said, “You know, tear the page right out of the church register that says their great-grandmother was colored.
Femme de couleur libre,
that’s what some old records say in French.
“Imagine tearing up that much history, the page right out of the church register with all those births and deaths and marriages, and not wanting to know. Imagine going into my great-great oncle’s house and breaking up those pictures, pictures that ought to be someplace safe for lots of people to see.”
She had sighed, rather like a weary woman, gazing down into the worn shoe box and its trophies.
“Now I have these pictures. I have everything, and I’m with you, and they can’t find me, and they can’t throw all these things away.”
She had dipped her hand into the shoe box again and taken out the
cartes de visite
—old photographs on cardboard from the last decades of the old century. I could see the high slanted letters in faded purple on the backs of these latest pictures as she turned them this way and that.
“See, this here is Oncle Vervain,” she said. I had looked at the thin, handsome black-haired young man with the dark skin and light eyes like her own. It was rather a romantic portrait. In a finely tailored three-piece suit, he stood with his arm on a Greek column before a painted sky. The picture was in rich sepia. The African blood was plainly present in the man’s handsome nose and mouth.
“Now, this is dated 1920.” She turned it over once, then back again, and laid it down for us to see. “Oncle Vervain was a Voodoo Doctor,” she said, “and I knew him well before he died. I was little, but I’ll never forget him. He could dance and spit the rum from between his teeth at the altar, and he had everybody scared, I can tell you.”
She took her time, then found what she wanted. Next picture.
“And you see here, this one?” She had laid down another old photograph, this time of an elderly gray-haired man of color in a stately wooden chair. “The Old Man is what they always called him. I don’t even know him by any other name. He went back to Haiti to study the magic, and he taught Oncle Vervain all he knew. Sometimes I feel Oncle Vervain is talking to me. Sometimes I feel he’s outside our house watching over Great Nananne. I saw the Old Man once in a dream.”
I had wanted so badly to ask questions, but this had not been the time.
“See here, this is Pretty Justine,” she had said, laying down perhaps the most impressive portrait of all—a studio picture on thick cardboard inside a sepia cardboard frame. “Pretty Justine had everybody afraid of her.” The young woman was indeed pretty, her breasts flat in the style of the 1920s, her hair in a bob, her dark skin quite beautiful, her eyes and mouth slightly expressionless, or perhaps evincing a certain pain.
Now came the modern snapshots, thin and curling, the work of common enough hand-held cameras of the present time.
“They were the worst—his sons,” she had said as she pointed to the curling black-and-white picture. “They were Pretty Justine’s grandchildren, all white and living in New York. They wanted to get their hands on anything that said they were colored and tear it up. Great Nananne knew what they wanted. She didn’t fall for their soft manners and the way they took me downtown and bought me pretty clothes. I still have those clothes. Little dresses nobody ever wore and little shoes with clean soles. They didn’t leave us an address when they left. See, look at them in the picture. Look how anxious they are. But I did bad things to them.”
Aaron had shaken his head, studying the strange tense faces. As the pictures had disquieted me, I had kept my eyes on the womanish child.
“What did you do, Merrick?” I had asked without biting my tongue wisely.
“Oh, you know, read their secrets in their palms and told them bad things they’d always tried to cover up. It wasn’t kind to do that, but I did it, just to make them
Femme de couleur libre,
that’s what some old records say in French.
“Imagine tearing up that much history, the page right out of the church register with all those births and deaths and marriages, and not wanting to know. Imagine going into my great-great oncle’s house and breaking up those pictures, pictures that ought to be someplace safe for lots of people to see.”
She had sighed, rather like a weary woman, gazing down into the worn shoe box and its trophies.
“Now I have these pictures. I have everything, and I’m with you, and they can’t find me, and they can’t throw all these things away.”
She had dipped her hand into the shoe box again and taken out the
cartes de visite
—old photographs on cardboard from the last decades of the old century. I could see the high slanted letters in faded purple on the backs of these latest pictures as she turned them this way and that.
“See, this here is Oncle Vervain,” she said. I had looked at the thin, handsome black-haired young man with the dark skin and light eyes like her own. It was rather a romantic portrait. In a finely tailored three-piece suit, he stood with his arm on a Greek column before a painted sky. The picture was in rich sepia. The African blood was plainly present in the man’s handsome nose and mouth.
“Now, this is dated 1920.” She turned it over once, then back again, and laid it down for us to see. “Oncle Vervain was a Voodoo Doctor,” she said, “and I knew him well before he died. I was little, but I’ll never forget him. He could dance and spit the rum from between his teeth at the altar, and he had everybody scared, I can tell you.”
She took her time, then found what she wanted. Next picture.
“And you see here, this one?” She had laid down another old photograph, this time of an elderly gray-haired man of color in a stately wooden chair. “The Old Man is what they always called him. I don’t even know him by any other name. He went back to Haiti to study the magic, and he taught Oncle Vervain all he knew. Sometimes I feel Oncle Vervain is talking to me. Sometimes I feel he’s outside our house watching over Great Nananne. I saw the Old Man once in a dream.”
I had wanted so badly to ask questions, but this had not been the time.
“See here, this is Pretty Justine,” she had said, laying down perhaps the most impressive portrait of all—a studio picture on thick cardboard inside a sepia cardboard frame. “Pretty Justine had everybody afraid of her.” The young woman was indeed pretty, her breasts flat in the style of the 1920s, her hair in a bob, her dark skin quite beautiful, her eyes and mouth slightly expressionless, or perhaps evincing a certain pain.
Now came the modern snapshots, thin and curling, the work of common enough hand-held cameras of the present time.
“They were the worst—his sons,” she had said as she pointed to the curling black-and-white picture. “They were Pretty Justine’s grandchildren, all white and living in New York. They wanted to get their hands on anything that said they were colored and tear it up. Great Nananne knew what they wanted. She didn’t fall for their soft manners and the way they took me downtown and bought me pretty clothes. I still have those clothes. Little dresses nobody ever wore and little shoes with clean soles. They didn’t leave us an address when they left. See, look at them in the picture. Look how anxious they are. But I did bad things to them.”
Aaron had shaken his head, studying the strange tense faces. As the pictures had disquieted me, I had kept my eyes on the womanish child.
“What did you do, Merrick?” I had asked without biting my tongue wisely.
“Oh, you know, read their secrets in their palms and told them bad things they’d always tried to cover up. It wasn’t kind to do that, but I did it, just to make them
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