The Book of Night Women (38 page)

Kingston. Miss Isobel ride straight down to the harbour that Massa Humphrey warn her about. By Lilith reckoning, they ride for twenty or so miles and when they get to Kingston it be noon. Lilith never before see the place. Is the noise that lick her ears first, the noise of one thing mixing with another and fighting with something else. The noise of coloured and mulatto pickneys, wearing shirts or trousers but never both, and yelling and laughing and screaming as they dodge carriage and cart, and market women, some of them nigger, some mulatto or quadroon or mustee, all selling by the roadside with they basket full of orange, yam, cassava and banana. They turn down Orange Street that litter with even more people moving up and down like mad ants. Most be white mens, but a good few coloured, some wearing loose shirt, old breeches or pantaloons with dirty boots or shoes. Some dress up in fine coat with tails. Some carrying cane, others books, others paper or handkerchiefs, which they use cover they nose when they pass a stink place.

Sometimes the people pack so thick that Miss Isobel halt her carriage and cuss. They turn left and go across two lane to King Street, then head down to the sea. Lilith can see two ships at the harbour. The buildings rise higher on King Street, some having three, four, even five floor. Some even more lavish than a great house, with window even in the roof and columns tall as a tower and wider than the carriage. The buildings colour like the sky or fruit or white woman skin, with French windows bigger than doors. But they stand tight together. Unlike Orange Street, womens be all over King Street, white womens especially. The womens all dress like Miss Isobel but in white clothes or yellow or blue or a plaid pattern. And some don’t have on petticoat so the dress fall flat. Some walk up and down the road, two by two and they stop and talk and whisper when they see one another. Lilith didn’t know that there be white woman who walk. Miss Isobel ride through a little ditch and almost splash a woman in red dots, who then cuss out like a nigger. Some of the womens in buggy and carriage like Miss Isobel. Some of the carriages draw by a niggerman or by a white woman with a negro housemaid in the back. They all hide they nose with a handkerchief when they pass a stink place.

At the bottom of King Street, nearer to the harbour, be the shops. They smaller, and even tighter, most with two floors, the shop at the bottom and what look like living quarters at the top with curtains in the windows. From the shops and stores come all sort of pretty smell. Perfume and powder from England and France that Miss Isobel say we still at war with. They ride past a tall building with a Christmas orb for a roof that name Batty’s Emporium. Lilith almost say it ’loud but catch her tongue. Lilith wondering if it slip before to Miss Isobel that she can read. She could always say that is Robert Quinn teach her and that wouldn’t be no lie. Lilith keep her mouth shut for the rest of the ride. They pass two store and one more by the name Emporium. They pass a shop with a green and bone wall and a tobacco smell that jump out the door and greet the carriage. Some buildings have a balcony that hang over the street with white mens, some of them in red uniform, looking over like they standing guard. Lilith looking at the negro womens selling by the roadside, not far from the shit water, and wonder if they be slave or free for is not Sunday, when slave get leave to sell. Then they pass a building and Lilith read these words quiet-like:

She think that Miss Isobel see her this time, but Miss Isobel busy cussing people to get out of her goddamn way. The carriage can barely move now, sake of the crowd of people. Lilith didn’t notice when they start swimming in this sea. Mens, mens and more mens, some dress up in hat, coat and tails and shiny boot, some in blouson and pantaloon, some dirty like nigger even though most white. Most huddle in group of two or three and they talking, whispering, laughing, shouting, but mostly looking forward to the platform. Negroes.

—A fine buck is what we ’ave ’ere, gentlemens, a fine buck! the auctioneer say and he open him tight collar to free him fat neck.

A negro man and a negro woman on the platform. The two naked, save for chain round they neck and another binding they wrist. Both shiny from palm oil that carry scent right up the street. The auctioneer grab the woman little titty and squeeze. The woman yelp and try to run but the man grab her by the hair. A white man whisper something to another white man and the woman beside them slap him, playful-like, on the cheek with her glove.

