Stella by Starlight Read online

  “Folks sick of Hoover—that’s for sure,” Spoon Man said.

  “I sure would like to cast my vote,” Papa added.

  Stella sat ramrod straight. What?

  “Now, you know they don’t want us to votin’,” Spoon Man chided, tipping his chair back on two legs. “Maybe that’s why they all of a sudden wearin’ the bedsheets off their clotheslines again.”

  “Look, I’m not lookin’ for trouble. I just think I ought to be able to vote,” her father said evenly.

  “What for?” Mr. Bates asked, coming up to the porch, taking his time as he climbed with his crutch. He’d contracted polio a few years back—the only person in town who had, as far as Stella knew. She scooted to the far side of the steps to give him room and began rubbing each of her toenails clean with a little bit of spit, hoping she’d stay unnoticed.

  “Won’t make no difference nohow. Won’t put a nickel in your pocket or a biscuit on your table,” Spoon Man argued reasonably.

  “It would to me,” her father replied stubbornly. “I live in this country and I ain’t no slave, and dagummit, I oughta be allowed to vote!”

  Dr. Hawkins swirled his tea around and gazed into the bronze liquid. “Jonah, I’ve looked into this. You know they’ve gone and set up these poll taxes.”

  “I know.”

  “And a literacy test about the Constitution you gotta pass.”

  Stella’s father set his jaw. “I know all that.”

  “Get ready for questions like, ‘How many bubbles in a bar of soap?’ or ‘How many wrinkles in an elephant’s trunk?’ ” Spoon Man said.

  Stella noticed that not one of the men even smiled. This was dead serious.

  “And the KKK? They get a report of any colored person who tries to register to vote. You want that hammer hangin’ over your family?” Mr. Bates’s face went angry. “You already got them burning crosses practically in your backyard!”

  Her father looked to the distance, out across the pond. “Sometimes I just get tired of bowin’ down and givin’ up, you know?”

  It was Dr. Hawkins who nodded in agreement. He placed a hand on Papa’s broad shoulder, but then he added, “You know, Jonah, sometimes it’s best to wait till times get better.”

  “And when will that be?”

  Stella hunkered over her toes. She knew none of them had an answer.

  13

  Sweet Potato Pie and Fried Green Tomatoes

  Jojo came staggering back, this time with a pile of kindling higher than his head. Stella hopped up to help him.

  “Anything else you need me to do?” she asked her father once she’d piled the kindling by the logs.

  “Go see if you can help your mother. Don’t know what made the wife plan this all sudden-like,” he grumbled.

  In the kitchen Stella hardly knew where to begin—Mama was already a whirlwind of activity. One moment she was bent over a boiling kettle, then turning meat in a sizzling pan, then hovering by the table as she baked, battered, and tossed several different foods, seemingly all at once. With flushed cheeks and sweaty face, she at last looked up and grinned. “I’m lovin’ this, you know,” she told Stella, pausing to take a sip of lemonade.

  Stella admitted to her mother what she’d been thinking as she’d watched her. “How can you do that all at once? I will never be able to do what you do.”

  “I felt the same way at your age, Stella. My mother had seven children—I don’t think she had a good night’s sleep in twenty years,” Mama joked, reaching over to flip a slice of spitting bacon. “I still don’t know how she did it.”

  Well, that wasn’t a helpful answer, Stella thought. Her mother must have sensed it, for she added, “Don’t worry, honeygirl. Things fall into place when they should.”

  Well, that wasn’t helpful either!

  “Tonight I might be plum wore out, but today the sun is shining, we got company, and life is good!” her mother continued cheerfully. Then she spun around to check on the biscuits in the oven.

  “Can I help?” Stella said, taking the stirring spoon from her and peeping into the pot. “What are we makin’?”

  “Killed lettuce. Quick, easy, and—” Mama paused and wiped her forehead.

  “And yummy,” Stella finished for her. The bacon fat was crackling, along with red onions and slabs of garden potatoes. Ohhh, it smelled so fine. As Mama tossed the lettuce in, the green leaves wilted immediately, absorbing the liquid and the flavor.

  Carolyn lunged through the front door, toting a large pan. “My mama sent pinto beans,” she announced, placing it on the table. “That woulda been all we had for supper tonight, but now we get a feast!”

