The Long Song (25 page)

Not all negroes were present to hear Robert Goodwin’s address as he stood atop the empty barrels in the mill yard. Many were still laid upon their beds with heads too sore to listen to no bakkra man. Some were now too free to follow commands, while others, packed up already, had fled from that benighted negro village. But nearly one hundred negroes did linger before him—fanning themselves with banana leaf, eating yam, calling pickney to them, shooing a dog, scratching their head, picking their teeth, yawning, chatting upon the show of his brown leather boots.

They had come to see this new overseer who did ride in from Somerset Pen ’pon his tall-tall horse with him head filled with big ideas. There was Peggy Jump, fresh from the river, still with her washing piled upon her head, soggy and dripping through the wicker basket. She and her husband, Cornet, the mule-man who rode the cart to and from the fields, long ago did think that when free did come, them might leave Amity to seek their daughter, who was sold by the dead massa to a far, far away plantation in Westmoreland.

Peggy did chat upon Mary Ellis that the last overseer, John Lord, was a good bakkra and how all the pickney did follow him to stare up his nose hole, for so much hair did sprout from it. Mary, straining her neck to get a little look at this new overseer said, ‘But him not a tall man. With no hat ’pon him head or barrel under him, he be lost in crab-grass.’

Mary, who worked the first gang with Peggy, had for too long shared a house with Peggy and Cornet; for her own home perished under hoof and flame upon that dreadful riot night. And up to now, never repaired! Just two sticks of it remain—worthless but for cruel remembering and tethering the goat. Mary’s Sunday prayer was never to hole, never to strip, never to manure, wretched cane no more. But, if she could get a little use off Peggy and Cornet’s house once them had lif’ up for Westmoreland, then without Cornet to snore her out of every bit of slumber, she would sleep blessed under that stout roof.

And there was James Richards. Any word this new overseer man would utter was going to vex him, and the white man had not opened his mouth yet. ‘Me never be a slave no more. Me a freeman,’ this carpenter did complain to any who could hear. ‘Me no have to listen up no bakkra no more.’

‘True, true,’ the boiler-man, Dublin Hilton, said. Dublin did think of going nowhere. Come, him was too old and now them seal up dungeon, all was not so bad. Plenty-plenty place worse. And Elizabeth Millar, who did come from her provision ground still carrying her hoe over her shoulder, told James loudly that the Queen did command that negroes must stay in their houses and work their lands.

Samuel Lewis hissed on her to hush so him could hear. Him made plenty money from his fishing and grounds. Him was a man of trade now and must come to some likkle arrangement with the bakkra so him may stay near the river.

While seated upon the ground in the line of some shade were Bessy and Tilly. Bessy was on the light-work people, since two of her fingers were crushed off in the mill. She did think to stay but had heard that bakkra must fetch a jobbing gang from Unity, and she would not work with no niggers from Unity. Oh no. For them be filthy, tricky, and idle. And Tilly was just staring on the scarlet bow upon the missus’s straw bonnet and wishing she were a white woman too . . .

But all who saw Robert Goodwin—dressed in his brown cutaway jacket with a striking panama hat upon his head—had no doubt that this new overseer was a preacher’s son; for his oration possessed the ardour of the most divine sermon. He began resonant and clear, ‘Good morning to you all. Your mistress, Mrs Mortimer, who is seated here beside me has, by the grace of God, and the law of England, granted you your freedom. No one can now oblige you to continue to work for her.’

One roaring hurrah ran out from that crowd before him. The overseer had to raise his palms for quiet once more. ‘But there is something that each one of you must remember. So listen to me well. The houses that you live in and the grounds that you work, do not belong to you. They are the property of your mistress. No matter how long you have lived within a house, how much effort you have extended to fix up that dwelling, or labour you have put in upon your garden and provision ground, these still belong entirely to your mistress. Now, be sure to heed me well, every one of you. If you will not labour for your mistress as you have done before, then you cannot expect to remain within your house. If you do not work hard for her then you cannot expect to continue to harvest your provision grounds. Those good souls who are willing to work for fair and reasonable wages, you may remain within your houses for a small rent and you may work your grounds as you have always done. The industrious and well disposed of you, will do well. The idle, disorderly, indolent and dissolute, will neither thrive nor remain. I hope that you will all choose to work hard—within the cane fields, the works, the pen or wherever your superiors decide that your industry is needed—so that the plantation of Amity may thrive and prosper for your esteemed mistress.’

Here the overseer lifted his arms to the heavens as he said, ‘And now you must all show yourselves grateful to your masters for having made you free. You must humbly thank God for this blessing of freedom. And you must prove to the Queen, the people of England, and your mistress, that you are worthy of the kindness that has been shown you.’

James Richards nearly swallowed his last tooth, so long and hard did he suck upon it. And he was not alone in his cussing. Come, suddenly there was so much sucking of teeth that it did hiss like the draining of a well. This commotion soon caught the overseer’s ear and Robert Goodwin knew the insolence of that sound very well. He raised his palms to implore them to quell it. But angry muttering and chattering did begin to swell from that crowd. Some even walked away. Robert Goodwin had to yell raucous as a street caller to be heard when he lastly cried, ‘But know this. When a man pays money for labour he will only employ those who will work diligently and cheerfully. Heed me well. Diligently and cheerfully.’

