Queen (124 page)

    for the color of Abner's skin was the confusion. All the mourners were

    white, as she looked to be, but the darker Abner told the truth.

    "Yet, 0 Lord God most holy, 0 Lord most mighty, 0 holy and most merciful

    savior, deliver us not into the bitter pains of eternal death."

    One of the mourners whispered to another, and pointed to Queen. The man

    who had been spoken to detached himself from the group, and walked

    quietly to Queen. He asked who

758 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

she was, and what she was doing there. Queen sensed his antagonism, and told

him that she had been a slave at The Forks, and had come to pay her last

respects to her old Massa. The man told her she could stay as long as she

behaved her nigger self, but she was to keep away from the family. He walked

back to the funeral, and Queen bowed her head and prayed.

    "We therefore commit his body to the ground, earth to earth, ashes to

    ashes, dust to dust, looking for the general Resurrection in the last day,

    and the life of the world to come, through our Lord Jesus Christ, at whose

    second coming, in glorious majesty to judge the world, the earth and the

    sea shall give up their dead."

    Queen moved back into the trees and stood with Abner watching as the,family

    made their way from the graveyard. Sally, supported by the young man she

    didn't know, walked by, and for just a moment Queen wanted to run to her

    and hold her and comfort her. But she didn't think Sally would know who she

    was.

    When they were gone, she took Abner to the grave, and said a small prayer

    for her father. She led her son up the hill to the slave cemetery, and

    looked for her mother's grave, but could not find it. There were some few

    mounds in the earth, but no markers, and nothing to indicate that the dead

    lay here. It didn't matter, Queen thought. Easter was somewhere happier.

    They wandered back to the slave quarters, and sat on the grass under an old

    oak tree. Queen had some sandwiches in her bag, and they made a picnic

    lunch.

    "This is where the slaves used to live," she told Abner. She could feel the

    ghosts of them now, and marveled at the fortitude with which they had

    endured their bondage for so many years, with so little hope.

    "Was you a slave?" Abner asked her, and Queen nodded, and pointed to the

    weaving house.

    "I was born over yonder." She could not avoid it; she had to go there.

    It was abandoned, almost derelict. Dust and cobwebs had claimed it for

    their own. Abner explored the nooks and crannies, while Queen stood in the

    middle of the room and won-

    A WIFE AND MOTHER, LOVED 759

dered why this house had ever seemed so important to her.

    Then Abner brought her some treasure. A few old cards, handmade and

    painted, of the alphabet. The dam that had been blocking her memory

    broke, and she remembered how Cap'n Jack taught her the ABCs from these

    cards, and Easter's disapproval, and she put them in her purse, and kept

    them for the rest of her days. She remembered the awfulness of her

    mother's death, and she remembered hearing Jass tell Easter that she,

    Queen, was to live in the big house.

    She went outside, to free herself of the nightmare that was sneaking into

    her mind, for the big house reminded her of things she would rather

    forget, of Lizzie, and of the Henderson store, and of being chased

    through the woods, and flames, and a burning barn, and more flames, and

    the body of Abner's father, and she wept a little for what had been.

    She held him close to her, and the sun and the daylight eased the grief.

    "We gwine go to the big house, Mammy?" Abner asked, for he was anxious

    to see inside it.

    Queen shook her head. There was nothing for her here anymore. Whatever

    relationship she had with this place was over, buried with Jass.

"No, chile, we're going home," she told Abner.

For home is where you are loved.

    89

Simon came to her late in life. Another little girl was born to them,

Emma, after Annie and Conway, but Emma died when she was three. She had

been playing on the kitchen floor, and drank some lye, while Queen was

hanging washing on the line. She died in great pain, and Queen blamed

herself for what had happened, and for a while they worried for her mental

state, but then she became pregnant again.

She had thought her childbearing days were over, and she

760 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

believed Simon to be a gift from God, to take Abner's place, for recently

he had demanded his right to his own life, and had left home. Abner had

grown into a handsome, strapping young man, with a young man's energy. He

worked hard and well on the farm, but he pined for a wider world, for

adventure, and he heard the siren song of the big city.

    He tried to explain it to his mother. "I'm twenty-one, an' all I ever

    seen of the world is Savannah. I wants to know what the rest is like."

    But his mother would not listen. He was still her baby. She had to

    protect him from the cruel world.

    "What you going to do, end up in a gutter like half the other nigger boys

    up North?"

    He grumbled because he didn't want to go far, only to Memphis, and only

    for a year or two, to see what it was like, and he wouldn't end up in a

    gutter, he'd get a job.

    "Ain't much call for sharecroppers in Memphis," Queen snapped.

"I's going, Ma," he insisted. "No matter what you say,"

    She tried to get Alec to talk some sense into him, but he listened to

    what Abner had to say, and nodded as if in agreement.

    "All my life, I's done what other people tol' me," he explained. "You an'

    Ma, and ev'ryone. Nobody ever done ask me if I wanted to be a farmhand,

    I jus' did it, coz I was tol'."

Alec accepted that, and it made Queen increasingly nervous.

    "All right. I'll ask you now," Alec said. "What do you want to do?"

    Abner didn't know, but he wanted to be more than what he was, doing the

    same thing day in, day out, coming home every night with cotton tufts in

    his hair, going to the same places, seeing the same people.

    "I don't want to end up with my guts busted from throwin' cotton bales,

    and never knowin' what else was out there."

He looked at his mother, who was fiddling with her dress.

"It don't mean I don't love you, Ma," he said softly.

