Jonah's Gourd Vine (2 page)

As a work of fiction,
Jonah's Gourd Vine
certainly has its flaws: transitions that jog, a little too much “local color.” And though Hurston can hardly be blamed for wanting to infuse the text with the fieldwork she had done as an anthropologist, all too often her eloquent commentary stands full-blown and self-contained, interrupting the narrative flow. John's final sermon is a case in point, for even its masterful train imagery seems too heavy-handed a foreshadowing when the locomotive comes barreling out of the blue, a modern-day
deus ex machina,
to seal John's fate.

But Hurston's language is superb, rich with wordplay and proverbs—not only compelling when it comes to rendering the dialect of the Southern rural black but also as an omniscient narrator who neither indulges nor condemns the actions of her characters but offers the complexity of life in a story that
leaves judgment up to the reader. John Pearson is presented as a human being in all his individual paradoxes—troubled and gifted, dignified and lascivious, pure and selfish—and as the exemplification of the country preacher, he is both poet and philosopher. If language is the chief visible sign of human beings' pre-eminence over beasts, then poetry is the purest expression of man's spiritual quest.
Jonah's Gourd Vine
is a glorious paean to the power of the word, an attestation to the promise made in Langston Hughes's famous 1926 essay, “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain”:

G
od was grumbling his thunder and playing the zig-zag lightning thru his fingers.

Amy Crittenden came to the door of her cabin to spit out a wad of snuff. She looked up at the clouds.

“Ole Massa gwinter scrub floors tuhday,” she observed to her husband who sat just outside the door, reared back in a chair. “Better call dem chaps in outa de cotton patch.”

“'Tain't gwine rain,” he snorted, “you always talkin' more'n yuh know.”

Just then a few heavy drops spattered the hard clay yard. He arose slowly. He was an older middle-age than his years gave him a right to be.

“And eben if hit do rain,” Ned Crittenden concluded grudgingly, “ef dey ain't got sense 'nough tuh come in let 'em git wet.”

“Yeah, but when us lef' de field, you told 'em not to come till you call 'em. Go 'head and call 'em 'fo' de rain ketch 'em.”

Ned ignored Amy and shuffled thru the door with the chair, and somehow trod on Amy's bare foot. “'Oman, why don't you git outa de doorway? Jes contrary tuh dat. You needs uh good head stompin', dass whut. You sho is one aggervatin' 'oman.”

Amy flashed an angry look, then turned her face again to
the sea of wind-whipped cotton, turned hurriedly and took the cow-horn that hung on the wall and placed it to her lips.

“You John Buddy! You Zeke! You Zachariah! Come in!”

From way down in the cotton patch, “Yassum! Us comin'!”

Ned shuffled from one end of the cabin to the other, slamming to the wooden shutter of the window, growling between his gums and his throat the while.

The children came leaping in, racing and tumbling in tense, laughing competition—the three smaller ones getting under the feet of the three larger ones. The oldest boy led the rest, but once inside he stopped short and looked over the heads of the others, back over the way they had come.

“Shet dat door, John!” Ned bellowed, “you ain't got the sense you wuz borned wid.”

Amy looked where her big son was looking. “Who dat comin' heah, John?” she asked.

“Some white folks passin' by, mama. Ahm jes' lookin' tuh see whar dey gwine.”

“Come out dat do'way and shet it tight, fool! Stand dere gazin' dem white folks right in de face!” Ned gritted at him. “Yo' brazen ways wid dese white folks is gwinter git you lynched one uh dese days.”

“Aw 'tain't,” Amy differed impatiently, “who can't look at ole Beasley? He ain't no quality no-how.”

“Shet dat door, John!” screamed Ned.

“Ah wuzn't de last one inside,” John said sullenly.

“Don't you gimme no word for word,” Ned screamed at him. “You jes' do lak Ah say do and keep yo' mouf shet or Ah'll take uh trace chain tuh yuh. Yo' mammy mought think youse uh lump uh gold 'cause you got uh li'l' white folks color in yo' face, but Ah'll stomp yo' guts out and dat quick! Shet dat door!”

He seized a lidard knot from beside the fireplace and limped threateningly towards John.

Amy rose from beside the cook pots like a black lioness.

“Ned Crittenden, you raise dat wood at mah boy, and you gointer make uh bad nigger outa me.”

“Dat's right,” Ned sneered, “Ah feeds 'im and clothes 'im but Ah ain't tuh do nothin' tuh dat li'l' yaller god cep'n wash 'im up.”

“Dat's uh big ole resurrection lie, Ned. Uh slew-foot, drag-leg lie at dat, and Ah dare yuh tuh hit me too. You know Ahm uh fightin' dawg and mah hide is worth money. Hit me if you dare! Ah'll wash
yo'
tub uh 'gator guts and dat quick.”

“See dat? Ah ain't fuh no fuss, but you tryin' tuh start uh great big ole ruction 'cause Ah tried tuh chesstize dat youngun.”

