VIIA BIRTH-NIGHT SUPPER
Thebirth-night supper had begun, and the big drum, answering licks that somebody laid on its head, called the people to come on. Louder and louder it boomed until the air itself was humming. Now and then when a rackety thump sounded in an unlooked for place Big Sue laughed. When the measure shortened beat by beat her fat toes made pats on the floor.
“Lawd, de drum’s got de people steppin’ light to-night. Is dey marchin’ or dancin’?”
“Marchin’. Dat’s Sherry a-beatin’ de drum, now. When de dancin’ starts Uncle Isaac beats de drum an’ Sherry squeezes de accordion.”
Big Sue got up and went to the door to hear better, and her thick stumpy body rocked softly from side to side. “Po’ ol’ Uncle! Most ready fo’ de grave an’ de biggest sinner roun’ here.” But the thought of Uncle’s sin made her laugh, as she swayed this way and that. “I feel light as a feather, Uncle Bill. Ain’ Sherry got dat drum talkin’ funny talk! E don’ sound noways sinful to me. You t’ink marchin’ is a sin?”
“No. It ain’ sinful to march. How ’bout walkin’ out an’ lookin’ at ’em a while.”
Breeze sat up. “Please lemme go too, Cousin Big Sue. I ain’ sleep. I too scared to stay by myself.” The corners of the room were full of darkness, the shed-room at the back was black, and the sea’s roar unsmothered by the drum-beats.
“How come you had you’ eyes shut, so? You been playin’ possum, enty? I caught you. I don’ like dat. No. Don’ you never make like you sleep if you ain’ sleep. No. But git up an’ dress. Me an’ Uncle Bill would walk on. You dress fast an’ catch up wid us.”
When Breeze overtook them, Uncle Bill, who walked in front, called back, “How you do, stranger? I glad to see you. Come shake han’s wid me.” Then he added, “A cowardly heart makes swift-runnin’ feet, enty?”
When Breeze answered promptly, “Yes suh,” Uncle Bill chuckled.
“You’s got manners, boy! Nice manners! I’m glad to see dat.”
“Sho’ e is!” Big Sue agreed. “All dat breed is mannersable people. Dat’s how come I took so much pains to git em.”
“Dat is nice,” Uncle Bill approved. “I ever did like people to hab manners.”
“Me too! I can’ stan’ no-manners people, specially a no-manners boy-chile. I’m all de time tellin’ Leah, Brudge’ll git hung if e lives. Brudge is too no-manners. I’d skin em if e was my own.”
The noise from the birth-night supper grew thicker and stronger as they got nearer the Quarters. Every beat of the drum throbbed unbroken by the laughter and singing and loud-ringing talk. Breeze’s feet stepped with the time it marked, and so did Uncle Bill’s and Big Sue’s.
The Quarter houses were all solid darkness but one, and its doorway was choked with people pushing in and out; its front yard hidden by a great ring of marching couples, that wheeled slowly around a high-reaching fire. These were holding hands, laughing into one another’s faces, their feet plumping down with flat-footed steps that raised the dust, or cutting little extrafancy hops besides the steady tramping bidden by the drum.
Two big iron washpots sat side by side with the fire leaping high between them. Zeda stirred one with a long wooden paddle, and a short thick-set woman stirred the other. They added seasoning, stirred, tasted, added more seasoning, until a tall fellow, black as the night, and strong-looking as one of the oaks around them, broke through the ring and stepped up to the pots, and put his hand on Zeda’s shoulder. What he said was lost in the noise, but his teeth and eyes flashed in the red light as Zeda put a hand on each of his broad shoulders and quickly pushed him outside the ring again. The short woman took the steaming paddle out of the pot and shook it gaily at him, shouting to him to get a partner and march until the victuals were done and ready to sell instead of setting such a bad example for the young people.
The marchers laughed, and the drummer, a long-legged young man, dropped his sticks and yelled out, “How long befo’ supper, Ma! I’m done perished. I’m pure weak, I’m so hongry!”
Zeda stopped short in her tracks and yelled back to him, “Shut you’ mouth, Sherry! You ain’ perished, nothin’! You beat dat drum or Bina’ll put all two feets on you’ neck!”
