A Peach For Big Jim

by Lisa Belmont

  Widow Jones was a real pretty lady, about a year younger than Momma. About a decade ago, she’d inherited Whitehall Plantation from her husband, Carlton.

  Momma had worked for Widow Jones for three years, but they'd been good friends since grade school. Momma did Widow Jones’ laundry and sewing. Once in a while though, they’d sit out by the pond and listen to the katydids. Momma would crochet a blanket while Widow Jones would sip a Kentucky Cousin, her favorite drink of mint, bourbon, and iced tea.

  Big Jim’s momma, Hattie Mae, worked for Widow Jones, too. She’d cook up some real good fried chicken and coleslaw, but I’d never heard Widow Jones say anything more to Hattie Mae than “these pies need more spice,” or “get me my hot water bottle, Hattie Mae.” Things like that. That’s mostly what Widow Jones would say.

  I was glad Momma was in real good with Widow Jones, though. She always made me feel right at home even though our little shotgun house was the size of her foyer. Just walking up the drive you’d see two or three groundskeepers, slender colored folk usually, trimming the trees or clipping the flowers. I’d never seen so many blush-pink camellias and lavender foxgloves. Not to mention them powder blue morning glories trellised-up real good to attract the hummingbirds. And roses. Lord, you ain’t never seen so many white roses. It was a sight.

  The thing I liked best, though, was to watch all them lily pads sparkle in the sun. A hand-painted footbridge crossed over the pond so you could get from one side of the garden to the other without any trouble. That’s what it seemed like more than anything – that Whitehall was free of trouble.

  The entire plantation had been restored to its former glory before The War Between the States had torn it all to pieces. Now, just to look at the sweeping veranda and the great white pillars, you’d think there were slaves frying up hoecakes and singing Swing Low, Sweet Chariot out by the slave cabins.

  Sometimes I’d get to looking at them dozen or so whitewashed cabins at the edge of the plantation. I reckon that once upon a time, Hattie Mae wouldn’t have been Widow Jones’ cook. She would’ve been her slave. It was a strange thought, but it was as much a part of our history as the fact that the first shots of The Civil War were fired at Fort Sumter and that South Carolina was the first state to secede. It seemed there was a certain rebellious spirit to the land, as wild as the coons Pa hunted and the rabbits Rufus chased. Sometimes I felt as though it was something that coursed in our blood. Something we couldn’t ignore.

  Momma helped me brush my long tangle of dark brown hair. It was always getting snagged in my comb, but at least I could smooth it out with marshmallow root and castor oil. Pa said it was pretty hair, that it brought out my green eyes, but I just wished I could get it to behave.

  After my hair was combed, I put on a wispy summer frock with a daisy print. Momma had sewn it for me last spring, but it still fit pretty well.

  “And bring your gloves,” Momma reminded, as I sifted through the dresser.

  I grabbed the whitest pair of gloves I could find and met Momma in the kitchen. She’d already set out biscuits and the strawberry jam we’d canned last summer. She was wearing a cream-colored dress and had on a pair of pearl earrings that Widow Jones had given her. She looked radiant in the morning light.

  “Ain’t you working today?” I asked.

  “No, Widow Jones gave me the day off.”

  “Hattie Mae working?” Caleb said, chewing on a biscuit.

  He’d laid out his Babe Ruth baseball cards, and I was real careful pouring my milk. He’d darn near tan my hide if I spilled on them.

  “Hattie Mae will be serving us,” Momma said, smearing peanut butter on a pinecone.

  I dolloped some jam on my biscuit and thought of Hattie Mae. She’d take out the silver platters for fine company and the crystal glasses that Widow Jones kept in the china cabinet. She’d say, “How would you like your tea, Miss Chloe? With lemon and sugar?”

  “Yes,” I’d say, and she’d scoop them little sugar cubes in my glass like I was something. “And Hattie Mae,” I’d say real demure like. “Another slice of pie, please.”

  “Why, shore, Miss Chloe,” she’d say. She’d slice the pie at the sideboard and hand me a real nice piece on a white china plate.

  “Anything else?” she’d say, looking at me with her big Milk Dud eyes.

