A Day to Pick Your Own Cotton - Michael R. Phillips [67]
“I came … for a visit, Josepha,” I answered. “I wanted you to meet the mistress of the place where I’m staying now … I mean it’s her mother and father’s plantation.—This is Miss Katie Clairborne.”
“I’m pleased ter mee’chu, Miz Clairborne,” said Josepha, “—but chil’,” she added, turning to me again, “you shouldna come.”
“Why not?”
“Things is a heap different now wiff der old master gone.”
“Where is he?” I asked.
“He be dead, chil’. Da poor old master, he died. An’ now der young master William, he be married an’ da new mistress, she don’ like coloreds none, an’ she an’ he’s different dan his daddy. An’ effen she fin’ me jabberin’ wiff you, I’s git a whuppin’ fo’ sho’.”
“But you said you’re not a slave anymore. How can they whip you?”
“Dey whips who’s dey likes,” she answered, shaking her head. “I may not be no slave, but dey act like dey neber heard ob no Lincoln or no ’mancipation proklimation or nuthin’. So you two’s better skedaddle afore she sees you here.”
“We wanted to know if a man’s come around here asking about colored babies,” I said.
Josepha’s eyes narrowed. “What’s all dis talk ’bout colored babies?”
“He says there’s some disease only colored babies have.”
“Who’s dis man yo’s talkin ’bout?”
“He came to Miss Katie’s asking if we’d seen any black babies around.”
“An’ what did you tell him?” she said, her eyes squinting all the more.
“Uh, nothing,” I answered. “But it just struck me as a mite curious that he’d be asking, that’s all.”
“Well, dere’s black babies an’ den dere’s black babies,” said Josepha cryptically, “an’ some ob ’em ain’t as black as dey seem, dat’s all I be sayin’. An’ dere ain’ nuthin’ I can tell you ’bout it, ’cause I ain’t seen no sech man askin’ no sech questions,” she added.
“Do you mean—” I began, but she interrupted me with a wave of her big fleshy hand.
“I don’ mean nuthin’ mo dan da speculations ob some ole black folks what used ter be slaves dat oughta learn ter keep dere moufs shut. Ain’t no black baby roun’ here gwine come ter no good no how.”
Suddenly a voice startled us all into silence. “Josepha!”
We turned to see a tall white lady walking into the room. How much of Josepha’s previous speech she had heard, I don’t know, but her eyes were on fire. She had a long thin face and wasn’t pretty to my eyes. But Josepha was obviously cowed by the sight of her. Seeing Katie, she turned temporarily from the tongue-lashing she had apparently been about to deliver.
“Who are you?” she said abruptly.
“Uh, Kathleen, ma’am,” mumbled Katie.
“What do you want … what are you doing in my home?”
“I, uh … we just came for a visit, ma’am,” said Katie hesitantly.
“A visit—who are you visiting? I have never seen you before.”
“No, ma’am. We were visiting Josepha.”
“Josepha? What could you possibly want with her? She works for me, and it’s precious little work I get out of her too, especially as long as she is standing here wagging her fat tongue to the likes of you. Well, speak up, girl—I asked you a question. What do you want with Josepha?”
“I don’t … I mean, Mayme used to live here, ma’am … and she wanted to visit.”
For the first time the woman now seemed to notice me. She turned and glared at me, sending her eyes up and down my front as if I was an object of scorn.
“You … used to live here?” she said, her voice suddenly very much changed.
“Yes’m,” I said. “My family was all killed in the colored town yonder.”
“Yes, the massacre—I’m aware of that. Why weren’t you killed?”
“I escaped, ma’am.”
“How?”
“I hid.”
“And then what did you do?”
“I ran away.”
She seemed to be thinking for a second, and after the way she’d been eyeing me as she drilled me with questions, I probably should have contemplated a little more directly what she might have been thinking about.
“Wait here!” she said, speaking like she was used to ordering people around, which from what Josepha had said, I guess she was.
If I’d have had my wits about me, I’d have run right then. But I didn’t think about it, and I was afraid to do anything to get Josepha in trouble.