Queen (91 page)

Jass nodded, and moved on toward the house.

    "Good luck to you, Massa," Isaac called after him. Jass did not look

    back, and Davy could hardly believe his good fortune.

    QUEEN 553

    "it true!" he cried softly. "We's free! Massa didn't even try an' stop

    us!"

    "Hush yo mouth," Isaac snapped. He never took his eyes off Jass, but

    watched the sad, lonely man walk on up to the big house. It was a hard

    homecoming for him, Isaac thought.

Sally was standing beside Lizzie on the veranda, and Queen was a little

distance away, mindful of her dubious place. Like Lizzie, Sally wanted to

run to him and take him in her arms, and hold him and love him and soothe

the hurt from him, but, like Lizzie, some evident pain in his manner

stopped her. The empty sleeve at his side caused her mother's soul to cry,

but she would not allow the tears to flow.

    Jass stopped, a little way from the house. He looked at the women, and

    tried to smile, but could not find sufficient joy in him even to do that.

    He could have been back days ago, two weeks ago, but he could not come

    home to nothing, with nothing. Jass took a resonating pride in his war

    record, in his achievements as a soldier; he had fought hard and well,

    but the surrender proved that he had not fought hard enough, and now he

    had to face-the consequences of his failure. He had seen the devastation

    in Georgia, caused by Sherman's army on its march to the sea, and

    although he knew that his property would not be so desolate, he knew it

    would be bad enough. Any soldier who had fought for the Confederate cause

    knew that of his home. They talked about it among themselves, each

    sharing the other's gloom. Unless they had gold hidden away somewhere,

    they had nothing, except land. Jass was rich in that, but the land was

    worth nothing, like his Confederate bonds and his Confederate dollars and

    his Confederate bank account, and so he was poor, dirt poor, war poor,

    Confederate poor, like a thousand and a thousand and a thousand others,

    He had tried to come back with something, but no one had anything to

    give. On his long walk home he had visited every friend, every

    acquaintance, calling in all his favors, in the hope of some scrap of

    promise for the future, but promises were all he had, and distant ones.

    Of immediate help, cash help, practical help, he had nothing. He had

    stopped in Florence the previous night, with Elizabeth, and comforted her

    for the death of Tom, and loved his children, and heard of the sorry

    state

554 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

of affairs at The Forks of Cypress. This morning he had walked from

Florence to the plantation, and saw that everything he had heard,

everything he had guessed, everything he had feared, was true.

    He stared at his mother, and at the empty, silent, bankrupt fields.

    Everything he had inherited, everything that had been in his governance,

    everything that his father had charged him to protect, was reduced to

    nothing.

It broke his heart.

"Mother," he said. "I'm so sorry. I am so very sorry."

    Sally knew that it had to be said, knew that he had to say it, but she

    was never prouder of him than at that moment. Her son was brave. He had

    fought and fought well, and would, she knew, have given his life for

    them. But her son was more than brave. Her son was honest.

    She moved to him slowly, love for him and pride in him battling in her

    heart for dominance. The evidence of his bravery, that awful empty

    sleeve, caused in her emotions she had not felt since he was bom, and was

    whole and complete and healthy, and she loved him for it. Now he was not

    whole, he was not complete, but he was alive, and she loved him all the

    more.

    "Oh, Jass, my darling son," she said, like a secret between them. "It's

    wonderful to see you."

    She took her wounded child into her arms, and held him as a mother

    should, to keep him safe from life's storms. He clove to her. The very

    smell of her that had so sealed itself in his memory on the day he had

    gone away to war broke open all the other memories of his love for her,

    and swept aside the bitter remembrances of war, if only for this moment.

    He did not weep, because he was home, and safe, and there was no need to

    cry.

    Lizzie, aware of some powerful, visceral emotion between them that she

    was not privy to, moved forward slowly, and now Jass saw her, his wife

    and love, and he included her in his embrace with his mother. They stood

    together, the three of them, and spoke not a word, and moved not at all,

    until each was sure, in their heart, that he would never go away again.

Then Lizzie laughed through her tears.

    QUEEN 555

    "Oh, come inside," she said. "You need looking after." He moved with them

    to the veranda, to the house, to the open door.

    He did not even see Queen, standing on the veranda, waiting so patiently

    for a word, a look, something, anything, that might acknowledge her

    existence. But there was nothing. Jass, still locked in Lizzie and

    Sally's loving embrace, moved past her into the house.

As if she wasn't there.

It was a shattering moment for Queen. She stood stock-still, waiting for

him to come back and include her in his embrace, but knew he would not.

She did not exist to him. She wasn't there. She was nothing, worse than

nothing.

    She bit her lip, hard, determined not to cry, but not knowing how to

    avoid it. She felt the salt taste of blood, her blood in her mouth, and

    knew she was trembling. She had to get away, and moved from the veranda,

    across the lawn, somewhere, anywhere; she had no direction or purpose,

    she only had to get away.

    She stopped at the edge of the lawn, and looked down at the drive. Isaac

    was moving slowly to the gate, trying to keep pace with the whooping

    Davy.

    Davy, looking back at Isaac, saw Queen alone on the little hill, and

    called out to her.

    "Come along with us, Miss Queen," he yelled, wanting to gather the world

    into his joy. Isaac looked back and saw her, and seemed to understand.

