Breeze scrambled over the boards of the pen, and slipped a pan under Jeems’ unconscious head, and held it in place in spite of the kicking death-struggling legs, saving the bubbling red stream for a pudding. The smell of it made him sick, and he couldn’t meet the look of those half-closed staring eyes.
Poor Jeems! His time was out. His kicks were getting weaker. His eyelids were wilting down over his dull sightless eyes. His soul would soon be gone home to God. Breeze looked up at the sky, but Big Sue called out to give her the pan before he turned it over. It had caught enough for a small pudding.
The hog was hurried into the barrel and scalded before the life cooled out of him, and his skin scraped clean of hair. As Uncle Bill worked he told Breeze he must always be careful to see that the moon is right before he killed a hog. A wrong moon will set the hair in a hog’s skin so no knife on earth could move it. Meat killed on a waning moon will dry up to nothing, no matter how you cook it. A certain quarter of the moon will make the meat tough and strong, another will rot it, no matter how much salt you pack around it. If Breeze would learn all the moon signs he’d be spared a lot of trouble long as he lived. White people leave money to their children, but black people teach theirs signs, which is far better. Money can be taken from you, but knowledge can’t.
When Jeems was scalded and scraped and washed and cleaned, he was hung up by a hickory stick run through the white sinews in his hind legs. The carcass must cool before it was cut up, for meat, like bread, is spoiled if cut while it’s warm.
Bina had come to help Big Sue, and the two women bent over a wooden washtub, sorting out the liver and lights and chitterlings, putting the small entrails aside for sausage casings. The hog’s fine condition made Big Sue cheerful. She declared she’d make a lot more lard than she’d expected, for all of Jeems’ insides were coated with fat.
The higher the sun rose the faster they worked, even when the neighbors dropped by for a little neighborly talk and to see how the hog-killing went on.
At noon they stopped for a breathing spell and bite to eat. Hot brown corn-bread and bits of fried liver were washed down with sweetened water. The grown people smoked one pipeful apiece, then set to work again, for Jeems had cooled enough to be quartered.
The back door slipped off its hinges made a table large enough to hold him. Uncle Bill’s big knife cut off the huge head, and separated the hams and shoulders and sides from the long backbone. He trimmed them neatly, throwing the scraps of lean meat into one tub for sausage meat, and bits of firm white fat into another for to-morrow’s lard making.
He wanted to give Breeze the pig-tail to roast on the coals right then, but Big Sue said Breeze had no time to be playing with pig-tails now. If he’d work hard Uncle Bill might find the hog’s bladder for him, and to-night he and Brudge could pleasure themselves blowing it up like a balloon.
A number of the plantation dogs had gathered, and they had to be watched, specially the hounds and cur-dogs. The bird dogs were better-mannered. Big Sue wanted to scald the lot of them for the pesky way they nosed around, but Uncle Bill wouldn’t let her. God made dogs so they hankered after hog-meat. It was sinful to be short-patienced with them.