The Sharecropper Prodigy Read Free

County, Alabama. Ben figured the world was probably full of them.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    CHAPTER TWO
     
                 
                  I climbed down out of the barn loft and slipped around to the back stall  where Uncle Lee sometimes kept Dan, his old work horse. I had my fishing gear hidden under some old loose hay in the corner, next to the manger. I slipped out the back of the barn and into the woods, trotting in the direction of the creek and my rendezvous spot with Ben.
                  When I arrived at the ancient sycamore tree, I saw that Ben hadn’t made it yet. There was a giant vine, big as a man’s arm, that stretched from the old sycamore to another tree close by that sagged just right in the middle to make a perfect swing. I sat down on it and started pushing myself with my feet, swinging slowly back and forth and waiting.
                  If my Uncle Lee or Aunt Mary Kate knew that I was playing hooky from school to go fishing, one or both of them would have worn me out. If Uncle Lee knew that I was fishing with Ben, it would have been worse. Uncle Lee wanted me to hang out with boys my own color. Aunt Mary Kate liked Ben. She was always saying what a smart boy he was. “And he’s so well behaved and well mannered,” she told my Uncle Lee. “I’d much rather Tom hang around with him than those white-trash boys who don’t bathe more than once a month. And every other word that comes out of their mouths is a cuss word, just like their daddy’s.”
                  I think secretly Uncle Lee agreed with my aunt, but would never admit it. He was one of those narrow minded southerners who had been raised to believe black folks were just a notch above primates. But Ben’s sagacity on almost any subject did amaze Uncle Lee and made him rethink his assessment sometimes. Of course he would just pass it off as Ben being one of those rare freaks of nature.
                  As much as Ben liked going fishing with me, he had begged me not to skip school. “If I had a chance to go to a good school like Collinwood, I wouldn’t miss a day. Papa’s old mule couldn’t drag me away,” Ben had said. But it was almost time to start picking cotton and I knew me and him both would be too busy once it started. I told him he didn’t need to worry about school and that he already knew more than any of the teachers at Collinwood, anyway.
                  Ben gave me an inferiority complex sometimes, though he never realized he was doing it. Ben was the type that would go out of his way to keep from hurting anybody’s feelings. But he was so smart, he just assumed I always knew what he was talking about. Especially since I had the advantage of getting to attend school regularly.
                  I pulled the pocket watch my Grandpa Martin had given me from the bib of my overalls and checked the time. Ben said he would meet me at nine-o’clock and he was now almost thirty minutes late. That wasn’t like him at all. When Ben Evans told you he would be somewhere at a certain time, he was there. He owned an old watch that didn’t keep very good time, but somehow he always knew what time it was, anyway.
                  I saw movement down in the little thicket where the creek made a slight bend. I recognized the old straw hat Ben sometimes wore and saw that he was walking slower than what was his usual springy, brisk pace. I trotted down to meet him and saw on closer inspection that his left eye was swollen shut.
                  “Did that old bastard beat you again?” I asked, feeling my blood starting to boil.
                  “I tried to stop him,” was Ben’s reply. “And I succeeded, too.”
                  “Tried to stop him from what? Hittin’ your mama?”
                  “No. I just had to stop him from doin’