Saving Savannah

by Tonya Bolden

  Principal Burroughs’s gospel of self-sufficiency was so real.

  “There are our teachers, of course, but other than them and a man or two who comes in the spring to plow up for our garden and do heavy repairs, we run the place ourselves.”

  Before each building, beds of tulips, crocuses, hyacinth, daffodils, freesia poised to burst into bloom.

  Just like Savannah.

  A place with such purpose. She could feel it.

  Girls solo, in groups, in wash dresses and shoes with Cuban heels, walked swiftly, regally in and out of buildings. Some twelve or so. Others maybe eighteen or older. And they all seemed so happy.

  “Just last week a group painted the parlor in the model home.” Savannah and Mona were heading back to Pioneer Hall. “The domestic science girls prepare all our meals and do the shopping. Those in dressmaking and millinery make most of our clothes, those in hairdressing do our hair, and once a week we get manicures from girls studying manicure and massage.”

  They passed a trio of floppy ginkgo trees.

  “And you, Savannah, where do you attend school?”

  “Dunbar.”

  “That is where Principal Burroughs went—back when it was the M Street School, of course. Graduated with honors.”

  Savannah had been past proud years back when one of Uncle Madison’s photos appeared in a Crisis article on old M Street School opening on N Street as Dunbar. The Crisis had hailed Dunbar as the “Greatest Negro High School in the World.”28

  When Savannah and her parents, Yolande and hers, first toured the soaring brick and stone-trimmed building—a castle!—that had everything, from a swimming pool to a fifteen-hundred-seat auditorium, Savannah was panicky, fearing that she’d never find her way around, would get lost, swallowed up in that huge school.

  But, oh, how absolutely ecstatic she and Yolande had been that their walk to, from school would be a whole five minutes longer.

  Now Dunbar no longer loomed so large, their twenty-minute walk to, from a bore.

  As she and Mona entered Pioneer Hall, Savannah thought maybe she could persuade Yolande to join her in helping out at Nannie Burroughs’s school29—if, that is, the woman first said yes to her.

  Sisters!

  Maybe she and Yolande could have that again.

  Tour of Pioneer Hall completed, Mona took Savannah to Principal Burroughs’s office.

  “And how do you find us?”

  “It is grand, Miss Burroughs. What a wondrous thing you have built! Just marvelous!”

  “We try,” said Burroughs with a wink, a sassy smile.

  “So do you think I might—”

  “I think we just might be able to use your helping hands. On one condition.”

  “And that is, Miss Burroughs?”

  “Written permission from your parents.”

  SPIRALING BLUE LEAVES

  Head up, like her nerve.

  “I have an announcement!”

  She had decided to go on the offense. Tell. Not ask.

  “And it is …?” That was Father.

  Savannah had just helped herself to peas. He had just passed the parsley new potatoes and looked longingly at the T-bone steak on his plate.

  Savannah cleared her throat. “I’m keen to pitch in at Nannie Burroughs’s school on Saturdays.”

  Father, Mother looked at each other.

  Then at her.

  As if she’d said she wanted to join a circus or marry a chinchilla coat–wearing, gold-toothed gangster.

  “Have you lost your mind?” Mother looked horrified.

  “Where did this come from?” asked Father.

  “I want to be useful. I can tutor girls in English or French or some other subject. They have a newsletter. I can help out with that. I can teach piano.”

  “What do you even know about that school?” Mother again.

  “Nella told me about it. She works there part-time. The other day—”

  “That’s absurd,” snapped Mother. “Now please help yourself to potatoes so that we can get on with dinner.”

  Savannah plopped a spoonful of parsley new potatoes onto her plate.

  “Now you may say grace,” commanded Mother.

  If making a self-portrait, Savannah would have drawn steam, spouting, spewing from her ears, the words DON’T IGNORE ME! ballooning from her head.

  “Wyatt, we received a postcard from the Blakes.”

  “Where are they again?”

  “Denver.”

  “Their grandchild? Has he or she arrived?”

