I Am Not Sidney Poitier (24 page)

“Who’s that up there?” the man calls from the water.

I draw my pistol and point it at the man’s chest as he climbs naked up the hill toward me.

“Excuse me, brother, but there seems to be a misunderstanding here. That horse, the one you’re putting a saddle on, belongs to me.” He holds his hat over his private parts.

“We’re trading,” I say. I nod over to my palomino.

“A trade usually requires agreement, wouldn’t you say?”

“I don’t have time for agreement. My horse is a good one. You’ll find that out once he’s rested.”

“I’m sure that’s true, brother. So, why don’t you sit here for a while and have some coffee and let him rest?”

“Don’t have time.”

“My name is Jeremiah Cheeseboro and I’m a man of the cloth. Does that make any difference to you, friend?”

“Another day it might.”

The man makes a move toward his clothes.

“That’s far enough,” I say and pull back the hammer on my nickel-finished peacemaker pistol.

“I was just reaching for my drawers,” he says. “I’m feeling a little exposed out here in my altogether, if you know what I mean.”

“You’re doing just fine.”

“So, you’re just going to steal my horse,” he says.

“Trade.”

“You say.”

“I say. Now, why don’t you just walk on back down that trail and get in that water.”

“I’m clean enough,” he says.

“Go on.”

“You’re no Christian, brother,” he says as he shuffles backward to the water and in. “Your deeds will catch up to you.”

“Better them than the posse that’s chasing me,” I say. I climb onto the back of the black horse, give a final nod to the preacher, and then gallop away.

I’m seeing this from high above, like a god, only shorter, I suppose. That preacher from the watering hole is dressed in black, dusty from the trail, dismounting and tying my palomino to the post in front of a livery. The preacher is minding his own business, his big Bible under his arm, no, held to his chest. He makes his way down the side of the livery to the back door of a saloon.

He takes off his hat and bows to a young boy. “Son, I would be much obliged if you would see fit to take my two bits into this here establishment and procure for me a bit of the spirits.”

The boy stares at him, dumbfounded.

“I want you to go in and buy me a whiskey.”

“Why didn’t you say that?”

“I’m sorry, lad. I’m afraid I overestimated your ability to comprehend simple language.”

“What?”

“I didn’t realize that you’re stupid.”

The boy goes inside and slams the door.

The preacher walks back to the street where he finds his horse encircled by dirty, dusty white men. “Is this here your horse?” a lanky man asks, stepping close and spitting tobacco juice onto the preacher’s shoes.

“Messy,” the preacher says.

“I asked you a question,” the white man says. “I asked you if’n this here horse is yourn.”

“Not exactly, brother, not. You see I was baptizing my body anew to the knowledge of the Lord when my own horse was stolen by a cowardly heathen, and that heathen left this wretched animal in the place of my own. He was almost lame when he was delivered unto me, but prayer, brother, good old prayer restored him to his present condition of health. My name is Jeremiah Cheeseboro, conveyor of the gospel, a shepherd of men’s souls.”

“Should we shoot him now or later?” asks a man standing on the other side of the palomino.

“I wouldn’t shoot me at all,” the preacher says.

The lanky man spits more juice onto the preacher’s boots. “And why is that, Mr. man of the cloth?”

“Because it is clear to me that you are searching for the very heathen what stole my horse.”

“Do you know where Buck is?”

“I didn’t even know his name. Thank you for telling me. But if I find him, I’ll be happy to inform you and your associates of his whereabouts.”

The man looks at the other thugs. “I like you, preacher man.”

“Thank you. I like you, too.”

“If you do find out where Buck is, you ride on out to Rusty Gulch and tell Mr. DeChenney.”

“DeChenney.”

“You do that?”

“As sure as Moses floated to safety in a basket.”

“Let him go,” he says to the other white men.

They all step away and let the preacher mount the palomino.

The lanky man says, “Preacher, if’n I see you again and you ain’t got no information for me, I’ll have to kill you.”

“I sincerely thank you for your overwhelming Christian generosity of spirit,” the preacher says and canters away.

While I’m aimlessly riding around the vast and mysterious landscape, things are happening at the camp of the newly freed slaves. White men, eleven of them, no, fifteen of them gather on horseback at the edge of the dark woods.

The white men rein their horses in tight circles and then charge the camp, wildly galloping down the sloping meadow, hooting and shouting. Moonlight. Black doughnuts around rocks. Moonlight. Women scream. Moonlight. Children cry out. A few men take up their few arms and are shot for the trouble. Perhaps because of the darkness, perhaps because of their drunkenness, the marauders kill only three people—two men and a young boy. They wreck a covered wagon, upset it, and leave it ablaze, sending gray smoke into the purple sky. The white men take the strongbox. Women weep. Men weep.

