Charles H. Grooms

Paul Harkness was driving through the low country of South Carolina somewhere south of Charleston. To put it bluntly, he was lost. He wasn't really concerned, because the whole idea of this trip was to loose himself, not to himself, but to the everyday world. The constant pressures of his job had mounted until he felt as though he was about to crack, so, since he was a bachelor, he had taken his doctor's advice and taken a leave of absence. Since then, he had just been driving around to see what he could see, stopping for a while when some place interested him and then moving on. He had seldom consulted a road map, he had just driven in whichever direction seemed interesting.

It was late afternoon as he drove into what appeared to be a small fishing village, and since his camper was getting low on gas, he pulled up at a combination service station - general store such as are fairly common in parts of the rural southern U.S.

A few seconds after he pulled up beside the gas pump, one of the darkest black men that he had ever seen came out of the store and walked leisurely over to the window of Paul's Winnebago and said, "Yassah, hep ya?"

"Uh, yes. Will you fill it up with high test, please?"

"Ain' got no hagh tes, jes regla and regla no lead."

"OK, I'll take the unleaded. Have they got anything cold to drink inside?"

"Sho' nuff. You jes go on in an' Ah'll tak care o' thins here, 'Sides, its coola inside."

"Thank you." Paul opened the door of his Winnebago and walked the few steps to the screen door at the front of the store and stepped inside. After the bright sunlight outside, it took a few seconds for his eyes to accustom to the relative darkness of the store. After a few seconds, he spotted an ancient drink cooler, one of the types where you lift the lid, make your selection and slide it over to the locking mechanism that would release the drink after you had deposited the proper amount of money. Despite the antiquity of the cooler, the drinks were cold and Paul quickly made a selection and extracted it.

After taking a long and satisfying pull at the bottle, Paul noticed another black man sort of ambling over to him from the counter. "Scuse me, Mista, we don' see many strangas roun these parts, hep ya fine sumpin?"

"Well, maybe. I've been just sort of driving around the country and stopping wherever some place seemed peaceful. Is there a campground around here anywhere?"

The black man chuckled. "Yeah, is peaceful roun heah all rat. We ain' got no cam groun, dough. Dere sumpin special you need or is you jes lookin fo someplace ta park?"

"Well, all I really need is someplace to park, my motor home is pretty much self contained."

"Den, yo ken jes sit yo'sel down mos bout any ole place. Folks roun heah don' mine much to see a new site, now an agin."

"We seem to be pretty close to the water here."

"Oh, yessa, jes roun de ben in the road dere, des de dock strikin out in de ribber."

"Folks do much fishing around here?"

"Wellll, sumtimes dey do, sumtimes dey don. Pends on de fishes. Iffn de fish be bitin, den folks be doin' a lot a fishin, iffn de fishes don' be bitin, den dey don' be doin' much fishin."

"Look, my name is Paul Harkness, and what I am really looking for is someplace to just get in some real relaxing, and maybe just a little fishing."

"My names John Wentworth. Folks roun heah mosly calls me John or `Fesser.' I specs you'd be mos comfotable callin me `John'."

"OK., you can call me Paul."

Just then the man that had been pumping the gas for Paul came in so Paul walked over to the counter to pay his bill. Having finished his soft drink in the meantime, Paul headed for the door and John walked out with him.

"Dat sho is sum 'schene you got dere," John said, indicating Paul's motor home. "If you like, I kin sho you a place yo mait park it fo a while."

"Good idea. I'd appreciate it if you would, Why don't you climb in and we'll go on over. Then I can bring you back here if you like."

After they had gotten in the motor home and Paul had started the engine, John said, "Just head on down the road there, just around the bend you will see the dock, right on the other side of that barn there."

Paul turned to look at John, "John, you have suddenly lost your accent. And I do believe that I detect a bit more education than you were displaying before."

John laughed. "The accent is real. Its the accent that I was raised with. I learned to speak without it at school. As for the education, I have a Masters from Clemson. Trouble is, the people around here aren't comfortable with me, as a native, if I speak like you. So... I speak like they do and we get along fine most of the time."

"If you have a Masters, what are you doing here? Surely you could make a lot more money living and working elsewhere."

"Certainly I could. And they would go right on living just the same as they have for the past hundred years and more. Every generation, one or two manage to break away from here and we never see them again. By coming back here, I may be able to better their way of life in some way."

"Well, have you managed to make any differences?"

