Page 31 of Queen

young. She guessed that she had become used to motherhood, and didn't

  worry so much whether she was doing the right thing. So she could shout

  at them, and cuff their ears, and laugh at their games, or simply tell

  them to get out from under her feet when she was too busy with other

  things. Whatever her other duties though, she tried to set an hour of

  each day aside, exclusively for them.

  Running a household as large as theirs was never easy for Sally, least

  of all in the summer months when they had so many visitors. Although she

  could rely on Parson Dick, and Julie, the cook, several of the younger

  girls needed constant supervision, were frequently sick or forgetful of

  their duties. Sometimes, Sally thought, the more house slaves you had,

  the more work there was to do. She envied those few Northern hostesses

  she had met who, employing domestic staff, could sack them if they were

  incompetent or lazy, for it seemed

  252 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

  excessive to Sally, but not to some others, to have a slave girl whipped

  or sold away for neglecting to empty a chamber pot or dust under a bed.

  Her various female relatives understood this-they shared the problem-but

  still they made demands on her time, for she was one of the reasons they

  had come.

  Jass found it hard work trying to remember all the family connections.

  Elizabeth, his mother's daughter by her first marriage, had married his

  cousin Tom, which meant she was both his half sister and his first cousin

  once removed. But what about Sam, their young son? Was he first cousin

  twice removed, or second cousin once removed, or half nephew? These

  things seemed to matter in a family, especially to the women. Aunt

  Letitia Hanna was the family authority, and very sharp with Jass whenever

  he flunked a relationship. "You will have to find an intelligent bride,"

  she had admonished once, clearly dismissing him as a dunderhead. "Someone

  has to remember all their birthdays."

  The cotton ripened, the buds bursting with the white gold that was their

  fortune. It was going to be a good yield, over a bale an acre, and with

  the recent reduction of tariffs demanded by South Carolina, the profit

  would move from the good to the spectacular.

  The work songs of the picking gangs could be heard everywhere on the

  plantation, drifting in to James through the open windows of his study,

  where he sat for hours on the sultry, sweaty summer days, counting his

  wealth, as if knowledge of the scale of it was insurance against its ever

  being taken away. When not in his study, he spent time at the stables

  inspecting his lucrative stallions and watching their training. He still

  fretted about John Coffee's visit, but the horses calmed him, or

  distracted him, and he put on a jolly, Irish face for his relatives,

  especially when they were Irish.

  It pleased him, too, when rich landowners came with their wives and

  daughters to call, the girls doing their best to make an impression on

  young Jass. The aristocratic families of the South were always plotting

  their survival, and although Jass was too young to be in a serious race,

  it was never too early to start building alliances. It pleased James, and

  thrilled Jass, that he was the object of these welcome attentions, and

  it amused Sally that any visit by a family with a daughter to

  MERGING 253

  dispose of was quickly followed by a visit from Lizzie Perkins and her

  mother. Sally watched with approval as Jass grew better and better at

  conducting himself in the presence of young ladies, and toward the end of

  summer, Sally realized that Jass was going to be a considerable catch.

  She had always thought him a good-looking boy, but the Jass who was

  measured for his new clothes at the beginning of summer was not the Jass

  who was fitted into them at the end, even though allowance had been made

  for growth. The cuffs of his trousers had to be let down a solid inch,

  and the sleeves of his jackets. His chest had filled out and his neck

  thickened, so that his new shirts were already tight, and Sally clucked

  in despair.

  That clucking stopped when he tried on his new evening clothes, and

  presented himself for her inspection, grinning because he knew they

  suited him.

  The elegant velvet coat, the pearly white jabot, flowing in elaborate

  ruffles from his neck, and the beautifully cut stovepipe pants changed

  him, before her very eyes, from a boy bursting out of his scams to a

  strikingly handsome young man.

  "What on earth are you crying for?" he laughed. And Sally laughed too,

  and could not tell him why.

  The end of summer also brought the last of their visitors and, for James,

  the most welcome.

  Sara came from Baltimore with her family, and for a few days James tried

  to lose himself in an orgy of Irish reminiscence, and music, and stories

  of their youth.

  Sara could see that something was troubling her brother but, like Sally,

  knew it was useless trying to provoke him to talk before he was ready.

  The two women discussed it at length, but Sally could shed little light

  on the matter.

  It had begun with the visit of John Coffee, she said, and she was sure

  it was related to Andrew and, somehow, the Indians. James scanned the

  newspapers avidly when they arrived, but was interested only in that one

  subject. A few weeks before, some reporters from the Washington

  newspapers had come to interview James, but he had refused to discuss his

  private business dealings.

  Then John Coffee died, of a chill he had caught coming back from

  Washington. James had ambivalent feelings about

  254 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

  the death. He tried to mourn the friendship they had once enjoyed, but had

  grieved enough for that long ago. He sent his condolences to the family,

  and attended the funeral, and said all the appropriate things, but there

  was a constant sense of relief in the back of his mind that John, at

  least, would no longer trouble him. He did feel a genuine sense of loss

  at this evidence of the passing years.

