All God's Dangers (15 page)

When I first went to work for him, and me and John Thomas run together on New Year's mornin, right at that hour and period of time, Mr. Barbour was in Opelika; he done took off to Opelika that mornin. So I give in to his wife, Mrs. Gertie Barbour—they called her Miss Gertie—what I was there for and so on. And durin that day, Mr. Barbour called up home from Opelika and called for John Thomas—that was the man he picked. He knowed of John more so than he knowed of me. We was both there, fresh hands, come into his home to go to work. John Thomas's daddy lived on his place at that particular time, old man Obie Thomas. Just a place Mr. Barbour had rented for him, joinin Mr. Barbour's lot there in town. Mr. Barbour didn't own no big lot but he owned a pretty good outlet, maybe two or three acres. Mr. Barbour lived right down close to the highway and old man Obie Thomas lived right above him.

So John shot out to Opelika accordin to Mr. Barbour's word
and when he got there Mr. Barbour had him fitted up with what he had bought for John to bring back. Mr. Barbour hisself hit the train and come on in home. The railroad run right into Apafalya—them trains was hootin and railin around there every day the Lord sent, mainly railroad transportation in them days. And just before night—it wasn't supposed to be but twenty-one miles from Apafalya to Opelika—John drove in there with a young pair of mules that woulda weighed fully eleven hundred pounds apiece, to a big low-wheeled white hickory wagon. Tires on that wagon broad as my four fingers.

Next day Mr. Barbour had a job settin ready. Me and John had to take that wagon and a pair of mules and go to haulin cotton seed out of the cotton seed house where loads of cotton seed would come in, all that the people livin in the country could bring in and sell. Had scales right there at the seed house, weighed the seed and chunk it in the seed house. And if the seed house was full he'd send some of them wagonloads of cotton seed to the train depot and throw em in the carboxes. Or if he had a shipment to ship out at the present time, he'd have the man that's sellin him these cotton seeds to carry em on and load em in the carbox.

Mr. Barbour was one of two men in Apafalya buyin cotton seed. Mr. Lester Watson, he was the other big cotton seed buyer in them days. After people would have their cotton ginned and didn't sell the seed to the gin men, they loaded their seed up and brought em to the seed buyin man.

Just any hour that we got our job done, it was another one to do; and it was from cotton seed to guano, from guano to cotton seed. Guano come shipped in on trains from these foreign guano factories. Mr. Barbour would announce, “Boys, there's a carload of guano at the depot to be hauled off. I want you to get it quick as you can, let that carbox go.”

That carbox had to be unloaded on the spot or else it stood there overtime and he had to pay rent on it. But if he moved it off in quick time and released the carbox, nothin to it but pay for shippin the fertilize in there. Sometimes part of that guano we'd haul right up to the cotton seed house if there was room to hold it and stack it there. Or he'd sell it directly off of that carbox. Then it was, “You boys carry so-many and so-many tons of guano to such-and-such a customer in the country.” He'd tell us where to
deliver it—to a white man that owned a big plantation or several plantations and rented em and divided em out amongst his hands, white hands and black hands, but mostly black.

Soon as spring of the year come, he begin lettin off guano; everybody'd got supplied. And he weren't the only guano man in Apafalya. They were fightin amongst each other “who should” and “who shant” sell in different territories. And they never would agree; it was just every man sellin all he could, the devil keepin score.

Soon as this guano business dropped off, Mr. Barbour had a plantation out in the country rented—it weren't his—went out and rented a place for us to farm for him. Every day we had to drive them mules to that big wagon on out there, carry our dinner along with us. Take them mules loose from the wagon and go to plowin. Kept us farmin—kept us busy from New Year's Day until he got through with us in August. No corn planted at all, he was strictly a cotton man. And also he had a farm right there at his house and John Thomas's daddy worked it with a horse. Me and John handled them big mules, tendin strictly to the country farm.

