“O heaben’s mighty nigh,Mighty nigh, mighty nigh,Ef you got a eye fer visionsIn de sky, in de sky!”
“O heaben’s mighty nigh,Mighty nigh, mighty nigh,Ef you got a eye fer visionsIn de sky, in de sky!”
When young Ready lay beside Shin Bone’s boy in the automobile, Skeeter felt almost happy.
“It ’pears to me like I got dis job by de tail wid a downhill pull!” he exulted, as he started his machine and drove away from Dirty-Six with a lighter heart.
“I’se gwine take dese babies to my cabin,” he decided. “Dem squallin’ womans kin wait fer deir brats—dey don’t ’preciate whut I done fer ’em nohow. But Marse John might git peeved up ef hemissed dis automobile an’ I cain’t affode to git in no lawsuit wid de cotehouse.”
Entering Sheriff John Flournoy’s yard, Skeeter Butts drove his little rattling runabout up the asphalt runway toward the garage in as nearly perfect silence as he could command.
Quickly he dismounted and pushed the little machine back where it belonged. Then he lifted the sleeping children out of the machine and started toward his own cabin.
Instantly a long shaft of white light shot across his path and he scampered out of the way, hiding behind some shrubbery which grew close to the house. He looked down the runway and his hair stood on end.
Flournoy’s big automobile was coming up the drive, its powerful light turning from side to side, illuminating every inch of the way. Skeeter did not know what moment a turn of the wheel would cause the light to flash across his body, so he slipped along the side of the house out to the front.
Alas! Standing at the front gate where she had just left the car was Mrs. Flournoy, and the electric light upon the corner made the front lawn as bright as day.
Skeeter noted that Mrs. Flournoy’s back was turned to him, so he scampered up the front steps and entered the front door just as Mrs. Flournoy turned to come up the walk.
Flournoy never thought of locking his house for the reason that half a dozen bloodhounds were running at large on his lawn all the time. For a moment,because of this fact, Skeeter had escaped observation. What to do next was his problem.
The house was perfectly familiar to Skeeter. He could have gone all over it with his eyes shut. And he was perfectly welcome there night and day, for he had been coming and going in that house for twenty-five years with no one to question his actions. But he had no desire to be caught in that house with two strange babies in his arms!
The front door opened and Mrs. Flournoy entered, snapping on the electric light in the reception-room. Skeeter retreated to the dining-rooms still hugging the two children in his wearying arms.
“Huh,” he muttered to himself. “Dese folks always gits somepin to eat befo’ dey goes to bed. I better git outen dis dinin’-room!”
He was just in time, too, for the doors to the dining-room slid open just as Skeeter stepped into a little back hall, which contained a narrow staircase leading to the second story. Skeeter tiptoed up the steps. His idea was to wait until the folks had entered the dining-room, then go down the front stairs, out of the front door and around to his cabin.
But luck was against him!
At the top of the steps he paused to rest his arms and get another grip upon the children he was carrying. He laid the boys side by side, took one under each arm like a bundle, and started on. Then it happened. He attempted to enter a narrow door and a little woolly nigger head hit the sharp edge of the door jamb on each side with a thump!
The two pickaninnies let out a howl which turned Skeeter’s blood to ice water.
Any effort toward concealment was useless now, and Skeeter was consumed with desire to get out of that house. He galloped down the front steps, turned into the rear hall, and stepped out upon a side porch.
Sheriff John Flournoy met him at the steps!
Flournoy turned the electric flashlight he had been using at the garage into Skeeter’s face, and the blinded, terrified darky reeled backward and dropped the two howling nigger babies upon the porch floor.
“Turn on the light, Skeeter!” Flournoy commanded.
Skeeter reached up above his head and switched on an electric light suspended from a cord.
Flournoy looked down at the howling nigger babies and grinned. He saw nothing unusual in the fact that Skeeter was coming out of his home at eleven o’clock at night, for Mrs. Flournoy had left Skeeter in charge of the house a thousand times in their absence. Nor did the two black babies excite anything more than amusement, for several negro families lived on his place and their cabins were full of children.
“Did you steal those nigger babies, Skeeter?” Flournoy drawled in his easy, smiling way. The remark was merely to make talk.
“Naw, suh,” Skeeter stammered. “Naw, suh!”
“I’m glad to hear you say that,” Flournoy chuckled. “Since the Lamana kidnaping case, the Legislature has passed a law making the penalty for stealing children very severe in Louisiana.”
Skeeter attempted to moisten his parched lips with a dry tongue. Then he asked through jaws which felt like they were locked:
“Whut—whut—whut am de penalty, Marse John?”
“Death!” the sheriff answered.
Then an oath of surprise popped from his throat. Skeeter had crumpled like a broken weed and had fallen face downward between the two squalling black babies.
Flournoy leaped forward and turned the prostrate man over on his back.
The negro had fainted.
