Sunset and Sawdust

9

Clyde knew Zendo and where he lived. Unlike many negroes, Zendo owned his own land and was not a sharecropper. He had worked in the sawmill for years, putting back every available dollar. Growing crops on the side while he sharecropped, feeding himself and selling the excess.

When he had the money, he bought at an inflated price, because he was a negro and in no position to quibble, a fine piece of bottomland near the creek, cleared a large chunk with an axe, a mule, and a strong back, and started growing vegetables. Used terracing and water channeling from the creek, staked tomatoes, fought bugs.

Fifteen years later, much to the dismay of many white farmers, his farm was the most productive in the county. People drove by just to look at it, lying there in its man-made black dirt, bordered at all four corners by massive compost piles contained within log structures.

Sunset and her deputy constables, and Karen, rattled out to Zendo’s farm in Clyde’s pickup. When they got there, they went by Zendo’s house, which was in better condition than most houses in the area. The tar-paper roof was nailed down tight and there wasn’t any cardboard in the windows.

They found Zendo’s wife out in the yard. She was a big coffee-colored woman in a bright sack dress with a toddler clutching her leg. She had a pan of shelled corn in one hand and with the other she was tossing it to the chickens that gathered around her like servants before the queen.

Sunset got out of the truck and walked up to the lady, passing a small pig that was rolling in a damp depression in the yard, grunting, turning its head as if hoping for some sort of positive comment.

Nearby, a dog lay in the middle of a flower bed that had died out. The dog looked dead himself, but when Sunset walked up, his tail beat a few beats, then went still.

“Not a watchdog,” Sunset said to Zendo’s wife.

“Naw he ain’t,” the lady said. “I used to have a pig that would bite you, but we eating on him. Can I help you?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“How come you got that badge on? You some kind of farm inspector?”

“I’m the constable.”

“Naw you ain’t.”

“Yes, I am.”

“Really? You the constable? How’d that happen? Thought Mister Pete was the constable.”

“No. I shot him.”

“That’s funny,” the lady said. “You done shot him and took his badge. You funny, miss.”

“Yeah, well, I really am the constable. And I really did shoot him. And he really is dead. And once again, I really am the constable.”

“Oh,” she said. “Well, no offense.”

“Like to talk to your husband. Could you tell me where I might find him?”

“He ain’t in any kind of trouble, is he?”

“Nothing like that.”

Zendo’s wife told her, with what Sunset thought was reluctance, that Zendo was still in the field.

On her way out to the truck she passed the hog and the dog again, but this time neither took note of her.

They drove to where the wife had indicated, got out of the truck and started walking toward where they could see Zendo having his dinner under a tree.

Two sleek, sweat-shiny mules stood nearby, still in plow harness, but the plow was no longer attached. The plow was leaning against the tree with Zendo. The mules had been hobbled and were mouthing grain from two flat pans.

The field Zendo had plowed, running the middles, cutting up weeds, was dark as sin, the rows straight enough to have been laid out with a ruler. The dark soil exploded with all manner of vegetables. Corn growing tall and green. Tied tomato vines twisted around wooden stakes, tomatoes dangled from them like little evening suns.

Zendo was biting into a biscuit when he saw a redheaded woman, a teenage girl, and two men walking toward him.

The woman looked roughed up, and his first thought was to run, just in case he was going to be blamed. Then he noted she was wearing a badge on her shirt. He considered this, but couldn’t get a fix on it.

By this time, they were standing beneath the oak, looking down at him. He put the biscuit in his lunch bucket and stood up. It wasn’t a long trip. He had a large head, broad shoulders, and a short body. If he mounted a Shetland pony, the pony would have to be cut off at the knees and placed in a ditch for Zendo’s feet to touch the ground.

“Howdy, this hot day,” he said, hanging his head, starting to shuffle his feet. “How is you folks? It sure is one of God’s good days, now ain’t it, even if it is hot.”

