Queen (109 page)

    herself. Perhaps she had known it when they lay together and made their

    plans, and he told her of his ambition to go North. He had included her

    then because he felt that he had to, but now she thought it had been his

    way of telling her he was leaving.

    She wasn't angry with him; she was angry with herself for being foolish

    enough to dream that she could bind him to her. There was something he had

    to do with his life that precluded her and a child, and it was important to

    him, and because it was important to him, it was important to her.

    And anyway, she had a part of him, growing inside her, the best of him. All

    that mattered to her now was his child.

    She left the little posy that Joyce had given her on a seat at the depot.

    If by chance she Vas wrong, and he had been delayed, he would see the posy

    if he came to the depot, and would know it was from her, and would know

    where to find her.

    She didn't realize she had waited for him for five hours past his appointed

    time.

    77

Queen gasped at the shock of the pain again, pushed as hard as she could, to

Miss Mandy's naive instructions, and grabbed on to the bedposts for

leverage. It had been going on for some hours, the contractions coming with

increasing frequency, and the birth was imminent. It was as well, for Queen

felt as if she were trying to push a giant watermelon through her loins.

Past all inhibition, she yelled to the rafters. Miss Mandy shouted at her,

but happily, for she was in her element.

    Miss Gippy was leaning against the wall in a state of shock, muttering for

    guidance from Jesus, trying to block her ears to Queen's cries, and

    uselessly insisting that they fetch help. No

    QUEEN 663

one heard her. Miss Mandy was determined to bring the child, which she had

already come to think of as her own, into the world herself, and Queen had

no other thought than to see him safely delivered.

Queen had not been devastated by the loss of Davis for she thought it

inevitable. She was angry because he had not been brave enough to tell her

the truth. She missed him, she was lonely, but mostly she was scared for the

future.

    She had dreaded the scene she knew must happen with the sisters when they

    were told of her plight and her condition. She had gone to Joyce for

    advice, and both agreed that Miss Mandy and Miss Gippy were her best

    chance. Joyce did suggest one other alternative, but getting rid of her

    baby was inconceivable to Queen, as Joyce knew it would be. Queen had never

    had anything that was truly her own before. Some clothes, which were

    usually other people's hand-me-downs, and a few trinkets, most of which she

    had misplaced. But the child inside her was hers, not to be shared with

    anyone, not even, now, with Davis. The baby was part of her body and all of

    her love, and the only person who could ever take him away from her was

    him. She didn't know what she would do if her baby didn't love her; it

    didn't even enter her thinking, for she could not imagine that he would

    not.

    Joyce had gone with her to the sisters, and had told them the news. The

    reaction was exactly predictable, at least at first.

    "A wicked, naughty girl, that's what you are!" Miss Mandy told her. She'd

    been wanting to say it for some time, but had refrained because she didn't

    want to lose Queen, wasn't prepared to risk Queen's running away before the

    child was born. Now that Queen was safe with them, for the term of her

    pregnancy at least, Miss Mandy gave full flood to her moral rectitude,

    chorused by her sister.

    "A sinner damned to hell," Miss Gippy triumphed. "The seventh commandment!

    "

    Joyce protested Queen's innocence, but Miss Mandy had other plans for her.

"How dare you speak to me like that." She glared at Joyce.

    "I'll speak to you any way I wants, you dried-up ol' prune," Joyce

    responded as angrily, playing fight into Miss

664 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

Mandy's hands. "This chile need help, not yo' sermons."

    This was heresy to Miss Gippy. What was a sermon but a path to divine

    assistance? She ordered Joyce out of the house, but Miss Mandy was more

    careful. Where was Queen to get this help, if not from them? It fell to the

    sisters to bear the burden of Queen's sin.

    Queen was curiously detached from it all, and played no part in the

    proceedings. Her mind was remembering Davis and thinking of her son. The

    sisters might very well throw her out. Miss Gippy was intent on it,

    although Miss Mandy was less determined. If they did throw her out, she

    would survive. She had a little money saved, and Joyce would help.

    "I'll take her with me," Joyce told Miss Mandy, and it was as good as done

    to Miss Gippy.

    "Out of the house, the pair of you," she commanded again. Queen accepted

    the order, and moved toward the door with Joyce, but a still small voice

    stopped them.

    " Not so fast," Miss Mandy said softly. "There are other things to consider

    here."

Everyone looked at her, and she looked at Miss Gippy.

    "Such as the child's immortal soul," she said. "Queen is lost to us; all

    the prayers in Christendom could not save her now. But the child is

    something else."

    A clear, shining path to Jesus revealed itself to Miss Gippy. Allow the

    little children to come unto me. They would allow the unborn babe to come

    to Him; indeed, they would push him along. They would take him by the hand

    and deliver him to Calvary. It was why they had come South, to save the

    souls of the innocents.

    "A precious burden," she whispered, in awe of the inspiration. "An innocent

    babe."

    Miss Mandy turned to Joyce. "I will not let the child go into your care,"

    she said. "He needs the advantage of a proper Christian upbringing."

    Joyce was still angry with her. "I's Christian," she affinned, but Miss

    Gippy, stirred by true missionary zeal, shouted about paganism, and

    heathenism and false prophets, which made Joyce even angrier.

    "I ain't lettin' her stay," she snapped, but Miss Mandy was ruthlessly

    reasonable.

    QUEEN 665

    in our care,

    "How will you stop it? Queen is in our employ' and I doubt that the

    allthOTities would consider you more suitable than we are. And where

    would she find another job, in her condition?"

