A Death in the Family - James Agee [36]
Ann, uh what dyou reckon I see,
A band ofshinin angels,
A comin‘after me.
Git on board, little children,
Git on board, little children,
Git on board, little children,
There’s room for many and more.
He did not look down but looked straight on into the wall in silence for a good while, and sang:
Oh, every time the sun goes down,
There’s a dollar saved for Betsy Brown,
Sugar Babe.
He looked down. He was almost certain now that the child was asleep. So much more quietly that he could scarcely hear himself, and that the sound stole upon the child’s near sleep like a band of shining angels, he went on:
There’s a good old sayin, as you all know,
That you can’t track a rabbit when there ain’t no snow
Sugar Babe.
Here again he waited, his hand listening against the child, for he was so fond of the last verse that he always hated to have to come to it and end it; but it came into his mind and became so desirable to sing that he could resist it no longer:
Oh, tain’t agoin to rain on, tain’t agoin to snow:
He felt a strange coldness on his spine, and saw the glistening as a great cedar moved and tears came into his eyes:
But the sun’s agoin to shine, and the wind’s agoin to blow
Sugar Babe.
A great cedar, and the colors of limestone and of clay; the smell of wood smoke and, in the deep orange light of the lamp, the silent logs of the walls, his mother’s face, her ridged hand mild on his forehead: Don’t you fret, Jay, don’t you fret And before his time, before even he was dreamed of in this world, she must have lain under the hand of her mother or her father and they in their childhood under other hands, away on back through the mountains, away on back through the years, it took you right on back as far as you could ever imagine, right on back to Adam, only no one did it for him; or maybe did God?
How far we all come. How far we all come away from ourselves. So far, so much between, you can never go home again. You can go home, it’s good to go home, but you never really get all the way home again in your life. And what’s it all for? All I tried to be, all I ever wanted and went away for, what’s it all for?
Just one way, you do get back home. You have a boy or a girl of your own and now and then you remember, and you know how they feel, and it’s almost the same as if you were your own self again, as young as you could remember.
And God knows he was lucky, so many ways, and God knows he was thankful. Everything was good and better than he could have hoped for, better than he ever deserved; only, whatever it was and however good it was, it wasn’t what you once had been, and had lost, and could never have again, and once in a while, once in a long time, you remembered, and knew how far you were away, and it hit you hard enough, that little while it lasted, to break your heart.
He felt thirsty, and images of stealthiness and deceit, of openness, anger and pride, immediately possessed him, and immediately he fought them off. If ever I get drunk again, he told himself proudly, I’ll kill myself. And there are plenty good reasons why I won’t kill myself. So I won’t even get drunk again.
He felt consciously strong, competent both for himself and against himself, and this pleasurable sense of firmness contended against the perfect and limpid remembrance he had for a moment experienced, and he tried sadly, vainly, to recapture it. But now all that he remembered, clear as it was to him, and dear to him, no longer moved his heart, and he was in this sadness, almost without thought, staring at the wall when the door opened softly behind him and he was caught by a spasm of rage and alarm, then of shame for these emotions.
“Jay, ”his wife called softly. “Isn’t he asleep yet?”
“Yeah, he’s asleep,” he said, getting up and dusting his knees. “Reckon it’s later than I knew.”
“Andrew and Amelia had to go, ” she whispered, coming over. She leaned past him and straightened the sheet. “They said tell you good night.” She lifted the child’s head with one hand, while her husband, frowning, vigorously shook