The Land(32)

I turned away.

“They’ll do it,” he assured me, “and even if you lived here on this land all your life, white folks come after you, I don’t know if even I could stop them from killing you, that’s what they had in mind.” My daddy put his hand on my shoulder and I winced. If my daddy noticed, he didn’t mention it. “Paul, listen and hear what I’m saying. Look at me, boy.”

Reluctantly, I did so.

“This here is a white man’s country, and long as you stay colored, you’ll never get anyplace using your fists. All using your fists’ll get you, leastways against a white man, is hanged or worse, if you can think on that. So you best be thinking on putting that steel-trap mind of yours to work. Use your head, Paul-Edward, not your fists. You hear me, boy?”

I stood then without answering and moved away. My daddy got up as well. “You go ahead, you stay angry if you want, but you remember what I said.” He waited as if expecting me to say something. I didn’t. My daddy hesitated. Then he said, “I was going to give this to you tomorrow, on Christmas Day, but I’m figuring I’d best give it to you now.” He pulled a ring from his finger and I knew right away which ring it was. It was made of gold and had one stone at its center. “I’ve given each of my boys a ring, and this one’s for you. It’s got meaning to it for me, and I want you to have it now.”

“What meaning?” I asked.

“It was my daddy’s ring.” He held it out to me, but I didn’t move to take it. My daddy then took my hand and dropped the ring into my palm.

I looked at my daddy and remained silent.

My daddy accepted the silence with a nod. “You keep the lantern and get on home to your mama and let her see to your back. It’ll be Christmas soon.”

“I don’t need your lantern.”

“I expect you do. It’ll light your way. And remember, Paul, your head, not your fists.” My daddy walked away then, and when he was gone, I started to throw the ring as hard as I could after him. But I thought better of it. I gazed upon the ring. I had seen the ring on my daddy’s hand, and it had been worn by his daddy. Now it was mine. I didn’t want to think on what that meant, not with my back seared through like it was. For a long while I sat by that creek holding that ring and thinking on what had happened. Finally I slipped the ring into my pocket and blew out the lantern light. I saw Christmas in alone.





It was morning when I went to my mama’s house. I was aching all over, and my back was stiff. I could hardly walk. The dawn had just broken, but Cassie was sitting there on the front steps waiting for me. She wore her nightgown still, and she had a shawl around her shoulders. Her arms were folded across her chest, and she was shivering. “So you thought you’d make your mama worry about you all night, huh?” she asked as I approached.

I shrugged off the question and put one to her instead. “How long you been sitting out here?”

“Too long. What’s the matter with you, staying away all night? Especially after what I heard happened over at that barn yesterday. Don’t you think your mama was worried?”

“Wasn’t thinking about her.”

“Well, that’s right plain. Howard and I got here last night, and Mama was sitting here all by herself, just sitting there in that rocker inside with her Christmas dinner cooking, waiting on you.”

“Where is Howard, anyway?” I asked, glancing toward the house.

“Where he’s supposed to be!” snapped Cassie. “In bed asleep.”

“You ought to be in there with him.”

“Well, I’d like to be, but how I’m supposed to sleep with you out wandering those woods on Christmas Eve? I started to come looking for you myself, because I knew where you’d most likely be, but Howard and Mama wouldn’t let me go stumbling off in those woods.”

“I wouldn’t think so. Aren’t you supposed to be having a baby?”

“You know I am, and don’t go changing the subject. I can still whip your little bottom.”

I smiled and sat down on the step beside her.

“How you feel?”

“I’m all right.”

“You look terrible. You were walking like an old man.”

“Thanks. I feel like one.”

Cassie pushed my hair back from my forehead. “From what I heard, our daddy used a strap. He couldn’t’ve done this here. Whose fist landed this punch?”

“Tell the truth, I got whipped on so much yesterday, I’ve got no idea.”

“How’s your back?”

“Raw.”

“We’d better get some salve on it. Course, it would’ve been better going on last night.”