by Daniel Black
Only a cotton field now separated the Black army from its white neighbors. None of them noticed Rosenthal in the distance, following clandestinely, hoping the sheriff and his racist crew wouldn’t slaughter half the colored population of Money. As the Johnsons prayed over breakfast, Rosenthal had found a miniature jar into which he poured Sutton and the fluid, and had eased the jar into his pants pocket in preparation for a morning walk. When his walk and the march of the people converged, Rosenthal paused, thinking it inappropriate to interrupt what looked like a move of solid Black determination. Instead, he lingered behind trees and shrubs, trying to ascertain exactly where the people were going and what would be the impact of their actions on his life. His and Sutton’s.
Without thinking twice, Jeremiah moved across the field, stomping cotton stalks boldly and daring anyone to stop him. Others did likewise. These poor, country soldiers never dreamed they’d do anything in a cotton field except pick it. That’s why they waltzed and pranced like pompous royalty. Chop was grinning so broadly the corners of his mouth ached. He wanted to ask who had seen what he had seen, but he chose, rather, to bask in his own glory and, as Miss Mary advised, to let each person discover God for themselves. When he looked around one last time, only the original remained.
Jeremiah halted the crowd. “Y’all sure y’all ready?” he challenged.
“Yep! We ready!”
When they reached town, they stopped in front of the General Store. Whites began to gather and whisper about why their servants hadn’t come to work that day and what they were doing bunched together in the center of Money.
“Shouldn’t you nigras be in de fields workin’?” Catherine Cuthbert’s Southern drawl screamed from the porch of the store. “You ain’t done enough damage already?”
“Just be cool,” Jeremiah mumbled, tight-lipped. “Don’t nobody say nothin’.”
Other whites surfaced and stared at the mass like observers at an exotic animal zoo.
“We wanna talk to de white citizens o’ dis town,” Jeremiah hollered. “All o’ y’all.”
“You wanna what?” the sheriff heralded. He approached Jeremiah, moving his tongue around in his mouth as though preparing to spit tobacco juice on him. “You must ain’t found yo’ boy yet”—he smiled—“’cause when you do, you’ll know never to so much as look at a white man again.”
Hold yo piece, ole man, Jeremiah told himself. “I got my grandboy,” he said with deliberate intensity, “and dat’s de reason we wants to talk to de white citizens o’ dis town,” Jeremiah repeated, staring into Billy’s eyes for the first time.
“You killed my brothers, you fuckin’ nigger bastard, and you think you can come over here demanding to talk to somebody?” he yelled. “Do I need to teach you another lesson?”
Jeremiah ignored the threat, and repeated, “We wanna talk to de white citizens o’ dis town.”
Billy mocked Jeremiah and laughed. “Y’all don’t never learn. I thought takin’ care o’ dat boy would teach you once and for all, but niggers just don’t never seem to learn.” Billy’s face was only inches from Jeremiah’s. “And anyway, what ch’all gotta say to white folks, nigger boy?”
“We didn’t come to start no trouble. We jes came to git a few thangs straight—today.”
“Thangs like what?” the sheriff asked on behalf of the twenty bigots huddled behind him.
“We wants to talk to everybody—not jes you,” Jeremiah said boldly.
“Oh, so you a bad nigger now?” Billy patronized. “You think you can talk to de whole white community like you a fuckin’ nigger governor or somethin’?”
“We intend to be as peaceful as you let us be, but if you wanna make trouble, we can sho have some.” Black folk lifted their rifles.
The sheriff’s face flushed beet red. He raised his hand, and said, “I’ll slap de fuckin’ black off yo’ face, nigger!”
“ … and if you do, you’ll never do it again!” Enoch hollered, pointing his shotgun at the tip of Billy’s narrow red nose.
“Dear Lord!” Miss Gladys mumbled.
“Do what my daddy asked, Sheriff, and won’t be no trouble. Jes gather as many o’ yo’ folks out here as you can find so we can say our piece and be on our way.”
Billy stared at the stoic Black faces in awe and wonder. He never dreamed a colored man would speak to him the way Jeremiah and Enoch had. “You’ll die for this. You know that, don’t chu? What somebody did to that nigger boy jes wasn’t enough to convince you people to stay in your place? That’s a mighty damn shame.”
