––––––––
“She let me come back, but I still have to return later. I’m gonna leave Abraham down here with you, if that’s fine. She had that little girl of hers playing with him, nearly suffocated him in all those sheets she piled on top of him,” Shelone said frustrated while shoving the cotton inside her bag. “She’s evil. Can’t even take care of her own ailing child but has us out here pickin’ cotton and giving birth right here on this here dirt.”
Lily laughed. “She did what?”
Shelone stood straight up and glared Lily’s way. “That’s funny?”
“I can jus’ see that lil white girl...I always see her, piling dirt on her doll’s face justa’ make ‘em look like our babies. Better keep Cosah from there...I tell you. You know how Mrs. Sarah...”
“Shh!” Shelone reached over and slapped her on her arm. “We can’t make mention of what I saw that day. I should have never told you...ever,” Shelone grinned.
“I’m just sayin’ that her lil girl loves herself some Negro babies is all. Just like her mama likes some Negro men!” They both laughed under their breath as they continued under the hot sun filling their bags. They could tell by the sun’s location in the sky how long they had to pick, and it was a lot longer. The children ran off to take their breaks and the adults split up, picking up where they stopped while the older people sat on the ground for a nice break.
It wasn’t long before Shelone’s thoughts raced back to Lady Rose, and she looked back toward the cabin. That was when she heard the hooves of plenty horses quickly approaching. Her heart began to race, and she called her children back over toward her to lay within the rows of their back breaking work. “Down! Down!” Their heads were already down as far as they could go, and then she positioned herself as far as she could go as well. Many hooves meant visitors, and visitors could very well have meant slave traders.
“Who that be, Mama?” Cosah asked, breathing heavily after having run back to dive back into the cotton. “Who they?”
“It’s somebody, some people that don’t live here is all that I know. Listen, keep your sisters. I’m about to go get Abraham from off the tree. Go on. If you even see them whites walking this way, you crawl your fastest, right along with your sisters, until you get to the woods.”
“They comin’ to take us?” he asked terrified.
“No. No,” she replied sharply. “Ain’t nobody takin’ my babies. That’s why I tell you to get away. You just do as I tell you. We leavin’ here, alright, but we’re doing it together. You hear me? Y’all my children...forever,” she huffed back the painful thoughts of having them stripped from her to go live with strangers who didn’t love them half of what she did. “Now, you remember what I said. If you notice them walking near, you and the girls go.” As she turned to go get Abraham from the tree, Bigun stood before her. His eyes said it all, and she stared right back at him just as intently. Then, she walked around him, on the way to her youngest child in order to wrap him atop her back and continue picking Mr. Marksman’s cotton. Nobody was sold off that day, and everyone made it back to their huts in one whole piece. Shelone was relieved and happy.
**
“I done asked him.”
She shut her cabin door and walked off into the darkness with him, struck with curiosity about what he said. “Asked who what?”
“I asked Mr. Marksman if we can marry. Told him we in love, and we want to have a family.”
“You mean you did it?” Shelone jumped for joy directly into his arms. “Oh, I know he said yes! I just know he did.” Having been raised on the plantation for so long, the one thing she knew was that Mr. Marksman favored having married couples around because in his words, “they breed well and don’t run”.
“You right!” he laughed. “He said yeah we could, so I ‘spect we can get ole Minister Flute to marry us down at Alligator River right ‘fore the next catch. I send word for him to meet us down there with the broom.” He took her by her hands, and Shelone gripped them tightly before he spoke again quietly. “Then, soon...really soon... we’re gonna leave this place. Watch and see. It’ll be easy to sneak out, with all the children. You’ll see. We gonna have plenty help. Plenty I say.”
“I love you, Clance!” She jumped onto his broad shoulders, and he clasped his hands around her waist, spinning her around in circles, until his eyes landed on a light that came on inside Mr. Marksman’s house. It was only seconds later that Shelone noticed it as well because the curtains were parted, like someone was staring straight out at them. Shelone just stood there with Clance, locking hands with him and staring up at the window from the side of her eyes while Clance looked directly at it.
“Clance, lower your eyes,” Shelone whispered, not wanting any trouble. “Lower them, Clance.”
