On his Mississippi Delta farm, Dad operated a cotton gin that processed only seven bales an hour, but that was enough, since he didn’t gin for the public.
Each year, a seed company assigned him a promising variety to grow, with the understanding that he could gin no other varieties, so as not to mix the variety’s seed with other types — a profitable arrangement for Dad.
My job at the gin was hammering together metal bale ties and buckles. When my boyhood best friend and mentor, the old black man known as Jaybird, wasn’t busy doing something else, he helped me.
One-eyed Deacon also worked at the gin. His glass eye frightened me — it was cornflower blue, and neither matched the brown one, nor was it synchronized with it. The good eye bulged like a bulldog’s, while its store-bought mate floated constantly … up, down, sideways.
One day, while we were hammering out ties, I asked Jaybird how Deacon lost his eye.
“He claims that when he was a boy, he was pesterin’ a toad frog, and it cast a curse upon him, causing the eye to go bad. He believes all frogs is kin to Satan, and has been terrified of ’em evuh since.”
A few days later, I was lolling on the porch of Dad’s country store. The scales for weighing truckloads of cottonseed were beside it, and having nothing better to do, I crawled under them. The damp, musty pit was full of Satan’s kinfolk, and I caught a bagful.
As I crawled out, Deacon pulled up in his old Packard, and went inside. Noticing that he’d left his coat on the seat, I dumped the frogs in its pockets.
Deacon came out, handed me an RC Cola and a Moon Pie, threw on his coat, and fired up the Packard. I felt awful … but it was too late.
Suddenly, the Packard careened crazily and lurched into a ditch. Out tumbled Deacon, flinging off the coat, tripping and falling, desperately fleeing the amphibians.
When he limped up to the store, Dad walked out on the porch.
“What’s wrong, Deacon?” Dad asked. Both brown and blue eyes glared at me as the old man struggled to catch his breath.
“Don’t know, Boss,” he said. “Sumpin’ come a-loose and the car started switchin’ on me.” Dad chuckled and walked off.
Those who forgive most shall be most forgiven. Deacon forgave me … but not completely.
“How much you got saved up from workin’ at the gin?” he asked.
“Fifty dollars,” I said, bowing my head shamefully.
“Well, I ain’t never wearin’ that coat agin, and yo’ savins’ is ’bout enough to buy a new one,” he said.
“I’ll get the money for you right now, but why didn’t you tell Dad what really happened?” I asked.
With forgiveness and love glimmering in both blue and brown eyes, he said, “Enough bad stuff happened today. If I told Boss what you done, they’d be uh killin’ too.”
Jimmy Reed is an Oxford, Mississippi resident, Ole Miss and Delta State University alumnus, Vietnam Era Army Veteran, former Mississippi Delta cotton farmer and ginner, author, and retired college teacher.
This story is a selection from Jimmy Reed’s latest book, entitled The Jaybird Tales.
Copies, including personalized autographs, can be reserved by notifying the author via email (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)).