“Naw, you ain't tried tuh chesstize 'im nothin' uh de kind. Youse tryin' tuh fight 'im on de sly. He is jes' ez obedient tuh you and jes' ez humble under yuh, ez he kin be. Yet and still you always washin' his face wid his color and tellin' 'im he's uh bastard. He works harder'n anybody on dis place. You ain't givin' 'im nothin'. He more'n makes whut he gits. Ah don't mind when he needs chesstizin' and you give it tuh 'im, but anytime you tries tuh knock any dese chillun 'bout dey head wid sticks and rocks, Ah'll be right dere tuh back dey fallin'. Ahm dey mama.”

“And Ahm de pappy uh all but dat one.”

“You knowed Ah had 'm 'fo' yuh married me, and if you didn't want 'im round, whut yuh marry me fuh? Dat ain't whut you said. You washed 'im up jes' lak he wuz gold den. You jes took tuh buckin' 'im since you been hangin' round sich ez Beasley and Mimms.”

Ned sat down by the crude fireplace where the skillets and spiders (long-legged bread pans with iron cover) sprawled in the ashes.

“Strack uh light, dere, some uh y'all chaps. Hit's dark in heah.”

John obediently thrust a piece of lightwood into the embers and the fire blazed up. He retreated as quickly as possible to the farther end of the cabin.

Ned smoked his strong home-grown tobacco twist for a few minutes. Then he thrust out his feet.

“Pour me some water in dat wash-basin, you chaps, and
some uh y'all git de washrag.”

There was a scurry and bustle to do his bidding, but the drinking-gourd dropped hollowly in the water bucket. Ned heard it.

“'Tain't no water in dat air water-bucket, Ah'll bound yuh!” He accused the room and glowered all about him, “House full uh younguns fuh me to feed and close, and heah 'tis dust dark and rainin' and not uh drop uh water in de house! Amy, whut kinda 'oman is you nohow?”

Amy said nothing. She sat on the other side of the fireplace and heaped fresh, red coals upon the lid of the spider in which the bread was cooking.

“John!” Ned thundered, “git yo' yaller behind up offa dat floor and go git me some water tuh wash mah foots.”

“You been tuh de house longer'n he is,” Amy said quietly. “You coulda done been got dat water.”

“You think Ah'm gwine take uh 'nother man's youngun and feed 'im and close 'im fuh twelve years and den he too good tuh fetch me uh bucket uh water?” Ned bellowed.

“Iss rainin' out dere, an' rainin' hard,” Amy said in the same level tones.

“Dass right,” Ned sneered, “John is de house-nigger. Ole Marsa always kep' de yaller niggers in de house and give 'em uh job totin' silver dishes and goblets tuh de table. Us black niggers is de ones s'posed tuh ketch de wind and de weather.”

“Ah don't want
none
uh mah chilluns pullin' tuh no spring in uh hard rain. Yo' foots kin wait. Come hawg-killin' time Ah been married tuh you twelve years and Ah done seen yuh let 'em wait uh powerful long spell some time. Ah don't want mah chilluns all stove-up wid uh bad cold from proagin' 'round in de rain.”

“Ole Marse didn't ast
me
of hit wuz rainin' uh snowin' uh hot uh col'. When he spoke Ah had tuh move and move quick too, uh git a hick'ry tuh mah back. Dese younguns ain't uh bit better'n me. Let 'em come lak Ah did.”

“Naw, Ned, Ah don't want mine tuh come lak yuh come nor neither lak me, and Ahm uh whole heap younger'n you.
You growed up in slavery time. When Old Massa wuz drivin' you in de rain and in de col'—he wasn't don' it tuh he'p you 'long. He wuz lookin' out for hisself. Course Ah wuz twelve years old when Lee made de big surrender, and dey didn't work me hard, but—but dese heah chillun is diffunt from us.”

“How come dey's diffunt? Wese all niggers tuhgether, ain't us? White man don't keer no mo' 'bout one dan he do de other.”

“Course dey don't, but we ain't got tuh let de white folks love our chillun fuh us, is us? Dass jest de pint. We black folks don't love our chillun. We couldn't do it when we wuz in slavery. We borned 'em but dat didn't make 'em ourn. Dey b'longed tuh old Massa. 'Twan't no use in treasurin' other folkses property. It wuz liable tuh be took uhway any day. But we's free folks now. De big bell done rung! Us chillun is ourn. Ah doan know, mebbe hit'll take some of us generations, but us got tuh 'gin tuh practise on treasurin' our younguns. Ah loves dese heah already uh whole heap. Ah don't want 'em knocked and 'buked.”

Ned raked his stubbly fingers thru his grisly beard in silent hostility. He spat in the fire and tamped his pipe.

“Dey say spare de rod and spile de child, and Gawd knows Ah ain't gwine tuh spile nair one uh dese. Niggers wuz made tuh work and all of 'em gwine work right long wid me. Is dat air supper ready yit?”

“Naw hit ain't. How you speck me tuh work in de field right long side uh you and den have supper ready jes' ez soon ez Ah git tuh de house? Ah helt uh big-eye hoe in mah hand jes' ez long ez you did, Ned.”

“Don't you change so many words wid me, 'oman! Ah'll knock yuh dead ez Hector. Shet yo' mouf!”

