Asafetida (The Grave and he Noble: old Josh series)

Asafetida
(The Grave and the Noble)

In the Heart of Niggertown

At one time it was just a cemetery and part of an old field, and before that, a plantation, then it became shantytown, with a nickname, of Niggertown, a few miles outside of Ozark, Alabama. One might even say, the noble face of Ozark, was next door to the grave face of Niggertown. The town itself, smelled like asafetida white folks would say, (devil's dung) (a flower native to Iran, grows seven feet tall, large yellowish in color, it has a foul smell)).
Often times the young Negros, on their way to school, stood aside on the dirt road leading out of Asafetida, or shanty town, it had all three names.
The area stunk because the folks living in Shantytown threw their garbage over into the cemetery with the dead, and rats, and dogs, cats, etcetera, and if a good Samaritan wished to clean up the smell, he or they would simply go burn it sooner or later, and bury the remains.
The white folks rode their buggies, wagons, or sole riders on horses slowly when they came by the road, dirt road that lead up to the shantytown; they almost stopped to get a look at their grave neighbors.
“What, Amos would say to the passersby, often was “What youall looking for?” Then old Amos would shut his eyes count to ten, and hope by then, by the time he opened his eyes, hoped they were gone, and they usually were, if not he’d add, to his monologue, “Dont you see yet, what yous lookin’ for? Is you deaf?”
In a lot of ways, he was like Joshua Jefferson, and we all know how he is, need I say more.
In the back fields of shantytown, there used to be an old plantation, now just ruins, an old scattered foundation remained—a gutted shell of a large mansion that used to be. Even a shell of a frame for a stable could be seen, it burnt down around the turn of the century, about 1799. You really couldn’t tell were the boundaries were, unless you went to the court house, and checked with the records clerk, the fields had not been cultivated for over a half century, or longer, once quite fertile. But who ever would buy the land, needed to build a road around shantytown which really was public land, and who lived there, were called invaders, but left alone, up to now anyhow. The second choice would have been to go through Niggertown, and that would be the shortcut, and less costly. And so when the subject came up, it seemed to die out quick, the investment wasn’t worth the trouble.
Well, Josh had settled his dispute in his brain about who he was, and were he came from, he was Zam, from the Congo, in Africa, or that is what he would have told you had you asked him in 1873, four years after Charles Hightower died, and left him $3000 dollars, and a plot of land on his plantation, and he had given Emma Hightower to purchase a note book concerning the ship he had come over on in 1803, called “The Monk.”
Hank Ritt was going to buy that land back yonder; the fields I was just talking about, and renting them out. There was 1200-acres back there, a lot of land, almost obliterated as a farm, with weeds and rocks, and every kind of creepy crawler you can think of, and the Shantytown was on the edge of the property. They, mayor and his associates, were going to have the black folks removed, regardless, no matter what, and have the huts torn down, burnt to the ground, if necessary, to accommodate Mr. Ritt, for the land would be purchased by him, and the money would go into the city fund, and the Mayors fund, if you know what I mean, he figured they had free rent long enough, and Ritt needed a road into his fields, and wouldn’t buy the land unless there was an easier way to get to it, and he didn’t care to have what he called shiftless people squabbling over his intentions, or stealing his firewood by cutting down trees, or throwing garbage over into the cemetery, so the odor drifted into the noses of his tenets.
They planned on bringing dogs and rifles and bottles of whiskey to make them more brave, and thus, clear the area one and for all of these pests, niggers and whomever else was there, nigger lovers would be welcomed to be removed also, the mayor said, every soul who went on this witch hunt would earn a twenty-dollar gold piece, yes just for one nights work.

Ritt was by far the largest land wonder in the area, but what he didn’t remember, or think about, or even did it come to mind, Joshua Jefferson, that old Josh had two-thousand dollars in the bank. Not a lot of money, but enough to buy one-hundred and fifty acres of that weedy property—and he got wind of what Ritt’s intentions were, Jordon over heard Ritt talking with his entourage in the grocery story one afternoon, and he did go tell his pa, and Josh, not having really any use for the money, didn’t tell anyone, not Ritt, or his son Silas, or even Mr. Hightower, no one, not a soul, and he bought the land, put the land in the name of Zam, and he gave the record clerk an envelope, which had his name in it, as the rightful owner, to put on file, but for the curious, it remained Zam, as long as the taxes were paid on it, the deal was ok. And he gave, the female clerk, the Methodist Sunday school teacher, Molly Brown, a twenty-dollar gold piece to keep it that way, secretive, on her honor, and she gave it, she gave her word not to expose the real owners name, and when Ritt came to buy all the land up, the first one-hundred and fifty acres which stretched from the rim of shantytown, outwards were purchased. Fine, thought Ritt, but he couldn’t buy the land now, he’d have to negotiate with the new owner, maybe the new owner didn’t know who he was, and perhaps could change his mind.
Ritt wanted to know the owner so he could buy the land from him, or make life un-derisible if he couldn’t, or wouldn’t or didn’t; and Molly Brown told her pa, “This here gold piece the man gave me to honor his wishes in not telling a soul who he is, has been the hardest earned money I have ever work for.”
As it was, so it remained, and life went on. In time, Josh would sell the land, but not to Ritt.