A Matter of Pride

by Jane Gill

  She stared back down at her hands. “Samuel, he shoulda stayed down there on the ground. He shoulda stayed down, but when he seen me, he got up, Luella.” She stared at Luella, pleading, tears welling up in her eyes. “He got up and he started toward the house. I seen his eyes when he seen me, and I knew he didn’t want the bossman to beat me too, fer when I come out the door. And then there was a strike of lightning, and Samuel fell to the ground. I was sure that God hissef had struck my Samuel down to keep him safe. But one of the bossman’s boys, he done had a gun and just like that, he kilt my Samuel.” Lu and Susan gasped. Miss Pearl grew silent, a single tear slid down her soft cheek.

  She brushed the tear away, took a short breath, and went on as if compelled by a force outside herself. “Oh, I was sure I would die. Lord knows, I wanted to. The baby, he done turned over inside me, right then an’ there, like an earthquake, just like an earthquake but inside me. It happened so fast it made me sick to my stomach, but I run over to my Samuel. Oh, there was blood everywhere. His back was all tore up from the whippin’ and his front was—they pulled me offa him. I was screamin’ and kickin’, and I could see them white mens laughin’ at me and laughin’ at my poor, dead Samuel.

  “The other turpentiners, they got me in the house somehow, and the women, they stayed with me and try to fuss over me until I stopped screamin’. They wouldn’t let me back out the door. I tried, but the mens, they had done got ordered to take Samuel away into the woods, and they said we had to be quiet about it or we probably all get killed. I lay there in the bed that whole night. I lay there cryin’ for my momma and wonderin’ what I was gonna do without my Samuel.”

  She was silent for a moment. Lu sat frozen, unable to hold back her own tears, and dared not speak.

  Miss Pearl continued. “Then in a little bit there come a tap-tap on the door.” Miss Pearl continued. “I was so scared, I was sure the bossman had done come back to get me, and I crawled up on the corner of the bed, pullin’ everything I could around me. And then the door click open, and there stood this little ol’ skinny boy. Just a little ol’ boy about fourteen! He say fer me to get myself up outen the bed, that he gonna take me someplace afore the bossman come fer me. He say the bossman and his friends is all lickkered up, and purty soon they gonna come back. He say he take me home wit him, but I gotta hurry. There wasn’t no time to take nothin’, not nothin’. He grabbed me by my arm, and we run off into the night. I run so hard through those piney woods, I can’t hardly remember, and he say I can’t stop, just run and run.”

  Miss Pearl reached for the edge of her apron, creasing the cloth over and over with her fingertips. The worst part of the story seemed to be over. “That boy was your father’s older brother, Jerome, Luella. He brought me out from the camp that night and took me to Mayetta and Nathaniel.”

  Lu’s mouth dropped open with the realization that what Dwight had told her was true.

  “They hid me out in that old log cabin what used to be your great-granddaddy Elijah’s,” Miss Pearl said. “They put me out there, and then they take turns standin’ guard over me—Nathaniel, Jerome, and your daddy, Sebastian. Sebastian wasn’t but a little boy then, but he stay there and he say I can’t go outside ‘fore the bossman’s friends, or the Sheriff, be lookin’ fer me.”

  Lu finally found her voice, “Why would they have been looking for you, Miss Pearl? Wouldn’t the sheriff have helped you?”

  “Oh, no, the sheriff, he woulda’ helped the bossman. The bossman he would say that none of it never happened. He would lie and say that Samuel run off and I was just storyin’, see? And maybe then the bossman would say like I owed the money. No, we couldn’t get the Sheriff. No, no.” She shook her head. “But they was lookin’ fer me because they knew that I knowed the truth! And, the baby, he didn’t wait. It wasn’t time, you know, but the baby start to come anyway and I cry and cry for my mamma and my daddy. Mayetta, she helped when the baby come, but it was all so hard. She was afraid we was both gonna’ die. She didn’t tell me that then, but she told me later.” Miss Pearl nodded, remembering her friend Mayetta. “And my little baby, Samuel, he so tiny and so weak, he can’t hardly take no milk, he cry all the time. And me, I cry too.”

  Who was baby Samuel? Lu wondered. She was confused, but she didn’t want to interrupt Miss Pearl to ask.

