Promised Land, page 12
While in the room, I could hear several people talking on the other side of the door. The dining room was nearby, and after I cracked the door, I peeked through it. The Masters were sitting at the table with Brock, Bobby Lee, Ben, Mathias and Maryann. She had the baby in her arms while listening to one of The Masters speak. I was shocked to see them with their masks off. More than anything, I couldn’t believe there was a black Master too. I’d seen him at the church earlier, but now that his mask was off, I covered my mouth with my hand because I recognized him. Seeing him made me sick to my stomach, and knowing that so many black people supported this idiot when he’d played sports, it pained me tremendously. I even recognized some of the other Masters. Many worked for the government; one had even run for president before. I couldn’t think of his name, but one of The Masters was often on TV, talking about his ongoing efforts to even the playing field between blacks and whites. Many black leaders praised his efforts, and after seeing The Masters together, it truly made me wonder who in the hell was their boss. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out, especially since everything had started to become much clearer to me now.
“If free labor made this country billions of dollars before,” said one of The Masters. “Can you imagine what free labor can do for us now? We need to separate these niggers and put them to work in places that can benefit us all in a major way. Think about the auto industry, government jobs and manufacturing jobs that we’re paying them too much for now. Not to mention healthcare and additional benefits. If we capture enough of them, they can work for free and we won’t have to pay for anything. White people can prosper again and we can get some of those jobs back that have been taken away from us.”
The black Master spoke up. “I like the idea of continuing to gather up people from broken households. There are plenty pertaining to black families, and they shouldn’t be difficult to find, thanks to social media. The women always out there griping and you can tell when the kids ain’t got nothing but time on their hands. I also like the idea of going into those inner cities and gathering up busloads of those non-working, low-life niggas who ain’t doing nothing anyway. Let’s put them to work. They may be a little difficult to tame, but after a few strikes across their backs from Mathias, they’ll fall in line.”
Mathias smiled. He appreciated the compliment. “You’s doggone right I’ll get’em in line. I got those niggers in line now, and lately they’s been real quiet and cooperative. The last busload that came wasn’t bad. I only had to shoot one of those niggers for fussin’ and cussin’ about being bumped into. I lifted my rifle like this and blasted him right in the chest.” Mathias made a gesture with his hand to describe his actions. “Boom, boom, boom! Took him to the river and said bye-bye.”
They laughed. “You’s got too much nigger blood flowing down that river,” Maryann said. “We might have to start digging and burying those bodies instead. I just don’t understand how foolish those idiots are. Black-on-black crime has made a mess of this country and those fools will fight over a chocolate chip cookie.”
They all nodded, laughed and agreed. As they kept talking, my eyes scanned two knives on the table, a lighter and a few forks. Those items would come in handy, but before I could search for anything else in the room, I saw Maryann pop up from the chair. I hurried over to the squeaky bed and pulled a thin sheet over me. As I pretended to be sleeping, I heard the door open. I shut my eyes, hoping that she hadn’t seen or heard me snooping. When the door closed, I sighed from relief.
What seemed like hours later, I was awakened by the sound of Maryann’s loud voice.
“Get yo lazy tail up, gal! You’s been taking advantage of my kindness and you ain’t allowed to sleep this late. We got work to do. Real work, not baking cakes and cookies in the kitchen.”
I wiped my eyes, yawned and stretched. The sun hadn’t even come up yet and she had the nerve to talk about me sleeping late. We were usually up by four or five in the morning. If it was after that, it wasn’t my fault it was hers.
“I need to use the bathroom,” I said to her. “May I go and then meet you outside?”
“Hurry. You got five minutes to get on some clothes, piss and then haul your ass outside to help out the women. Mathias been complaining about the women not doing their part. Maybe I need to send you back there for more motivation. All’s they probably need is a pep talk.”
Maryann stormed out of the room. I put on a sack shirt and khaki long skirt that fell below my ankles. I rushed towards the bathroom, but on my way there, I passed through the dining room to see if the knives and forks were still on the table. I saw one fork and two lighters. I snatched them up and put them into my pocket. While I was in the bathroom, I heard Maryann yelling for me.
“Asia, you need to get out here now! Look what we have here!”
“Coming,” I said loudly. “On my way!”
I flushed the toilet and barely had time to wash my hands. As I pushed on the screen door and stepped on the porch, I saw everyone who was at the table last night standing around. Masks covered The Masters’ faces, but mean mugs were locked on the faces of others. The men working in the fields looked towards the house. I didn’t know why, until I turned my head to the left and saw Brian being held up by Ben and another man I hadn’t seen before. Malcolm stood next to a white truck with his head hanging low. Brian’s face appeared disfigured. His eyes were nearly shut—they were swollen so badly that it looked like tennis balls were underneath his eyelids. His lips were busted and bleeding. So was his nose that I could tell was broken. I gasped at the sight of him, and with tears pouring over the rims of my eyes, I placed my hand over my chest, squeezing it.
