Journeyman (3 page)

“You mean to say she anticipates you,” Semon said. “She has that rare gift of anticipating. I see that myself now, after I’ve met her. You are dead right about it. She does give a fellow the notion that she’s the anticipating kind.”

Clay sat up erect.

“What in the doggone hell do you know about what Dene does?” he said angrily.

“I was just helping you out with the big word, coz,” Semon said.

“Well, now,” Clay said, “I don’t give a doggone if you are a preacher, but I don’t aim to have you butting in all the time like that.”

“Take care, Horey,” Semon said severely. “I’m a man of God, I am!”

“I don’t give a hoot who you are. You ain’t past looking at a woman, are you?”

“Now, wait a minute, Horey. You’re taking the hurdles before you get to them. Just what are you driving at, anyway?”

Clay jumped up, his fists doubling.

“I don’t like for no man, be he preacher or be he sinner, to be coming around and patting Dene on the behind like you did.”

“I don’t see how you can talk like that,” Semon said. “I was taming her just as much for you as I was for myself, coz.”

“That’s all I want to know,” Clay said, turning and walking heavily into the house.

W
HEN SUPPER WAS OVER,
they walked out into the yard. The sun had set, but the hour’s twilight had just begun. There was a thin layer of blue smoke hovering close to the earth. The wild-fires on the ridge that had been smoldering all day in the sun began to blaze in jagged outline against the sky.

Semon strode around the yard, looking, listening, and breathing deeply. Clay tried to keep up with him, but Semon did not notice him. He moved about the yard as restlessly as a fox in a cage.

“What’s galling you, Semon?” Clay asked him, running in front of Semon and blocking his path. “I’ll be doggone if I ever saw a man carry on like you do. What’s tormenting you, anyway?”

Semon craned his neck to look down at Clay. In the twilight his face looked like a sheet of pebble-grain leather.

“It’s like this, Horey,” he said, leaning closer. “My wife has been gone from me for three or four years now, and I’ve never married again. Women like to stay in one place, where they can have a house and grow flowers and raise children. But I can’t settle down. And as long as I’m a traveling preacher, I reckon I’ll be wifeless.”

“That’s a doggone shame,” Clay said.

He did not look at Semon. If he had had a little more nerve, he told himself, he would have advised Semon to pack up his belongings and go somewhere else before night set in. Before he could get really good and mad, Semon slapped him on the back and winked at him with one of the slits in his leather-tight face.

“I feel horny tonight,” Semon said, nodding his head. “How about showing me a little fun, coz?”

He jabbed at Clay with his stiff thumb, but Clay was too quick for him. He stood back and looked up at the leather-colored face jutting into the sky.

“You know what I mean, coz,” Semon said, nodding his head.

Clay caught himself nodding his own head. To save his life he could not keep from doing that.

Before he knew it, he was following Semon across the yard and running beside him in the road.

“Which house does Sugar live in?” Semon said, striding ahead no matter how fast Clay walked to keep abreast.

“Now, you don’t mean Sugar, doggone it,” Clay said.

He saw there was no way to stop Semon from going to Sugar’s house. He hoped Hardy was not there. Just before reaching the cabin, Clay stopped.

“Don’t be lagging behind, Horey,” Semon said, grasping his shirt and pulling him along. “I want you to knock on the door and call her outside.”

After passing the first cabin, where Susan and George lived, and where Vearl slept and played, they stopped in the road in front of the next house. There was no light in the front room, but from the kitchen they could hear sounds of laughter.

“Go on, Horey,” Semon said, pushing him.

Clay found himself stumbling across the ditch into the yard. He went slowly to the back door.

Sugar was sitting in a chair at the door. She was as surprised to see Clay as he was to be there.

“Why, howdy, Mr. Clay,” she said, getting up.

“You better come around to the front a minute, Sugar,” he said.

She followed him around the house to the middle of the road. Semon was standing in the same tracks Clay had left him in.

“Here she is,” he said. “Here’s Sugar.”

Semon grabbed her in the darkness before she knew what had happened. She tried to twist out of his grip, but Semon held her firmly.

“Look out there, white-folks,” Sugar said. “What you trying to do to me?”