  “Then, Jerome, he say he ‘gwan on up to Georgia and git my daddy to come take me home. Now, Jerome, he was just a boy, Luella,” she continued. “Mayetta and Nathaniel, they say ‘No, Jerome!’ They say it be dangerous fer him to go so far. Somebody might steal him off the road. They did that, too, back then,” she interjected forcefully. Clearly, she wanted Lu and Susan to know how important her story was. “They steal folkses off the road and take them to the turpentine camps, and they can’t never get out. And your daddy, Sebastian, he beg and beg his big brother not to go! But I guess Jerome, his heart was so big, and he hear that baby cry night and day and he hear me cry. Well, he just up and disappeared one night. He was there in the night, but he was gone in the mornin’.”

  Susan, who had been sitting stock still as the story unfolded, spoke for the first time, her voice raspy. “Did he go to Georgia?”

  “I don’t know, we didn’t never know.” Miss Pearl shook her head sadly. “We never did know if they come for him from the camp or what. Maybe they come for him in the night. Sometimes back then, even the Klan would come and take folks off, you know? Or maybe he took off to go fetch my daddy. We never knowed. But didn’t nobody ever hear from little Jerome no more—not never. He was just gone. All because of me. Ummm hummm, they was bad times. Bad, bad times.” She stared down at her hands, her head bowed.

  “This was in 1945, Miss Pearl?” Lu asked quietly. “You said your baby was Samuel?” She was hoping she would not cause Miss Pearl to dwell on the sadness of the story she had just related, still she was anxious to know if there had, perhaps, been another child.

  “Oh, yes, my Jerome. His real name is Samuel, after his daddy. Samuel Jerome Jackson,” she said with pride. “But as he was growin’, why he had the same tender heart that your Uncle Jerome had. A heart sweet as the Lord Hisself. Kind, gentle, and always so happy. So after a while, when your Uncle Jerome didn’t come back, we just took to callin’ little Samuel by Jerome’s name, me and Mayetta. Um hmmm.” She closed her eyes and rocked back in her chair, “It ease our pain, hers and mine. It ease our pain.” Her words were reverent.

  Lu couldn’t help herself. She needed to sort out what she had always thought in the past from what Dwight had told her. “You mean your husband wasn’t killed in the War?”

  Miss Pearl sighed and looked up, clear-eyed now. “Well, that’s what lots of the folks ‘round here thought. So Nathaniel, he say we just never tell them no different. That way me and little Jerome, we could stay on the farm.” She leaned toward Lu, “See, that been a secret all these years,” she whispered. “But pretty much everybody’s dead now, so it don’t matter no more. Times is changed, too, what with a black President and all,” she said. “I’m sorry to have to worry you with all this, Chile, but it was time you heard the truth.”

  Lu rose from the sofa and knelt on the carpet before her. She stretched her arms around the old woman and lay her head on her knees. “Oh, Miss Pearl,” she lamented. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know how you ever could have borne all that. I’m sorry about the herdy cup. I never knew.”

  Miss Pearl smoothed Lu’s hair. “It’s all right. It’s all right, now. I didn’t think I could bear it, but, see, the Lord, He takes care of all these things in time. Um hmm.” Lu sat back on her heels. Miss Pearl placed her hand on a well-worn Bible on the table next to her chair.

  “The Lord don’t like for pride to get in his way. Why, after a while,” she continued softly. “After Jerome didn’t come back, I see what it done. My grief had gotten that boy so upset, and I feel real bad about that to this day. But the Good Book, it say that the Lord sees all these things. And after a while, what with your Grammy Mayetta an
d Granddaddy Nathaniel, and your daddy, I see how the Lord had been takin’ care of me and little Jerome all along. He sent your uncle to get me out of that camp that night, just like an angel of the Lord, he did. And your daddy, he take care of little Jerome all those years, like he was his own boy. And he give me Lovie and you, and Martin, too!” She nodded knowingly. “Just like old Job in the Bible, the old devil he take everything away from Job, and he suffer and suffer, but the Lord seen it all. He give Job his friends to set with him and then the Lord, he done give it all back!

