The Sacred Place

by Daniel Black

  “No!” Rosenthal cried, and fell to his knees. “I just need to hold it a few seconds. That’s all. I promise! I’ll give it right back. I will!”

  “Let’s go, Daddy,” Enoch suggested, touching his father’s elbow. “We done had our say, and you got yo’ apology.”

  Jeremiah nodded, and said, “Let’s go, y’all. We got one mo’ piece o’ business to handle.”

  The Black mass turned to leave.

  “Please don’t take Sutton away from me again!” Rosenthal groaned to the people’s backs. “I know this sounds crazy, but I found it, and it’s mine!”

  His wrinkled white body contracted into a fetal position upon the ground. Tears issued forth freely, but no one really understood all that Rosenthal was trying, though failing, to articulate. The farther the Black mass retreated, the harder he sobbed, having no choice now but to recognize how and when he had failed.

  Throughout the ordeal, Rose Love, Cecil’s wife, studied her maid’s countenance. She feared the Negroes’ stark defiance might mean Inez wasn’t coming to work the next day. If she did come, Rose surmised, Inez would probably insist that she stop calling her “gal” and start calling her by her name. Such a demand would be a meager price to pay, Rose admitted, for a woman whose hands and knees had never touched her own floors. She just hoped Inez hadn’t become drunk with self-righteousness. Had Rose known that Inez would never set foot in the Love home again—much less clean it—she might have run after the Black recessional and promised Inez all sorts of perks, like having some weekends off or even being called “Miss Inez.” But Rose’s inability to read her maid’s mind or to understand the finality of the moment just passed left her praying for the impossible while, down the road, Inez chuckled at the prospect of sleeping in her own bed long after sunrise.

  When the bold ones reached The Sacred Place, Miss Mary began singing, “I know it was the blood!” Her hands shot into the air like one under arrest. “I know it was the blood! I know it was the blood, for me! Oh yes! One day when I was lost, he died upon the cross! I know it was the blood for me!” Twisting and jerking convulsively, she screamed, “Thank ya, Lawd! You been so good!” Her huge palms created thunder each time they met, and others began to weep simply watching Miss Mary surrender to the Holy Ghost. Then, slowly, she moved throughout The Sacred Place, touching trees, flowers, butterflies, birds, deer, rabbits, and squirrels, all of whom accepted her anointing willingly, lovingly and nodded as she continued, “One day when I was lost, he died upon the cross. I know it was the blood for me!” Others joined her, creating a collective voice that reverberated throughout The Sacred Place like the voice of God. “He never said a mumbling word!” the people sang, releasing the angst of the day. Together, they looked possessed, marching from tree to bush, singing to the animate and the inanimate about the power of sacrifice and giving. Their slow motion and unrestrained weeping made Rosenthal, standing at the edge of the clearing, wonder if, indeed, they all had consumed the same drug. They seemed to have lost their consciousness, he noted, for none of them had the least concern for onlookers or the backlash of earlier insulted whites. Instead, they floated throughout The Sacred Place, wailing and moaning a song Rosenthal didn’t know and therefore couldn’t sing.

  Having always been reserved, Miss Gladys didn’t know what to do when the fire hit her. She clutched her arms tightly, trying to deny the spirit’s overflow, but her soul cried out “Hallelujah!” anyway. She grabbed Pet’s arm to steady her step, yet her feet started shuffling a dance only her ancestors would have recognized. “They whipped him all night long!” she sang out and flung her head in every direction. Images of Billy Cuthbert—or whoever—beating Clement crowded her consciousness and caused her to scream, “They whipped him all night long for me!”

  “Oh yeah!” the crowd supported.

  “They whipped him all night long for me!” Miss Gladys declared without shame. “For me! For me! For me!” Her hands joined Miss Mary’s in thunderous applause of a God who, though never punctual, was always right on time. Pet tried to constrain her, saying, “It’s all right, honey, it’s all right” while rubbing her back gently, but Miss Gladys was glad to be free of the bonds of propriety that governed genteel, educated Black women. Her jerks and subsequent strides looked choreographed as she made her way to the middle of The Sacred Place, proclaiming all the while, “For me! For me! He did it for me!”

  “They beat him ’til he died!” Miss Mary resumed the lead.

  “Oh yeah!” the people returned.

  “They beat him ’til he died, for me!” Together, the people sang, “One day when I was lost, he died upon the cross! I know it was the blood for me!”

  Like an electric current, the Holy Ghost moved across the crowd and filled everyone’s spirit to overflowing. Screaming, shouting, and dancing, they conjured Clement’s spirit and thanked him for being the bridge that took them over.