Semon put one of his arms around her and began patting her buttocks. Clay watched them with his mouth hanging open. Sugar stopped twisting and struggling and appeared to be standing still of her own accord. Clay stepped closer and watched Semon stroke her into submission.

“I’ll be doggone if I ever saw the likes in all my life,” Clay said. “That’s the doggonest little trick I ever laid eyes on.”

Semon craned his neck and looked around at Clay. There was an opening and closing of one of his eyes that made Clay blink in admiration. He could not stay angry with a fellow who acted like that.

“There’s nothing like knowing how, coz,” Semon said.

Clay walked in a circle around them trying to see all that was taking place. When he got back, Semon was still patting Sugar.

“My Hardy would choke the life out of me if he caught me messing around,” Sugar said.

“This is different, Sugar,” Semon said. “You’re not messing around with one of your own race. I’m a white man.”

“And what else?” Sugar asked.

“I’m a preacher, too.”

“Uh-huh! I thought so!”

Semon stroked her some more.

“Man, you oughtn’t be messing around like this. Looks like you’d leave colored girls alone and attend to your business.”

Clay began pulling at Semon’s sleeve. He finally got him started back up the road, after Semon had told Sugar something that he could not hear.

When they were half way up the road, Semon asked him why he had pulled him away like that.

“I heard Hardy coming somewhere,” Clay said. “I’ll be doggone if I want to get mixed up in anything that you started.”

They walked the rest of the way without talking again. When they got to the house, Clay started up the steps to the porch, but Semon stopped and looked back at the quarter where the cabins were. Clay went back down the steps.

“Come on in on the porch and sit down,” Clay said. “I wouldn’t stand up out here.”

“I’m waiting for Sugar,” Semon said. “She’ll be along in a little while.”

Clay gazed up into the leather-hard face.

“I didn’t know you told her to come up here to the house. What makes you think she’s coming?”

“I told her, all right,” Semon said. “She’ll come.”

Clay sat down on the bottom step, looking at Semon all the time. He did not know what to think about a man like that.

Presently he turned around and caught Dene standing behind him looking at Semon. She did not know Clay had seen her.

“What you doing, Dene?” he said, turning around and catching her before she could get away.

“Just looking,” she said.

“Looking at what?”

“At him,” she said, pointing at Semon in the yard. “He’s the handsomest thing.”

“If I ever catch you making up to him, I’ll thrash the hide off you, Dene. That’s one thing I won’t stand for at all.”

He turned her loose, but she did not run away. After looking at Semon a little longer she sat down in the rockingchair by the door. Clay could hear her rocking back and forth, but he did not look back at her again. He was busy wondering if there was going to be any trouble that night. He knew he could not handle Semon.

Semon had gone to the road several times, only to come back and stride up and down the yard. He did not look in Clay’s direction.

Clay heard Dene stop rocking.

“He’s the potentest thing,” she said.

“Now, look here, doggone it all,” Clay said, jumping up and running up the steps.

He ran to her chair and shook her.

Just when he was getting ready to scold her for talking the way she did, he heard Semon run across the yard to the road. Clay was able to see Sugar coming up the road.

Leaving Dene, he ran down the steps. By the time he reached the road, Sugar and Semon were coming into the yard. He walked along beside them until they reached the house.

“Now, let’s stop right here,” Clay said, getting in front of Semon. “This is just about far aplenty.”

Semon laid a hand on Clay’s shoulder and looked down into his face.

“You wouldn’t stand in the way of a fellow’s good times, would you, coz?”

“That all depends,” Clay said. “But too far is far enough.”

Sugar started backing away, but Semon grabbed her. She could not struggle much in a grip like Semon’s.

“White-folks, I don’t want to mess around none. You sure did get all mixed up about me.”

“Now, now,” Semon said, “don’t start talking like that, Sugar. Just keep quiet and I’ll straighten things out.”

Sugar showed no signs of obeying him.

“You’re a preacher, ain’t you, Mr. Semon?” she asked.

“I am,” he said.

“Then you oughtn’t be out worrying colored girls like this. If you’ll just turn me loose, I’ll be much obliged.”

“Don’t try to put me off, Sugar.”

