The Poisonwood Bible
Page 57
Father is trying to teach everybody to love Jesus, but what with one thing and another around here, they don’t. Some of them are scared of Jesus, and some aren’t, but I don’t think they love Him. Even the ones that go to church, they still worship the false-eye dolls and get married to each other time and again. Father gets right put out about it.
I’m scared of Jesus, too.
When she came back from the woods, we hooped and hollered and ran to the porch and just jumped up and down and pulled her inside by her shirttails. But uh-oh, there “was Father in his dark bedroom doorway looking out. All you could see was his eyes. We didn’t want to get the same medicine, so we just looked at Leah real hard with I’m sorry for you eyes and tried to get a nice message across. After we went to bed I reached over through the mosquito net and held her hand.
Mama didn’t sleep in her room.
Mama says birds are going to be her death. I’d sooner say it was snakes. But I guess if a bird is going to eat up the dead children’s souls, that is a worry. That is one more sound to listen for at night. One more thing you can’t say out loud after dark.
Rachel
IN JANUARY the Underdowns showed up as a complete surprise from Leopoldville.They came in Mr. Axelroot’s plane, when the most we were really expecting was Potato Buds and Spam. The Underdowns don’t like to come out here in the boondoggles, so believe you me this was an occasion. They looked like they had nervous-tension headaches. Mother was upset because they’re our bosses from the Mission League, and they’d caught her red-handed doing housework in her old black Capri pants with the knees worn through. She was a sight to behold there on the floor, scrubbing away, with her flyaway hair sticking out and dark bruise-colored circles under her eyes from all her worrying about us catching the kamikaze disease. What with the mongooses and lizards traipsing in and out of the house as they pleased, she had a lot more to be embarrassed about than just getting caught in her old clothes, it seems to me. But at least that horrible owl was gone.Thank goodness to that, even if Father did come down too hard on Leah about it. That was a bad scene. We were all tiptoeing around on the eggshells even more than usual, after that. But that owl stank of rotten meat so I do have to say, Good riddance.
But listen, why should we have to put on the Ritz for the Underdowns? They aren’t even Baptists, I heard Father say; they just oversee the financial affairs for the Mission League since so many people have pulled out. They are Episcopotamians, and their real name is actually something foreign like On-tray-don. We just say Underdown because it’s easier. To tell you the truth, the two of them are just a couple of the plainest Janes you ever saw, in their economical home haircuts and khaki trousers. The funny thing about Frank and Janna Underdown is that they look exactly alike except for the accessories: he has a mustache, she has little gold cross earrings and glasses on a chain. Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head.
They sat at our table sweating while Mother ran and squeezed the orangeade and served it. Even the glasses were dripping with sweat. Outside, the sky was getting its regular afternoon storm organized: wind whacking the palm leaves together, red dust ghosts flying up from the road, little kids running like bansheets for cover. Mother was too nervous to sit down with the company so she stood behind Father’s chair, leaning on the windowsill, waiting for him to finish the newspaper they’d brought. All of them passed it around. Except Mr. Axelroot, the pilot, who probably wouldn’t know what to do with a newspaper except wipe his you-know-what.Yes, he was there among our numbers too. He stood leaning in the back doorway and spitting until I thought I would croak. He stared right at me, undressing me mentally. I have said already my parents are entirely in the dark about certain things. I made faces at him and finally he went away.
While Father was reading the latest news, Mrs. Underdown tried to make friends with Mother by complaining about her houseboy in Leopoldville. “Honestly, Orleanna, he would steal anything except the children. And he would have those, too, if he thought he could sell them. If I try to lock things up, he slaps his hands over his heart as if I’ve accused him of murder. Even though I just caught him the night before with four of Frank’s handkerchiefs and a kilo of sugar tucked into the front of his shirt. He always claims he has no idea how they got there.”
“Well, my stars,” Mother said, without seeming all that interested.