  “Tell your mama her beans will go perfect with the killed lettuce. I hope Mrs. Odom is bringin’ her famous corn pone,” Stella’s mother said as she stirred another pot.

  Just then two of the Spencer girls knocked on the front door. “We brought collard greens and fried green tomatoes, Mrs. Mills,” Hannah said.

  Stella whispered to Carolyn, “Glad she didn’t send frog legs!”

  “Just set everything on the big table outside, girls, and thank you kindly,” Stella’s mother sang out. “And Stella,” she added, “go find Tony and Johnsteve and Randy, and ask them to bring over some chairs, would you?”

  “Yes, Mama.” Stella ran out to find the boys, who were already sneaking samples of okra and hush puppies from the makeshift table. Without even thinking, she popped Tony’s hand as he was about to swipe a fingerful of icing from a cake. He looked at her with a smirk. “My mama said get some chairs so we can eat,” Stella said, a flush coming to her cheeks. The boys swiped one more hush puppy each and trotted back toward their houses.

  The makeshift table was soon overflowing with food—oatmeal cookies, cheese grits, hot biscuits and honey, a sweet potato pie, Apple Brown Betty, black-eyed peas, fried chicken, corn pudding, pulled pork, and pickled pigs’ feet. Every single family brought just a little something. Pastor Patton and his wife from New Hope Church brought a pot of chicken and dumplings.

  Mrs. Grayson arrived carrying a carrot cake. She nodded toward all the food, then winked at Stella. Oh, thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Stella knew there would be no discussion of school problems this evening.

  She began carting out her mama’s food, but once the boys were back, they plunked the chairs down and organized a massive game of capture the flag. The children chased one another until everyone was panting, the perfect moment for her to zero in on Johnsteve, who had the flag in hand—a rag from Mama’s sewing basket—and grab it from him.

  “I am the champion!” Stella cried as she shimmied away from Helen and Henrietta, who were trying to snatch the flag from her, only to have Tony swing back around and swipe it from her at the last moment.

  Then Randy let out the cry, “Time to eat, y’all!” The flag was forgotten. Pastor Patton blessed the food, and everyone’s attention turned to what ended up being a real feast.

  Stella waited to let others go ahead of her before getting in line, as she knew her mother would want. Folks sat anywhere they could—on the ground, on the porch, on the various chairs that the boys had dragged down the road. Spoon Man wove in and out, offering a pair of earrings to Mrs. Bates, and a new hacksaw to Mr. Spencer.

  “You sure would look pretty in a new dress,” he purred to Claudia’s mother, holding up a bolt of butter-yellow linen. “Even got enough here so you can make a dress for little Claudia, too. One dollar for two yards. You can’t get this at the general store.”

  Mrs. Odom frowned and fretted, fingering the soft fabric, but finally pulled out four quarters from a knotted handkerchief.

  After most folks had been served, Stella picked up a plate, relieved that the boys had left a few hush puppies—they were one of her favorites too. She took a little extra of her other favorite, the corn pudding. Perching on a wobbly kitchen chair, balancing the plate on her lap, she set into devouring foods seasoned by other mothers’ hands—familiar, yet different from what her o
wn mama cooked. Sweet potatoes glazed with sugar. Crisp string beans and onions. Yeast rolls soft as pillows.

  All the while, Spoon Man quietly meandered through the crowd, selling a frying pan, a box of buttons, a kerosene lamp, and a fishing pole. Then, oh happiness, she saw her mother give Spoon Man ten pennies for that purple glass bracelet, which Mama then quickly tucked into her apron pocket. It was the only thing she bought.

  In between, Spoon Man knocked back two heaping plates of food, plus several kinds of dessert. He finally ambled over to Stella. “So, how’s school?” he asked as he sat down heavily beside her.

  “Not bad, but not so good sometimes,” she said evasively, popping the last of her mother’s dumplings into her mouth. “I like arithmetic.”

  Spoon Man studied her. “School stuff feels kinda pale when you think about what you and Jojo saw. Am I right?”

  Instead of answering, Stella concentrated on the last kernels of corn pudding. But she felt Spoon Man’s continued gaze and finally admitted that she felt a little scared.

