Pulling out the bottle of laudanum, Lisbeth said, “Let’s return this to Father’s bedside.”
Lisbeth wanted to rush upstairs, but she forced herself to go slowly. Julianne or Mother might be nearby, and she did not want to alert them that anything was amiss.
Lisbeth paused at the door, uncertain about what she would find on the other side. She turned the knob, Emily close behind. The room was dark, and the air smelled foul. The loud rattle of dying breaths filled the room. Father was still alive. Lisbeth let out a sigh. She didn’t relish once again leaving him to face his death alone. She looked at Emily. They crossed to each side of his bed and looked down at the man who had fathered them both. Lisbeth let that understanding sink in a bit further. Emily was her sister. She still didn’t know what that meant, but she was glad to have the truth of it.
Lisbeth startled at the sound of fumbling at the doorknob. The two women looked over in unison. Lisbeth expected to see Julianne, but she was surprised to see Mother, disheveled and bleary-eyed. She stared at the two women, looking back and forth between them for too long, hostility and pain in her eyes.
Along with fear and disappointment, a new emotion rose in Lisbeth—sympathy. This woman, her mother, had been forced to live with Emily for decades. How soon after her wedding did the nineteen-year-old bride learn that the beautiful, light-skinned girl was her husband’s daughter? Lisbeth could barely imagine the confusion and betrayal she must have felt at the time, and perhaps every day since.
Finally Mother stopped glaring at the two young women and looked at her husband in the bed. She asked, “Is he gone?”
The sounds of his breathing were so loud that the answer was obvious. The question was strange, but Lisbeth answered, not unkindly, “No.”
Mother walked to the end of the bed and stared at Father’s face. “This is taking forever,” she declared. “It is making me ill.”
“We can get you to bed, ma’am,” Emily said, and took Mother’s arm.
“Don’t touch me!” Mother jerked her arm away and scolded Emily. “My daughter is here, now. She will help me.”
Lisbeth raised an eyebrow at Emily and signaled with a hand for her to stay there. Lisbeth took the soon-to-be widow’s hand and led her out of the room, taking the laudanum with her.
“I have your medicine, Mother.” Lisbeth adopted Emily’s soothing voice. “We’ll get you tucked in, and you won’t have to think about any of this.”
Despite her newfound sympathy, Lisbeth was still going to abandon this woman. In the morning, her mother’s life as she knew it would be over. She’d have to move, dependent on the mercy of her bitter drunkard son. Lisbeth felt sick at her own capacity for deception, to uphold appearances, but from the moment of her birth, her mother had taught her well.
Once again, Lisbeth wished only to escape from this life.
After leaving the house for the third time that night, Lisbeth and Emily made it to the stand of trees and found their people. Matthew and Sammy rushed to her as she walked up and welcomed her back in an extended embrace.
“Momma, Willie says you rescued him!” Sammy beamed at his mother.
“I suppose I did.” She smiled back at him. She was no Harriet Tubman, but today she’d done what had to be done, at least for a few people.
“I hope you won’t make a habit of it,” Matthew said. “My heart can’t take the stress!”
“I promise I have no intention of repeating the experiences of this night, ever again,” Lisbeth reassured him.
Sammy pointed. “Can I ride in the wagon with Willie?”
She looked at Matthew. He nodded, and she replied, “I don’t see why not.”
“Thanks,” Sammy yelled as he ran off to join his friend.
“Where is Sadie?” Lisbeth asked Matthew.
He pointed to one of the wagons. Her daughter was asleep, curled up with her head resting on Jordan’s lap. Lisbeth joined them in the wagon bed.
“Thank you for giving her comfort,” Lisbeth said, patting her daughter’s back. Oh, to be so innocent.
Jordan smiled and nodded. Most of the time Lisbeth didn’t think of this Jordan as the same precious baby she’d loved so many years ago, but in this moment, time folded and she fully felt that the lovely young woman in front of her was the same person as the infant she had carried in her arms.
