Roots: The Saga of an American Family

  Riding with the “punkins” on the wagon to unload them at a large building called the “barn,” Kunta was able to see that some of the black men were sawing a big tree into thick sections and splitting them with axes and wedges into firewood that children were stacking into long rows as high as their heads. In another place, two men were hanging over thin poles the large leaves of what his nose told him was the filthy pagan tobacco; he had smelled it once before on one of the trips he had taken with his father.

  As he rode back and forth to the “barn,” he saw that just as it was done in his own village, many things were being dried for later use. Some women were collecting a thick brown “sage-grass,” he heard them call it, and tying it into bundles. And some of the garden’s vegetables were being spread out on cloths to dry. Even moss—which had been gathered by groups of children and plunged into boiling water—was being dried as well; he had no idea why.

  It turned his stomach to watch—and listen—as he passed a pen where still more swine were being butchered. Their hair, too, he noticed, was being dried and saved—probably for mortar—but the thing that really sickened him was to see the swines bladders being removed, blown up, tied at the ends, and hung up to dry along a fence; Allah only knew for what unholy purpose.

  When he had finished harvesting and storing the “punkins,” Kunta was sent with several others to a grove of trees, the limbs of which they were told to shake vigorously so that the nuts growing in them would fall to the ground, where they were picked up by first-kafo children carrying baskets. Kunta picked up one of the nuts and hid it in his clothes to try later when he was alone; it wasn’t bad.

  When the last of these tasks was done, the men were put to work repairing things that needed it. Kunta helped another man fix a fence. And the women seemed to be busy in a general cleaning of the big white house and their own huts. He saw some of them washing things, first boiling them in a large black tub, then rubbing them up and down against a wrinkled piece of tin in soapy water; he wondered why none of them knew how to wash clothing properly by beating it against rocks.

  Kunta noticed that the whip of the “oberseer” seemed to strike down upon someone’s back much less often than before. He felt in the atmosphere something similar to the time in Juffure when the harvest had all been put safely into the storehouses. Even before the evening’s conch horn would blow to announce the end of the day’s work, some of the black men would begin cavorting and prancing and singing among themselves. The “oberseer” would wheel his horse around and brandish his whip, but Kunta could tell he didn’t really mean it. And soon the other men would join in, and then the women—singing words that made no sense at all to Kunta. He was so filled with disgust for all of them that he was glad when the conch horn finally signaled for them to return to their huts.

  In the evenings, Kunta would sit down sideways just inside the doorway of his hut, heels flat against the packed dirt floor to minimize the iron cuffs’ contact with his festering ankles. If there was any light breeze, he enjoyed feeling it blowing against him, and thinking about the fresh carpet of gold and crimson leaves he would find under the trees the next morning. At such times, his mind would wander back to harvest-season evenings in Juffure, with the mosquitoes and other insects tormenting the people as they sat around the smoky night fires and settled into long conversations that would be punctuated now and then by the distant snarling of leopards and the screaming of hyenas.

  One thing he didn’t hear, it occurred to him, and hadn’t heard since he left Africa, was the sound of drums. The toubob probably didn’t allow these black people to have any drums, that had to be the reason. But why? Was it because the toubob knew and feared how the sound of the drums could quicken the blood of everyone in a village, until even the little children and the toothless old ones would dance wildly? Or how the rhythm of the drums would drive wrestlers to their greatest feats of strength? Or how the hypnotic beat could send warriors into a frenzy against their enemies? Or perhaps the toubob were simply afraid to allow a form of communication they couldn’t understand that could travel the distance between one farm and another.

  But these heathen blacks wouldn’t understand drumtalk any better than the toubob. Kunta was forced to concede, though—if only with great reluctance—that these pagan blacks might not be totally irredeemable. Ignorant as they were, some of the things they did were purely African, and he could tell that they were totally unaware of it themselves. For one thing, he had heard all his life the very same sounds of exclamation, accompanied by the very same hand gestures and facial expressions. And the way these blacks moved their bodies was also identical. No less so was the way these blacks laughed when they were among themselves—with their whole bodies, just like the people of Juffure.

  And Kunta had been reminded of Africa in the way that black women here wore their hair tied up with strings into very tight plaits—although African women often decorated their plaits with colorful beads. And the women of this place knotted cloth pieces over their heads, although they didn’t tie them correctly. Kunta saw that even some of these black men wore their hair in short plaits, too, as some men did in Africa.

  Kunta also saw Africa in the way that black children here were trained to treat their elders with politeness and respect. He saw it in the way that mothers carried their babies with their plump little legs straddling the mothers’ bodies. He noticed even such small customs as how the older ones among these blacks would sit in the evenings rubbing their gums and teeth with the finely crushed end of a twig, which would have been lemongrass root in Juffure. And though he found it difficult to understand how they could do it here in toubob land, Kunta had to admit that these blacks’ great love of singing and dancing was unmistakably African.

