Mandingo

by Kyle Onstott

  ‘Big Pearl, yas, suh.’

  ‘I have the full brother of Big Pearl, from Lucy bred back to Xerxes. He is about three years, nearly four, older than Pearl. Handsome an animal as ever you saw—bigger, finer all over than Xerxes. If you want to take him along with you and let your papa look at him and try him, you’re welcome to do so. That is, if he wants to go, and he will want to.’

  ‘I’d have to keep him until May, when I come back to Crowfoot fer my weddin’.’

  ‘That’s all right. Keep him as long as you like. When you are through with him, write him a pass, give him a package of pone and turn him loose. He’ll come home. There’s only one thing.’

  ‘Yas, suh.’

  ‘He is mortgaged, in the amount of fifteen hundred dollars, I think—it may be only twelve hundred—and a couple of year’s interest. The whole of The Coign is mortgaged and every stick of furniture and every slave. The mortgages are all mature and interest is delinquent, and I am just living here on the sufferance of the Jew, who refuses to kick an old man out and is waiting for me to die to foreclose upon his property. Jew Wertheimer of Mobile, no matter what folks may say about Jews, is a white man. If that Mandingo buck should die or even be crippled while he is your possession, you’d have to pay off the mortgage on him. I wouldn’t want the Jew to stand the loss, after his leniency to me, and I should be unable to pay him.’

  ‘Of course, that all right. Papa do that, of course. I’ll give you a writin’ about it.’

  ‘No writing required, just a clear understanding. If Warren Maxwell’s boy isn’t good for a dead nigger, my faith in human nature dies and I might as well die with it. I haven’t lived eighty-seven years without learning to know men, especially when I know their breeding—and you can’t deny yours. Maybe you’d like to see him.’

  ‘I’d thank you, suh. Sure would like to see that Mandingo.’

  ‘Is he a fightin’ nigger?’ Charles asked.

  ‘Cain’t you never think about nothin’ but fightin’, Charles?’ demanded Hammond.

  ‘Ben, oh Ben,’ Wilson called, pounding on the floor with the poker to summon the butler, who appeared immediately. ‘Round up that Ganymede and bring him in here.’

  ‘Whut you call that boy, Mista Wilson? Ganymede; whut kind of name is that?’ Hammond asked.

  ‘I usually call him Mede. I carry him in the books and on the mortgage as Ganymede.’

  ‘That whut I take you to say. Whut it mean?’

  ‘Well, to tell it without blushing, Zeus, the sovereign god of the Greeks, saw a boy named Ganymede and fell so in love with him that he sent a great eagle to steal the boy and to carry him off in its talons to Mount Olympus where the boy served Zeus as a cup-bearer, that is he poured his wine, and for other purposes.’

  ‘Other purposes? Whut other purposes?’

  ‘Well, other purposes—whatever Zeus wanted.’

  The door opened and Ben asked, ‘Ready for Mede, suh?’

  ‘Yes, let him come in,’ replied the master.

  Mede bounded in and filled the room, which was not large enough to give him scope. His legs seemed made of springs. He moved like a stallion and yet maintained the dignity of a potentate. Though some six feet two or three inches, he looked taller than he was. He seemed incapable of fear, and his subservience to his kindly master derived from devotion.

  ‘Mede, come here,’ was hardly uttered when the boy was across the floor, standing docile but nervous in front of the old man’s chair.

  Hammond noticed that his skin was not dead black but a deep, warm brown, like polished walnut, with vague hints of red in the cheeks. His eyes were spaced wide in his broad face, but within the temples, flush with the cheeks and without much overhang to the brow of the low forehead. The bridge of the nose was not quite flat and the enormous round nostrils were animated by the boy’s breathing. The large, regular teeth were yellow and bone-like behind the wide opening which formed the thick-lipped but not protruding mouth. The lower jaw was massive and square. A mat of kinky, coarse wool grew low and formed a straight line across the forehead. The effect was barbaric, like some rough-hewn sculpture, a great unfinished carving, with a head so powerful and primitive as to inspire fear—except for the eyes, black, long-lashed, and benevolent. The eyes rested on their master with adoration.

  ‘Mede, step out of your clothes and show these gentlemen what you have.’ The command was modulated into a request. ‘They won’t mind a little musk, if Ben didn’t give you time to wash yourself.’

  ‘Masta, are you planning to sell me?’ Mede asked with interest but without alarm.