    Alec didn't want him to go to nothing, and it was agreed he could visit

    Memphis on weekends and look for employment. If he found a job, he could

    take it, with Alec's blessing.

"No!" Queen shouted. They looked at her in surprise. She

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was snatching cookies from the table, and stuffing them into her pocket.

    "You don't listen to him on this," she told Abner. "He ain't your real

    pa. You listen to me!"

    She stopped in horror, appalled by what she had said. She pleaded with

    Alec to forgive her, but he was bitterly hurt. He got up and left the

    shack. He sat in his old rocking chair, puffing on his pipe, furious with

    Queen, for he had never done less than his best by Abner. To his

    surprise, Abner came and sat with him, on the step. He wasn't quite sure

    what to say. Nor was Abner.

    "She didn't mean it, Pa," Abner said eventually. "She's upset, coz of me.

    -

"I know it," Alec agreed.

    "I won't go if'n it's gwine cause trouble," Abner said, and he meant it,

    Alec knew, but it cost him dear.

    "You go, if'n you want," Alec said. "If'n you c'n find a job. You cain't

    live yo' life tied to yo' mammy's apron strings. She gotta let go, one

    day. -

    In the kitchen, Queen tried to do the dishes, but she was bitterly

    disappointed in herself for what she had so unfairly said to Alec, and

    she was terrified for Abner, who had so nearly been taken from her by

    fire when he was little. Those fire demons crept up on her, and burned

    themselves into her mind. She went out into the night, to be free of

    them, but no matter where she went, she could not find peace.

They found her two hours later down by the river, wandering up and down

the bank, clutching at her skirts, and crying out.

    "They're after me," she cried, for all she could see was flame. They took

    her home and Alec fetched the, doctor, who recommended care and rest, and

    constant attention. He walked outside with Alec, and suggested that if

    she was not better in a few days, he might want to consider having her

    put in an institution for a while, for examination.

    Alec was appalled. "She ain't mad!" he insisted. "She jus' a Fil bothered

    about her boy."

    He paid the doctor and went back into the shack. He sat with Queen,

    holding her hand, and stroking her forehead. He slept beside her at

    night, and stayed with her in the day. He

762 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN

fed her and washed her and changed her, and slowly the fire eased in her

mind. Abner did not mention leaving while she was ill, but he went to

Memphis on his weekends, and eventually found a job that suited him, in the

cattle yards. He did not know how he was going to tell his mother.

    To everyone's surprise, Queen accepted Abner's news well. Her brush with

    her demons had frightened her, and by now she knew she was pregnant with

    Simon. She took it as a sign that she should let Abner go, and in any case

    was persuaded that his going was inevitable. She kissed him sweetly, and

    wished him Godspeed.

    "Wherever you go, whatever you do," she told him on his last night with

    her, "if you don't find what you're looking for, or if you got troubles, or

    if you lonely and cain't manage no more, remember no matter how far you've

    traveled, it ain't such a long road home."

    He kissed her, and told her he would not forget, but she was not happy.

Yet as she had hoped, her last-born son healed the rent in her heart caused

by her first. Simon was a blithe and serious child, light-skinned, and with

a gentle, caring manner. He was also a quick study, and by the time he was

four he knew his ABCs. Queen taught him, using Cap'n Jack's old cards and

others she made herself in place of those that were missing. When he was

five, she delivered him to school and felt a pang of loss, but it was not as

sharp as that caused by Abner. Simon did well at school, and was his

teacher's delight. By the time he was in sixth grade, the teacher had

developed an ambition for Simon that she knew was unrealistic, but she could

not bear to see his mind go to waste. She went to see Queen, and said she

wanted Simon to stay on at school, until eighth grade, at least. Queen was

all in favor of it, but had learned something from her experience with

Abner. She spoke to Simon, to find out what he really wanted to do, before

tackling the man who had the final decision.

    "No," Alec said. And to make sure Queen understood, he said it again. "No!"

    "I heard you the first time," Queen said calmly, sucking on her empty pipe.

    They rocked their chairs in the peace of the night.

    A WIFE AND MOTHER, LOVED 763

    "He's leavin' school," Alec said firmly. "That's what boys do in these

    parts. I need him on the land."

    It wasn't true. George was married and had a few acres of his own, but

    Freeland and Conway were all the help Alec needed, and Simon had never

    been much use in any practical sense, on the farm. Still, Alec couldn't

    imagine an alternative career for him.

"You hear me?" He was angry now.

    "I hear you." Queen nodded calmly. "Cain't believe what I'm hearing,

    though."

Alec sighed. He knew he was in for a hard time.

"Dadgummit!" he muttered.

    Queen had her arguments beautifully marshaled, and went through them

    point by point. She wondered what they had worked so hard for all these

    years. They'd built the farm up to a hundred and fifty acres, and didn't

    need any more. They weren't rich, but they surely weren't wondering where

    their next meal was coming from. It had been hard, and she and the

    children had worked hard, and Alec, but it had been good because she

    thought it had been for a purpose. Now she wondered what it had all been

    for.

    "It's been fo' us," Alec said, "an' fo' our children. So they'd have a

    better day to look forward to than we did."

    "That's what I thought," Queen agreed. "Obviously, I was wrong.

    Alec said "Dadgummit" again, but more softly, knowing she wasn't done.

    She wanted to know where the better day was for Simon. He worked hard,

    as hard as any of them, was in sixth grade while most boys of his age,

    black or white, were in fifth, and now he had to throw it all away