We did not go back into the parlor, but grabbed our coats from the kitchen where we found Washington. The three of us set off fairly running through the woods.
Selena met us at the door. Before we could say a word, she told us that we had just missed Julia who had arrived after all with her fiancé, an older man very stuck up and wearing a bowler hat which he never even took off his head. They had not received my letter. Julia was real mean about everything that had happened at Agate Hill, and did not have any appreciation at all for what good care Selena was taking of her father. Harsh words were exchanged. Julia and her fiancé had left within an hour of their arrival, taking little Junius with them.
What? Everything went black for a minute as I sank down upon the cold stone steps of the piazza. Did she say anything about me? I asked. I did not say, Didnt she ask for me too?
She brought you all some oranges, Selena said. But that so-called fiancé of hers was egging her on, I swear I would rather be horsewhipped than marry that one. You get up from there now Molly. It is cold as a witches tit out here. Get on in the house.
So I did, and then Victoria and me told her everything else.
She stared at us open-mouthed. Well honey, she said, there is not a goddamn thing I can do about any of it. You better go in there and tell Junius, which I did, though the medication keeps him so dreamy now it is hard to tell if he takes things in or not.
I was feeling light headed myself by the time I finally got back to the kitchen. Liddy had left the stew still warm on the stove. The wooden box of oranges sat beside it. I got some stew and ate it all alone at the big pine table which used to hold ten or twelve of us, negro and white alike. A low fire burned in the hearth so that points of light gleamed from the hanging pots, and shadows flickered on the old brick walls. I finished the stew and got an orange from the box.
Suddenly I remembered it was Christmas. And now it was almost time for all the animals to kneel in prayer as they did in the stable so long ago, Fannie used to tell us the story. If I got up and went down to the barn right now, would I find Buck and Bill on their knobby old knees in prayer? I did not think so. I thought of the baby Jesus born in the stable and then I remembered Mamma telling about some family back in South Carolina who had so many children to die that they didnt even name them when they were born, they waited to see if they would live until their first birthday. They called all of them Captain, Mama said. But the baby Jesus was Jesus right from the beginning and everybody knew it. I started peeling the orange. The white stuff makes my nose wrinkle.
Actually I like the baby Jesus better than I like the grownup Jesus whose eye is on the sparrow and I know he watcheth me. Aunt Mitty said, You have an eternal soul, Molly, whether you want it or not. I hate that. This makes Jesus seem to me like a sharpshooter in Wade Hamptons army, moving from tree to tree with his rifle aimed at me.
The orange exploded with sweetness in my mouth.
January 13, 1873
Dear Diary,
We did not go back to Four Oaks. There will be a funeral later for Mama Marie and Aunt Mitty when it thaws and the minister can come. As for now they are froze in their caskets out there in the little tobacco barn with Rom and Spence to watch over them. Susie disappeared from the house leaving a note which I had to read aloud to Uncle Junius. She said that she had been well provided for thanks to Aunt Mitty, and that she would pray for us all. Selena sniffed. I am certainly glad SOMEBODY has been provided for, she said. Selenas baby is starting to show now. I put the note into Uncle Junius hand but he dropped it onto the counterpane. His eyes are like old milkglass when he opens them, but mostly he sleeps. Liddy boils chicken to make him a hearty broth though he has nearly quit eating. He sleeps, and Selena sleeps, or else she paces, I can hear her in the night. Sometimes she takes Uncle Junius medicine herself, to help her rest. Sometimes she talks to herself. Those men in the black coats have come here twice now. Victoria is planning to run away with Declan Moylan whenever he gets a horse. Victoria and me work like dogs and sometimes we play games but whenever I look in her eyes I can tell, she is already gone. In the interests of phenomena she has showed me her breasts which have gotten bigger. But guess what Dear Diary? Now I am getting some too.
January 18, 1873
Dear Diary,
It is nothing but snow and work here now. This is the coldest winter that anybody can remember. Since Godfrey lies sick it is my job to go to the well for water and when I drop the bucket down, it breaks the ice every time. So I must go often in order to keep it broke up, Washington does this at night. Let me go for Molly, he said this morning, but Selena made him chop more wood instead as there is no one else to do it. The springhouse trough has already froze and quit running down in the cellar.
