Free John Crow's Devil by Marlon James Page A

more. Climb any ackee tree since mornin, Lucinda Queenie?”
    In obeah-man country there are several teas. People think the secret history of witchcraft is of oils, but that is no secret. Oils are given to those who pay, but tea is for those who believe. There is cerasse to ease the stomach, soursop leaf for nerves, and comfrey for health and strength. But there is another tea with a name lost to those who live in light. A tea that is prepared in hidden places that nobody drinks alone. Lucinda’s mother hid the secret callaloo under her bed and never gave her daughter that warning. Lucinda had mixed the tea as her mother had done, boiling the weeds and gulping the acrid broth down in three, then covering her mouth as it scalded her gut. She filled her mouth with river water and spat into the fire. A huge cloud of steam rose and surrounded her in mist. Lucinda felt cold, very cold. A wet wind stirred and hissed. She was no longer on the ground or in clothes. In a blink she soared so high that Gibbeah became a dot of flickering light. In another blink there was nothing but moon and sky. She screamed and laughed. Lucinda willed herself there and suddenly she was. Nothing would stop her revenge. From up in the ackee tree she saw them. The bride and groom, years from becoming Widow and corpse, consummating their marriage. In the moonlit glimmer of the bedroom she saw the manic movement of sweaty flesh. The whiteness of the Widow’s feet, up in the air and bobbing as her husband fucked her. Each thrust cut through Lucinda’s blackened heart. Mrs. Greenfield came and opened her eyes expecting to see love all wet and real. But instead she saw a shadow falling out of the ackee tree. The shadow’s hair was parted at the middle; the way Lucinda kept it until the day of her death.
    Lucinda’s hands were shaking as she stood at the Widow’s door. She turned to leave but the rain was waiting and she feared the beat of wings. Did the Widow hear the flutter? Her face was unchanged.
    “Tell him that the Apostle say him can come back.” Lucinda turned away. The rain swallowed her up and she was gone.
    The Rum Preacher had heard. Widow Greenfield stood in the doorway looking out, but was aware of the clumsiness of his stealth.
    “Look like you church want you back.” As she turned, he looked away.
    “You think them goin kill the fattest calf?”
    She was in the mood. Lucinda had whet her appetite for more. No damn way she was going to be miserable by herself. The Preacher withered, slipped back into his room, and left her to the dead space. The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. He prayed in thanksgiving.

    Rain fell all night. Some wondered if God had turned back on his promise to never flood the Earth no matter how much man sinned on it. Rain fell on the righteous and unrighteous. Rain fell on Clarence when he left Mr. Johnson’s house after fucking Mr. Johnson’s wife, as he did most nights while the husband slept soundly in the same bed. Thunder judged him and he left her in a flurry. Clarence was a good distance from the house when semen wetted his thighs, reminding him that he had forgotten his briefs. Then lightning struck, exposing him in a flash of light, and he forgot again. Clarence ran home, stumbling twice in the muddy water.
    Lightning was the pointed finger of God’s judgment. The people of Gibbeah knew this well. Lightning had killed the Contraptionist. Its blinding light exposed iniquity, its singular force burst through the dark skin of sin. The Contraptionist was a lonely man who lived not in Gibbeah but less than a mile beyond the river. Each day he was seen twice: driving his cows to the field at dawn and back to the pen at dusk. But from his house came the sound of industry. The bustle of hands and machines and hammers and saws and pulleys and ropes and wood at work.
    One evening, just before the rains came, a curious odor drifted from his shed, something sickly and sweet. As quick as the wind, the pleasant