As a man, he felt the pressure to stare down whoever it was that was staring back at him in the pitch black of night. He wasn’t doing anything wrong, so his eyes remained locked onto whoever it was looking out of the window. Shelone’s heart beat rapidly the longer Clance stood there, however, she noticed his heartbeat remained steady the entire time he challenged the person inside Mr. Marksman’s house. Finally, she felt his chest relax, and she lifted her head up to look back at the house. The curtains were closed.
“I have to go. We’ll be married by next alligator catch.”
“I love you, Clance.”
He gave her a warm kiss, stared back at Mr. Marksman’s house, and then left, on the way back to his cabin. Deep down inside though, she knew he was headed somewhere else, and she hoped that he made it back to the plantation safely. In the meantime, she kept her head down, afraid to look back at the plantation house in attempts to keep things as good as they could possibly get for herself and her family...until things were able to get much better.
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Sunday night came with much sorrow and grief as they all gathered at the gravesite of the much loved Lady Rose. The gravesite was located in the woods, away from everything and everyone, inconspicuous to those who rode by on horseback or walked the main pathway. They’d embedded stones into the ground around the area so that they would always know, along the people who’d come after them, where an elder was laid to rest.
Lady Rose’s gravesite was to be marked with many of her pots and stones she used in her everyday life. It was one of the Negro men who was good with his hands that found her a big stone that would be used as the main marker for her grave. His hand print went on the very top of it so that everyone could see and know that this site was Lady Rose’s. Before placing her inside the deep hole, everyone gathered around and held hands under the night sky and sang hymns and some songs from the old country. The wooden casket wasn’t closed, and that was so everyone could place their final items in the coffin with her. By the time the ceremony was finished, they put ropes underneath Lady Rose’s coffin and lowered her down into the hole as everyone watched under the light of fire.
As the crowd began to recede, it was Shelone and her children that were one of the last groups to leave the gravesite. Clance was there returning the dirt back into the hole with the other men, all of them pitching in because there was still work in the morning. Mr. Marksman rarely gave any of them a day off. As a matter of fact, it had been six months since any off them had a full day of rest because he believed he needed to work them harder than any animal as if they were lower than an animal. He had so much money that he could replace anybody at any particular time at a slight change in attitude or ability with any of who he called property. This left all of the Negroes on edge, never able to know each and every time the Marksmans were inspecting them.
“Go!” Seena and Sadie raced through the woods.
“Be careful!” She nudged Cosah. “Run behind them. I told them about doing that at night. Catch up to them.”
Cosah ran off while Shelone walked steadily with Abraham until she spotted something in the woods. She stopped dead in her tracks, her eyes fixed on what she swore in her heart of hearts was to the right but far off from her. Immediately, she thought about her children but didn’t run. Instead she stayed put, right where she was. If it was danger, she didn’t want to lead it to her other children and she was close enough to Clance that he would come running the second he heard her call. Therefore, she just stood there and watched the motion of the leaves along with listening to the movement of the ground. Then she finally saw it. She exhaled.
“A dear.” She shook her head, smiled and continued to walk back toward the plantation when she heard Clance call her. She turned around and met him coming toward her. The look on his face was ecstatic, and a smile spread across Shelone’s face as she watched him approaching, feeling just as excited as he appeared.
“Shelone, Shelone, listen to me,” he exclaimed taking a deep breath. “Just saw Minister Flute. Spoke to him and all before he left the site.”
“Minister Flute? Where at? I thought he left after he spoke so he could get back in time.”
“I know, I know, but you gotta come back with me right now,” he panted, grabbing her arm to motion her back. “Where the children?”
“They ran back to the house,” she stated confused. “Clance, what...”
“Go on over there and get ready. He don’t got much time. We getting married. I’m going to get the broom from Lady Rose’s...and the children!” He ran off so fast that Shelone was left in a daze of delight. She danced all the way back to the gravesite with Abraham in her arms, and when she got back there were only two other people there with Minister Flute, and that was all that was needed. Before Shelone even got back, Lily came bolting behind her after getting word from Clance who ran straight past her. She was closer to a broom than he was and that’s what she toted back while she grinned from ear to ear. Ten minutes later, Shelone had a new husband, and she went to his cabin for the first time overnight. Lily kept the children on the same night Lady Rose was buried and a new union was formed.