“Jes git the rest of your people,” Enoch said again calmly.
Billy backed away, fearful and embarrassed. He hollered for other whites to come and look at all the niggers in Money, gathered together like they really meant something.
Other whites didn’t take the scene quite so lightly. Most of them stood in the road quietly, unsure of exactly how bold the coloreds had become.
After several intense minutes, a sizeable mass of Southern whites had gathered and now stood directly in front of Jeremiah and the others.
“We don’t mean no harm to any o’ y’all,” Jeremiah began kindly. “We jes come to talk to you ’bout how we been livin’ in Money and to tell you how we gon live here from now on.”
No whites responded.
“Somebody beat my grandbaby to death and throwed his body in de river. And dat somebody wasn’t colored. Now I don’t know which one o’ y’all did it, but we here to tell you today that we ain’t gon have this no mo’. Not never again.”
A few whites chuckled.
“Laugh if you want to, but I promise you dat killin’ anybody else colored in dis town is gon cost you more than you willin’ to pay.”
“What chu gon do, nigger boy?” Old Man Cuthbert asked.
“That’s the last thing I’d like to show you,” Jeremiah said with a broad smile. “But if you make me, I will.”
“Are you threatenin’ us?” the sheriff asked.
“You can call it what chu want to,” Jeremiah offered, “but you’d be sorry fu tryin’ us. I guarantee you that.”
Silence consumed the white audience.
“Now let’s get clear about a few things. We been buryin’ Black folks fu years as y’all been killin’ ’em, but we ain’t doin’ dat no more.”
“Dat’s right,” a few brave, Black souls affirmed.
“For every Black funeral, it’s gon be a white one,” Jeremiah proclaimed. “Y’all gon stop comin’—”
Where the shot came from no one knew, but Ray Ray slumped to the ground, clutching his shoulder. Screams from both sides filled the air and ushered in the chaos Miss Mary had prayed wouldn’t come.
“My baby!” was all Ella Mae could say, as drops of Ray Ray’s burgundy blood stained her white Sunday dress.
“I’m okay, Momma,” Ray Ray whispered. “It just brushed my shoulder. I ain’t hurt bad. I’m okay.”
The other shot came from Enoch’s gun. He had prepared the target in case of such an emergency, and now stood proud that someone white in Money would finally know the feelings of intimidation and familial loss. When twelve-year-old Alvin Cuthbert Jr. fell, his mother collapsed along with him. “NO!” Catherine screamed, trembling and holding one she thought more precious than any Black child could ever be. “You shot my fuckin’ son!” she announced, more in surprise than anger. “You killed my husband, and now my son?” In the sheriff’s rage, he reached for his pistol, hoping to destroy Jeremiah, but the old sharecropper planted two shotgun shells in Billy’s chest long before the white man ever touched his gun’s trigger. Instead of inciting fear in Black people’s hearts, Billy’s tumble energized them. Whites never believed that Blacks would ever act in concert against them. Now they knew, and every Black citizen holding a gun sought to feel the pride Jeremiah and Enoch felt. So, before angry white men could hoist their rifles, angrier Black men and women pressed the butts of their own guns against their shoulders, closing one eye and aiming with the other.
If they died that day, Blacks resolved in their hearts, whites were going down with them.
Rosalind had known this day would come. She used to tell Billy that coloreds weren’t going to allow their own degradation forever, but she never guessed they’d kill him so soon. And so easily. Kneeling at his side, she wept—not for him or herself or her girls, but because, as always, her mother had been right. She had wanted nothing more in life than Billy Ray Cuthbert. And then she got him. At least now, she thought, the wounds and bruises on her face could heal before being made worse again.
Watching from the back of the crowd, Rosenthal had expected Jeremiah and the others to crumble in fear, yet, to his amazement, each stood resolute, one foot slightly ahead of the other, inviting the fullness of Chaos since it would not be denied. Had anyone white had the humility, he or she could have stepped forward slowly and seen the entire history of Black people in their red, translucent eyes, and they would have known why this day was inevitable. Yet whites in Money never considered the possibility that their own fate was somehow connected to their Black neighbors’.
Jeremiah’s bottom lip quivered when he asked, “Y’all wanna talk now?”
