happened, the thing that turned the stomachs of even the evilest members of the group. A young man, maybe sixteen, maybe younger, fought his way to the front of the crowd; his arm was raised, shielding his face from the heat of the flames. In his other hand he clutched the wooden handle of a rusted machete. He charged toward Mary with the machete held high above his head and when he was in striking distance he brought it down in one precise stroke and the blade split Mary’s belly clean open.
The infant tumbled bloody and squirming from her womb, careening downward, stopping just inches above the ground, its impact thwarted by the umbilical cord.
The air sucked away. Some women bent and spilled sick onto their feet. Others clasped their hands over the eyes of their children. The men looked away and then looked back again. The second swing of the machete severed the cord and the baby hit the ground with a soft thud and uttered a pitiful wail.
Isaac looked around and saw that shame had replaced the rage of the crowd and one by one the people turned their backs on him and started home.
Castor peered down at the crying infant, then up at his father. “Can I have it, Daddy?”
Isaac shook his head, raised his foot, and brought the heel of his boot down onto the baby’s skull.
The following day Valdosta was as quiet as a crypt and Easter was packing to leave.
“They turn on you,” Mavis murmured as she watched Easter throw the few pieces of clothing she owned into her suitcase. “I don’t know why, but they do.” She sat down on the bed and pulled her knees to her chest. In that moment Mavis looked just like Easter’s mother, and Easter almost cried.
Mavis smoothed her hand absentmindedly across her hair. “You know, Mary nursed that boy when his mama was too sick to do it herself.”
“Which boy? The one that cut her?”
Mavis shook her head no and leaned back on her arms. “Castor, the one that lit the flame.”
Easter glanced around the space to make sure she had everything. When she looked back at Mavis she said, “You should come with me. You and the children.”
Mavis stood and wrapped her arms around Easter and squeezed. “You don’t even know where you’re going.”
“Any place gotta be better than here.”
Mavis stepped away and snorted laughter. “Girl, every place the same as here, they just go by different names. Anyway, I’d rather stay here and deal with the devil I already know.”
Part vaudeville act, part circus, Slocum’s Traveling Brigade crisscrossed backwoods America, entertaining Negroes barely forty years free of slavery who were uneducated hard workingmen and -women who, when told to sign on the dotted line, all had the same name: X.
They went to the jig show, clutching their nickels and pennies. The men tucked pints of moonshine safely into the back pockets of their overalls and wore their straw hats slung back on their heads, as they looked on in awe at the fire-eating Indian, the counting goat, and the magician who made a raccoon disappear right before their very eyes.
Easter, leaving but not really heading anywhere in particular, with anger lodged in her throat like a peach pit, marched right past the brigade and then doubled back. She paid her nickel and found herself in the midst of the adults-only midnight ramble, so called because the female performers often stripped out of their clothes.
Easter planted herself between two men. The one to her right was a grizzled old guy who smelled of wet earth. He stood slump-shouldered with his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his pants. His fingers wiggled beneath the material, in search of something Easter was more than sure wasn’t coins. The man to her left was long and lanky, with eyes that bulged unnaturally from their sockets, veiling him with a comical jig-a-boo look the white folks caricatured in their daily newspapers.
The members of the three-piece jug band climbed onto the wooden stage and peered put at the audience. A young boy moved along the row of oil lamps carefully igniting their wicks.
Slocum, the short, round, dimple-cheeked proprietor, bounded onto the stage and cast his toothless grin over the crowd before joyfully announcing: “Women hold onto your husbands, men hold tight to your hats, a storm is coming that I guarantee will leave you soaking wet!”
The audience tensed.
“Put your hands together for Mama Raaaaiiiiin!”
The jug band struck up. Fingers covered in thimbles glided down the belly of a washboard, lips blew breath over the ceramic mouth of the whiskey jug, a pick plucked banjo strings, and two pewter spoons angrily conversed. Combined the sounds created music, and Easter began to tap her foot against the sawdust-littered ground. The audience swayed in unison, becoming one living, breathing, rhythmic organ, and then Mama Rain sauntered onto the stage and everyone went still.
Six-foot, red-boned, green-eyed, Geechee girl with close-cut curls the color of straw. She was barefoot and Easter thought that Rain had the prettiest toes she had ever seen. She wore a yellow-feathered boa coiled around her neck.
The music climbed and Rain began to dance, to shimmy and shake, and with every lunge, every hop, the peach pit in Easter’s throat began to break apart, to disintegrate into dust. Her mouth went dry and her tongue withered like a tuber left out beneath a blazing, midday sun.
Rain tossed her head seductively to one side, kicked her leg out, pulled it back, rolled her hips, took three dainty steps toward the edge of the stage, and bent over the crowd so that the tops of her breasts peeked above the jewel neckline of the orange silk shift she wore. Mama Rain offered a girlish grin as her shoulders caught the rising melody of the angry pewter spoons. Up in the air now, square with her perfect ears, they began to pump. No one was ready for the next thing that happened. Mama Rain straightened her back, placed her hands on her hips, and with one sudden visceral move she sent her groin forward. The thrust was accentuated by the thundering sound of the band members’ heavy boots crashing down onto the stage floor. Two men standing in the front row fell backwards, as if hit by an invisible battering ram. Another thrust and three more men crumbled.
Mama Rain clasped her hands behind her head, curled her mouth into a devious smile, and threw her pelvis forward again, sending five men to their knees and striking Easter with a thirst that she would soon realize a hundred tin cups of water would never satisfy.
When it was all said and done, Rain was soaking wet, the thin shift cleaved to her body, outlining every luscious curve. Easter heard someone whisper, “My Lord,” in a sinful and dirty way, and when she looked around to see who had uttered the sacrilegious statement, two sets of eyes were staring right back at her. Easter clamped her hand over her mouth, turned, and fled.
***
Easter didn’t have a plan or a place to go and so she hung around the brigade grounds, hoping to catch sight of Rain one last time, but she had disappeared and had not reemerged. Easter tried to look as inconspicuous as possible lugging that brown suitcase and dressed in a blue and white dress that made her look like a schoolgirl on the run. She tried to blend, but instead she stuck out like a snowflake in a vat of coal.
“Ain’t you got no place to go?”
Easter spun around and found herself eye to eye with Slocum. He considered her, and she took in his blistered lip and heavy eyelashes.
“I need a job.” The words jumped out of her mouth and landed on the ground between them. Slocum grunted, slipped his hands behind the bib of the overalls he wore, and rocked back on his heels.
“Oh, really now? What you do?”
Easter shrugged her shoulders. “This and that.”
“This and that? Well that’s just what we been looking for!” Slocum clapped his hands together and laughed. “Go on home now, ain’t nothing here for you.” He dismissed