All God's Dangers (13 page)

Hannah walked up to the fence and looked at me. She said, “Why, here is Mr. Shaw over here.”

Her mother and all of em then looked and seed me. It was surprisin to em, no doubt, that I was out there, but thank God I was in a clean clear place, didn't catch me at no devilment. I was
up in them bushes pickin plums. Weren't no other girls about there except my first cousin, Uncle Grant and Aunt Leafy's daughter.

Hannah said, “Why, Mr. Shaw appears to be caught up in a plum bush. He don't even come down and talk to us. Watch out for yourself, Mr. Shaw.”

So I told her, yes, I would, and they went right on up the road, crossed and went right across the Pollard place to their place.

Well, all such as that was keepin me stuck up. I was comin to like her more every year of my life and she liked me. Kept on pickin plums and they went on home. Got done pickin plums and went back to Uncle Grant's house. I stayed over there till late hours, then went on back to my daddy's.

I lingered; I never did go to see that girl yet. I was gettin to be a man in them days but still I wouldn't lurch out and be too fast. But the kind of creature I am, when I take out at anything or want to do anything, I'll bust to do it.

1905, I was beginnin to pick up and spur my own horse then. One Sunday in October—I disremember whether it was the first Sunday, second Sunday, third Sunday, or the fourth Sunday, but it was October—I heard that this girl—I done waited as long as I could. I loved her, I loved her. I done got to where I couldn't stay away from her—I heard that she was goin down to the piney woods on a Saturday and spend the night, her and her baby sister Mattie, with her older sister and Malcolm Todd. Hannah's older sister was named Lily, Lily Ramsey, and she married Malcolm Todd. And I heard one day durin the week, 1905, in October, that them two youngest Ramsey gals was goin down there on a visit, goin on a Saturday and comin back on Sunday. It was about four miles from where my daddy was livin on the Wheeler place down there to where Sister Lily was livin, on Mr. Harry Black's place. I got right busy, prepared myself all week—that Sunday, cleaned up, fixed myself up, I got one of them old mules out the lot and hitched him to my daddy's buggy, pretty good buggy, and I took a drive.

I done stayed out of correspondin with that girl as long as I could. I drove down there that Sunday and when I drove up in the yard, she was the first one that I seed comin to the door. She said, “Mr. Shaw, what are you doin way down here?”

I said, “I'm just drivin around for a little enjoyment.”

She said, “Well, get out and come in.”

She called her brother-in-law “Brother.” She said, “Brother and
Sister aint here”—that was Malcolm and Lily— “there ain't nobody here but me and Lena and Mattie. Come on in.” Sister Lena stayed with Malcolm and Lily at that time; her and her husband was separated.

I went in and set down. She taken a chair and set down pretty close to me, reasonably close. We set there and talked a while.

She said, “Mr. Shaw, we are down here on a visit. Sister and Brother, they gone over to Teaks' Church to a sing. We was plannin and preparin to go down to Mr. Spivey's”—fellow by the name of Will Spivey, lived right below em—“we was plannin to walk down there this evenin. They goin to have a little singin down there.”

I done got hot in the collar then. I was drivin in, too; goin to learn which way the world was goin or which way that girl was goin.

She said, “Would you wish to drive down to the singin?”

I said, “No, I wouldn't care to go down there right now. I just got here. You all can go down there if you like.”

Right then Sister Lena begin talkin with me on some conversation, but Lena weren't on my mind a bit. Set there a few minutes and I said, “I'll probably come down there before I turn around and go back the other way. I may drive down.”

Hannah said, “All right. If you decide, come on down. We goin down there now—” her and Mattie. You could see one house from the other; weren't a half-mile apart. I set there and talked with Lena again.

After a while I got up, walked out and untied my mule, throwed my tie halter in the buggy, crawled up there and drove straight down to Mr. Spivey's where Hannah was. I got down there and the house was full of gals. Whooooeeeee, when I drove up and stopped, a crowd of em come to the door, bulged up in the door. They come jumpin out that house then, into the yard, runnin in their long skirts. Hannah weren't sayin a word, only just laughin with the rest of em and laughin at what they said.

“What you doin way down here, Mr. Shaw? What you doin way down here? You way out of your country. Never seed you down here before. How come you down here?”

