The Friendship (4 page)

Mr. Tom Bee looked over at him. He took a moment, then he nodded and I thought he was going to come on out. But instead he said, “Be right wit’ ya, boy…soon’s I get me my tobaccie.” Then he turned again and faced John Wallace. “You—you gonna give me that tobaccie, John?”

Dewberry pulled from the counter. “Daddy! You don’t shut this old nigger up, I’m gonna do it for ya!”

Mr. John Wallace turned a mean look on his son and the look was enough to silence him. Then he looked around the room at Mr. Simms, at R.W. and Melvin, at Thurston, at the two other white men gathered there. The store and all around it was plunged into silence.

Mr. Tom Bee glanced nervously at the men, but he didn’t stop. He seemed bent on carrying this thing through. “Well?” he asked of John Wallace. “I’m gonna get me that tobaccie?”

Silently John Wallace reached back to a shelf and got the tobacco. He placed it on the counter.

Mr. Simms exploded. “What kind-a white man are ya, John Wallace, ya don’t shut his black mouth? What kind-a white man?”

Mr. Tom Bee looked at Mr. Simms and the others, then went and picked up the tobacco. “Thank ya, John,” he said. “Jus’ put it on my charges there, John. Jus’ put it on my charges.” He glanced again at the men and started out. He got as far as the steps. The boys and I turned to go. Then we heard the click. The explosion of a shotgun followed and Mr. Tom Bee tumbled down the steps, his right leg ripped open by the blast.

The boys and I stood stunned, just staring at Mr. Tom Bee at first, not knowing what to do. Stacey started toward him, but Mr. Tom Bee waved him back. “Get ’way from me, boy! Get ’way! Stacey, get them younguns back, ’way from me!” Stacey looked into the store, at the shotgun, and herded us across the road.

The white men came out and sniggered. Mr. John Wallace, carrying the shotgun, came out onto the porch too. He stood there, his face solemn, and said, “You made me do that, Tom. I coulda killed ya, but I ain’t wantin’ to kill ya ’cause ya done saved my life an’ I’m a Christian man so I ain’t forgetting that. But this here disrespectin’ me gotta stop and I means to stop it now. You gotta keep in mind you ain’t nothin’ but a nigger. You gonna learn to watch yo’ mouth. You gonna learn to address me proper. You hear me, Tom?”

Mr. Tom Bee sat in silence staring at the bloody leg.

“Tom, ya hear me?”

Now, slowly, Mr. Tom Bee raised his head and looked up at John Wallace. “Oh, yeah, I hears ya all right. I hears ya. But let me tell you somethin’, John. Ya was John t’ me when I saved your sorry life and you give me your word you was always gonna be John t’ me long as I lived. So’s ya might’s well go ’head and kill me cause that’s what ya gon’ be, John. Ya hear me, John? Till the judgment day. Till the earth opens itself up and the fires-a hell come takes yo’ ungrateful soul! Ya hear me, John? Ya hear me?
John! John! John!
Till the judgment day!
John!
”

With that he raised himself to one elbow and began to drag himself down the road. The boys and I, candy canes in hand, stood motionless. We watched Mr. John Wallace to see if he would raise the shotgun again. Jeremy, the candy cane in his pocket, watched too. We all waited for the second click of the shotgun. But only the cries of Mr. Tom Bee as he inched his way along the road ripped the silence. “
John! John! John!
” he cried over and over again. “Ya hear me, John? Till the judgment day! John!
John! JOHN!
”

There was no other sound.

Author’s Note

I was born in the South but I didn’t grow up there. In fact, I was only three months old when my parents took my sister and me to live in the North. Over the years of my childhood I came to know the South through the yearly trips my family took to Mississippi and through the stories told whenever the family gathered, both in the North and in the South. Through the stories I learned a history about my family going back to the days of slavery. Through the stories I learned a history not then taught in history books, a history about the often tragic lives of Black people living in a segregated land. My father told many of the stories. Some of the stories he had been told when he was a boy. Some of the stories he actually lived himself.
The Friendship
is based on one of those stories.

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BOOKS BY MILDRED D. TAYLOR

The Friendship

The Gold Cadillac

Let the Circle Be Unbroken

Mississippi Bridge

The Road to Memphis

Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry

Song of the Trees

The Well