The Bible Salesman (7 page)
After her bedtime, Caroline, almost asleep, lay on the cot against the bedroom wall, still afraid for Henry, listening for talk and movement.
“Let’s get you a fresh diaper,” said Aunt Dorie to Henry.
“Look,” said Uncle Jack. “He’s got a woody.”
“Jack. You shouldn’t be talking that way. Caroline might be awake.”
“She’s asleep. He’d rather play with that thing than win money.”
“Jack! Be quiet.”
Caroline wondered if a woody was something caused by Henry almost drowning. What was he playing with? She saw a small piece of wood stuck to his side somehow. She thought about the big plank that killed her daddy, and the man who drove the truck.
H
enry, in Aunt Dorie’s lap, wore the blue pajamas that Santa Claus had brought him. Aunt Dorie sat up in bed. He listened as she finished the story of Joseph and his coat of many colors from
The Children’s Book of Bible Stories
, and then as she read aloud to him from a thin, blue book: “All the king’s horses and all the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again.”
Jack, propped up on the other side of the bed, read the newspaper, folded so he could hold it in one hand. A cigarillo and a kitchen match hung between his lips.
“Why couldn’t they put him together?” Henry asked Dorie.
“He was broke.”
“Why was he bloke?”
“He fell off a wall.”
“Why?”
“He just did.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know. It doesn’t say, sweetie.”
“Read it again.”
Dorie read the nursery rhyme.
“Who was the king?”
“He was the head man in England.”
“Did he know Moses?”
“I don’t think he did.”
“Did God know the king?”
“I guess he did. Yes, he did. God knows everybody.”
“Did Jesus know the king?”
“I don’t know. I don’t think so. He was at a different time.”
Later, after Henry was asleep on his thick pallet, Jack looked over. “I just think you should read him nursery rhymes and comic books. That Bible-story book . . .”
“What?”
“Where’s it at?”
“What?”
“That book of Bible stories.”
“Right here on the table.”
“Hand it here. Which one were you on?”
“Joseph. It’s from the Bible, Jack. Let’s don’t do this again now,” said Dorie.
“I’ll just open it. Okay. So here we go. Adam and Eve. Poor them.”
“Let’s don’t do this in front of Henry.”
“He’s asleep.”
“You read to him if you don’t like what I read.”
“I’ll tell him some stories. And you show me a man that won’t eat a apple hanging in his own yard and I’ll show you a . . . wimpy man.”
The next night, in bed, Dorie rested her head back with her eyes closed. Henry sat in Uncle Jack’s lap, facing him.
“Now,” said Uncle Jack. “Once upon a time there was this old woman lived way out in the woods by herself, and every night she cooked biscuits and gravy for supper, and while she was cooking she’d go to the door and say, ‘Who’s a-coming to eat biscuits and gravy with me tonight?’ And nobody ever answered, except one night this voice from way off says, ‘I’m a-coming.’ So she went back inside and started fixing biscuits and gravy, then in a little bit went back to the door and said, ‘Who’s a-coming to eat biscuits and gravy with me tonight?’ And not that far off a voice says, ‘I’m a-coming.’ So she went back in and finished up with the biscuits and gravy and then came back to the door and said, ‘Who’s a-coming to eat biscuits and gravy with me tonight?’ and right around the corner of the house this voice said,
‘I’m
a-coming,’ and she went back in and this big, tall man followed her in the door. He had long hair, and long fingernails, and long teeth. So the old woman says, ‘Why you got those long fingernails?’ and he said, ‘To dig graves with.’ And she said, ‘Why you got that long hair?’ and he said, ‘To lay graves with.’ So then she said, ‘Why you got those long teeth?’ ”
Henry’s head leaned forward.
“To EAT YOU UP!”
Henry jumped, grinned. “Tell it again.”
Henry stood on the stool at the woodstove. Uncle Jack handed him the salt shaker to sprinkle the two rabbits, each split down the middle, lying on a big piece of wax paper. In the big black frying pan, bacon grease was beginning to fizzle.
“Okay, I’m going to just drop them in there. Good. Now. We’ll just wait till they’re done, and then we can dress them up fancy. You can sit at the table now.”
Uncle Jack cut open a lemon with the sharp kitchen knife.
