Wild Seed (32 page)

She ignored Doro. "Are you hungry now?" she asked the boys.

One nodded, a little shy. "I am!" the other said quickly.

"Come with me then," she said. "Rita will give you bread and peach preserve." She noticed that they did not look to Doro for permission to leave. They jumped up, followed her, and ran out to the kitchen when she pointed it out to them. Rita would not be pleased. It was enough, surely, to ask her to rush supper. But she would feed the children and perhaps send them to Luisa until Anyanwu called for them. Sighing, Anyanwu went back to Doro.

"You were always one to overprotect children," he commented.

"I only allow them to be children for as long as they will," she said. "They will grow up and learn of sorrow and evil quickly enough."

"Tell me about Stephen and Joseph."

She went to her desk, sat down, and wondered whether she could discuss this calmly with him. She had wept and cursed him so many times. But neither weeping nor cursing would move him.

"Why did you bring me a man without telling me what he could do?" she asked quietly.

"What did he do?"

Anyanwu told him, told him everything, and ended with the same falsely calm question. "Why did you bring me a man without telling me what he could do?"

"Call Margaret," Doro said, ignoring her question. Margaret was the daughter who had married Joseph.

"Why?"

"Because when I brought Joseph here, he couldn't do anything. Not anything. He was just good breeding stock with the potential to father useful children. He must have had a transition in spite of his age, and he must have had it here."

"I would have known. I'm called here whenever anyone is sick. And there were no signs that he was approaching transition."

"Get Margaret. Let's talk to her."

Anyanwu did not want to call the girl. Margaret had suffered more than anyone over the killings, had lost both the beautiful, worthless husband she had loved, and the younger brother she had adored. She had not even a child to console her. Joseph had not managed to make her pregnant. In the month since his and Stephen's death, the girl had become gaunt and solemn. She had always been a lively girl who talked too much and laughed and kept people around her amused. Now, she hardly spoke at all. She was literally sick with grief. Recently, Helen had taken to sleeping with her and following her around during the day, helping her with her work or merely keeping her company. Anyanwu had watched this warily at first, thinking that Margaret might resent Helen as the cause of Joseph's trouble—Margaret was not in the most rational of moods—but this was clearly not the case. "She's getting better," Helen told Anyanwu confidentially. "She was by herself too much before." The little girl possessed an interesting combination of ruthlessness, kindness, and keen perception. Anyanwu hoped desperately Doro would never notice her. But the older girl was painfully vulnerable. And now, Doro meant to tear open wounds that had only just begun to heal.

"Let her alone for a while, Doro. This has hurt her more than it's hurt anyone else."

"Call her, Anyanwu, or I will."

Loathing him, Anyanwu went to find Margaret. The girl did not work in the fields as some of Anyanwu's children did, thus she was nearby. She was in the washhouse sweating and ironing a dress. Helen was with her, sprinkling and rolling other clothing.

"Leave that for a while," Anyanwu told Margaret. "Come in with me."

"What is it?" Margaret asked. She put one iron down to heat and, without thinking, picked up another.

"Doro," Anyanwu said softly.

Margaret froze, holding the heavy iron motionless and upright in the air. Anyanwu took it from her hand and put it down on the bricks of the hearth far from the fire. She moved the other two irons away from where they were heating.

"Don't try to iron anything," she told Helen. "I have enough of a bill for cloth now."

Helen said nothing, only watched as Anyanwu led Margaret away.

Outside the washhouse, Margaret began to tremble. "What does he want with me? Why can't he leave us alone?"

"He will never leave us alone," Anyanwu said flatly.

Margaret blinked, looked at Anyanwu. "What shall I do?"

"Answer his questions—all of them, even if they are personal and offensive. Answer and tell him the truth."

"He scares me."

"Good. There is very much to fear. Answer him and obey him. Leave any criticizing or disagreeing with him to me."

There was silence until just before they reached the house. Then Margaret said, "We're your weakness, aren't we? You could outrun him for a hundred more years if not for us."

