Page from a Tennessee Journal (AmazonEncore Edition)

and food and clothes fo’ us. It was fo’ us.” The boy lowered the pitchfork, but John could see the firm grip his son still kept on the handle.
    “No, son.” Annalaura’s knees buckled.
    “If she hadn’t let him stay, he was gonna throw us off the place.” Cleveland’s words came in jerks between sobs.
    Out of the corner of his eye, John watched Lottie pull a porcelain-headed doll with light brown hair off Cleveland’s bed and hug it to her little chest. Toys, food and plenty of it, new clothes. Even the dishes were new. He looked over at Annalaura who staggered to her feet. Her eyes stared frantic warnings at Cleveland.
    “Boy…” John menaced.
    “I’ll tell you if you promise to never touch my momma again.” Cleveland raised the pitchfork chest high. “If you don’t, I’ll kill you myself.”
    He turned to the woman he had always thought too good to be his wife. The swelling had almost closed both eyes shut. Blood ran from nose to mouth. A button was ripped off the bodice of her dress. A cut sliced across her forehead.
    “You ain’t had no right to go with no other man no matter what I done.” The words croaked out.
    Cleveland aimed the pitchfork directly at his back.
    “I ain’t meant to wrong you by leavin’. I did it fo’ business, but if you think it was fo’ somethin’ else, then I reckon I’m sorry you didn’t put mo’ stock in me than that.” Bile filled his throat. “But, ain’t nothin’ I could have done was so bad that you had to do this.” Rage stoked his mind. “You ain’t had no right to go with another man. You is my wife.” He started toward her. The pitchfork scraped his side.
    “She didn’t go with another man.” Cleveland’s voice rose to the rafters. “Mr. Alex went with her.”
    “Say what?” John felt frozen in mid-step.
    “She ain’t had no say-so. Even I know that.” Cleveland circled the pitchfork next to John’s heart.
    What difference did it make if his own son ran him through with a farm tool? His boy’s words had already done that damage and more. “It’s all right, boy. I ain’t gonna touch…touch yo’ momma if you is tellin’ me that the owner of this here farm…Mc…he the one who…McN…bought all these things for you…Mm…and yo’ momma. McNaughton.” The name stuck in his throat.
    “I am telling you that.” Cleveland lowered the pitchfork.
    Most of the air swept out of John’s lungs. He turned to Annalaura and worked his mouth. Pictures flooded his head. Bad pictures. Awful pictures. His wife naked. White man…nak…
    “I knows I wronged you, John.” Annalaura stood behind the new kitchen chair, both hands on its back. “I knows I ain’t never been the wife I should have been to you. I was just too ’shamed to tell you.” The words came out of a mouth full of blood.
    The roaring in John’s ears made listening hard.
    “Cleveland’s tellin’ you the truth. Mr. Alex did give us all this stuff, and he has been sniffin’ around here a lot, and I knew what he wanted.” She rubbed at her stomach. “You is right to beat me. He said he would bring food if I let him have breakfast here some mornings befo’ I went to the fields.”
    “And you ain’t known better than to trust a white man’s word?” John nodded his head in disbelief.
    “I know what you say is true. I was weak. I couldn’t think how else to feed my children.”
    “And you let him climb into yo’ bed…my bed…and give you a baby ’cause you was weak and couldn’t think?” The rage roared back.
    “No,” Annalaura screamed as her figure swayed in front of his face. “What Cleveland saw was true. Mr. Alex was here in the mornings for breakfast, but this ain’t his baby.”
    Out of the corner of his eye, John watched the surprise in Cleveland’s face.
    “This here ain’t his baby.” Pleading edged out of Annalaura’s voice.
    John inched closer. “A white man brings you food and gives you presents and you gonna tell me it ain’t his baby? Who the hell baby is it then?”
    His fists doubled up just as the pitchfork jabbed him in the small of the back.
    “He was gonna throw us off the place if we didn’t bring in the tobacco. You was gone fo’ months. I thought you was never comin’ back. Me, Cleveland, Doug, and Lottie worked so hard, but it wasn’t enough. Even little Henry carried water to the fields. We just couldn’t do it by ourselves, John.” Her garbled voice rose to a shriek.
    John nodded his no.
    “Mr. Alex