When the rabbits were done on one side he turned them over with a fork, and then when they were done on that side he forked them to a plate and placed them in front of Henry at the table. “Now. We got all our stuff ready here. Get you a handful of them crushed pecans and sprinkle them on. Good. Now I’ll pour this lemon juice in the frying pan, and let’s let it heat for about a minute. Okay. Now. We stir it good. There you go. This is going to be good. Okay, I’m going to pour this over the rabbit, and we got a little scraped lemon peel I’m going to sprinkle on, then these real thin lemon slices. Now, don’t that look good?
“Dorie. Dorie, come and get it. Come look what me and Henry cooked.”
T
hree colored women dressed in white uniforms sat in the back of the trolley. Most of the other people were dressed up. Aunt Ruth, who was small, had let Caroline dress up in one of her dresses. Henry wore his coat and tie, and Aunt Dorie wore a Sunday dress. The trolley was so full that Henry sat in Dorie’s lap.
“Is it like the museum in Raleigh?” Dorie asked Jack.
“Not exactly. You’ll see.”
“I’m just not sure about this.” Somebody had loaned him a white jacket cut off at the waist. He was up to one of his schemes. The jacket and a little card he’d gotten from somewhere could get them all into the Electra — a special building that sometimes admitted only club members or high-priced ticket buyers. Jack was dressed as a cook, or waiter, a helper of some sort.
A low bridge crossed the channel, only wide enough for the trolley tracks, and Henry looked out at the water and boats. Tall masts with white sails and shiny wooden motorboats moved about. When the motorboats went fast, water slashed up from both sides in front.
“They might not ever open it up to cars,” said Jack. “They’re going to keep it special. And don’t y’all be ashamed. We’re as good as any of these people.”
When they stepped down the trolley steps on Swan Island they were standing in a small station like the one they’d just left. The station was across the street from the house of the famous Papa John McNeill, the founder of McNeill, the town back across the channel. They could trolley around the island, but walking was cheaper.
They’d driven down in the truck that day, about an hour’s drive, from Simmons to McNeill, then over on the trolley to Swan Island to see a building that would be all lit up with electricity, and to hear a big band that would play inside. It was a famous place, Uncle Jack said. Henry thought he’d be able to see water surrounding the island, but standing in the trolley station he couldn’t see water anywhere. Jack asked a man in a uniform for directions. The man told them about five blocks and pointed. As they walked, Henry looked on the ground for wooden play blocks. After a while, he stared at the biggest building besides a city building he’d ever seen. It was three levels high, each of the top two levels a little less wide than the one below it, and on the very top was a tower with windows. He could hear music coming from inside. Uncle Jack led them up a wide set of stairs to a porch that went all the way around the building. A short line of people waited at a door. A bald-headed man sat behind a table. He waved at Jack.
“You-all wait right here for a minute,” said Uncle Jack. He stood in line and handed the man a card when his time came. Then he motioned for them to come with him.
Inside was a large, open space with a shiny floor. At one end sat a raised stage with a giant clamshell behind it.
Four men on the stage played piano, guitar, bass fiddle, and trumpet. Caroline grabbed Henry’s hand. Polished, dark wood columns stood around the large, open dance area. Red, white, and blue streamers hung from the ceiling. Electric lights brightened everything, and the late daylight shone through high windows in the west wall. As Henry looked up, he turned in a half circle.
Women and men stood talking. Some of the women had little clips holding back their shiny hair. The men wore coats and ties. No woman had a scarf on her head, and no man had on just a T-shirt. Some, holding small, thick glasses in their hands, occasionally glanced at Henry and Caroline.
Jack led them onto the porch. And there, just beyond a field of white sand, lay the ocean. Henry thought about Jesus walking on the sea, calming the waters during that terrible storm.
“Look,” said Dorie. “Look at that screen. That’s for a movie, ain’t it?”
A big movie screen stood in the shallow surf. Men in white coats were placing beach chairs on the beach between the Electra and the screen.
“Sure is,” said Jack. “You-all go get some food. I need to do something over yonder.” Inside, Henry, Caroline, and Aunt Dorie filled their plates with small red potatoes, string beans, fish that wasn’t fried, small pieces of all-mixed-together lettuce and tomato and cucumber, and big rolls. They sat on the steps and ate together. Uncle Jack was setting up chairs. He turned and waved to them.