Old Man Cuthbert yelled, “You fuckin’ Black bastards! I hate you colored sons of bitches! You niggers are gonna pay!”
Jeremiah and Miss Mary cackled together.
“Pay?” Miss Mary shouted. “Did you say ‘pay’? Chile, we been done paid!”
Catherine Cuthbert rose and screamed, “You ain’t paid nothin’ like what you ’bout to!”
Miss Mary sashayed forward, staring directly at the pale white woman. “Girl, I done buried half my family, and you think you ’bout to make me pay?” The fire in Miss Mary’s eyes matched the vehemence in Catherine’s. “Is you really serious? You think you can make me pay more than I done already paid?” Miss Mary stared beyond Catherine’s pupils. Satisfied, now, that the woman knew she meant business, Miss Mary stepped back and blended once again into her people.
“Now, like I was sayin’,” Jeremiah continued, “ain’t no mo’ Black life gon be sacrificed ’round here. Everybody in Money gon live in peace or ain’t gon be no peace.”
“That’s right,” Pet said.
“And if you think we scared to make good on dis promise, jes try us again.” Jeremiah looked into the eyes of every white person present.
“Anythang y’all wanna say?” he asked lightly.
Jeremiah never dreamed he’d witness white silence in the midst of Black strength.
“Good!” he offered. “Now, one last thing.”
Black folk lowered their weapons.
“I want somebody to ’pologize to my people for killin’ so many o’ us over de years.” Whites lowered their eyes. “I’ma count to ten and somebody better start talkin’ or more o’ y’all gon start fallin’.”
Jeremiah raised his shotgun again. “One,” he said confidently. Pet motioned for others to reassume warrior position.
“Two,” Jeremiah said more loudly.
“Three.”
“Ain’t nobody ’pologizin’ to you niggers!” Old Man Cuthbert declared. “You cain’t come over here and shoot white folks and then make us say we sorry! You fuckin’ niggers must be crazy!”
“Four.” Jeremiah stared at Old Man Cuthbert.
Chop’s nerves disintegrated, and he ran to his grandfather’s side. “It’s all right, Granddaddy,” he whispered. “We can go now. I think they understand.”
“We ain’t goin’ nowhere ’til somebody ’pologize for killin’ my people. Somebody beat my grandson’s eye right out o’ his head, and somebody better ’pologize befo’ I go to shootin’ all o’ y’all.”
Rosenthal shivered. He thought of returning Sutton to his people, but now it was simply too late. No explanation would make sense, and the act might even cost him his life. “Everything’s going to be all right, Sutton,” he mouthed. “Everything’s going to be all right.”
“Five,” Jeremiah said.
Rosenthal rushed forward. “We’re sorry,” he offered abruptly.
Whites grumbled their dissent.
“We’re sorry for killing Black people over the years. It wasn’t right. And what happened to your grandson should never have happened.”
Rosenthal’s right hand remained locked around the jar in his pocket.
Jeremiah looked confused. “I thought you wuz gon help us, Mr. Rosenthal? After all that talk, we never heard from you no mo’.”
“I told y’all dat cracker wunnit shit!” Tiny yelled.
Rosenthal felt his reputation faltering. “I … um … meant what I said. I really did. But … um … things didn’t turn out like I had hoped.”
“Look where he’s standin’,” Tiny pointed, “and that’ll tell you whose side he’s on. Don’t be no fool, Mi.”
“I’m not one of … these,” Rosenthal said awkwardly, looking behind him. “I’m on your side. Trust me. If you only knew—”
“If we only knew what, Mr. Rosenthal?” Jeremiah pressed.
He almost exposed the jarred Sutton, but was not yet convinced it would help one way or the other. “If you only knew … um … how I’ve changed.”
“We thought we knew the other night,” Pet chimed, “but now looks like we wuz wrong.”
“But you weren’t wrong!” Rosenthal protested. “You weren’t. I just didn’t get a chance to get back to you and—”
“You didn’t get a chance to help me save my boy’s life, Mr. Rosenthal? What wuz you doin’ that wuz mo’ impo’tant than that?”
“I was loving your boy!” Rosenthal belted regretfully.
“What?” Possum frowned. “How wuz you lovin’ my son?”
