Roots_ The Saga of an American Family - Alex Haley [279]
Massa Lea scoffed. “Big, strapping twenty-year-old buck like you? Boy, don’t tell me you’re not slippin’ around nights gettin’ plenty of that good hot tail! Hell, I could hire you out to stud; bet you’d like that!” The massa’s face creased into a half leer. “Good friend of mine says them black wenches got plenty good hot tail, now tell me the truth, ain’t that right, boy?”
Chicken George thought of the massa with his mammy. Steaming inside, he said slowly, almost coldly, “Maybe dey is, Massa—” Then, defensively, “I don’t know dat many—”
“Well, okay, you don’t want to tell you’ve been slippin’ off my place at night, but I know it’s time, and I know where you go and how often you go. I don’t want that road patrol maybe shooting you like happened to that Mr. Jewett’s trainer nigger, so I’ll tell you what I’m going to do, boy. When we get back, I’m goin’ to write you out a travelin’ pass to go chase tail every night if you want to! Ain’t never thought I’d do that for no nigger!”
Massa Lea seemed almost embarrassed, then covered it with a frown. “But I’m going to tell you one thing. First time you mess up, don’t get back by daybreak, or too wore out to work, or I find out you’ve been on that Jewett place again, or anything else you know you’re not supposed to do, I’m tearin’ up the pass for good—and you along with it. Got that?”
Chicken George was incredulous. “Massa, I sho’ ’preciate dat! Sho’ do, Massa!”
Expansively, Massa Lea waved away the thanks. “All right now, you see I’m not half bad as you niggers make out. You can tell ’em I know how to treat a nigger good if I want to.”
The leering grin returned, “Okay, what about them hot black wenches, boy? How many can you mount in a night?”
Chicken George was squirming in his seat. “Suh, like I said, ain’t know many—”
But his words seemed unheard as Massa Lea went on. “I hear tell whole lots of white men go and find nigger women for their pleasure. You know that happens, don’t you, boy?”
“I’se heared of it, Massa,” he said, trying not to think about the fact that he was talking to his own father. But apart from what went on in plantation cabins, George knew that in Burlington, Greensboro, and Durham there were “special houses,” spoken of only in hushed tones, usually run by some free black woman, where he had heard that white men paid from fifty cents to a dollar to couple with women in their choice of colors from sooty black to high yaller.
“Hell,” the massa persisted, “I’m just talkin’ to you sittin’ up here by ourselves in this wagon. From what I hear tell, they’re nigger women, all right, but by God they’re women! Especially if it’s one of the kind that lets a man know she wants it as much as he does. I hear tell they can be as hot as firecrackers, not always claimin’ they’re sick and whinin’ about everythin’ under the sun.” The massa looked inquisitively at Chicken George. “Fellow I know told me you nigger boys can’t never get enough of that hot black tail, that your experience?”
“Massa, nawsuh—leas’ways, I means jes’ now sho’ ain’t—”
“There you go talkin’ round the maypole again!”
“Don’t mean roun’ no pole, Massa.” Chicken George was trying his best to project his seriousness. “I’se tryin’ to say sump’n to you I ain’t never tol’ nobody, Massa! You know dat Massa MacGregor wid dem spangle yellow birds in de cockfights?”
“Of course. He and I talk a lot. What’s he got to do with it?”
“Well, you done give yo’ word you gon’ give me a pass, so ain’t no need me lyin’. Well, yassuh, lately I been slippin’ out jes’ like you say, visitin’ dis here gal over at Massa MacGregor’s—” His face was a study in earnestness.
“Dis here’s sump’n I really been needin’ to talk wid somebody I really can talk to, Massa. Jes’ cain’t figger ’er out! She name Matilda, she work in dey fiel’, an’ fill in if dey needs ’er in dey big house. Massa, she de firs’ gal don’t care what I’se said or tried, won’t let herself be touched, nawsuh! Bes’ I can git, she say she like me all right, ’cept she cain’t stan’ my ways—an’ I tol’ ’er I sho’ ain’t got no use for her