Lisbeth’s heart welled up. “You were the first baby I ever loved, Jordan.”
Jordan gave a small laugh. “My mama tells me that. I know you made my blanket, which I still have, but I don’t remember.” She shrugged.
“Of course you don’t,” Lisbeth said. “You were so young, hardly more than a year when you left.”
The two women sat in silence in the dark, with Sadie sleeping between them. Lisbeth watched the others getting ready to go to Washington. She had more to say, but felt vulnerable.
Eventually she screwed up her courage. “Thanks for sharing your mama with me. I’m not one of her real children. But she’s the best mother I had.”
“I’m not so sure about that,” Jordan replied.
Lisbeth looked at Jordan, her eyebrows furrowed in a question.
“I’m not so sure that you aren’t one of her ‘real’ children,” Jordan clarified. “In our own peculiar way, we’re a family of sorts.”
A sweet warmth passed through Lisbeth. She certainly felt more of a kinship with Mattie, Samuel, and Jordan than she did with her mother, father, and brother. It was sweet to know Jordan might feel something similar toward her.
Sadie stretched her head up and looked around. “Momma! You’re back. Did you get Willie?”
Lisbeth nodded at her daughter. Whatever was left of the conversation with Jordan would go unsaid.
“Then we get to go home!” Sadie declared. “Right, Miss Jordan?”
“Sadie,” Jordan said gently, her voice full of emotion. “I’m not going back to Ohio.”
Sadie’s face fell. “You aren’t?!”
Lisbeth’s heart hurt for her daughter.
Jordan shook her head and replied, “I’m going to be a teacher in Richmond, with the freed little children. And some not-so-little ones.”
Lisbeth said to Jordan, “Your mother will miss you.”
Jordan nodded.
Sadie looked at Lisbeth, her chin quivering. “Is it bad that I’m sad?”
Lisbeth pulled Sadie onto her lap for a cuddle. “It’s never a sin to love.”
“I will come for visits,” Jordan reassured Sadie. “When I do, will you come to dinner?”
“Can I, Momma?” Sadie asked, looking at Lisbeth with such hope in her eyes.
Lisbeth nodded. “That would be real nice.” She smiled at Jordan. “For all of us.”
Sadie cuddled up against Lisbeth in the back of the wagon. They were stopped in front of Miss Grace’s home, dropping Jordan off. After they said their farewells they were going to drive through the night, heading north into Washington, DC, and through Pennsylvania to Ohio. They were confident they would be safe once they crossed out of Virginia. In the unlikely event that Jack followed them, they would be hours ahead of him. Lisbeth sincerely believed he would be too overwhelmed with Father’s death, and his own humiliation, to seek them out so far from home, especially in the heart of the federal government.
Lisbeth watched Jordan saying goodbye to her family. She saw Mattie reach into her bodice and pull out her shell necklace. She slipped it over her own head and placed it over Jordan’s. The younger woman started to protest. Lisbeth couldn’t hear what Mattie said, but she saw them hug.
Sadie said, “Her necklace is just like yours!”
Lisbeth replied, “It sure is.” Lisbeth pulled it out and fingered the shell. “Mattie gave this to me to remind me that her love would always be with me.”
“When I grow up will you pass yours to me?” Sadie asked.
Lisbeth looked at Sadie and thought about all that she had already passed on to her; then she nodded, and said, “I sure will.”
&
nbsp; “Momma,” Sadie said, sounding very serious.
“Sadie,” Lisbeth replied, matching her daughter’s tone.
“Sammy says he’s gonna introduce Willie as his friend at school. And he says I get to introduce Ella as my friend, but I don’t think that’s quite right.”
Lisbeth asked, “Why not?”
“I don’t know.” Sadie shrugged. “They just seem like they are something different than friends.”
Lisbeth understood what her daughter was struggling with. What were these people to them? Lisbeth looked around at the faces of the group who would be making the journey back home with them: Samuel, Emmanuel, Mattie, Sarah, Ella, Emily, William, and Willie.
