“Younguns, this here is your Uncle Rondal. You dont know him but he is one fine feller. He’s going to be around for a spell.”
“He got a gun?” the oldest boy, Brigham, asked.
“Hell, yes, he’s got a gun,” Talcott said. “What he does, he has to have a gun.”
“Can I see it?”
“Naw,” I said. “You aint got no business till you git older.”
“Daddy lets us.”
I looked at Talcott, who shrugged and smiled.
“That’s up to your daddy,” I said. “But I dont show nobody my gun. Hit’s a big secret. You understand?”
They all nodded gravely. They were the spitting image of the way we were at their age, with their sharp eyes and narrow noses, and I yearned for a moment to have children of my own. But the feeling passed.
I saw Carrie Bishop on the street the next day. Carrie Freeman, I guess I should say, although it was hard to think of her as married. She hadn’t changed. She is the kind of woman who won’t, until one day her hair turns white and you notice she is old.
She’d just left Doc Booker’s office when I saw her. She walked right past me, not even noticing who I was, with that intent look on her face.
I sang softly at the back of her white uniform.
“Weep no more my lady, oh weep no more today.”
She wheeled around.
“Hey, Kentucky,” I said. When I approached she took a step backward.
“I heard you come back,” she said. “Doctor Booker told me.”
“So you’re working for Doc. Aint it funny how people git to know each other.” I turned and put my hand on the shoulder of Antoine Jones, who stood just behind me. “You know Antoine? He’s my shadow for today. Isom’s taking real good care of me while I’m in town. Let’s the three of us go git a sandwich and have a little talk.”
Carrie and I sat in the back booth of the Black Diamond Grill and ordered bacon and tomato sandwiches. Antoine sat across the aisle and kept his eye on the door.
“I heard your husband’s doing my job for me,” I said.
She nodded proudly. “They’s over a hundred men that meets every day over their dinner pails in the Felco mine,” she said. “They fill up the main haulage way just to hear Albion Freeman.”
“Aint it something he could do that just by preaching.”
“Hit aint just preaching,” she said. “He’s preaching God delivering the children of Israel out of Egypt. He’s preaching the first shall be last and the last first. You know he goes to folks’ houses and speaks the Word? They study the Bible then, too. And they study the United Mineworkers.”
“I wonder,” I said. “I wonder does he do it for the love of God or the love of Carrie Bishop?”
She turned all hard. “You got no right to talk about love. You told me oncet you couldnt love nobody. Dont make fun of them that do.”
I traced my finger along the wooden tabletop where people had carved their initials with penknives. “I reckon you’re right,” I said with exaggerated politeness. “I didnt bring you to lunch to talk about silliness anyhow. I come to talk business. I’m going to have my hands full organizing Winco and Davidson. Isom and Doc and C.J. are going to work on the Jenkinjones miners for me. Hit would be a powerful help if I could trust Felco to Albion. And that’s where you come in. You’re in Annadel every day. You can carry messages.”
She nodded, wrapped her hands around her coffee cup.
“We got to talk about some things first,” she said.
“What?”
“I love my husband. But I love you too.”
I always thought honesty in a woman was overrated. “So?”
“So, I just wanted you to know it. And to know that hit wont change nothing. I wouldnt never hurt my husband.”
“Fine with me,” I said. “Why’d you bother to tell me that?”
“Hit’s a hard time you’re facing. I thought it might be a comfort.”
I lit a cigarette. The match burned my finger and I tossed it into the ashtray. She still ate her sandwich but I stood up. “We’d best not be seen together after this. Ifn I got a message, I’ll git word to Doc.” I laid five quarters on the table. “Lunch is on me. Least I can do.”
It pleasured me to leave her there alone, even though I knew it hurt her. Maybe because I knew it hurt her. Her eyes reproached me. I never felt so close to Carrie as when she looked at me that way.
