Browse:Intimidation: Created Situation (Volume 1, entries 862–865)
Intimidation: Created Situation
Volume 1, entries 862–865. Source context: THE DOCTORS AT WORK: REPORTS FROM LAYMEN → THE DOCTORS THEMSELVES: BIRTH TO DEATH: DESCRIBED BY LAYMEN. Entries listed under this heading in the source volume.
Entries
Entry 862
[How does a doctor start into business? Find work? The answers are scattered throughout this book. Here, I am primarily concerned with intimidation of prospective patient and created situation caused by fear of hoodoo:] A cunjure come to my house in Fredericksburg and she told me she was a fortune teller. She said she came from Richmond to the fair, she thought she would do good business. We used to have it every year. So she cam in, I asked her in, and she sat back for some little time. Then she asked for a cup of coffee and I gave her a cup of coffee. And then she went away. She came back on the next day and she wanted to tell my fortune. I told her I didn't have much patience with fortune-tellers. So she went away again. And the next afternoon she came back again and my husband was there that time. And she asked me to gave her some money and I told her I didn't have any money. And she told me if I didn't gave her some money I wouldn't have good luck [this is a bad mouth]. I got mad. I run her out of my house and she went up the street. We didn't have a cement walk then, it was a dirt walk, and she took a stick and made a round ring [see margin- title Marks]. And after she made the round ring she stepped over towards it and started to drop something out of her fingers in this ring she had made. And I Was so close behind her with a broomstick that she didn't get a chance to finish. She told me that she would get me [another bad mouth]. I didn't give her time to finish her little stuff. Then I went on in the house. And my husband said, "Don't bother with them kind of people. They might do something to you." I said I wasn't afraid of them. The last thing I saw of her was her coat tail going around the corner. I ain't seen that woman from that day to this. [Near Fredericksburg, Va., (72), by hand and light from kerosene lamp.]
The narrator reports a money demand backed by a conditional threat of losing good luck; no loss of luck is established.
Entry 863
Well, mah husband wants once tuh run a jewelry shop an' it was a woman loved him an' he wouldn't love her, so she got about twenty needles and twenty pins an' po' some kind of stuff on 'em an' put it in a red piece of flannel, an' that morning when he went to de jewelry shop it was tacked on de do' right under the knob. An' he started to touch it an' the man said, "Don't touch it." So he said, "What ah'm goin' do - how'm ah goin' tuh git in?" Said, "Wait a minute." So he threw gasoline on it an' he threw a match on it. Mah husband didn't know whut it meant, so it worried him all day, so he got on de train an' he went to Tampa. So a lady [cunjure] tole him that a lady put it on dere. So he said, "Well, whut does she mean tuh do?" Say, "She meant fo' yo' tuh tear up yore business - that's whut chew gon'a do." She say, "In less time than two months if yo' don't pay twenty-five dollars [to the cunjure for protection], yo' goin' out business." So pretty soon mah husband jest went to giving his stuff away an' selling it an' he jest said he wanted tuh git out - said his business was torn up Wit those needles and pins an' red flannel dat was sticking on de do'.
Entry 864
A fortune-teller woman told me year before last that someone got a lock of my hair, that I combed out, and buried it with the dead to keep me down and out, ailing and always feeling bad. She told me if I was to give her a couple of frying chickens, she Would stop it. [She also said], in washing my face in a few mornings I would find this hair in the water I washed in. I didn't do it because I didn't believe in it. And she told me, if you don't give it [them] to me that they will die. And sure enough, they were dead in three days. I'm sorry I didn't give them to her but I didn't want to get such foggyism in my head. She said the reason I would have bad luck was because her mother was sick and she was begging for her.