“Ah change jes' ez many words ez Ah durn please! Ahm three times seben and uh button. Ah knows whut's de matter wid
you.
Youse mad cause Beaseley done took dem two bales uh cotton us made las' yeah.”

“Youse uh lie!”

“Youse uh nother one, Ned Crittenden! Don't you lak it,
don't you take it, heah mah collar come and you shake it! Us wouldn't be in dis fix ef you had uh lissened tuh me. Ah tole you when dey hauled de cotton tuh de gin dat soon ez everything wuz counted up and Beasley give us share for yuh tuh take and haul it straight tuh dis barn. But naw, yuh couldn't lissen tuh me. Beasley told yuh tuh leave hit in
his
barn and being he's uh white man you done whut he told yuh. Now he say he ain't got no cotton uh ourn. Me and you and all de chillun done worked uh whole year. Us done made sixteen bales uh cotton and ain't even got uh cotton seed to show.”

“Us et hit up, Major Beasley say. Come to think of it 'tis uh heap uh moufs in one meal barrel.”

“No sich uh thing, Ned Crittenden. Fust place us ain't had nothing but meal and sow-belly tuh eat. You mealy-moufin' round cause you skeered tuh talk back tuh Rush Beasley. What us needs tuh do is git offa dis place. Us been heah too long. Ah b'longs on de other side de Big Creek anyhow. Never did lak it over heah. When us gather de crops dis yeah less move.”

“Aw, Ah reckon we kin make it heah all right, when us don't have so many moufs in de meal barrel we kin come out ahead. 'Tain't goin' be dat many dis time when Ah goes to de gin house.”

“How come?”

“Cause Ah done bound John over tuh Cap'n Mimms. Dat's uh great big ole boy, Amy, sixteen years old and look lak he twenty. He eats uh heap and den you won't let me git de worth uh mah rations out of 'im in work. He could be de finest plowhand in Alabama, but you won't lemme do nothin' wid 'im.”

“He don't do nothin'? He's uh better hand wid uh wide sweep plow right now dan you is, and he kin chop mo' cotton dan you, and pick mo' dan Ah kin and you knows Ah kin beat you anytime.” Then, as if she had just fully heard Ned, “Whut dat you say 'bout boundin' John Buddy over tuh Cap'n Mimms? You ain't uh gonna do no sich uh thing.”

“Ah done done it.”

In the frenzied silence, Amy noticed that the rain had
ceased; that the iron kettle was boiling; that a coon dog struck a trail way down the Creek, and was coming nearer, singing his threat and challenge.

“Ned Crittenden, you know jes' ez good ez Ah do dat Cap'n Mimms ain't nothin' but po' white trash, and he useter be de overseer on de plantation dat everybody knowed wuz de wust one in southern Alabama. He done whipped niggers nigh tuh death.”

“You call him po' when he got uh thousand acres under de plow and more'n dat in wood lot? Fifty mules.”

“Don't keer if he is. How did he git it? When Massa Pinckney got kilt in de war and ole Miss Pinckney didn't had nobody tuh look atter de place she took and married 'im. He wan't nothin' but uh overseer, lived offa clay and black m'lasses. His folks is so po' right now dey can't sit in dey house. Every time you pass dere dey settin' in de yard jes' ez barefooted ez uh yard dawg. You ain't gwine put no chile uh mine under no Mimms.”

“Ah done done it, and you can't he'p yo'seff. He gwine come git 'im tuhmorrer. He's gwine sleep 'im and feed 'im and effen John Buddy's any account, he say he'll give uh suit uh close come Christmas time.”

“Dis heah bindin' over ain't nothin' but uh 'nother way uh puttin' us folks back intuh slavery.”

“Amy, you better quit talkin' 'bout de buckra. Some of 'em be outside and hear you and turn over you tuh de patter roller, and dey'll take you outa heah and put uh hun'ed lashes uh raw hide on yo' back. Ah done tole yuh but you won't hear.”

The clash and frenzy in the air was almost visible. Something had to happen. Ned stood up and shuffled towards the door.

“Reckon Ahm gwine swill dat sow and feed de mules. Mah vittles better be ready when Ah git back.”

He limped on out of the door and left it open.

“John Buddy,” Amy said, “you and Zeke go fetch uh bucket full uh water and hurry back tuh yo' supper. De rest uh y'all git yo' plates and come git some uh dese cow-peas and
pone bread. Lawd, Lawd, Lawd. Je-sus!”

There was a lively clatter of tin plates and spoons. The largest two boys went after water, Zeke clinging in the darkness to his giant of a brother. Way down in the cotton Zeke gave way to his tears.

“John Buddy, Ah don't want you way from me. John Buddy,—” he grew incoherent. So John Buddy carried him under his arm like a shock of corn and made him laugh. Finally John said, “Sometime Ah jes' ez soon be under Mimms ez pappy. One 'bout ez bad as tother. 'Nother thing. Dis ain't slavery time and Ah got two good footses hung onto me.” He began to sing lightly.

They returned with the water and were eating supper when Ned got back from the barn. His face was sullen and he carried the raw hide whip in his hand.