Over the hills and everywhere
Go, tell it on the mountain,
That Jesus Christ is born
While shepherds kept their watching
Over silent flocks by night
Behold throughout the heavens
There shone a holy light
After the beautiful sound of the song faded away the preacher began preaching, and he preached long and hard. Hunger, thirst, and all physical things departed from my mind. It felt like it had in the cotton field when Poudlum had taught me how to endure the hardship of picking cotton by separating your mind from your body, except in this case you didn’t have to put forth any effort because the preacher did it for you.
He started out speaking gentle and low, talking about suffering, and how none of us had endured anything near to the extent our Savior had. He said how we all spent eternity depended on how we spent our mortal days on earth, and that someday we all would rid ourselves of our mortal bond and set off toward eternity.
It wasn’t too far into his sermon before his voice grew and he picked up a rhythm. And about that time the amens and praises increased as the congregation began to sway in rhythm with the preacher’s voice. Pretty soon folks were talking back to the preacher after almost every sentence he uttered. They were caught up in something special as they called out, “Sweet Jesus,” “Yes, Lawd,” and “Amen, brother!”
His voice grew in volume and intensity, and I began to feel something myself and wanted to shout it out. I just didn’t know what. What I did know was that that church was rocking with folks shouting, jumping, and clapping their hands.
The preacher wound the congregation down with just as much expertise as he had wound them up. His voice receded in volume, turned into almost a whisper as the shouts evolved into tears. Finally, the choir of black angels sang a moving rendition of “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child,” and then it was over.
I got to see Poudlum one more time before school started back. It was when Uncle Curvin took us up there to get us an official copy of the papers where Mr. Jackson had invested our reward money.
After that, while my uncle was taking care of some other business, Poudlum, Fred and I walked over to the drug store. When we walked in, I saw the man who had thrown Poudlum and me out of the store back in the summer when I had attempted to have ice cream at the counter with him.
At first, I was afraid he was going to do the same thing again, but he surprised me. While we observed, he bent over behind the counter and emerged with three cones of chocolate ice cream, which he handed over to us and said, “Boys, these cones are on the house. You young fellows enjoy them.”
We thanked him, and then bought us some comic books and some hard candy before we walked back outside, licking our cones.
While we were rolling up our comic books and tucking them in our pockets, Poudlum said, “Dat sho wuz nice of dat gentleman to give us dese ice cream cones. You think he would let us sit down at de counter and have us a dish of ice cream like we tried to dat one time before?”
“No, not yet,” I told him. “But one day, one day soon.”
About the Author
Ted M. Dunagan was born in 1943 in rural southwestern Alabama. He attended Georgia State University, and served for three years in the Army as a member of the 101st Airborne Division and Special Forces Training Group. Dunagan is now retired after a career in the cosmetics and fragrance industry. He writes features and columns for the Monticello News in Monticello, Georgia, where he lives with his wife. Dunagan was named Georgia Author of the Year 2009 in the Young Adult category for his debut novel A Yellow Watermelon, which was named one of the 25 Books Every Young Georgian Should Read by the Georgia Center for the Book.
To learn more about Ted Dunagan and Secret of the Satilfa, visit www.newsouthbooks.com/satilfa
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