  I’d shake my head. “No, Hattie Mae. You may go.”

  She’d go to the kitchen and start on them dishes. Never did seem like Hattie Mae took a break. Sometimes I’d see Momma sitting under a shade tree with Widow Jones, and the two of them would be laughing at something or other, but I never saw Hattie Mae laughing like that. Seemed like she had too much on her mind.

  Caleb ate his third biscuit before he promised to help bury Little Chirpie. He was wearing the old cotton shirt and denim britches that he always wore for catching crabs. He’d take a chicken neck and tie it with a weight, lowering it into the water until one of them crabs grabbed ahold. Then he’d lift that crab right out of the water and put it in one of Momma’s pots. Caleb could catch a mess of crabs in no time and we’d have crab cakes for supper that’d like to make your mouth water.

  On school days, Caleb walked me to the schoolhouse and made sure that nobody bothered me. Some kids liked to tease me because I was afraid of the dark. I was thirteen, but still, word had gotten out that I needed Pa to take me to the outhouse in the middle of the night. I tried not to let it bother me, even when they called me “scaredy pants” and “fraidy cat.”

  Mainly, I spent my time focusing on Miss Lilly, who said I was the best reader in eighth grade. She’d hand me a book like Pride and Prejudice by Miss Jane Austen and I’d think I’d died and gone to heaven. I loved books. Any kind I could get my hands on. Of course, Pa didn’t think much of me reading about all them English folks.

  “Their language is too highfalutin,” he said after I read a passage from Wuthering Heights out loud. “Don’t they know how to speak English?”

  That’s just it, I thought. They don’t speak like everyone else. They speak better. Course, I didn’t tell Pa that. Couldn’t tell him nothing. Especially not when Miss Lilly sent me home with Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Pa asked me what it was about, and I told him it was about a man who lived in the woods.

  “Uh-huh,” he said, taking a smoke out on the porch and scratching Rufus’ belly.

  I loved Pa, but I couldn’t tell him it was about the evils of slavery and what some have called – as Miss Lilly put it – “the little book that started The Civil War.”

  “Ain’t gonna be no relief today. Not from this heat,” Momma said, fanning herself.

  That was another reason I was grateful to be going to Widow Jones’. Her house always stayed nice and cool in summer and it was loaded with books. She had a library as big as our shotgun house with lots of them painted white shelves.

  “After your morning chores,” Momma said, “we’ll head up to Whitehall.”

  “Yessum.”

  “And we’re taking Rufus.”

  “Rufus?” I said, as Pa came in the front door. His hours had been cut down at the sawmill and every other day he was home from work. He’d sit in his maple rocking chair and smoke his pipe, looking more miserable than a cat taking a bath.

  “Why do we need ol’ Rufus?”

  “For protection,” Momma said.

  “From what? Mosquitoes?”

  “Mind your mother, Chloe,” Pa said. “Until the buggy’s fixed, you’ll be walking.”

  “Yes, sir,” I said, as Rufus moved his flea-bitten hide off the porch and walked into the house. Flies buzzed lazily against the windowpane, and I felt the first beads of sweat accumulate under my arms.

  I fed the chickens that morning, scattering the tiny grain-like kernels onto the dirt path around the henhouse. A couple roosters, Tom and Jeb, went after each other and I nearly got pecked to death. Those roosters were always strutting around and getting into fights.

  Caleb brought the basket with Little Chirpie out to the h
enhouse.

  “We better get ‘em buried.”

  I brushed off my hands and took the basket. Little Chirpie looked real peaceful as Caleb dug a hole and piled a mound of dirt next to it.

  “Shouldn’t we say a prayer?”

  Caleb took off his hat and closed his eyes. I held Little Chirpie’s basket to my chest.

  “Lord,” Caleb said. “We’ll miss Little Chirpie and think of him every time we go to Foxhole Swamp. And please forgive Chloe. She don’t know nothing about taking care of no bird.”

  Caleb took Little Chirpie and placed him in the hole.

  “Is he going to heaven, Caleb?” I asked, as he covered the hole with dirt.

  “Sure, Chloe. He’ll be there.”