“It’s me,” Clyde said. “You can cut the ‘I sure is dumb’ routine.”

“Is that you, Mr. Clyde? I ain’t seen you in a coon’s age, if you’ll pardon the joke. We got to do us some more fishing.”

“I agree,” Clyde said, stuck out his hand, and they shook. Hillbilly did the same, hesitantly. Zendo didn’t offer to shake hands with either Sunset or Karen.

“Crops look great, Zendo,” Clyde said.

“Bottomland,” Zendo said. “And I treat it good. I run the creek water in it sometimes, does it with lots of cured manure and compost.”

“Sure looks good,” Clyde said. “Zendo, this is Sunset Jones. She’s the constable in these parts now.”

“Say she ain’t,” Zendo said.

“No. She is.”

“Shut me up. Really? You the constable, miss?”

“I am.”

“You’re yanking on me.”

“I tell you I’m not,” Sunset said.

“I thought Mister Pete was the constable.”

“He’s dead,” Sunset said.

“Oh, well, I’m sorry to hear that,” Zendo said.

“He was my husband.”

“Well, now, I’m sure sorry. How did he die, you don’t mind me asking?”

“I shot him.”

“Say you did?”

“That’s what I’m saying.”

“Dead.”

“Yes.”

Karen started back to the pickup.

“We’ll be here just a little while,” Sunset said to Karen’s back.

Karen didn’t answer, just kept walking.

“She’s still sensitive about her father’s death.”

“I hear that,” Zendo said. “Yes, ma’am. I understand. Mr. Pete was a good man.”

“No, he wasn’t,” Sunset said. “He was a sonofabitch, and I’m glad I shot him.”

“Say he was a sonofabitch?”

“That’s what I’m saying. I bet you agree with me.”

“Well, ma’am,” Zendo said, “I ain’t gonna argue with you none.”

“We’re here about dealings Pete had with you.”

“Me and him didn’t have no dealings.”

“A body in a pottery jar,” Sunset said.

“Oh, yeah. Was that. Said he wouldn’t gonna make no big deal out of it.”

“I read it in his files. Tell me about it. Tell me where the baby ended up, or if you have any idea whose it was.”

Zendo told them pretty much what Sunset had read in the files. He found the body plowing, where someone had buried it in a large pottery jar, probably the night before. It was buried deep, but he was plowing deep, and the top of his middle buster broke the rim of the jar.

“I thought it might be one of them Injun pots. I’ve found a bunch of em. But it weren’t. I looked in that pot and seen there was a tow sack stuffed in there. When I pulled that off the top, I seen a little baby about the size of a newborn kitten.”

“Black or white?”

“Couldn’t tell. It was all dirty, and there was some kind of stuff in there.”

“Stuff?”

“Something sticky. It was on the edge of the pot and dirt had stuck to it. It was all over the baby. It was like someone had dipped the baby in it. I thought it was molasses.”

“Was it molasses?” Sunset asked.

“I thought it was, but it had a smell to it, and I figure it was oil mixed in with the dirt.”

“Car oil?”

“Maybe. I didn’t know what to do with it. I feared it might be a white baby and white folks would think I killed it cause it was on my land, so I hid it in the woods.”

“You buried it?” Sunset asked.

Zendo shook his head. “I ain’t proud to say I didn’t, but I didn’t. Mr. Pete found the pot, knew the dirt on it was mine. Ain’t no one around here got dirt this good. Not the way I treat it.

“Thought he was gonna think I done it for sure. But he didn’t. Wasn’t hard on me at all. Didn’t even ask me if I knowed anything about it, just took and buried that poor thing over in the colored graveyard. Or said that’s what he was gonna do.”

“You know Pete found it himself?” Sunset asked.

“He just come to me about it. I reckoned he did. Suppose someone else could have found it, told him, and he figured out it come from my place.”

“Where is the graveyard?” Sunset asked.

“Clyde here knows,” Zendo said.