Caroline Mortimer, seated composed upon a chair throughout this whole announcement, had been gazing up upon this new overseer with the rapture of a lonely boy before a shooting star. She began to clap when he had finally finished, but soon stopped when she felt a hundred pairs of black eyes look upon her. Oh, what a storm negroes did conjure for the missus. So many savage eyes. She nearly passed out at the sight. She commenced to waft her sweet-scented handkerchief back and forth under her nose with some vigour, as she asked her overseer, ‘Do you think we have now restored their best feelings to me, Mr Goodwin? Do you think all will be well now?’

And her new overseer, smiling broadly while dabbing sweat from his forehead with a white handkerchief, said confidently, ‘Oh yes, madam. Absolutely. I have not one doubt upon the matter.’

 

 

 

 

‘M
ARGUERITE.’ JULY HEARD HER missus call as fearsome black clouds reached across Amity to encase its lands, firm as a lid being sealed upon a box. The wind whipped the bamboos until they bowed within it. It stripped the cotton tree of all but clinging vines and compelled those leaves to dance. Lightning—those devils’ sunbeams—cracked with startling, jagged veins before rain began spilling fierce as if overturned clumsy from a colossal pail. And her missus cried out again, ‘Marguerite, come here at once. I am calling.’ Streams ran everywhere July looked—snaking around bush, stone and tree to find the quickest path. Four, six, eight and one hundred-legged creeping things crawled to mass within the wet; lizards, excited, jumped from hidey-holes to feast, and mosquitoes waking from puddles launched as vicious mist. ‘Marguerite, where are you? Marguerite . . .’ After sultry heat, it was now chill enough for July to give a little shiver. She raised herself slowly from the stool upon the veranda with her skilful timing. Her missus found July dashing in from . . . somewhere; eyes wide with concern to do her missus’s bidding . . . of course.

‘There you are, Marguerite, did you hear me call?’

‘Oh me run so, missus, me be out of breath,’ July puffed.

‘Go to Mr Goodwin’s house and ask if he would care to dine with me this evening. A heifer was killed in the pen so Molly has some beef that must be eaten. I know he will be interested in beef.’

Caroline Mortimer had begun to find such interest in her plantation that her daybed became quite neglected—come, its horse-hair was at last beginning to recover its shape. For, standing upon the veranda straining to look over the fields, peering through the windows or pacing the long room to find reasons why July must get a message to Robert Goodwin at his house—‘At once, Marguerite, at once!’—was how her missus now filled her day. ‘Perhaps I should enquire if everything is to Mr Goodwin’s liking at his house? Yes, tell him to pay me a visit . . . I must know of the new book-keeper the overseer has hired. Tell him to ride over to me on his way to the fields . . . A fine mistress I would be if I did not insist my overseer come to tell me how many hogsheads are going to the port today . . . Byron said that the negroes’ pigs have got into the fields again. Run and tell Mr Goodwin to deliver me a full account of any losses to the crop . . .’ And so on and so on.

July knew every stone, bush, hole and curve on the winding path that led to the overseer’s dwelling. In dry weather it was eight hundred steps from the spreading tamarind tree at the great house to the sweet orange tree that shaded the wooden steps that led into his door. But when she was forced to walk it in a storm—when the wind gusted so that she had to fasten herself to a trunk of a tree and crawl to hide within the refuge of a rock lest she be blown away to England; when she did slip and slide in filthy mud, then wade through rain water that did gush from the hill to eddy around her knees like the tide of a swelling river, then July lost all count of her stride.

July looked from her missus to the window, where the deluge of rain was obscuring the view sure as muslin curtaining. ‘Me can go to the overseer when the rain stops,’ July said.

But her missus replied, ‘Oh, it’s only little rain, go now.’

Free. Cha! What change had free brought that July might seize?

By the time July reached Robert Goodwin’s house that day, she was bedraggled and sodden as a mound of rotten trash. Her white cotton blouse, the one with the lace trim at the neck, clung to her tight as skin. She had to wring out her blue skirt as she ascended the steps, for the heavy rainwater hobbled her tread. And even when under the shelter of the eaves, her red head kerchief continued to trickle a tide of water down her face as if a sly cloud had pursued her into the house so it might continue its drizzling.

Upon entering the long room of the overseer’s quarters, a turmoil assailed July. In the centre of the room, Robert Goodwin, his shirt dangling loose and untied over his breeches, was prancing lightly upon his toes, while first waving his arms, then pointing here, then pointing there, before clapping his hands at four negro boys who were upon their knees about the room. These boys, in an attempt to obey the overseer’s tangled directions, were fussing in corners, peering at the base of the wainscot, pouncing at cracks in the boards of the floor, throwing chairs aside, scuttling under the table, and generally rushing from this side to that, as the overseer bellowed upon them, ‘Look, look over there. There were some in that corner! Here is one, here is one, Elias! Horatio, look to here boy!’