Lost in a dark abyss, Rosenthal tried his last option. “I found this the other night.” He removed the jar from his pocket and held it high for everyone to see.
“What the hell … ?” Jeremiah murmured, stepping toward Rosenthal.
“It’s an eye. His eye. I found his eye in the woods.” His hand trembled. “It’s a beautiful eye. Just like the colored boy’s at Harvard. I took it home and loved it. Its name is Sutton.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Possum screamed in disbelief. “You found my son’s eye, and you took it home and put it in a jar?”
“Yes! That’s it!” He hoped she was beginning to understand. “I took it home. And I loved it and surrounded it with liquid so it’d stay moist. We read aloud together and listened to music.”
Tiny laughed. “Y’all gon listen to me next time!”
“You can hold it if you want to,” Rosenthal offered, extending the jar to Jeremiah.
In slow motion, Jeremiah received it. He unscrewed the cap and looked into the jar like one fearful of beholding Satan face-to-face. “Mr. Rosenthal? You’s a sick man,” he said and resealed the top. He handed the jar to Possum.
“It’s not what it seems,” Rosenthal cackled. “I was doing my duty. I knew it was right because, although the eye belonged to your boy, it looked just like Sutton Griggs Jr., so I knew God was giving me one last chance to right my wrongs.”
“What the fuck is this cracker talkin’ ’bout?” Possum yelled in every direction.
Rosenthal knew his explanation wasn’t going over very well. “It’s very complicated, ma’am”—he smiled patronizingly—“so it’s probably best if you don’t even try to understand. You certainly have enough on your mind.”
Enoch whispered, “Daddy, can I shoot him?”
Jeremiah raised his hand. “Let him be.”
Possum enclosed the jar with both hands and stared at Rosenthal.
“I do need that back, though,” he said. “That probably sounds pretty crazy to you, but our … um … relationship is just getting started.”
Possum’s silent stare burned a hole in Rosenthal’s confidence. His hands fidgeted as though playing an invisible piano. “I need Sutton now,” he said slowly, “to pay my debt.”
“Y’all done killed my son,” Possum intoned,
“and now you say even his eye belongs to you? You a goddamn—”
“I didn’t kill him!” Rosenthal boasted.
“You might as well have! You had his eye and didn’t give it back!”
Rosenthal hesitated. “Yeah, but that’s different.” He sighed. “I knew you wouldn’t understand. And it’s okay. This whole thing is crazy. But please understand that I need Sutton—well, the eye—back. It actually belongs to me.”
Possum squinted. “Well I’ll be damned. Has this man lost his mind?”
“Just give me the eye back and I can explain more later. Right now, everybody’s tense and probably should just go home and cool down.”
Black folks snickered sporadically.
A white lady touched Rosenthal’s shoulder tenderly, and asked, “Are you okay, Mr. Rosenthal?”
“Don’t touch me!” he yelled, and jerked away. “I’m not crazy! I’m just trying to get back … um … something that I desperately need. Something that belongs to me.”
“I don’t know what chu talkin’ ’bout, Mr. Rosenthal”—Jeremiah sighed, relinquishing the battle for clarity—“but this here eye’s going back where it belongs—in my grandson’s head.”
“Oh no!” Rosenthal pleaded. “You can’t do that!” He realized the madness of his statement. “I mean … um … please don’t do that. I have to have it. I have to. It’s the only way I’ll be forgiven.”
Possum stared harder at Rosenthal. “There’s no way you’re getting my son’s fuckin’ eye, white man!” she bellowed. “Y’all ain’t satisfied with killin’ Negroes? You want every little piece of us, too?”
“You don’t understand!” Rosenthal shouted. “It’s not that I want every piece of your boy! I just want … um … what I found, what belongs to me.”
“I cain’t understand what chu talkin’ ’bout, Mr. Rosenthal, but like I said, this here eye’s goin’ back where it belongs. At least then we can bury my grandson whole.”
“Okay! Fine!” Rosenthal waved frivolously, “but can’t I just hold it once more? I mean, what harm would that do?” His yearning eyes evoked no sympathy.
Jeremiah said, “We ain’t gon talk about this no mo’, Mr. Rosenthal. We’ll be goin’ now.”