Mrs. Flournoy appeared upon the side porch and quieted the babies by the simple process of giving each of them a piece of fried chicken.
Sheriff Flournoy as quickly restored Skeeter to consciousness by pouring cold water on his head and hot liquor down his throat.
Then leaving the babies to play under the electric light upon the porch, they conducted Skeeter to the kitchen and demanded explanations.
Nobody can beat a negro making explanations.
Skeeter’s statement was utterly untrue, but when we remember that the frightened darky considered that he had been guilty of the crime of kidnaping and was hopefully attempting to save himself from the penalty of death, all kind-hearted persons will forgive him. Most of us would stretch the blanket just a little if by doing so we could save our lives.
“It happened dis way, Marse John,” Skeeter saidin a trembling voice. “I wus givin’ dem two little black babies a little outin’, an’ I decided I would fotch ’em up here an’ let ’em see whar I lived at. I’s proud of dat little cabin whut you-all gib me, even ef I do say it myse’f. I ain’t been feelin’ so powerful well sence ’bout supper-time to-night—it muss had been somepin I et—an’ passin’ de house I got to feelin’ powerful bad, an’ I decided I would git me some medicine. I knowed you-all warn’t at home, but de med’cine chist is right up-stairs whar it’s been fer twenty year, so I wint up dar to git me some linimint to rub on my misery. When I heerd the auto come in, I comed down to ax Ole Miss whut to take, an’ when I wus talkin’ to you on de po’ch somepin jes’ nachelly happened!”
This sounded perfectly plausible to Skeeter’s two white friends who did not have the least hint of the mess he had mixed down in the negro settlement.
“You’d better go to bed, Skeeter,” Flournoy said kindly. “I’ve seen niggers pull many different stunts in my life, but you are the only darky I ever saw all in a dead faint.”
“I been feelin’ kinder faint an’ feeble fer a good while,” Skeeter moaned.
“I’ll give you some pills to take, Skeeter,” Mrs. Flournoy said. “Go to your cabin, and if you are not better in the morning we’ll have the doctor.”
Skeeter turned to her pleadingly.
“Whut is I gwine do wid dem two nigger babies?” he asked. “I bet deir maws is bellerin’ fer ’em right now like cows callin’ fer deir calves.”
“Do you feel strong enough to drive my little runabout,Skeeter?” Flournoy asked. “You can take the babies home in that.”
“Yes, suh,” Skeeter exclaimed eagerly. “I’s strong enough to run it an’ de fresh air will do me good.”
Flournoy pushed out the little machine, helped Skeeter arrange the children so they would not tumble out, cranked the car for the “sick” negro, and for the second time that night the sheriff’s little runabout started for Dirty-Six.
In the meantime things had been happening in that negro settlement. The grapevine telephone carried the news that Shin Bone had stolen Happy Rocket’s baby. A little later the message ran along the same mysterious channel that Happy Rocket had stolen Shin Bone’s baby. Then the startling information came that some party or parties unknown had stolen Shin Bone’s baby out of Happy Rocket’s cabin.
This was enough to bring the entire population of Dirty-Six out of their cabins into the street. They streamed up and down the narrow lanes, jabbering, gesticulating, telling again and again of the fight between Whiffle Bone and Happy Rocket, of the divorce of Shin and Whiffle, of the drunken spree of Shin Bone.
The general idea prevailed that Shin Bone had possession of both babies, but no one cared to go and inquire while Shin was crazy drunk, singing “heavy religion” songs, and pounding the table with a tin coffee pot.
Then Whiffle Bone caused a sensation by leaving her uncle Pap Curtain’s cabin and running down thestreet toward the Bone eating-house squalling like a catamount. Dozens of negroes fell into her wake and followed at a safe distance.
As they approached the restaurant they all recognized with pleasure that Shin Bone was sobering up. The best indication of this improvement was the character of songs he was singing. He had abandoned the heavy religion tunes, his voice had lost some of its volume, and the music was gay and lightsome:
“De boss he squall to de nigger boys:‘Don’t bother dat jug in de spring!’De jug he gurgle out: ‘Good, good, good!’But me, I holler an’ sing:‘O gimme dat gal,De big, greasy gal—Don’t nobody bother dat sway-backed Sal,Who wrops up her hair wid a string!’”
“De boss he squall to de nigger boys:‘Don’t bother dat jug in de spring!’De jug he gurgle out: ‘Good, good, good!’But me, I holler an’ sing:‘O gimme dat gal,De big, greasy gal—Don’t nobody bother dat sway-backed Sal,Who wrops up her hair wid a string!’”
Whiffle Bone threw open the door of the eating-house, ran across the sanded floor, threw herself into Shin Bone’s outstretched arms, and broke into his song with a loud wail:
“O Shin, I loves you wid all my heart! Less don’t fuss no more—I’ll ’vide up de money even! An’ fer Gawd’s sake, come an’ he’p me find little Shinny, our darlin’, angel chile!”
