Hindsight Page 3

  Cindy eyed her mother curiously. "The gift?"

  Maudie took the supper plate from Cindy's hands and set it on the nightstand beside the bed. "Yes, honey, the gift of second sight. Your grandma Darrow had the gift. She got the power right after she laid up sick in the bed with the flu when she was but thirteen. That's why I started looking for the signs right after you came back from the hospital. Grandma always told me that most girls who received the gift got it right after a bad sickness."

  The sudden information explained some things to Cindy, but still it did nothing to ease her fears. "Mama, this gift ... is it something bad?"

  "No, baby," assured Maudie. "It's a gift from God."

  "Then why did Vera Mae's baby die? Did I hex it or something?" Thoughts of that tiny, white casket under the church cemetery kept haunting her.

  "No, that wasn't your fault. You've got to make yourself believe that. Predicting that baby's death, well, that was just something that came to you. There's no need for you to feel guilty over it. And like the times when you get a feeling about things that are going to happen, you're just foreseeing the future. You don't really have any hand in making it all come to pass."

  "You mean like the fortune teller at the county fair?"

  "Sort of like that, but it's different. They used to call them prophets or soothsayers in the Bible."

  The girl's thoughts turned inward as she considered what her newfound gift might mean in the future. Would she touch her mother or father one day and foresee their deaths, know the hour and circumstances of their passing? Would she see her own death? The questions that ran through her mind were enough to chill her to the bone.

  "Now, I don't want you to pay no attention to what folks might say about you," Maudie told her flatly. "After what Vera Mae accused you of, some might call you a witch or a jinx or such. But you won't pay no never mind to any of them, 'cause you know they're all wrong. It's just the gift, that's all. The Lord has seen fit to bless you with it, child, so it's something you need to learn to cherish, not to curse."

  "I'll sure try, Mama." In a way, Cindy felt much better, but in another sense, she felt a creeping apprehension about the subject they had just discussed.

  "One more thing," Maudie pointed out. "It'd be best if you'd not mention our little talk to your pappy. He's a good, hardworking man, but he understands only what he can see or touch. He holds no faith in such things as foresight. Most hereabout don't. That's why we'll just keep it among ourselves. No need to anger your pappy none."

  "It'll just be our secret, Mama." Cindy Ann smiled. Her mother suddenly gathered her in a smothering hug, a rare show of affection from a woman who usually regarded her young'uns with a stern eye and an iron rule.

  "Well, you finish up your supper and, if you feel like it, join us on the porch. Your pappy's got the radio warmed up for Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy."

  "I'll be out directly," promised Cindy. As her mother left, she took the plate and dug in. The food was welcomed, for she was hungry. But her thoughts, however, lingered on things other than nourishment. There was still that underlying feeling of guilt — guilt for the misfortune brought upon the Holts and their stillborn baby. And accompanying that guilt was a nagging uneasiness.

  She could not help but wonder just who was going to suffer next.

  Chapter Four

  It was a Friday and the last day of school when Johnny left the Biggs household, anxious to spend the coming year working for the Civilian Conservation Corps at Cherokee National Forest.

  The children sat sullenly around the kitchen table awaiting breakfast, their school books and lunch pails beside their plates. The old German cuckoo clock in the hallway sang the arrival of six o'clock. They all turned their heads solemnly when their brother Johnny appeared in the doorway. He toted a bedroll packed with his few personal belongings in one hand, while the other clutched the fretted neck of his ever present flat-top guitar.

  All eyes followed Johnny as he unburdened himself and pulled out a chair to sit down. Johnny Biggs was a handsome, young man, as tall and lanky as his father, but whose features were devoid of Clay's grim homeliness. Johnny's thin brows always seemed to be cocked in an expression of mild amusement, his lips forever curled in a wry grin. There was a maturity to him that transcended his eighteen years, yet he still managed to maintain an air of reckless boyishness. That morning he was decked out in his traveling clothes and his charcoal gray fedora, the brim pulled low. The hat had been an heirloom given to him by Grandpa Biggs, who had presented it to Clay's firstborn just before his death. Johnny had not spent a waking hour without it since.

