The Long Song (36 page)

 

 

 

 

‘T
HIS DAY IS TO serve as a warning to all the negroes of the village,’ was how Robert Goodwin began. ‘You will not be required to evict every negro from their house and provision lands, but just enough to act as example that I, the master of this plantation, mean to deliver upon my word; that those who have not paid their rent must now work for me, or be removed from their dwellings and grounds.’

July had once cautioned Robert Goodwin to be mindful that negroes were not as biddable as perhaps he and his papa believed. She had whispered it upon him within the closeness of their bed. He had laughed and teased that her own naughtiness towards him made him very aware of that. But as he stood there, resolute upon the veranda before the mishmash gang of white men he had summoned from around the parish to assist him with the evicting of negroes from Amity, July wished she had given him that lesson with more urgency. For his right hand, that he held hidden behind his back, was uncontrollably trembling as he spoke.

‘Are we to burn them out?’ was shouted by a rude white man who was picking his front teeth with a sharpened stick.

Robert Goodwin’s fist landed upon the veranda’s rail heavy as a fallen stone. ‘No,’ he said, ‘do not burn down the houses for they will be needed again once the negroes have agreed to return to working.’

The bafflement at this soft command appeared on every face that heard it, while the panic of seeming weak before this assembly suddenly lit within Robert Goodwin’s eyes. July, seeing his distress, thought to run down amongst that impudent mob, grab a few by the throat and rage upon them to listen up—for him, Robert Goodwin, her husband, was a better man than all who now looked upon him—so them must heed him and do as him say.

But there was no need of her meddling, for he did not betray his worry to that audience, but wiped his arm across the perspiration upon his forehead to shield them from it. He then held his trembling hand within the other, behind his back, and rocked upon his toes to proclaim, ‘But you can throw any of their belongings out into the lanes. And kick over the fires. Scatter any animals. And keep as many chickens as you can find.’

His gaze briefly met July’s before he carried on with greater confidence, ‘Make sure any pigs or goats are shot. I do not want them screeching their way into the fields. You can trample any crops that might be in a garden, but do not burn them.’ Most within this rabble did begin to grin at the promise of such sport. But when Robert Goodwin added,

‘Use your weapons with care—I want no one accidentally maimed or killed,’ the eyes that were heeding him did suddenly begin to roll. ‘Many of you have done this before and do not need my instruction. Make as much noise as you can,’ he said. ‘They will be mostly women, the superannuated, children, lame males, for I intend for the able-bodied to be putting out the fires upon their grounds.’ And the shouts of approval that rose from the pack steadied Robert Goodwin’s hand enough for him to raise it to appeal for hush so his plan might be better heard.

‘Because that is how this will all start,’ he said. ‘I have here a map which I have drawn myself,’ and he beckoned to July to perform the task he had asked of her before the crowd assembled. July grabbed Elias to shove him forward with the map that he had requested her to hold up. As Robert Goodwin began to point at this chart, his hand once more began to shake until, again, it was hidden.

‘Well, you may all step up and look at it when I have finished addressing you. First you must ride out to these provision lands—I will allocate who is to go where—and once you arrive upon them, see that they are burned to the ground. If the crop is wet and won’t burn, then just destroy it any way you can. You may shoot any cattle or livestock, or drive them out. But do not run them into any cane fields. While those negroes are busy saving their crops and cattle, it is then we will go in and evict enough from the village to bring those obstinate ingrates back to obedience.’

Having finished his instruction, Robert Goodwin then pressed this restless group to bow their heads to join him in prayer. ‘Almighty God,’ he began, ‘who desireth not the death of a sinner, but rather that he may turn from his wickedness and live—grant us this day the blessing to turn the negroes of Amity back from sin, to the path of righteousness, so that they will labour once more upon this plantation, as is your divine will. Amen.’

Not long out from England . . . still a bit green . . . his dad’s a parson back home . . . believes we should be nice to niggers . . . married well—was the meagre reputation that Robert Goodwin had enjoyed with the men that stood before him. But, after finishing the devotion he lifted his head to say, ‘Be in no doubt all of you, I mean you to frighten every last one of those negroes and remove their livelihoods until they beg to work once more for me,’ respect soon puckered the mouth and brow of all who stared upon him.

 

 

 

 

W
HEN JULY HEARD, ‘MARGUERITE,’ whispered softly at her door, she at first believed it to be the wind breathing through a crevice. ‘Marguerite.’ Or perhaps the call of a night bat. ‘Marguerite, are you there?’ Or maybe even a duppy prowling the garden. She did not think it was the missus. For, since the missus had taken Robert Goodwin for her husband, she would have rather walked through the whole house than come by way of July’s dwelling. The missus would have sooner circled the entire garden than ascend the stairs over July’s home. Come, if the missus were ever forced by circumstance to pass by July’s abode, she would have neared the lime-washed wooden door of that intimate room under the house with her eyes closed tight shut and her ears blocked by her fists.

So when July opened her door, she was vexed to find her missus standing before her. The moonlight had dulled all colour, yet July knew that the grey pallor of her missus was her cheeks flushed with pink, her eyes rimmed with red. But that unwelcome plump face in the gap of her doorway—so anxious and fretful that even her blond curls shivered—soon had July saying, ‘Cha, wha’ you want? Me no have to serve you now.’