“Don’t pester yo’ mind ’bout our angel chile,” Shin Bone vociferated, pounding the table with the battered coffee pot. “I fotch him home from de Hen-Scratch—he layin’ in de back room in his own little bed!”
Placing his coffee pot under his arm, he led hissobbing, hysterical wife into the back room and then stood gazing in pop-eyed, drunken amazement at the empty bed.
“Whar is he at? Oh, whar is heat?” Whiffle screamed.
“I—I thought I toted him home, Whiffle!” Shin Bone said in a hysterical tone. “I wonder did I drap him down a well—or somepin like dat?”
This suggestion threw Whiffle into a maniacal frenzy and administered such a shock to Shin Bone that it sobered him completely in a moment.
“Come on, squall-cat!” he bellowed. “Less go to de Hen-Scratch an’ ax Skeeter Butts ’bout dis!”
When they arrived at the saloon they found a dense crowd of negroes within the place listening to the whoops and howls of Happy Rocket and Hopey Prophet, both of whom had also come to the saloon to interrogate Skeeter Butts.
When Shin and his wife entered they occupied the opposite end of the barroom, and then began an antiphonal chorus between the two bereaved parties which was better as a show to the bystanders than a zoo full of ring-tailed monkeys.
Finally all their wails became focalized into one hysterical appeal:
“Where, oh, where is Skeeter Butts gone at?”
When Skeeter spun around the corner and looked up the street at the crowd assembled around his place of business, he availed himself of benefits of that intolerable nuisance called the muffler cut-out, and drew up to his saloon and stopped his car, popping like a battle of rapid-fire guns.
A man-sized voice at the door bawled the information to the people in the saloon:
“Here comes Skeeter Butts in Sheriff John Flournoy’s ought-to-be-a-mule!” A moment later he bawled another announcement: “Skeeter’s got the two lost babies wid him!”
In a moment more Skeeter was pushing and shoving at the door, while his voice cackled like a hen:
“Git out de way an’ lemme pass! Lemme git in wid dese here stole babies!”
They made a ring around him in the middle of the room as he placed the two grinning, bright-eyed children on the floor at his feet. Each baby was happily chewing a chicken bone. The two mothers rushed forward to embrace their children, but Skeeter’s commanding voice cracked like a bull-whip:
“Stan’ back, nigger womans! Don’t tech dem brats till I gib de word!”
There was a moment of intense silence while Skeeter gathered his wits to speak. No one in that crowd will ever know how frightened the little barkeeper was, nor how desperate. He had determined to risk his life and liberty upon the magic name of John Flournoy, Sheriff of Tickfall parish.
If this name failed to save him, he saw nothing before him but the prison and the hangman’s noose.
“I been talkin’ to Sheriff John Flournoy,” he began. “Me an’ Marse John is kinnery—I’m his folks.”
He paused and took out his handkerchief, mopping his face. He felt like every pore of his skin was a spouting fountain of perspiration and he was sweating ice water.
“I went up to Marse John’s house an’ tole him dat Shin Bone stole little Ready Rocket outen my saloon, an’ Marse John mighty nigh bust out cryin’! I tole him dat Happy Rocket stole little Shinny Bone right outen his mammy’s arms, an’ Marse John jes’ blubbered right out like a little baby!”
“I don’t see nothin’ so powerful bad!” Shin Bone interrupted.
“My Gawd, Shin!” Skeeter exclaimed with all the dramatic force of his nature. “Marse John says he ain’t had to hang no nigger sence he’s been a sheriff, but de law specifies datde penalty fer stealin’ a baby is death!”
If Skeeter hoped to make a sensation, he did!
Whiffle Bone threw her arms around her husband’s neck and sobbed as if he were already dead.
Happy Rocket dropped upon her knees upon the barroom floor, raised her quivering hands in an attitude of prayer and sobbed:
“O mussiful Gawd! I’s a mean, wuthless nigger an’ I ain’t prepared to die!”
“Looky here, Skeeter!” Shin Bone howled in a desperate, frightened voice. “Didn’t you steal dem babies yo’ own se’f? How come you is got ’em wid you ef you didn’t steal ’em?”
“Naw, suh!” Skeeter Butts squealed. “I attached dem chillun in de name of de law an’ de sheriff an’ de Nunited States of Loozanny!”
Then Shin Bone broke down and howled:
“Gimme my baby! Me an’ Whiffle is gwine leave dis town till atter de gram-jury meets!”
“Take him!” Skeeter exclaimed. “I don’t wanthim—I’d druther hab a yeller-jacket under my shirt. Jes’ take yo’ brat an’ go!”
“Gimme my baby!” Happy screamed. “I’se gwine back home to-night on de fust train!”
“Honey, don’t let nothin’ detain you!” Skeeter admonished her. “I don’t want yo’ baby—I’d druther hab a cockle-bur in my sock. Jes’ take yo’ brat an’ go!”