"Just a little, here and there. You don't change the ways of generations overnight. First, you have to let them see for themselves that you are smart, and that you know a lot of things. But you have to do it in a way that doesn't make them feel as though you are being uppity and better than they are. They know that I have been away to school, but as long as I act more or less like they do, we will be all right. As soon as I start telling them things, then they will think that I am trying to show off my education, and that I think that I am better than they are. After that, we wouldn't get anywhere and I could just as well leave the area for good. So, slow and easy does it."

"Would it really be so bad if you were to leave? I mean, the people that I have seen here seem to be happy, and although they certainly seem to be poor, I haven't seen anyone that looked hungry."

"Yes, Paul, I think that most of them are happy most of the time, but it is a happiness that is bred of ignorance. Most of these people haven't been fifty miles from here. Would you believe that most of them have never even seen a medical doctor in their entire lives?"

Paul was startled. "But what if they get sick, or how about when the women get pregnant? Surely they don't just tough it out?"

John laughed, a rather bitter laugh. "No, of course not. For pregnancies, there are a couple of midwives in the area. Actually, they are pretty good. Then there are a couple of herb women, one of them is also one of the midwives. For something serious, there is the priest."

"You have a priest here? Is he medically trained?"

"Different kind of priest. This priest is a voodoo priest. You would probably call him a witch doctor."

"You've got to be kidding. I thought that these people were mostly Christian. Are you actually telling me that voodoo is alive and well in these parts?"

"Sure is. You see, the slaves brought it in with them. Then the white man taught them about Jesus and Christianity. With the beliefs that they already had, they didn't see any conflict. So they just embraced Christianity and fitted it right in with their old beliefs without giving up either. To you, voodoo and Christianity are mutually exclusive. To my people, they are just different aspects of the same thing. Now don't misunderstand me. I am not saying that this is true of all blacks, or even a large percentage of blacks. But it is certainly true of blacks in this area and in many other rural southern areas. Besides here, there are still areas in parts of Louisiana and Mississippi and Georgia, for instance, where you can still hear the voodoo drums."

"I can't believe that I am hearing this. You mean that these people really go around decapitating chickens and hanging them over peoples' doors and sticking pins in dolls and other things like that?"

"You have been watching too many late movies on TV. Obviously, you don't understand just what voodoo really is. To you, its black magic. In reality, voodoo is a religion. Sure there are aspects of `magic' involved in voodoo, and some of them, you would label as `black', but there are also aspects that you would label as `white.' It would probably surprise you to know that there are a lot of white people that you would call "good Christians" as well as many Orientals, that share many of the beliefs that the followers of voodoo have. For that matter, it would surprise them, too."

Paul was quiet for awhile while he started the Winnebago into motion. He drove on down the road following the instructions that John had given him until he came in sight of the dock that John had mentioned and John pointed out a place to park. After he had shut off the engine, he turned to look at John, "John, I'm kinda worried. I mean, with the voodoo and all, would it be safe for me to stay here? I mean, the people..."

John laughed again, this time a truly hearty laugh. "Paul, there you go with your late movies again. Look. These are just people. Most of them are good people, some of them are not so good, but none of them are `bad' people. How can I get through to you? OK. If you were to get sick while you were here, what would you do?"

"Uh, I guess that I would go try to find a doctor."

"Yeah, and you would have to drive damn near to Charleston to find one. If you asked me, I would send you to Dokta Joe."

"Who is he?"

"Dokta Joe is our voodoo priest."

"You mean, he would try to cure me? I'm not a follower of voodoo, hell, I'm not even black. Wouldn't he be more likely to ignore me, or try to throw a curse at me or something?"

John's amusement was obvious, "Dokta Joe is not what you would call an educated man, but in his own right, he is very well educated. Oh, he can barely read and write, and he has never been exposed to math much higher than multiplication and division, but in ways that your people don't even recognize, he is educated. And... he is a very astute business man. If he didn't cure you, there would be no charge. He might surprise you at some of the things that he can do." Suddenly, John changed the subject. "You are planning to stay here a few days, aren't you?"

"Well, yeah, if it is all right."

"No problem. Just stay inside your motor home after dark."

"Oh, the voodoo."

"No, the bugaloo." He pronounced it "Bug' ah lou."

"The what?"

"The bugaloo. I guess that I had better tell you the story.

"It started just about a hundred years ago. The slaves had been freed and some of the young ones had grown up without the plantation masters' laws, so some of them were pretty lawless. One man, in particular was bad. His name was Sam Daniel, even though few people today remember that. One of the things going for Sam was his size. As the story has it, he was the largest man in these parts and had the strength to go with it. And he was just plain mean. He loved to fight and actually killed five different men during these fights. Crippled a few others, too. When some of the local people made the trip to the county seat to ask the sheriff for help, all that they heard was, `Oh, that's jest one nigga killin' anotha,' and that was the end of it.