  I held onto those words, hoping they were true. It didn’t seem right that I should be the one who ended Little Chirpie’s life. At least if he ended up in heaven, I was pretty sure he’d forgive me.

  I met Momma in the kitchen. She took off her apron and called for Rufus. I was glad we were finally going.

  Momma and I got to humming as we made our way down the narrow path that ran alongside Foxhole Swamp. It was the same path Caleb and I had taken last night. I’d never known Momma to take Rufus to Widow Jones’, though, and started wondering what she was worried about.

  Rufus ran ahead and took a drink from the swamp. He was standing right next to the hollow tree that was reportedly the home of the Foxhole Swamp ghost. People were always saying the swamp was haunted and that anyone who stuck their hand in the knothole would lose a hand. The ghost apparently didn’t like being disturbed.

  Ghost or no ghost, I started feeling hot and sticky and wondered if I could at least stick my toes in the water. It was a fleeting thought because as soon as I looked through the cattails, I noticed the thick, leathery head of an alligator gliding across the water. It looked like it was heading straight for Rufus.

  “Rufus, come on boy,” I hollered.

  He perked up his ears and barked like he’d treed a coon before joining us on the path.

  “Shore is hot,” Momma said, fanning herself.

  The sun was glinting through the trees with a stifling ferocity, typical for South Carolina this time of year. Overhead, you could hear the high-pitched calls of ospreys, their dark shadows moving above us. Once in a while you’d see wood storks and egrets or a long-legged ibis wading into the water with its curved bill. Sometimes you’d even hear woodpeckers high up in the trees looking for ants. Last summer, Caleb and I’d found a couple of turtles that we kept at the house until Rufus got to playing with them and bit through their shells. Momma tried to heal them but couldn’t. She even tried using masking tape to hold the shells together, but they were cracked too bad.

  Momma said she always liked the walk to Widow Jones’, but this morning she didn’t seem in the mood to talk much, so I kept my mind on what book I was going to choose. Last time I’d been to Whitehall Plantation I’d seen Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner. Miss Lilly said it was an “ambitious read,” but I hoped that would be the book I could take home today.

  We neared Widow Jones’ plantation, just past the swamp, and came upon a great willow oak. A black and white newspaper article was tacked to it, waving a little in the wind. Momma and I looked at it and saw a picture of someone hanging from a tree.

  “Come on,” Momma said, pulling me away.

  “What was in that picture?”

  “Nothing for a child to see,” Momma said, sighing so deeply I wondered what in the world was happening

  We turned down the path to Widow Jones’ and I said, “Was that what Uncle Joss was talking about last night?”

  Momma stopped and looked at me. “They’re just trying to scare him, Chloe. That’s all.”

  “You mean Big Jim?”

  “He’s been peeking in windows, things like that.”

  I thought of Caleb firing that shot at Big Jim yesterday and how scared he looked.

  Momma mistook my concern and said, “Don’t worry none, Chloe. Your pa would skin the hide of anyone who tried to hurt you. You know that.”

  I did know that, but still, I couldn’t shake the vision of someone hanging from a noose. It was troubling, to say the least.

  “Come on,” Momma said, taking my hand. “Don’t wanna be late for lunch.”

  Widow Jones’ flowering mimosas were in full swing. They were shaped like great umbrellas, their fern-like leaves sprinkled with wispy pink blossoms. They had the sweetest nectar too, drawing honeybees from all around. Yet I knew it wouldn’t be the same tree in winter. By December, it’d be showered in ugly bean pods. They’d hang from every branch and taint the memory of all them pretty blossoms.

  “Look there, Chloe,” Momma said, pointing through the lacework of leaves.

  Whitehall Plantation was in all its glorious splendor. It’d once been a flourishing plantation with over a hundred slaves when cotton was king. Widow Jones said it was one of the most beautiful antebellum Greek Revival plantations ever built. I didn’t have much of a mind to argue, especially when I looked at the gated drive that led to the main house with oaks on either side that dripped of moss.

  Puddingtate, the head gardener, was clearing out some overgrown grass as Momma and I walked beneath the great oaks.

  “Morning, Mrs. Mason. Miss Chloe,” he said, tipping his hat.