  “You got a right to be. You were a witness. That’s important.”

  “I kinda wish I hadn’t seen it,” Stella told him. “It’s like a bad photograph I can’t get out of my head!”

  “Know what I do when something’s stuck in my mind?”

  “What?”

  “I grab me a scrap of paper and write it down. It be out of my head then, and onto the paper.”

  Stella narrowed her eyes slightly.

  “Hey, you don’t think old Spoon Man knows his letters and numbers? Girl, I got more learnin’ than you know!”

  “Oh, I wasn’t thinking that. It’s just that, that . . .” She shrugged in defeat. “I’m not so good at writing.”

  With a hefty “Oomph,” Spoon Man stood up. He chucked her under the chin. “Give it a try, Stella. Trust the words. Maybe that image will fade.”

  Stella shook her head doubtfully. “I’m no storyteller,” she told him as she walked away. “I can’t do what you do.”

  14

  The Chicken Who Was an Eagle

  Stella watched Spoon Man wander over toward where the neighbors, like moths, were hovering over the warmth of the fire pit. The odd flame shot up, and while the sight of it sent a flicker of a shiver through Stella, she also noticed that the fire’s glow gave everyone a blush of peacefulness. Any threat, for now, seemed distant.

  “Ooh-wee, this was a good idea, Georgia,” Mrs. Spencer told Stella’s mother as she finished her third piece of pie. “I was good and hungry!” She was a tall woman with a huge gap between her two front teeth and the biggest laugh in the neighborhood. Stella had never seen her lose her temper or yell at one of her children, not even once.

  “I heard once about a man who was so hungry he salted and peppered himself and swallowed himself whole!” Mr. Bates said, slapping his skinny knee.

  “That’s nothin’,” countered Mr. Winston. “I know a man who was so hungry he ate up his skin and bones and left nothin’ but his shadow!”

  Loud guffaws followed.

  Mr. Spencer jumped in. “Well, I know a man so stingy that he wouldn’t eat out in the sunlight, ’cause he was scared his shadow might ask for some of the food!” His wife howled.

  Mr. Winston, who worked in the mill with Mr. Spencer, added, “Now I know ’bout stingy. The boss be stingy. I know a boss so cheap that one day when the mine blowed up and some of the workers got blown in the air, he docked their pay for the time their feet wasn’t on the ground.”

  “Smitherman,” several men said at once, nodding. Everybody seemed to be in agreement at that one. An uncomfortable silence suddenly fell.

  Stella’s father looked over at Spoon Man’s mule, and, clearly trying to lighten the mood, quickly called out, “Your mule sho is skinny, Spoon Man. But I know a man whose mule was so thin that he had to feed that animal muddy water just to keep from seeing through it!” That brought the laughter back.

  Mrs. Malone, sipping from a mug, said, “Sarah Bates, this is some right good cider. You ever heard tell of the man who grew an apple so big that when it fell in the river one day, the river ran pure cider for six months?”

  “No,” Mrs. Bates replied. “But I know ’bout an apple tree that grew so tall that it took fifty years to cut it down. My great uncle started sawing it in 1882, and it just fell yesterday!”

  Stella cracked up—that was a good one!

  Dr. Hawkins stretched his hands out toward the fire pit. “Winter comin’ soon. I remember that day it got so cold that my words got frozen as they come out my mouth. I had to take ’em inside by the fire and melt ’em before my family knew what I was saying!”

  Mr. Spencer added, “Yeah, but remember last summer when it got so hot we had to feed the chickens ice water to keep them from laying hard-boiled eggs?”

  The laughter rippled across the darkness like a silken ribbon.

  “Well, what about that storm that blew the crooked road straight?”

  “The same wind that blowed so hard the sun came up late and Sunday didn’t get here until late Tuesday evening?” Pastor Patton joined in.

  “That’s musta been why I missed church last week,” Mr. Winston said.

  “You missed church because you went fishing!” Pastor Patton retorted.

  Mr. Winston turned to Spoon Man. “Save me, Spoon Man,” he pleaded. “Tell us a story before the pastor sends me to damnation for a fishin’ trip!”

