All That Lives (18 page)

One lovely spring night, the Reverend Johnston and Calvin Justice and my family were gathered in the parlor in our customary
places discussing our supernatural visitation.

“Its tone reminds me of the marvelous talking bird we witnessed at the fair of Knoxville years ago. Do you recall it, children?”
I closed my eyes and breathed the fresh night-blooming stock and the scent of Mother’s roses, heavy in the cooling air, drifting
in the open windows. I had a picture in my mind of being small and craning my neck up to look at a large black carriage. There
was a man standing tall before it with a wildly colorful bird on his shoulder, but I could not remember hearing the creature
speak. I looked to Drewry and John Jr. to see what they recalled, but they had their eyes closed, and I could not tell what
they pictured in their minds.

“If a bird can learn to speak, what of other lower forms?” The Reverend Johnston pursed his lips in open inquiry and I suspect
he wished to discover if the Being could do more than repeat Scripture to him. Could it speak for itself? As his enthusiasm
for the entity had grown, so had his Bible. I saw the leather binding of it strained to hold the many parchment notes he had
stuffed within it.

“This form is low indeed, Reverend,” Father said. He did not look well. His brow was twisted down with ever growing concern.
“Plead with the Lord, Reverend, on our behalf, plead that this demon would trouble us no more.” Father let no opportunity
pass him by to remind the Reverend of what he hoped was his true purpose in the matter.

There was a general rustling of clothing as everyone sat up, in a position of alert meditation. I bowed my head, beginning
to concentrate on my own breath, filling my lungs with the scent of flowers and my mind with peace. This was not as difficult
as it had been previously, for I was not frightened of feeling nothing. I listened for the Reverend’s reading but before he
could begin, cold air filled the room and I experienced a swirling of images, including the hearth where there was no fire
filled with sparks, before I fell into unconscious darkness. When I awoke, I was lying with my belly and cheek pressed against
the parlor rug and my toes touched the smooth wood of the floor.

“Who are you and why are you here?” the Reverend Johnston demanded, irritating me, for I felt I was just waking up from a
too short nap, when into the cold silence I heard the voice distinctly reply.

I am a Spirit; I was once very happy, but I have been disturbed.

“Look, Jack, her eyes are open.” Mother kneeled beside me, her face concerned. I wished to tell her, do not be afraid, for
I am well, but I found I could not force myself to speak. I struggled to move my tongue but it was as if my mouth was frozen
still. I closed my eyes. For a moment I felt it was speaking only to me, expressing my own true feelings: I once was happy,
but I had been disturbed.

“Mark its words!” The Reverend was excited.

“They are the first not taken from the Scripture,” Calvin Justice whispered.

“What do you mean?” the Reverend Johnston asked the air.

I am a Spirit; I was once very happy, but I have been disturbed.

It repeated the phrase once more, and I heard it, but pretended to be sleeping, as I could not speak of what it called to
mind, an ugly incident our family had hoped would remain forever forgotten. With my body frozen stiff as my voice, I recalled
it fully, measuring the import of the Spirit’s words.

Years ago, Father and the slaves had cleared a plot of thistles and brush up on the plateau at the northern boundary of our
land above the river and in carrying out the work, they came upon a small mound of what appeared to be graves. Father surmised
the site was an Indian burial ground and gave orders to work around it. A few days later, Vernon Batts came calling to our
home, as at that time he was trying to make a friend of Drewry. Together the two boys went out to hunt down the spot of the
graves, hoping to find some relics the Indians were thought to bury with their dead. When they reached the mound, Drew had
suggested they leave well enough alone, as the graves did not seem fanciful up close, but Vernon maintained they would have
to look inside them to be certain. Drewry had foolishly agreed and they had proceeded to scatter the rocks and dig up the
earth, and in the process, they disinterred the bones. There was nothing of value in the grave but Vernon did not wish to
leave empty-handed. He had removed the jawbone from a skull and carried it back to our house, devising an elaborate plan to
scare Richard and Joel and myself. I was sewing in the parlor when they ran in, wildly excited. I had seen Vernon slip on
Mother’s clean and polished wood, whereupon the jawbone flew from his hand and struck the wall with such force a tooth was
knocked loose, and it disappeared from sight through a crack in our floorboard.

Unfortunately for Drewry, Father had been passing through the house at that very moment and hearing the scuffle he had entered
the hallway and demanded a full account of their doings. Once informed, he had reprimanded both boys severely. Vernon was
sent home and Drewry was taken to the barn for a whipping. Father sent Dean to take the jawbone back to the grave and he was
instructed to replace the bones that were disinterred and told to make certain the rocks were piled high to protect the graves
from future marauders. The following year, Father had allowed the thistles to reclaim the area.

“She is waking now,” Mother said. I had opened my eyes but remained still. As I focused on Mother’s cotton dress I realized
she had moved my head onto her lap. She stroked the hair off my forehead and I felt as though it was true, I was waking from
a long and restful sleep though I was unaware of having slept at all.

“It has departed.” The Reverend shook his head with some consternation and his silver hair fell in front of his ears. I felt
sorry for him, none the wiser on his mission.

In the morning, once the Reverend and Preacher Justice had departed, our family sat all together at the table, discussing
the Spirit’s meaning in using the word
disturbed.
The same recollection of the lost tooth had visited all of us. Drewry, brave soul that he was, suggested perhaps our family
troubles had been brought about by his own thoughtless and horrible mischief from that day long ago.