“Ain’t no need for your tears,” Maryann said with the baby in her arms again. “He deserves what he got. Tried to catch a train and leave his poor family behind. It’s a cotton-picking shame and you should be mountain-high upset with him for this. Maybe not, because you picked him, Asia. He’s a loser and Lizzy deserves to have a grandfather who is way better than him. My only question to you is, did you approve or know about his little plan to escape the Promised Land?”
I was speechless and couldn’t even answer. My eyes stayed locked with Brian’s. I assumed he could barely see me. His shirt was off and I could already tell he’d been whipped because of the white, bloody flesh marks across his chest and arms. He could barely stand, and as his knees buckled, Ben and the other man continued to hold him up by his arms.
“Gather around, folks, come on let’s all gather around,” Ben said. “We have our first runaway slave here and we bout to have ourselves a little fun wit’em.”
By way of a rocky pathway that led to a tall tree with a noose hanging from it, they all made their way to it. Maryann had left the porch, but she turned to me as I stood frozen with chills running through my body.
“Asia, get yo panties out of a bunch and come on, gal. You need to see this. The Masters or Ben and them may need your help.”
Appearing giddy as ever, she damn near fell and broke her neck as she jogged over to the tree. I still hadn’t moved, so she yelled at me from afar.
“Now Asia, before I get Ben to string you up next to your runaway husband and do away with you too!”
Lord knows I didn’t want to watch this. I looked far into the fields, wondering if my boys could see what was about to happen. I certainly didn’t want them to see me hanging next to their father, so I moved slowly down the stairs and made my way over to where the others stood. Malcolm remained near the truck with his head shamefully lowered. I wondered what he was thinking. I also wondered if Brian had really tried to leave without us.
Ben grabbed Brian’s head that was slumped down and forced him to look up. Now that I was closer, I could see that all of his front teeth had been knocked out. The noose was around his neck; hands were tied behind his back. Brian snatched his head away from Ben’s grip, refusing to look at me.
“I know, boy,” Ben said then chuckled. “I wouldn’t want to look at her either. Why don’t somebody go fetch those boys and that bitching daughter of his? His grandbaby is already here, and the whole family can see up close and personal what happens to niggers when they disobey the rules ‘round here.”
My body couldn’t stop trembling and my eyes weren’t focused on anyone else but Brian.
“Not my children,” I said. “They don’t want to see him. I . . . I don’t want them to see this, please, I beg you, Maryann, please just let my children stay right where they are.”
Maryann chuckled and turned the baby to face Brian. “I guess you and Elizabeth being here to witness this is enough. She can happily watch her grandmother get all the payback she needs when she tears the skin off that fool of a husband’s back with that there whip in Leroy’s hand.”
Leroy tossed the snake whip in my direction. It dropped right at my feet, but I just looked down at it.
“Pick it up,” Maryann yelled. “Pick it up and get your revenge right now, Asia! It’s gon’ feel soooooo good, gal. We both knows this scumbag had it coming!”
I watched as Leroy and Ben removed the noose from Brian’s neck and untied his hands. They then wrapped his arms around the trunk of the tree, with his back facing me. His hands were secured together with a rope.
“What do you have to say for yourself?” asked one of The Masters. “Shame on you, Mr. Evans. Shame on you!”
Brian didn’t say a word. All he did was whimper. The Masters laughed and many stood with their arms folded across their chests. The others looked at me. I was supposed to make the next move, but the only gesture I made was moving my head from side-to-side, signaling no.
“I can’t and I won’t,” I said, wiping my face free of tears. “This is too much and I . . . I want no part of this.”
Maryann rushed up to me and put her finger near my face. “Listen to me and listen good. You don’t call the shots around here, I do. When I tell you to do something, you need to do it! If you don’t there will be hell to pay!”
Her threats didn’t scare me. Not today. This was already horrible enough, and if I had to pay for not using that whip on Brian, so be it. I stood without saying a word. Didn’t move, was barely breathing. The whip remained on the ground in front of me. Maryann was so upset that she lifted her hand, backslapping me so hard that I lost my footing and fell to the ground. The side of my face burned. I lifted my hand to rub it against my face.
“You’s a bigger fool than I thought. Go get me that gal who just came here on that bus. Brian’s other wife who’d he recently married. I guess you didn’t know about that, did you, Asia? He didn’t even have the guts to tell you he’d got himself a new bride.”
That was another gut punch to my stomach, and yet again, I didn’t know if Maryann was being truthful or not. It didn’t even matter at this point, because it was obvious that they would make Brian pay for leaving here, far more than I could ever make him pay for all the wrong he’d done to me. As Ben sped off in the truck to get Jessica, the rest of them stood around talking as if me, Malcolm or Brian wasn’t even there. I could see Malcolm watching me from my peripheral vision, and while Maryann was busy running her mouth, I reached in my pocket and dropped one of the lighters on the ground. I kicked it as close to Malcolm as I could. He took a few steps forward to pick it up. Shortly thereafter, Ben returned in the truck with Jessica next to him. Her stringy, dirty blond hair was swooped behind her ears, sweaty face was rosy red and had patches of bumps all over it. The black-and-blue bruise underneath her swollen eye had gotten darker and the oversized sack dress she’d had on was stained with dirt and grass. She got out of the truck, slipping and falling on the white tiny rocks as she rushed over to Maryann. When she reached her, Jessica fell to her knees.