  But what really began to soften his heart somewhat toward these strange people was the fact that over the past moon, their great showing of distaste for him had continued only when the “oberseer” or the “massa” was around. When Kunta came by anywhere the blacks were among themselves, most of them by now would quickly nod, and he would notice their expressions of concern for the worsening condition of his left ankle. Though he always coldly ignored them and hobbled on, he would sometimes find himself later almost wishing that he had returned their nods.

  One night, when Kunta had fallen asleep but drifted again into wakefulness, as he often did, he lay staring up into the darkness and feeling that Allah had somehow, for some reason, willed him to be here in this place amid the lost tribe of a great black family that reached its roots back among the ancient forefathers; but unlike himself, these black ones in this place had no knowledge whatsoever of who they were and where they’d come from.

  Feeling around him, in some strange way, the presence of his holy-man grandfather, Kunta reached out into the darkness. There was nothing to be felt but he began speaking aloud to the Alquaran Kairaba Kunta Kinte, imploring him to make known the purpose of his mission here, if there be any. He was startled to hear the sound of his own voice. Up to this moment in the toubob’s land, he had never uttered a sound addressed to anyone but Allah, except for those cries that had been torn from him by a lash.

  The next morning, as he joined the others in line for the march to work, Kunta almost caught himself saying, “Mornin’,” as he had heard them greet each other every day. But though he knew enough toubob words by now not only to understand a good deal of what was said to him but also to make himself somewhat understood as well, something made him decide to continue keeping that knowledge to himself.

  It occurred to Kunta that these blacks masked their true feelings for the toubob as carefully as he did his changing attitude toward them. He had by now many times witnessed the blacks’ grinning faces turn to bitterness the instant a toubob turned his head away. He had seen them break their working tools on purpose, and then act totally unaware of how it happened as the “oberseer” bitterly cursed them for their clumsiness. And he had seen how blacks in the field, for all their show of rushing
about whenever the toubob was nearby, were really taking twice as much time as they needed to do whatever they were doing.

  He was beginning to realize, too, that like the Mandinkas’ own secret sira kango language, these blacks shared some kind of communication known only among themselves. Sometimes when they were working out in the field, Kunta’s glance would catch a small, quick gesture or movement of the head. Or one of them would utter some strange, brief exclamation; at unpredictable intervals another, and then another, would repeat it, always just beyond the hearing of the “oberseer” as he rode about on his horse. And sometimes with him right there among them, they would begin singing something that told Kunta—even though he couldn’t understand it—that some message was being passed, just as the women had done for the men on the big canoe.

  When darkness had fallen among the huts and the lamp lights no longer glowed from the windows in the big house, Kunta’s sharp ears would detect the swift rustlings of one or two blacks slipping away from “slave row”—and a few hours later, slipping back again. He wondered where they were going and for what—and why they were crazy enough to come back. And the next morning in the fields, he would try to guess which of them had done it. Whoever it was, he thought he just might possibly learn to trust them.

  Two huts away from Kunta, the blacks would seat themselves around the small fire of the old cooking woman every evening after “supper,” and the sight would fill Kunta with a melancholy memory of Juffure, except that the women here sat with the men, and some of both sexes were puffing away on pagan tobacco pipes that now and then glowed dully in the gathering darkness. Listening intently from where he sat just inside his doorway, Kunta could hear them talking over the rasping of the crickets and the distant hooting of owls in the forest. Though he couldn’t understand the words, he felt the bitterness in their tone.

  Even in the dark, Kunta by now could picture in his mind the face of whichever black was talking. His mind had filed away the voices of each of the dozen adults, along with the name of the tribe he felt that particular one most resembled. He knew which ones among them generally acted more carefree, and which seldom even smiled, a few of them not even around the toubob.

  These evening meetings had a general pattern that Kunta had learned. The usual first talker was usually the woman who cooked in the big house. She mimicked things said by both the “massa” and the “missus.” Then he heard the big black one who had captured him imitating the “oberseer,” and he listened with astonishment as the others all but choked trying to stifle their laughter, lest they be heard in the big white house.

  But then the laughter would subside and they would sit around talking among themselves. Kunta heard the helpless, haunted tone of some, and the anger of others, even though he grasped only a little of what they discussed. He had the feeling that they were recalling things that had happened to them earlier in their lives. Some of the women in particular would be talking and then suddenly break into tears. Finally the talking would grow quiet as one of the women began to sing, and the others joined in. Kunta couldn’t understand the words—“No-body knows de troubles I’se seed”—but he felt the sadness in the singing.

  At last there came a voice that Kunta knew was the oldest man among them, the one who sat in the rocking chair and wove things of cornshucks, and who blew the conch horn. The others would bow their heads, and he would begin speaking slowly what Kunta guessed was some kind of prayer, though it was certainly not to Allah. But Kunta remembeed what was said by the old alcala down in the big canoe: “Allah knows every language.” While the prayer continued, Kunta kept hearing the same odd sound exclaimed sharply by both the old man and others who kept interrupting him with it: “Oh Lawd!” He wondered if this “Oh Lawd” was their Allah.