  Toward sunset, on the day before she was due to leave, James asked Sara

  if she would like to visit the stables with him. They walked to the

  racecourse arm in arm, gossiping, and leaned on the fence to watch the

  horses being exercised. Lauderdale, grazing in a paddock, came trotting

  over to his owner.

  "He's from Miss Shipton, and he's going to make me a fortune," James

  said, stroking the stallion's nose and feeding him the apple he had put

  in his pocket for the purpose.

  Sara laughed. "All you've talked about this last hour, this last week,

  is how much money you've made. As if you were scared of losing it."

  James smiled. She could read him like a book. That was why he had brought

  her here. If anyone could make sense of it, it was Sara.

  The story came pouring out of him, in flooding relief. He told her

  eve
rything, kept nothing back. Except his present feelings about the

  Indians.

  Sara felt keenly her brother's distress, and was not surprised that

  Andrew was at the heart of it. She wanted to crow in triumph, "I told you

  so." She wanted to box her younger brother's ears for getting involved

  in the sordid mess, but knew that would get them nowhere.

  "You lent Andrew money," she said. "What Andrew did with it is his

  business. You've been lending him money for years. Did he ever pay a

  penny of it back?"

  James stared at her, trying to come to terms with the simplicity of the

  statement. It was true. All he had done was lend Andrew a sum, admittedly

  a very large sum, of money. And that was all.

  "Oh, James--there was a trace of sadness in Sara's voice, but she

  couldn't resist the dig-"we've been trying to warn you about Andrew for

  years, Sally and 1. Why didn't you listen?"

  MERGING 255

  She knew the answer. James had wanted to be part of something grand,

  something magnificent, and ambition had clouded his mind. Men leave such

  a mess behind them wherever they go, Sara thought. 'Tis women have to do

  the cleaning up.

  "The only evidence of anything is in those letters," she said. "As long

  as they remain under lock and key, your nose is clean."

  Sara wasn't sure what he was thinking now, but pushed her case. Living

  in Baltimore, closer to the heart of things than James, tucked away on

  the other side of the Appalachians, she had heard the stories about

  Andrew coming out of Washington. He was already an old man when he first

  became president; now his years in office were said to be making him more

  and more cantankerous, more vindictive toward his enemies, less and less

  tolerant of opposition. She wanted James done with Andrew, and she feared

  his great, soft heart might lead him to actions he would regret.

  "Don't give them to Andrew, I beg you. Who knows what the old devil would

  do with them?"

  She knew it was useless to publish them. The resulting scandal would

  surely harm James, but Andrew, as usual, would find a way to wriggle out

  of it. And she didn't completely disagree with Andrew on the matter of

  the Indians.

  "As for the Indians," she continued, as if guessing his moral dilemma,

  "there's nothing you can do. We can't give back every square inch of land

  to the bloodthirsty savages, go back where we came from and pretend we

  were never here."

  She was smiling, he knew, teasing him with the absurdity of the idea.

  Then she became serious again. "This isn't the British in Ireland, Jamie.

  This was wasted land before we came."

  She hadn't used his pet name since he was a boy, and he almost laughed

  in relief. Sara's analysis of the settlement of America was so very

  realistic. He couldn't alter the past; he couldn't unmake history; he

  couldn't pretend the European migration to America had never happened and

  send everyone home again. That would create a new race of dispossessed,

  the children who were born here-they had no other home to go back to. His

  guilt at the piteous plight of the Indians had clouded his objectivity,

  and he now saw that he had been an

  256 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

  easy victim to John Coffee's blackmail. John had simply been telling him to

  shut up, to keep quiet about what he knew. James would oblige.

  Still, Sara was wrong. There was something he could do. He could still talk

  to Andrew, try to persuade him to end the removal of the native people. But

  he would do so with a considerably lighter heart.

  Sally, on the veranda, could see them talking and guessed they were

  discussing whatever it was that had so been distracting James these last

  several weeks. She felt a mild twinge of jealousy that her husband should

  choose to discuss these things with his sister and not with his wife, but it

  quickly passed. When they walked toward her, Sally could tell, from James's

  laughter and the energy in his stride, that Sara had resolved whatever

  problem had been vexing him so. She blessed her sister-in-law for being a

  practical, pragmatic woman, and waved cheerily to them as they came up the

  hill.

  31

  in the first week of September the family traveled to Nashville. It took

  them a full day to cross the river at Muscle Shoals; their carriage had to

  be ferried across, and then the luggage wagon and the slave cart. Jass spent

  most of the day at the water's edge, fishing or, with Cap'n Jack, chatting

  with the black laborers, and from one of them he bought a few freshwater

  pearls. They were silly, small, irregular things, but the man hadn't wanted

  much money, and Jass thought they would be a nice gift to some young woman,

  even Lizzie perhaps, for he was intent on cultivating relationships with

  girls. Sally and Sassy sheltered from the sun at the inn on the northern

  shore, so he saw little of Easter. She was wide-eyed at this exotic new

  adventure of travel-she had never left The Forks before-but she was taking

  her new duties as Sassy's maid seriously, and hardly left Angel's side.