Time it come to make a crop, that other work had pulled me down. I was young, weren't grown quite, weren't used to heavy jobs every day. So I went to the doctor to see about my condition—weak, all out and down, weren't able to do the work that was put on me. Dr. Herman, in Apafalya, told me the mornin I went to him—he called me Tate; my name was Nate Shaw but he called me Tate. He never did say “Tate Shaw” but he called me Tate. He examined me, said, “Tate”—seemed to be a kind man, middle-aged—“Tate, you just about lost your nervous system—”

Well, I'd been handlin heavy stuff, big forks of cotton seed every day, from that to haulin guano and natural soda and all that mess. Them fertilize bags was two-hundred-pound bags, ought to been handled by two men, one on each end pickin it up. John Thomas—he was a young fellow too but he was a little older than I was, he was stouter-built than I was—he was used to that heavy work. He stood it better than I did. I give out at it. By spring of the year, crop time come, I weakened down.

Dr. Herman said, “Tate, you about lost your nervous system. You got to slow down, boy. I'll fix you some medicine that'll fix you up though. Do what I tell you to do and how I tell you, you'll be all right.”

He fixed me up a bottle of liquid medicine—I don't know
what was in it—and he gived me orders to take it so many times a day. Picked me right up, got my nerves together, went on and done every job that was put on me.

Mr. Barbour had some old Boy Dixie plows, old-timey weak plows, wood beams. Good mule would snap the beam clear out of one. And he put us to plowin—now, them Oliver Goober plows come in several years after that Boy Dixie plow; Vulcan plow come in, too. Both of em was iron-beam plows, Vulcan number six, Oliver number seven—plows that stood up with big mules and cut deep. The points on them plows cut that many inches, accordin to the number of the plow: cut six inches, cut seven inches. That Boy Dixie run about five inches deep. But that Oliver Goober, when it come into this country, it didn't cut under seven inches; it was a seven-inch cutter. For my personal use, after I got old enough to run mule plows for myself, I never did run a Boy Dixie. You know, wood is never as strong as iron and a animal pullin against that beam, single-tree hung to the end of that beam, if it strike a severe stump or hang up on a root under the ground and that mule have good weight about him—POP—pull that Boy Dixie beam clean in two. But it couldn't do them iron beams that way; might break the frog in them Olivers, break the points, but never break that beam, that beam was substantial.

So at that period of time, 1906, them Boy Dixies was beginnin to go down and them iron-beam plows takin their place. But Mr. Barbour hadn't got a hold of them new plows yet. Put me and John Thomas to plowin them old Boy Dixies. And many a farmer had his crop all laid by by July, but Mr. Barbour didn't. It come a heavy wet spell that year and we couldn't plow at all. Soon as it quit rainin he got in a hurry and wouldn't wait for the ground to dry. Any time your crop of cotton sprouts, or your corn—when you get a stand of cotton all over your farm or a stand of corn, if you want to prosper and not defect it no way, you better keep your plow out the field when the ground's wet or you'll ruin your crop in its growth. Plow that land wet around that stuff you'll disturb the roots and the ground dries, it dries in a hard position. It injures your land to plow it wet, it injures your crop. You must cultivate your crop when the ground is dry. Pile up wet earth around the stalks, it dries and scalds em out. Tear up them roots and the sun run out behind it, that earth hardens away from the roots and there's no moisture can stay in there very long. And it dries out and
crusts up around them roots, smothers them feed roots to that cotton or that corn—it's just a plumb killin and a disadvantage to your crop. For God's sake, don't plow it that way. Wait till the ground dries.

But he wouldn't wait. He was in a hurry. I don't know what old man Jim Barbour meant by havin me and John Thomas plow them Boy Dixies around that cotton with that wing settin to that row and just pilin up dirt to one side, then go to the other end and turn right around and that wing right to that row again. Makin a list around that cotton, coverin up the grass and vegetation around the stalks. If he'd a done it in dry weather it wouldn't have hurt at all. In a few days, by plowin that ground when it was wet—I could take up a handful of that dirt after we plowed it and squeeze it up tight to a ball in my hand, pitch it up and catch it and it wouldn't bust, too much water in it, it aint goin to bust, it'll hold. You hurtin that cotton, you hurtin that corn. He oughta made twenty bales of cotton off of that farm that year but when he wound up he didn't get but thirteen bales. I seed it gathered every day—I weren't workin for him durin pickin time, he'd turned me and John Thomas loose by then; but when I'd go to Apafalya to catch the train, in August, after I left him the third day of August and was goin to my job down between Stillwell and DeGrasse, at the sawmill, I seed his hands pick that crop and I heard em say what he made that year—nothin but thirteen bales of cotton when he oughta made at least twenty. His cotton done come up short and thin, pitiful plants. I seed it myself travelin backwards and forwards through the month of August.