    It was inarguable. Whoever these authorities were, secular or religious,

    they would undoubtedly be sympathetic to a white woman of faultless civic

    standing, and would scarcely listen to the pleadings of a black, no

    matter how reasonable. It was also logical. As generous as Joyce was, she

    and Abram did not have the physical room or the financial resources to

    care for Queen for an extended period of time. They would have found a

    way, but it would have been hard for them, and Queen would indeed have

    trouble getting another job. So while Joyce still resisted the sisters,

    it was less stubbornly now.

"She ain't stayin'," Joyce said, without conviction.

"I have to," Queen said quietly.

    It was the simple truth, and everyone breathed a small, silent sigh of

    relief.

    "A fairly graceless response, Queen," Miss Mandy chided, entirely

    satisfied with it. She laid down her rules. Queen would continue to work

    for them as her condition allowed, and would be paid, and given her board

    and lodging. She would be well looked after and given whatever medical

    help and advice was necessary. When the child came, Queen would continue

    her employment. Miss Mandy asked only one thing in return, that Queen

    forsake her rowdy, nigra church, and worship with the sisters. Joyce

    tried to protest, but lamely, and Queen agreed to the terms. Joyce was

    told to leave, and it was indicated that she was not welcome in the house

    anymore, although Queen could continue to see her occasionally, as a

    friend. Joyce said a private good-bye to Queen, assuring her of any help

    she needed, and an alternative sanctuary if conditions with the sisters

    became intolerable, and left. Miss Mandy sent Queen to her room, for it

    was already quite late, reminding her that they would have prayers at

    seven in the morning.

    Queen sought simple mercies in her prayers that night. She prayed for

    Davis, that he be blessed and protected wherever he was, and that he be

    granted a little happiness. He shouldn't have run away, or at least he

    should have told her good-bye, but she understood why both were

    impossible. She asked a

666 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

similar blessing and protection for her child, that he be bom whole and

complete, and that he come to love her. She asked nothing for herself,

except that the old dragons not be too hard on her.

    She climbed into bed, missing Davis, missing his protective arms around

    her, and worrying about where he slept that night, and what the future

    held in store for him, who had known so much suffering. But he was gone

    from her now, and someone else needed the attention of her hearL Quietly,

    sweetly, softly, sadly, she sang the song of her unborn baby.

Miss Mandy sang that song too. Through the weeks and months of Queen's

pregnancy, Miss Mandy lived it with her, as if the child had two mothers.

While Miss Gippy expected Queen to fulfill all her household duties, Miss

Mandy wanted daily reports as to her welfare and that of the child. She

looked to all the mothers at her church for guidance, and fussed about

Queen's diet and the baby's health. As Queen's stomach filled and rounded,

Miss Mandy insisted on increasingly long periods of rest, and even Miss

Gippy joined in the spirit, and cosseted Queen, for the closer Queen came

to term, the more Miss Gippy stood in awe and fear of the processes of

creation. Queen became quite fond of them-their many attentions made her

feel secure, and their delight in imagining the child as an infant was

touching. On the warm summer days Queen would sit in the garden with Miss

Mandy, while Miss Gippy fussed with warm, unnecessary rugs and welcome,

cool refreshments. They had a new gardener now, an older man, but he came

only twice a week, to maintain what Davis had done. It pleased Queen to

sit in the pretty arbor, surrounded by the fragrant roses, and survey the

handiwork that her man had made.

    "And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my

    body to be burned, and have not Charity, it profiteth me nothing."

    Miss Mandy was reading from her Bible. Miss Gippy was fussing with a

    tray.

    Prospective motherhood became Queen, and she looked wonderful.

    "Charity suffereth long, and is kind. Charity envieth not. Charity

    vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up."

    QUEEN 667

    It pleased Miss Mandy to sit here on these pleasant afternoons, close to

    maternity, and she vaunted herself a little, and puffed herself up at her

    own charity to Queen, which is why she read the good words of

    instruction, to be delivered from vanity and pride.

    "It's getting a little chilly," Miss Gippy said. "Don't you think you

    should go inside, Queen?"

    It was a very hot day. Queen smiled, and Miss Mandy was cross.

    "For heaven's sake, Gippy, don't fuss," she told her sister. Miss Gippy

    was a little put out. She was only thinking of Queen's well-being, and

    the baby's. The way Miss Mandy carried on, anyone would think the child

    was her own.

    "I'm only thinking of the boy," she sniffed, and picked up the tray.

    "Why you so sure it's going to be a boy?" Queen wondered, to placate her

    and include Miss Gippy in a process from which Miss Mandy seemed

    determined to exclude her.

    Miss Gippy did something very odd. She giggled, and was embarrassed by

    her own frivolity.

    "Well, of course, I don't know," she twittered. "How could I know?"

She moved away toward the house.

    "Don't sit out here too long," she said, to spite Miss Mandy. Queen

    adjusted her position on the chair. She was almost to term and could

    never sit comfortably in one position for very long. Miss Mandy put down

    her Bible and stared at the garden.

    "She's convinced it will be a boy because she wants it to be a boy," she

    said quietly. "We both do."

    She wondered why. Men were deceitful, distrustful, and disloyal. Look

    what her fianc6 had done to her, all those years ago. Look what Davis had

    done to Queen. Why should she want to bring such a creature into the

    world? She was honest enough to admit to herself that she adored men, for

    all their imperfections, and a boy child could be fashioned into the