The Voices of Martyrs Read online

  “Apparently, word had escaped to the Scott settlement about the storming of the jail and the justice to be carried out on old Ezekiel Walker. The people of Parsons didn’t care. They wanted the Scott folk to know that any one of them could be next if they stepped out of line or forget their place. Even as the good people of Parsons were dispersing after our … bonfire … word got back to us that the Negroes were arming themselves. For a war. Can’t say that I much blame ’em really, folks just defending themselves and their families. But niggers with guns? No one could have foreseen that. The very notion of that was disconcerting. A stand had to be taken. There had to be respect for the rule of law.

  “Night dusted down to the song of dusk. A hot, sweaty dusk. The night color gave courage to many men who had been different during day hours. Men swarmed about, the hour too late for respectable women and children. It was a motley collection of overalls, thick tan shoes, and felt hats. They weren’t thinking any more, not in the way men usually think. It was as if they were seized by a feeling, almost a presence, bigger than themselves, bigger than Holten Owensby, maybe bigger than Parsons. Like worker bees rushing about serving an unseen queen bee. I don’t know what their intentions were, whether we wanted to secure our town or rush into the Scott settlement with the common goal of beating every Negro in the area. I really think we believed it was more of the former.

  “They reached the crest of the hill where their meager cabins sat like Christ seated in judgment over our town. The people of Parsons labored beneath a feast of a moon. Between bolts of pine trees, oil lamps swayed in marched unison to the flop of their feet along the dusty road. Caught up in the urge that first made Cain splinter his brother’s skull with a stone.

  “The pull of blood. I recognized the quickening of the pulse. The metronome of the hunt. The taste of copper on the tongue. Blood drew them like a thirsty man to honeysuckle.

  “No, not them. Us.

  “The plaintive cackle of chickens first announced their presence as they neared the first farm. A shadow peered from behind the henhouse.

  “‘Evenin’, gen’lmen,’ Jim Archer said, his old shotgun, reminiscent of a Confederate provost’s musket, cradled in his arms like a bouquet he’d come a-courtin’ with. He tanned hides down at the Pruitt Shoe Company. A good man. Never tried to cheat you. He should’ve been running a middle buster, plowing his field, not challenging them.

  “‘Where you going with that gun, nigger?’ Holten asked. I heard the voice as clear as day, yet it sounded as alien as anything I had heard. Angry, distorted, little more than a growl, not in control of his own faculties. Like a puddle of quicksilver, each of them was a drop that pooled together in one unseemly mass. One voice speaking for the whole.

  “‘Thought I might stick around. Use it iffen I have to,’ Jim said in that steady, unintimidated voice of his. By light of day, this might simply have been a man protecting his family’s farms, but that night, right then, he was only a nigger threatening white men with a gun. Part of me wanted to cry, ‘Put the gun down and run, Jim. Don’t be so damned proud.’ But my silence, the conspiracy of silence which kept secrets long buried like cancer eating away from the inside continued to hold reign.

  “‘We takin’ you down, boy.’

  “The thing about quicksilver is that once you drop it, it scatters in little drops that you have to sweep up.

  “But you could never track all the drops.

  “Men pounced on Jim from the surrounding shadows. They jerked his gun high, with only a single shot fired off. Two men held him while others beat him. Others set his henhouse, and then his own house, ablaze. He must’ve sent his family to a neighbor’s house. I could almost hear his wife pleading with his stubborn mule self to join them. Now, the only voice heard was an unsteady, terrified one that cried out to Jesus.

  “‘Southern niggers deserve a genuine lynchin’!’ Holten coaxed, in mincing school mistress fashion, as if to school boys with their primers, all dirty grins and horrid chuckles. He danced about overturned chairs, climbing atop Jim’s hay-filled wagon for a better view. Holten against the flames, the very picture of the devil incarnate, his features, dark and twisted in a wrathful shade of red.

