A Day to Pick Your Own Cotton (2 page)
“Not when you get to know her, ma’am. And she’s real smart.”
“Well, she doesn’t look any smarter than she does comely,” huffed Mrs. Hammond, who didn’t like anyone telling her anything, especially a young girl. She took
any
statement by someone else, especially if it expressed an opinion on just about any topic under the sun, as grounds for contradiction. “No, she doesn’t look like she has a single brain in that little black head of hers,” she added after a minute. “I’m not sure I like the sound of it one bit.”
“We’ll be back when we’ve done our other errands,” said Katie, “when you’ve got our order ready.” Then she turned and walked back outside.
The black girl they were talking about, sitting in the wagon outside, was me. ’Course I couldn’t hear everything from where I was sitting, but Katie told me all about it later. This is our story. Hers and mine together.
I’m Mary Ann Jukes. But folks call me Mayme, which I figure you might as well too. The girl inside the general store and post office was named Kathleen Clairborne. Folks called her Katie, at least her friends did. That’s what I called her, or Miss Katie.
Katie and me were in a pretty bad fix ’cause the war had left us all alone in the world. That’s what we were doing together.
I reckon I ought to tell you a little about it.
You see, Katie and me had found ourselves together about a month and a half before, when some real bad men called Bilsby’s Marauders had come through Shenandoah County after deserting from the army.
When the marauders came through, they killed people at both my master’s plantation and at Katie’s. I’d been fetching water and was away, and that’s why I didn’t get shot.
And Katie’s mama had hidden her in the cellar of their house, so they didn’t find her either. But they killed both of our families.
I left as soon as I’d finished the burying. After wandering a spell, I found myself at Katie’s plantation. When we first saw each other, neither of us knew what to do. But gradually we started talking. I spent the rest of the day there, figuring at first that Katie needed someone to take care of her for a spell until she got used to what had happened. But she wanted me to keep staying. So I did, and gradually a week, then two, then finally three passed.
All that time the two of us just lived there in that great big plantation house all alone, milking the cows and making bread and taking care of ourselves. Katie showed me books and gave me one of her dolls and taught me how to read better. And I taught her how to do things like chop wood and sing slave revival songs. She read me stories from books, and I told her stories from memory.
But all the while I knew I needed to be getting away from Rosewood—that’s what Katie’s folks’ plantation was called. If anybody found me, a colored girl and a runaway, sleeping in a white man’s bed, I knew they’d skin my hide or hang me from a tree or something else pretty bad. I didn’t know what had happened to my own master. He might be alive or dead for all I knew. But mostly I was worried about what would happen to Katie. I tried to get her to think about her own future and what she oughta do. She had three uncles and an aunt. The aunt lived up north somewhere, but Katie had never seen her. One of her uncles lived not too far away, and after Katie told me about him, I was afraid he might try to get his hands on the plantation. Another of them had gone to California hoping to find gold, and Katie figured him for dead. The third was a ne’er-do-well that came around sometimes when he needed money from his sister—which was Katie’s ma. Katie didn’t seem to like any of them and didn’t cotton much to the notion of going to live with any of them either.
One day some rough men came looking for one of Katie’s uncles. We hid and managed to scare them away by shooting guns over their heads. After that, I knew Katie was in danger and that she had to do something. Eventually I figured it was the best thing for her if I left. And I did leave, too, but not for long, because Katie came after me and begged me to come back. She had just discovered a girl hiding in the barn! The girl was about to have a baby and Katie needed my help with the birthing.
That girl was Emma, a halfwit slave girl who was running away from some trouble we couldn’t get her to tell us about.
It was while we were trying to figure out what to do with Emma and the newborn baby, and when I was thinking about leaving again, that Katie came up with her crazy scheme.
Her scheme was just this—for us to keep living at Rosewood alone like we had been, but to pretend that we
weren’t
alone, to make like her father and brothers hadn’t come back from the war and that her mama and the slaves were still there.