In a few minutes the barroom was empty, the crowd splitting into two parts, following either Happy Rocket or Shin Bone home, according to their sympathies.
In the middle of the floor Skeeter found a tin coffee pot. It was battered, broken, and useless, and one side was caved in until it resembled a big, toothless mouth grinning at him in sardonic glee. He bent over it, examined it from all sides, but did not touch it. The mishaps of the night had made him cowardly.
“Nigger luck is always bad luck,” he whispered. “Dis here tin pot might be a bomb an’ bust right in my face. I’ll let Little Bit pick it up when be cleans up in de mawnin’. All dis night bad luck has kotch me befo an’ behime—mostly behime.”
Skeeter sat down to rest his mind and collect his impressions. He was not the jaunty, confident, debonair young man he had been a few hours before. He felt like something had gone out of him, fading like breath upon a razor, leaving him but a shell of his former self, never to recover what he had lost and be the same again.
Tears of weakness and nervous collapse came intohis eyes and rolled down his cheeks to the corners of his mouth. He wiped them away with the palm of his yellow hand and spoke again:
“One time when I wus little I axed Marse John Flournoy whar I come from. He tole me dat a buzzard laid me an’ de debbil hatched me in de hot ashes. I don’t misdoubt dem words, because I been ketchin’ hell ever since!”
“I ain’t no scholard an’ I don’t need no book,” Skeeter Butts proclaimed as he sat under the shade of a chinaberry tree in the rear of the Hen-Scratch saloon.
“Mebbe so,” the glib-talking man beside him said; “but dis here ain’t no highbrow book. It tells all ’bout whut dreams means. Don’t you never dream nothin’?”
“Shore!” Skeeter exclaimed, clawing at a high, white collar which threatened to saw his head off. “Las’ night I dreamt dat I done died an’ went to de bad place.”
“Dar now!” his friend exclaimed, turning the pages of the book until he found the word “Hell.” “You listen to dis.” Then, with the utmost difficulty the darky read: “‘To dream of seein’ hell denotes dat de dreamer’s life is a bad one, an’ is an in-ti-ma-tion to him of re-for-ma-tion.’”
“My gosh!” Skeeter Butts exclaimed, his eyes nearly popping out of his head. “Dat shore hit me right in de center of myse’f. How do dat book know?”
“I dunno,” the negro answered. “I s’pose it’s inspired. Anyways, it don’t never miss nothin’. Is you had any mo’ dreams recent?”
“Suttinly,” Skeeter said, with a frightened expression on his saddle-colored face. “Night befo’ las’ I dreamed dat I wus up in a balloom.”
“Us’ll see whut dat means,” his friend exclaimed, fumbling with the book. “Here it am: ‘Balloom—To dream of it shows dat you will engage in many chi-mer-i-cal plans.’”
“Engage in—which?” Skeeter demanded in a startled tone.
“Chi-mer-i-cal,” the negro repeated with difficulty. “Dat’s de kind it specify—Gawd knows whut dat means.”
“How many of dem dreams comes true?” Skeeter asked uneasily, gazing at the gaudy red cover of the book.
“All of ’em,” his companion answered promptly. “A garntee goes wid de book. Try it on wid anodder dream.”
Skeeter hesitated a moment, thinking heavily. Then he said:
“’Bout a week ago I dreamed ’bout rats.”
“Huh!” the other darky grunted as he found the place in the book. “Here am de word: ‘Rats—Se-cret en-e-mies.’”
“Looky here, nigger!” Skeeter Butts exclaimed in a frightened voice as he sprang to his feet, “dat shore is a dangersome book. Put all dem dreams togedder an’ look whut sort of a prize-package I done drawed!”
“Dat package shore is got some lemons in it fer you, Skeeter,” his friend assured him. “De fust dream says dat yo’ life am bad an’ you oughter gitreformed; de second dream specify dat you is gwine engage in—in—whut-you-call-it plans; de las’ dream orate dat you got plenty enemies!”
“Dat’s de way it goes,” Skeeter mourned.
“Does you want a garntee dat all ’em dreams will come true?”
“Naw!” Skeeter howled. “I wants a garntee dat none of ’em gits to come to pass.”
He snatched a package of cigarettes out of his pocket, lighted one with trembling fingers, burned it to his lips with furious puffs, and spat the stub out upon the ground. Then he exhaled an immense volume of smoke around his head, as if invoking protective incense from the depths of his lungs.
“How much do dat book cost?” Skeeter finally asked.
“One dollar,” was the answer.
“Make it fo’ bits an’ I’ll buy de book,” Skeeter told him.
“I cain’t do it, Skeeter,” the other darky responded. “I needs a dollar. Excusin’ dat, a nigger whut ain’t willin’ to pay one roun’ dollar to learn how much bad luck is gwine git him deserves to hab a few mo’ bad dreams.”
“Dat’s a fack,” Skeeter sighed as he laid a silver dollar on his companion’s knee and reached out his hand for the volume.
