The two men sit in the kitchen for some time, silent. Respectful of each, both think hard and heavy. Planning and conniving is a part of a the men’s job. Plans upon plans, first second and third. Nothing is done without a backup and a backup for that.
Curious as he sits back in his chair, ready to hear the plan of a lifetime, benjamin thinks of other rumors he has heard. “So. What's in Nola' ?,” he finally asks.
Slick sits back, deeply sighing as the sun shines through the kitchen window on his handsome face. He peers over to Benjamin, a man as equally dashing as he. The white slickster instantly thinks back to a time where money was not so plentiful. Where life was rough and hard, brutal.
A time when friendship was a defense against death itself.
Atlanta was a harsh for the poor back in the 1900’s. Sharecroppers and the wealthy was all that existed, there was not much of a middle class.
Around April 6 1902, Henry Igasho, a sickly small blonde little boy with a strange Native American last name, met a mixed race black boy. A robust child of the same age, Benjamin Beaulieu.
The black boy’s family were always treated badly, a family of seven working in a large tobacco field. One hundred acres to be toiled over by broken backs and spirits.
There were other black families on the Stewart's’ plantation. Fifty to be exact, one family for every two acres. The patriarch of the plantation, David Stewart, was a reasonable men, though racist to his core. Which always confused little Benjamin. The man would call the little boy a nigger, then come back a few hours later with sweets for all the kids.
Little Henry’s family did not fair any better. One of two, the boy had a sister. The kids belong to a small family, one of twelve white families working on the fields.
When Stewart would ride around with one of his sons, young men just as crazy as him, the plantation owner would always eye Benjamin’s mama curiously.
Then eye the boy, always with a gentle smile.
Nothing was ever said, but Benjamin suspected the landowner was his daddy. A secret his mother carried to her early grave. Probably because she was raped.
Little Benjamin, always curious and hardworking, nose always to the ground when around the land owner and his arrogant sons. Even young, the boy was always taken aback at how Stewart would treat the white sharecroppers. He instinctually knew that the man was a bully.
It was as if Stewart hated them more than the blacks, always vindictive and petty.
His sons were even worse.
One day, the sun bright in the summer sky, one of Stewart’s sons, Daniel Stewart, decided he wanted blood sport. A cruel excuse for skin and spit, the young man pushed little Henry hard as he could.
A few feet away, Benjamin watched as the small white boy fell to the dirt, screaming out in pain as Daniel starting kicking the child.
Years later, Benjamin and Slick eventually found out that the evil young men hated young Slick because they suspected that old man Stewart was the child’s father. Being white, the hateful sons despised the fact that Slick could have a rightful claim to their fortunes.
Their evil daddy broke the cardinal rule when trolling for ‘midnight tail’. Never take it from a white woman.
Because what comes from her belly could take everything right back.
Benjamin's mother, Clara, a wise and honorable dark-skinned beauty, at that moment, fearing for her own child, grabbed Benjamin. Pushing the young boy down into her chest, the mother shielded both of their eyes.
As the young woman turned her head, she figured that there was nothing that could done.
There comes time when destiny stares a human being right in th eyes. Old and wise, the sage of time dares one to make a choice, a change, a chance.
This was Benjamin’s chance for change. He knew it, even as a boy in that moment huddled against his mother’s bosom.
From under his mother’s loving arms, Benjamin watched as the evil Daniel kicked little Henry over and over again. A child that weighed no more than seventy-five pounds soak and wet with rocks in his pockets.
Rage building in his small brow, his hazel eyes feeling as if on fire, the young creole was always formidable.
A powerful boy child that was big for his age, Benjamin had the will of a young warrior, even back then.
With all his might, quickly squeezing from his mother’s loving embrace, young Benjamin looked destiny right in her face and spat in it.
Rushing as fast as his bare feet could take him, the brave child sped in the direction of Slick’s bloody screams.
As the young warrior leaped through the air, blinded by fury with a sickle in hand, Little Benjamin made contact.
A sickening crunch was heard as shocked gasp were heard by everyone watching.
In front of several sharecroppers, blood trickled from his head, danial Stewart turned around with a shocked look on his face. The last thing the evil bastard saw was young Benjamin’s murderous grimace, a gleeful grin of pride and redemption.
“I’s send ya’ ass back ta’ damn hell naw .... say hello ta’ ya daddy fo’ me ....,” the young Benjamin hissed.
As his eyes slowly grew dim, the Stewart boy, the most infamous bully in several counties, finally glazed on into death, falling dead into the dirt from his favorite horse.
At the age of 18, the eldest son of the one of the most powerful landowners, Daniel Stewart, known to rape girls as young as six, was dead as a doorknob.
The evil young man was even suspected in lynching several black men and woman.
The blood thirsty maniac, cruel from sun up to sun down, every day. Died face down in the very dirt his father killed and maimed others for.
That fateful day everybody saw everything, but said nothing.
As young Benjamin and Henry looked on, the master’s boy was rolled up in burlap by a group of men. His horse was taken deep into the woods and killed.
All was taken care off. So they thought.
It took weeks, but the sheriff finally came around asking questions. A tough racist white man whom hated more than he loved, especially the weak, Sheriff Wilson made it his duty to bring fear everywhere he went.
Over a few days, the hateful lawman rounded the sharecroppers in groups of ten, never with their families. The lawman questioned and intimidated several groups forcefully. Loud and boisterous, the lawman promised death to each if the truth was not told.
Weeks of this took place, until the sheriff became even more brutal. Finally he lynched three innocent men, a white and two blacks that newly arrived on the