“You can tell everyone they’re your kith, Sadie.”
“My what?”
“These folks are our kith, the people we are connected to because of our choices. Somewhere between friends and family.”
Sadie looked satisfied with that answer. She gave a decisive nod, then lay down by Lisbeth, ready to sleep for the night. Mattie climbed into the wagon on Lisbeth’s other side.
Matthew and Emmanuel were in the front, ready to guide the horses out of town. Lisbeth and Mattie would take shifts later in the night, but for now they would get a chance to sleep.
Lisbeth held Mattie’s hand as they drove away. Jordan waved, her arm held up high. Miss Grace stood at her side. Lisbeth watched the young woman get smaller and smaller until she disappeared from sight.
“Jordan is going to be all right, Mattie,” Lisbeth said. “You raised a strong, and kind, woman. You can be proud.”
A sweet smile on her face, Mattie gazed at Lisbeth, like she was looking right into her soul, and said, “I did. And I am.”
EPILOGUE
JORDAN
Richmond, Virginia
Teachers aren’t supposed to have favorites, but I do. Tessie captured a special place in my heart the first time she boldly declared, “Show me!”
My affection grows each time she takes my hand as we travel the four blocks from our home to school. She chats as we walk, speculating about the morning ahead of us and reminding me of the chores we left unfinished yesterday.
It wasn’t hard for me to convince Miss Grace that this precocious girl would be a wonderful addition to her life. She only met Tessie once before agreeing to take her in. They fill a longing in each other’s lives, and I’m greatly relieved that Tessie and Miss Grace will take care of one another after I’ve finished my time here. I wish I could say that I have found permanent homes for all of the children in my school, but saying something is true doesn’t make it so.
Eager to please, Tessie helps me get this one-room school ready for the other students. We straighten the desks, tidy the books, and wash the slates clean. When everything is set, she looks at me and waits for my nod. When I give it, she swings open the door with a flourish, stretching her arms wide in a grand gesture of greeting.
I stand in the threshold to welcome each student individually. At the beginning of the term I learned what each prefers, a hug or a handshake, and I respect their boundaries, though I get a special joy when a child comes to trust me enough to seek out an embrace. These children do not have enough affection in their lives.
Most of these children are like Sophia, my little cousin who isn’t so young anymore, alone in the world without a loved one to provide daily care for them. Only a few have found a permanent refuge. Their mothers, fathers, sisters, and brothers are lost. And to their families, they are missing children. I imagine some of their names are being called out in churches on Sunday mornings while congregants listen intently, desperate to hear a familiar name.
When my students are seated, I cross to the front of the class and gaze out at all their hopeful faces. Children of all ages and capacities stare back at me. They range in color from nearly white to the darkest of dark. Some are quick and confident, others deliberate and cautious. All of us are former slaves, though they have memories of that experience that I do not. These precious children know the suffering of backbreaking work, forced separations, and grisly warfare.
I have the privilege of opening up the world of education to them, though too often I’m entirely inadequate to the task. I pray that, if only from my example, they will imagine so much more for their futures than they lived with in their pasts.
I’m emboldened by the realization that many, many classrooms just like this one are giving newly freed people tools to succeed in the postslavery world. I am only one of scores of teachers who are educating for the betterment of the Negro race.
Too often this work is overwhelming and seemingly insufficient in the face of so much pain and need. The children casually compare stories of whippings, and killings, and near starvation. They display their physical and spiritual scars as if they are natural and commonplace. And for them they are. I want to shield them from worldly realities that are too distressing for children to learn about, but it is too late. These stories are simply a reflection of the lives they have already lived.
Some of them are so withdrawn I doubt they will be capable of caring for themselves when the time comes. Others are so prone to anger, for understandable reasons, that I fear for their futures. But whenever doubts overwhelm me, I call Sophia to my mind.
