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Samantha Power

Mr. Gallagher

AP Literature

15 December 2009

“Barn Burning” – Hemingway Remix

The Justice of the Peace held the hearing in a store. The boy sitting in the back, watching,

smelled cheese. There were tins of cheese on the top of the shelves, and the smell of meat coming

through the door. He heard from the hearing, which he could not see:

“But what proof have you, Mr. Harris?”

“I told you. The hog got into my corn. I caught it up and sent it back to him. He had no fence that

would hold it. I told him so, warned him, the next time, I’ll put the hog in my pen. When he came to

get it I gave him enough wire to patch up his pen. The next time I put the hog up and kept it. I rode

down to his house and way the wire I gave him still rolled on to the spool in his yard. I told him he

could have the god when he paid me a dollar pound fee. That evening a nigger came with the dollar

and got the hog. He was a strange nigger. He said ‘He say to tell you wood and hay kin burn.’ I said,

‘What?’ ‘That whut he say to tell you,’ the nigger said. ‘Wood and hay kin burn.’ That night my barn

burned. I got the stock out but I lost the barn.”

“Where’s the nigger? Have you got him?”

“He was a strange nigger, I tell you. I don’t know what became of him.”

“But that’s not proof. Don’t you see that’s not proof?”

“Get that boy up here. He knows.” Pause. “Not him. The little one. The boy. “

The boy got up. He approached the justice. He avoided his father’s look as he walked. The boy knew

what his father wanted him to do.

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(EMISSION)

The Justice to the man trying the boy’s father: Do you want me to question this boy?”

The room was silent.

“No!” The man said violently. “Damnation! Send him out of here!”

The Justice said, “Then this case is closed. I can’t find against you, but I can give you advice. Leave

this country and don’t come back to it.”

In his cold, harsh voice, the boy’s father said, “I aim to. I don’t figure to stay in this country with you

people.”

“That’ll do. Take your wagon and get out of this country before dark. Case dismissed.”

Walking out of the courthouse, the boy followed his father’s stiff walk and brother, in between two

lines of grim-faced men. A voice as they were going by hissed:

“Barn burner!”

There was an altercation. The boy was hit and bleeding.

“Go get in the wagon,” came from his father’s harsh voice.

At the wagon was his family sitting ready with all of their things – the stove, broken beds and chairs,

the clock that stopped at fourteen past two. His mother jumped toward him to clean the blood.

“Get back.”

“He’s hurt, I got to get some water and wash his…”

“Get back in the wagon.”

Then they were off, again.

“Does it hurt?”

“Naw, it don’t hurt. Lemme be.”

“Can’t you wipe off some of the blood before it dries?”

“I’ll wash to-night. Lemme be, I tell you.”

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The family stayed the night over in a grove of oaks. The night was cool and there was a small fire that

his father always had a habit of making, even in the freezing cold weather. The family ate their supper,

and the boy was almost asleep when his father called ho him. He followed his father up a slope away

from camp.

“You were fixing to tell them. You would have told him.”

His father hit him.

“You’re getting to be a man. You got to learn. You got to stick to your own blood or you ain’t going to

have any blood to stick to you. Understand?”

The boy just stood there.

“Answer me.”

“Yes.”

“Get on to bed. We’ll be there tomorrow.”

The house they got to the next day was identical to all the others the boy had seen in his ten years. His

mother and aunt got down unloading the wagon and his father addressed his older brother.

“When they get unloaded, take the team to the barn and feed them,” his father said to his brother.

“Come with me.”

“Me?” The boy said.

“Yes. You.”

They went up the road to the grove of oaks, cedars, and other trees and shrubs. There was a fence

massed with honeysuckle and Cherokee roses. They came to gate open between two brick pillars, and
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they came upon a house. His father continued to walk to the front door of the house. The door opened

as soon as they got to it, and a Negro spoke.

“Wipe yo foots, white man, fo you come in here. Major ain’t home nohow.”

“Get out of my way, nigger.”

His father stood on the white carpet, leaving dirty prints from his boots.

“Miss Lula! Miss Lula!”

A woman appeared with an incredulous look on her face.

“I tried, I tole him to…”

“Will you please go away? The Major is not at home. Will you please go away?” Her voice was

shaking.

His father walked out the door without saying a word and the boy followed.

“Pretty and white, ain’t it? That’s sweat. Nigger sweat. Maybe it ain’t white enough yet to suit him.

Maybe he wants to mix some white sweat with it.”