“Rest assured, I will do all I can for your benefit and Clara’s.” I knew Mother’s word was good, but what could she do? “Shall we have that cup of tea?” Mother left her basket at the bush and took Mrs. Randolph’s arm in hers. They walked together down the path into the house, where I could no longer hear their conversation.
The Spirit did not speak of Clara or the Randolphs again during the week that followed, but Mr. Thorn came with a cartload of supplies, and while he smoked his pipe and shared a drink with Father, Thenny and I were allowed a brief visit.
“Betsy, have you heard of the affair?” Thenny’s eyes shimmered with the excitement of her knowledge.
“Of course, for I was present at the accusation.” I felt proud of this fact though I knew it was wrong to be boastful.
“The store is buzzing with it! Mother says Alice Randolph ought to tie that Clara flat down on her husband’s stone and grind her up like corn to grist.” I said nothing in response to this, recalling Mrs. Randolph’s worry for her delicate cousin. I had a strong sense of discomfort and foreboding as she went on, describing the gossip at her father’s store, and it grew so intense, I changed the topic, asking what she knew of Joshua Gardner.
“Josh Gardner no longer comes to lessons regularly and I suspect the reason is your long absence!” This news was a great distraction from Clara and the Randolphs’ troubles and we worried over it until Mr. Thorn was slapping the reins of his mares and ordering Thenny to climb in the cart before he left her behind.
It was only one week later when we received the devastating news that Clara Lawson had hanged herself inside her barn. Mr. Randolph had found her swinging from the rafters when he called to give his customary help about her lands. No one was privy to the scene when he cut her down and most certainly considered his own role in her sin, but we were all at church that Sunday when he rose and spoke.
“The evil curse hosted by the Bells attacked our poor Clara, God rest her soul, with gossip and fear, and they put no stop to its vile lies!” Thomas Randolph was a tall man and wiry, and his voice rang strong with angry conviction.
“How say you? What relationship do the afflicted have with what has cursed them?” the Reverend spoke in our defense. “I hesitate to remind you, Mr. Randolph, your cousin Clara sinned against the Lord in taking her own life.” Thomas Randolph sat and I saw Alice put her arm around him for comfort, but he shook her off.
“Please, do not further pile our sorrows,” Mother begged, standing to face him. “The loss of Clara Lawson is a heavy blow to all gathered here.” She meant this most sincerely, but I could see from the hard set of their faces that the Randolphs would forever hold us responsible, despite Mother’s woeful insistence we were not to blame.
“Get on with the sermon, Reverend,” Old Kate called from the back, for once representative of most of the congregation, who felt the Spirit had simply hastened the affair to its natural conclusion. Most were satisfied to hear of it no more.
We did not attend Clara’s funeral, held the next day, but the Reverend Johnston said her eulogy, despite her sin, for he was a kind and forgiving soul. When he arrived at our home that night, he told us it had been a nasty business, for a hard rain had fallen all afternoon.
“ ’Twas mud they buried the poor girl in.” The Reverend shook his head with some sympathy, removing his wet hat and coat in our hallway.
“Perhaps they might have waited …” Mother lingered at the door and held her lamp aloft. She stared unseeing at the great drops of water falling on our porch. “God’s tears fall hard for poor Clara.” The whole incident had greatly disturbed Mother and we were well aware of it, for at suppertime over Chloe’s fried chicken and fresh peas, she’d prayed for Clara to enter the Kingdom of Heaven, despite her sins.
“Better it is over and her body in the ground.” The Reverend spoke not unkindly, but with resignation. He turned away and entered the parlor, greeting my father, my brothers and myself with a sigh. No one else was present, and though I knew it was only the rain and a symbolic gesture of community respect for the Randolphs that kept the curious away, I felt an overwhelming loneliness at the thought of Clara Lawson’s frail bones buried in the ground. I recalled her sewing at a quilting session, her long black eyelashes vivid on the pale skin of her cheek, focused on her work. The Reverend waited for Mother to come away from the door and join us.
“I shall read tonight, as I did at the grave, from Genesis, of Eve’s original sin.” Mother frowned, but I realized the Reverend needed to atone for having given poor Clara any eulogy.
“God hath said, ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye die.”
The Spirit entered the parlor like a small leak of rain speaking softly.
Luce …
It whispered Mother’s name and brought the scent of wet roses and lavender with it.
Luce, it was her fate and his to be thus severed. The wages of sin is death.
It said nothing to show mercy for Clara’s pale skin and long black eyelashes, forever closed and buried under mud. No mercy, and no remorse, entirely culpable as it was.
witch creatures
It rained constantly for one long week and the stream below the house rose to dangerous levels, as did the Red River. Mother kept me sequestered inside, along with Richard and Joel, for she feared one of us might carelessly fall in the water and be drowned, or perhaps she had even greater fears. She did not reveal them, but forced us to do her bidding. The sound of the harsh rain pelting against the roof and window-panes was an incessant drone accompanying the many monotonous chores she set for us. Every morning she had me on my hands and knees beside Chloe, scrubbing the mud tracked in by Father, John Jr. and Drewry off her smooth wood floors. Father and my brothers spent all day along with the hands, working in the wet, digging berms around the fields to protect the young tobacco plants from flooding. I thought the rain would never end and God’s tears would fall forever for poor Clara, but finally the clouds extinguished their supply and the night came when the rain did cease.
