Gloryland Read Online Free PDF

all, but I slept plenty last night. I’m rested and I got somethin to do right here, somethin I been meanin to do for a long time.”
    And right then Daddy jumped down from the wagon, landing not two feet from the sheriff. Sheriff Reynolds jumped back a little and gripped his stick harder and put his left hand on his pistol, but he didn’t seem scared. If anything he seemed anxious for something to start.
    “Daniel,” said the sheriff, louder now so the people around could hear, “it would be a pity to leave this fine boy of yours without a father, or such a good-lookin woman here without a husband.
Course, me bein the sheriff, I’d be derelict in my duty if I didn’t check on ’em from time to time, just to see if they all right. But we can avoid all that if you come with me to jail right now, or turn that wagon round and get yourself home, cause you sure as hell not goin up these courthouse steps.”
    Daddy took a step toward the courthouse. The crowd stepped back a bit, but Sheriff Reynolds didn’t move, standing less than a foot away from Daddy. The sheriff was an inch or so shorter, but he was even heavier. I noticed my father’s hands at his sides. They were opening and closing but there was nothing inside them. I could see the veins on his hands slipping round under the skin, and the veins in his neck were full as he bent toward the sheriff like a big old tree leaning into the wind.
    “Nigger, you take one more step, I’ll bust yo head wide open!” Sheriff Reynolds announced. He was done pretending to be Daddy’s friend.
    I thought my daddy would explode like a bucket of water left out in the night when the temperature drops below freezing. It wasn’t heat he was giving off no more but cold, cold like I ain’t never seen in a living man before. The coldness of death must’ve been inside him trying to get out, and the sheriff had the key in the door, turning it this way and that.
    I watched Daddy slowly shift from his right foot to his left. He was about to walk and I couldn’t think of any way to stop him, and I didn’t know for sure if I should stop him. That’s when Mama got down from the wagon. Nobody seemed to see her do it, but somehow she was standing next to my father. She looked so small beside him.
    Mama paid no attention to the sheriff. As Daddy leaned his body forward to start walking, Mama hooked the little finger of her right hand squarely into the crook of his left elbow. That’s all. No strain, no sweat. Just her little finger on Daddy’s arm.
    And I watched my daddy, all six foot six inches and two hundred and fifty pounds of him, stop completely under the weight of that
finger. I mean, he was moving toward the sheriff till he felt a pressure on him that no one could see but me, and no one could feel but him.
    Then my father broke somewhere inside. It was a break you couldn’t see on the outside, but he was like an old tree that’s finally tired of bending, knows it’s been done in by the wind and is just marking time till the next breeze comes up, and down it goes. I watched him die some right there, even though he was still standing, still breathing. I don’t know if the sheriff or my mother killed him, or if it was suicide, but a man died in front of that courthouse and the killer got away.
    What was left of Daddy turned and got up into the wagon. Mama followed him, but then she stopped and looked back at Sheriff Reynolds. I couldn’t clearly see her face, but I could see the sheriff’s. It was red like a tomato. The sheriff scratched his neck and looked away. Mama climbed up and sat down next to Daddy, who sat stiff as a corpse. It shocked me to see him shake the reins and get the mules moving away down the street. The crowd that had gathered parted to let the wagon through. Those white people were whispering but saying nothing out loud, and their silence was more frightening than any yelled curses. I lay my head in my mother’s lap and tried to forget their eyes.
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