"His other bad habit was raping women. Young, old, married, single, it didn't matter. Most people tried to avoid him, but it wasn't always possible. It seemed that what he liked most was to catch a man and woman together. It didn't matter to Sam if they were casual friends, brother and sister, husband and wife or father and daughter. He would start to molest the woman and when the man would object, he would beat the man senseless and then take the woman if she hadn't fled.

"Finally, the villagers had had enough. The men had a meeting and decided to ambush Sam one evening on his way home. Sam had a shack out of town a ways, and there was one good spot on the path that he traveled on his way home where they could conceal themselves and wait for him. When he came down the path that night, they were ready, and as he got into position, they jumped out. Now Sam was big and strong, but he was no match for forty men with clubs. Needless to say, Sam was soon laying unconscious on the path. The village men knew that they couldn't let him live, especially now. He would really get mean. But they were angry enough and hated him enough that they didn't want to kill him outright. They wanted him to suffer, just as he had made so many of them suffer.

"While Sam was still unconscious, the men stripped him and stood him against a tree where they tied him securely. Since it was getting dark, they built a fire and threw Sam's clothing in it and waited for Sam to regain consciousness. They didn't have long to wait. They were all watching him when Sam lifted his head and looked around at each one of them. His first words to them were, `I'm gonna kill all of yo.' Some of the men admitted later that they felt a chill of fear go through them at Sam's words.

"But there is bravery in numbers, and the men started joking about it, saying things like, `He ain' gonna hurt no mon, no mo' when we get dun wit him.'

"Some of the men had brought some moonshine with them and soon the Dutch courage was strong. Then one man took out a knife and announced to the rest, `Dis mon dun took my wife an my sista, an Ah knows dat he dun took som o' yo wimmens, too. So Ah gonna fix him so's he don nebber tak no mo' o' our wimmen folk.' With that, he walked over to Sam and cut off his male parts. It is hard to believe, but they say that Sam did not pass out or even scream, he only cursed them. Then they heated the knife in the fire and cauterized the wound. They really didn't want him to bled to death and die too soon.

"One of the men started laughing at the sight of Sam standing there without his genitals and with blood running down his legs. He said, `Dat Sam, he ain' no mon no mo', he ain' nuttin' but a bugaloo.' That name stuck.

"The men laughed and joked about it for awhile, and finally one of them said, `Dat bugaloo, he too tall!' Then one of the other men said, `Ah knows whut we can do 'bout dat, we can cut off he feet.' So, that is precisely what they did. They amputated his feet at the ankles. Again they cauterized the wounds. They say that this time, Sam almost passed out, but continued to curse them.

"The men started taunting the bugaloo about his lack of masculinity and the fact that he was now a cripple. Finally, one of the men said, `Yo know, bugaloo, yo still too tall.' The other men agreed and decided that the only thing left to do was to cut off the top of his head. They taunted him about this for awhile, but finally got around to it. Obviously, even the bugaloo couldn't survive that, and the men were jubilant that they were finally rid of him.

"The men left the bugaloo tied to the tree and carried his amputated parts back to the village. Soon every man, woman and child in the village were having a celebration, with the amputated parts on display. During the party, people would come up to the grisly display and spit on them.

"Toward dawn, they threw the bugaloo's parts into the fire and burned them, then they dumped the ashes into the river.

"The next afternoon, a couple of the men decided to go out to the bugaloo's shack and see if they could find anything of value, after all, he had stolen things from just about everyone in the village.

When they reached the spot where they had killed him, they were shocked. They found the ropes that they had tied him with, some blood, and the remains of the fire, but no bugaloo. They forgot completely about their original mission and ran back to the village with the news that the bugaloo was gone.

"Most of the villagers gathered together and went out to the bugaloo's shack to see if, somehow, he had managed to crawl back there, and if so, to finish him off for good. When they got there, there was no sign of him. Some of them did reclaim some of their belongings, then they burned his shack to the ground and returned to the village. For a couple of weeks, there were fearful mutters about it, especially when someone mentioned that the bugaloo's mother was a bit further into voodoo than most, then things returned to normal.

"They say that about six months passed uneventfully and peacefully. Then one day, one of the village men's body was found. He had been stripped, and his genitals, feet and the top of his head were missing. Just exactly what had happened to the bugaloo. The only difference was that the wounds had not been cauterized. You can imagine the terror that swept through the village.