Entry 865
Once I was hurted in mah hand and [it] lasted above nine month, an' whilst I was like that - jes' before I got in that condition a fortune-teller came by home one time an' wanted to tell mah fortune, an' I wouldn't let 'im because I didn't have any money. An' he tole me some trouble was comin' fah me, you know, an' said if I would let 'im tell it, he may could avoid it. An' so after [that] he went off. In about two or more weeks after that, a one Satiday - you know, I had a husband, you see, that's runnin' about so bad. An' one Satiday he didn't come home until aroun' - he left home about fiye-thirty that mornin' tc work. An' I looked for 'im about twelve o'clock an' he didn't come, an' five o'clock he didn't come. An' about seven o'clock I went by a lady house that he's always, you know - I used to go by an' he was there. So I went past an' she was settin' on the porch, an' I ast her if Bert wasn't there. An' so she got firin' mad with me, joo know, because I ast her. So about Monday night - she said, "No, he's not herel What the hell you ast me if he's here!" So I didn't pay any attention to her an' I went on back home. An' so that night [the same Saturday night] she set on her porch until about twelve o'clock to show that he wasn't there that Satiday. An' so she waited till he came by [that Saturday night], you see, an' she stopped 'im an' wanted to know how come I could come there an' ast 'er fer 'im. An' so when he come home he ast me not to go by an' ast her again after this. An' so I tole 'im didn't he know the children were hungry an' I was hungry an' didn't have anything to cook or nuthin to get me some with, an' nuthin to pay rent with or nuthin. An' this woman - that he passed on by when comin' home - she waited till that Monday night. About ten o'clock, after I had gone to bed, she come by my house an' ast me - she came to my house and knocked bringin' two more peoples, an' when they knocked I was gone to bed. An' so I didn't dress or nuthin. [She says], "I come up to see you." I says, "All right." I went to the door an' ast 'em in. An' they come in an' set down. An' she wants to know how come I'd come to her house an' ast for him. An' we commence talkin'. An' I tole 'er, I said, "If you had children and you husband was out an' you had no way to get yore livin' from 'im but to wait until he come, you'd go an' hunt him yoreself." An' so she said, "Oh, if that's case, well you kin come again." That happened Monday night when she was in mah house an' that [the following] Satiday mornin' I got an' wash his silk shirts an' pressed them an', you see, did my other work. An' I didn't feel no hurtin' or nuthin like that. An' around two o'clock mah - two o'clock mah arm commence to hurtin', commence to hurtin' - it was a tired feelin'. It kept a hurtin' an' it jis' like the more I'd draw it up an' stretch it out, the worser it would hurt. An' when night come it commence to gittin' worser an' worser an' worser. An' that Sunday it looked like it was gittin' worser an' worser. So I went down about 'leven blocks from the house to church an' I tote the baby, an' before I got back home I couldn't even tote that baby back home an' I stayed down there about two hours, an' before I got back home I couldn't tote the baby. An' so then, that Monday over in the nex' week, then mah arm jis' commence to gittin' worser. An' mah han's was swoll up that Monday about dat high - jist as high. An' so then I didn't have any use of it - couldn't even lift it, couldn't move it no'ere [nowhere] unless dis han' under it. An' so I tried ever'thing. It looked like the doctor medicine, ever'thing I took would make me worser. An' so then this fortune-teller fellah he come by. An' then he tole me - an' he tole me [before] that it was some trouble comin' for me. An' I wouldn't let 'im tell it [at their first meeting]. An' so he tole me that it sure Was put in the wash for Bert for me, because they knowed that I had to wash with mah hands. [The woman dressed Bert's soiled silk shirts. He took them home to be washed by his wife.] An' listen! That han' last me nine months before I was able to put all mah clothes on an' take them off of me. I didn't have no use of that han' or nuthin. I couldn't even steady it up for over a year, but after nine months I felt, you know, I could take care of mah arm - but, I couldn't open nor shut my hand. An' so the remedy what mah mother used, why - she'd, while mah arm was like that - she jis' kept on bathin' an' rubbin' an' bathin' an' rubbin', but looked like none of that wouldn't do any good. An' somebody tole 'er to get a quarter, a silver quarter, an' trim de edge off of it an' put it with some rock sulphah an' beat it up an' let me lick it. An' after I use that, then I commence to feelin' mahself where I could, you see, get mah arm - the use of mah arms back. So they took the quarter [that was left after the milled edge had been scraped off] an' put it in two quarts of water an' boil it down to a pint [magic of diminishing amount] an' make me a tea with that water. An' that seems like it help me more than anything I took. An' then she took a white [Irish] potato an' shave that white potato - jis' split it as little [thin] as you kin git it, an' put that on mah han'. An' after I use that - they put there that night, the nex' mornin' I was able to lift mah han' off the pillah, wherein I couldn't pick it up before. Wilmington, N. Car.,
(293), 214:3; in 1926.]