  “Not as of the mailing of the card.”

  Savannah barged in. “Is that it? No discussion?”

  “About what?” asked Father. “The Blakes?”

  “No, about me and Nannie Burroughs’s school.”

  “Not at this time, pumpkin.”

  “Why not?”

  “You know how I can get if my steak goes cold.” Father gave her that smile of his that always made her melt.

  Not this time. “Well, one day you two are going find out how I can get if—”

  From Father a withering look.

  “I’m seventeen, not seven,” she mumbled, then speared a potato.

  Savannah looked around at the dining room with its burl and marquetry china cabinet, buffet, sideboard, and all the rest. Such heavy furniture. Dark.

  She glared at the vase of flowers in the center of the table, flanked by Mother’s precious Tiffany candlesticks with off-white tapers.

  It’s not as if we don’t have electricity.

  Near Father, Mother’s precious Tiffany salt and pepper cellars with their silly little spoons. Too tiny for Father’s hands. Why can’t she just have salt and pepper shakers? Doesn’t Tiffany’s make them? Savannah hated it all.

  The wallpaper—tiny rose and pale yellow flowers on a background of spiraling blue leaves. There are no blue leaves in nature.

  From where she sat she could see some of the parlor and decided to hate everything in that room too.

  Blue velvet settee and chairs.

  Silly-looking little footstool.

  Marble turtle-top tables.

  Another pair of dumb Tiffany candlesticks on the fireplace mantel.

  Same wallpaper with those ridiculous blue leaves.

  And Mother’s pride and joy—the crystal chandelier and matching floor lamps.

  The room is a mausoleum. Only ever used when there was a dinner party or when some very important person visited, and yet spring and summer Mother kept the room in flowers.

  What a waste!

  Savannah picked at peas on her plate. She hadn’t touched her steak. She pushed her plate away.

  “Can you give me one good reason?”

  “Savannah, please,” chided Mother. After a few bites she added, “For one, that school is all the way out in Lincoln Heights.”

  “But a streetcar goes out there.”

  “And you know this how?” asked Mother.

  “I can read maps.” Savannah thought she’d leave it there but then decided no! “I went there today.”

  Savannah looked Mother dead in the face, unblinking.

  Father’s knife, fork, hit his plate.

  Mother stopped chewing, swallowed.

  “You did what?” Father’s voice was like coming thunder.

  Savannah lowered her head, her grip on boldness slipping away.

  Mother’s silverware was now on her plate too. “You told us that you were going out to sketch and that you might take in a photoplay later with Yolande.”

  “I did sketch. On the cars. As for Yolande …”

  Father’s eyes narrowed. “So you flat-out lied to us?”

  Silence.

  Out of the corner of her eye Savannah saw Father rubbing his chin.

  “I’m disappointed in you, Savannah. Very disappointed.”

  “But I did sketch. On the cars.”

  “Anything short of the truth is a lie, and you know that, Savannah.”

  She heard not only
anger in Father’s voice. There was hurt too.

  “I knew that if I told you, you’d probably say no. I thought that if I went there first, saw that it was a good place for myself—and it is. It really is. As far as I could tell, people in the surrounding area are Negro. The school is only a short walk from the streetcar stop. The girl who gave me a tour said that the only time any men are on the premises is in the spring.”

  Silence.

  “Nannie is—”

  “You know her?”

  “Yes, of course. She is a member of the Association.”

  “Really?”

  Whenever Mother hosted an Association tea or luncheon, Mary Church Terrell was there, Mattie Bowen, Emma Merritt. She ticked off more names in her head. But never Nannie Burroughs.

  “Savannah.” The ferocity in Father’s voice was gone. “Your mother and I will discuss this later and let you know.”

  “I am sorry, Wyatt, but I do not think that there is anything to discuss. She simply cannot go traipsing off to Lincoln Heights.”

  Savannah threw her napkin onto the table, shot up.

  “Savannah!”

  That was Father.

