The Known World - Edward P. Jones [127]
By morning much of the swelling had gone down and he led the slaves out into the fields. Alice was no different than she was on any other day: a good worker who didn’t sass and who seemed to go up and down a furrow in the time it took most people to turn around good. Occasionally, he would rise from his own work and look over at her, but, as always, she was in her own world. When the wind was right or when there were no songs from anyone, he could hear her: “I’m gonna pick you. I’m gonna pick you. I’m gonna leave you be till you say my name just right.”
That evening he changed and washed at the well and put on his new shirt and britches to report to Caldonia. The work of another day had gone well, he told her. He sat back in the chair and she asked him for the first time if he, too, wanted coffee. He said yes and Loretta brought him coffee in a cup that was identical to the one Caldonia had.
“I worry bout this Alice traipsin off every night,” he said near the end of the meeting. “She might need lockin up every night just so them patrollers don’t do somethin to her.”
“The sheriff and his patrollers have said nothing to me. Has someone said something to you, Moses?”
“Why no, Missus. But she been doin this too long. A crazy woman be a disruption to peace and harmony, I’d say. Evbody else start wantin to act crazy, too.”
“How long has she been doing this?”
“Since the day Marse Henry bought her.”
“Then maybe she’s as insane as she will ever get.”
“Oh, she could get more crazy all right. I wouldn’t put it pas her to get more crazy.”
She set her cup on the little table beside her and leaned her head back and closed her eyes and was silent. He thought she was asleep but she unfolded her arms after several moments and rested her open hands on either side of her body. He followed her neck as it went down from her chin and disappeared into her blouse. She was still but her bosom rose and fell and he watched her for so long that he fell into the pattern of her bosom rising and falling. She had put on weight over the years. He had stood at his cabin door that first night she and Henry were married, had looked up at the house with only mild curiosity. Now he was only the distance of one jackrabbit hop from her, from all that Henry had been able to have any night of their life together.
“You won’t forget him,” she said at last.
“Ma’am?”
“You won’t forget Henry Townsend, will you?”
“I’d sooner forget my own name, Missus.”
“Good night, Moses. Tell Loretta to come in.”
He waited as long as he could and then took the image of her on the settee with him out into the woods. He had not thought of a real woman, a woman he had met in the flesh, since the early days when he would come out there and think of Bessie, the woman Jean Broussard and his Scandinavian partner had purchased along with Moses in Alexandria. Moses rose without lingering in the woods when he was done and listened for Alice.
When he got back to the lane, she was coming out of her cabin and he stepped into her path. She tried going around him but he followed her. “Leave me be or I’ll send you to hell,” he said and raised both fists to her face. “Oh, Marse, I’m just goin to feed my chickens,” she said. “What?” Moses asked. “Whas that you say?” “I’m just goin to feed my chickens. Here little chick. There little chick, lemme feed you.” He pushed her down as hard as he could. “I told you to leave me be.” Alice began crying. “I told you to leave me be.