"Ain't nuttin' for yo' here," he cried.

    She should, she knew, go with them, because Isaac was right, there was

    nothing for her here, not even a father's love. She wanted to call out

    to them to wait for her, to run down to them, careless of clothes or

    baggage, to be with people who might have liked her, or at least admitted

    she existed, off together to a bold bright somewhere.

    But she could not. This was her place. These people, even if they did not

    acknowledge it, were her family. The Massa was her pappy, and she would

    make him love her. She convinced herself, in that moment, that they

    needed her at least as much as she needed them. She tried to smile, but

    could not.

556 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

She gave a little wave to Isaac and Davy, and Davy called something that

she couldn't hear, but that might have been good-bye, then danced away.

Isaac, after another glance at Queen, followed him more slowly.

    Queen watched them until they were gone from the gate and gone from her

    life, taking her last opportunity of freedom with them. She turned back

    and looked at the house. Through the open window she could see Jass, the

    Massa, her pappy, the returning hero, sitting with his family. His white

    family.

    Well, he would be hungry soon, after his long walk, so she had better go

    to the kitchen and make him something to eat.

She walked away, to the back of the house.

    64

lass spoke to Queen later, in the kitchen when she was cooking. She'd

killed a broody hen to make a little celebration dinner for his return,

and occupied herself with jointing the bird while he talked, so that he

might understand her determination to go on as before, that she expected

no special treatment from him, which, of course, she did. He was kind to

her and clearly relieved by her domesticity, and her apparent refusal to

ask for more than he could give.

    Queen had hardly occupied his mind for the last several months, for her

    place within the structure of his household was special only to her. When

    he thought of his family, it was of Lizzie and his children by her, of

    his mother, and then, by extension and lessening concern, of Elizabeth

    Kirkman and her family, and on through the great network of his white

    relations. He was fond of Queen, fonder of her than of any other of his

    former slaves, for she was Easter's child, and a living fragment of the

    memory of his love. That she was also his own child was a lesser issue,

    and one of lessening importance to him. Although the war had been over

    only for a few weeks, his discussions with his friends and associates had

    con-

    QUEEN 557

centrated all his attention on the survival of his immediate and legal

family in the postwar years.

    As foreseen by Sally some time earlier, and Parson Dick before that,

    white Southern society was already closing in on itself, as protection

    against the new occupying armies of the North, military or civilian, and

    that other army of countless numbers of freed slaves, who represented a

    considerable threat to life as it had been and the life that any of them

    saw as a viable future. Queen was part of the past. In that past she had

    a clearly defined role, a child of the plantation, her place understood

    by the entire society. In this new world, these children were dangerous,

    less so in the case of girls, but profoundly so in the case of boys, who,

    if they were given legal standing, might expect some portion of their

    true parent's, estate. Thus the fragile white Southern inheritance might

    be diluted to a point when those of Negro blood had dominance over great

    estates. Since this was unthinkable, these children, boys and girls, had

    to be excluded. This exclusion did not prohibit gentle treatment of them,

    or even affection for them, but the gentler the treatment and the larger

    the affection, the more claim they might have to recognition.

    Intuitively, every Southerner understood this, and each was going to

    considerable and sometimes brutal lengths to achieve a dispossession of

    those who had once been admitted, if not nurtured.

    Jass had talked with Sally, and she had told him of Queen's resistance

    to the idea that she should leave. In this, Jass sided with Queen. She

    was of his blood, however perversely, and he could not bear to make her

    an outcast. So he came to her, and treated her as a valuable member of

    his staff. He thanked her for her hard work, and told her of his

    gratitude.

... Tain't nuttin'," Queen shrugged.

    "Yes, it is," Jass said. "I don't think my family could have managed

    without you."

    He deliberately said "my family," instead of "our family," as part of the

    process of exclusion. Queen guessed this, but chose to ignore it as a

    slip of the tongue.

"It's my job, Massa," Queen shrugged.

    He smiled. "You don't have to call me 'Massa' now," he said.

But what else could she call him?

558 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

    "And there's something else," he continued. "I can't afford to pay you

    very much. Something, but not much. But then when things pick up-"

    Queen was shocked. She was being relegated to a staff position. If he

    paid her, he could dismiss her whenever he chose. That he could have

    chosen not to pay her, but to send her on her way, did not occur to her.

"I don't want your money," she muttered.

    Jass smiled again. "I have to pay you something," he said. "Slavery's

    illegal now."

    He left the room. He had hardly asked after her welfare, had not

    discussed his own. He had taken on a cookhousekeeper at miserable wages,

    and had, neatly and effectively, boxed her into a hole from which it

    would be difficult for her to escape. Queen slumped on a chair at the

    table, and hid her head in her hands.

    "Slavery's illegal, but family ain't," she whispered to God. "And I's

    family."

    And God was kind to her, just for a moment, and sent a tiny ray of hope

    into her heart. At least he hadn't dismissed her. At least he hadn't told

    her she must leave, as Miss Sally had. He was letting her stay, and by

    doing so, he had left open the door of her confining box. Times were

    difficult for him, but when they got better he would see the error of his

    ways, and elevate her, if only a little, from her lowly station. In the

    meantime, she would put on a cheerful face, and make him realize what she