The Black Rose Read Online Free PDF Page A

cried.
    “I seen it,” Mama said, but kept her voice low. She and Papa both seemed to be listening; Sarah wondered what they were listening for, until she heard the man shout for the horses to git , and they could hear their wagon driving away. Mama and Papa didn’t want to talk about them until they were sure they were gone, Sarah realized. She wondered if the visitors were driving one of those fancy carriages she had seen in Vicksburg, sleek and black and pretty.
    “Come askin’ after that hoodoo at suppertime , when she know you tired an’ hungry,” Mama said. “Her mama woulda knowed better manners’n that.”
    “Sho’ glad for this money, though,” Papa said, shrugging. He picked up his bowl and began to scoop food into his mouth with a spoon. “This’ll go a long way to what we owe ’em.”
    “Y’all see how Mr. Long come in here all haughty ’cause he liked them Rebs?” Alex said, laughing as he imitated the white man’s barrel-chested stance, his hands planted on his hips. “Them Rebs ain’t do nothin’ in that war but lose. Papa, I seen him jump away scared o’ dat nigger still goin’ roun’ wearin’ his blue coat on Sundays. You know who I mean, that cropper was with them Yankees way back?”
    “Yeah, I know ’im,” Papa said. “They say Simon crazy, but don’t none of them buckras bother ’im, neither. They hate that blue like they hate the devil. Scared, that’s why. Simon was jus’ a-poundin’ on his drum in the war, tol’ me he didn’t even git no gun with that blue coat, but white folks roun’ here think he done kilt a mess o’ buckras an’ liked it.”
    Mama humphed , exhaling loudly through her nostrils. “Scarin’ ’em ain’t gon’ do no good. That’s why them Vicksburg niggers gettin’ kilt now. Seem like ain’t nothin’ changed.”
    “Sho’ ain’t,” Papa said. “Talkin’ ’bout Mis’sippi done sent a nigger to the Senate, but ain’t nobody better fo’ it but him. Niggers out here still workin’ theyselves to death like befo’,” Papa said, and Mama and Alex murmured their agreement.
    Sarah mustered enough nerve to creep to the window to try to peer after the woman in the white dress to see if she was indeed riding in a shiny carriage. By then their visitors had already vanished behind the thick stand of trees. All she could see was a low cloud of dust left by their departure. She knew Papa hadn’t told the truth when he told the white man he didn’t know anything about pol’tics , because that was his favorite subject with the men who came to visit him on the porch. He talked about Re-con-struc-tion and the Freed-men’s Bu-reau and Wa-shing-ton . Those days, Papa was like a preacher, and every time his voice rose up, the men called back to him Tell it! and You ain’t lyin’! They had come to talk to Papa a lot before Christmastime, when all those people got killed in the race riot in Vicksburg. Mama said she was tired of all their talking, and on Christmas Eve she just about had to chase all those men home. She said they shouldn’t be talking about so much ugly so close to Jesus’ day.
    “But we gon’ go west or nawth, come spring,” Papa said, eating a spoonful of food. “If there a way, Lord know I’ma find it.”
    “Tell you what, if Missus Anna give me a hunnert dollars, I’ll mix up a potion my own self,” Mama said with a laugh. “ That’ll git us west and whatever else we want, too.”
    “Mama, you don’t know no hoodoo like Mama Nadine!” Louvenia said.
    “I ain’t said I did. But Missus Anna ain’t got to know I don’t.”
    “Woman, you so wicked,” Papa said, but he was grinning. The grin changed his whole face, as if he weren’t tired at all. “Who wanna walk with me down to Mama Nadine’s?”
    Sarah jumped up and down. “Ooh, Papa, I does! Me!”
    “You ain’t scared o’ that witch woman, Li’l Bit?” Papa said, and Sarah shook her head. Papa rubbed the top of her head, his fingers sifting through