  The Civilian Conservation Corps had been formed a few years before; one of Roosevelt's New Deal programs established to relieve unemployment in such impoverished rural areas as central Tennessee. The CCC was intended for young, unmarried men, providing them with steady work and a much needed thirty dollars a month. The job consisted of working the national parks, planting trees, fighting forest fires, and maintaining roads and trails.

  Johnny and his two best friends, C.J. Potts and Billy Longcreek, had applied for CCC work upon turning eighteen. They had only recently received their letters from the government informing them of their acceptance. Johnny had wanted the job for the steady thirty a month, most of which he intended on sending back home to his folks. Billy Longcreek's intentions were to get away from his overbearing mother, as well as his dark resentment for his father, who had deserted them when he was an infant. C.J., well, old C.J. was going for several reasons. First of all, he wanted to put the little farming community behind him, as well as his pompous, greedy father, Ransom Potts, the president of the Coleman Citizens Bank. But mostly, C.J. wanted something to brag about when he returned. It was just his crude way of showing his self-importance to a county that held as much ill regard for him as it did for his selfish, foreclosing father.

  Maudie set a platter of steaming hot biscuits in the center of the table. She expected some degree of praise from her brood, but received only an appreciative grin from Johnny. The others—Polly, Josh, Cindy and Sammy — sat there glumly, staring forlornly at their older brother.

  "You young'uns keep sporting those long faces and Johnny might get it in his head to stay up there in them mountains," Maudie told them all.

  Johnny agreed. "Y'all look like you're at a wake. Well, I'm far from kicking the bucket, so there ain't nothing for no one to be grieving about."

  "But, we'll miss you something awful, Johnny." Polly pouted; she who usually spent the breakfast hour pestering her siblings and making a general nuisance of herself.

  "The only thing you're gonna miss is having one less body to pick on, Miss Prissy-Pants." Johnny grinned slyly. "Why, it'll be a doozie of a job just trying to bail you outta all the trouble you'll cause whilst I'm gone. Might even find that Sheriff Taylor White has had enough of your shenanigans and locked you up in the Bedloe County jailhouse."

  "Now I am glad you're going!" said Polly, wagging her coal-black pigtails and sticking her tongue out. She received a scolding look from her mother, who told her straight out, "You stick your ugly tongue out over the eating table again, young lady, and I'll lay a hot fork across it." To illustrate the point, Maudie lifted a cooking fork dripping with bacon grease from a cast-iron skillet.

  The twelve-year-old clammed up immediately, unable to determine whether her mother was serious or just joking. Johnny chuckled heartily and commenced to eating. He started by filling his blue china plate to the rim with brown molasses.. Taking a good-sized pat of fresh country butter from a saucer, he mashed it thoroughly into the syrupy sorghum. He then procured one of the big cat-head biscuits and went at it.

  It was nearing six-thirty when the children left the table to get ready for school. "I'm sure gonna miss your home cooking, Mama," Johnny told her. He pushed his chair back from the kitchen table, yawning and stretching like an old, yellow cat in the sun. "Where's Pappy? I want to say good-bye before I go."

  "Last I saw,
your daddy was out back working on Clint Devane's Chevrolet. Been at it since daybreak."

  Johnny nodded and took off out the back door, letting the screen door slam loudly behind him. He stood on the back porch for a moment and looked over to where the black, Chevy sedan was parked beneath a spreading chestnut tree. He started through the dewy grass. The hood was open, greasy tools laid out haphazardly on the left front fender. Clay Biggs was nowhere to be seen.

  "Pappy?" he called out.

  "Back here, son," answered Clay's baritone voice.

  He found his father at the fence row behind the smokehouse. Clay stood there, his grease-blackened hands crossed over a weathered post, his blue eyes staring blankly to the north. He often found his papa that way, mostly in the morning or at sundown, surveying the vast tract of land that no longer belonged to him. The earth which had once born row upon row of brilliant green tobacco now lay empty and unplowed. Unsightly weeds sprouted high like an obscene gesture in Clay's eyes, as did a hand-painted sign near the edge of the road. It proclaimed PROPERTY OF THE COLEMAN CITIZENS BANK. As far as Clay Biggs was concerned it might as well have read PROPERTY OF RANSOM POTTS, for it was the rotund banker who had taken the acreage in exchange for the amount that had paid off Cindy's hospital bills in full.