One of them gals spoke, said, “Hannah's here, that's the reason of it; don't you understand? Hannah's here. That's who he come down here after.”

All of em run out to my buggy then and surrounded me, and
they commenced a chattin, talkin. I weren't sayin nothin, just lookin at em, laughin, humorin em in their talk. They just hit the very key note. Got high enough to go to jabbin with me—I was always a fellow that taken well amongst the girls. All I had to do was present myself. But there was one in the bunch that I liked better than I did the others; consequently, I didn't go no further with em than to treat em right, treat em with respect. I conducted myself well and I was just a young fellow. I was a popular young man—the girls would cut buttonholes over me—but I never thought I was more than I was. It was the easiest thing I ever done in my life, tamperin with women. I was a heavy hitter surely; I knowed I could hit heavy in any way I wanted to but I held myself back.

So, “Mr. Shaw, aint that how you come down here? Didn't you come down here to take Hannah home?”

O, they was hot at me. I looked straight at em, pulled myself up on the buggy seat, said, “If them buggy wheels turns over I'm goin to carry her home.”

That's all I give em. Hannah smiled. I had never asked her
could
I carry her home, neither. I just told that drove of girls, “If them buggy wheels turns over I'm goin to carry her home this evenin.” I didn't bite my tongue.

Well, when the crowd broke up, then I
asked
Hannah for the privilege of carryin her back home. She granted me the privilege. And when that buggy left there, she left on it with me. Drove back up to Malcolm Todd's and Lily's. She got her things together, what she had carried down there to spend the night in; nicely fixed em up and put em in the buggy. Luke Milliken happened to be down there that Sunday. He was a little kin to em and he brought Mattie home, the baby sister. So that give me and Hannah the buggy by ourselves.

That evenin, late, just before sundown I landed her home. And just before we got there we met her mother, walkin, at a fork in the road. She was on her way up to Uncle Price MacFarland's house. It set right up the road along the right hand side of the fork goin away from the Ramsey land. Takin a late evenin walk up there. Met her right at the fork and stopped the buggy. She walked up and looked in at Hannah said, “Sweet”—they called her “Sweet”—“who is this got you on the buggy? Who is this?” She smiled and laughed. “Who is this man?”

She liked me—her and old man Waldo Ramsey liked me for a young fellow; been knowin me from before I was nine years old. My mother died in August and three weeks to Christmas my daddy married old man Waldo's sister. And in the Christmas I become nine years old. So the Ramseys and the Shaws done been together, learnt about one another—names and families and so on. And I liked Hannah from a girl on up. I used to look at her when she was small—I was a small boy, too. Her little old cheeks would be just as red, just as red—her mother was a half-white woman.

So, her mother went on, “Well, Sweet, you all can go on to the house, you and your company.”

I knowed I stood well with em because I always treated in growin up her mother and father nice as a little boy could treat old folks.

I drove on up to her house and helped Hannah out the buggy, went in and stayed there until just about first dark. Her mother come back home right quick, and old man Waldo was already there; but they didn't come into the room where we was. That was where my love was. I was highly appreciated by the old folks and I knowed it.

First dark I got up to go. Me and Hannah stood at the fireplace—weren't cold enough for no fire. The mantel board was reasonably low and we stood against it talkin. I hit her then, hit her a hard lick and this is the way I hit her. I done been granted the privilege to correspond her—that evenin when she allowed me to carry her home I asked her about it and she agreed. Got her home then, stayed until about first dark, I decided I'd better be pullin out. But before I did I just come out fair, didn't ask her in no roundabout way. I thought she had it in her for me; I knowed I had it in me for her. I said, talkin low, “Well, do you love me or think enough of me to live a married life with me?”

It stuck her. She smiled but she was slow to answer. She said, as a girl would, “Mr. Shaw, I'll talk with you further about that on your next trip.”

I said, “Very well as far as talkin goes, we'll talk. But I wants to know now.”

She hated to say it, she hated to say it, but she decided to make up her mind right there and answer my question.

She told me, “Yes, I love you. And I agree to marry you, live a married life with you.”

