Three Days Before the Shooting ... (209 page)

“I didn’t want to touch that woman, so I yelled for somebody who knew her to come forward and get her out of there. Because even after I had calmed them a bit, she kept her death grip on you and was screaming, and Sister Bearmasher still had all that red hair wound round her arm and wouldn’t let go. Finally a woman named Lula Strothers came through and started to talk to her like you’d talk to a baby and she gave you up. I’m expecting the police or some of her folks by now, but luckily none of them had come out to laugh at us that night. So Bliss, I got you into some of the women’s hands and me and Sister Bearmasher got into the woman’s rubber-tired buggy and rode off into town. She had two snow-white horses hitched to it, and luckily I had handled horses as a boy, because they were almost wild. And she was screaming and they reared and pitched until I could switch them around; then they hit that midnight road for a fare-thee-well.

“The woman is yelling, trying to make them smash us up, and cursing like a trooper and calling for you—though by the name of Cudworth—while Sister Bearmasher is still got her bound up by the hair. It was dark of the moon, Bliss, and a country road, and we took every curve on two wheels. Yes, and when we crossed a little wooden bridge it sounded like a burst of rifle fire. It seemed like those horses were rushing me to trouble so fast that I’d already be there before I could think of what I was going to say. How on earth was I going to explain what had happened, with that woman there to tell the sheriff something different—with her just
being with
us more important than the truth? I thought about Sister Bearmasher’s question about who the man was that had been picked to die, and I tell you, Bliss, I thought that man was me. There I was, hunched over and holding on to those reins for dear life, and those mad animals frothing and foaming
in the dark so that the spray from their bits was about to give us a bath and just charging us into trouble. I could have taken a turn away from town, but that would’ve only made it worse, putting the whole church in danger. So I was bound to go ahead since I was the minister responsible for their bodies as well as their souls. Sister Bearmasher was the only calm one in that carriage. She’s talking to that woman as polite as if she was waiting on table or massaging her feet or something. And all the time she’s still wound up in the woman’s hair.

“But the woman wouldn’t stop screaming, Bliss; and she’s cussing some of the worst oaths that ever fell from the lips of man. And at a time when we’re flying through the dark and I can see the eyes of wild things shining out at us, at first up ahead, then disappearing. And the sound of the galloping those horses made! They were hitting a lick on that road like they were in a battle charge.

“‘Revern’?’ Sister Bearmasher yelled over to me.

“‘Yes, Sister?’ I called back over to her.

“‘I say, are you praying?’

“‘Praying,’ I yelled. ‘Sister, my whole body and soul is crying out to God, but it’s about as much as I can do to hold on to these devilish reins. You just keep that woman’s hands from scratching at my face.’

“Well, Bliss, about that time we hit a straightaway, rolling past some fields, and way off to one side I looked and saw somebody’s barn on fire. It was like a dream, Bliss. There we was making better time than the Hamiltonian, with foam flying, the woman screeching, leather straining, hooves pounding and Sister Bearmasher no longer talking to the woman but moaning a prayer like she’s bending over a washtub somewhere on a peaceful sunny morning. And managing to sound so through all that rushing air. And then, there it was, way off yonder across the dark fields, that big barn filling the night with silent flames. It was too far to see if anyone was there to know about it, and it was too big for anybody except us not to see it; and as we raced on there seemed no possible way to miss it burning across the night. We seemed to wheel around it, the earth was so flat and the road so long and winding. Lonesome, Bliss; that sight was lonesome. Way yonder, isolated and lighting up the sky like a solitary torch. And then as we swung around a curve where the road swept into a lane of trees, I looked through the flickering of the trees and saw it give way and collapse. Then all at once the flames sent a big cloud of sparks to sweep the sky. Poor man, I thought, poor man, as that buggy hit a rough stretch of road. Then I was praying. Boy, I was really praying. I said, ‘Lord, bless these bits, these bridles and these reins. Lord, please keep these thin wheels and rubber tires hugging firm to your solid ground, and Lord, bless these hames, these cruppers, and this carriage tongue. Bless the breast-straps, Lord and these straining leather belly-bands.’ And Bliss, I listened to those pounding hoofbeats and felt those horses trying to snatch my arms clear out of their sockets and I said, ‘Yea, Lord, and bless this wiffle tree.’ Then I thought about that fire and looked over at the white woman and finally I
prayed, ‘Lord, please bless this wild redheaded woman and that man back there with that burning barn. And Lord, since you know all about Sister Bearmasher and me, all we ask is that you please just keep us steady in your sight.’