The Baldwin-Felts guards on Blackberry Creek knew I was back. We did everything out in the open. We reasoned that it was easier for a man to get killed if he was operating undercover and no one knew of his presence. So I rode the train into Justice County with an escort of District 17 officials. Every newspaper in the area was notified, and many sent reporters to meet the train at Justice. The new leadership in Charleston was young, smart, and ready to take on the Levisa coal operators in a fight to the finish. We read statements about how we had come as free American citizens to invite the miners of Justice and Paine Counties to join the United Mineworkers. Then we rode on to Annadel where C.J., Isom and the whole police force was tricked out to meet us. I enjoyed all the attention, the back-slapping, the bold glances and impudent smiles at the ever-present Baldwin-Felts guards. I knew the pleasure wouldn’t last long.
I had been reminded of the danger I was in by the route we took to reach Justice. The most direct way was through Logan. But Logan County was ruled by a sadistic sheriff named Don Chafin, backed by hundreds of deputies whose salaries were paid by the coal operators. Chafin wouldn’t have hesitated to yank our asses off the train and shoot us on the spot, reporters or no reporters. So we traveled to Justice by way of Huntington.
Ermel set me up with a room in the Alhambra and Isom placed a twenty-four hour guard on me. It wasn’t the best situation to get my work done, because anybody with a little sense could keep track of my movements. But there would be time enough for risks. I settled in to keep my eyes and ears open and to make the Baldwins wonder what I was up to.
I had time early on to spend with my buddies. It saddened me to learn that Isom and C.J. weren’t getting along. Isom was in love with C.J.’s oldest girl, Gladys, and they wanted to get married. C.J. said no. I could see his point—Gladys was only fifteen. But C.J. told Gladys she would never have his blessing to marry Isom Justice. Isom was highly offended.
Each of them expected me to side with him. C.J. and Violet invited me to dinner and after the chocolate cake, Gladys went to a friend’s house. C.J. started in.
“Aint you a bit hard on Isom,” I said. “He’s a good man. He wouldnt be my buddy ifn he wasnt.”
“Good in some ways,” C.J. said. “Hell, I like Isom. But not for Gladys.”
“Aint Gladys got to decide what’s good for Gladys?” Violet said.
“When she’s older,” C.J. replied. “She’ll see things different when she’s older. You know how younguns are. Right now she sees that shiny badge Isom wears, and she laughs at his jokes, and thinks that’s all they is in the world. When she’s older, she’ll know they’s other things more important.”
“He treats her real good,” Violet said. “And he’s got the money to take care of her.”
“Course Violet takes up for him. He’s her cousin.” C.J. said it like Violet wasn’t even sitting there.
“What’s so bad about Isom?” I asked. “What kind of feller are you looking for?”
“I’m looking for somebody serious. Somebody with a purpose in life. Somebody with principles. You know how Ermel is. When it comes to politics, he’s crooked as a dog’s hind leg. Isom’s his daddy’s boy. Only reason he comes to our club meetings is to drink whiskey. He thinks everthing comes easy because that’s the way it’s allays been for him. He pokes fun at everthing me and Doc say, pokes fun at the newspaper. And besides that, he’s a tomcat. He wouldnt be faithful to my little girl. He’d hurt her.”
“You dont know that,” I said. “He seems plumb crazy about her.”
C.J. pulled on his pi
pe, narrowed his eyes. “Let me ask you this. Ifn you had a youngun that was set on marrying at fifteen, would you approve?”
“Dont know,” I had to admit. “Hit aint been too good for Pricie.”
“See there!” C.J. exclaimed, and considered his case won.
When he went in to the toilet, Violet leaned over and patted my knee.
“Hit’s you he wants for Gladys,” she said. “He thinks now you’re around, she’ll fall for you.”
“Oh, lord. You know me, Violet. I cant never settle. I got nothing to offer.”
She grinned. “I wouldnt wish you on no woman.”
I’d said that many a time myself, but it hurt to hear it from her.
“No one would have me anyway,” I mumbled.
“No, they’s a certain kind would love no one but a man like you. That aint Gladys though. Gladys wants babies, and a man that will put her on a pedestal. That Isom, law, he’s allays making over her. He’s just got her head turned plumb around.”