“I have thought it over and I must speak of how it seems not right.” Drewry set his elbows firmly on the table and raised
his eyes to Father. “I cannot understand,” Drewry said nervously, “
why,
if the Spirit belongs to the bones I did disturb,
why
has it come to settle at our home rather than Vernon’s, since Vernon was the one who plundered the bone from its grave?”

“It would come here, Drewry, searching for the tooth it lost!” Richard was on my left and as he spoke I turned to him with
great concern. Did he not realize our father was unaware of this significant detail?

“What say you, Richard? What tooth?” Father set his spoon beside his bowl.

“It was wrong in every aspect—” Drewry began his explanation but once it was revealed how the Indians’ tooth had fallen under
our house Father became enraged. Slamming his fist down on the table, he ordered Drewry out to the barn. I squeezed Drew’s
arm as he stood, for I saw beneath his mask of stoicism he was crumbling inside.

“Father, I would have you know I do repent that incident more than any other from my short lifetime and if I could but live
that day again, never would it be the same.”

Mother looked as if she might cry, as it was sad for her to hear her son’s repentance, but she said nothing aloud. It was
useless to dissuade Father from implementing punishment once he had decided on it. We all knew it was better not to speak.
As Drewry left the room, Father rose and went not directly to the barn as I expected, but instead into the hallway. Removing
his short knife from his belt he stuck its sharp end into a crack between two floorboards, meaning to pry it up right then,
with his bare hands. He exerted all his effort and though I expected it was an impossible task he had set himself since our
floor was well laid, I did not say a word.

“This floor is solid as they come,” Father grunted with frustration, unable to loosen it. John Jr. rose and stood behind him,
waiting for the instructions he correctly sensed would be forthcoming. Mother, Richard, Joel and I sat at the table holding
our breath, unable to touch the grits and fresh milk in our bowls. When he had exhausted the possibility of removing the board
with his knife and hands, Father sat back on his heels. “Fetch Dean up to the house, John Jr., and the crowbar and the claw
hammer,” he ordered.

Father spent the rest of the morning disassembling that section of our floor. Our hallway was demolished, board by board,
and the creak and split of the wood coming up induced terrible fear in my heart, as I associated the sound with the previous
violence of the Spirit. I remained seated at the table, but Richard and Joel moved to sit above the action on the stairs.
I expect they wished to jump down and play under the house, but they were too frightened of Father’s anger to ask if they
might. Father himself climbed down through the open floor when it was large enough to do so and stood firmly on the cold earth
exposed below. Dean had brought the fine rake and Father combed the dirt carefully, but he found nothing.

“Lucy, get the sifter,” he commanded, and I saw Mother frown.

“Goodness, Jack!” She shook her head all the way to the kitchen as if she thought his was a foolish pursuit, but she brought
the sifter to him with no further remark. I followed her example and kept a silent vigil, but moved to the parlor so I might
engage my hands at mending and have an excuse to look away from the consternation on Father’s features as he sifted the dirt
beneath our house, cup by cup. He kept at it all the day, but he did not find the missing tooth.

“If ever a tooth did fall here, the earth has claimed it for its own.” He climbed from the hole defeated, and after John Jr.
and Dean had helped him replace the boards, it was near time for supper.

“Betsy, fetch your brother,” he looked to me, wiping dirt from his cheek with a white muslin cloth Mother gave to him. He
apparently had no energy left for whipping Drewry, who had waited all day in the barn.

“Tell him make haste to return to the house and to his room, where he might pray to God for forgiveness for his sins.” I hurried
to the stables, relieved to be outside, for I had not known the day was so lovely. The sun was soon to pass behind the trees
and the land glowed with the pink goodbye kiss of day. The grass seemed greener and the air more still and I heard the whippoorwills
starting their evening song. Despite my relief at being out-of-doors, I felt a tingling fear, walking alone down the path,
and I ran the final yards to the stable barn, throwing open the door when I reached it. A group of flies, warmed to buzzing,
spun about my head, and I saw Drewry pacing through the dusty straw littering the rough barn floor, his eyes downcast and
his face pale from fear.

“Father has not the heart for whipping, Drewry. All the day he has searched for the tooth and found it not. He instructs you
to your room to pray for forgiveness for your sins.” When Drewry stopped his movements and turned to face me, his features
were without the joy and relief I expected.

“Dear sister, do you know why we are so cursed?” His face seemed to crumble and he stepped forward clutching me to him in
a hard embrace. In the troubled lines around his eyes I saw my own inner feelings and I struggled not to give in to tears.

“At least Father’s crop will not be laid across your backside,” I said meekly, squeezing my arms around his waist in an effort
to console him.

“If all my sins and yours, sweet sister, and all the sins of every one of us within our family were combined and offered up
to God, along with all our resolutions
never to sin again,
what would be the outcome? More of the torture we have received as good, God-fearing Christians?” Drewry had clearly thought
about it in the day. “Tell me, Betsy, what horrific crime has any one of us indulged, that we should be singled out for such
punishment?” Drewry’s hands gripped my back and reminded me of Father undoing my stays. “I do believe what haunts us here
has naught to do with God,” Drew continued, “and God’s forgiveness of our sins has naught to do with our continued torment.”
I could not answer him and though it was blasphemous to do so, I well understood the feelings he did voice, for the injustice
of our suffering weighed heavily on us all.

“We will be transfigured by our affliction,” I said, repeating a phrase I’d heard the Reverend say to Father. I tried to utter
it with hope for a positive transformation in our future, but I too was filled with dark foreboding thoughts. We remained
standing together as the last rays of sunlight filtered like the long fingers of God through the cracks in the barn siding.
The last pure beams of light fell well short of our two figures, and as we gazed, it disappeared entirely.