  “Frenzied whoops of carousing, between their cheers, their howls, and their imprecations arose at his suggestion. Even as the smoke seared my nostrils, through the tumbling smoke, buried in the flames, Jim was no longer Jim. No longer human, but some vague threat wrapped in flesh. Clubs smashed his head open with brutal efficiency, the poor cuss. Bloody, unconscious, near death. Lofted into the air, they passed from man to man, a battered ragdoll no one wanted yet everyone wanted a piece of. ‘I got some rope,’ someone yelled. A noose slid around Jim’s blood-slickened neck. As he was hoisted into the air, the rope broke.

  “‘Get stronger rope,’ another voice bellowed. It sounded like one of my neighbors, but again, the voice was distorted. Ugly. Barely human. Jim, however, was none the wiser and long past caring. In order to put the rope about Jim’s neck, someone (I?) stuck his (my?) fingers inside the gaping scalp and lifted his head. What monsters we had become, to think nothing of the fact that my hands were awash in the man’s blood. To drink deep of the violence to quench the thirst for blood.

  “‘Grab hold and pull! Pull for Parsons!’ Holten yelled. We pulled Jim about seven feet off the ground and left him hanging in a grove of mulberries and locusts, a blood-smeared, sambo scarecrow. I drew water from his well. Tepid water, tasting like beech trees and old bucket, but it was wet in my parched throat. Though my thirst remained unabated. The evening had barely begun.

  “We set afire the shacks of poorer Negroes who lived in the surrounding area. The flaming wood skeletons painted the night in amber hues. We stoned and clubbed Negro men, women, and children, whoever we came across. We were a mess of people tramping about in the mud; muddy, despite the fact that it hadn’t rained in quite a spell, but you stomp enough people, your boots’ll get wet just the same.

  “I don’t know if you knew or not, but I was a gunner in the war. Worked as swift as we could. Focused, we were. The labor was meticulous, or so it seemed to the other calvary men. We was always asked, ‘How do you remember what all you have to do in that confusion?’ I became numb to it, if I were ever truly conscious to it to begin with.

  “The key was to concentrate on the work. Experience which came in handy that night. We destroyed any saloon or business that catered to Negroes. We overturned the tables, drank the liquor, broke the windows, then torched the place in view of hundreds of spectators.

  “As the night wore on, the creature we had become had to find new ways to amuse itself. Make no mistake, on the fringes of the chaos, I fed. Blood smeared my lips and dappled my neck. But the blood on me was out of thirst. Primal necessity. No one glanced a second time in my direction. In the shadows of night, however, neighbor reveled with neighbor, spurred on by their own blood sport. We was all a-whoopin’ an’ a-hollerin’; having a gay, ole time of things. We were heady on the intoxication of that night’s pursuits, emboldened by the fine liqueur of fear. I was blood drunk. Fear—ours and theirs—swept us along. Fever infected our brains, and we were a brigade of possessed madmen—grinnin’ devils, teeth looming large and yellow in the amber glow of the torches, going about the business of hell.

  “The frightful din of windows breaking. The clutter and clang of fences being knocked over. The screaming. The caterwauling. Babies crying, mewling, like they were past scared tears and simply awaited what they knew was coming. Or worse. Eyes wide open taking in everything that they saw, they were just too young for their brains to know what to do with the information. Not crying a bit, just staring, with dead eyes, eyes no child should have.

  “Shooting residents as they ran through smoke and flames became a game, monstrous fun, if one were to judge by the laughter, hollering, and clapping. One Negro, in particular, gave us quite the sport of a chase. That crazed fool dashed from his burning home. We fired by the score, not to hit him,
only to scare him into running. I kept waiting for a fox hunting bugle to be blown. He zigzagged between the few buildings that remained untorched. The men fanned out, more amused than perturbed, between the shacks and sheds, eyeing the crawl spaces and nooks that our quarry had to know far better than we. Some men had been foolish enough to follow him directly and were soon tangled up in trash.

  “Unfortunately, for him, his panic at our proximity took him down an alleyway. The nearest three men or so followed him in. He regained his senses long enough to use his head. He smacked the first man on him, knocking him clean out, which gave the rest of them pause, pause enough for him to scamper past them.