“I hates to part wid dis book, Skeeter,” his friend said, as he reluctantly handed it over. “It shore is a wonder book. I been readin’ atter it fer mighty nigh a year. One dream I had specify dat somebody wus gwine inherit me money!”
“I might could stan’ dat kind of a dream,” Skeeter said in a solemn tone of voice. “But I’s gwine roost powerful low fer a little while till I kin change dem bad dreams I’m had to good ones.”
“Dat’s de rule,” the other darky chuckled, as he pocketed the dollar and rose to leave. “Ef dat book says, ‘Lay low,’ you done got yo’ ordahs. Ef it tells a rabbit to climb a tree, Br’e’r Rabbit had better hunt a easy one to git up on an’ straddle a limb.”
“Don’t tell nobody dat I done bought dis book, pardner,” Skeeter begged. “I wants to gib it a good try-on fust.”
“I ain’t say nothin’,” the darky grinned as he started away. “Dis dollar will gib me a trip to N’ Awleens on de steamboat, an’ I’s gwine to de landin’ right now.”
When the man had gone Skeeter laid the book aside, and busied himself in cleaning the saloon, wiping off the bar and the tables and sweeping the room. He tried to take his mind off of the book, but the interpretations of his dreams constantly recurred to his mind, and he felt a growing uneasiness.
“I wonder who dem secret enemies is,” he sighed. “Dat book oughter had tole me mo’ ’bout dat.”
He counted off upon his fingers all the negroes whom he did not like; then he counted those whom he knew did not like him; then he exclaimed:
“Dat don’t he’p me none. Ef I knows deir names, of co’se dey ain’t really secret enemies!”
He sat down at a table, lighted another cigarette, let the hot ash fall from the end and set his trousersafire. Then he dropped his smoke, put out the fire, and viewed the damage with popping eyeballs.
“Dat’s abadsign,” he exclaimed. “A nigger ain’t in luck whut sets his pants on fire!”
He got up and walked toward the rear exit of the saloon, traveling with jerky, nervous steps, and looking behind him twice with a frightened glance. He seated himself again in the shade of the chinaberry tree, and the book lay upon the chair which his friend had vacated.
Skeeter eyed the volume a long time with increasing uneasiness. The gaudy red-cover design represented a red woman, propped up on some red pillows, asleep, and holding a red fan in her hand. In the background was another red woman waving a wand, and a winged white boy, holding a black hat in one hand and a bag of money in the other. Scattered about on the red woman’s red couch were playing cards, envelopes, and one square piece of paper which contained the numbers, “4-11-44.”
“I onderstan’s dem numbers,” Skeeter mumbled to himself. “Whar is 7-11?”
Skeeter lighted another cigarette and puffed it furiously. Twice he reached out his hand to take the book, then drew back without touching it. He looked away several times, but the gaudy cover design attracted him each time with a sort of hypnotic fascination.
“I hadn’t oughter bought dis book,” he sighed. “A nigger ain’t in luck ef he knows too much about his innards.”
Finally he overcame his fear to the point where heventured to turn the cover, and lo! on the other side was the picture of an aged negro, his black face framed in white hair and beard, his spectacles pushed up on his flat forehead, his mouth spread wide in a snaggle-toothed laugh.
“My Gawd!” Skeeter exclaimed, springing to his feet and gazing at the face with a fear which made his lips tremble, and his hands shake, and his knees knock together. “Dar’s a tintype of ol’ Swampo, dat wild Affican nigger whut used to live in a holler sycamo’ tree in de Little Moccasin Swamp!”
He sat down, resting his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands. For five minutes he strove to recall all that he knew and had heard of Swampo.
He remembered the leering, leathery, wrinkled face of the old half-wit negro, who came to town on every Saturday afternoon, and smirked and bowed and scraped around the white folks, holding out a clawlike hand, begging for a few pennies. Once he had heard a fearful screaming among the blue jays in the swamp, and had crept through the high undergrowth to see what the trouble was; and lo! Swampo had caught a blue jay, had laid the bird on its back, and had pinioned its wings to the ground with forked sticks.
The bird’s horrible screams had brought all the jays in that part of the swamp to the spot, and they stood around the imprisoned bird, making loud and profane comments upon his unfortunate predicament. At intervals some blue jay, impelled by curiosity, walked up within reach of the captive bird’s claws. Instantly the captive reached out, seizedthe bird, and held him a prisoner until Swampo slunk out of the underbrush, grinning like an ape, and released it!
As he thought about this fearful scene, Skeeter’s hair stood up on end, just as it had years before when he witnessed it, and had crawled, terrified, away from that vicinity. A cold shiver passed over his sweat-drenched body; he raised his head and eyed Swampo’s wide, laughing mouth with superstitious awe.
“Swampo shore is got de laugh on me,” he muttered through chattering teeth. “I wish dat nigger hadn’t sold me dis book. I ain’t no scholard!”