  A few days later, the night winds began to blow with a coldness beyond any that Kunta had ever felt, and he woke up to find the last leaves stripped from the trees. As he stood shivering in line to go out to the fields, he was bewildered when the “oberseer” directed everyone into the barn instead. Even the massa and the missus were there, and with them four other finely dressed toubob who watched and cheered as the blacks were separated into two groups and made to face each other at ripping off and flinging aside the whitened, dried outside shucks from the piled harvest of corn.

  Then the toubob and the blacks—in two groups—ate and drank their fill. The old black man who prayed at night then took up some kind of musical instrument with strings running down its length—it reminded Kunta of the ancient kora from his own homeland—and began to make some very odd music on it by jerking some kind of wand back and forth across the strings. The other blacks got up and began to dance—wildly—as the watching toubob, even the “oberseer,” gleefully clapped and shouted from the sidelines. Their faces reddened with excitement, all the toubob suddenly stood up, and as the blacks shrank to the side, they clapped their way out into the middle of the floor and began to dance in an awkward way while the old man played as if he had gone mad and the other blacks jumped up and down and clapped and screamed as if they were seeing the greatest performance of their lives.

  It made Kunta think of a story he had been told by his beloved old Grandmother Nyo Boto when he was in the first kafo. She had told how the king of a village had called together all of the musicians and commanded them to play their very best for him to dance for the people, including even the slaves. And the people were all delighted and they left all singing loudly to the skies and there had never been another king like him.

  Back in his hut later that night reflecting upon what he had seen, it occurred to Kunta that in some strong, strange, and very deep way, the blacks and the toubob had some need for each other. Not only during the dancing in the barn, but also on many other occasions, it had seemed to him that the toubob were at their happiest when they were close around the black ones—even when they were beating them.

  CHAPTER 47

  Kunta’s left ankle had become so infected that pus draining from the wound all but covered the iron cuff with a sickly yellow slickness, and his crippled limping finally caused the “oberseer” to take a close look. Turning his head away, he told Samson to remove the cuffs.

  It was still painful to raise his foot, but Kunta was so thrilled to be unfettered that he hardly felt it. And that night, after the others had gone to bed and all had become still, Kunta limped outside and stole away once again. Crossing a field in the opposite direction from the one he had fled across the last time, he headed toward what he knew was a wider, deeper forest on the other side. He had reached a ravine and was clambering up the far side on his belly when he heard the first sound of a movement in the distance. He lay still with his heart pounding as he heard heavy footfalls approaching and finally the hoarse voice of Samson cursing and shouting, “Toby! Toby!” Gripping a stout stick he had sharpened into a crude spear, Kunta felt strangely calm, almost numb, as his eyes coldly watched the bulky silhouette moving quickly this way and that in the brush at the top of the ravine. Something made him sense that Samson feared for himself if Kunta succeeded in getting away. Closer and closer he stalked—Kunta coiled tight but motionless as a stone—and then the moment came. Hurling the spear with all his might, he grunted slightly with the pain it caused and Samson, hearing him, sprang instantly to one side; it missed him by a hair.

  Kunta tried to run, but the weakness of his ankles made him hardly able to keep upright, and when he whirled to fight, Samson was upon him, slamming with his greater weight behind each blow, until Kunta was driven to the earth. Hauling him back upward, Samson kept pounding, aiming only at his chest and belly, as Kunta tried to keep his body twisting as he gouged and bit and clawed. Then one massive blow sent him crashing down again, this time to stay. He couldn’t even move to defend himself any further.

  Gasping for breath, Samson tied Kunta’s wrists tightly together with a rope, and then began jerking Kunta along by its free end, back toward the farm, kicking him savagely whenever he stumbled or falte
red, and cursing him every step of the way.

  It was all Kunta could do to keep staggering and lurching behind Samson. Dizzy from pain and exhaustion—and disgust with himself—he grimly anticipated the beatings he would receive when they reached his hut. But when they finally arrived—shortly before dawn—Samson only gave him another kick or two and then left him alone lying in a heap.

  Kunta was so used up that he trembled. But with his teeth he began to gnash and tear at the fibers of the rope binding his wrists together, until his teeth hurt like flashes of fire. But the rope finally came apart just as the conch horn blew. Kunta lay weeping. He had failed again, and he prayed to Allah.

  Through the days that followed, it was as if he and Samson shared some secret pact of hatred. Kunta knew how closely he was being watched; he knew that Samson was waiting for any excuse to hurt him in a manner the toubob would approve. Kunta responded by going through the motions of doing whatever work he was given to do as if nothing had happened—but even faster and more efficiently than before. He had noticed how the “oberseer” paid less attention to those who worked the hardest or did the most grinning. Kunta couldn’t bring himself to grin, but with grim satisfaction he noted that the more he sweated, the less often the lash fell across his back.

  One evening after work, Kunta was passing near the barn when he spotted a thick iron wedge lying half concealed among some of the sawed sections of trees where the “oberseer” had two men splitting firewood. Glancing around quickly in all directions, and seeing no one watching, Kunta snatched up the wedge and, concealing it in his shirt, hurried to his hut. Using it to dig a hole in the hard dirt floor, he placed the wedge in the hole, packed the loose dirt back over it, then beat it down carefully with a rock until the floor looked completely undisturbed.