  MERGING 257

  The Trio had stayed behind at The Forks. They were not invited to the

  wedding, and were not returning to their school in Nashville. much to

  Sally's relief. She hated sending these youngsters so far away from home to

  school, too young, she told herself, for such separation from a mother's

  watchful eye and warm embrace. A.J. had done it, and Jass, and she'd hated

  that as much, but they'd had little choice-the Stevens School in Nashville

  was the nearest suitable institution. Since then, Reverend Sloss had opened

  his Preparatory Academy in Florence, but that had no facilities for

  elementary education. James had murmured platitudes about character

  building, which left Sally entirely unimpressed, and the only consolation

  Sally could find was that the boys would be under the careful eye of

  Eleanor. Now, and not before time, thought Sally, the reverend gentleman

  had extended the age limits of boys he would accept, and the Trio were to

  go there, as did Jass, and could live at home.

  The journey was slow, the pace dictated by the slave cart. The carriage was

  hot and uncomfortable, jarring their bones as it bounced over the rough

  roads. Sometimes Jass rode on Morgan, but he didn't want to tire the horse

  unnecessarily, and mostly kept him tethered to the slave cart. Then Jass

  preferred to ride on the box with Samuel, the coachman, who claimed to have

  covered all this territory before, in the few short days of his freedom,

  when actually he had never left the outskirts of Florence, and knew the

  road only because he had driven the coach to Nashville and back many times.

  Ephraim drove the luggage wagon, and Easter and Angel were with Cap'n Jack

  in the slave cart.

  Each evening they would stop while it was still light at travelers' hotels,

  around which small settlements had grown, and Jass was al
lowed to join his

  father in after-dinner conversations with the older men or, in the hour

  before sunset, free to explore the surroundings.

  Jass had made the journey many times, but as a boy, going to and coming

  from his school, and he now saw the adventure with a young man's eyes. This

  is still the frontier, he thought, and it thrilled him and horrified him.

  He saw a slave being mercilessly lashed in public for some hurt, real or

  imagined, to his master, and he had turned away, for it provoked sub-

  258 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

  conscious memories of another lashing he had seen, as a boy, to a man who

  was now his friend and walked beside him. Once he saw a white man shoot

  another to death with a pistol, in full view outside the hotel, for what

  Cap'n Jack, talking to other slaves, discovered was a question of honor.

  Conversely, he experienced hospitality from almost everyone he met, a sense

  of welcome to a stranger, which his father assured him was the nature of

  these people. He knew his family occupied a privileged position-because of

  his father's status, because they were guests traveling to an important oc-

  casion, and because they had made the journey so often that many of the

  innkeepers and their families remembered thembut even so, the generosity

  that was extended to them warmed his heart.

  The later discussions with older men, in his father's company, both

  intrigued and bored him. Alfred and Gracie's wedding was on everyone's

  lips, a source of amusement to some, evidence of the increasing uppitiness

  of niggers to others, and this led to discussion of the man Jass called

  Uncle Andrew, who, however, was not related to him and whom he had never

  met.

  Here in the West, Andrew's actions as president had only increased his

  already legendary status. He was seen as champion of the little man, the

  settler, the battling individual. People here believed him dedicated to

  enfeebling the bureaucracy in Washington, reducing the undue influence of

  the industrial Northeast over their lives, and by removing the federal de-

  posits from it, curbing the outrageous power the centralized bank had

  previously enjoyed. Only a few speculators and businessmen dissented from

  this view, and then vehemently.

  It had always been the same, his father explained. Andrew was an

  extraordinary man, capable of arousing violent passions in people, both

  toward him and against him.

  Above all else, Andrew was seen as the salvation of the white settler from

  the bloodthirsty savages, the consensus being that the sooner the land was

  rid of all Indians, the better life would be. It puzzled Jass that his

  father would walk away every time this subject was raised, nor would he

  discuss it with Jass.

  MERGING 259

  Easter had hoped to see more of Jass on this journey than she had done all

  summer, but she knew something had happened in their relationship,

  something he had to come to terms with for himself. He didn't ignore her,

  he still visited the weaving house, but now he kept a distance between

  them, as if determined to avoid actual physical contact with her, and she

  missed the easy familiarity they used to- enjoy. Here on the journey, when

  he was riding Morgan, he'd trot beside the slave cart for a while,

  pointing out new things to her, but Angel and Cap'n Jack were an obvious,

  inhibiting influence to any intimacy between them.

  At night she'd be too busy to see him, for she and Angel had to unpack

  the trunk, prepare the clothes for the morning, and see to their

  mistress's comforts before they could even begin to think about their

  own. They ate and slept in the dingy slave accommodations attached to the

  hotels, and while she enjoyed listening to the slaves of other travelers,

  she was too shy to voice opinions of her own. Up from well before sunrise

  to iong after dark, drowsy on some uncomfortable cot in a lousy communal

  shed, Easter decided that traveling was an overrated experience and