Aunt Cumsee died the last week in February, and my mistress on the third of March.
Two women, one nigra and one white, whose voices were part of me, whose hands had comforted, soothed, and taught. One a pine-knot torch and the other a scented beeswax candle against the darkness of my ignorance and fear. Both gone.
Where? I believed in Aunt Cumsee’s Jesus and in Mrs. Wheatley’s God of Deliverance, but I was hard put to say how either one of these ladies was now occupying her time. Unless Jesus had a side of mutton that needed turning on the spit. And God had any little nigra girls running around who must be taken in hand.
How could people be here one moment and gone the next?
I was not there when Aunt Cumsee died, but I was notified the next morning. I was at the bedside of my mistress. Mary and Nathaniel were not. Mary was in childbed. Mr. Wheatley was in attendance but of no earthly use. The poor man was so addled he had all he could do to pace and wring his hands.
It was me, her little nigra slave girl, she wanted.
I knelt beside her.
“You must make me a promise.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“You must write no elegy for me, no poem.”
“Oh, ma’am. How can I not? I am known for my elegies. To not write one for you, the woman who gave me so much!”
“Christian humility dictates that I forbid it. The Author of all good works knows what I have done. Do you think you can best Him at saying it?”
“No, ma’am.”
“Another thing.” She paused, resting. “That letter you wrote to Reverend Occom.”
“What letter, ma’am?”
“Silly girl, did you think you could keep it a secret from me? The one on freedom. And the hypocrisy of Christian slaveholders. He wrote to me of it and how he wants to get it published. But you said no, until after my death.”
“Ma’am, I didn’t wish to disgrace you.”
“Do you think so little of me, then?”
“Oh no.”
She smiled weakly. “Well, you may publish it now. I wish you to. Do it with my blessing.”
She died that night, with her eyes fully open and her hands reaching outward. “Come, come quickly!” she shouted. “Oh, I pray for an easy and quick passage.”
There was a parade of mourners at her funeral. Boston prides itself on gala funerals.
Mr. Wheatley did not go.
Before we were to leave, I found him gazing out the window of the front parlor. “Sir, I have your heavy coat. The sun is warm but the wind is brisk.”
He turned and eyed me quizzically. “Is there to be another riot, then? There is a crowd outside. Are the Liberty Boys gathering? Has the news arrived from England how they will punish us for the tea?”
Dear God, I thought, he has taken refuge in idiocy. He’d been doing a lot of that of late. Times his mind was sharp as a saber. Other times he could not remember your name.
I sat him down in his favorite chair. “You wait here, sir. Your friends will wish to know where to find you.” I fetched his paper and called to Sulie to bring him a pot of chocolate.
“You’re a good girl, Phillis. Where are you off to?”
“I’ve an errand to run. I’ll be back shortly. I’ll send Bristol with another log for the fire.”
All I could think of, as I wound along Boston’s cold streets with the procession of mourners, was the day so long ago when the skinny little nigra girl, crawling with vermin and wrapped in a scrap of rug, was carried into the Wheatley mansion by Prince to meet the fair-haired goddess of a lady in her gray gown with rose fluff on it.
All I could think of was her eyes. And how they looked like she was just about to tell me something wonderful. And how I’d wondered what it was.
So long ago now, I thought, with a pang of sadness for Nathaniel and his boyish kindness. For Mary and her girlhood giddiness—Mary, now a married woman, so worn down from bearing child after child that she could not even be here today. I thought of Mr. Wheatley’s quiet power and dignity, now ground down to muddleheaded confusion.
White folk don’t have it any easier than we do, I minded. They just think so. We all die in the end. That of itself is not so grievous to me. It’s what comes before we die that gives me the quivers and quakes.
Nigras know what comes. White folk never do. It always takes them by surprise.
So, then, why is it I am fear quickened of a sudden? Because inside I’ve become white. They’ve treated me white. I’ve trusted their soft words. I’ve been coddled by everyone.
Except Nathaniel. Nathaniel knew. He always knew I was still nigra, would always be nigra. Aunt Cumsee knew, too. So did Obour. But I fought them all.
So here I am now, come to a pretty pass—white on the inside, where nobody can see it, and nigra on the outside, where it’s all anybody sees. Free, yes. Oh, I’m free all right. But all that means is that I must now earn my own bread.
A melancholy took hold of me as we passed through the gates of the Old Granary Burial Place on Tremont Street. Mary’s husband, Reverend Lathrop, was saying prayers.
I looked into the yawning grave and was frightened. My mistress and only protector is gone. What will happen to me now? Mr. Wheatley is half daft. War is coming. There is no telling what the British will do to punish Boston for the tea. I have three hundred more books coming in May and I must sell them in order to live.
Who will buy them? Who will care about the poems of a little nigra girl if there is war?
The sun, which had been milky weak, disappeared behind a cloud. A gust of wind blew some old leaves around. I’m one of those leaves, I thought, discarded, of no more use to anyone.
Reverend Lathrop finished his prayers. We turned to leave.
Then the sun came out again. Or was it just the fact of John Peters standing there waiting for me at the cemetery gate?
The next day, Mr. Wheatley passed me in the hallway. “Phillis, where is my missus?” he asked of me.
“She is with the Lord, sir. We buried her yesterday.”
Tears gathered in his eyes as my words took hold. He blew his nose.
“Why wasn’t I told so I could go to the funeral?” he asked petulantly. “You must tell me these things, Phillis. I count on you to do so.”
“You were told, sir. We decided it was best for you not to brave the raw March air. She would have wanted it that way.”
“Oh yes, of course. She was a true Christian, Phillis.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I have a letter from Nathaniel. He plans a trip home soon. This is his house now, you know.”
I felt something coming. I nodded.
“We shall prevail upon him to let us stay.” He winked at me. “Else I shall have to remove to Mary’s. I don’t think I would care for that. Do you think he will permit us to stay?”
“I’m sure he will, sir,” I said.
He patted me on the shoulder and went on his way. And I thought, He is warning me, in the only way he can. I must plan. What if Nathaniel does not let me stay? What will I do?