  “I found myself rooting, even praying, for him, but only the way you cheer for the hopeless horse in a race. God heard my prayer as well as any made for myself the night I was cornered trying to fight past just as ancient a hate on that fated battlefield so long ago. Only the Negro’s fate was more merciful. All it took was one well-aimed shot. The Negro leapt into the air, his sprawl met with our shouts of approval. As the flames crept toward his body, he writhed, attempted to get up. A few warning shots kept him low. The flames marched on. He looked up at me with his yellow eyes, desperately searching out hope. His veiny hands pulled him away from the flames’ grasp, faster than the fire moved to catch him.

  “Someone shouted that his arms should be broken, see how fast he’d crawl then. A man stepped forward and brought his heavy boot down upon the Negro’s arms. He stomped until a bone poked through the flesh. The terrible snap it made.”

  The scrape of his boots as he paced along his wood floors drew him out of his revelry. The old, rocking bed creaked as she rolled over in her sleep. It neared dawn now. Soon she would wake, full of hope and promise. So often he’d visited those of his line from when he was human. Not to watch over them but to see what he’d missed. To touch, to rekindled, whatever remained of his humanity.

  The story was almost done now.

  “The soft glow of the burning moon showered the Negro shanties, a mournful luminescence over the ashen countryside. The low murmur of wind whispered through the tree branches. We had cut a bloody swath from one side of the Scott settlement to the other. I don’t know how much was left. I only knew the one cabin that stood in front of me. Mocking as all of the Scott settlement had mocked Parsons and what we stood for.

  “The single log cabin room was built of logs split open and pegged together. From my window-side vantage point, one window, two doors. The wind whistled through the black cracks of the wall boards. The black earth along the floorboards crunched beneath soft footfalls. A woman hummed as she tended the black iron kettle that swung above the fire. She pressed her delicate hand against the small of her back to ease whatever back strain she may have had. The backdrop of the fire against her robe revealed how full with child she was. She slumped wearily into a chair, the sole furnishing in the room except for the pallet in one corner and a spinnin’ wheel and loom in the other.

  “She had a wheel an’ loom in one corner of the cabin. Her son scrambled into her lap, enthusiastically clutching a tattered hand-me-down children’s story book. An oil lamp burned unsteadily above them as they stole a moment to read.

  “Their brown eyes strained against the fine print. Her pointed nose, straight and long, set against her high cheekbones. Her skin, the color of leaves in the fall, she kissed her son with the loving affection I’d seen your mother so often show you.

  “That was when we heard the scraping sound.

  “They looked up out the window. I scrambled out of view as I heard the sound. I wondered why I chose to get out of sight, though I had no reason to hide. I knew the all too familiar sound, but maybe she didn’t. So far away from everyone else, she may have been too far removed from ‘the trouble.’ Or maybe her husband had left her there while he went out to protect them. Maybe that’s who she thought she heard approach as she excitedly scanned the surrounding woods. But I knew. The woods were deathly still. A throbbing silence. A womb song. Interrupted only occasionally by the rustling of leaves caught up in the night’s breeze. And the scraping sound.

  “The scraping sound drew nearer.

  “Apprehension must have fanned the embers of dread in her soul, with the dawning realization of the scraping sound. The sound of men on a mad march, like papal warriors on yet another unholy crusade. The scrape of gun barrels against tree branches, the early dawn of nearing torches from all sides.

  “‘Manna?’ I heard the little boy ask. He clutched her desperately, perhaps sensing her own fright. Fear-dilated eyes frantically scanned the room.

  “Holten was the first to enter probably because he knew her folk was away. ‘What have we got here?’ he said with a devil’s drawl.

  “‘Nothin’, suh,’ she said. I truly feared for her in that moment. My soul filled with an unspeakable dread. The loose pile of bedding shifted behind her.

  “‘You lyin’ ta me, girl?’ he said. His shotgun issued a single report. “Executed for her crime of hiding her child. I felt her deep-set eyes poring over me, accusing me, as her limp and lifeless body collapsed into a heap on her floor. Her blood mixed with the dirt, making it look like she bled mud.

  “The wee boy was torn in two by the second report of the shotgun. Blood sprayed the cabin walls. Shot just because … The room filled quickly with the odor of blood. Blood smells. The hovel smelled of a butcher’s shop, at the time of an animal’s butchering. The thick, musky, biting aroma of blood and the earthy odor of slaughtered meat, that was what I smelled that night.

