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By Root 1358 0

carefully arranging into piles of twelve all of the multicolored pebbles that he had dropped faithfully into his gourd with each new moon. He was so stunned by what the stones finally told him that the gardener never learned the answer to his question. Surrounding him there on the dirt floor of his hut were seventeen piles of stones. He was thirty-four rains old! What in the name of Allah had happened to his life? He had been in the white man’s land as long as he had lived in Juffure. Was he still an African, or had he become a “nigger,” as the others called themselves? Was he even a man? He was the same age as his father when he had seen him last, yet he had no sons of his own, no wife, no family, no village, no people, no homeland, almost no past at all that seemed real to him anymore—and no future he could see. It was as if The Gambia had been a dream he’d had once long ago. Or was he still asleep? And if he was, would he ever waken?

CHAPTER 57

Kunta didn’t have long to brood about the future, for a few days later came news that took the plantation by storm. A captured runaway housegirl, reported Bell breathlessly after the sheriff arrived for a hushed meeting with the massa behind closed doors, had admitted under a lashing that her crude escape route had been drawn for her by none other than the massa’s driver, Luther.

Storming out to slave row before Luther could run away, Massa Waller confronted him with the sheriff and demanded angrily to know if it was true. Terrified, Luther admitted that it was. Red-faced with rage, the massa lifted his arm to strike, but when Luther begged for mercy, he lowered it again and stood there staring silently at Luther for a long moment, tears of fury welling in his eyes.

At last he spoke, very quietly: “Sheriff, put this man under arrest and take him to jail. He is to be sold at the next slave auction.” And without another word he turned and walked back to the house, ignoring Luther’s anguished sobs.

Speculation had hardly begun about who would be assigned to replace him as the massa’s driver when Bell came out one night and told Kunta that the massa wanted to see him right away. Everyone watched—but no one was surprised—as he went cripping into the house behind Bell. Though he suspected why he had been called, Kunta felt a little scared, for he had never spoken to the massa or even been beyond Bell’s kitchen in the big house during all his sixteen years on the plantation.

As Bell led him through the kitchen into a hallway, his eyes goggled at the shining floor and the high, papered walls. She knocked at a huge carved door. He heard the massa say, “Come in!” and Bell went on inside, turning to beckon expressionlessly to Kunta. He couldn’t believe the size of the room; it seemed as big as the inside of the barn. The polished oaken floor was covered with rugs, and the walls were hung with paintings and tapestries. The richly dark, matched furniture was waxed, and long rows of books sat on recessed shelves. Massa Waller sat at a desk reading under an oil lamp with a circular shade of greenish glass, and his finger held his place in his book when, after a moment, he turned around to face Kunta.

“Toby, I need a buggy driver. You’ve grown into a man on this place, and I believe you’re loyal.” His widely set blue eyes seemed to pierce Kunta. “Bell tells me that you never drink. I like that, and I’ve noticed how you conduct yourself.” Massa Waller paused. Bell shot a look at Kunta. “Yassuh, Massa,” he said quickly.

“You know what happened to Luther?” the massa asked. “Yassuh,” said Kunta. The massa’s eyes narrowed, and his voice turned cold and hard. “I’d sell you in a minute,” he said. “I’d sell Bell if you two had no better sense.”

As they stood there silently, the massa reopened his book. “All right, start driving me tomorrow. I’m going to Newport. I’ll show you the way until you learn.” The massa glanced at Bell. “Get him the proper clothes And tell the fiddler that he’ll be replacing Toby in the garden.”

“Yassuh, Massa,” Bell said, as she and Kunta left.

Bell brought him