Clyde shook his head. “Not anymore. I used to. But I ain’t been out in that neck of the woods in years. Since you and me hunted there last, and that’s been-good grief, we was kids.”

“Ain’t that the truth,” Zendo said. “You and me was the same tall then. Now you just like a tree, and me, I’m like a stump.”

Zendo picked up a stick and drew a map in the dirt, made an X where the graveyard was, said, “Right there. Got to walk some to get to it. Can’t go all the way there by car.”

“Thanks,” Sunset said. “You can finish your dinner.”

Zendo said, “Guess Mr. Pete done hit the wrong person, didn’t he?”

“On that day, yes,” Sunset said.

They had to leave the truck on a clay road by a sweet gum and walk down through the trees to get to the cemetery. The air was heavy beneath the trees, and though the shade took away the direct heat of the sun, it was humid and the mosquitoes were thicker than tacks in a tar-paper shack.

Karen said, “Why would anyone put a graveyard down in the woods like this? Ain’t they usually alongside the road?”

“Some white folks think it’s a real laugh to mess with colored grave-yards,” Clyde said. “This way it ain’t so easy to bother.”

“Kind of hard to carry the bodies to the hole, ain’t it?” Hillbilly said.

“Reckon it is,” Clyde said, swatting a mosquito.

“Bugs are eating me up,” Karen said.

“You can go back and wait in the truck if you want,” Sunset said.

But Karen didn’t go back. Finally the woods thinned and there was a trail.

“Didn’t Zendo say turn left?” Sunset said.

“Way I remember it,” Hillbilly said.

“Yeah,” Clyde said. “That’s how you go. It’s coming back to me.”

They walked along for a distance, and soon there was a large clearing that looked to have been worked with machetes, and just beyond that was a place of erected stones. There were oak trees in the cemetery with moss and vines growing up the sides, dripping off their limbs. There was one dogwood in the cemetery and some honeysuckle, and the aroma of the honeysuckle was strong and bees were buzzing the flowers on the tree.

Some of the graves ran right up to the trees, and you could see where roots had lifted the stones and made them sag. But it was a well-cared-for place and there were fresh flowers on many of the graves and voodoo beads and pieces of bright-colored glass on some of the others. There were even a few fruit jars with liquid in them.

“What’s in them fruit jars?” Hillbilly asked.

“Home liquor sometimes,” Clyde said. “They bring it out for the dead.”

“That’s silly,” Hillbilly said, “and a waste of liquor.”

Karen laughed at that.

Hillbilly grinned at Karen. “Me and Karen could drink that instead of it going to waste, couldn’t we, kid?”

Karen laughed again.

Sunset said, “Karen don’t drink.”

“Course not,” Hillbilly said. “Just making a joke.”

Finally Sunset found a grave with a wooden cross over it. The cross was made of cheap lumber and two nails. Next to it were fragments of busted pottery.Written on the cross was: BABY.

“Pete did this,” Sunset said. “I recognize the way he carved the B’s into that cross. It’s like his writing, way he makes his B’s. He must have busted up the pot to get the baby out, or maybe it got busted later on by someone else.”

“Daddy wasn’t so bad,” Karen said. “See how he done with the baby and all.”

Hillbilly swatted a mosquito. “Long walk down here for nothing, you ask me.”

“We could give the baby a name,” Clyde said. “We could write it on the cross. We could call it something like Snooks.”

“No, we couldn’t,” Sunset said. “And besides. We don’t know if it was male or female.”

“I still like Snooks,” Clyde said. “It works either way. Girl or boy. You like Snooks, Hillbilly?”

“No,” Hillbilly said.

“Hell, you got a name like Hillbilly,” Clyde said. “What’s wrong with Snooks?”

“Hillbilly’s a nickname. And don’t ask my real one, cause I don’t tell it. What did we learn here, Sunset? What was this trip all about?”

“Don’t rightly know,” Sunset said. “Let’s go back.”