Property(15)

“They have murdered him,” she said.

“Father!” I cried and ran to the door.

“Manon,” Mother shouted, jumping to her feet. “Don’t go out there.” She came to me and took me in her arms and I wept. I couldn’t understand what had happened. “The driver has gone for your uncle,” Mother said, “and we must stay inside until he comes.”

That night I slept in Mother’s bed. In the morning she refused to get up, refused to eat, sobbed and muttered wild accusations by turns. “She mad with grief,” Celeste said.

Late in the afternoon my uncle arrived and I was allowed to leave the house. “Stay away from the quarter,” he said, “and stay away from the gin.” All night I had wanted to run, and as soon as I was outside I did run, as hard and fast as I could, across the lawn and down the road to the river landing. I wanted to keep running forever, but I came to the end of the dock. The water swirled at my feet, the wind lifted my hair. No steamer was in sight. I raised my arms above my head and called out “Father, Father,” in a transport of suffering. But of course there was no answer; Father was gone.

What happened then? A blackness suffused my memory. I was sick for some time. But before that.

Before that, I turned back and saw two negro boys standing at the edge of the dock, watching me curiously. They were dressed in rags, their feet bare. One wore a rough jacket made of quilted sacking, the other had fashioned a cape from what looked like a scrap of horse blanket which he held tight around his thin shoulders. I judged them to be twelve or thirteen, my age, though I was several inches taller than they were. I wasn’t afraid of them. I didn’t think I had seen them before.

I approached the boys. When I was close, the taller of them said, “Your pappy is dead.”

“I know it,” I said.

“He kilt in the fire,” the other said. “A big beam fall on him.”

“Did you see it?” I asked. “Were you there?”

The taller boy squatted down on the grass, rubbing his hands together for warmth. “My auntie say your pappy set that fire hisself and shot hisself in the head, so he dead already when the beam came down on him.”

“You’re a liar,” I said.

“That’s what my auntie say,” he replied, keeping his eyes on his friend, who nodded his head in agreement.

It was a lie, of course. It was not possible that Father would do such a thing. It was an outrage that they should seek me out to tell me this lie which they had made up just to hurt me. My sadness and confusion turned to rage. I wanted to kill the boys and they seemed to know they should be afraid of me, for when I said, “You’d better run,” they took off like scared rabbits and didn’t stop until they were out of sight behind the house. I stood on the dock, shaking with fury.

It started to rain, but I couldn’t move. I just stood there until I was soaked through and my teeth were chattering and then I stood there until it was getting dark and Celeste came out and found me. By the time we got back to the house, I was delirious with fever.

I never told anyone this lie the boys told me. Perhaps it never happened and I only dreamed it when I was sick. The doctor and my uncle agreed that Father’s death was an accident. Mother always said he’d been murdered. They never did find out how the fire started.

Lies, I thought, lies without end. We lived on them, all of us, all the time.

The image of Sarah as I had seen her leaving my husband’s room filled my head, banishing these unendurable recollections. Her hair was all undone, her eyes bright, she was wearing a loose dressing gown I’d never seen before and a dark mantle pulled over it. I had only the quickest look at her in the lamplight, but I’d seen a great deal. And so had the doctor, I didn’t doubt, when he opened his door and spoke to her. What had he said? My head began to hammer. The room was so hot I was suffocating. I staggered to the dresser and poured out a glass of water, drank half of it, then poured the rest down the front of my shift. It was as if someone had slapped me. In the distance I could hear shouting, the tolling of the bell. I gripped the table and hung my head forward, trembling from head to foot. A feeling of dread crept over me as I realized that I was laughing.



ALL NIGHT I prayed myself a widow, but to prove there is no Supreme Being who hears our prayers, in the morning Sarah came to my door with the message that my husband had gone to his brother’s house and would not return until dinner. He wants to borrow more money, I thought, and he will be in a foul humor when he returns. “Has the doctor gone as well?” I asked.

“Yes, missus,” she said.