Mandingo

by Kyle Onstott

  The rain had abated to a drizzle. Hammond, against Doc Redfield’s counsel and Charles’s wish, decided to make for home. They ate their final dinner at Squires, relinquished their room to Charles, and paid their score.

  Redfield proposed one more drink, which Hammond refused. ‘We losin’ time,’ he said.

  Charles walked to the door and out on to the uneven brick sidewalk to watch them mount. He shook Redfield’s hand and held Hammond’s a full minute, patting his shoulder.

  ‘Whyn’t you carry that big buck of yourn acrost? Course, after cholerie is out of the city. I knows four or five fightin’ gen’lemen down the river whut got niggers, good niggers. I makin’ a match fer yourn any time, any time at all.’

  ‘You meanin’ my Mandingo?’ asked Hammond.

  ‘Yeh, that Mandingo, or whut you call him,’ Charles specified.

  Hammond made no reply. He motioned the boys with the empty litter into action. Redfield led the mule for a hundred yards and when he dropped the bridle the mule trudged after him.

  It was plain that the progress could be no faster than the boys could trot with the litter on their shoulders, and Hammond resigned himself to it, for he would not leave the hammock behind. Redfield was in no haste, and the pace suited the old mule well. The slogging over the rough roads and the necessity to keep in step bored the boys more than it tired them physically. Each few miles, Hammond permitted them to sit by the roadside and rest.

  Nothing untoward occurred on the journey. Hammond had counted upon making sixty or seventy miles a day without difficulty, whereas, with the boys carrying the litter, thirty miles was a good day’s journey, thirty-five was the maximum, and one day they covered but little more than twenty.

  The journey, Natchez to Falconhurst, used up seven days and on the final night there was no pause to sleep. The closer Hammond approached his destination, the more impatient to reach it he became. Two hours before daybreak he abandoned the party to Redfield’s care, gave Eclipse his head, and, breaking into a gallop, reached Benson before anybody was stirring and by eight o’clock turned into the lane at Falconhurst.

  Lucretia Borgia and Meg seemed to sense the arrival; on hearing the hoofbeats they came pell-mell to the gallery, where they waited for their master to alight. Lucretia Borgia gathered him in her arms and Meg stroked his long coat.

  ‘Whure Papa an’ them?’ the master demanded. ‘Ever’thin’ all right?’

  The latter question Lucretia Borgia refrained from answering. ‘Ol’ Masta, he good; he well, Masta, suh. I reckon he never hear,’ she said. ‘Git him, Meg. Tell him Masta done come.’

  But it was unnecessary. The older man appeared, radiant in his delight. He hugged and kissed his son until the youth led him into the house.

  ‘Whure—whure Blanche an’ all of ’em?’

  ‘Blanche ain’t a-feelin’ real good. She ain’t come down,’ the father explained.

  ‘Drunk?’

  ‘Well, no,’ the old man hedged. ‘That is, she ain’t drunk much. No more than she needin’, in her shape.’

  Hammond shook his head in doubt as he took a toddy from a tray with which Meg appeared. ‘An’ how Ellen? Whure she? Whyn’t she come?’ he asked.

  ‘Why, Ellen, I tell you,’ the old man hesitated. ‘She gone an’ slip that chil’ she totin’.’ There was a long silence as the father noted his son’s consternation.

  ‘Ellen right ’shamed. She a-skeared o’ seein’ you, Masta, suh,’ Lucretia Borgia interpolated. ‘I tellin’ her you not be mad.’

  ‘Slip it? How come?’

  Lucretia Borgia left the explanation to the master, and he only shrugged his pretended ignorance.

  ‘Whure she? I got to see her, got to know,’ said the distraught youth. ‘I got her somethin’. I brung her a presen’.’

  ‘She in the kitchen, a-waitin’,’ Lucretia Borgia told him, and he set down his toddy without tasting it and went to find her.

  Ellen was tremulous in anticipation of seeing her lover. As he entered, she faced him, but backed away as if to avoid his blows, which she would have withstood better than the anger she expected. ‘I never meant to. Masta, I never meant to,’ she pleaded, bursting into weeping.

  Hammond encircled her in his arms. ‘It all right; it all right,’ he assured her. ‘You well? Ellen, Honey, you gittin’ better, we make you another one. Cain’t you un’erstan’, Honey, it all right. I isn’t mad.’

