Sharecropper Hell (Illustrated) by Jim Thompson

Author:Jim Thompson [Thompson, Jim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780989671415
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2013-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

Even standing in the shadows, and at the distance I was from him, he looked pale. He was just about the scaredest-looking man, white or Indian, I’d ever seen. His lips moved, like he was about to say something, and he sure shouldn’t have done that, it seemed, because the medicine man began shrieking at him; and the two Indians at his side threw him down on the ground.

He lay on his back, with the wind knocked out of him, maybe. Anyway, he didn’t move or try to speak again.

The semi-circle spread out. The medicine man took two clamshells from his pockets, and handed them to the Indians nearest him. They passed them on, to the men nearest them, and those two passed them on again. They moved from man to man, until they reached the two men sitting next to the creek.

One of them made a pass at the creek, making out like he was filling the shell with water, but not actually doing it. He started it back up the line again; and the Indian opposite him waited a minute, then went through the same motions and passed his shell back.

The medicine man squatted down at Abe’s side. He grabbed him by the nose and forced his mouth open. One of the shells had reached him by this time, and he snatched it and “emptied” it down Abe’s throat and handed it down the line again. Then he took the other shell and “emptied” it into Abe and passed it back. He reached for the first one again.

It went on and on, the shells moving at just the right speed to keep the “water” pouring down Abe’s throat. And I knew they weren’t actually doing it—only going through the motions—but it all seemed so real that I found my breath coming hard. It was as though I were being executed by drowning in the old tribal way, as they were “executing” Abe.

The medicine man stood up, and put the clamshells back in his pocket. He walked to the pot, scooped out some pashofa on a strip of bark and carried it back to Abe. He offered it to him, pushing it out at him then jerking it back. And Abe stood up—somehow, in all the goings-on, his bonds had been untied. But he didn’t touch the pashofa, of course.

Dead men don’t eat.

The medicine man laid the bark strip on the sand. He squatted over and reached for the pebbles which the others had gathered. And the others drew in their semi-circle until Abe was standing outside of it.

The medicine man covered the bark with the pebbles, laying them over it one by one— making a tiny stone wickiup. That wickiup was Abe’s grave. The bark was his body.

Everyone stood up again in that tight semi-circle, and Abe was shut off from sight. Then the semi-circle broke up, and they began scraping out the pot. The execution and burial were over, and they got ready to leave.

But Abe was already gone.

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