“Wish we hadn’t of left our spears at the goat pen,” Poudlum said softly.
“You won’t need ’em,” Miss Lucretia said. “I got something dat’ll help us fend off even a panther.”
I couldn’t imagine what that was, but I did feel better after she said it.
“Now, y’all hush, no mo talking,” she said as we made our way deeper into the forest.
We finally came to a halt in a small clearing where the trail ended. I noticed that a thick limb of a giant oak tree extended out over the clearing and it had a rope hanging down from it.
“Hold dis chicken,” she said as she handed it to Poudlum. “and don’t y’all move till I tells you to.”
She proceeded to a small pile of brush that rested on the ground just below the end of the hanging rope. Then she got down on her knees and pulled the brush pile away to reveal the gaping opening of a pit in the ground.
Still on her knees, she motioned for us to come forward. We got on our bellies and crawled up to the edge and peeked down inside. We gasped when we saw Old Bill and Rip lying motionless in the dim light at the bottom of the pit.
“They look like they dead,” Poudlum moaned.
“Dey is all right,” Miss Lucretia reassured us. I chunked ’em both down a biscuit laced wid my potion dis morning.”
“How we gonna get them out of there?” I asked.
“One of you boys got to go down and get ’em. It’ll take two trips, so y’all can take turns.”
I looked at Poudlum and saw he was looking at me, and I knew he was thinking the same thing I was, that this could be a trick to put us down in that hole with our dogs.
But Miss Lucretia must have been able to read our minds, and she vindicated herself when she said, “Better yet, I’ll go down and get ’em myself. ’Spect I’m a little lighter dan either of y’all. One of y’all fetch me dat rope over yonder in dat hollow sweet gum tree, just behind de big oak.”
I retrieved the rope and she instructed us on how to tie the knot under her arms. Then we slowly lowered her down. We felt the slack in the rope when she touched the bottom. She brought Rip up first, and then we lowered her back and got Old Bill.
As we petted and talked to them, they got up on wobbly legs, whined, and licked our faces.
“Dey gonna be all right,” Miss Lucretia said.
“How did you get them down in there?” I asked her.
“Same way I took ’em out, wid de rope, ’cept I put a slip knot in it so it would come loose when I jerked it real hard. We’ll feed ’em some meat and give ’em some water when we get back, and dey’ll be fine.
“But first, I need y’all to cover de pit back up and I’ll show y’all how I bait dis pit for a panther.”
While we were putting the brush cover back over the pit, I noticed the chicken was lying limp on the ground. “What happened to it?” I asked.
“It had a little sniff of my potion inside de hood I put on it. Didn’t need it making no fuss while we wuz here.”
We watched as she used a stick to retrieve the end of the rope hanging over the pit. “What I do is tie a chicken by de feet to de end of dis rope and let it dangle over de pit to tempt a panther, ’cept all I ever catches is a dumb bobcat. But I ain’t gonna bait de pit today, cause I intends to fry dis chicken up wid some eggs in de morning.”
With that said, she tossed the rope up over the limb so it couldn’t be seen, and we headed back toward the cabin with our happy dogs.
When we got back to her cabin, she scooped two rabbit legs out of the stew and gave each of the dogs one, and then poured some water in a pan. We watched with glee as our dogs lapped up the water and wagged their tails, and I began to feel that everything was going to be all right.
It had been an hour since the dogs had eaten, and they were fine, so Poudlum and I had no qualms about eating the stew and the left-over butterbeans.
There were two rough benches at the table under her shed, and that’s where we ate supper with Miss Lucretia, the first time she had shared a meal with people in fourteen years.
She asked us questions about everything. Who was the president, who was the governor of Alabama, what we learned in school, and on and on.
We were astounded when we found out she knew absolutely nothing about World War II. “Why, Miss Lucretia, thousands of our soldiers died in Europe, Africa, in the Pacific Ocean, on islands and all over,” Poudlum told her.
“Was any of ’em colored?” she asked.
“Yes’m, a lot of ’em.”
While she was putting our plates in a pan of hot water on her grill, she shocked us when she said, “Y’all ever hear of somebody walking on fire?”
I looked at Poudlum, and in the firelight I saw his eyes grow large, and I felt my own doing the same. I let Poudlum answer her.
“Yes’m, we have heard of it, but ain’t it some kind of voodoo ritual?”
“It is,” she said. “But ain’t no need for y’all to be scared of seeing it.”
“Seeing it!” I gasped.
“Dat’s right, Mister Ted, I can walk across a bed of red-hot coals, and never even get a little blister on my feet. Y’all want to see me do it?” she asked as she added more wood to the fire.
While I was sitting there thinking if I wanted to see such a thing, Poudlum said, “We only want to see it if you’ll tell us how you do it.”
I could tell she was thinking it over. Then she said, “I’ll tell you after I do it, but not before. Is dat agreeable?”
I looked at Poudlum, and we both nodded.
“All right, den,” she said as she stoked her fire. “But fo’ I does, dey is something I forgot to ask y’all. How did y’all cut dem wedges offen de stool to jam my door?”
Poudlum reached down and pulled his pocket knife out of his boot, and said, “We had these in our boots.”