“Those horses moved, Bliss. Zip, and we’re through the land and passing through a damp place like a swamp, then up a hill through a burst of heat. And all the time, Bliss …”

The voice had ceased. Then the Senator heard, “Bliss, are you there, boy?”

“Still here,” the Senator said from far away. “Don’t stop. I hear.”

Then through his blurring eyes he saw the dark shape come closer, and now the voice sounded small as though Hickman stood on a hill somewhere inside his head.

“I say, Bliss, that all the time I should have been praying for you, back there all torn up inside by those women’s hands. Because, after all, a lot of prayer and sweat and dedication had gone into that buggy along with the money-greed and show-off pride. Because it held together through all that rough ride even though its wheels were humming like guitar strings, and it took me and Sister Bear-masher to jail and a pretty hot time before they let us go. So there between a baby, a buggy, and a burning barn I prayed the wrong prayer. I left you out Bliss, and I guess right then and there you started to wander….”

Hickman leaned closer now, gazing into the quiet face.

The Senator slept.

THE ROOF, THE STEEPLE AND THE PEOPLE

QUARTERLY REVIEW OF LITERATURE
10 (1960): 115–28

Bliss, Daddy Hickman said, you keep asking me to take you even though I keep telling you that folks dont like to see preachers hanging around a place they think of as one of the Devil’s hangouts. All right, so now I’m going to take you so you can see for yourself, and you’ll see that its just like the world—full of sinners and with a few believers, a few good folks and a heap of mixed-up and bad ones. Yes, and beyond the fun of sitting there looking at the marvelous happenings in the dark, there’s all the same old snares and delusions we have to side-step everyday right out here in the bright sunlight. Because you see, Bliss, it’s not so much a matter of where you
are
as what you
see…
.

Yes, sir, I said.

No, dont agree too quick, Bliss; wait until you understand. But like old Luke says, “The light of the body is the eye,” so you want to be careful that the light that your eye lets into you isn’t the light of darkness. I mean you always have to be sure that you
see
what you’re looking at.

I nodded my head, watching his eyes. I could see him studying the Word as he talked.

That’s right, he said, many times you will have to preach goodness out of badness, little boy. Yes, and hope out of hopelessness. God made the world and gave it a chance, and when it’s bad we have to remember that it’s still his plan for it to be redeemed through the striving of a few good women and men. So come on, we’re going to walk down there and take us a good look. We’re going to do it in style too, with some popcorn and peanuts and some crackerjacks and candy bars. You might as well get some idea of what you will have to fight against, because I dont believe you can really lead folks if you never have to face up to any of the temptations they face. Christ had to put on the flesh, Bliss; you understand?

Yes, sir.

But wait here a second, Bliss—

He looked deep into me and I felt a tremor. Sir? I said.

His eyes became sad as he hesitated, then:

Now dont think this is going to become a habit, Bliss. I know you’re going to like being in there looking in the dark, even though you have to climb up those filthy pissy stairs to get there. Oh yes, you’re going to enjoy looking at the pictures just about like I used to enjoy being up there on the bandstand playing music for folks to enjoy themselves back there in my olden days. Yes, you’re going to like looking at the pictures, most likely you’re going to be bugeyed with the excitement; but I’m telling you right now that it’s one of those pleasures we preachers have to leave to other folks. And I’ll tell you why, little preacher: too much looking at those pictures is going to have a lot of folks raising a crop of confusion. The show hasn’t been here but a short while but I can see it coming already. Because folks are getting themselves mixed up with those shadows spread out against the wall, with people that are no more than some smoke drifting up from hell or pouring out of a bottle. So they lose touch with who they’re supposed to be, Bliss. They forget to be what the Book tells them they were meant to be—and that’s in God’s
own
image. The preacher’s job, his main job, Bliss, is to help folks find themselves and to keep reminding them to remember who they are. So you see, those pictures can go against our purpose. If they look at those shows too often they’ll get all mixed up with so many of those shadows that they’ll lose their way. They wont know who they
are
is what I mean. So you see, if we start going to the picture-show all the time, folks will think we’re going to the devil and backsliding from what we preach. We have to set them an example, Bliss; so we’re going in there for the first and last time—

Now dont look at me like that; I know it seems like everytime a preacher turns around he has to give up something else. But, Bliss, there’s a benefit in it too; because pretty soon he develops control over himself.
Self-control’s
the word. That’s right, you develop discipline, and you live so you can feel the grain of things and you learn to taste the sweet that’s in the bitter and you live more deeply and earnestly. A man doesn’t live just one life, Bliss, he lives more lives than a cat—only he doesn’t like to face it because the bitter is there nine times nine, right along with the sweet he wants all the time. So he forgets.

You too, Daddy Hickman? I said, Do you have more than one life?

He smiled down at me,

Me too, Bliss, he said. Me too.

But how? How can they have nine lives and not know it?

They forget and wander on, Bliss. But let’s us leave this now and go face up to those shadows. Maybe the Master meant for them to show us some of the many sides of the old good-bad. I know, Bliss, you dont understand that, but you will, boy, you will….

Ah, but by then Body had brought the news:

We were sitting on the porch-edge eating peanuts, gooberpeas, as Deacon Wilhite called them. Discarded hulls littered the ground below the contented dangling of our feet. We were barefoot, I was allowed to be that day, and in overalls. A flock of sparrows rested on the strands of electric wire across the unpaved road, darting down from time to time and sending up little clouds of dust. Body was humming as he chewed. Except in church we were always together, he was my right hand. Body said,

Bliss, you see that thing they all talking about?

Who, I said.

All the kids. You see it yet?

Seen what, Body. Why do you always start preaching before you state your text?

You the preacher, aint you? Look like to me a preacher’d
know
what a man is talking about.

I looked at him hard and he grinned, trying to keep his face straight.

You ought to know where all the words come from, even before anybody starts to talk. Preachers is suppose to see visions and things, aint they?

Now don’t start playing around with God’s work, I warned him. Like Daddy Hickman says, Everybody has to die and pay their bills—Have I seen what?

That thing Sammy Leaderman’s got to play with. It makes pictures.

No, I haven’t. You mean a kodak? I’ve seen one of those. Daddy Hickman has him a big one. Made like a box with little pearly glass windows in it and one round one, like an eye.

He shook his head. I put down the peanuts and fitted my fingers together. I said,

Here’s the roof
,
  
Here’s the steeple
,
   
Open it up and see
    
the people
.

Body sneered. That steeple’s got dirt under the finger nails, why dont you wash your hands? You think I’m a baby? Lots of folks have those kodaks, this here is something different.

Well, what is it then?

I dont rightly know, he said. I just heard some guys talking about it down at the liberty stable. But they was white and I didn’t want to ask them any questions. I rather be ignorant than ask them anything.

So why didn’t you ask Sammy, he aint white.

Naw, he a Jew; but he looks white, and sometimes he acts white too. Specially when he’s with some of those white guys.

He always talks to me, I said, calls me
rabbi
.

The doubt came into Body’s eyes like a thin cloud. He frowned. He was my right hand and I could feel his doubt.

You look white too, Rev. Why you let him call you ‘rabbit’?

I looked away, toward the dusting birds.

Body, can’t you hear? I said he calls me
rabbi
.

Oh, it sounds like my little brother trying to spell rabbit. Re-abbi-tee,
rabbit
, he say. He a fool, man.