"I've never been content without my own around me," Anyanwu said. She met the girl's light brown eyes. "Why do you think I have all these children? I could have husbands and wives and lovers into the next century and never have a child. Why should I have so many except that I want them and love them? If they were burdens too heavy for me, they would not be here. You would not be here."

"But . . . he uses us to make you obey. I know he does."

"He does. That's his way." She touched the smooth, red-brown skin of the girl's face. "Nneka, none of this should concern you. Go and tell him what he wants to hear, then forget about him. I have endured him before. I will survive."

"You'll survive until the world ends," said the girl solemnly. "You and him." She shook her head.

They went into the house together and to the library where they found Doro sitting at Anyanwu's desk looking through her records.

"For God's sake!" Anyanwu said with disgust.

He looked up. "You're a better businesswoman than I thought with your views against slavery," he said.

To her amazement, the praise reached her. She was not pleased that he had gone snooping through her things, but she was abruptly less annoyed. She went to the desk and stood over him silently until he smiled, got up, and took his armchair again. Margaret took another chair and sat waiting.

"Did you tell her?" Doro asked Anyanwu.

Anyanwu shook her head.

He faced Margaret. "We think Joseph may have undergone transition while he was here. Did he show any signs of it?"

Margaret had been watching Doro's new face, but as he said the word transition, she looked away, studied the pattern of the oriental rug.

"Tell me about it," said Doro quietly.

"How could he have?" demanded Anyanwu. "There was no sign!"

"He knew what was happening," Margaret whispered. "I knew too because I saw it happen to . . . to Stephen. It took much longer with Stephen though. For Joe it came almost all at once. He was feeling bad for a week, maybe a little more, but nobody noticed except me. He made me promise not to tell anyone. Then one night when he'd been here for about a month, he went through the worst of it. I thought he would die, but he begged me not to leave him alone or tell anyone."

"Why?" Anyanwu demanded. "I could have helped you with him. You're not strong. He must have hurt you."

Margaret nodded. "He did. But . . . he was afraid of you. He thought you would tell Doro."

"It wouldn't have made much sense for her not to," Doro said.

Margaret continued to stare at the rug.

"Finish," Doro ordered.

She wet her lips. "He was afraid. He said you . . . you killed his brother when his brother's transition ended."

There was silence. Anyanwu looked from Margaret to Doro. "Did you do it?" she asked frowning.

"Yes. I thought that might be the trouble."

"But his brother! Why, Doro!"

"His brother went mad during transition. He was . . . like a lesser version of Nweke. In his pain and confusion he killed the man who was helping him. I reached him before he could accidentally kill himself, and I took him. I got five children by his body before I had to give it up."

"Couldn't you have helped him?" Anyanwu asked. "Wouldn't he have come back to his senses if you had given him time?"

"He attacked me, Anyanwu. Salvageable people don't do that."

"But . . ."

"He was mad. He would have attacked anyone who approached him. He would have wiped out his family if I hadn't been there." Doro leaned back and wet his lips, and Anyanwu remembered what he had done to his own family so long ago. He had told her that terrible story. "I'm not a healer," he said softly. "I save life in the only way I can."

"I had not thought you bothered to save it at all," Anyanwu said bitterly.

He looked at her. "Your son is dead," he said. "I'm sorry. He would have been a fine man. I would never have brought Joseph here if I had known they would be dangerous to each other."

He seemed utterly sincere. She could not recall the last time she had heard him apologize for anything. She stared at him, confused.

"Joe didn't say anything about his brother going crazy," Margaret said.

"Joseph didn't live with his family," Doro said. "He couldn't get along with them, so I found foster parents for him."

"Oh . . ." Margaret looked away, seeming to understand, to accept. No more than half the children on the plantation lived with their parents.

"Margaret?"

She looked up at him, then quickly looked down again. He was being remarkably gentle with her, but she was still afraid.

"Are you pregnant?" he asked.

"I wish I were," she whispered. She was beginning to cry.

"All right," Doro said. "All right, that's all."

