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By Root 4796 0

lane, the one Alice, whom he called the Night Walker, shared with Delphie and her daughter Cassandra, the slaves were filling the lane. A few women had cried, remembering the way Henry smiled or how he would join them in singing or thinking that the death of anyone, good or bad, master or not, cut down one more tree in the life forest that shielded them from their own death; but most said or did nothing. Their world had changed but they could not yet understand how. A black man had owned them, a strange thing for many in that world, and now that he was dead, maybe a white man would buy them, which was not as strange. No matter what, though, the sun would come up on them tomorrow, followed by the moon, and dogs would chase their own tails and the sky would remain just out of reach. “I didn’t sleep well,” one man across the lane from Elias said to his next-door neighbor. “Well, I know I sure did,” the neighbor said. “I slept like they was payin me to, slept anough for three white women without a care in the world.” “Well,” the first man said, “sounds like you gotta hold a some of my sleep. Better give it back. Better give it back fore you wear out my sleep usin it. Give it back.” “Oh, I will,” the neighbor said, laughing, inspecting loose threads on his overalls. “I sure will. Soon as I’m finished. Meantime, I’m gonna use it again tonight. Come for it in the mornin.” They both laughed.

It was often the case that Alice, the Night Walker, would be standing just inside her door when Moses opened it each morning, dressed and ready to work, as if she had been standing at the door waiting for him all night. She was waiting now and she was smiling, the same smile she had for everything—from the death of a neighbor’s baby to the four oranges Henry and Caldonia gave each slave on Christmas morning. “Baby dead baby dead baby dead,” she would chant. “Christmas oranges Christmas oranges Christmas oranges in the mornin.”

“I don’t want no foolishness from you, woman,” Moses said now. He turned and saw Stamford, the seeker of young stuff, in the middle of the crowd, eyeing Gloria, who didn’t want to be his young stuff anymore. “Master dead,” Moses said to Alice. “No foolishness this mornin, woman.” Alice went on smiling. “Master dead master dead master be dead.” “Hush, girl,” Moses said. “Respect the dead the way they need to be respected.” The story went that mule that kicked Alice in the head when she was years younger had been a one-eyed mule, but no more ornery for being one-eyed than any other mule. The story continued that when she regained her senses, moments after the kick, she slapped the mule and called it a dirty name. This was before Henry bought her for $228 and two bushels of apples from the estate of a white man who had no heirs and who was afraid of mules. It was the dirty name that made everyone know she had gone down the crazy road, because before the kick Alice had been known as a sweet girl of sweet words.

“Moses?” Delphie came up behind Alice, her cabin mate.

“Master dead,” Moses said. “You and Cassie get Alice and come up with evbody to the house.”

“Master dead, Moses?” Delphie said. “Whas gonna come of us?” She would be forty-four in a few months and had already lived longer than any ancestor she had ever had, every single one of them. She did not know this history of eons about herself; there was only the feeling in her bones that for some time she had been venturing into a place unknown, and that feeling made her hope for a road that would not cut too deeply into her feet and her soul. To live to see fifty was a wish she was beginning to dare to have. My name is Delphie and I’m fifty years old. Count em. Start at one and count em. One Delphie, two Delphie, three Delphie . . . Before she had reached forty her only wish was that the world would be kind to her daughter, Cassandra, or Cassie as some people called her. Now a second wish was beginning to creep up on her, and she was afraid that wishing to see fifty might make God turn his back on the first wish about her daughter. God might say: Make up your mind