  “Can’t help you much there, John,” Spoon Man replied with a smile. “I tend to tiptoe around the edges of any church I happen to see. But I’ll oblige y’all with a story, just to show I’m so very thankful for the hospitality and the vittles!”

  Cheers and shouts of encouragement followed. Spoon Man cleared his throat and shifted to the edge of his chair. Then he began, his voice low and deep.

  “Once, long, long ago, there was a noble eagle who laid three eggs. She carefully set them in her nest atop the tallest mountain. She watched those eggs, and kept them warm, and loved her little nestlings even before they hatched.

  “But one day a great storm raged around that mountaintop. The winds blew something fierce, and heavy rains pelted the eagle and her nest. Thunder crashed and lightning crackled! An earthquake rocked the earth. Why, the whole world shook with the power of that storm!”

  As he spoke, Spoon Man whistled like the wind and burbled thunder from his lips, flailing his arms to capture the fury of the tempest. Stella scooted closer to her mother, who very quietly slipped the purple bracelet onto Stella’s wrist. Her first bracelet! Stella laced her fingers between her mother’s.

  “The mother eagle did all she could to protect her eggs,” Spoon Man continued, “but during the height of the storm, one of those eggs was blown out of the nest, and it rolled swiftly down that mountain. The mother eagle squawked and cried out, but there was nothing she could do except try to protect the two eggs that remained. The storm ended, the rains stopped, the sun came out, but the egg was gone and the mother eagle was heartbroken.

  “Now that egg that fell didn’t break. No, M’am and no, sir! It came to rest in the garden of a farm at the base of the mountain.

  “The next morning the farmer noticed the unusual egg. He picked it up and placed it in the nest of his favorite chicken—the Rhode Island Red that took such good care of her chicks.”

  Stella could almost imagine going out to check her chickens for eggs and finding a big old eagle egg sitting there. Yep, that’s just what she would do—give it to her best hen.

  Spoon Man cleared his throat. Mrs. Hawkins brought him a glass of lemonade. He gulped some down and continued.

  “That mother hen, she clucked a little, but she made room for the eagle egg in her nest. A few days later—scratch, scratch, peep, peep. Three little chickens poked their way out of their shells, and for the next few days they happily began exploring the farmyard while the mother hen stayed with the last egg, the big one.

  “On the fifth day, the strange, large egg be
gan to shudder and crack until a gigantic chick emerged from that shell, wide-eyed, and doin’ more squawkin’ than peepin’. Gradually it, too, began to explore the farmyard and joined its brother and sisters as they all learned how to be chickens. They learned to drink water from the pan the farmer had set out for them, how to pick up little pieces of grain with their beaks, and how to scratch in the dirt for bugs or grubs. They followed their mother around as she taught them how to survive.

  “The three little chicks were a pretty golden-yellow color, but the larger chick was pure white with large, dark curious eyes. His beak was black instead of yellow, and so were his claws. He was a clunky, awkward little fella. But the mama chicken didn’t mind at all—she loved him and took care of him no matter what.”

  Spoon Man took another sip of the lemonade.

  “As the chicks got older, the baby eagle grew increasingly discontented. While his sisters grew to be plump yellow chickens, and his brother into a rusty red-rooster, the baby eagle had lost the white feathers and turned into a sleek golden-brown bird—so much taller and stronger than the other chickens.

  “His brother and sisters either ignored him or laughed at him as he scratched for food. The mama tried to intervene when she could, but she knew that children had to find their own way.

  “Finally, one bright clear day, the young eagle looked up and saw something soaring high above. It was sleek and black. It glided on the currents of the wind, swooping and turning with the breeze.

  “ ‘Oh my,’ said the young eagle. ‘I wish I could do that.’

  “His brother the rooster cackled, ‘You can’t do that. You’re a chicken! And everybody knows that chickens don’t fly in the sky.’

  “The young eagle tucked his head in his wings and scratched in the dirt sorrowfully. The mama chicken walked in that funny chicken strut over to him. ‘Son,’ she asked, ‘do you want to fly?’

  “ ‘Oh yes! I wish I could fly like that great bird I saw in the sky. I wish it more than anything.’

  “ ‘Then you must fly,’ the mother chicken said simply.