  "You'll get it back someday, Pappy," Johnny assured him.

  "I keep hoping that, son, but every month we just get deeper in debt and that land seems even farther out of reach."

  Johnny Biggs stooped by the fence row where Tippy lay on his back, sunning his belly. He ran a hand absently over the hound's speckled chest, his eyes on his father. "Now that I'm gonna be working, I'll be able to send most of that money home. Kinda help out some."

  Clay continued to stare out over the pasture. "And we'd surely appreciate it, son," he replied. "Though you needn't do it if you don't want to."

  "I want to, Pappy." Johnny stood up and spotted C.J. and Billy sauntering down the road to the house. "There's the boys. I reckon I'd better be going."

  Clay stood like a statue by the fence, saying nothing.

  "Well, take care," Johnny said with a big lump in his throat. He adjusted the brim of the gray fedora and turned to go.

  "Johnny?"

  The boy turned back and saw his daddy start toward him, hand outstretched. Johnny took it with a big grin. "I'm damned proud of you, boy," Clay told him. "All grown up and going off to work. You're finally a man. You stick to your own mind and walk straight and you'll make a damned fine one."

  "Thank you," Johnny said, voice cracking. He walked back to the house, tears threatening to come, but he steeled his backbone and ducked back into the kitchen, the coonhound at his heels.

  Maudie overlooked the dog's entrance. All her attention was focused on Johnny. "So you're leaving now," she breathed. Tears collected on her lower lashes, then trickled down her round cheeks. "Would you do me a favor before you go?"

  "I surely will."

  "Sing me a song."

  Johnny grinned. "Let's go out on the front porch."

  He picked up his bindle and guitar, and they made their way through the house to the front porch. The rest of the Biggs clan was there, holding their school books and wearing sullen frowns.

  As Maudie sat on the porch swing, Johnny shook a tortoiseshell pick from the hollow of his guitar and began playing. Much to his mother's delight, he sang "Will the Circle be Unbroken," one of Maudie's favorites. His voice, rich and fluid, sang the verses much as an expert woodcrafter might caress and carve a stick of coarse walnut into a thing of beauty. He sang it with such depth and emotion that had the Carter Family been there, the gospel trio would have surely been put to shame.

  After the last chord had been played, Johnny received a round of applause. "Thank y'all very much" he smiled, sweeping off his hat in an exaggerated bow.

  "Come on, Johnny," yelled C.J. Potts from the road. He stood there at the gate with Billy Longcreek. "We ain't got all day!"

  "Keep your suspenders buckled, C.J.," Johnny bellowed back. "I'm a-coming!" He turned to the children, and they rushed him, clutching him in one massive hug. "You young'uns behave yourselves and mind your folks, and I'll send you a souvenir from the mountains."

  The three stepped away reluctantly, and Johnny regarded his brother Josh, who stood against a porch post. "Don't you dig all the sang outta them woods or hunt down all the ripe coons, cause I'm gonna want my fair share when I get back."

  Josh grinned slow-wittedly and shook his older brother's hand. "Heck, Johnny, you know I ain't that good a hunter."

  "Johnny!" whined C.J. impatiently from the road.

  "Coming!" Johnny picked up his gear and guitar and eyed his mother as she sat in the swing. "Good-bye, Mama."

  "You write me," Maudie told him.

  "You bet. Just as soon as I get there."

  Then he was walking down the crude two-by-four steps of the porch, strolling through the abundance of Johnson grass and new clover, past Maudie's patch of marigolds and purple irises.