  “Sit back down, young lady.”

  Savannah slumped into her chair.

  “Sit up straight and finish your dinner,” Mother said calmly.

  “I’ve lost my appetite.”

  Father weighed in. “Then take a few minutes to find it.”

  Savannah picked at more peas, then cut into her cold T-bone steak. “It’s just not fair,” she muttered. “Father, you go out to the reform school once a month to counsel boys. And, Mother, years ago didn’t you have a club, one that helped poor women with children?”

  “Yes, I did. The Mothers’ Helpers Club.”

  “What, did you just abandon those poor people?”

  “Tone, young lady,” said Father. “Tone.”

  “No, I did not abandon those people. When the Association formed, the Mothers’ Helpers Club was folded into it. Part of the point of the Association was to pool resources and not duplicate efforts. Younger hands are now at the helm of what became of my club.”

  Savannah pressed on. “And when the Association sprang into action to help save Frederick Douglass’s estate, you drafted letter after letter soliciting funds to pay off the mortgage. And you’ve spent hours on restoration plans. You even pitched in and pulled weeds and got rid of trash. And look at the work you do around the Anthony amendment. You two are always supporting all kinds of things.”

  “And your point?” Mother’s voice possessed a lot more bite.

  “You both have your causes. Why can’t I have a cause?”

  “The Bethel Junior Literary Society awaits you.”

  “With all due respect, Mother, sitting around with members of the smart set having debates and giving speeches on the latest books read is hardly a cause.”

  “What about your school’s newspaper?” asked Father.

  “I’ve given that up.”

  “Really? When? Why?”

  Mother cleared her throat.

  “What?”

  “Father, Cary is the editor. Things would be, you know, a bit awkward.”

  “Oh, yes, I see.”

  “There’s the Y,” Mother chimed in.

  “The war is over. Or hadn’t you noticed?”

  “Savannah …” By then Father had abandoned his steak.

  “There is to be a new kind of comfort kit,” said Mother. “One for our soldiers unable to find employment.”

  Savannah thought for a bit. “I can do that some Saturdays and go out to Lincoln Heights other Saturdays.”

  Mother dabbed her mouth with her napkin.

  Savannah speared another parsley potato. “You two are always talking about how I must be a credit to the race, how I must lift as I climb.”

  “Yes, but—”

  “But I can only be a credit in a way you see fit. I can only lift in the way you think I should.”

  “We are merely looking out for you.”

  “No wonder Charlie never comes home! No wonder he wanted to get as far away from you as possible!”

  “That’s enough!” said Father. “To your room!”

  From the tempo, the timbre, she knew whose rap it was.

  “Come in, Mother,” Savannah said drily from her bed, stretched out on her back, hands beneath her head, eyes fixed on her ceiling fan, shoes kicked off.

  Mother perched on the foot of her bed. “My darling girl, please don’t be upset with us. Understand that we are just trying to look out for you, protect you, save you from—”

  “Protect me, save me from what? Nannie Burroughs?” Savannah refused to look at Mother.

  “Well, yes, in a way. She is of the more radical element.”

  “She runs a school. What’s so radical about that?”

  “Savannah, we live in perilous times, on the razor’s edge. You don’t know what it was like in the capital before. It was called the colored man’s paradise. Negroes prospered in multiples.”

  “Father is prosperous, so is Yolande’s, and the Lees, the Sandersons, the—”

  “It was even more so in the past. Barber shops that catered to prominent white men owned by Negroes. Hundreds of our people had good government jobs. Then President Wilson came in and drew the color line in civil service. Treasury Department … Government Printing Office … all the way through. Many of our men with good jobs—some even in supervisory positions—were demoted, others fired. Wilson opened the way to harder treatment of Negroes all over the city.”

  “But what does all this have to do with Nannie Burroughs’s school?”

  “It’s so far away, for one. And you won’t be around anyone you know.”

  “But I told you Nella works there part-time.”

  “I mean people you’ve spent time with. People like Yolande.”