“Dat’s good to know,” she said. “I just wanted to make shore dey wasn’t no voodoo involved.”
“There’s something I want to ask you, Miss Lucretia,” I said.
“Ask away,” she replied.
“How did you ever dig that panther pit so deep?”
“It wuz already a sink hole I found. I just finished it off.”
“Well, how did you get in and out of it while you was digging. And how did you get the bobcats out after you trapped ’em?”
“Next to dat hollow tree where I keep de rope, buried under some leaves, I kept a big stout hickory pole wid little stubs of de limbs still on it. I would slide it down into de hole at a slant and use it like a ladder. As far as dem bobcats, I just leave ’em down in dat pit till dey get real hungry, den throw down a biscuit laced with my potion, like I did wid de dogs.
“Now, y’all just be still fo’ a minute, and I’ll be right back.”
We watched as she went over to the cabin door and disappeared inside. In a few moments she reappeared with the kerosene lamp and set it on the table.
The lamp cast an eerie light all about as she went over to the fire pit and used a stick to rake out a big mound of red-hot, glowing coals.
I could see the heat waves as they rose up from the hot embers.
When she had them spread out good, she took a deep breath, and then stepped right into them with her bare feet!
We stared in amazement as she walked real leisurely across the bed of coals, then turned around and walked through them again!
Afterwards she walked over close to us, and one by one, she held each foot up for us to inspect. Not only were there no blisters, but there was no indication of how she had just abused her feet.
“I ain’t never seen nothing like that in my whole life!” Poudlum said.
“Me neither!” I added in amazement.
Miss Lucretia took a seat on the bench across the table from us and said, “I’m ’bout to tell y’all something da
t no voodoo queen would ever dare tell to nobody ’cept somebody destined to take her place.”
We sat there holding our breath until she said, “I’s gonna tell y’all how I’s able to walk on fire!”
Chapter 9
Fire Walking
Miss Lucretia sat there looking like the cat that swallowed the canary, while we held our breath waiting for her to reveal her great secret.
“It’s really a very simple thing, boys, to be able to walk on fire,” she said. “Wid de right preparation de two of y’all could do it, too.”
“You said you was gonna tell us how you done it,” Poudlum said impatiently.
“I said it, and I is. Just hold yo’ hosses fo’ a minute. De last voodoo priest showed me how to do it. He was my Uncle Caledonia Jones, on my momma’s side of de family, and he had a little gristmill where he ground up corn into meal during de day, but by night he practiced voodoo. He didn’t have no children of his own. I don’t know why he picked me, but he did, and it made me feel special. So I went along wid it, and de next thing you know he up and died, and dat’s how I come to be de voodoo queen.”
“What did your family think about that?” I asked.
“Didn’t have none left ’cept my poor old momma, who was just trying to survive, and so voodoo become our livelihood.”
“How in the world did y’all make a living on voodoo?” Poudlum asked.
“Real simple,” she replied. “Somebody would get mad wid somebody else, and dey would bring me a sack of taters or a bag of meal, and whisper dat person’s name in my ear. Sooner or later something bad would happen to dat person and I would take credit for it.”
“Without having done anything to ’em on your part?” I asked.
“Dat’s right,” she confirmed.
“Well, didn’t anybody ever get suspicious that you was a fake?” I enquired.
“Uh huh, sometimes.”
“What would you do?”
“I would build a fire and spread de word I was gonna walk on it. After folks would see dat I did, dey would be right back at my door wid a bushel of apples wanting me to put a curse or a spell on somebody who had done ’em wrong.
“Occasionally, at a gathering, I would slip a little of my potion into somebody’s ice tea, and just fo’ it knocked ’em out, I would make a big fuss about how dat person was about to leave dis world, and den just fo’ time for ’em to come to, I would wave my stick over ’em to revive ’em. After dat, I would be selling drogues fo’ a month.”
“Why, you was just nothing but a witch doctor!” I declared.
“Voodoo queen,” she corrected.
“It’s all just a bunch of fake stuff, just like I suspected,” Poudlum said.
“It is,” Miss Lucretia said, “unless you really believe in it, den it can seem real.”
Poudlum continued, “I heard tell you could see into the future using voodoo.”
“Used to could,” she said, “or make it seem like so, but I couldn’t never use dat part of it.”
“How come?” I asked.
“On account of de drums, or I ’spose I ought to say, on account of de absence of ’em.”
“I don’t understand,” I said.
“Voodoo folks used to send messages to each other wid drums, so dat dey would know what happened somewhere else fo’ de word ever got to anybody, and dat made folks think dey knew what happened fo’ it ever did.”
“What happened to the drums?”
“Back fo’ dey got ’round to coronate me, when white folks heard ’em, dey would search ’em out and destroy ’em.”
“Hey, Miss Lucretia, did you forget you was gonna tell us how you walked on fire?” Poudlum asked.
“I didn’t forget, and I’s gonna tell you, but I did forget my stuff. I’ll be right back.”
She disappeared into the cabin once again, but was back momentarily with three jars in her arms, which she sat down on the table.
She picked up the first one, which was half full of something white, and said, “Dis is camphor, a medicinal cream.”