  Cindy stood by the porch railing and sadly watched her brother's departure. As she stooped to retrieve her books, something came over her. It hit with the force and fury of a physical blow, yet it struck inside her young mind. There was some confusion at first, then a horrible realization of great danger. Abruptly, a chill gripped her frail body, and a sensation ran along her skin like the pattering of a cold rain. But that was not what frightened her the most. It was the undeniable fear of pursuit that caused her heart to pound, almost as though someone were coming for her from behind.

  Cindy Ann broke away from the disturbing sensation. Her eyes focused on the departing back of Johnny. Did her feeling have anything to do with him? She had no idea, but could not let him go without saying something. She ran down the steps and out into the yard, intent on warning him.

  "Johnny!"

  The lanky, young man stopped and grinned quizzically as the girl paused breathlessly, in the frame of the open gate. "What's the matter, Cindy Ann?"

  Cindy opened her mouth, but only stammered, for she did not know exactly what to say to him. "Johnny," she finally managed. "Be careful."

  "I will, pumpkin," he promised. "And don't you worry none. I'll be back in a year and a day." Johnny ran his hand playfully through her orange-red hair. "A year and a day." Then Johnny joined his buddies and the three started down the dusty dirt road, laughing and horsing around.

  "You young' uns get on to school now," Maudie commanded from the porch. "Wouldn't want to be late for your last day."

  Cindy, however, paid her no mind. She continued to stand there by the front gate, her hands clutching her school books absently to her chest. Her hazel eyes watched as the three boys headed north for town, their feet scuffling clouds of powdery dust from the roadbed. And the feeling, that cold, overbearing sensation that had gripped her moments before, remained there in the back of her mind, as it would for the remainder of that hazy, spring day.

  Chapter Five

  "Witch, Witch, the red-haired bitch! Set her on fire and roll her in a ditch!"

  The degrading chant assaulted Cindy from all directions as she sat motionlessly on one of the playground swings. The girl's eyes were diverted from the gloating children and their playful accusation. She stared at the earth at her feet, ground scrubbed bare by generations of scuffling feet, and tried hard to hold back angry tears.

  It was one o'clock, the time of afternoon recess, when Chester Martin and his cronies once again descended upon the quiet Biggs girl, their minds brimming with mischief and their grins with pure meanness. The others were just followers, looking for approval from the school bully, perhaps agreeing to his every whim in order to escape ridicule themselves. They were merely pawns, of course, an army of gutless children that Chester used to amplify his strength and his amusement at humiliating those weaker than he.

  And today Cindy Ann was the victim. Ever since the tale of Vera Mae's hexed baby had swept the little farming community, Cindy had experienced a strange
interest directed toward her, from adults as well as children. It was much more tolerable with the grown-ups, for they silently appraised her with solemn stares and no harsh words. Women in a family way crossed the road to avoid her, and the old men playing checkers on the porch of Woody's General Store refused to make their move until the "jinx" had passed. Such responses were easy for a child to ignore. It was when those her own age, her classmates and friends, turned on her that the new attention became downright painful.

  Chester Martin had been the first to jump on the superstitious bandwagon and had begun his scathing remarks and taunting the day after the infant's burial. Chester was an ugly boy, tall for his age and fat. His hair was greasy black, and his dark eyes possessed the same oily quality. His father, Sony Martin, owned Coleman's only gas station, and folks swore his scrappy ten-year-old was every bit as pushy and mean as he was.

  It was on that final day of school that Chester invented the sneering chant that he relished so. He and the others repeated it over and over again, their ugly words assaulting the little girl from all sides. Cindy had attempted to pay them no attention at first, but her resistance began to dissolve as more of her classmates joined in.

  "Witch, Witch, the red-haired bitch! Set her on fire and roll her in a ditch!"

  Cindy Ann felt the tears come; welling in her hazel eyes, but tried to hide them from the others. She wondered where Polly or Josh were, why they had not intervened and stopped Chester's hateful assault. But then she remembered. The older kids were limited to the far side of the playground during recess. If they had heard the commotion, there was a chance they would not have known who it was being directed at.

  As the taunting grew louder and the circle closed in around her, Cindy could take it no longer. She glared tearfully at Chester Martin. "Stop it!" she yelled at them all. "Why don't you just leave me alone?"