  Ellen could only bury her face in his coat, sobbing her relief that she was not blamed.

  ‘Look, Ellen,’ said Hammond, forcing her to arm’s length. ‘Look. I done fetched you somethin’ from the city, somethin’ goin’ to make you purty. Not that you a-needin’ purtifyin’.’ He drew from his pocket the small packet and unwrapped the earrings from the tissue-paper around them. ‘There. Don’ that happify you?’

  Ellen took them, moved. ‘They fer me? They fer me? They purty enough fer a white lady,’ she beamed her thanks, and fell again to weeping.

  ‘I fetch some jest like ’em, same thing, fer Miz Blanche,’ said Hammond.

  ‘Miz Blanche, she already got holes; she kin wear hern. I got to have my ears punched.’

  Hammond had forgotten the need to pierce the ears. ‘Won’t hurt much. We tend to it first thing.’

  ‘They purty. They awful purty, Masta, suh.’ In her enthusiasm Ellen had forgotten her miscarriage. ‘You hadn’t ought. They cost.’

  ‘Nev’ mind, an’ they did,’ Hammond scoffed.

  Ellen held the jewels to her ears. ‘Ain’t no other nigger never had aught so purty.’

  ‘They markin’ you mine, my own, jest like my letters burned into your hide. You well enough fer tonight? See that you clean. Have Lucretia Borgia wash you all over.’ Hammond did not press for a cause of the accident. He returned to give his father an account of his trip.

  ‘Whure Doc Redfield?’ the father asked on the son’s return to the sitting-room. ‘He go on home? Whyn’t he stop by? Better have that boy heat up your toddy.’

  ‘Doc Redfield, he a-comin’ with the niggers. I rode ahead.’

  ‘Oh,’ the father was mollified. ‘Niggers goin’ down, I reckon? Ourn didn’ hardly fetch nothin’, the cholerie an’ all?’

  ‘Niggers up, goin’ up all the time. Natchez full of folks, runnin’ from cholerie. We done right good. Course, one run, that mustee,’ Ham admitted.

  ‘Git him?’

  ‘No. Still a-runnin’. I reckon he go home to Briarfiel’ where we bought him. I’m goin’ there fer him tomorrer.’

  The father was complacent, but chuckled his disparagement of the boy’s carelessness. ‘Won’t do no good,’ he shook his head. ‘That boy near white. He strikin’ North. I reckoned Redfield more watchful.’

  ‘He wanted I should chain ’em,’ Hammond absolved the doctor. ‘Here they are, a-comin’.’

  They went together out upon the gallery to receive Redfield, herding his charges down the lane. The doctor dismounted, exhausted, and shook the elder man’s hand.

  ‘Whut kin’ of gyascutus is that them bucks a-totin’?’ the old man asked.

  ‘It a carryin’ bed fer you to ride in aroun’ the plantation. You kin go anywhures now—down by the Tombigbee, up to the buryin’ grounds, out to the cotton, anywhures you craves,’ Hammond expanded with pride.

  ‘Huh!’ sniffed the rheumatic. ‘You expectin’ me to ride in that contraption, you wrong. Ain’t goin’, not a step. I got my own legs yet. Not strong, but I got ’em. Afore I ridin’ aroun’ nigger-back, I stay in an’ rest me.’

  ‘Ever’body in Natchez usin’ these carryin’ beds,’ Hammond exaggerated. ‘Ever’body who cain’t git aroun’.’

  ‘Cain’t he’p. I won’. May be all right in Natchez, an’ down in Brazil, an’ in all them fine-haired cities, but me out here in the country—no. It ain’t no Alabama dingus at all. Mayhap, all right to pleasure in, right sof’, an’ you ain’t got no feather bed, but fer a growed up man to go bouncin’ about on niggers’ shoul’
ers—why, even field niggers would lose their respeck.’

  Hammond knew that the rejection was final. He had wasted at least four days in bringing the litter, all to no purpose. Pride. He told the bearers to cast it on the gallery floor against the wall of the house.

  Instructing Lucretia Borgia to feed the four children well and afterwards to bed them down on long straw, Hammond drew Redfield into the house for breakfast. In the course of it, the doctor, fortified by two preliminary toddies, recounted with embellishments their experiences in the city. Redfield omitted to discuss the sale of the sterile Pole, since he had himself made it; nor did he mention Hammond’s illness and the meeting with Charles. This was a convenient negligence. He had heard Hammond’s promise to Charles not to tell Blanche about seeing him and he hoped that the secrecy from the wife would extend to the father. He had compunctions about neglect of his companion, although Hammond had never mentioned it.

