April had felt no heat. His foot was dead. It couldn’t feel fire! April grabbed the fire shovel, and scraped up a batch of live coals from under the fire and dropped them on the hearth. He’d see if fire had stopped being hot. Uncle Bill didn’t raise a finger to stop him when he lifted his other foot and pressed its heel down on the coals and mashed hard on them.
The bitter smell of his burned flesh stung the air. April’s eyes glared, and he laughed a harsh discordant laugh. But a sob quickly caught him by the throat and choked him. He leaned over and picked up a live coal in his fingers, then dropped it quickly, for his fingers were alive. They could feel. The coal burned them. But his feet were dead. They couldn’t feel even fire!
“Oh, Gawd!” he moaned, and his long fingers knotted and clenched, his strong tobacco-yellowed teeth ground together.
Joy came in from the field to feed her little baby. Nobody heard her bare footsteps, until she spoke to Uncle Bill and Breeze. She went up to April and put a hand on his arm, and asked how his feet were. She leaned over and looked at them, but he drew them underneath his chair. He didn’t want her to see. He reached for the quilt on the floor beside him and covered them over.
“My feets is all right,” he told her gruffly.
But Joy sniffed the air once or twice, she searched the fire with her eyes, then she swept the hearth clean of the coals. She patted April’s shoulder, and said gentle things to him. He must have patience. She’d make some fresh violet-leaves tea and soak his feet. She was sure that would help them.
Bright tears ran out of April’s eyes, down his thin hard cheeks, and fell on the bony clasped hands that held tight to each other in his lap. Breeze could hardly bear to see those tears. Uncle Bill got up and tried to say something, but his voice broke, and he began punching the fire. For April was crying out loud. Saying he had given out! He couldn’t go on any longer!
Joy put her arms around him and held his head on her bosom, and patted his face and tried to hush him. She wiped his tears away with her homespun apron, and smoothed his eyelids softly. Her fingers were trembling, but April became quieter. She stroked his head and begged him to go back to bed and lie down and rest.
He was hard and sullen, and frowned as if she had insulted him. He’d stay right where he was. Bed and chair were the same to him now. Joy stood with her eyes on the red embers, never answering back a single time, even when anger made the words strangle in his throat. It was hard for him to bend his neck under such a galling, hellish yoke.
Until now he had never asked a favor of anybody in his whole life. He had always worked, and made others work. His women and children too. And now his feet, the feet that had carried him faithfully through all these years, the only ones he could ever have, had failed him. They made game of him. And it was more than he could bear. He bellowed out recklessly, but Joy got a pan and spoon and dipped some hot soup from a pot on the hearth and urged him to taste it. He shook his head. He didn’t want soup. He didn’t want anything to eat. He’d rather starve to death than be helpless. Joy began some pleasant talk. How fast the cotton was growing. The fields were green. Last night’s shower was the very thing spring oats needed. He leaned back in his chair, humbled, crushed with misery. Uncle Bill said he would come back a little later and bring April some medicine. Some strong medicine from the Big House medicine chest. It would help those feet.