"The villagers talked about it and pieced together what had happened. The last time he had been seen alive was the previous evening. Some of the men had been drinking, and he had headed for home alone, well after dark. He never made it.

"After that there were several other deaths, not too frequent, and always at night. It was always a man that died, and he was always outside, never in his home. It was always at least three months and sometimes as much as five years between deaths, and always in the same way. So the villagers learned not to go outside after dark if they could possibly avoid it.

"Things had been going like this for about forty years, and it had been almost five years since there had been a death. Then one night, a young man was walking his girlfriend home. There was a full moon that night and the sky was clear so the girl could see clearly what happened. Suddenly, the figure of the bugaloo stepped out of concealment, grabbed the young man and throttled him. He stripped the young man, took a knife from a strap around his waist and removed the man's genitals, feet and the top of his head. Then came the part that frightened the young woman even more. The bugaloo fitted these parts to his own body, and they stuck!

"After the young woman reported what she had seen, the villagers figured out that the bugaloo was searching for his own missing parts, and since he couldn't find them, he was trying to substitute parts from other men. Unfortunately, since he had been such a large man, the parts that he was taking didn't really fit. So they decided that these misfitted smaller parts would eventually rot and fall off, so he would go looking again."

Paul gave John a skeptical look and said, "John, have you ever really seen anyone who has died this way?"

"Yes, I have, three or four times. It is always a man, the women seem to be safe, so the men just don't go outdoors after dark if they can possibly avoid it. That is why I told you that you are welcome to stay here, just stay inside your motor home after dark."

Paul decided that even though John was obviously well educated, he was either pulling his leg, hadn't been able to overcome his native superstition, or was a bit touched in in the head. So he decided to humor him, "OK, I'll stay inside, I've got a good book to read anyway. Say, how is the fishing off of this dock?"

John laughed at the sudden change of topic. "Sometimes its pretty good. Wait till the tide starts coming in, then you might catch something. Look, I've got to be going, I'll drop by and see you tomorrow.

"Hey, can I give you a ride?"

"No, its not far, besides, the exercise will be good for me. Take care, now. And stay inside after dark."

After John left, Paul did do some fishing, and managed to catch his supper. After he had eaten and cleaned up the dirty dishes, he decided that it was getting stuffy in the motor home, even with the windows open. So he got out a folding table and a lawn chair and carried them outside. Then he went back in, fixed himself a glass of iced tea and got out his kerosene lantern. He lit the lantern and went back out and sat down to enjoy the evening.

He was thinking about the story that John had told him while he was stoking up his pipe. Funny how educated people could believe some of the folk tales and legends that they grew up with. And all of that voodoo. But John had really seemed to be sincere and seemed to believe that tale about the bugaloo.

He had been sitting there for about twenty minutes when he heard a bumping and scraping sound coming from outside the radius of his lantern's glow. Probably someone playing a trick on him, OK, he would play along. Feigning fear, he peered into the dark. He could begin to make out a shape coming his way. Finally, it came far enough into the light cast by the lantern that he could see it clearly. This was no trick! The dark brown naked shape of a hugely muscled man hove into view. Even though the genitals were missing, it was obviously male. And huge. Even though the feet were missing as was the top of it's head it was still taller than his own six foot one. It's only "clothing" was a leather strap around it's waist from which hung a knife. It was hobbling toward him on the stumps of it's legs, reaching for him. Now the chill of fear that ran through him wasn't feigned, it was real!

Without thinking about what he was doing, he grabbed the kerosene lantern from the table and threw it at the approaching bugaloo. Fate, or a voodoo priest or God or something must have been on his side. The lantern hit the bugaloo square in the chest and as it did, the bugaloo smashed at it with one huge fist. The fuel chamber broke, pouring flaming kerosene all over the bugaloo. It screamed, tottering around, slapping at the flames. It started to move away, then fell to the ground and was completely engulfed in the consuming flames. Within minutes, a crowd of villagers was gathered around, watching as the bugaloo burned.

Suddenly, John was at his side. "We were watching you from our windows. I was sure that you wouldn't stay inside, even after I told you about the bugaloo. We really expected to see you get killed. Now I am glad that you didn't stay inside."

"Well, I really didn't believe that story. Guess that I was wrong."

"Oh well, it worked out for the best. This time, we will make sure of the results. When that fire goes out, we will take what remains of the body and really burn it. Then the ashes will go into the river like the ashes of the rest of him did so long ago."

Paul noticed that some of the villagers were already gathering wood into the center of the street. A few of them were starting to sing a happy sounding song. It looked as though the bugaloo would soon truly be history and these villagers could finally live without fearing the night.

the end

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