“Now, I was thinking,” Clay said, stepping in, “if we would only—”

Semon reached an arm around Sugar and began patting her. She looked from Clay to Semon.

Clay had to stop talking and watch what was taking place. He had never seen anything to equal it before in all his life. Up on the porch Dene got up out of her chair, and she came as far as the top step to watch.

“Mr. Semon, you’re the most devilish white man I ever saw in all my life,” Sugar said.

Semon winked at Clay in the half-light, drawing shut one of the slits in his face and opening it again. He patted Sugar’s buttocks while Clay watched speechless. Before Clay realized it, Semon was drawing Sugar closer to the house. They were at the steps before he caught up with them.

“Now, let’s just hold on here a minute,” Clay began. “If I know the first thing about anything, I know—”

Semon and Sugar mounted the steps and crossed the porch to the door. Clay leaped up the steps behind them.

When he got to the door, he could do nothing. Semon and Sugar had gone inside; he was left standing in the doorway with Dene.

He turned and looked at Dene, staring at her when she continued to look inside. He gave her a shove.

“He’s the strangest man,” she said.

He shoved her again, pushing her back on the porch, and went inside to find out where Semon was going.

I
NSIDE THE DARK HOUSE
Clay managed to find a lamp. He lit it hurriedly and ran to Semon’s room. He got there before Semon had a chance to shut the door.

“Now, I’m as open-minded as the next one to come along,” Clay began, “but when it comes to bringing darky girls—”

“Set the lamp on the table, Horey,” Semon ordered. He waited for Clay to obey.

“When you drove up here today,” Clay said, “I was mighty glad to welcome you, but—”

Semon took out his revolver and laid it on the table by the lamp. It was the first time Clay had seen it, and he was too surprised to learn that Semon carried a gun to say anything more.

The pistol was a six-shooter with a spring trigger. It was a dangerous-looking gun to find on a man like Semon Dye. Clay blinked at it in the lamplight.

“You don’t have to stay, Horey,” Semon said, motioning him towards the door. “You can get out.”

“Well, now,” Clay said, “I don’t want you to think I ain’t as hospitable as the next one, but—”

“Coz,” Semon said, “I hate to disappoint you, but it ain’t in my nature to play second-fiddle. You’ll just have to go outside and wait.”

He went to Sugar and began stroking her.

There was nothing Clay could do after that, and he backed from the room into the hall. He stood there looking inside until Semon slammed the door shut. He walked unsteadily through the hall to the porch.

Dene was standing at the door.

“He’s the funniest man,” she said.

Clay looked at her a moment, and then he shoved her away from the door.

“Shut up, Dene, doggone it all,” he said.

When he sat down, Dene came to the chair beside him and sat down on the edge of the seat.

“I’ll be doggone if I ever heard tell of a preacher like him before in all my born days,” he said. “He’s Semon Dye, all right, but he don’t act like a preacher no more than me or Tom Rhodes.”

He stopped talking and stared at the red glow in the sky over the ridge.

“He’s the potentest man,” Dene said, rocking a little.

“Shut up, Dene, doggone it all,” he said.

There was a sound in the yard like somebody scraping shoe-leather on hard sand. Clay jumped in his seat, straining his eyes in the darkness. Dene clutched his arm, but he paid no attention to her. He moved to the edge of his seat, pulling himself forward with hands gripped on the railing.

Once he thought he caught a glimpse of a dark face in the path from the road. He was a little uneasy when he realized that the only person who might be out there was Hardy.

“Who’s that?” Clay asked.

“It’s me, Mr. Clay,” Hardy said, coming closer to the porch.

“What do you want, Hardy?”

“I’m up here looking for Sugar, Mr. Clay. I wouldn’t be bothering you if it wasn’t for that.”

“What makes you think she’s up here?” Clay said.

“Mr. Clay,” Hardy said, “please don’t go trying to put me off. I know you ain’t that kind.”

“Are you looking for Sugar?”

“Mr. Clay, you know good and well I’m looking for her. Please don’t go trying to put me off, Mr. Clay.”

Hardy came to the foot of the steps. From where he stood he could see through the open door into the hall. There was no light anywhere except in Semon’s room.

“Did Sugar tell you she was coming up here, Hardy?” Clay asked him.