—A ripe one, this lassie is, not yet fifteen, methinks. Aye, I’m sure of it. An exotic princess was she back in the dark continent, a boon to any household. And fine gentlemen such as you are surely you know a good value, so lets start at one hundred, do I hear one and twenty? the auctioneer say.

One by one hands rise up and Lilith hear what negro woman go for. Montpelier be an estate for three or four generation now and there be so many slave that Lilith can’t remember the last time she see one that come straight from the Africa. Plenty on the estate, but they work the hardest part of the field so that they can get seasoned quick and none allowed to work in the house, sake of how they brutish and chat bad. She look at they body and forget palm oil and wonder if is so they come from the Africa, so shiny that they body glow. But then Lilith see something in the Africa man that she thought was only in the colony nigger. The hunch in the shoulders, the sinking neck. Just off the ship and the Africa man sinking into nigger pose already. He already buckling under backra weight. For all they funny talking and funny smell, Lilith did imagine the African back as always straight, the African leg powerful and the African eye big and wide. But there they was, a man and a woman, and already they body twist into question mark like what Massa Humphrey write.

—One hundred ninety-five, sold! say the auctioneer.

The auctioneer talking ’bout how hard the negroes goin’ work but he point to the negro woman breast and bottom and stuck him finger in her mouth to show her white teeth. He make the man spin round couple time and use him cattle prod to poke the man balls and lift up the man cocky so that it jiggle.

—A right bounty of negroes will be sprouting up from that seed, gentlemen, you might mistake him for a stallion. You may never need to buy a nigger again. Spiting me own self out of business, yes I am. Shall we start at two hundred?

Again, plenty hand shoot up one after the other. Lilith looking at the white mens buying and the black bodies shining and didn’t notice they eye. When she see the woman, the woman was looking at her already. Lilith see them eye before. On Andromeda daughter when she watching her mother spit blood till she dead. But she see it on white man too, on Massa Roget when she pin him to the bottom of the bathtub and he realise he not coming back up. Lilith think she know what frighten is, but didn’t know it until she see the woman face. But is more than frighten, is something else, mayhaps in the eye or the eyebrow, Lilith don’t know. Something else that her mind answer before the question ask. She know the answer. She can’t help nobody out of white man power, not even herself. The woman eye still asking. Lilith don’t know how to fix her eye to say no, so she look at the man and the same question come over him face.

The negro man and woman look round and round, frighten by the dog barking, horse whinnying, wheel crunching, goat mehhhhing, donkey heehawing, womens cussing, mens shouting, pickney playing, cat jumping, whip cracking, people pointing, ladies blushing, flags flapping and sun rising. Lilith watch as they get the frighten eye, the mark of every negro.

—Two hundred ninety pounds! the auctioneer shout and the woman jump. Lilith jump too. A church bell ring from the south and Lilith look at the two negroes again. Lilith wonder what running through bush with no chain on you foot or dog coming after you feel like. And what it feel like to know all of that, then lose it. Do losing feel different from never having? Do a captured nigger be a different nigger? Lilith gone from perplex to melancholy. She surprise that she never talk to a Africa man or woman before. Except Homer. And even Homer, who talk more Africa tongue than most, still don’t talk ’bout the Africa land much.

Miss Isobel yelling that if they don’t let her through, she going to giddy-up her horses and let come what may. The men give her pass. The auctioneer yell, Sold and two white mens come for the negro man. He bolt. The white women stiff and screaming. A naked negro man let loose in they company set off a terror. Some of the womens swoon, some try to run, some hide behind they mens. But the negro man run only so far before the chain yank him by the neck and he drop flat on him back. The auctioneer go to strike the Africa man but stop, perhaps because he remember how much the slave worth. Some of the womens still hide behind they mens. The Africa man make a sound and the white mens laugh and call him beast and monkey. But Lilith know the sound even though she never hear the wail before. She know what he bawling for and force herself not to look in him eye, for she know he looking at her. The carriage take her away.