She carefully set it aside and picked up the second one, which was half full of a light brown liquid, a little darker than honey, and said, “Dis is storax, a liquid balsam from de bark of a special tree.”
After she carefully placed it next to the jar of camphor, she held up a small glass container with a big cork stopper in it. It looked like liquid silver as she held it up to the lamplight.
“Dis is quicksilver, like de mercury in a thermometer. I make a mixture of it wid de camphor and de storax and rubs it on my feet, and it keeps the hot coals from burning.
“I still have it on my hands. See,” she said as she bent over and picked up a big red-hot coal and held it in the palm of her hand for a moment before she tossed it back into the fire.
“Well, I’ll be John Brown!” Poudlum said. “All you got to do is mix up some chemicals and rub ’em on your feet, and you can walk on fire!”
“Y’all just settle down, now,” Miss Lucretia said. “I’m awful sorry I ain’t got nothing to offer you boys for dessert. Run out of sugar three weeks ago. And dis is my last dip of snuff,” she said as she loaded up her bottom lip.
“But y’all did have some honey yesterday,” she added.
“How you know about that?” I asked in amazement.
“Heh, heh,” she snickered. “I picked up y’all’s trail right after I heard de shots when y’all shot Old Rufus, and then—”
“Wait a minute,” Poudlum interrupted. “You saying you was following us all the time after that?”
“Not all de time, but most of it,” she replied.
As soon as she answered Poudlum, I asked, “Did you call that rattlesnake we shot a name?”
“Uh huh, he was Old Rufus, and I been fattening him up to get him big fo’ I took his skin. I got it anyway after y’all left him. But y’all got his rattlers. I use them rattlers to trade, too.”
“So you trade rattlesnake skins, their rattlers, and bobcat fur to your nephew for the supplies he brings into here for you?” I asked.
“Dat’s right,” she said. “Plus he always wants a little of my potion, too.”
“What does he do with the skins and the rattlers?” Poudlum asked.
“He sells de rattlers fo’ drogues, and he ships de skins all de way over de big water to, I think he say France, where dey make belts and shoes wid ’em.”
I was afraid to ask what he might be doing with her potion.
“How many snakeskins you give him?” Poudlum asked.
“Oh, I gives him thirty or forty twice a year.”
“And all he gives you is salt, sugar, meal, flour, and sewing needles?”
“He brings me some snuff, too.”
“Miss Lucretia,” Poudlum said, “them skins are probably worth several dollars apiece. A jar of snuff don’t cost but a dime. I suspect you being taken advantage of.”
She thought on this for a few moments before she said, “I wouldn’t doubt dat a’tall.”
“Does Mister Autrey know your nephew comes in here?”
“Oh, no. He say he parks his truck in de woods a piece down from Mister Autrey’s house. My nephew say nobody needs to know ’bout him coming back here.”
“I bet he does,” I said. “When’s the last time he came in here?”
“Been six months. I told y’all. He due any time. But enough talk about dis. Y’all got yo’ dogs, don’t you want de rifles?”
“Yes’m,” we said in unison.
“Den one of y’all grab de lamp and let’s go inside and I’ll get ’em. De other one bring one of dem benches so we can sit at de table.”
When we were settled down at the table, Miss Lucretia walked over to the mysterious curtain in the far corner, reached behind it and pulled out our rifles.
; After she had placed them on the table, we inspected them to find out they were still loaded with the safeties on.
The dogs had followed us to the cabin and I could hear their slight rustling sounds as they settled down for the night.
Everything seemed to be right again. We had our dogs back, and now we had our rifles. I was fixing to ask Poudlum if he wanted to let’s light out in the morning and spend Friday night at our camp before leaving on Saturday morning when I heard him ask Miss Lucretia what was behind the curtain in the corner.
“Why you wants to know?” she asked.
“’Cause I got a feeling they’s something back there that we need to know about. You done told us how you walk on fire, and all the other tricks about voodoo, so what else you got to hide?”
She stood up, and said, “Y’all come on and we’ll take dat curtain down, ’cause you is right. I ain’t got nothing else to hide.”
When we got over to the curtain, she said, “One of y’all grab each corner. Dey just hooked on to a nail.”
I just about jumped out of my boots when that curtain came down because the first thing I saw was the biggest rattlesnake I had ever seen. If it hadn’t been in a cage I expect I would have fainted. When it raised its big head up I saw that it was as big as my hand.
The cage was a crude affair made of more salvaged fence wire over a wooden frame with a little door and a latch on it.
“Good Lord, Miss Lucretia!” Poudlum gasped. “That’s the biggest snake I ever seen! What you doing with it here in the house?”
“Fattening him up,” she said painfully. “My nephew always likes for me to fry him up some when he comes.”
Now I knew what had been moving inside her pocket earlier. More than likely it had been mice she had brought in to feed that monster snake.
“You sleep in this room with that snake all the time?” I asked her.
“He’s penned up,” she said.
“But what if he got loose?” Poudlum asked. “And what if you rolled over on it during the night? I’ll answer that myself —you wouldn’t never live to see the light of day!”
Salvation of Miss Lucretia Page 7