The next day I went for a walk beyond the stable and the hog pens toward the fields to see the puddles for myself. It was near the dinner hour and as I came around the corner I saw Dean, Father’s boss man, standing under the whipping tree, holding forth to the rest of the slaves. They sat on tree stumps and upended germination crates, eating corn cakes, and they looked completely absorbed by his talk. No one noticed me slip off the path and sneak behind the honeysuckle bushes where I could hear what he was saying.
“You all know I was among the folk most pleased when this recent rain did stop, for it had been a week since I could make the journey to visit my Aggie.” Dean’s wife was called Aggie and she belonged to the Thorns. Her cabin was full of Dean’s children, and he usually spent some nights there. “Now, Aggie, superstitious like she is, she thinks it is black magic here happening to the Bells and to protect me she done made a witchball.”
“A what?” someone interrupted.
“A witchball. Out a hair from both our heads. She done made it up in a tangle a fur culled off the back of a red fox.”
“Lord, whose idea was that?” The woman who spoke smiled and slapped her knee, amused.
“She got the idea for it from Corrine, Old Kate’s woman. Aggie made me promise I would carry it and she said it was sure to work to protect me good. So last night, when I saw the rain had done, I set out down the road. I had the witchball in my pocket and my ax in my hand. The moon was waxing so I had some light and I was just at the hill near the poplars when I heard something in the brush and a large black dog come out of the trees.”
“Were it Caesar? That farm hound, he always running off,” a man with a floppy hat sitting on an upended crate asked curiously, without looking up from the stick he was whittling while Dean told his story.
“No, it were not Caesar, but at first, I was thinking it was, just a wild dog, or a lost dog, so I spoke to it, nice and easy, low and sure. Hey there, doggie, go on wit’
you.” Dean imitated himself, talking to the dog, but then he changed his tone and imitated the voice of the Spirit. “Where are you going? came from the mouth of the dog! I saw it was a witch creature and I done prepared myself for a fight.”
“No strong arm can keep away what tortures the masta’s family.” One of the women brushed crumbs of corn cake off her smock onto the ground. “But here you be, so what did happen?”
“It asked me, What’s that you have in your pocket? I felt it could see right through my trousers. I said nothing, I got nothing, and it growled and called me out, That’s a lie! You got foxfire wrapped in your wife’s hair rolled into a ball just to pester me! It pawed the ground and I fell to my knees in the mud. I put my hands together and I prayed, Lord Almighty, I been bad, but redeem me now.” Dean held his hands aloft in a posture of prayer, but remained standing. The crowd had stopped fiddling and chewing and waited, barely breathing, for Dean to continue. “Foxfire to pester me! it kept saying and I talked to it straight. What you want with me? Give me that ball of yours or I’ll turn you into an ass and ride you into the river.”
At this several of the men laughed nervously, and Dean paused to share a smile with them.
“Lord knows I’d do most anything not to be magicked into an ass and ridden by a demon into the river, so I reached in my pocket and got the witchball, but the damn thing was hot as a coal from the fire! I threw it at the dog and in the air it done swelled to the size of a watermelon and when it struck the road, it burst into flames. The dog moved off then, but I saw it was ready to rip me to pieces.”
“Pray to Jesus!”
“How did you survive?”
“The Lord He work in unexpected ways. I was standing there thinking I might meet my maker when all at once I had the memory of the day masta Bell and I chopped the giant oak we used for the cold storehouse door. Whooping like an Injun warrior I charged the creature. I could see pretty good with the light of the blaze and I brought my ax down hard. I hit that dog square in the middle of the head and it split wide open. Blood poured out, then I done seen that dog body leap up and roll over three times before it fell forward right into the flaming ball of fire, and shot up from the ground like a star across the sky. Lord, I never seen such like that! I ran fast as I could all the way to Aggie’s door.”
“I would stay at home now.” The woman who had spoken before shook her head giving this piece of advice.
“But I do love to visit Aggie, and she will form a bad impression if I do not go.”
“Rather a bad impression than no you at all!” I recognized Little Bright’s sweet voice, filled with concern for Dean, and my eyes watered with unexpected tears. How many lives were to be altered by what tortured us? I ran home and found Mother on the front steps with Chloe shelling peas and before them I repeated all I had heard.
“He said it was a black dog the size of a foal, that could talk and make fire in the road. He said it was a witch creature.” I was out of breath from excitement and running, but Mother and Chloe remained calm. Chloe gave me a look as I told the story that made me think she had heard it already from Dean. She expertly split the pods with the sure edge of her nail, and as I caught my breath, resting in my thoughts, a memory of strange winged animals Drewry and I had spied in the meadow years ago came back to me. Had they been witch creatures?
