Roots_ The Saga of an American Family - Alex Haley [287]
“Mammy, what you ’speck?” he said as irritably as he dared. “When massa say, ‘Go,’ tell him I ain’t?”
Kizzy’s eyes were blazing. “Ain’t talkin’ ’bout dat an’ you know it! Tellin’ dat po’ gal you settin’ up nights tendin’ sick chickens an’ sich as dat! Where you git all dis lyin’ an’ drinkin’ an’ gamblin’ an’ runnin’ roun’ ? You knows I ain’t raised you like dat! An’ don’t think dis jes’ me talkin’! ’Tilda ain’t no fool, she jes’ ain’t let you know she seein’ right through you, too!” Without another word, Gran’mammy Kizzy stalked angrily from the cabin.
With Massa Lea being among the entrants for the great 1830 cockfighting tournament in Charleston, no one could criticize Chicken George for being away when the baby was born. He returned as ecstatic to learn about his second son—whom Matilda had already named Ashford, after her brother—as he was aglow with his good luck. “Massa winned over a thousan’ dollars, an’ I winned fifty in de hackfights! Y’all ought to hear how white folks an’ niggers both has started to hollerin’, ‘I’m bettin’ on dat Chicken George’!” He told her how in Charleston, Massa Lea had learned that President Andrew Jackson was a man after their own style. “Ain’t nobody love cockfightin’ mo’n he do! He call in dem big congressmens an’ senators an’ he show ’em a time fightin’ dem Tennessee birds o’ his’n right dere in dat White House! Massa say dat Jackson gamble an’ drink wid any man. Dey say when dem matchin’ chestnut hosses pullin’ ’im in dat fine Pres’dent’s coach, he be settin’ up dere wid his velvet-lined suitcase o’ liquor right beside ’im! Massa say far as southern white men’s concerned, he can stay Pres’dent till he git tired!” Matilda was unimpressed.
But Chicken George had seen something in Charleston that shook her—and the others on slave row—as deeply as it had him. “I bet you I seen a mile long o’ niggers bein’ driv along in chains!”
“Lawdy! Niggers from where?” asked Miss Malizy.
“Some sol’ out’n Nawth an’ South Ca’liny, but mainly out’n Virginia was what I heared!” he said. “Different Charleston niggers tol’ me it’s thousan’s o’ niggers a month gittin’ took to great big cotton plantations steady bein’ cleared out’n de woods in Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, an’Texas. Dey say de ol’style nigger traders on a hoss is gone, done become big companies wid offices in big hotels! Dey say it’s even big paddle-wheel ships carryin’ nothin’ but chained-up Virginia niggers down to New Orleans! An’ dey says—”
“Jes’ heish!” Kizzy sprang upright. “HEISH!” She went bolting toward her cabin in tears.
“What come over her?” George asked Matilda after the others had left in embarrassment.
“Ain’t you know?” she snapped. “Her mammy an’ pappy in Virginia las’ she know, an’ you scare her half to death!”
Chicken George looked sick. His face told her he hadn’t realized, but Matilda refused to let him off that easily. She had become convinced that for all of his worldliness, he was sorely lacking in sensitivity about too many things. “You knows well as I does Mammy Kizzy been sol’ herself! Jes’ like I was!” she told him. “Anybody ever sol’ ain’t gwine never forgit it! An’ won’t never be de same no mo’!” She looked at him significantly. “You ain’t never been. Dat’s how come you don’t understan’ no massa cain’t never be trusted—includin’ your’n!”
“What you rilin’ at me fo’?” he demanded testily.
“You ax me what upset Mammy Kizzy an’ I tol’ you. Ain’t got no mo’ to say ’bout it!” Matilda caught herself. She didn’t want harshness between her and her husband. After a moment’s silence, she managed a small smile. “George, I knows what make Mammy Kizzy feel better! Go make ’er come on over here to hear you tell dis baby ’bout his African gran’pappy like you tol’ Virgil.” And that’s just what he did.
CHAPTER 96
It was near dawn, and Chicken George was standing in the