Color Purple, The - Alice Walker [78]
They thought at first it was something she ate. But then another one had one and also the women start to have twins. So the people start to put the white babies and the twins to death. So really Adam wasn't even the first white man. He was just the first one the people didn't kill.
Mr.??? look at me real thoughtful. He not such a bad looking man, you know, when you come right down to it. And now it do begin to look like he got a lot of feeling hind his face.
Well, I say, you know black folks have what you call albinos to this day. But you never hear of white folks having nothing black unless some black men been messing with 'em. And no white folks been in Africa back yonder when all this happen.
So these Olinka people heard about Adam and Eve from the white missionaries and they heard about how the serpent tricked Eve and how God chased them out of the garden of Eden. And they was real curious to hear this, cause after they had chased the white Olinka children out of the village they hadn't hardly thought no more about it. Nettie say one thing about Africans, Out of sight, out of mind. And another thing, they don't like nothing around them that look or act different. They want everybody to be just alike.
So you know somebody white wouldn't last long. She say seem tike to her the Africans throwed out the white Olinka peoples for how they look. They throwed out the rest of us, all us who become slaves, for how us act. Seem like us just wouldn't do right no matter how us try. Wen, you know how niggers is. Can't nobody tell 'em nothing even today. Can't be rule. Every nigger you see got a kingdom in his head.
But guess what else, I say to Mr.???. When the missionaries got to the part bout Adam and Eve being naked, the Glinka peoples nearly bust out laughing. Especially when the missionaries tried to make them put on clothes because-of this. They tried to explain to the missionaries that it was theywho put Adam and Eve out of the Village because they wasnaked. Their word for naked is white.
But since they are covered by color they are not naked. They said anybody looking at a white person can tell they naked, but black people can not be naked because they can not be white.
Yeah, say Mr.???. But they was wrong.
Right, I said. Adam and Eve prove it. What they did, these Olinka peoples, was throw out they own children, just cause they was a little different.
I bet they do that same kind of stuff today, Mr.??? say, Oh, from what Nettie say, them Africans is a mess. And you know what the bible say, the fruit don't fall too far from the tree.
And something else, I say. Guess who they say the snake is?
Us, no doubt, say Mr.???.
Right, I say. Whitefolks sign for they parents. They was so mad to git throwed out and told they was naked they made up they minds to crush us wherever they find us, same as they would a snake.
You reckon? Mr.??? ast.
That's what these Olinka peoples say. But they say just like they know history before the white children start to come, they know the future after the biggest of 'em leave. They say they know these particular children and they gon kill each other off, they still so mad bout being unwanted.
Gon kill off a lot of other folk too who got some color. In fact, they gon kill off so much of the earth and the colored that everybody gon hate them just like they hate us today. Then they will become the new serpent. And wherever a white person is found he'll be crush by somebody not white, just like they do us today. And some of the Olinka peoples believe life will just go on and on like this forever. And every million years or so something will happen to the earth and folks will change the way they look. Folks might start growing two heads one of these days, for all we know, and then the folks with one head will send 'em all someplace else. But some of 'em don't think like this. They think, after the biggest of the white folks no longer on the earth, the only way to stop making somebody the