The Conjure WomanChesnutt, Charles W. (Charles Waddell)
General
The Conjure Woman
Chesnutt, Charles W. (Charles Waddell)
African Americans -- Fiction; Southern States -- Social life and customs -- Fiction
On another occasion, Aunt Harriet's finger swelled up "as big as a corn
cob." She at first supposed the swelling to be due to a felon. She went
to old Uncle Julius Lutterloh, who told her that some one had tricked
her. "My Lawd!" she exclaimed, "how did they fix my finger?" He
explained that it was done while in the act of shaking hands. "Doctor"
Julius opened the finger with a sharp knife and showed Harriet two seeds
at the bottom of the incision. He instructed her to put a poultice of
red onions on the wound over night, and in the morning the seeds would
come out. She was then to put the two seeds in a skillet, on the right
hand side of the fire-place, in a pint of water, and let them simmer
nine mornings, and on the ninth morning she was to let all the water
simmer out, and when the last drop should have gone, the one that put
the seeds in her hand was to go out of this world! Harriet, however, did
not pursue the treatment to the bitter end. The seeds, once extracted,
she put into a small phial, which she corked up tightly and put
carefully away in her bureau drawer. One morning she went to look at
them, and one of them was gone. Shortly afterwards the other
disappeared. Aunt Harriet has a theory that she had been tricked by a
woman of whom her husband of that time was unduly fond, and that the
faithless husband had returned the seeds to their original owner. A part
of the scheme of conjuration is that the conjure doctor can remove the
spell and put it back upon the one who laid it. I was unable to learn,
however, of any instance where this extreme penalty had been insisted
upon.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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