OCR Text |
Show in my father's house/ 159 "Do you think it's bad to be dark?" I asked my mother. She looked at her hands and stammered. "I - uh - I... don't know. It says so somewhere in the scriptures. That Cain was cursed with a black skin for killing Abel. And Ham's wife, Egyptus, carried the curse on, through the flood. Those must be the Negroes. And then, the Indians - the Lamanites - were once white, until they were punished. It must be true, it's scripture. And your father says it's true." "But what about the other Lamanites - the ones in Mexico that Daddy taught the Gospel to?" My mother cleared her throat and shaded her eyes. "Well, they're Christians. They accept the sacrifice of Christ and they're on their way to becoming 'a white and delightsome But these... people1 as it was promised in The Book of Mormon. ^They don't even wear clothes." I watched the Indian children dunking each other. Perhaps it wasn't so bad to be cursed if it meant you didn't have to wear a swimming suit and could laugh and play without all the thinking I had to do. "Don't you want to swim anymore?" my mother asked. I watched my three brothers diving in the dark, deep water, swimming against each other. Then I put my head on her lap and finally went to sleep. My brothers grudgingly took me fishing and hunting, and Saul taught me to read tracks and water. But there was a new depth to Saul's quietness and a manner in Jake and Danny that made me feel unwanted, as though the three of them formed a closed circle, the way skin tightens around a wound. |