I like to imagine that she is in a classroom, similar to this one, being taught with respect and kindness. I remind myself that I alone cannot ensure a good life for these children, but I am one person planting seeds that may encourage them to take steps in the right direction. As Mama says, I will not know which seeds will take root and flourish, but the sowing itself is an act of faith. In the midst of so much ongoing ugliness, these are the faces of hope.
As I do each day, I slip my hand into my pocket and feel the mustard seeds Mama left with me. I say a silent prayer for our lost soul: God, please watch over Sophia. Keep her safe, and help her to come home to Cousin Sarah.
And then I recite my prayer for the children that are right here in front of me: God, help me to be a worthy guide for these hearts, souls, and minds. Amen.
And then I get to work.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I’m grateful for these resources:
Louisa Hoffman, Archival Assistant at Oberlin College
Roslyn at the Library of Congress
Help Me to Find My People: The African American Search for Family Lost in Slavery by Heather Andrea Williams
“Life in Virginia by a Yankee Teacher” by Margaret Newbold Thorpe
Negroes and Their Treatment in Virginia from 1865 to 1867 by John Preston McConnell
Plain Counsels for Freedmen by Clinton B. Fisk, assistant commissioner in the Freedmen’s Bureau
“Richmond Slave Trail,” http://www.rvariverfront.com/monuments/slavetrail.html
Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of Black Americans from the Civil War to World War II by Douglas A. Blackmon
Slavery by Another Name documentary, http://www.pbs.org/tpt/slavery-by-another-name/home/
Worse than Slavery: Parchman Farm and the Ordeal of Jim Crow Justice by David M. Oshinsky
Republicans and Reconstruction in Virginia, 1856–70 by Richard G. Lowe
Thank you to these individuals and groups:
The people who read drafts, including Heather MacLeod, Jodi Warshaw, Gogi Hodder, Darlanne Hoctor, Amanda Smith, Sheri Prud’homme, Rinda Bartley, Roz Amaro, Aria Killebrew-Bruehl, Jill Miller, Dan Goss, Margie Biblin, Kathy Post, Carmen Tomaš, Sarah Prud’homme
Terry Goodman for finding my needle in the self-publishing haystack
The Lake Union and Amazon Publishing teams, including Jodi Warshaw, Tiffany Yates Martin, Gabriella Dumpit, Irene Billings, and the rest of you whose names I don’t know
My Woolsey family for hope, support, and connection in these painful times; I love you all
The Tijuana Gals for laughter, tears, honest conversation—and names for characters
The First Unitarian Church of Oakland for challenging me to grow in f
aith and kindness for more than thirty years
BOOK CLUB QUESTIONS
1. At the start of Mustard Seed, Mattie and Lisbeth have a deep love for one another, though they have not been close in many years—even in a community like Oberlin. Why do you believe there was a distance between them? Talk about any people in your life who were like family to you and then you grew apart from.
2. Early in the novel, both Lisbeth and Jordan proclaim that slavery has been abolished and it is time to move forward as a nation. As the story progresses we learn that the owning class is using alternative ways to get reduced-price labor. What are some examples? How did these methods surprise you, if any did?
3. What character did you relate to? Like? Dislike?
4. Faith played a large role in Mustard Seed. Talk about any ways you identify with the faith of one of the characters in the book. How did any of the characters make you think about faith in a new or different way, if at all?
5. Lisbeth returned to Virginia to care for her dying father. Mattie returned to Virginia to encourage her niece, Sarah, to move to Ohio. How compelling was each reason to you?
6. Oftentimes it is difficult for a younger generation to really understand their parents’ life experiences, as well as the other way around. Discuss a time in your life when this was true, and if you were able to bridge the gap, how that came about.
7. The ongoing, often hidden, effect of war is a subtheme in Mustard Seed. How does that resonate in your life? In our nation?
8. Family is a theme in this novel. What are some examples of the various ways people become family to one another in Mustard Seed? How does chosen versus inherited (blood, marriage, adoption) family function in your life?
9. How do the life experiences you read about in Mustard Seed impact how you understand race relations in the United States today?
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