At sunrise I approach the wagon train. From the ridge I can see the smoke rising from the burnt wagon. I kick the black horse and gallop into the camp. My hat blows off as I dismount while the black horse is still running. I don’t ask what happened; I don’t need to ask.

“How many were there?” I survey the damage—the three bodies covered from the neck down some yards away. The faces are ashen, unreal seeming. The dead boy looks younger the longer I study him.

“I don’t know, Buck,” one of the men says. “It was quiet and peaceful and then all hell broke loose. Nothing but the flash of powder everywhere and bullets whizzing every which way.”

While I stand there listening and not listening, someone taps on my shoulder. I turn around to find that preacher from the watering hole. He doesn’t say anything. I can see the anger in his clenched jaw and gritted teeth, and then he rears back and punches me square on the jaw.

I wake up and I’m confused; sunlight cuts through haze and my dusty back window. I come fully awake to the nudging and pointy-fingered prodding of Sister Irenaeus. She had the driver’s-side door of my Skylark open and had pushed forward the driver’s seat.

“Mr. Poitier, wake up,” she said. “It is time to work. It’s time for you to build our church.”

“What are you talking about? I’m on my way to California.”

“You have to build our church. That is why the Lord has sent you to us poor sisters.”

“I really believe you misunderstood him,” I said. “I don’t know how to build anything, not even a doghouse.”

“We don’t need a doghouse. We don’t have a dog. We need a church, and you have been sent to build it.”

I moved her away and out of the car and followed her into the chill of the morning. Whether it was the previous day’s hard work on the roof, I do not know, but I felt stiff, creaky, considerably older. I did not have on a shirt and my dark skin glistened; I could feel it glistening, and I became aware of my partial nakedness. I leaned back into the car and grabbed a T-shirt, pulled it on while she pointed with an open hand past the chicken coop.

“It will be built over there,” she said.

Sister Irenaeus led me across the yard, past the chicken coop where Sisters Eusebius and Firmilian were trying to stretch and staple wire netting about twenty yards on to a large clearing. “Here,” she said. “You will build it here, and we will help you.”

I laughed. “Sister, I told you, I don’t know how to build anything, much less a building. No, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll fix my car and get back on the road before you ask me to turn water into wine.”

The other sisters had formed in a huddle behind us. They said nothing, neither to me nor to each other. I smiled weakly as I stepped by them and back toward the chicken coop. Sister Irenaeus and the others followed me back to my car where they hovered like bees making no sound, and yet I could feel them buzzing.

As suggested in my trusty car-service manual, tightening the belts was not so difficult. I used my lug wrench as a pry bar and stuck it between the alternator and the water pump. While I was tightening the bolt on the alternator bracket, contorting my body to keep sufficient pressure on the bar to keep the belt taut, I noticed the faces of the sisters under the hood with me, staring at my progress. I managed to get the bolt tight, and they all said, “ahhhh,” as I pulled away.

“You are good with tools,” Sister Irenaeus said.

“Nice try, Sister,” I said.

I tossed my tools in the trunk and shut it, then fell in behind the wheel. I turned the key and the engine started and ran smoothly, at least as smoothly as it ever had. I decided that it was best to say good-bye from inside the car, that I might feel less guilt if I were already rolling away, as opposed to a more formal standing, hand-shaking farewell. Even then I laughed at myself, wondering why I should feel guilt at all. For what? Refusing to perform a task I was incapable of doing? I drove away. I leaned out the window and waved as I approached the bend in the dirt drive. They did not wave, but looked to the sky. The mere thought of them praying should have been enough to keep me driving and yet their faces were so innocent, so open, so, so stupid. I got to the highway and drove back toward Smuteye.

My stomach was twisted with hunger, and so I stopped at the sadly, but no doubt aptly, named Smuteye Diner. It was not a railcar, not even a large Airstream trailer, but a sad rectangle of a mobile home, set up on cinder blocks with a bent set of prefab metal stairs. I entered and sat at the counter.

A large woman turned to me and smiled. “Food?” she asked.

“Please,” I said.

She pointed over her broad shoulder at the menu hand printed with a marker on a poster board.

“What’s good?” I asked.

“It’s all good,” she said. “At least it’s all the same.”

“I’ll have two scrambled eggs.”

“Bacon or sausage?”