It was around the time when I was only nine and collecting leaves in the woods for the harvest pageant. Drewry and I had gone for a walk beside the meadow and I had been behind him on the path when suddenly he had stopped and pointed into the tall grass, where there were a cluster of unusual creatures. They had appeared to have wings as well as fur and they half hopped, half flew away from us into the woods. Neither of us recognized the animals as any we had seen before, but Drewry had surmised they were probably creatures particular to Father’s land. One had spread its wings and turned its furry head to look at us, aware of our presence. Larger than a turkey buzzard, its fur had been white as a snowy jack rabbit’s and its tail had swished above the tall meadow grass like a horse tail swishing flies. We had taken off running, low and sneaky, through the tall meadow grass to get closer and then we had heard the flap of wings. When we reached the wooded place where the animals had been, we saw nothing. The grass was not trampled down as it should have been and though we searched the ground, there was no scat, nor fur, nor feather. The wind that day had brought a rain of blood red maple leaves swirling down around us. I remembered playing a game where we tried to catch the leaves, making wishes. We had looked a little longer for the animals, then we had given up and returned home. I had forgotten all about them. Were they witch creatures? Drewry and I had never spoken of them since. I supposed I should find him and ask his opinion before I brought it up, considering how it had gone regarding the tooth. I took a pod from the basket between Mother and Chloe and burst the shell in my palm too quickly so the fat peas inside went bouncing over my skirt and down the steps.
“Careful, dear,” Mother said, dropping a handful of her own into the pot. “ ’Tis Dean’s only weakness, his love of a good story,” she commented, seeming disinclined to believe the witch creature tale, but later, during supper, I heard her mention it to Father.
“For certain he has made the matter worse with vivid details.” Father sighed, leaning his elbows on the dining table. “We’ll have no slaves out in the nighttime now.” He correctly perceived the effect the attack on Dean would have. The May Day holidays were approaching and it was sometimes necessary with so much work and so many gatherings for the slaves in the district to run messages for their masters after dark. However, after the attack on Dean, none of them would leave their cabins once the sun had set, and all feared the witch creatures in the night.
“We must protect them and ourselves from further harm,” Mother insisted, and she asked Father to speak with the Reverend and Preacher Justice about it. He raised the subject that Sunday as soon as the two men settled into their chairs in our parlor.
“You have heard the tales of my man Dean, as trustworthy a slave as ever there could be?” Father said.
“Oh yes, we heard the tales.” Calvin Justice pulled his riding gloves off with a snap, and I wondered why he was so dismissive. He had the chair farthest from the window and I saw the last daylight caused his chestnut hair to gleam dark red.
“Witch creatures in the night! Are they varied in their aspect?” The Reverend raised his eyebrows to my Father, expressing his great interest. “What do you think?”
“I think we must ask Dean.” Mother set her teacup on the side table with determination in her attitude. “John Jr., fetch Dean and bid him make haste here to our home.” I could tell Mother and Father had already agreed on this course of action, and I was amazed how the conventions governing our lives were falling away. What had seemed unthinkable was now easily practiced. John Jr. rose and left without a word.
“ ’Tis well we should discuss the matter with your man.” The Reverend seemed to look forward to the accounting and leaned back in his chair, opening his Bible to choose the passage he would read.
You would do well to speak to me of Dean’s exiguous troubles.
The Being’s voice caused all of us to sit up straight as ladder-backed chairs, for it had arrived without warning, bringing with it no noise, or sudden faint, but only a small cold bristle to the air. I shivered, for I was dressed in a spring cotton and I wrapped my arms about my front as much for warmth as for protection from the unknown. Our lamps spontaneously lit.
“Why, thank you for the light, but could you kindly cease to visit us each evening?” Mother spoke the plea softly, with respect and deference. Father twisted in his chair and looked upset with her.
“Be gone, evil demon from Hell! Return to this world no more!”
“Jack, Jack, I would know what it has to say.” The Reverend put a restraining hand on my Father’s shoulder, and I felt suddenly immensely tired of their petty arguments.
“Tell us, what constitutes a witch
creature?” The Reverend directed his voice to the unseen.
You will know when you see one.
“I do not wish to see one!” The Reverend shook his head, smiling as though he shared a cup of whiskey at the still with the Being. “Are there many such creatures in this district, or is it yourself, inhabiting other forms?” He bent forward, inclining his ear around the room, listening for the location of the voice, his perpetual curiosity displayed as vivid as his Bible held against his chest.
They are many and all are me.
“What do you mean?” The Reverend looked at Calvin Justice and my Father, puzzled by the Spirit’s bold assertion.
Old Sugar Mouth, you are a potbellied ninny!
Mother gasped at the affront to the Reverend but I wondered how she could expect good behavior from a force so evil in its ways and means.
“Cease your insults in my good home!” Father stood, casting his arms wide as though he might catch the Being and throw it out.
O long-suffering Jack, so it is with you.
“The Lord knows my character.” The Reverend stood beside my Father, about to give a patient listing of his own best qualities, accompanied by a statement of his intent to learn the true nature of the visitation, but the Spirit cut him off.
I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet!
“ ’Tis Revelation …” Calvin Justice remained seated and I observed the line of his mouth was pure concentration. Behind me the door opened and John Jr. arrived with Dean.
I smell a slave in this room!
All That Lives Page 14