Me and John knowed it would injure his crop to plow it like he told us, we had the experience of a crop—I was right at grown and John was older than I was. But it weren't no use to tell that white man nothin. He runnin his business and we had to do what he said do. He'd a told us, if we told him, “Mr. Barbour, that's ruinin your crop”—“Well, plow it, plow it.” If he hire you to work, you just go on and work, that's all you can do. He tell you to plow it, or whatever he say do, and you workin by the day, just go on and do it, you hired to him and you might not be seein any of that money your labor is drawin. If he ruins his stuff, you aint to blame. It weren't none of my business: he put me out there to plow it and he oughta been capable of the knowledge to know hisself what to do in that situation. And if he didn't know he could have asked me.
But he didn't ask, didn't expect a nigger to have any idea about it one way or the other. He was a old white man. He had several children and they was grown. Some of em was in California at that time.

So, two or three days after we done that work, the cotton started to turn yellow; it went on down, yellowed up and throwed off the fruit, parched up considerably. And he made just thirteen bales of cotton off of that crop when he shoulda made twenty, the way he worked. He was a guano salesman and he'd just use any amount of guano he wanted to on his crop. He spoke these words: “Put it down, put it down”—that's guano—“if I don't make enough to pay for it, I've already got enough.”

The way I was treated there, his wife had more dealins with me in some ways than he did. When I first went there, the mornin I walked in, Miss Gertie asked me had I et breakfast.

I said, “No ma'am, I haven't et.”

She give me breakfast—I et three meals a day there, from the first day of January, 1906, up until the third day of August, and if I didn't it was because lunch was brought out in the field or because I was at home on Saturdays and Sundays.

The white lady didn't give me the same food to eat that they et, not all the way through. She fed me mostly on boiled grits and some sort of cornbread. And I et off a table out on the north veranda of the kitchen, up against a wall. I'd sit there and eat, rain or shine, cold or hot. And if it rained it just blowed in there over me. Sometime the wind shaked my back down, and when it weren't shakin me down, it was blowin the food off my plate. And she had a knack of feedin me on sour bread, sour biscuits; I couldn't hardly eat em to save my life. I wasn't used to eatin sour bread. At home and at Mr. Knowland's house I ate straight good biscuits, and at Mr. Knowland's I took my meals in the dinin room.

Sour biscuits, sour bread, that's what they fed me. I didn't like em noway. I told her, one mornin, “Miss Gertie, I can't eat your sour bread. I don't like it at all.”

What the devil good did it do tellin the white lady that? Just kept pilin em up there for me, bout two good biscuits—no ‘bout' to it, just two biscuits, fresh cooked biscuits for breakfast like they et themselves and all else they'd give me was sour biscuits, sour bread. And what reason they had to feed me that way I never learnt. I got so tired of that I partly lost my appetite. At dinner or
night, if she had any cold biscuits left, she'd put em out for me. But my regular diet at breakfast was two good biscuits and three or four, maybe five, sour biscuits. No butter, not a bit, just plain biscuits. Piled them sour biscuits high on a plate and set em out there in spite of redemption; I couldn't stop her. And the way she acted when I told her, she let me know it weren't none of my business to try to stop her. All I could do was tell her in a nice, kind way that I didn't like sour bread. But she paid me no more attention than she paid to a bird eatin crumbs off the ground.

The mornin I wound up with Mr. Barbour, after me and John Thomas had completed what he told us to do—no kicks to come on it; we done followed his orders to the last notch—he sent me home just like I was a little boy. It was in the way he told me—John weren't there that mornin. He hadn't come down from his daddy's because he knowed we was wound up. But I had to be there. I stayed at Uncle Obie's: me and John slept on the bed together every night God sent from the first day of January, 1906, until the third day of August, except maybe I'd take a notion to run off and go over to Cousin Lark Shaw's and be with his folks, spend the night. But very few nights I missed stayin at Uncle Obie's. Cousin Lark was livin on Mr. Ruel Akers' place; it weren't over a mile. But I didn't go over there three times. I stayed with John Thomas. Mr. Barbour had me hired by the month and he had that place prepared up there for me to sleep at Uncle Obie's. It was part of the deal. And Uncle Obie was plowin a horse, durin the day, on a small farm under Mr. Barbour's jurisdiction.