Adventure: The Second Coming (Continued)

            Last week we met two young men from the Depression-era Arkansas Delta. They had launched off on an adventure that would involve watching a neighbor’s daughter take her Saturday night bath. First though, they had to escape, a trick complicated by the fact that the narrator’s father made whiskey this time of year and might have been too conscientious in the task. We re-join the narrative.

My fears were realized. Papa had tied one on by the time I came home, but luckily for me he had sailed right past belligerence and was nearing a state of bewilderment as Mama tore into him. I could hear them when I reached the front yard.

"You low down sorry outfit.

Silence

“You ain't fit to live!"

            Finally a response: "Shut up for Christ's sake," Papa was struggling to keep his balance. He kept reaching for the garden fence and every time he did he grabbed a handful of blackberry vines.

            “Damn it to godalmighty hell,” he yelled.

            "Blasphemer!" Mamma shouted.

            "Yes, goddammit!" Papa countered, "Now get out of here and leave me alone." I had walked up and noticed the green cast to his skin. "I don't feel good," he said weakly. He tried to look past Mamma to me.

            "No wonder," Mama shouted right into his face.  "You been swillin' rotgut whiskey all day and now git ready for the Lord's turn." Then she looked around at me. "Bobby you get over here and help me pray."

            "I was going over to Uncle T. J's," I said.

            "You get your hind-end over here and pray." Mama said. Then she dropped to one knee.

            "All of you leave me alone. Just get away!" Papa shouted. Then his jaw went slack. "I'm gonna be sick," he announced, not to any particular person. He just announced it like it was of some importance to the world at large.

            "You get out of my sight then," Mama said although she needn't have bothered, for Papa had already lurched around the corner of the house. Then she turned to me. "I hope you're satisfied."

            "Me?"

            "You should look after him. You know how sorry he is."

            Papa was making awful noises. Sort of like the gurgling sound that a hog makes when it's stuck, I thought, only much louder and with a lot more thrashing around. I didn't want to draw attention from him so I played it contrite. "I ain't done nothin'."

            "Hush," Mamma said, to my relief. She was listening for Papa, who wasn't making any noise at all now. I looked at her and I could see real concern in her face.

            "You think he passed out?" I asked.

            "You shut your little smart mouth!" Mamma said. I had forgotten that criticizing Papa was a privilege that she reserved for herself.  "He may have died for all you know. A man that works all day and all week for you and who don't ask nothin, who ain't never done nothin' but smell the backside of a mule all his life and ain't got a nickel to his name for it because he spends it to keep you fed and who you ain't never once offered to help, even once when his back was bent over and breakin', not once, just always off with Clifton doin' God knows what."

            She could have gone on like this for hour or so if she had wanted to. I've seen her. But Papa had walked up so quietly that we hadn't noticed. He stood by the back door and he looked worse than before.

            "I think maybe you had better pray after all," he said softly, his eyes meeting Mamma's.

            "Halleluiah!" she said and forgot all about me.

            It was settled then. I was cleared for action. I changed shirts; that's the only thing I could think of that might add dignity to the affair.  It was true that the shirt I changed to was exactly like the one I discarded, and that my dress was the same overalls and blue shirt that every young boy in the county wore, but I felt that the impending activities required some sort of special attention, no matter how modest.

            I stopped by a window before I left to make sure that Mamma and Papa were going to be occupied for a while, and, sure enough, they were going at it in earnest.  Mamma had Papa on his knees with his head in both hands and tears were streaming down her face, which was, of course, raised toward the Savior.

            "Lord, look at this poor drunk sinner." she began.

            "Wait!" Papa cried. "Wait just a goddam minute!"

            "A blasphemer and a drunkard," Mamma expanded.

            "Wait," Papa said again and he tried to rise but Mamma had him in salvation's grip. He simply rolled over on his back.

            "You be still, "Mamma said, and she raised her face once more toward heaven. "Lord, this drunk sinner needs forgiven. I wouldn’t do it if it was me, but you’re a better person, I think."

            This time Papa prevailed. "Don't tell Him I're drunk, dammit, tell Him I're sick!"

            "I can't lie to the Lord," Mamma said, and she raised Papa's head up until his eyes met hers. "I won't lie to the Lord, even for you."

            "Just tell him I're sick, then, that part's the truth. Just don't mention the drunk part."

            "I can't Homer, not even for you."

            "Oh please just this once. Who’ll know?"

            I listened to them go on like this for a few minutes and I guess you could say that Papa finally got his way, for as I left for Clifton's house I could hear Mamma's voice drifting out over the cotton fields. It was sort of musical, like some misty plea for mankind itself.  "Help this poor sick sinner, Lord.  He ain't worth a ten-cent bucket of lard, but could you help him please?  He ain't much, but he's sick and he's all we got."