  Sarah Jane marveled at the sight. She wanted to feel that invisible power rush all over her, too, but, for some reason, she couldn’t. Then she closed her moist eyes and visualized Billy and others beating Clement mercilessly. She heard, in her soul, the hollow sound of the hammer bludgeoning against Clement’s skull, and that’s when she began to tremble. The men’s hyena-like laughter crushed her microscopic dream that whites might, one day, honor Black life. Each time they slapped Clement, Sarah Jane shuddered, feeling the pain as though it rested upon her own face. Even the kicking, which made his thick brown body coil like a snail, left Sarah Jane doubled over in agony as she wondered who could treat a child that way. Yet the sound of the crowbar cracking Clement’s crown was more than she could bear. Each hollow thump, like an axe against a stubborn log, churned bile in her stomach and made her sure that, at any moment, she’d vomit her entire insides. She tried to abort the imagining, but each time her grandmother cried, “They whipped him all night long!” the imagery strengthened in her mind’s eye and she saw Clement’s blood mingle with the red clay near the banks of the Tallahatchie. Why he wasn’t protesting she didn’t understand. He just stood there, it seemed, leaning against an old oak tree, as though he owed the price they extracted from him. Eventually the blows cut him down. The final strike sent his left eye hurling into the darkness—“No!” Sarah Jane shrieked—and the men dragged his body away. So when Miss Mary announced, “He never said a mumblin’ word!” Sarah Jane understood, finally, that she and her grandmother were in the same spiritual moment, and she gave thanks for her inclusion.

  “He never said a mumblin’ word!” Miss Mary repeated melodiously. “He never said a mumblin’ word, oh me!” With eyes closed and arms stretched wide, she declared, “My baby! They done killed my baby!” The crowd finished the chorus: “One day when I was lost, he died on the cross! I know it was the blood for me!” Dust rose and created a brown cloud around the people’s feet. The pandemonium inspired even an ant community to pause its busyness and watch Money’s Black elders dance the cosmic merger of spirit and flesh. From a distance, the people’s bodies appeared elevated, like angels preparing to ascend into midair.

  “Thank ya, Jesus! Oh, Glory to your name! Hallelujah!” voices declared to the heavens. Even the children shared the ecstasy, crying quietly as their elders connected with a spiritual tradition found only in the people’s epic memory. The spirit became contagious that day. A young cypress sapling, desiring desperately to contribute unto the praise, fanned its leaves vigorously and bent its branches until they touched the earth. An observer might have screamed in horror, for the tree moved as though it had come to life. Yet the Black participants simply danced along.

  When Miss Mary sang richly, “He’s comin’ back again!” and the people confirmed, “Sho nuff !” Jeremiah released a lifetime of pain. His entire body shook as he cried “I love ya, Lawd!” and fell to his knees. No one understood the fullness of Jeremiah’s purging, for most had never seen an old Black man sob that way. Ray Ray almost ran to his grandfather, thinking the old man needed some help in restoring hi
s usual resolve, but Sarah Jane told him, “He’s all right. Leave him alone. This is between him and God now.”

  And suddenly, those ancient beings, the once Invisible Ones, came again. Yet this time, they arrived in radiant splendor. Draped in flowing, snow-white garments with matching headwraps and accompanying staffs, they looked like gigantic African spirits on their way to a river baptism. As Revelation foretold, they descended from the sky like majestic clouds of glory. One by one, single file, they marched to an earthly Zion, humming “I Know It Was the Blood,” crying congratulatory exultations to a people who had finally converted prayer into power. And they kept coming by the thousands. Chop gawked at the legions, processing like a Black Baptist church choir, who then filled The Sacred Place and encircled their children in a Jericho wall of pure white. “Wow,” he mumbled, and noted that their faces were midnight black. The eyes, however, were solid white, lacking irises and pupils, but their warm smiles kept the boy from fearing them. One with Billie Faye’s robust shape and confident swagger winked at Sarah Jane and bowed slightly before her. She bowed in return and waved excitedly, far too overwhelmed to speak. Her soul was satisfied. The Sacred Place was indeed heaven, she thought, complete with all the people she loved and those beautiful, colossal, Black spirits singing, along with her elders, about how somebody’s blood had set them free.

  Though miniature next to the ancestors, Miss Mary walked among them, shaking hands and speaking as though knowing them personally. She then constructed her own verse: “They threw him in de river!”

  “Oh, yes!” the spirits bellowed in response.

  “They threw him in de river!” Miss Mary was beside herself now. “They threw him in de river … for me!”

  “Hallelujah!” the spirits sang in chorus. Then they belted, “One day when I was lost, he died upon the cross! I know it was the blood for me!”

  Enoch and Jeremiah each held one of Possum’s arms as she shouted and kicked away her agony. Snot rested on her upper lip and dried tear streaks, like warrior marks, painted her face. Her torn dress hung limp across her left shoulder, exposing a full, right breast, but no one bothered to cover her. She was in the land of the free, and her only desire was to understand why Clement, her only begotten son, had been the sacrifice required to save the people. So she danced and wept, screaming “Why? Why? Why my chile?”

  In the next improvised verse, her mother explained, “Trials come to make you strong!”

  “Oh yes!” the spirits confirmed.

  “Trials come to make you strong!”

  “Sho nuff !”

  “Trials come to make you strong … oh me!” Miss Mary’s arms oscillated like helicopter propellers.

  Other elders ad libbed, “My Lord!” and “Good God!” until the moment echoed with a thousand tongues contributing unto a spiritual ritual none had ever experienced before.

  Unable to get her fullest deliverance, Possum escaped the patriarchal clasp and ran to her mother.