The other woman pointed her paddle at him threateningly, shouting as she did it, “You’ ma is sho’ right, son! I wouldn’ pay you, not one cent to-night, if you don’ beat dat drum sweet as you kin! Keep de people marchin’ a while yet. I got a whole hog an’ a bushel o’ rice a-cookin’! Right in dese pots. I wouldn’ sell half if you don’ git ev’ybody good an’ hongry! Rattle dem sticks, Sherry! Rattle ’em like you was beatin’ a tune fo’ Joy to step by!”
This brought a shower of laughter and funny sayings and jokes as the crowd bantered Sherry about the way he beat the drum when Joy was here to march. But instead of answering a word, Sherry rolled the sticks softly on the drum’s head, making a low sobbing sound that held on and on, swelling, mounting until a battering roar made the air throb and hum, then he stopped off short with a sudden sharp drub.
For a second there was a dead silence, then somebody cried out, “Lawd, if you much as call Joy’s name, Sherry kin make dat drum talk some pitiful talk! Joy ought to heared em to-night!”
“I got goose bumps big as hickory nuts all over me!”
“Me too. I’m pure shakin’ like a chill! Beat, Sherry! I got to march to warm up now!”
Everybody laughed and the clatter of voices made a merry confusion.
Zeda laughed with the crowd. Then she added a handful of salt to her washpot, tasted it, smacked her lips and added several pods of red pepper.
“Yunnuh got to dance nice if you want to eat dis rice an’ hash! I ain’ mixin’ no cool Christian stew!”
Bina laughed and chimed in, “Dat’s de Gawd’s truth, Zeda! Not wid all dat pepper.”
But Big Sue sucked her teeth. “Zeda don’ know one kind o’ seasoning f’om anudder. Pepper an’ salt; dat’s all Zeda knows. E never could cook no decent rations.”
A short fat man, with a well-greased face and a good-natured smile, who stood waiting for Bina to say the word, began bawling with all his might, “De victuals is ready, peoples! Come on up, men! Treat de ladies! We’s got t’ings seasoned fit to make you miss an’ chaw you’ finger! Liver-hash an’ rice! Chitterlings an’ pig feet! Spare-ribs an’ backbone! All kind o’ hog-meat.”He trailed off into a sing-song chant, while the crowd pressed close around the pots.
Uncle Bill treated Breeze and Big Sue to heaped-up panfuls of food and tin cups of molasses-sweetened water to wash it down. “Dis is sweetened wid store-bought molasses. It ain’t fittin’ fo’ nobody to drink.” Big Sue made an ugly face and threw the sweetened water on the ground. “I wouldn’ have de face to sell sich slops to people an’ call it sweetened water. Bina ever was a triflin’ ’oman. Gittin’ money is Bina’s Gawd!”
“How ’bout a little nip o’ toddy?” a deep voice spoke out of the darkness and Big Sue turned quickly around to face it, then she laughed out with pleasure. “No, t’ank you, April. I wouldn’t fool wid dat whisky. You don’ know if it’ll kill you o’ not.”
“Come off, Big Sue,” the voice chided, “when did you get so scared o’ whisky?”
“I ain’ scared o’ good whisky,” Big Sue gurgled as he walked up near and took her hand. “Dat last one you fetched me is sho’ fine. But I sho’ don’ trust de whisky Jake makes! Lawd!” She broke into a loud laugh. “I’m pure shame’ to say it but somebody told me when Jake gits in a big hurry fo’ de whisky he don’ stop wid puttin’ lye in de mash! Dat scoundrel goes straight to de horse stable an’ gits de yeast to make em work! My stomach tries to retch if I much as t’ink on de way Jake makes whisky! Jake’s a case in dis world!”
April and Uncle Bill both laughed with her, and Jake’s voice called out cheerfully from the fire-brightened doorway, “Git you’ partners ready fo’ de square dance! Git you’ nickels ready too! Fi’ cents a set! All you chu’ch-members better git on home befo’ Sherry squeezes dat ’cordion. I’d hate to see anybody hab sinto-night! Cherry’s gwine mash out tunes dat would tickle a preacher’s toe! A deacon’s ear would git eetchy! Git you’ partners, boys! Don’ be wastin’ time!”