  ‘No such luck,’ scoffed the master. ‘You know damned well, Mede, that I wouldn’t sell you without asking you.’

  ‘You need money, Masta, and I’m worth a good price. It’s all right with me if you want to sell me.’ Mede was kneeling to unbuckle his shoes.

  ‘I’ll do the worrying around The Coign about getting all of us something to eat, boy, and I won’t have to sell you either. I don’t eat my slaves. The reason I’d like to sell you is to know what is going to happen to you, to get you a good master before I die.’

  ‘I knows that, Masta.’

  ‘God damn it, stop that nigger talk. You grew up to speak English,’ the first harshness the master had shown.

  ‘I know, Masta,’ Mede corrected himself contritely.

  ‘That’s better.’

  ‘Yes, suh. Let the old niggers, Ben and the others, worry about new masters. I’ll bring too much money on the block for a new masta to treat me bad.’ Mede cast aside his shirt and stepped out of his pants.

  Hammond nodded his head in approval. ‘A right purty boy,’ he said. ‘Looks like Big Pearl, too, even bigger. Right purty,’ he repeated.

  Soundness was not in question, but Hammond rose to run exploratory hands over the boy’s shoulders and arms, stroked his thighs and smiled his admiration. Hammond knew a fine Negro when he looked at one.

  Wilson realized the pleasure Hammond took from seeing so magnificent an animal, and, connoisseur himself, sensed Hammond’s speechless admiration. Ham merely looked at the old man and nodded.

  ‘Thought perhaps you’d like him. Young, not at his best even yet, but a better buck than his sire. Think Warren would want to use him?’

  ‘Papa sure would admire to see him. Just whut he cravin’ fer Lucy and Big Pearl. He splendiferous,’ answered Hammond.

  Ganymede, aware of his own magnificence, made the most of it. He flexed his muscles, twisted his body from side to side, stooped and rose.

  ‘Mede, squat down there and listen to me,’ said the master. ‘Mr. Maxwell, here, is—or, rather, Mr. Maxwell’s father is an old friend of mine.’

  ‘Yes, suh,’ Mede said.

  ‘He wants to keep the breed pure. Mr. Maxwell wants to borrow you for stock, and I’d like to accommodate him. What do you say? Do you want to go with him? Nobody is going to make you.’

  ‘What you say, Masta. When do we start?’

  ‘I’ll tell you later. Mr. Maxwell will stay here a few days. I’ll tell you. Now, take your rags and go back to the quarters.’

  Mede threw his shirt and trousers over his arm and stooped to gather his shoes.

  ‘Wait,’ Ham interposed, at last finding words for the exciting idea that had been growing in his mind since Mede appeared. ‘Mista Wilson, would you sell this buck?’

  The old man hesitated. ‘You’d want him for yourself and not to sell again?’ he asked.

  Mede looked at Wilson, then at Hammond, and again at Wilson. He trusted his master, but was no indifferent spectator of his destiny.

  ‘Wants him to keep,’ Hammond explained. ‘Fact is, I wants him fer a fighter. I ben lookin’ around. Kin he fight, do you reckon?’

  ‘Sure kin. Sure kin fight,’ Charles interposed. The very word thrilled him. ‘Buy him; why don’t you?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Wilson. ‘He’s strong enough. When old Xerxes was gored, the young one grabbed hold of that bull’s
horns and broke its neck. Can you fight, Mede?’

  ‘Who you want me to whip? What for?’ the Negro asked, with a show of interest, even of alacrity. ‘Yes, suh, I can fight. Yes, suh.’

  ‘I’ve heard something about this recent sport of fighting bucks, but I never saw a main of it. Something we didn’t do in my days,’ said Wilson. ‘Must be exciting as a horse race, but dangerous. I’d hate to have Mede ruined in a fight.’

  ‘All the young gen’lemen has their fightin’ boys,’ explained Hammond. ‘I ben a-cravin’ one. Papa say I should buy me one, but buy a good one, one that kin whup.’

  ‘This here one is good. He kin win for us. Whyn’t you buy him?’

  ‘Don’t know yet does Mista Wilson crave to sell him,’ Hammond answered.

  ‘Yes, I’d sell him—to you,’ Wilson conceded. ‘That is, provided the boy wants to go. Think you want to, Mede? Want to be Mr. Maxwell’s fighting nigger?’

  ‘And have those wenches all the time?’ the Negro stipulated.