  “See, honey, once I see that, I stopped all that cryin’ and fussin’ about all the things that was wrong in my life, I start to be happy.” She placed her hand gently on Lu’s arm. “You know, bein’ happy is a choice. I made that choice, and I been happy ever since!”

  Susan wiped a tear from her cheek. “Excuse me, but Miss Pearl, now that, like you said, just about anybody who would remember is gone, would you mind if I wrote down your story? I mean, I would keep it private, but I would like to have it written down, you know, so it won’t get lost. It’s an important story.”

  Miss Pearl patted Lu’s shoulder, indicating she wished to rise from her rocker. “Oh, honey, you can go ahead and write it down if you want,” she said. “But I already wrote it out a long, long time ago. It’s over there in your granddaddy’s house. I wrote it and give it to Lovie to keep safe in case anything ever happen to me, you know.”

  “You did?” Lu asked incredulously.

  “Yes’m, I wrote it all out. In case it might be important some day. There’s things over there I think Lovie wrote out, too. Didn’t you find them?” she asked.

  “No,” Lu lied, thinking about the envelope she’d left in her father’s dresser drawer. “Uh, I mean we’re going back over today to see if there is anything we missed before. Maybe we’ll find them then.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Miss Pearl instructed Lu and Susan to carry the pitcher of lemonade and glasses out to her lanai as she busied herself in the kitchen preparing their sandwiches. A huge African violet graced the center of a hand-embroidered lunch cloth which was draped carefully over a small round table.

  Lu was anxious to lighten the atmosphere, especially for Susan who looked shaken. “I’m so glad you’re making those sandwiches for us!” Lu called to Miss Pearl.

  “Oh, I planned it! I didn’t forget how much you loved them. You see that Jerome picked these tomatoes right this morning, while they was still wet on the vine,” she proclaimed, setting the plate of sandwiches down. “I’ve got another little treat for after, too, fresh Plant City strawberries!”

  “Everything looks so pretty, you shouldn’t have gone to so much trouble,” scolded Lu.

  “Us old ladies, we don’t get too much company, you know. So I went all out!” Miss Pearl said joyfully, inviting them to take a seat at the table.

  “I hope you don’t mind if I don’t stay too much longer,” Susan apologized. “If I’m going to get over to Barberville and back, I think I need to hurry.” She quickly ate half a sandwich and downed her lemonade.

  Miss Pearl walked her to the door, dictating last-minute directions. Then she returned and sat across from Lu. “It’s just not the same here anymore.” She sighed as she held out the platter offering Lu another sandwich. “What with all the new developments and shopping centers, why there’s hardly any farm folks left around here. Even all the birds are gone. Guess there isn’t any place for them to live no more, either. Jerome, he gets all upset over it.” She paused briefly, staring out the window. “Why, we used to hear old whippoorwills every night, and watch the great white herons fly over in the mornins’, but as the woods gets chopped down and the marshes get filled in, they gone now, too. There just ain’t no room left for poor old farmers and whippoorwills no more. It’s all big, fancy retirement places and golf courses now.”

  “But don’t you think it’s a good thing?” Lu asked. “Look at you. You’ve got a beautiful new home, a nice yard, and shopping is closer. It’s just progress. Things aren’t supposed to stay the same forever. That was something Daddy could never accept. He never would change anything. ‘It works just fine,’ he’d say,” she imitated her father’s gruff voice.

  “I sure miss seeing him,” Miss Pearl said thoughtfully. “He was always so good to me and Jerome. He taught Jerome all about farming, taught him to drive, too! You shoud’ve seen that.” She laughed.

  “You gonna get to stay a few days this time?” She inquired, spooning out a dish of succulent strawberries and offering Lu a small pitcher of milk.

  “No, I’m really just here to take another look around the house. We can’t seem to find the deed to the property, and I was wondering if maybe you would know where Daddy kept it?”

  “Oh, I don’t know nothin’ about your daddy’s business, honey. You know, he always felt bad about his readin’ and writin’, so he was kind of secretive about some things.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “Well, like when he give me this land here, he was real shy about the way he wrote it out and such. He didn’t never want me to show the paper he gave me to nobody,” she offered.

  Lu brightened at the thought. “Do you still have the paper? I mean maybe that would help me.”