I lingered along with her then; went a few times to see her. I had got up to twenty years old and come in the knowledge of so many different things; I'd come into the knowledge of women to an extent. Nature will teach you like it teaches a stallion to jump a fence; you aint goin to hold down. The thing for a boy to do when he gets old enough for his nature to begin to teach him, don't make a dog of himself. So, I was afraid my nature would take over me and I stayed away from Hannah to a great extent.

I corresponded her until Christmas, 1906. Anywhere she'd tell me she wanted to go, to meetin or just for a pleasure trip, I'd hire me a nice buggy and take the best mule in the lot—my daddy happened to have a old mule, called him Haggard. That old mule, you could take a straw and drive him to death. You better not touch old Haggard, slap him with the lines or either hit him with a straw—Haggard's gone. That scoundrel could trot like a horse. He was a slender-built, sorrel-colored mule.

1906, my daddy had me hired to Mr. Jim Barbour, but Saturday evenins I'd go around—and there was three fellows that had nice buggies: Mr. Stark, man that I lived with in the year of '23, he had a nice buggy and he was livin at that time on a place he had bought right on the road between Apafalya and my daddy. I'd stop there, hire Mr. Stark's buggy for Sunday use. If I didn't get it, Mr. Chester Allen lived right up above Mr. Stark;
he
had a nice buggy. I'd get Mr. Allen's. If I missed on any one of em, a young white fellow lived across Sitimachas Creek, just the other side of my daddy, by the name of Chester Edmonds. I could hire his buggy any time he weren't usin it. And out of the three of them buggies—all of em was nice buggies—one of em was goin to stand in the yard. And I'd hire that buggy for Sunday; go there Sunday mornin and get it. Sunday night, first part of the night, I'd drive the buggy back in there. Everybody'd be asleep—I wouldn't rouse em up. Drive up to the shed, take that buggy out, lay the harness off my mule, lay it in the foot of that buggy, pick up them shafts, and push that buggy back under the shed. That's just workin one mule to the buggy; if it's two, it'd be a pole—I never did carry Hannah nowhere with two mules. Just get old Haggard and put him between the shafts of some white man's buggy. Drive over to the Ramsey home on Sundays, Hannah would come out and invite me in. I'd get out the buggy, hitch my mule, walk in. The old folks, I'd just as soon talk to them as talk to their daughter. That's the way I conducted
myself. Never did shine my eyes to old folks and ignore em. And they never turned me down for nothin.

Hannah would go on and get ready to go out with me. Sometimes before we'd leave she'd come in the room where I was settin, say, “Mr. Shaw, Mama wants to go with us this mornin. Would you carry her?”

I'd say, “Of course, I wouldn't miss it. Tell her to get ready.”

They had—old man Waldo had a nice mule, long-legged scoundrel, and his wife was scared to ride behind him. Name of the mule was Prince. He'd run away with you if you let him. He weren't real bad about it but he'd do it. See anything in the road he didn't like he'd turn around. Old man Waldo was a good old man but he was
too
good in a way; he let that mule do him as he pleased a heap of times and in that the mule developed a mind of his own. Old lady Molly Ramsey didn't want to ride behind him, scared her. She'd jump out of that buggy when that mule started.

Hannah kept a comin to me that way. I'd just tell her, “Yes, why sure, your mother's plumb welcome to go with us anywhere she wants to go, if we go.”

They had a nice Barnville buggy. Old man Waldo bought it second-handed from some Higgins fellow in here about Pottstown; was goin off to some sort of business or school and he sold his buggy to old man Waldo. Nice buggy, just wasn't a rubber tire buggy. And he had nice lap robes for buggy use, a summer robe, fall robe, winter robe. Old lady Molly Ramsey'd take the lap robe from their buggy and cover her and Hannah's lap with it. I'd take mine and fold it up and spread it across the buggy down in the foot. I'd set down straight, cross them lines on the dashboard, put my foot in the buggy stirrup, Hannah and her mother sittin on the seat of that hired buggy—didn't use their buggy, didn't use their mule. I hired a buggy and drove the best mule my daddy had. And that old Haggard would put you wherever you called. My daddy had one old yellow mule, called him Pomp. Old Pomp, he'd trot along for you but he didn't get up and get off down the road like old Haggard.