She got up quickly and left the room. When she was gone, Anyanwu said, "Doro, Joseph was too old for a transition! Everything you taught me says he was too old."

"He was twenty-four. I haven't seen anyone change at that age before, but . . ." He hesitated, changed direction. "You never asked about his ancestry, Anyanwu."

"I never wanted to know."

"You do know. He's your descendant, of course."

She made herself shrug. "You said you would bring my grandchildren."

"He was the grandchild of your grandchildren. Both his parents trace their descent back to you."

"Why do you tell me that now? I don't want to know any more about it. He's dead!"

"He's Isaac's descendant too," Doro continued relentlessly. "People of Isaac's line are sometimes a little late going into transition, though Joseph is about as late as I've seen. The two children I've brought to you are sons of his brother's body."

"No!" Anyanwu stared at him. "Take them away! I want no more of that kind near me!"

"You have them. Teach them and guide them as you do your own children. I told you your descendants would not be easy to care for. You chose to care for them anyway."

She said nothing. He made it sound as though her choice had been free, as though he had not coerced her into choosing.

"If I had found you earlier, I would have brought them to you when they were even younger," he said. "Since I didn't, you'll have to do what you can with them now. Teach them responsibility, pride, honor. Teach them whatever you taught Stephen. But don't be foolish enough to teach them you believe they'll grow up to be criminals. They'll be powerful men someday and they're liable to fulfill your expectations—either way."

Still she said nothing. What was there for her to say—or do? He would be obeyed, or he would make her life and her children's lives not worth living—if he did not kill them outright.

"You have five to ten years before the boys' transitions," he said. "They will have transitions; I'm as sure as I can be of that. Their ancestry is just right."

"Are they mine, or will you interfere with them?"

"Until their transitions, they're yours.

"And then?"

"I'll breed them, of course."

Of course. "Let them marry and stay here. If they fit here, they'll want to stay. How can they become responsible men if their only future is to be bred?"

Doro laughed aloud, opening his mouth wide to show the empty spaces of several missing teeth. "Do you hear yourself, woman? First you want no part of them, now you don't want to let go of them even when they're grown."

She waited silently until he stopped laughing, then asked: "Do you think I'm willing to throw away any child, Doro? If there is a chance for those boys to grow up better than Joseph, why shouldn't I try to give them that chance? If, when they grow up, they can be men instead of dogs who know nothing except how to climb onto one female after another, why shouldn't I try to help?"

He sobered. "I knew you would help—and not grudgingly. Don't you think I know you by now, Anyanwu?"

Oh, he knew her—knew how to use her. "Will you do it then? Let them marry and stay here if they fit?"

"Yes."

She looked down, examining the rug pattern that had held so much of Margaret's attention. "Will you take them away if they don't fit, can't fit, like Joseph?"

"Yes," he repeated. "Their seed is too valuable to be wasted."

He thought of nothing else. Nothing!

"Shall I stay with you for a while, Anyanwu?"

She stared at him in surprise, and he looked back neutral-faced, waiting for an answer. Was he asking a real question, then? "Will you go if I ask you to?"

"Yes."

Yes. He was saying that so often now, being so gentle and cooperative—for him. He had come courting again.

"Go," she said as gently as she could. "Your presence is disruptive here, Doro. You frighten my people." Now. Let him keep his word.

He shrugged, nodded. "Tomorrow morning," he said.

And the next morning, he was gone.

Perhaps an hour after his departure, Helen and Luisa came hand in hand to Anyanwu to tell her that Margaret had hanged herself from a beam in the washhouse.

For a time after Margaret's death, Anyanwu felt a sickness that she could not dispel. Grief. Two children lost so close together. Somehow, she never got used to losing children—especially young children, children it seemed had been with her for only a few moments. How many had she buried now?

At the funeral, the two little boys Doro had brought saw her crying and came to take her hands and stand with her solemnly. They seemed to be adopting her as mother and Luisa as grandmother. They were fitting in surprisingly well, but Anyanwu found herself wondering how long they would last.