Isom took me drinking the next night.
“You put in a good word for me?”
“I tried. But you know how stubborn he is.”
“Damn!” He slapped the table. “Dont he know we could run away?”
“Dont do that. Hit would kill him.”
“How long am I supposed to wait? Hit’s a killing me too.”
“Is it? Aint you seeing nobody else?”
He dropped his eyes. “Course I am. Hell, I’m only human.”
“You aint hurting then.”
“You sound like goddamn C.J. I love her.”
“You say you do. C.J. loves her too. And if yall marry without his permission, he’ll cut you off. This aint the time for a feud.”
He sighed. “That may be. I know we got a fight on our hands.”
“Damn straight. And I need both of you.”
“What am I supposed to do to win him over? Buy into them daydreams of his? I just cant. Hit’s so much silliness.”
“You help with this organizing, he’s got to respect that.”
“I already keep this here town protected from the gun thugs. You think he appreciates that? Hell, no. To satisfy him, I’d have to believe that C.J. Marcum and his brand of socialism will build heaven right here on Blackberry Creek.” He sucked on his long-neck, then tossed down a shot. “You know what I think? Ifn C.J. Marcum had been born in Philadelphy, he’d be just like the damn coal operators. He’d be building model towns and straightening out folks’ lives for them, and bragging about how happy everybody was now that he was in charge.”
“That aint fair. C.J.’s motives is different.”
“Hit feels the same,” he said.
“C.J. aint as bad as some,” I said. “Them socialists up in Chicago fight amongst theirselves. One disagrees and goes off and starts his own group. Then somebody else argues and starts another group. Hit’s as bad as a bunch of Baptists.”
“True believers,” said Isom. “Tell me more about Chicago.”
“Aint much to tell. Hit’s like a big Annadel. I told them that up there and they laughed. But hit’s true. Bars. Women. The theaters flashing their lights just like the Roxie. The buildings all close together and the streets full of people, Italians and Negroes and them Poles. One thing I found out, they dont know about us down here and they dont give a damn. Even the socialists. To them we’re just a passel of ignorant hillbillies. Anything we do will be done our own selves.”
“Only thing I want to do is git back that land. And the only reason I want it is to shut C.J. up.”
C.J. finally agreed to let Isom court Gladys one night a week if Isom would promise not to run off with her. In the meantime, I got lots of invitations to eat supper with the Marcums.
On Labor Day I boarded the train for Davidson. A Baldwin-Felts guard who rode down from Jenkinjones took the seat behind me. Sweat trickled down my breastbone, tickled the small of my back. I strained to hear any movement he might make. But he sat still until we reached Davidson. He followed me down the aisle. When I stepped onto the platform, he pinned my arm behind my back, pushed me against the wall.
Two men approached. One hit me in the chest with a rifle butt. My knees buckled and I nearly blacked out. They hoisted me up and dumped me back on the train.
“You’re moving on, son,” one of them said. He hit me in the belly with the rifle.
I huddled there, just inside the door, all the way to Justice. No one offered to help me for fear of the gun thugs still on board. At Justice I managed to drag myself off the train and collapse on a bench. A guard watched me from a nearby doorway.
When the Annadel train arrived, I limped on board and slumped on my seat. Again, a gun thug sat behind me. This one was talkative.
“Boy, you should have kept on riding. You’re awful young to die. Wouldn’t you rather go on back to Charleston and lay around drunk and fuck women? Hey, redneck, you hang around here, we’ll cut your pecker right off. The ladies wont like that, will they?”
At Annadel I staggered off the train and up to Doc Booker’s office above the furniture store. Carrie came out to the waiting room, unbuttoned my shirt, felt my chest.
“I think it’s broke ribs,” she said. “Probably two.” Her eyes were dark with worry.
“Could be worse,” I said.
“You got to be careful.”
“Hell, you love to see me risk my neck.”
She backed away.
“I’ll git Doctor Booker,” she said.
C.J. heard what happened and stopped by the hotel.
“So much for operating in the open,” I said. “From now on, hit will be at night.”