And that’s why we were together that day, orphans and Civil War sisters you might say. This trip into town, leaving Emma and her little baby boy, William, alone at Katie’s house, was our first try to see if we could make people believe everything was normal and how it should be back at Rosewood.
K
ATIE CAME OUT OF THE STORE AND WALKED
toward the wagon, glancing up at me with a little smile on her face. Behind her I saw the hawk eyes of Mrs. Hammond staring at us through the open window.
“Don’t say nothing, Miss Katie,” I whispered, trying to keep my lips from moving. “She’s watching!”
Katie started to turn around.
“Don’t look!” I said.
Katie turned back toward me. As she climbed up and sat down, I stared straight ahead, trying to keep the kind of look on my face that white folks expected out of colored slaves—dull and expressionless, like they aren’t thinking of anything, like they don’t even know how to think.
But inside, my mind was racing.
If we can make Mrs. Hammond believe everything is fine,
I thought,
we oughta be able to make anybody believe it!
Katie took the leather, released the wheel brake, then flicked the reins, and we bounced into motion along the street. I knew we were both dying of curiosity to look back. But we couldn’t yet, ’cause we both knew Mrs. Hammond was likely still watching us.
“I did it, Mayme!” Katie finally said softly. “I think I made her believe Mama sent me into town.”
“Don’t forget, Miss Katie,” I said, “we gotta go back and see her again.”
Suddenly I heard someone speaking to us. I nearly jumped out of my skin!
“Mo’nin’ to you, Miz Kathleen,” called out a friendly voice.
I turned to see a tall, lanky black man on the side of the street tipping his hat and smiling broadly.
“Hello, Henry,” said Katie, pulling back on the reins, then stopping the horses.
The man approached. I saw his eyes flit toward me for a second. But I still kept looking straight ahead. It was a little hard, though, ’cause sauntering up beside him a couple steps behind was a black boy just about as tall who looked about the same age as Katie and me. I could feel his eyes glancing my way too.
“How’s yo mama, Miz Kathleen?” he said.
“Uh … everything’s just fine, Henry.”
A funny expression came over his face, like he’d noticed Katie’s stepping sideways to avoid answering his question directly. But before he could say any more, Katie spoke up again.
“This is Mayme, Henry. She’s going to … uh, work for us.”
“Dat right nice—how ’do, Miz Mayme. Ah’s pleased ter make yo ’quaintance.”
He paused briefly, then looked to his side and then back. “I don’ bleeve you two ladies has eber made ’quaintance wiff my son Jeremiah.—Jeremiah,” he added, looking at the boy, “say hello ter Miz Kathleen an’ Miz Mayme.”
The young man took off the ragged hat he was wearing, glancing down at the ground and kind of shuffling like he was embarrassed, then looked up at the wagon.
“How ’do,” he said. “Glad t’ know you both.”
“I … I never knew you had a son, Henry,” said Katie as the boy looked down again. “Did … I mean, does my mama know?”
“Can’t ermagine she could, Miz Kathleen,” replied Henry. “I neber talked ’bout him much on account ob how much it hurt ter ’member him. ’Twas all I could do ter keep from cryin’ downright like er baby. Him an’ his mama, dey was sol’ away from me, you see. Dat be when Jeremiah bin jes’ a young’un. An’ after I bought my freedom, I dun search high an’ low ter fin’ ’em, but I neber foun’ so much as a tiny noshun where dey might hab git to. But after der proklimashun, Jeremiah dun come a-lookin’ fer me. His mama, she dun tol’ him enuf where fer him ter make his way here ter Greens Crossing.”
Once or twice while he was talking, I could tell that Henry’s son was looking at me out of the corner of his eye. I could feel my neck and face getting hot all over, but I just kept staring down at my lap and pretended I didn’t notice.
“Is your wife here too?” asked Katie.
“I’m sorry t’ say she ain’t, Miz Kathleen. She din’t make it through der war.”
“Oh … I’m sorry.”