“Please,” she said, rocking back-and-forth. “Where is my baby? Is that my baby? I want to see her!”
Maryann moved back and kicked dirt and rocks in Jessica’s face. “Hells no this ain’t yo baby. This here is my Lizzy. She don’t look anything like that creature you had. Now get yoself up and move the hell away from me. Ben, come get this heathen away from me and Lizzy.”
This time, Ben and Mathias came over and lifted Jessica from the ground. They positioned her so she could see the back of Brian. I guess she hadn’t noticed it was him who was tied to the tree. She screamed and jerked herself around to break their tight grip.
“If you want to see your baby again,” Maryann shouted. “Calm yoself down and straighten up right now! I don’t have much tolerance for nigger lovers and you’s lucky that I have spared your life this far.”
With tears cascading down her face, Jessica looked at Maryann again and pleaded. “I do want to see my baby again. Let me see her and please tell me she’s still alive. Is she still alive?”
Maryann stood with a smirk on her face. She was one evil bitch; I couldn’t wait to deal with her myself. She looked at me, then back at Jessica.
“Asia, come get my Lizzy and take her on the porch. Things about to get too ugly around here and the last thing I want is for her to get struck by that whip. Afterwards, I still need to figure out how I’s gon’ deal with you.”
I wasn’t looking forward to my next beating; then again, I figured she had plans for my children too. Once I removed the baby from Maryann’s arms, I turned my head towards the fields. I could still see several men peeking through the crops to look in this direction. In no way could I tell if they were Drake or Demonte. Hell, I didn’t even know if they were still alive—maybe they had made the boys pay for what Brian had done too.
Following Maryann’s orders, I carried the baby towards the porch. I walked close enough to Malcolm so I could whisper something to him. Our eyes connected and through gritted teeth I let him know the next move.
“Burn it down,” I said. “All of it.”
He nodded and continued to look straight ahead without saying a word.
I made my way to the porch with the baby, and as soon as I reached the first step, Maryann’s loud mouth caused me to pivot. She had picked up the whip, trying to force it in Jessica’s hand. As Jessica moved her head from side-to-side, Maryann moved closer and screamed out in her ear. Her head shook so hard that the bun on top of her head unraveled.
“I know you’s braver than his other wife is and don’t you forget that you got Caucasian blood running through your veins! Alls he is is a filthy nigger who was gon’ leave you here to die. Ask him where your baby is. He knows. Maybe he’ll tell you, maybe he won’t, but he knows the gotdamn truth!”
Brian turned his head to the side and finally spoke out.
“Our baby is on the train! Go get her and get out of here, baby. And don’t listen to Maryann. She just wants you to do her dirty work for her.”
“You shut your mouth, boy,” Mathias yelled. “You’s the one who’s a liar!”
“Yes he is,” Maryann said to Jessica. “Now handle yo business, gal, and beat the hell out of him until he tells you what he done with y’alls baby.”
Malcolm looked at me; we both knew what Brian meant about the train. He knew his baby wasn’t on the train, but he mentioned it just so we would know it was the way out of here. Unfortunately, Jessica was confused and she picked sides. She lifted the whip with her weak arms and struck it across Brian’s back. He stood up straight and his head jerked back as he hollered out in pain.
“Ahhhhh! Do . . . don’t listen to them!”
“Hit’em again,” Maryann ordered. “You’s got to show a lil more enthusiasm this time.”
Jessica struck Brian again, but it was just as weak as the first one. She growled out and cried on the third strike, and by then, she had fallen to the ground and dropped her head in shame.
“I . . . I caaaaan’t,” she said, sobbing as she looked at the whip with Brian’s blood painted on it. “All I want is my child!”
Maryann stood next to her with one hand on her hip. She grabbed Jessica’s hair and yanked her head back. “You pathetic little bitch you. What a waste of a white woman. Benny, stop foolin’ around and take her to her baby, please.”
Ben lifted his rifle, squinting one eye as he held it close to Jessica’s head. She cried out for him not to shoot her; he slowly turned the gun in Brian’s direction. He then unloaded several bullets into the center of Brian’s back. His body jerked, and within a matter of seconds, his head slumped to the side. I quickly turned around and held the baby closer to my chest. Pain was shooting from everywhere in my body, and my legs were so weak that I could barely turn around when I heard Ben speak again.
“You can go gets your baby now.” He aimed the rifle at Jessica’s head again. “Yo baby and Brian waitin’ for you to come home.”
This time, he fired one bullet into Jessica’s chest. Her blood sprayed Maryann’s dress, before her body dropped to the ground. Ben looked over her shoulder at me.
“I done had it with these niggers,” he said, marching in my direction. “They won’t listen and we need to let them know who’s runnin’ thangs ‘round here.”