  After breakfast, the older man suggested, ‘Bring your bag of gol’, Ham, an’ pay off Doc Redfield. Might as well, right now. How much we owin’ you, Doc?’

  ‘Nothin’, nothin’ at all. Won’t take nothin’, not a cent,’ affirmed Redfield.

  ‘Why?’ Maxwell demanded. ‘Hammond here has had a right fruitful trip. We countin’ on payin’. Only right!’

  ‘Beginnin’ with, Hammond pay ever’thin’, all I spent. Besides that, I sell one of them bucks fer three hun’ert dollars more than he a-wantin’ an he said I should keep the money. I didn’t crave——’

  ‘That case——’ Maxwell conceded. ‘But we willin’ to pay. I right obliged you goin’ along. If Ham got sick or a-needin’ somebody——’

  The allusion caused Redfield to wonder whether Hammond had told of his illness before his arrival. Maxwell was capable of such an oblique accusation. Redfield saw fit to take his departure. He could detect no lack of cordiality in the leave-taking.

  Hammond even accompanied the guest to his horse, after which he went to the cabin to examine the Mandingos. He found Mede reclining on the bed, Lucy standing above him feeding him bite by bite.

  ‘Whut ails him? Ain’t he got stren’th to eat his vittles?’ Hammond demanded with irritation.

  ‘Yas, suh, Masta, suh. Mede strong-like,’ replied Lucy. ‘On’y he likes I should feed him, layin’ down. An’ I likes to. He so purty.’ To the woman, Mede was like a great doll, a helpless baby to humour.

  ‘I’ll purty him,’ Hammond threatened.

  The boy arose to permit his master to inspect him. Hammond detected a softening of the belly muscles that he did not like. He accused the slave of neglecting his training. ‘Cain’t git no work out of you up here. I reckon you better be barned agin. Room a plenty down there now. This takin’ up——’

  ‘No, no, Masta, suh. He workin’ all the time. All the time, Mede here runnin’, jumpin’, a-liftin’. All the time. All the time.’ There was anxiety in Lucy’s voice.

  Mede was indifferent to the threat. He accepted whatever happened.

  ‘Well, keep him workin’ hisself. I be home to stay in three, four, five days, an’ then I takin’ him in han’. I learn him whut workin’ is.’

  After riding all night, Hammond was fatigued, and he returned to the house. Blanche, big-bellied and blowzy, had come downstairs.

  She rocked her chair gently and greeted her husband with, ‘Whut you fetch me? You gone a long while, an’ me here a-waitin’ fer it!’

  He drew the trinkets from his pocket and gave them to her. They pleased her beyond his expectations. She could only gasp and gasp again in her excitement.

  ‘They di’mon’s?’ she inquired.

  ‘Not di’monds,’ Hammond opined. ‘Di’monds white. These somethin’ else.’

  ‘They costs, I reckon.’

  Hammond admitted that they had some value. ‘Put ’em on,’ he suggested.

  Blanche struggled to insert the clasps into the small holes in her ears, which had shrunk from disuse. She ignored the pain.

  ‘Now I cain’t see ’em no more. Are they purty?’

  ‘Your hair brushed, an’ they goin’ to be. Cain’t see ’em now, your hair so snarly-like an’ hangin’.’ There was no note of censure in the statement.

  ‘Now, folks goin’ to know who your wife, who you buyin’ jewellery.’ Blanche turned her florid, bloated face from side to side the better to display the gift. Garnets accentuated the girl’s blondeness.

  The indiscretion of bringing identical presents to his wife and his concubine struck Hammond for the first time. Why had he not foreseen Blanche’s resentment, which was sure to follow? There was no occasion for a gift to Ellen, who had expected none—except that he loved her. The gift had been made and could not be withdrawn. He kept silent about it.

  ‘These ain’t nothin’. They don’ mark you my wife. But I got somethin’ that do. I got me that di’mond ring at las’.’ He got out the soiled ring Charles had thrown at him and placed it on her finger. ‘Now, that there is a di’mond,’ he said.

  Blanche examined it proudly and kissed it on her finger. ‘How it sparkle!’ she wondered, holding her soiled hand in the air and twisting her gross wrist. ‘Now I kin have my chil’. I married right. Plumb married.’