  ‘Well, when we not readyin’ fer a fight. Won’t have you wearin’ yourse’f out a-pesterin’ wenches,’ Hammond made that clear.

  ‘Wouldn’t hurt him none,’ Charles interposed, and was ignored.

  ‘Mr. Maxwell will treat you well. Good food and plenty. Of course, things will not be the same as here. You would have to find Mr. Maxwell’s ways and follow them; obey him. What do you say? I can’t live much longer, and it is better than being sold on the block to you don’t know whom.’

  ‘It is better,’ Mede agreed.

  ‘How much you want fer him, Mr. Wilson, suh?’ asked Hammond.

  ‘I don’t know. I just don’t know. Mede is a sort of fancy nigger—something special that ought to bring a good figure. As I said, the Jew in Mobile lent me twelve or fifteen hundred on him—I don’t remember the exact amount—and you know what that means he’s worth,’ the owner speculated. ‘No telling what such a boy would bring in the market, but to you, to your father, to a good home where he won’t be abused and overworked—is three thousand dollars out of the way? Is it too much?’

  ‘I reckon he worth it. A right purty boy.’ Hammond hesitated. He reached out and pulled Mede toward him. ‘Kneel down,’ he commanded. He had forgotten to examine the teeth.

  ‘Find anything wrong with him after you get him home, or if Warren doesn’t like him, turn him loose and tell him to come back to The Coign. There’ll be no hard feeling,’ Wilson specified.

  ‘Papa will cotton on to him, all right,’ said Hammond, stroking the black shoulder.

  ‘That’s too much,’ Wilson decided. ‘Can’t bleed the son of an old friend. I said three thousand; make it twenty-seven hundred and fifty. That’s better. That’s enough. That’s all any nigger is worth.’

  ‘I’ll come back next week and git him,’ Ham promised. ‘I ain’t got that much—not with me. I’ll come, sure. You won’t sell this buck to somebody else, Mista Wilson, suh?’

  ‘Don’t talk nonsense. Take him along. Take him with you. You can send the money.’

  Mede rose to his feet, again picked up his clothes, then sank to his knees before the old man’s chair, embracing Wilson with his arms and burying his face against his chest. He was convulsed with sobs.

  ‘What’s the matter, Mede? I asked you first, before I sold you. There, there. Mr. Maxwell will release us from my bargain. You won’t have to go. Get up.’

  Mede clung to Wilson the tighter. ‘It’s best,’ he said. ‘I want to go. I want a wench. I want to fight. But I love The Coign. I love you, Masta. You’re so good, Masta, suh, and so old. I love you.’

  Wilson ran his fragile fingers through the wool of the great black head and patted it gently. Then he loosened the boy’s hold on him and pushed him away. Tears gathered in his eyes, but he did not wipe them away. He looked out of the window as Mede rose and gathered his clothes.

  ‘That all, Masta?’

  ‘That’s all, Mede. You can go now. That is, unless your masta, your new masta, has orders for you.’

  ‘No, I reckon not,’ said Ham. ‘You kin go. Be ready in the mornin’, early like.’

  The silence that ensued after the Negro had gone was broken by Charles. ‘He right powerful buck. We carry him to town and fight him next Sat’day? Eh, Cousin Hammond?’

  ‘We trains him first. We got to learn him and toughen him.’

  Ben entered with an armload of wood for the fire, and discharged it. As he brushed the ashes that littered the hearth, nobody spoke. He rose to go.

  ‘I sold Mede, Ben,’ his master announced.

  ‘Sold Mede? I didn’t think you’d do that, suh. Then The Coign is breaking up. We’ll all go soon.’

  ‘Yes, we’ll all go soon,’ echoed the master.

  ‘Supper will be ready right away, suh. We’re having a haunch of venison, that young doe that Old Frank shot up by the wood lot.’

  ‘Ought not to shoot does. Let ’em live and breed. Tell Frank not to shoot does,’ said Wilson, frowning. Frank had no sense of values.

  The Colonel’s punctilious observance of a host’s duties was further demonstrated after the evening meal which Ben served with slow ceremony.

  ‘We go to bed early at The Coign. Not much else to do. Reading by candelight, hard on the eyes, although I want to go through Propertius once more, just once more, before I die,’ Wilson declared, pushing back his chair from the supper table and draining the port from his glass. ‘But you’ll want wenches for the night, I suspect. I haven’t forgotten when I was young.’