Lighting one cigarette after another to bolster up his courage, he managed at last to put out a trembling finger and turn the book over so he could read the title-page. With the greatest difficulty he spelled it out, giving the peculiar negro pronunciation to the words as he uttered them:
“‘Af-ric-an Dream Book an’ Fortune Teller, containin’ de true in-ter-pre-ta-tion of dreams, an’ de numbers of de events to which dey ap-ply. Also prog-nos-ti-ca-tions an’ di-vi-na-tions by cards, dice, do-mi-noes, dreams, moles, an’ marks, phy-si-og-no-my, phy-si-ol-o-gy, signs, au-gu-ri-es, charms, an’ in-can-ta-tions——”
“My good gosh!” Skeeter almost screamed as he sprang to his feet. “Dis is a awful book! Half dem words don’t signify nothin’!”
For ten minutes he walked up and down under the trees muttering to himself, his face fear-stricken, his hands trembling, his body oozing with cold sweat.
Then with a mighty resolution he reached out for the book, folded it, and slipped it into his hip pocket.
“Dis book is done skeart me plum’ to death,” he sighed. “Ef I die, I’ll go to hell! I wonder whar Revun Vinegar Atts is at? I’s gwine to talk dis over wid some religium pusson!”
The Rev. Vinegar Atts occupied four chairs under a tree in front of the Shoofly church—his body on one, his feet on another, his arms spread wide across the back of two more.
“Howdy, Skeeter?” he exclaimed. “Fotch you out anodder chair from de chu’ch. I needs all I’m got.”
Skeeter looked him over and grinned. For a moment he forgot his fears in contemplation of this squat-legged, pot-bellied, moon-faced negro preacher, whose head was bald except for two tufts of hair, one over each ear, which made him resemble a mule wearing a blind bridle.
“You shore is spreadin’ yo’se’f out, Elder,” Skeeter said, as he set his chair close beside Vinegar. “You look like a buzzard whut is tryin’ to fly back’ards an’ upside down at de same time.”
“I’s like a watermillyum vine,” Vinegar boomed. “When I gits sot good, I begins to spraddle.”
Skeeter reached to his hip pocket and brought out his dream book.
“Whut you flashin’ dat book aroun’ fer, Skeeter?” Atts asked suspiciously. “De Bible say dat many study is weary on de flesh.”
“I needs some advices from a scholard,” Skeeter remarked as he lighted a cigarette. “I done smokedup a whole pack of dese here things in de las’ half-hour. I’s powerful worrited in my mind.”
“You done come to de right place fer advices, son,” Atts announced with confidence. “Ef you got anything to ax me, jes’ bawl out!”
“Does you b’lieves in dreams, Elder?” Skeeter began.
“Well, suh, dat depen’s,” Rev. Vinegar Atts announced after a moment of cogitation. “As a preacher, of co’se, I b’lieves in Proverdunce; but ef you ’terrogates me jes’ as a common cullud nigger pusson—of co’se dat’s plum’ diffunt.”
“Is you had any dreams recent?” Skeeter inquired.
“Yes, suh; I dreamt about a wash-tub las’ night,” Vinegar informed him.
“Dis book tells whut dat dream signify,” Skeeter explained, as he opened the volume and turned to the proper page. “I reads dis about tubs: ‘Ef it be filled wid water, you hab evil to fear; an empty tub signify trouble; an’ to run against one, sorrow.’”
“Lawdymussy!” Vinegar bawled.
With a convulsive movement of his body, he kicked the chair from under his feet, hurled the chairs from under his arms, and upset himself falling over on his back with his feet in the air like an overturned bug.
He jumped up, breathing like a foundered horse.
“Fear, trouble, an’ sorrer!” he bellowed. “I knowed it! I knowed it wus comin’ on all de time!”
He sat down, folded his hands, and gazed around him, his mouth hanging open like the jaws of a bull alligator.
“Here I is, Luck!” he mourned. “Jes’ come right along, throw me down, an’ set on my head, den gimme a dose of bumpo-calomel an’ lemme die! O Lawdy, dat dose of dreams is shore heavy on dis nigger’s stomick!”
“Dat’s pretty servigerous, Vinegar,” Skeeter said mournfully, “but you oughter hear whut dis book prophesy ’bout me!”
“Go ’way, little yeller nigger!” Vinegar exclaimed with a flapping motion of his hand toward Skeeter. “Don’t tell me nothin’ ’bout yo’se’f! Ain’t I got all I kin stan’ right now? Look at me—I’s skeart already; I’s got plenty trouble right dis minute; an’ as fer sorrer—I’s shore sorry you ever fetch yo’ ole yeller mug up on dis hill whar I sets!”
“Whut you gwine do, Elder?” Skeeter inquired in a voice which quavered with fear.
“I’s gwine hide out till dese here calamities is done passed over,” Vinegar bellowed.
He jerked out a soiled white handkerchief and mopped it around his face, backward across the top of his bald head, and over the back of his bull-like neck.
