The Water Is Wide Read Online Free PDF

at the club and take the children with them when they do it. Satan smiles at all the sinnin’ going on at that club.”
    We soon departed. On the trip back I tried to gather my impressions together and come out with a final decision about teaching on the island. Andy handed out encomiums to several productive fishing holes we passed and indicated an osprey’s nest on top of a utility pole. Bennington talked about farming. I sat in the back of the boat and decided once and for all to take the job. Yamacraw was a universe of its own. The lushness of the island pleased me and the remarkable isolation of the school appealed to the do-gooder in me. Only a thoroughbred do-gooder can appreciate the feeling, the roseate, dawnlike, and nauseating glow that enveloped me on the return trip that day. I had found a place to absorb my wildest do-gooding tendency. Unhappy do-gooders populate the world because they have not found a Yamacraw all their own. All my apprehensive feelings disappeared. I had made a decision. The last statement I remember that day came from Mr. Bennington.
    â€œDid you notice how well I got along with those children?” he asked.
    â€œYes,” I answered.
    â€œI’ve always been able to get along with colored people. They’ve always loved me.”
    My first night on Yamacraw Island was spent in a sleeping bag on the schoolroom floor. The forest outside the perimeter of the schoolyard was insane with insect voices and the dark seemed darker than any place I had been before. No streetlamps, no traffic lights, no squeal of brakes, nor any other evidence of city life presented itself that night. Darkness in strange places is always fearful and, lying on the floor that night, sweating from the armpits to the metatarsals from the heat, I felt the fear that comes from being alone in a new environment. When I did get to sleep, I was later awakened by a thunderstorm. Lightning flashed around the island; thunder played its favorite game of scaring the crap out of all the shivering mortals on the earth below. Overall, the night seemed to augur strange things.
    But the morning was a time of renewal. The first morning was incredibly bright and tranquil. I awoke, shaved without a mirror, lost several pints of blood, and awaited the arrival of Mrs. Brown and the school bus. Mrs. Brown came first.
    â€œWelcome overseas,” she greeted me.
    â€œThank you, ma’am. It is great to be here.”
    â€œHo, ho, ho. Don’t speak too quick. You are in a snake pit, son. And them snakes are gonna start snappin’ at your toes. You’re overseas now.”
    She then delivered a rather ferocious homily about the handling of colored children by a teacher so obviously white.
    â€œYou’ve got to treat them stern. Tough, you know. You got the older babies. Grades five through eight. Keep them busy with work all the time or they’ll run you right out of that there door,” she said. “I know colored people better than you do. That’s because I am one myself. You have to keep your foot on them all the time. Step on them. Step on them every day and keep steppin’ on them when they gets out of line. If you have any trouble, Mama Brown will be right next door. We got lots of trees outside, and every tree gets lots of switches. I got some in that cabinet right over there.”
    â€œThank you,” I said.
    The kids arrived at 8 A.M. and swarmed into the class, each of them pausing to murmur a dutiful good-morning. One small fry climbed into a seat only to be accosted by a larger girl who said that he was sitting in her seat. He said something unintelligible (to me). She cuffed his head, he swung a fist, then she drifted into another seat while I watched the whole scene. I think I said something profound like “now, now.” After this everyone sat erect in his seat appraising me with indirect glances, looking around at one another, then giggling and looking back at