  ‘Not needful, suh. Really not needful. I plenty tired out from ridin’ all the way from Crowfoot,’ Hammond made a polite protest.

  ‘And you, suh?’ The old man turned to Charles. ‘You’re not too young to wrestle with a healthy wench? I have no desire to corrupt youth.’

  Charles looked at his plate with embarrassment. ‘I has a wench at home, suh. My papa given her to me.’

  ‘Well, well, I supposed so,’ said Wilson. ‘Ben, are those three girls ready? Bring ’em in and let the young gentlemen take their choice.’

  ‘That Lutitia can’t come, suh. It’s her time, her time of the month, suh,’ Ben explained.

  ‘Well, bring the two,’ Wilson commanded. ‘I’ve been waiting for some personable young white men for these girls. Except for their brother, their half brother, I have no young buck for them and I do not feel like putting them to a worn-out old man. They’re too nice. Fact is, they’re fancies.’

  Ellen and Edna had been waiting in the kitchen for this summons. They edged their way through the door in Ben’s wake and took places in the shadows beside it. Edna smothered a giggle with her hand. Both were enveloped in starched frocks that reached the floor.

  ‘Come here, my dears, and let the gentlemen look at you,’ commanded Wilson, extending his hand in invitation.

  They came forward with a show of reluctance and stood beside their master’s chair. Both looked steadily at the floor. Wilson grasped Ellen’s hand and patted it.

  ‘You’re virgin, aren’t you, Ellen? That is, you are pure—you never had a man. Isn’t that so?’ the master inquired.

  Ellen nodded.

  ‘These gentlemen, Mr. Maxwell and Mr. Woodford, want you to sleep with them—in their beds. You know what that means, don’t you?’

  Ellen blushed and nodded again, and Edna suppressed another giggle.

  ‘You want to do it? You’re sure?’

  ‘Whatever Masta says,’ assented Ellen. The assent of the other was silence.

  ‘You gentlemen will have to decide between yourselves which is for which. There is little to choose, I judge. Come around and let the gentlemen look at you, Ellen.’

  Hammond’s indifference was real. ‘Either,’ he said.

  ‘I likes the little ’un, the light ’un. I’d sooner have her,’ Charles declared without reticence.

  ‘These two and the other one are the only young wenches I have left. I had a young overseer at The Coign for a couple of seasons abou
t sixteen or seventeen years ago—a good looking, well set up youth, named Hall, Willis Hall. White trash, I suppose, but he made good cotton crops. The wenches on the plantation were all crazy for him, and he just as crazy for them. I didn’t have a good light stock buck at the time, and so I let this Hall have his way. I’d have him yet, I suppose, but he got religion, took to praying all over the plantation, finally wound up with a craving to preach. He had visions of some kind, said he heard the Lord calling him to gather sinners. One month he wouldn’t touch a wench; the next month he was at them worse than ever. I think the call to preach was a mere satiety with yellow flesh and a craving for white women; niggers no longer good enough for him. He left, and I haven’t had any luck with overseers since, nor a fair crop of cotton.’

  ‘Willis Hall? That was the preacher at Benson last year, till he got into some kind of a scrape,’ said Hammond.

  ‘I hear of him around, now and again. Made quite a preacher,’ said Wilson. ‘Woman scrape, I guess?’

  ‘No, somethin’ about him and another feller from Natchez tryin’ to steal a nigger. We’d a hung him if we had proof. Way it come out, they jest run him off.’

  ‘Well, Hall was the sire of these two. I think you may like them.’ Wilson got to his feet. ‘Ben will tell you where the gentlemen will sleep, young women; be sure you’re clean.’

  ‘Your bedtime, Masta, suh,’ announced Ben. ‘Come along now, please, suh. Time to go up.’

  ‘Well, orders are orders, gentlemen,’ the old man sighed resignedly. ‘Ben will take care of you. I trust you enjoy those wenches, but no obligation. Good night. Ben will show you up when you’re ready.’ As he spoke, the butler’s hand under his arm helped him to rise.

  Hammond rose and beckoned to Charles to do likewise. Wilson extended his hand to Charles first. As he clasped Hammond’s hand, he said, ‘Bless you for coming, my boy. You’re like your papa. You won’t forget to give him my compliments.’

  Soon Ben came back. ‘Want for anything, gentlemen?’

  ‘Only to go to bed,’ said Hammond. ‘Take us up, when you are ready.’

  ‘Then come with me, suh,’ said the old butler.