            I skedaddled before Papa got his strength back.

            I arrived at Uncle T.J.'s house on time. Clifton was ready. I don’t think that I would have been disappointed if he had thought up an alternative adventure. But he was as determined as ever and we were soon on our way. We told his grandparents that we were going to check our trotlines. I don’t think they even heard us. They were sitting on the front porch, Aunt Hallie snapping green beans and Uncle T.H. reading the Bible. Neither of them looked up. We backed off the porch and across the yard, quietly. Then we simply evaporated, headed for the bayou.

Clifton was giving the directions and I was following as best I could. I was, at the same time, plotting an escape route in the event that old man Ratliff became involved. I didn't mention this to Clifton, of course, for it was his strong belief that if you even thought of an unlucky possibility it was more likely, than not, to happen. Planning for any sort of mishap, would, in his way of looking at it, invite that very disaster. So why bother?

            "Lucky for us they live on the edge of the bayou," Clifton explained as we crossed the Ratliff's field. "We'll act like that's where we're headed and then we'll just move up in the cover of the woods when the sun starts going down."

            "Sounds good." I tried to sound older than I was.

            "You ain't told nobody, have you?'

            "Who would I tell—Mama and Papa?"

            "Something like this, well you just got to keep it to yourself," Clifton said with a wise nod. "No use letting it get around."

            "You're right," I agreed and fought away the image of old man Ratliff's knife.

We decided to sit for a time on the bank of the bayou to wait for the sun to go down. It was quiet and peaceful there. The shade felt good and there was a soft summer breeze drifting through. We had a few moments, time to ponder the greater mysteries of life.

            "Clifton?"

            "What."

            "Why do men want to?"

            "Want to what?"

            "You know," I struggled for the words.  "See nekkid women."

            "Just something to do," said Clifton.  "Just for fun, like us I reckon.  Why else would they want to?"

            "That's what I wondered, myself," and I noticed that the woods were getting darker. "Think it's nearly time?"

            "Purt-near," he replied and I felt something inside me tremble like it was cold but I knew it couldn't be in August.

            "Clifton?"

            "What."

            "Do you reckon we'd go to hell for this?"

            "We ain't old enough. You got to get to what they call the ‘age of accountability’ for it to count that hard agin’ you."  He paused for a minute as he chewed on a twig.  "I reckon we're safe from about anything for a couple of more years. Except maybe killin' or something."

            "Oh," I said. I hoped that the relief didn't show through in my voice.

            "So I guess we'd better get going," he said.

            "Yep, I guess we'd better," I said.

            We were able to stay well hidden by hanging close to the edge of the bayou, it being so low that time of year.  We got due south of the Ratliff place just as it got dusky dark for we could make out the two oak trees that stood by the house place. As we began to ease our way up the bank toward a vantage spot, Clifton whispered his final instructions.

            "No more talkin'. Find yourself a low tree limb to sit in and enjoy the show. I"ll whistle like a Bob White two times when it's time to go. Okay?"

            "Okay," I whispered, thankful that I didn't have to muster enough spit to talk out loud.

            "You won't forget this night," Clifton said, and disappeared into the darkness.

            He didn’t have to tell me that. I eased forward toward where I thought the house was and immediately decided to amend Clifton's plan. I wasn't going to climb any tree and risk getting caught there by a Ratliff. No thank you.  I'd take my chances on foot even if it meant getting in closer.

            I took each step slowly, easing through the foliage as I had been taught to when hunting, not making a sound, even when walking on dry leaves, the way they said Indians could do.  I parted each vine carefully, half expecting some trap to spring, set by a Ratliff as a precaution against … well against people like me.

All around me the night voices of lowland insects had erupted with the end of the last light and I had never heard them enjoin so loudly. Surely they were alerting the household to the presence of strangers. I stopped, swallowed as best I could, and eased forward again. Never in my life, I imagined, would I ever be as alone as I was now.

            "Surely I'm almost there," I was thinking when the area directly in front of me exploded in light. I froze in my steps. A sharp, electric surge raced across the back of my tongue and I could almost see the front of my overalls bounce with every beat of my heart which I knew could be heard for half a mile. I couldn’t, of course, see my hair but I was sure it was standing straight up. This was it. This was what life had come to for a ten-year old boy who would never see another adventure, who in fact was destined to die before his first was really underway good. I froze and waited.

            Then I realized that I was still in the shadow of the woods and that, at least yet, nothing was coming for me. As I watched, with blood screeching through my head with every heartbeat, the scene formed before me.