Mrs. Underdown stared at Mother, puzzled. “Your stores’?” She always implies we have an accent, by repeating our words and expressions like little jokes. With her being somewhat of a foreigner herself, that’s the pot calling the skillet black if you ask me.
I’m scared of Jesus, too.
When she came back from the woods, we hooped and hollered and ran to the porch and just jumped up and down and pulled her inside by her shirttails. But uh-oh, there “was Father in his dark bedroom doorway looking out. All you could see was his eyes. We didn’t want to get the same medicine, so we just looked at Leah real hard with I’m sorry for you eyes and tried to get a nice message across. After we went to bed I reached over through the mosquito net and held her hand.
Mama didn’t sleep in her room.
Mama says birds are going to be her death. I’d sooner say it was snakes. But I guess if a bird is going to eat up the dead children’s souls, that is a worry. That is one more sound to listen for at night. One more thing you can’t say out loud after dark.
Rachel
IN JANUARY the Underdowns showed up as a complete surprise from Leopoldville.They came in Mr. Axelroot’s plane, when the most we were really expecting was Potato Buds and Spam. The Underdowns don’t like to come out here in the boondoggles, so believe you me this was an occasion. They looked like they had nervous-tension headaches. Mother was upset because they’re our bosses from the Mission League, and they’d caught her red-handed doing housework in her old black Capri pants with the knees worn through. She was a sight to behold there on the floor, scrubbing away, with her flyaway hair sticking out and dark bruise-colored circles under her eyes from all her worrying about us catching the kamikaze disease. What with the mongooses and lizards traipsing in and out of the house as they pleased, she had a lot more to be embarrassed about than just getting caught in her old clothes, it seems to me. But at least that horrible owl was gone.Thank goodness to that, even if Father did come down too hard on Leah about it. That was a bad scene. We were all tiptoeing around on the eggshells even more than usual, after that. But that owl stank of rotten meat so I do have to say, Good riddance.
But listen, why should we have to put on the Ritz for the Underdowns? They aren’t even Baptists, I heard Father say; they just oversee the financial affairs for the Mission League since so many people have pulled out. They are Episcopotamians, and their real name is actually something foreign like On-tray-don. We just say Underdown because it’s easier. To tell you the truth, the two of them are just a couple of the plainest Janes you ever saw, in their economical home haircuts and khaki trousers. The funny thing about Frank and Janna Underdown is that they look exactly alike except for the accessories: he has a mustache, she has little gold cross earrings and glasses on a chain. Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head.
They sat at our table sweating while Mother ran and squeezed the orangeade and served it. Even the glasses were dripping with sweat. Outside, the sky was getting its regular afternoon storm organized: wind whacking the palm leaves together, red dust ghosts flying up from the road, little kids running like bansheets for cover. Mother was too nervous to sit down with the company so she stood behind Father’s chair, leaning on the windowsill, waiting for him to finish the newspaper they’d brought. All of them passed it around. Except Mr. Axelroot, the pilot, who probably wouldn’t know what to do with a newspaper except wipe his you-know-what.Yes, he was there among our numbers too. He stood leaning in the back doorway and spitting until I thought I would croak. He stared right at me, undressing me mentally. I have said already my parents are entirely in the dark about certain things. I made faces at him and finally he went away.
While Father was reading the latest news, Mrs. Underdown tried to make friends with Mother by complaining about her houseboy in Leopoldville. “Honestly, Orleanna, he would steal anything except the children. And he would have those, too, if he thought he could sell them. If I try to lock things up, he slaps his hands over his heart as if I’ve accused him of murder. Even though I just caught him the night before with four of Frank’s handkerchiefs and a kilo of sugar tucked into the front of his shirt. He always claims he has no idea how they got there.”
“Well, my stars,” Mother said, without seeming all that interested.
Mrs. Underdown stared at Mother, puzzled. “Your stores’?” She always implies we have an accent, by repeating our words and expressions like little jokes. With her being somewhat of a foreigner herself, that’s the pot calling the skillet black if you ask me.