“If they catch you then, they’ll kill you sure.”
“If I dont try, I might as well head back to Charleston.”
Who can say why the miners were ready to listen to me? They broke their backs and died of roof falls and rib rolls and gas, their children went to bed hungry, and died of the typhoid, their wives took the consumption, they themselves coughed and spit up. True enough. They stayed in debt to the company store, they had no say at the mine or freedom of any kind, they could be let go at a moment’s notice and put out in the road, or beaten, or shot. All true. But it had always been that way, and they never fought back. Everything had always been the way it was, we were all pilgrims of sorrow, and only Jesus or the Virgin Mary could make it right.
So why did they listen this time? Why did they decide that Jesus might not wait two thousand years for kingdom come, that Jesus might kick a little ass in the here and now?
“Hell, it aint got nothing to do with Jesus,” Talcott said grumpily. “Half of em dont believe in Jesus. They just stood all they can stand, and they dont care for it.”
But I didn’t think that was all there was to it when I visited Doc Booker’s church up toward Jenkinjones at Conklintown. It was named the Uprising Chapel. Me, C.J. and Isom attended a Wednesday night service by special invitation of the elders. The congregation huddled on benches, their faces soft as black velvet in the lantern light. Doc, one of the elders, asked me to say a few words before the preaching. I walked to the front of the church, looked down at my toes in a fit of shyness.
“I aint no preacher,” I mumbled. I couldn’t remember the neat little speech I had practiced about the union and solidarity. So I told them about Johnson. The terror of the scene returned to me, it was hard to speak very loudly, and I feared I would lose them, would frighten them off.
“Hit is an awful thing to see a man die that way,” I said. “Even more awful to be the man kilt. Hit was a painful death. He had to carry hisself clean outen his mind in order to face it.”
They sat in silence, Johnson screaming and burning before their very eyes.
“But he went out singing,” I said. “I seen his head roll back and his eyes was wide open. He was looking to heaven, ready to charge right up to the gates. He already knew about death. Everybody in this here church knows about it. You face the roof falls, you lose your youngu
ns to the sickness. Johnson, he didnt wait for no roof fall. He went out singing.”
I had raised my voice without realizing it. A woman in the back cried out, “Praise the Lord! Praise you Jesus!”
“Amen!” Others took up the cry. “Praise Jesus!”
“Johnson wouldn’t be a slave no more!” I cried. “He died a free man. They’s slaves today in Justice County, both white and black. Hit’s time to break them chains.”
I slipped back to my seat, for it was time for them to do their own talking.
“Lord!” the preacher was shouting, “we heard this before! And we are not afraid!”
A long-necked woman with her head bound in a yellow kerchief stood with a tambourine and sang, “This little light of mine, I’m gonna let it shine.” She stepped from side to side in time to the music and the congregation joined her, clapping, rocking.
Way down in that coal mine
I’m gonna let it shine.
Isom clapped and sang along. C.J. tried, but he had no sense of rhythm. He clapped half a beat behind everyone else and called out in a tuneless monotone.
Doc Booker, up front, pulled a red bandana from his back pocket, waved it back and forth, tied it around his neck. It was an old sign of poor people standing together, the red badge of the union, a death warrant if seen by the gun thugs. I tied on my own bandana.
This little light of mine,
Lordy I’m gonna let it shine.
One by one the men fished out their red bandanas, knotted them around their necks.
Cant no fire burn me,
I’m gonna let it shine.
Doc placed a stack of union cards on the communion plate beside the broken crackers. When the plate reached the back of the church, the cards were gone. The pianist played a rattling version of “Precious Lord Take My Hand.” They sang again and their shadows danced across the ceiling.
I sat still all through the preaching, about preparing roads in the wilderness and making straight the way of the Lord, about John the Baptist, Herod, messengers, persecutors, martyrs. The preacher, a short man in a flowered vest who worked in the Jenkinjones mine, shook my hand after the service.
“The Holy Ghost got a holt of us now,” he said.
Storming Heaven Page 18