  “You mean our kind of people?”

  “No, I’m not saying that. Not at all.”

  “Is Nannie Burroughs not our kind of people, Mother? Is that it?”

  “No, I’m not saying that!”

  “Then what’s the harm, Mother?”

  Mother had that weepy look. Savannah knew what was coming.

  “I know, Mother, I know. I know how after Charlie the doctor said you would probably never be able to have another child. I know how you prayed and prayed, how much you especially wanted at least one daughter. How the years passed and passed and you kept praying and praying and praying.”

  You are my miracle, Savannah remembered Mother saying when she was very young, when they were out for a stroll, when Mother washed her hair, tucked her into bed.

  How alarmed Mother got over a skinned knee, a cold. When Spanish flu hit, Mother was in such a panic. All that Lysol F&F.

  And those stupid dress rehearsals for the first time she and Yolande were allowed to leave their block. Mother had actually made a map of the route they were to take to Board’s. Three times they practiced the route.

  Mother walking a few feet behind them.

  Mother reminding them to look both ways.

  Mother had moved to the window. “Things are becoming more dangerous for us, Savannah. With the war over, so many soldiers unable to find work …” Mother was wringing her hands. “With these being hard times for so many people, whitefolks are getting their backs up more and more, grumbling. The mere sight of a Negro in uniform … And what with so many of our people leaving parts South for up North, out West … This migration is growing greater and with it, the rage.”

  “But why?”

  “Money. Power. It’s always one or the other. Or both. Added to that, there’s fear … My point, Savannah, is that you seem so keen to just—just shrug off, turn your back on, even, all that we’ve made possible for you.” Mother shook her head, rubbed her upper arms as if she had a chill. “At such a time as this.”

  Savannah thought for a bit, then returned to her goal. “But, Mother dear, what does any of this have to d
o with Nannie Burroughs’s school?”

  A VERY BAD INFLUENCE

  “You’re going to do what?”

  That Nella was a bad, a very bad influence.

  Yolande had heard that people from the islands did voodoo, drank blood.

  Had Nella cast a spell on Savannah?

  “Why would you want to volunteer there?”

  “You should see it, Yolande! It’s a little village, a piece of paradise. Girls out there, they really do things!”

  “Like what?”

  “They have a laundry business, a store. In the summer, a farm stand.”

  “You want to do laundry, work in a shop, sell vegetables?”

  “Girls out at Lincoln Heights run things. They are—they are making lives.”

  Yolande shook her head. “And your parents are letting you do this?”

  “Yes. Two Saturdays a month—and maybe more. And on two conditions. I must keep my grades up and Father must drive me out there and pick me up at four.”

  They were a few blocks away from Dunbar. Savannah in a navy blue pleated skirt and shawl-collared white blouse, her tan coat, like her school bag, slung over a shoulder. Yolande in a white tucked-collar blouse beneath a burgundy serge-and-silk ripple-back suit was increasingly annoyed by what seemed to her Savannah’s ever-widening strides.

  “I’ve heard very bad things about Nannie Burroughs,” Yolande sputtered.

  Both girls were walking in white hose and black patent leather Mary Janes.

  “Like what?”

  “She doesn’t much care for our set.”

  “Nonsense. If that were true she wouldn’t have welcomed me to lend a helping hand. And you know she went to M Street. Graduated with honors.”

  “But she’s from common folk. I think her parents or maybe it was her grandparents—in any event she comes from slaves. Virginia, I think.”

  Yolande didn’t know what to make of Savannah’s queer look.

  “So what?” Savannah finally said. “Dr. Woodson’s parents were slaves for many years. Ida Wells-Barnett, she was born a slave. She wasn’t in slavery for long, but—”

  “But—”

  “But what? Think about it. If Nannie Burroughs graduated with honors from M Street, if Dr. Woodson graduated from Harvard, if Ida Wells-Barnett became a first-rate journalist—what does that tell you? For heaven’s sake, Frederick Douglass was born a slave!”