Henry watched and listened to the dressed-up people talk and laugh. He didn’t see many other children except for three colored boys and a colored girl with their mama, who was dressed in white. He stepped back inside the door and watched as twenty or thirty men dressed in black suits prepared to make music. They moved with purpose and ease — like they might be from New York.
Then the music commenced: a fast song, a brass sound that filled every space in the room, drums in his chest. People took to the dance floor. Henry stood still. Caroline, Jack, and Dorie came in and stopped beside him. Caroline leaned against him.
When a slow, quieter song started, Jack took Dorie’s hand and said, “Come on, honey. Let’s give it a try.”
“Jack, you know I can’t dance.”
“You know good and well there ain’t nobody from the church all the way down here.”
“I can’t do it, Jack. I’m not supposed to.”
“Well, you’re going to watch the movie, ain’t you?”
“Nobody’s said anything about movies.”
“Yet. They’ll get to it.”
As night came on, people wandered out to find seats on the beach and others gathered on the sand off to the side of the beach chairs. Henry, Caroline, Jack, and Dorie walked down the steps.
Jack said, “Let’s leave our shoes under the steps.”
“I’m wearing hose,” said Dorie.
“So? Let’s take off our shoes and socks, boys and girls.”
Henry sat on the bottom step and pulled off his shoes and socks. He watched Aunt Dorie. She had turned her back and was taking off her stockings. He stuffed the socks into the shoes and felt the sand beneath his feet, cool.
Evening had calmed the ocean. They found a place near the beach chairs and sat on the sand without a blanket or quilt like some others had, and suddenly a bright light was thrown upon the movie screen and Henry followed the light back to its source — a machine he’d seen on a platform. A man stood behind the machine. The images on the screen were of men running across a field in a war and then of a big city. The main film then began, a story about a man in a fancy suit and a woman who almost had a halo. She had shiny earbobs and was either smiling or sad.
As they watched the movie, a gigantic, full, dull orange moon crept up out of the ocean as if to command armies, and people pointed at it, and Henry felt like it was so close that he could walk to the edge of the water and hold out his hands, palms up, and feel heat from the deep orange glow, then ride out in a rowboat along the path of reflections on the water, hold up an oar, and touch it, feel the oar against the crust.
The woman and the man were dancing up on the screen, and Jack said to him and Caroline, “Y’all sit right here,” and he reached and pulled Dorie up by her hand. He led her over to a place on the beach that put the full moon right behind them, took her in his arms. They danced slow just like the people in the movie. They danced in front of the moon and then away and then back in front of it. Henry guessed that this might be the beginning of when Uncle Jack would not drink any more beers and Dorie would dance when Jack wanted to. He guessed that this was what his mama and daddy did before his daddy got hit by the timber.
“What are you thinking about?” asked Caroline.
“The moon.”
“Me too. I was thinking about how it throws out beams of love that go into your heart.”
“It’s like it’s alive and sad.”
Caroline grabbed his arm, hard. “Look.”
Aunt Dorie was motioning for them to come. She was standing with Uncle Jack and two men. The men pointed back toward the Electra, where two policemen talked to another man in a white coat. Uncle Jack jerked his arm from a policeman’s hand. The policeman put his hand on the stick in his belt, and Uncle Jack kept talking.
Aunt Dorie walked toward him and Caroline now. She bent down and said, “We’ve got to go on out front and wait for Uncle Jack.”
There was plenty of room on the trolley going back over to McNeill.
“Some people are going to look down on you no matter what,” Uncle Jack said to Henry and Caroline. “But it takes a sorry son of a bitch to do it who’s rich and in a club and got all he needs to get along and can run a big, fancy showplace like that and make more money than he can burn, and some of them don’t even cut their own goddamn
grass
!”
“Jack, I don’t think —”
“I’m going back over there,” said Jack. The trolley was slowing to a stop. “And I guarantee you they’ll know I was there. Here I bring my entire family, my niece and nephew and —”
“We got to get off, Jack.”
“Chaps my ass. It just chaps my ass.”
“Jack. They ought not to be hearing this.”
“Oh yes they
had
ought to be hearing this.”