  ‘We married all right, even before. Your papa written it right in his Bible,’ Hammond asserted without satisfaction. ‘It hold. That chil’ of yourn legal.’

  ‘I knowin’, but now I got me the di’mon’ ring.’

  Hammond was cheered by the simple girl’s pleasure with her bauble.

  ‘She ain’t got none,’ Blanche gloated.

  ‘Who ain’t?’

  ‘That Ellen.’

  ‘Course not. She jest a nigger,’ Hammond scoffed.

  ‘She slip her chil’ while you away,’ Blanche introduced the subject tentatively and cautiously. She wanted to make sure that he did not know the cause.

  ‘That whut Papa say. Don’ know whut make her. I wantin’ you should be careful.’

  ‘I is. I ain’t slippin’ nothin’. I’s glad, glad she slip it. I didn’t do it, but I’s glad.’

  ‘How come? Whut fer you glad? That sucker worth a hunderd, two hunderd dollars the day she drop it,’ Hammond attributed his interest in the accident to the monetary value of the child.

  ‘Oh, she thinkin’ she so purty an’ all, rollin’ her eyes. Jes’ another nigger!’

  ‘Ellen don’ mean no harm. She right nice, an’ smooth,’ Hammond defended his property.

  ‘You a-thinkin’ that chil’ yourn?’

  ‘Whut chil’?’

  ‘That Ellen’s,’ Blanche said spitefully.

  Hammond shrugged an assumed ignorance. He had never denied to his wife his relationship with Ellen or any other wench.

  ‘One of the bucks, likely; liable all of ’em. She pleasurin’ with ’em all, ’specially that Mede,’ the wife asserted without denial from her spouse. ‘Leastwise, it come black,’ she went on, ‘or real dark, ever’body sayin’.’

  ‘Who sayin’? Who?’

  ‘Folks, niggers, ever’body who seen it. Real dark.’

  Hammond did not dispute the assertion. If the belief gave his wife any satisfaction, she was welcome. He was tired of the night’s ride, and tired of the conversation.

  ‘I reckon I better lay me down awhile,’ said Hammond. ‘I got to go agin, come mornin’.’

  When he awoke, Blanche was with his father, and he found no opportunity to tell of his meeting with Charles; nor could he tell of his illness without dragging Charles into the story. But such considerations paled before his joy at being home. Falconhurst, for Ham, was the centre of the world.

  20

  But there was the unfinished business of Ace’s escape, and the following day Hammond set out on his ride to Briarfield. Meg arose to dress him and Lucretia Borgia to prepare his breakfast. He was irked by the necessity to make the journey, irresolute in his determination to flog the truant slave when—and if—he should find him.

  He rode rapidly. His horse
had not been taxed on the trip from Natchez and had rested in his spacious stall the whole of the previous day. The morning was crisp with just a hint of frost, and activity warmed both horse and rider.

  Riding hard, he reached Fairfax in time for supper and Briarfield the following morning in time for dinner. But at Briarfield there was no news of Ace. The slave had not returned to his erstwhile home.

  Hammond was resigned; he had only half expected to find the boy, in any event, and he did not know where else to seek for him. Then a signpost reminded him how near he was to Crowfoot, and his wife’s parents. He had no will to go, but felt an obligation, since he was so near.

  ‘The ol’ Major goin’ loony, folks says,’ the innkeeper at Briarfield told Hammond. ‘Don’t know, my own self. Ain’t seed him fer a long time back.’

  ‘I ain’t heared nothin’, an’ Miz Maxwell ain’t,’ Hammond expressed his doubt.

  ‘It’s that boy that done it, that Charlie runnin’ away. Jest drove his pappy crazy.’

  Then Hammond knew he must go and see.

  When he rode into Crowfoot, he noticed that the plantation was in a better state than when he had last seen it. Fences had been repaired, gates were upright, weeds had been mowed, cabins whitewashed. The house was tightly shut up, although smoke came from the chimney and he knew somebody was at home. At length a Negro woman came from somewhere to take his horse and it was necessary for him to knock upon the door for admission.

  The Negro man, who after a while answered the knock, said, ‘Masta Dick out, suh, Masta. I ain’t know wha’ at are he. Come right in an’ set down, suh. You Miz Blanche’s man. I knows you.’

  ‘But whure Major Woodford? Whure your masta?’ Hammond inquired.