“Dat’s right kind er you t’ say, Miz Kathleen.—Say, hit seems ter me dat bridle er yers is frayin’ an’ ’bout ter break. You don’ want ter hab no horse runnin’ loose wifout a good bit in his mouf. Why don’ you two come ter da livery an’ let me an’ Jeremiah put on a new piece er leather? Won’ take but er jiffy.”
“Uh, we don’t have time just now. We’ve got to get back. Well … good-bye, Henry,” said Katie, giving the horses a swat with the reins.
We continued on again, and for some reason I was glad to be done with Henry and his son. As we rode off down the street I was dying to glance up, and I almost did too. But I’m glad I didn’t, because I could feel that he was looking at us and watching us ride away.
We didn’t have anything else to do in town, but when we’d made our plans to come in, we thought it might be good for folks to see me and Katie, just to get used to the idea of seeing us together. So in spite of what she’d just said to Henry, Katie led the team through town, greeting a few people she saw that she knew, pretending to be about some business or other, though we weren’t. Then when we reached the end of the street, we went around behind a few houses and headed back the way we’d come.
“You want me to come in with you, Miss Katie?” I asked when we stopped in front of Mrs. Hammond’s store for a second time. “To carry out what you’re buying? She’ll think it a mite strange if you carry it yourself.”
“I wouldn’t have thought of that, Mayme,” she said.
“Yes, come in with me.”
We got down and walked into the shop. I kept a step or two behind Katie and kept my eyes down. I wanted to look around, and especially to get a good faceful of Mrs. Hammond, but I didn’t dare.
“I see you’re back, Kathleen,” said Mrs. Hammond, glancing over at me for a second with a look like I had some kind of disease. “I have your mama’s things ready. Tell her to take them out,” she added, nodding her head in my direction.
Katie looked over at me. “Take these things out to the buggy, Mayme,” she said.
“Yes’m, Miz Katie,” I answered slowly, taking a step forward.
At the words, Mrs. Hammond spun around with fire in her eye and glared at me.
“Watch how you speak to your betters, girl!” she said, almost yelling at me. “Didn’t Mrs. Clairborne tell you how to address her daughter? You are to call her Miss Clairborne or Miss Kathleen.”
“Yes’m,” I nodded, feeling stupid for forgetting something so simple.
All of a sudden the door banged open behind us and a man stormed in. He walked straight up to the counter and started talking to Mrs. Hammond. I snuck a glance at him and his profile seemed familiar. And if there was a white man that I knew or that knew me, that couldn’t help be anything but bad. So I quickly turned away from him.
“You seen a runaway nigger girl anywhere?” he said to Mrs. Hammond. “I figured you’d know if there’d been any talk.”
“Why, no,” replied Mrs. Hammond, though I saw her hawk eyes dart my way and narrow slightly as she said it.
“Whose is it?”
“One of our brats is missing. She might have a baby with her.”
At the word, I saw Katie start to glance my way, but then she stopped herself.
“A baby—gracious,” said Mrs. Hammond. “Did she steal it?”
“Naw—it’s her own. Since all this commotion with Lincoln’s proclamation …” he went on, then paused.
Now for the first time he seemed to notice me standing on the other side of the store. I kept my head down but knew he was looking me over. Apparently satisfied because I had no baby and was too thin to be carrying one, he turned back to Mrs. Hammond.
“You know how it is now,” he said. “The girl wouldn’t give me a day’s work, and now she’s up and disappeared.”
“I’m sorry,” said Mrs. Hammond. “I’ve heard nothing.”
“All right then, guess I’ll be going. You keep your ears open, though, you hear.”
He turned and walked out, throwing me a scowl as he went by that worried me a bit, like I might be familiar to him too but he didn’t know why. I let out a breath of air when the door closed. Whoever he was, I didn’t like him!
As soon as he was gone, I walked forward and took the two packages off the counter and slowly walked toward the door. As I passed by her I saw that Katie’s eyes had gotten all wide again. She looked at me, and I looked at her, but neither of us said a word. I think we were both thinking,
We’d better get out of here before anything worse happens!