‘Come and sit with me,’ was what the missus said to her.

July sucked upon her teeth for a long while; being called Marguerite by this woman was what began the cuss, but its vent was lengthened for having this missus bid her, as if she were still her slave, to sit with her. Sit with her! Cha. The last time the missus had required July’s company she was still giggling upon the blueness of her overseer’s eyes.

Come, she had not looked upon July’s face since . . . well, since July’s pregnant belly became a bulge that none could miss. So aghast was the missus to realise July was carrying a child that she stared upon July’s face with the distress of a big-eyed puppy dog seized to be drowned. July had nearly felt pity for her as the missus staggered back away from that protrusion, desperate to escape its bitter meaning. Since that day, the missus had ceased even addressing July—she clapped, flapped, tushtushed, banged the table, flicked her fingers, waved her arms, but all in mute command.

‘Please, Marguerite, please come and sit with me.’ The missus was, without any doubt, pleading, and a bedevilling sound it was to July’s ear. To get this white woman gone from her door, was all July had wish of. So July, gazing carefully upon the missus said, ‘But me must look after me pickney,’ before adding, ‘Emily, me baby girl, must be fed.’

For according to the missus, July had no child. According to the missus, she had never ever, ever, seen July with a child. She had never heard a cart draw up carrying the midwife from the village. No sets of rushing feet ever ran across the veranda, down the stairs, and under the house. Caroline Goodwin did not see her husband pacing about the garden for hours and hours, biting hard upon his fingertips. Nor hear mewling break upon the air and feel the sigh of blessed relief that emitted from her husband’s chest. Never had she heard a baby crying, nor whimpering around the house. No cooing ever seeped up from under her floor. To the missus’s recollection, she had not once even heard mention of a child. Her husband had never spoken the child’s name at the dinner table, nor requested to have her brought to him after the meal. She had not chanced upon Robert rocking the child on his knee as he sat on the veranda. Nor had she ever found white christening clothes and a sweet wooden-faced doll amongst his belongings. Not one person in town that the missus could recall, had ever whispered of the shame of Caroline Goodwin’s husband keeping a negro woman with a bastard child . . . and in the same house, in the same house! No one ever spread that gossip behind their hand as the missus approached them. Why, the very idea! No, there was no child.

So when, with a quivering lip, the missus replied, ‘You may bring your baby with you, Marguerite,’ it was July, once more compelled to yield to this woman’s wishes, who did then pale grey within that moonlight.

Entering in upon the drawing room, July at once understood why her missus was driven to breach her own deceptions to seek out some companionship. Cries, yelling, shouts, banging, and screams were escaping the negro village in a furious squall that jolted through the thin glass of her window. That commotion did haunt the room. The sideboard bounced and rattled within it, the candle flames spluttered, and the daybed, where the missus bid July to lay down her baby, appeared to wobble. Having settled upon the seat before the window, July was forced to heed her missus as she pranced about the room ceaselessly chattering.

‘The negroes have driven him to this action—I mean, what choice was left to him? . . . No one does more for the negroes’ welfare than he. He cares too much . . .’

All at once, July’s awareness was snatched from her missus’s fretting when a murky pink glow framed the horizon, as if the sun were about to rise upon it. So pungent did the smell of burning become that it irritated July’s nostrils, while a gloom of smoke misted the room.

‘But niggers cannot be reasoned with. If those abolitionists in England had ever actually lived amongst negroes then they would have known it was folly to free them . . .’

A black stain of startled birds flew from the tree tops when a clear strike of repeated rifle shot caught in the air. Was it the birds that squealed so as they rounded in the sky?

‘His father is quite wrong. Negroes will never be civilised, nor will they ever do as they are bid.’

Flames, clear as the candle beside July, glimmered in the distance.

‘But now it is too late. They have been made free. Free not to work. Why, those niggers will not rest until every planter is in the workhouse . . .’

And the missus’s pacing began vibrating under July’s feet like the low rumbling of galloping horses.

The negroes were running down the lanes now, July knew it. For in her mind’s eye she was once more amongst them. All was crazed motion. Into the fields, into the trees. Seizing belongings, kicking chickens, struggling with goats. Standing flailing sticks and machetes. Cussing curses upon the white men who would dare to enter their homes. Screaming to find lost pickney. Where you be? Where you be? Confusion, smoke, fire. Run, July, run. Pull that white man from his horse and stamp upon his hand. And that one, quick, fright him with that fire stick. Mash him. Bash him. But then run. Run!

Suddenly, without warning, July had to slap her hand across her mouth to catch the vomit that began to spew from her.

‘Marguerite, where are you going?’ her missus yelled as July fled from that room.

July’s sick splattered over the veranda. She retched. Her throat was scoured hoarse by it. And she retched. Her stomach ached with it.

But the terror of the din that rose from the negro village was now louder with no glass to curb it. It hurled July back inside. She wiped snot from her nose, tears from her eyes, and breathed as deeply as her foreboding would allow.