  “Oh, no, honey, I don’t have it,” Miss Pearl answered absently. “And if you don’t mind, it was somethin’ I wanted to ask you about. See, most all of my papers got wet and ruined when the hurricanes come through here and took that old roof off. That paper he give me way back in 1966, it was just a wet rag after that. You couldn’t even read it.”

  “Oh, no!” Lu spoke too quickly then caught herself. “I mean, how sad for you. Of course, it would still be your land. You paid the taxes all these years, right?”

  “Yes, me and Jerome, we always gave your daddy the money for the tax,” she responded quickly. He would bring the bill over here, and we would cipher it out together. The bill was always for all the land, and I only had to pay for part, so we’d make sure the numbers were fair. Your daddy knew his numbers, so we would work it out, and I would give him the money we owed, and he would go down and pay the tax. Oh, yes, the taxes have always been paid.”

  Lu felt her heart sink, realizing that would explain why the tax records remained in her father’s name.

  “So, what are you and Martin going to do about the farm?” Miss Pearl asked.

  “We’ve got to sell it. It’s not practical for us to keep it. That’s part of why I came back down. I’ve asked Dwight Powell to handle things for us. Do you remember him? You know he’s a lawyer these days,” Lu offered.

  “I know, I know!” she responded with delight. “I saw him at the service. He has done hisself proud, hasn’t he? Just like you, Lu, you done your family proud, too.”

  “Thank you,” Lu said gratefully. “But, Miss Pearl, I need to apologize to you for all the years I wasn’t around. You meant all the world to me when I was growing up and I haven’t treated you right at all. I’d like to find a way to make that up to you, if you’ll let me.”

  “Aw, now, Honey, don’t you be worryin’ about old Miz Pearl. I understand, you was young and crazy to get out in the world and do things. That’s how it’s supposed to be. I always knew you loved me. You know that!”

  “Well, Daddy didn’t want me out in the world. You were the only one who understood, I think,” Lu mumbled.

  Miss Pearl sat up straighter in her chair. “Luella Sue, let’s talk about you and your daddy. There’s some things you don’t know, and the way everybody’s dyin off ‘round here it looks like it’s up to me to tell you.”

  “Actually, there is one thing I really need to know,” Lu said, “but I’m not sure how to ask you.”

  “Why, just ask me, chile,” Miss Pearl said.

  “You mentioned my father’s brother, um,” Lu began. “I mean, my Uncle Jerome. Do you know of any way we could be sure that he’s not alive? I mean maybe he escaped and married someone and I have cousins or something.�
� Lu swallowed hard, knowing that if she had cousins, even though she’d never met them, it might complicate things.

  Miss Pearl looked off into the distance briefly. “You don’t need to be askin’ me that question, honey. The one who can answer that is Reverend Parker. He told me, oh, just a few years ago, or maybe it was more than a few years ago, I don’t remember. Anyway, he said that one time, way back, he was asked by some folks on his circuit, north of here somewhere, if he knew a boy they had found dead. Reverend Parker said it was your Uncle Jerome.”

  “Oh!” Lu said, surprised. She hadn’t expected a solid answer. “Did my father know, I mean before he passed?”

  “Oh, yes, he knew,” Miss Pearl said. “The Reverend said he finally told your daddy after Mayetta died.”

  “Why did Reverend Parker wait until after she died?” Lu asked.

  “He said all those years he’d been thinkin’ that it would have been too hard on all of us. I guess he was figurin’ that we already had too much to bear and so long as we believed Jerome got away safe we was better off.”

  “Then why come and tell you now?” Lu asked.

  “At the time he told me, he said it weighed heavy on his heart. Ain’t none of us getting any younger,” she said. “He said he wanted to clear his mind before he has to meet his Maker hisself. Now, speakin’ of gettin’ old, you know I’m not so old I forgot what we were talkin’ about.” Miss Pearl reminded her.

  “No, I don’t think you’re so old you forgot,” Lu said. “But, honestly, I don’t think we need to discuss Daddy. With all due respect, even though I love you with all my heart, I don’t think you ever really knew what went on with me and Daddy.”

  “Oh, but, honey, maybe I do,” she said knowingly. “Old Miz Pearl, she might help you understand your old daddy after all this time.”

  “Understand him! No, I don’t think so.” Lu leaned back in her chair.