Four Men in the Field

A short story set during the times a slavery with a Biblical overtone.

            The hot wind blows, bending the white blossoms forward to reach out and wipe the sweat from their dripping backs, the only good thing that ever comes from the fluffy flower.  It is what they live for: to pluck and pull and yank every fiber from the tufted blooms.  Up and down every row, singing in dynamic harmony.  They rise before the sun, and they fall long after it has gone.  The godly ball scorches their brows with a vengeance.  What have they done, these sons of Ham, to deserve such a punishment from God?

            The field folds down over the rolling hills, stretched out in a blanket of white and brown.  The white buds rise above the crisp stalks.  The hands get to grabbing their budding bane.  Every hand is split, cracked, and dry, the only reminder they have of their arid home.  Here is but a humid jungle where they are the animals, the obedient dogs serving their unappreciative master.

            One falls amongst the rows in a fit of hacking convulsions, unnoticed by the others but noticed by the first horseman.  He gallops over as a woman drops down in aid, disgusted by the idleness of the ailing worker.  He bellows over them, not just the fallen, to move faster, work harder.  He does not bother calling the snake to use on the fallen; he just calls for the woman to tie the worthless worker to his horse.  Some turn to was as the dust clouds up as the expendable worker’s head bobbles through the dry dirt, never to be seen again.

            A second attentive horseman rode over hollering and swinging his snake above his head.  He lashed it out at a paused woman allowing it to lunge and hiss at her feet.  She jumped from its vengeful tongue, her hands plucking once more, avoiding the horseman’s watchful gaze.  His snake recoiled in his hand as he trotted away with a glare of antipathy.  She cursed his name to the wind as it whispered her words in his ear, making sure she would regret it later.

            The hot wind blows as the sun rises higher.  There are fewer blossoms to soak up the sweat streaking down their scarred backs.  Their bones seem to protrude from their skin.  The third horseman watches the woman as they beg him for food.  He laughs at their famished bodies as he hops down from his horse.  He still towers over them as they fall to his feet, all of them but one woman stands strong against her hunger, does not bow to the horseman.  It is her he chooses, approaches her, seizes her hair listening to her cry, and shoves her face into the dirt, making sure she gets a mouthful.  His hand releases her and pulls him onto his horse once more, riding off into the dust.

            The sun turns to scarlet fire, but the wind turns to ice.  The sweat on their backs freezes to make them shiver with the stalks.  From the sun, the fourth man rides lit up in the bloody light.  His uniform, horse, and scaled snakes are blacker than the workers’ skin.  They stand before him, picking their last row, avoiding his gaze.  His eyes are hidden behind black shades, so they cannot look into his dark eyes with their deadly gleam.  He stops and looks at the woman in the field.  She had aided the coughing worker, cursed the violent horseman, and had been forced to eat the earth, but she had picked hardly enough for that day.  The horse he sits upon breathed loudly into the frozen air, matching the steady pace of her beating heart.  The black horseman tightens the grip on his reigns before dismounting the horse.  His hand moved to the handle of his coiled ebony snake, letting it unfurl and slither through the dirt.  His hand strikes out for her wrist, causing her to whimper in terror.  He draws his snake back before letting it lash at her skin, its poisonous bite drawing blood out of her.  Over and over the snake cracks and bites her until her flesh is nearly gone.  The horseman ties her lifeless body to his horse and rides off wordlessly into the darkness.

            The sun rises with glowing heat.  The hot wind blows, bending the stocks in the field slightly.  However, the floccose flowers are no longer pure white.  Each bud is spotted with crimson.  The workers bow their heads and work in silence, no song today.  The wind carries the only sound of the woman’s lost voice.