  “Momma!” she yelled. “It hurts so bad!” Clutching her sides, her torso bent to a ninety-degree angle with her legs. All she knew to do was cry out, “Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!” The ancestors wept streams of living water for Possum, thanking God for the fruit of her blessed womb. Their tears fell upon her like waterfalls rushing to cleanse and heal one whose entire life had been composed of nothing but struggle, heartache, and loss.

  “Sing de song, chile!” Miss Mary declared. “Sing de song! You gotta sing de song!”

  “It hurts too bad, Momma! Why did dey have to kill my baby?” Possum ripped the remainder of the dress from her flesh and flung her arms wide in surrender to anyone willing to help her. Naked and unashamed, she yelped, “Help me, Lord!”

  “Sing de song, chile!” Miss Mary repeated. “Sing de song!”

  With eyes aglow, the ancestors stared at Possum their hope that she would follow her mother’s directive. They hummed the chorus line incessantly, waiting for her to assume the lead, and suddenly Possum felt a small, familiar hand pat her shoulder, and she knew her child was safe among the angels. She rejoiced, “They beat my baby down!”

  “Oh, yes!” the ancestors answered, waving the sleeves of their white gowns frantically.

  “They beat my baby down!” Possum sang sadly.

  “Hallelujah!” Miss Mary cried.

  “They beat my baby down … and he did it for me!” Possum’s feet stomped the earth.

  The ancestors finished the chorus, “One day when I was lost, he died upon the cross. I know it was the blood for me!”

  Possum wasn’t finished. The smiles of her mother and her people erased what would have been the shame of her nudity, so with embarrassment unencountered, she sang, “They gouged out his eye!”

  “Oh Lord!” the ancestral chorus declared.

  “They gouged out his eye!”

  “Uh-huh!”

  “They gouged out his eye … for me! One day when I was lost,” they sang together, “He died upon the cross! I know it was the blood for me!”

  “Dat’s right baby!” Miss Mary heralded. “Sing yo’ song!”

  Everyone, spirit and flesh alike, gathered around Possum and contributed to the healing of her soul.

  “He’s comin’ back again!” Possum sang, with head held high and breasts standing at attention.

  “That’s right!” the chorus belted.

  “He’s comin’ back again!” Possum began to walk among her people, like her mother had done, shaking hands and hugging necks while spirits rejoiced above them.

  “Oh praise his name!” they declared.

  “He’s comin’ back again … for me!” she poked her chest proudly. Jeremiah, Enoch, Ella Mae, and the children cried, “Thank ya, Jesus!” and others murmured, “Get what cha need, baby. Get what cha need!” One lone spirit stepped forth and ended the melody in Jerry’s silky smooth bass, “One day when I was lost, he died upon the cross. I know it was the blood for me!” The spirit nodded to all who had risked their lives earlier, then, standing before the Johnson family, bowed slowly and held the bowed position as though wanting each family member never to forget the beauty of what they had initiated. There were no tears this time. Pride, clarity, and determination shone on Johnson faces as they bowed in return, thankful for the reunion each had dreamed of. Now Sarah Jane was free to love and Jeremiah would never again carry the guilt of inactivity. Enoch and Ella Mae thought they heard the words “thank you” and their response was simply to enshroud Sarah Jane between them. Had they spoken, they would have said, “No, thank you. All of you.” Bursting with joy, Miss Mary grinned and nodded, grateful that years of hoping, praying, and believing had not been in vain. Chop and Ray Ray understood now why their grandmother stayed on her knees and hummed incessantly. They smiled as they decided to join her next time. Two other spirits joined hands with the first and the Johnson family was made whole again.

  Then, one by one, like they came, the spirits marched into the sky until each being merged with the clouds. Chop waved vigorously as they returned to glory. Sensing closure of the moment, the animals retreated into the safety of the forest, and the trees stood themselves upright again.

  When the spirits were no more, the people calmed to a deafening silence. They joined hands tightly, all of them, and formed a circle as Possum covered herself with shreds of her mangled dress. Each set of eyes confirmed in the others that colored people in Money had become one—one people, one strength, one fortress—and they knew they’d meet in this place again. Until then, they gloried in what they had witnessed and, after shaking hands and embracing, each bent and touched the earth of The Sacred Place in celebration of the union of flesh and spirit on holy ground. Upon exiting, they waltzed slowly through the woods, single file, strutting like Billie Faye used to, clear that the war was not over, but clear also, now, that they could win.

  Also by Daniel Black

  They Tell Me of a Home

  This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed
in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  THE SACRED PLACE. Copyright © 2007 by Daniel Omotosho Black. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin’s Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

  www.stmartins.com

  Design by Maggie Goodman

  eISBN 9781466818590

  First eBook Edition : April 2012

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Black, Daniel.

  The sacred place / Daniel Black.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  ISBN-13: 978-0-312-35971-3

  ISBN-10: 0-312-35971-3

  1. African American teenage boys—Crimes against—Mississippi—Fiction.

  2. Mississippi—Race relations—Fiction. 3. Racism—Mississippi—Fiction.

  I. Title.

  PS3602.L267S23 2007

  813’.6—dc22

  2006050974

  First Edition: February 2007