Lilith look at Miss Isobel. She sweating even though the Kingston air cool, and trying to catch her breath even though the horse doing all the work. Two white mens step in the carriage way and Miss Isobel hide her face quick with her hand, not even watching where she going until the mens dash to the other side. The taller older man cuss but the younger man say nothing. Some of Miss Isobel hair fly out of her bonnet and she grab it quick with her right hand, almost letting go of the reins, and push it back underneath. Miss Isobel looking straight ahead but Lilith look back. The younger man was looking at the carriage and Lilith know she seen him before. She ain’t never been to Kingston and Massa Humphrey don’t keep no friend so it must be a man who did be at the Rogets’ funeral. Plenty mens was there but she remember him now. Miss Isobel did take more notice of him then and he tip him hat to her. Lilith surprise that she remember and Miss Isobel forget, for he wearing the same purple coat—the only one on the street—and the same brown top hat tilt to the left to show him black hair. The carriage take them away but even as he get smaller and smaller he still looking.

Lilith and Miss Isobel come back to Montpelier at about one o’ clock. Robert Quinn waiting at the step when Miss Isobel drop Lilith off. Robert Quinn and Miss Isobel don’t look at each other. She drive off, the back of the carriage full with parcels.

—Fer her wedding dress, luv?

—Yes, massa.

—Yer not helping the cow, are ye? Robert Quinn say.

—Me don’t know how to sew, massa.

—Good. Good. Ye shall have nothing to do with that poppy-show, he say.—Do ye hear me, Lilith?

—Yes, massa.

—Now fix us a proper lunch, will ye? he say.

 

 

The next morning,
Lilith in the great house kitchen early. Robert Quinn leave out before dawn. Nobody in the kitchen but Homer.

—Me pass a place where they was selling negroes, Lilith say.

Homer put down the knife and the potato she was slicing. She don’t say nothing for a while.

—When you see that? she say.

—Yesterday on the way to the dry goods merchant. They was having auction for negroes.

—Do tell. Me did hear that slave ship come in on Tuesday. How them look?

—How who look?

—The slave them, the Africa mens and womens.

—Me only see two, a man and a woman. The woman go for a hundred ninety-five pounds and the man two hundred ninety.

—Nigger price goin’ up like everything else in this world. How them look?

—Frighten.

—Frighten. Poor sum’bitches don’t know the meaning of frighten yet.

Homer go back to her potato peeling.—But is all right. White man goin’ know the meaning of frighten soon and very soon.

Then she start sing.

—Soon and very soon, we are going to meet the King. Soon and very soon we are going to meet the—

—Me see white man frighten out o’ him wits already.

—What? What you talking ’bout?

—Me see white man frighten before. Frighten like God catch him a sin. Back at Coulibre.

The knife fall from Homer hand.

—Jesus the father. Me did know you was the one.

Homer cover her mouth with one finger and say, Shhh. She look round, outside, out the door and out the window.—You burn down the Coulibre house, she whisper.

—You sound like you never did sure.

—You sound like me was asking question. Me just saying things as they be. What me don’t know is how you manage to burn them up without them trying to escape.

—Me kill them first, Lilith say.

Homer pick up the knife again but pause. She pause long. She turn to the window. She look at the floor. Then she look at Lilith hard.

—Me know you have the darkness, but me didn’t know it so black, she say.

—Blacker than midnight when me ready.

—How you kill Massa Roget?

Lilith go over to the kitchen window to watch slave coffle pass and singing work song.

—You wasn’t at Coulibre the first time Massa Roget heart take set ’pon him.

—No, but me know ’bout it.

—Well, him heart take set ’pon him again. Right when me was giving him bath and him want him cocky jerk. Him ’bout to get out when him heart sick him. Fall right back in the tub and slip under the water.

—Go on.

—Him pull himself up and wheezing and he begging that me must help him. Me help him, all right. Me help him right back down under the water. Me hand on him chest, him trying to wring me titty, but me keep him down. Then me eye see him eye.

Homer silent.

—Sometime he slip from me and sometime he try to grab me hair, but him heart was on my side, the son of a bitch. Him own heart. Me hold him down until him nose start suck in water and bubble come up. Me hold him down until all him cocky stiffen up. Best cockstand that devil ever manage.