“How you like de boy’s looks?” Big Sue mumbled, casting a smiling look up at April.
“I ain’ had a chance to look at em, not yet,” he answered low.
Sherry squeezed a long chord out of the accordion and the crowd shouted with laughter. Uncle Isaac battered the drum, and swarms of them trooped inside the cabin, falling into step with the accordion’s frolicsome measure, but instead of Uncle Bill’s leading the way straight home, he took a stand outside the cabin by an open window to watch. The tall strange man leaned over and said to Breeze, “You’s too low to see, son. Le’ me hold you up.” And he lifted him as if he were no heavier than a feather.
The light was dim. Two glass kerosene lamps burned on the high mantel-shelf, doing their best to help the fire light up the room. Music and drum-beats and lively chatter swung into time with dance steps. The confusion flowed into clean-cut swing.
Every man had his hat on. Some were tilted back, some balanced on the side, some pulled to the front; few were right and straight. Many of the dancers wore shoes, and the loose boards on the floor rose and clattered to the regular beat of their feet.
“Did you ever seen people dance before?” April murmured in Breeze’s ear.
Breeze’s bashful “No, suh” was lost in noise, for Jake, who took up the nickels at the door, was yelling briskly, his words guiding the dancers into figures. “Hands ’round, all!” shifted the couples into a wide circle that had to crumple in spots because the roomwas too small. As it turned around every heel bumped the floor until the stamping tramp shook the cabin from pillars to roof. Once in a while Breeze could feel the big chest pressed against him shaking with laughter.
“Ladies to de center! Gentlemens surround dem!” Jake yelled it, and the ring split and went double ply. “Make a basket!” he howled. Feet shuffled and scraped the floor, as the men made a cord of long arms and tight clasped hands that slipped over the ladies’ heads. The swaying bodies were tied together tight. Sweat shone on every face. Eyes gleamed. Teeth flashed.
“How you like dat, son?” April asked, and Breeze answered, “I like em nice.”
“Wheel de basket!” Jake bawled, and the solid ring turned, slowly, evenly at first, then faster and faster until its wild whirling threw the dancers into knots of dizzy cavorters. Hot breath poured through the windows. The rank smell of over-heated sweaty bodies ran high. The house shook and creaked. Breeze could feel the strong throb of the heart in the man’s breast beating against him. Gradually the long black face leaned forward nearer to his.
“Right hand to you’ partner!” Jake cried, and hands trembling with excitement squeezed each other and held fast.
“Do de gran’ right an’ left!”
Jake dashed the sweat out of his eyes with a bare hand, as the dancers fell into two lines. A thread of ladies wound in and out between the gentlemen, whose feet kept up a frisky jumping and jigging and jerking, like drumsticks gone crazy and trying to hammer in the floor.
“Ain’ dey done dat nice!” Big Sue exclaimed.
“Dey done it mighty well,” the big man approved, his mouth close to Breeze’s ear.
When the ladies had gone clear ’round and come to their partners again, “Swing you’ own true love!” set every skirt to spinning in a giddy ring that twirled until “Sasshay, all! Croquette! Salute de lady on de right!” unwound them, let them fall limp.
Shrieks of laughter followed smacking kisses. Sherry’s accordion blared out. Then something went wrong. The joyful clamor died into a frightened hush as a long arm shot up. A razor flashed. A muttered curse was followed by a slap on a cheek. Everybody stood still for the length of a heart-beat. The muscles of the arms holding Breeze hardened. A long low hiss of sucked-in breath made him shiver with terror as the tall man leaned forward and said coolly:
“If yunnuh don’ quit dat doins’ it wouldn’ take me two minutes to come in dere an’ butt you’ brains out o’ you’ skull! We ain’ gwine hab no cuttin’ scrape here, not to-night, boys. Outen de lamps, Sherry. Outen de fire, too. Dis dance is done broke up!”
“No, Cun April,” Jake began pleading. “Nobody ain’ fightin’ now. Dem boys was just a-playin’. Dey ain’ gwine be rough no mo’. You wouldn’ broke up a dance not for a li’l’ prankin’, would you?”