“Whoosh!” he snorted. “I’ll be skeart to eat my vittles! I’ll be skeart to go to bed at night! I ain’t gwine take no chances wid a dream like dat taggin’ behime me!”
Skeeter fumbled with the volume a moment, then inquired:
“Would you wish to own dis book?”
“Who? Me?” Vinegar howled. “Naw,suh! Whut a nigger don’t know cain’t never hurt him; butef he knows whut’s gwine to happen, he ain’t never real sapisfied till it comes to pass.”
“Dat’s right,” Skeeter mourned. “I shore made a miscue when I paid a dollar fer dis book. It’s got a tintype of ole Affican Swampo in it—you rickoleck him, Elder?”
“I shore does,” Vinegar responded. “De white folks found him dead out in de Little Moccasin Swamp wid a live rattlesnake in his hand!”
“Yes, suh, dat’s him,” Skeeter said fearfully. “I had done fergot ’bout dat snake.”
“Atter dey kilt de snake de white folks foun’ dat Swampo wus holdin’ it so tight in his dead han’ dat dey couldn’t git it away from him,” Vinegar said. “Dey buried Swampo an’ de snake togedder!”
“Listen to dat!” Skeeter exclaimed, his hair standing up on his head. “Ain’t dat plum’ awful?”
“Whut dey doin’ wid Swampo’s picture in dat book?” Vinegar wanted to know.
“Dis book is named atter Swampo,” Skeeter informed him. “It’s called de Affican Dream Book.”
“Go ’way wid dat book, Skeeter!” Vinegar bawled. “O Lawdy, I wonder whar I kin borry a rabbit foot at?”
He sprang up, began to search his pockets, and announced tragically:
“I ain’t got no luck-charms but a buckeye, a raw pertater, de toof of a hoss, an’ de foot of a mud-turkle!”
Then happening to glance down to where a road ran around the foot of the hill on which the church was located, he waved his arms wildly and bellowed:
“Hey, Figger Bush! Come over here a minute! Come prompt, cullud man!”
Figger looked up, vaulted the churchyard fence, and came up the hill toward them, wading through weeds shoulder high.
“Don’t you say nothin’ ’bout dat book till I borrers his rabbit foot, Skeeter!” Vinegar admonished in a low tone as the two watched Figger’s approach.
A moment later, Vinegar said:
“Figger, ain’t you got no luck-charms or rabbit foots dat you kin loant me fer a little while?”
“Naw,” Figger grinned. “Dey don’t do no good. I done tried ’em out!”
“Does you believe in dreams, Figger?” Skeeter asked after the three had seated themselves.
“Shore!” Figger answered, “I dreamed ’bout a rabbit las’ night. De Revun is done reminded my mind by axin’ ’bout my rabbit foot.”
“I’s gwine tell you whut dat dream means, Figger,” Skeeter announced, looking at his book. “‘Rabbit—To dream of a rabbit denotes some bad accidunt.’”
Have you ever seen a goose sitting in a summer shower when a big drop of rain hits him on the top of his head? A whitish film comes over his eyes, he looks up at the sky with a ludicrous appearance of meekness and humble supplication, then ducks his head beneath his wing and waits for the worst to happen.
When this appalling interpretation of his dream struck Figger on the top of his head he looked up atthe sky with filmed eyes, then walked to the middle of the churchyard and stood upright with legs as wabbly as those of a new-born calf.
“Fetch me a chair out here, Skeeter,” he howled. “Don’t make me stan’ up any longer—I mought fall over an’ bust my head or somepin. I’s gwine set out from under dat tree! Set down in dat chair, Skeeter, an’ see ef it is solid—it might break down an’ run one of dem spokes clean through me.”
Skeeter tested the chair, and Figger sank down upon it with an air of thankfulness. Then he sighed:
“I shouldn’t had walked through dem high weeds comin’ up here—I bet dar is a snake in dem weeds as long as a railroad track!”
Thus, in one minute, Figger Bush had reduced himself to a hopeless imbecile. The other two looked upon him with pity and compassion, trembling at the dire portent of their own dreams and entering into full fellowship of sympathy with Figger. They sat for a few minutes in silence, then Skeeter Butts announced:
“I reckin I better mosey back to de Hen-Scratch.”
“Us is gwine wid you, Skeeter,” the other two announced promptly. “We is all sons of sorrer, an’ we oughter stick togedder.”
At the Hen-Scratch saloon they found Hitch Diamond, Prince Total, and Pap Curtain.
“Whut ails you-alls?” Hitch inquired curiously as he gazed into the frightened faces of his three friends. “You niggers look like you is jes’ foun’ out you wus borned to die!”
“Dat’s a fack, Hitch,” Skeeter sighed, as he and his two companions seated themselves on a bench. “Us is all had bad dreams.”
