Today, it was the aroma of fresh-baked cake. There was no mistaking the two sisters of my mother’s mother, Aunt Minnie and Aunt Sadie, who both smelled like peach-flavored snuff.
I felt suffocated and my face ached from having my cheeks pinched. Finally, I escaped when everyone’s attention turned toward the new Chevrolet Fleetwood station wagon pulling into the churchyard. It was Old Man Cliff Creel.
That was how everyone referred to him—as Old Man Cliff Creel. He was the only rich man I knew and he seemed to own just about everything. Miss Lena’s store wasn’t really Miss Lena’s. It belonged to Mr. Creel. As did the sawmill, the land where Uncle Curvin grew his cotton, and most of the other farm land around. Anytime anyone pointed out a field, more often than not someone would say, “Old man Cliff Creel owns that.” He owned the trucks which hauled the logs and the forests where the logs were cut. He even owned the three-room shack where we lived; my father had to pay him twelve dollars a month for rent.
If anybody wanted to borrow money, then Mr. Creel was the only source, and there would be interest to pay. I had passed many times by his big white house, about a mile past Miss Lena’s store heading toward Coffeeville, but had never even entered his front yard. It was just too intimidating. I had heard folks say he kept a mean dog behind the picket fence with a manicured lawn on each side of the walkway, leading up to flower beds and shrubbery in front of the long front porch, which was lined with swings and rocking chairs.
There were also several outbuildings, including a large barn and a smokehouse which was almost as big as our house. I had never seen Mr. Creel without a hat, except inside the church, and today was no exception. As soon as he got out of his new car the preacher rushed over to shake his hand and welcome him. They were the only two men there wearing suits and neckties.
Old Man Cliff Creel looked fat and mean to me. His face was shaved clean, framing his fat nose which was crisscrossed with tiny red and blue veins. I remembered my mother saying that was a sign of a man who had drunk too much whiskey for too long. Below his nose were thin lips between which I could see his tobacco-stained teeth. When he and the preacher began walking toward the front door of the church everyone knew that it was time to start. As they walked through the crowd everyone would say, “Good morning, Mister Creel.”
He would nod to people while he kept walking. I saw the glint of the sun’s reflection off the gold bar on his necktie when he walked by me, and I shrank away.
The announcements had been made, the hymns sung, the collection plate passed, the prayer that lasted for what seemed like eternity had been prayed, and now Brother Benny Hurd was deep into his sermon. About then I felt an itch so deep it was almost painful. It was coming from just below my waistline and I knew at once that a redbug was embedded in my skin. I gritted my teeth, thought about the wonderful food I was about to have, jumping into the cool water of Satilfa Creek, or dousing that nasty chigger with some rubbing alcohol. When I could stand it no longer I plunged my hand into my pants and began scratching vigorously; that is, until my mother started whacking my head with the edge of her Jesus fan.
I became very still until everyone’s attention was back on the preacher, then I slowly turned my head toward the window. From my seat on the end of the pew I saw Fred and Robert kneeling over two wash tubs containing huge blocks of ice. They were attacking the blocks with ice picks and I could see chunks falling away from the blocks into the tubs. I saw Fred insert a sliver of ice into his mouth. He looked up, saw me, and must have felt guilty because he turned his back toward me.
A little river of sweat, starting from beside my ear, had trickled down my face onto my neck where another aggravating itch had begun, but I dared not scratch.
I didn’t know how much longer I could stand it. My belly was itching, my neck was itching, I was hot, I was thirsty, and I was hungry. I decided to try to listen to the preacher and see if I could make any sense out of what he was yammering about. It was about something in the Bible where one brother killed the other. I listened while he said, “After Cain, out of jealously, killed his brother Abel, God put a mark on him and banished him to the land of Nod, east of Eden, where he would be a fugitive and vagabond for all his days on the earth.”
Preacher had my attention, but I wasn’t sure what he was talking about. He paused, took a handkerchief from his pocket, mopped his face, and glanced out the window toward the big oak trees. I sat up straight and thought, yes, he’s thinking about iced tea and fried chicken, too.
He continued: “Yes, my friends, look around you and see who has the curse of the mark of God.”
I slid up on the edge of my seat and gripped the back of the pew in front of me. I certainly wanted to know who God had cursed and what kind of mark He had put on them. In case I ran into one, I definitely wanted to recognize them. My itching, hunger, and thirst were gone as I anxiously waited for the preacher to reveal this great secret.
His voice was rising now as he abandoned the lectern and walked to the left side of the podium, directly in front of Old Man Cliff Creel. “Who among us are the vagabonds and the fugitives? Who among us bear the mark of the curse of God?”
I was beside myself, thinking, why doesn’t he just tell us?
Preacher’s voice was a roar now as he pumped his fist into the air. “I ask you, who among us tills the earth, but it no longer yields its strength to them? It’s the black man! He wears the mark of the curse! My friends, it’s the niggers!”
I was astounded as I heard Old Man Cliff Creel yell, “Amen, brother.”
The sermon was concluded and Brother Benny called everyone to their feet to sing the closing hymn. Every once in a while he would break in, and as only the piano played softly, he would invite people down to the altar to be saved or rededicate their lives to Jesus.
I don’t know whether it was my prayer to be released or the food outside, but no one wanted to be saved that day.
Finally, mercifully, it was over. Everyone was outside, smiling, talking and eating. I knew where the best food was. The fried chicken and the butter beans were my mother’s, then I helped myself to Aunt Ola’s potato salad and Aunt Lillian’s banana pudding. I cleaned my plate and drained my iced tea along with Fred and Robert on the tailgate of Uncle Curtis’s pickup.
Through it all I kept thinking about the end of the preacher’s sermon. I had never heard of the land of Nod. I thought black people came from Africa, and I was glad they had, because somehow they had managed to bring some okra seeds with them. Without them, there would be no fried okra.
There were a lot of questions in my mind, but I knew this was not the time, the place, and there was not a person—then I thought, Jake! I had to figure out a way to get to the sawmill, today!
Almost immediately opportunity presented itself. While cleaning up my mother told me, “Go get on the truck. We’re going to visit at your Uncle Curtis’s for a while.”
“Can I just walk on home? I want to see if Ned and Daddy are home yet. See what they got.”
“Well, I suppose. You just be careful.”
During the confusion of everyone packing up I snatched a chicken leg and a pulley bone, quickly wrapped them in a piece of used wax paper, and stuffed them into my pocket. Just before leaving, I took off the hurtful shoes and tossed them in the back of the truck.
4
I dashed into the woods just past Miss Lena’s store. When I reached the first pile of logs, not yet in sight of Jake’s shack, I stopped dead in my tracks. I heard a strange, rhythmic, melodious, wonderful sound—one I had never heard before, and I liked it.
The sound stopped. I stood frozen in my spot and waited for it to start again. It didn’t, so I walked on past the far end of the sawmill and there was Jake, sitting on a block of wood, staring into his bed of hot coals with his old guitar resting across his knees.
He looked up at that