The two fighters were held apart, one with his bullet head crouched forward, his fists clenched; the other with his razorless fingers reaching out to grab and strangle. April looked at them with a half smile.
“Put dem boys out de door, den, Jake. Dey ain’ fit to be wid ladies. Let ’em go wallow wid de hogs an’ cuss all dey please, so long as dey don’ cut wid no razor.”
But Uncle Bill spoke out, “Dey is too no-manners to wallow wid de hogs. Yes, suh. My hogs yonder to de barnyard is too nice to ’sociate wid any such mens. Cussin’ befo’ ladies! Dey makes me feel pure blush.”
Big Sue wanted to go home, but April and Uncle Bill said there’d be no more trouble, and as the accordion sang out with a low sad whine, another dance set was made up. Pairs of feet were already cutting happy capers patting flat-footed and with heel and toe.
They were going to black bottle, and that was a dance that beat the four-horse altogether. The cabin room, packed with a seething mass, rocked with the reeling and rolling inside it. The accordion’s mournful crying timed to the beat of the drum sounded faint above the confusion, but its pitiful wailing went clear through to Breeze’s very backbone.
Gusts of hot breath poured out through the window. The smoky lamps sputtered low. The yellow light grew dim. Little sharp outcries mixed with mad stormy thundering steps. Big Sue called out shrilly that she wanted to go! People get drunk if they listen to music too long. Sherry was squeezing out a mighty wicked tune. First thing they knew somebody would kick both those lamps off the mantelpiece and when the crowd started jumping out of the windows, they’d get trampled to death. She hadn’t forgotten how the last birth-night supper broke up in a terrible fight. April could hold those boys down a while, but when that music got to working in their blood, the devil himself couldn’t stop them.
She could feel that music going straight to her head, and she was a good quiet Christian woman. April laughed and put Breeze down and bowed low and said good night. Big Sue invited him to walk home with them and when he declined, saying he was tired and ready to go home to bed, she insisted, but he declared that he hadn’t the heart to get in Uncle Bill’s way. He’d see them to-morrow or some time soon.
On the way home Big Sue asked Uncle Bill why itwas so sinful to dance, yet not sinful at all to march by the drum. She never could exactly understand. Uncle Bill said that crossing your feet is the sinful thing. The people in the Bible used to march. Of course it was wrong to march by reel tunes. Christians ought to march by hymns.
Breeze fell into a sound sleep and left Big Sue talking, but he woke up in the night with his throat tight and dry sore, and a hoarse cough that barked. Everything was dark and Big Sue’s heavy snoring was the only sound to be heard. What must he do? Suppose he choked to death! Nobody would ever know it. His mother was way off yonder on Sandy Island, and Big Sue sound asleep. He’d wake her. He couldn’t die here in this dark by himself.
Crawling out of bed and guiding his way toward the sound of the snortles that were all but strangling her, Breeze went to Big Sue’s bed in the shed-room, felt for her shoulder and coughed as loud as he could in her ear.
“Great Gawd, who dat?” she cried out. “Who dat, I say!” Big Sue was on the other side of the bed!
“Dis is me,” Breeze whispered.
“How come you’s up a-walkin’ round, boy? Git on back to bed. You’ ma didn’ told me you was a sleepwalker. Great Gawd a’mighty! I can’ stan’ a sleepwalker.”
“I ain’ ’sleep,” Breeze whispered again, but she didn’t hear him, so he gave a loud cough that all but split his throat in two.
“Who dat cough? You, Breeze?”
“Yes’m.”
“Jedus, hab mussy! I ain’ never hear such a cough. You’ palate must be fell down. Git on back in de bed. If you keep coughin’ I’ll gi’ you a spoonful o’ kerosene.If you’ palate is down Maum Hannah must tie up you’ palate lock. Go on back to bed. I sho’ am sorry you’ palate is fell, but don’ you ever walk in on me a-sleepin’, not no mo’!”
The threat of the kerosene made Breeze struggle to hold in his coughs, and whenever one tried to burst out he covered up his head, although it seemed to him somebody was laughing in the shed-room with Big Sue.