“I had a dream las’ night,” Hitch announced in his deep, rumbling bass. “I dreamed I runned a donkey down an’ tied him to a tree, an’ he brayed all night. Dat dream woked me up an’ I like to never got to sleep no more.”
“Does you know whut dat dream means?” Skeeter asked.
“Naw, suh, it’s been worritin’ me all day.”
“Dis book tells whut dreams means, Hitch,” Skeeter exclaimed as he opened the pages.
The negroes bunched up close around him, and after a moment Skeeter found the place and read aloud:
“‘Donkey—If you see him runnin’, brings misfortune; if he is tied you will ex-per-i-ence great loss; if you hear him bray, signifies death.’”
As Hitch Diamond received this intelligence he was a study for the psychologist. His iron features seemed to disintegrate, becoming a heterogeneous mass of conflicting emotions; his giant form seemed to shrink until his garments became too large, and hung loose and flapped around him; his scalp moved, forming a wedge on the top of his head, the point of the wedge at the apex of his skull.
“Oh, swelp me!” Hitch mourned. “I shore hab put up a job on myse’f dis time!”
The negroes gazed upon him with mournful curiosity, but none offered encouragement or sympathy. The fear of the unknown had gripped them all. Inthe blazing heat of the mid-afternoon, few living things were stirring, and an unearthly stillness seemed to pervade the entire town of Tickfall. In that vast silence of sun-slashed sky, and drooping, withering earth, and quiet animate life, these six men sat, filled with superstitious awe, appalled by fear of the unknowable, confidently anticipating the very worst of misfortune.
After a long time, Pap Curtain began to fidget.
“Say, Skeeter,” he whispered, “I don’t hanker atter no trouble, but I dreamed ’bout a cart las’ night. I’s jes’ bound to know whut dat means. See if——”
His whisper ended in a gasp as Skeeter began to turn the pages of the mysterious book with nervous, shaking fingers.
Pap waited, a picture of fear. His long neck rising from his collarless shirt seemed to stretch longer; his mouth, naturally so wide that one could sling a side of bacon into it, hung open loosely, and moisture appeared upon his cracked lip which retained a habitual sneer; his large, shifty eyes rolled back in his head like the eyes of a choking horse; then Skeeter pronounced his doom:
“Here ’tis,” Skeeter said, in a voice which sounded unnaturally loud, and which made every listener jump. “‘Cart—Its ap-pear-ance indicates ser-i-ous in-ju-ry. If you go upon it or move from it, de in-ju-ry may prove fat-al.’”
“Oh, Lawd, ain’t I a fool nigger?” Pap mourned. “I wish I hadn’t ast nothin’ ’bout dat. I wus feelin’ powerful good up to now, but——”
He wiped the sweat from his face on his ragged shirt-sleeve, reached back and jerked a twist of perique chewing-tobacco from his hip-pocket, bit off a chew, and promptly spat it out on the ground with an exclamation of fear.
“I fergot, fellers!” he sighed. “Dat book specify serious injury. Dis terbaccer mought hab a dynamite cap wrapped up in it, an’ when I chaws dat cap de top of my head will be over yanside de Massassap’ River!”
He held the twist off at arm’s length, slowly released his fingers, and let it fall to the ground.
“Hey!” Hitch Diamond bellowed, flinching away. “Don’t git so brash all of a suddent—be keerful how you drap things aroun’ me! I done heerd a donkey bray, an’ dat shore signify death!”
Prince Total got up, walked with jerky steps like a string-halt horse into the saloon, and exercising the right of assistant bar-tender, helped himself to a liberal drink of red liquor; thus fortified, he came out and sat down again. He opened his mouth to speak several times, then closed it without a word. He was aching to know the interpretation of his last dream but dared not ask.
“Wus you aimin’ to ax somepin, Prince?” Skeeter finally inquired in a lugubrious tone.
Prince shook his head, and Skeeter took out a buckeye and began to shine it up by rubbing it upon the leg of his trousers. At last, when Prince could stand the suspense no longer, he asked in a feeble voice:
“Skeeter, I don’t hanker to wish no bad luck onto myse’f, but, please, suh, look an’ see do de book sayanything about a wheel? I seed a wheel in my sleep las’ night.”
“Here ’tis,” Skeeter replied promptly. “Down close to de eend of de list. ‘Wheel--Is om-i-nous of evil.’”
“Dar now, Prince, you done got yourn,” Hitch Diamond bellowed.
“I knowed it wus somepin bad,” Prince remarked in a weak voice. “Nothin’ good don’t never happen to a nigger!”
Skeeter Butts dropped the book upon the ground, and it fell open with the laughing face of the gray-haired negro exposed to the view of the men sitting around him.
“Dat Swampo wus in cahoots wid de debbil, fellers,” Hitch remarked in a low tone, as he pointed to the picture. “He wus always potterin’ aroun’ wid buzzards an’ sich like. He teached me a song ’bout de turkey-buzzard when I wus jes’ a little shaver. It went like dis:”