  “‘Look what we got here, boys,’ Holten said, spying the risin’ in her belly.

  “‘What you reckon we ought’n do with it?’ someone asked.

  “‘Someone here needs a doctor,’ Holten said, pulling out his hunting knife, ‘and looks like I’m the nearest surgeon.’ The flesh made a horrific sound as it was torn, not unlike the gutting of a hog. Her open eyes were long past caring. Her insides ripped open as she lay in a pool of her blood. He paused for a moment then found my gaze. And he smiled the same terrible grin he gave me when he spied me hovering over Samuel Demory’s body, my mouth buried in the open rictus of the man’s throat. No revulsion, no horror, only the light of damnable opportunity in his eyes. He resumed his carving until a small purple fleshy mass was pulled from her, sputtering mewls as it gasped for breath. Holten carried it outside with the casual disdain of a man carrying one of his dog’s newborn pups. ‘It’s over, boys,’ Holten jabbed his knife through the infant into a willow tree, letting it hang. And he stared at me with knowing eyes. Leaving it for me, scraps for a dog from his master’s table. ‘Let’s end things.’

  “It didn’t take long for the fire to consume the cabin. The tongues of flames wagged, swollen with the gossip of hate, serenaded by the morning song of whippoorwills. The crackling and spitting of logs, like mocking laughter. They tossed the woman into the fire. Blood splattered their shirt sleeves as if they labored at an abattoir. It was then that I realized that in the light of morning, with time to reflect on what they’d done, they would be able to meet one another’s eyes without care or remorse. Unashamed. Plastered with mud, shivering in the pre-dawn air, my time drew near, an empty sort of fear all over, so I ran to beat all.

  “Holten blamed the whole affair on ‘Negro agitators.’ The conspiracy of silence consumed everyone. From the town leadership down, no one wanted to press the matter. No copy of the newspaper that riled so many of us could be found, not even in the archives. It was as if the paper skipped a day in its publishing history. The state attorney in Jefferson County claimed that he couldn’t prosecute anyone because he was unable to find a single person who witnessed any citizen committing violence that night. No one had that look, that tainted, guilty look of barely-held, barely-hidden secrets.

  “I’m tired of the hate. I’m tired of the unceasing thirst, that soul ache, which can drive someone to depths they’d never imagine. Even those that prey in the night trembled before the malice of t
he human heart unchecked.

  “It is almost morning. I had it in my mind to drain you. Prevent you from growing up in this cesspool. But who am I to judge.

  “I’m so tired. And the sun will be up soon. It will be a beautiful view.”

  Shadow Boxing

  The roar of the crowd burned in Lee “Stagger” Jackson’s ear, a hornet’s nest of hate and catcalls. He closed his eyes beneath the blindfold, making himself undistracted by tricks of the light. And he waited. At the hollow clang of the bell, Stagger retreated to his corner. Hastily-strung ropes formed a twenty-by-twenty canvas-topped “ring.” Four other gloved men, also Negroes, skulked around its breadth and width behind their own blindfolds with no obvious plan beyond flailing about. A hilarious spectacle for the jeering audience who watched them. His opponents fought solely from fear, and, though it was a powerful motivator, fear also gave them away.

  Tall, thick-bodied with the power of a 90-horsepower automobile, Stagger listened for the drag of heavy foot falls against the canvas. His massive upper body chisled from the heart of a mountain atop his oddly slender legs, Stagger stood upright. His generous nose and thick lips would have made tempting targets for a sighted opponent, though he kept his fist steadily cocked, a spring-loaded weapon in need of release. The same way some folks had music in their soul and couldn’t help but give voice to the song in their hearts, Stagger fought to fight. He also understood that commitment to his craft didn’t stop with the match; they demanded he put on a show.

  As they always did, his thoughts idled to the last memory of his father. The frantic, desperate thrashing as he fought the men determined to slip a noose around his neck. How his legs kicked and strained, dancing about without purchase, struggling against the twin implacable foes of the rope and gravity. And how the harder he fought, the louder the crowd cheered. Cutting through the din of the audience, Stagger focused on the shuffle of feet. The echo of closeness. The heat of pressing bodies.