  “Morning, Puddingtate,” Momma said, real cordial like.

  He was older than Methuselah, his skin real crinkly and paper thin, but Momma said he was the best pruner in Charleston County. He could make the dogwoods bloom like there’s no tomorrow and get those weeping cherry trees to cascade in delicate, pink blossoms. He didn’t work real fast though. Momma said most of the time he’d sit on the porch and lollygag about Jackie Robinson. Puddingtate couldn’t believe a colored man was playing baseball with all them white folk. Pa couldn’t either. He said it was a sin for a black man to be playing with white folk and that he oughta go back to the Negro Leagues.

  “You makin’ them yellow roses real pretty?”

  “Sure am, Mrs. Mason,” Puddingtate said.

  Last year Widow Jones won a prize from the Charleston Rose Society for growing them real sweet-smelling roses. They had delicate petals and were about the creamiest shade of buttercream you’ve ever seen. Momma liked to smell them every time she walked past. Course, she asked Pa for roses like that on her anniversary, but all she ever got was a broom from Uncle Hickory’s store.

  We left Puddingtate as he started singing one of his Negro spirituals. He moved beneath those great oaks that made you feel like you’d stepped back in time, like something of the past was trying to take hold.

  “Have you worked up an appetite?” Momma asked, as we climbed the steps to the veranda.

  “Yessum. I can practically taste Hattie Mae’s lemonade.”

  The wide slat boards had been freshly coated in varnish, and the air lingered with the scent of white flowers. Hattie Mae opened the door with a big smile. She was wearing the gray maid uniform and white linen apron she always had starched real good. Course, Widow Jones never made Momma wear nothing like that.

  “Good to see you, Miss Chloe,” she said, giving me a big hug.

  She had soft, doughy arms that liked to wrap all the way around you and a face that glowed with kindness. Momma liked to say she’d been dipped in cypress water cuz her skin was darker than coffee grounds.

  “Mrs. Jones is in the library. She’s got something for you.”

  “Something for me?”

  Momma nudged me and we stepped into the foyer. I never could get over how different Whitehall was from our little house. The foyer was a round room with marble floors and a sweeping, curved staircase. Overhead a sparkling chandelier descended from a painted rotunda. Every time I’d look up, I’d marvel at the creation scene depicted on the ceiling. A lush garden with lots of trees and flowers was painted in vibrant blues and greens. Adam and Eve seemed to be having a real good time.

  I just wondere
d how Hattie Mae cleaned the chandelier. Probably had to climb on one of those rickety ladders the painters used last spring to paint the siding.

  The foyer split off into several rooms. Widow Jones’ dining room was done up by some famous designer who decorated it in the “British colonial” style. All that meant was that it had a lot of botanical prints and palm-leaf shaped ceiling fans. Then there was the kitchen. It was real light and bright with lots of cream-colored cupboards and one of them automatic dishwashers that Momma said she’d feel like she’d “died and gone to heaven” if she ever owned. And then, of course, my favorite room – the library. It had decorative crown molding and honey-colored hardwood floors, just like the rest of the house.

  In summer, Momma would take up the hallway rugs to keep the floors cool. That’s why I slipped when I hurried to the library. I was used to the plush rugs slowing me down.

  White shelves went on for miles in the library. Mr. Jones had been a prolific reader, but mostly loved books about the sea. He had all kinds of books on admirals and famous captains. Sometimes I wondered if he’d rather been born on a ship than a plantation.

  Widow Jones was about thirty years his junior. Before she got married, she was crowned the Magnolia Queen of Charleston. Course, she still had most of that beauty-queen prettiness. She had soft brown hair with light golden touches in it and one of them peaches-and-cream complexions. Most folks wrote home about her figure, though. It was one of them real curvy kinds. Momma said she was the quintessential Southern belle. She always had her nails painted fresh and her lipstick on just so. Course, that was most women in these parts. Even if they didn’t have Widow Jones’ figure, at least they’d put on a dress and some makeup.

  Widow Jones was sitting by the window, looking through the pages of her wedding album. Some folks said she married Carlton Jones for his money, but I didn’t think that could possibly be true. Not when she’d look at all them pictures of the two of them getting married.