At least I get to wear Julias old green boots now, I found them up here in the closet. Victoria tried to take them but Selena gave them to me since Victoria refuses to work outside. Selena slapped her yesterday.
January 21, 1873
Dear Diary,
Selena doses Godfrey up with whisky and honey which does not help, you can hear him coughing all over the house. For years I have wished he would die but now I am not so sure as it seems he might. He will burn in Hell for sure if there is one. But I am so cold right now as I sit here writing that Hell sounds pretty good.
I put socks on my hands for gloves but they are cracked and bleeding anyhow. Liddy rubs them with lard. My face is as red and rough as a cob I can not write my hands are too cold This is my blood on this page
It is snowing again
January 25, 1873
Snowing and Snowing
Dear Diary,
Washington and me played checkers in front of the hearth in the kitchen while Liddy baked sweet potatoes in the coals. Selena did not mind, she came in and smiled and touched my head. Her face is very thin now but all of a sudden I see that she is beautiful, in the way of La Belle Dame Sans Merci in Mary Whites book which is gone. This is a poem which I am forgetting already. But it is hard for me to read now anyway, for some reason I can not keep my mind on the page. I dont know what is wrong with me.
January 30, 1873
Dear Diary,
For once I have some good news! Spence and Rom came with a load of wood and some food stuffs from Four Oaks, so Liddy fried pork chops and eggs before they left and we all ate so much we could not move and Spence played Liza Jane on his harmonica for Uncle Junius who never opened his eyes. I wonder if Spence even knows Uncle Junius is his father. Cant he remember riding his pony Silver Shoes and learning his lessons with Fannie? Cant he remember anything? Sometimes I think, which is worse? To remember nothing or to remember too much, like me? Rom is a skinny mean looking negro man with scars on his cheeks, he used to be the slave driver. But he is devoted to Spencer and sometimes he plays the banjo along with him.
I hated to see them go, watching from the parlor window as they drove their wagon off into a landscape so gray that you couldnt tell the land from the sky. My breath made ice on the inside of the pane.
February 3, 1873
Where is he? Selena stood in the kitchen drinking coffee, her hands shook so bad that the coffee splashed onto the floor.
She means Doctor Lambeth, who has not come for days.
Nevermind. Here now. You have got to eat, Liddy said. She dished up a plate of fried potatoes and bacon and put it on the table. Sit down. Liddy is small and quiet but she will boss anybody, even Selena, if s
he takes a mind to.
Selena sat down and picked up the fork then looked away. Oh Liddy I cant do it, she said.
Liddy said, How you think that baby is going to eat?
I dont care. I cant understand where he is, Selena said. Junius will die without his medicine.
Liddy looked at her. Mister Junius going to die anyway, she said.
Then Selena twisted around to grab Liddys skirt. Send Washington, she said.
But Liddy shook her head. Its too bad out. Look how dark it is out that window.
Washington has got to go right now, Selena said.
Finally even Liddy could tell it was no use talking to her about it.
So Selena ate her breakfast and Washington left for Hillsborough in a sleeting rain and now it is night and he has not got back yet.
February 4, 1873
Dear Diary,
The worst has happened, the well has froze. Now I must go to the spring in the woods and break the ice to get the water. Yesterday I got so tired on my last trip out there that I sat down to rest for a minute before starting back. The buckets get so heavy when they are full. I lay back in the snow underneath that big pine tree which makes the nicest sound, like it is sighing or singing a lullaby just for me. It was so quiet and peaceful in the snow that I might have gone to sleep for a while but woke to see a fairy sitting on the bough just above my head. His face was dark and pointed, his little cap was red. Wake up Molly Petree, he said in his high chirping voice. Go home. He pointed his green gloved finger straight at me. Then he lifted off. His wings beat the air to a silvery blur. It was almost dark but he shone like a star as he disappeared into the tree. I got up from the snow and hoisted my buckets and headed home.
Washington has not returned, may be he never will.