            The light was coming from a lantern which had been swinging from an arm and which now was being set on a barrel. The light framed a clearing about fifty feet across with the Ratliff's chicken house on the back side and the woods on the other three. In the center of the light was Geehaw Ratliff. Her head was framed in its glow and the scene brought back a memory of something I had seen before. But I was too scared to remember what. A picture of something I had seen. What was it?

Then I remembered. In the Bible, the pictures of the Virgin Mary always looked like that. With her head framed in light and all. The Wise Men would be looking at her and the Baby Jesus and the light would glow all around them like this. But this wasn’t the Virgin Mary and the Baby Jesus. It was Gehaw Ratliff and I was not a wise man, I felt, just a common sinner, watching something I had no business watching.

She had all her clothes on but there was a number three washtub in front of the barrel and I could see that the tub was full of water.  It had no doubt been set out earlier to warm in the sun.  As for me, I was completely hidden in the dark, but another step or two would have had me walking into the clearing just as Gehaw did.

            So it seemed that for now I was safe. Gehaw went about her business without looking our way so I guessed that Clifton was safe as well and had a good view. Gradually, my heart stopped pounding and I felt as normal as a person could have felt under those circumstances, I suppose.  Actually, if you had known the truth, there were a lot of places where I would rather have been, but I was here so I determined to take her in for all it was worth.

            As my presence of mind returned, I noticed that Gehaw didn't seem in any hurry to take a bath. In fact, she seemed a little nervous and kept looking toward the far corner of the chicken house. I was puzzled. If she was going to take a bath I wished that she would get it over with so I could find Clifton and get out of there.

            Then I saw what she was looking for. There was someone else that had come to take part in this Saturday night ritual - a guest that was surely more welcome than the two of us. He was standing in the shadows at the edge of the building but I could make out who it was and I tell you I was shocked to the bottom of my feet, more shocked still when Gehaw walked over to him like she had been waiting for him all of her life, and shocked further when she took him by the hands and spoke to him so softly that I couldn't hear. I was so shocked, in fact, that I didn't notice old man Ratliff come around the opposite corner.

            "Come out from around there," he yelled and I turned to see him clearly in the light.

I guess, now that I think about it, it was just a regular shotgun. But in that pale light, with the bugs beginning to swirl around it, things took on a bizarre look and the gun sure looked bigger. It looked more like a cannon, I thought, and it wasn’t even aimed at me.

"I got you now," Mr. Ratliff said. He sounded like a man on a hunt that had just trapped a coon in a tree.

“Hot damn boys, I got him now!”  I half expected him to say something like that.

            Gehaw didn't say a word, just flattened herself against the building like maybe she could get so flat that her Papa couldn't see her. 

            "Girl git to the house," he said and motioned that way with the gun. Then he addressed the still hidden figure again.  "I told you once to get around here you son of a bitch - I got a shotgun!"

            The other man never moved. I was the only one who could see them both and I could tell that he wanted to run but maybe he didn't know exactly where Mr. Ratliff was or whether there might be some more Ratliffs waiting where he wanted to run. Mr. Ratliff started toward that end of the chicken house.

It was when he was about halfway there that Gehaw let out a scream that curled my toes and that was when we first saw it. We must have all seen it right about the time that she screamed, for I heard the man behind the chicken house yell "Oh my God!" Gehaw was still screaming and even Mr. Ratliff stopped to look.

Then the shotgun went off.

            Let me tell you, it was confusing for a couple of seconds.  Old man Ratliff must have fired the gun off accidentally when he saw the thing in the sky and when that happened, the other man just disappeared. In fact, there seemed to be movement everywhere.

The spray from the gun hit the roof of the chicken house right over Gehaw's head and shingles flew every which way. She bolted and ran right by me out into the edge of the field and ran smack into a section harrow. The handle was sticking up and she hit it with a thud that made me sick to my stomach. She screamed again but just kept running out of the light and into the cotton field.

            "Come back daughter!" old man Ratliff yelled but it was no use.  She was gone. He didn't stay long either. He took one more look into the sky, threw down the shotgun and ran for the house screaming  "Mamma get the boys, the world's coming to an end and I done kilt Caroline!"

            “Caroline?” So that was her name. Of all the shocking things going on before me, I remember being most interested in the fact that Gehaw had a real name.

            Then I heard the woods coming alive to my right and in a second I heard Clifton holler, "Bobby, you all right?"

            "Yeah," I hollered back. "I'm right over here.

            Clifton materialized in a second and, after assuring himself that I hadn't been shot, pointed to the sky.  "What in the hell is that?"

(To be continued)