I got mine out quickly, at last. "You could set me free.”
“It is better be a slave to a rich man than a slave to poverty. Poverty is a cruel master, a cruel master every day. And there are kind masters in the world.”
“I don't want to go.”
“You distract your mother more than you know. And I have lost too many children for her to lose none."
"What has that to do with me?”
“I'm willing to lose another to make her feel the loss of one. My sorrow needs company." So he sold me to his friends in Charleston with the promise they would be kind, and they were kind enough. But the influenza came through, and so many died in so few days, so many wills, and I was passed along with the Thomas Elfe chairs from house to house, until, like the chairs, I stumbled into an establishment more starved of cash than elegance, and I was sold. Too many folk died, and I was in the market and my breasts were turning red from the sun. Later, the skin from my chest would come off in sheets. This is my story and I tell it again.
I get in Debt's carriage. It was an altogether different girl that got into Planter's then. Back then, before the country was at war, when the belles were still dancing, and the swains still provoked swooning, when the blue blood of the South was hunting', shootin', fishin', drinkin', arguin', and even studyin' a little, at Virginia, at Princeton, at Harvard, and at William and Mary, before the first public brother-against-brother blood had been publicly shed, I went to war, and I was a battlefield.
My weapon against fear was anger. My shield against pain was my own scream less bloodless, battlefield surgery performed without ether or alcohol. I cut off memories, I gouged out feelings the way you gouge out the little dirty places on a potato you dig up in the field before you serve it at the table. I gouged out dirt holes where I found them in my soul, and in my mind, and in my heart. I amputated and cauterized with searing thoughts, thoughts so disgusting I not only never thought them again, I recollect distinctly I have never thought again in the particular place that spawned the particular thought. And with the bleeding parts cut away, the necessary places cauterized, I survived, as fortunate soldiers do.
I fought my war before the war. And in it I earned my courage. And when I stopped being afraid, there were not many places left to hurt, and I thought so fast and clear-so separate I was from feeling.
Feeling slows down most women's minds. Mine is not hindered like that.
It is not burdened.
I think quick. So I recall it's not slavery and freedom that separate my now from my then; it's when I could read and when I could not, it's when Mammy loved me and I didn't know it, and when Mammy loved me and I did. It is when Lady was white and when Lady was black. It is still me, and it's still a carriage, but me in the carriage has changed more than I would have thought possible. All my old dreams have come true, and I am too tired to dream anew.
Other's man, house, and farm are mine; this is not a complete surprise. These things were hoped for and achieved. To look in the mirror and know, not simply that my beauty eclipsed hers, but that it is elemental, that it does not require purchase or contrast to be, or to be valued, is a miracle. A miracle begun when? When I saw myself reflected in the Congressman's eyes as I twirled in his arms. I want to see myself, again, in that mirror.
We are back in Atlanta. It seems so short and flat after the Capital.
A place to move through, not a place to stay. A place that was not, a place that will be, but a place of friends. This is the only city in the world in which I have friends. Am I am ready to rest and be thankful?
tiptoe into Beauty at breakfast this morning. Just looking at her makes me smile. She powders her face so white and dyes her hair so red, I expect to hear God shout down, "So you think you paint better than me!”
“Mrs!" Beauty says out loud to me. I hold out my hand and wiggle my finger; the ring sparkles. She presses a cup of coffee into my hand and I too sip. "I wasn't jealous of you having him in your bed. I had that before you did, but I don't believe anybody's ever married me. I think I'd remember if they had." We both laughed.
"I know you've been asked," I say.
"Asked, yes, I've been asked but not by him, and he's the only one I'd give up my ladies for. For him and a proper ring, I might just have given up pussy.”
“You are too horrible," I say. If I could be scandalized, I would be.
She hugs me. It's a way of saying congratulations, well done. She kisses me on the forehead and I kiss her on the lips. I am so tired of being alone, and Debt has not been true company for me in a long time, since before Precious died. We are just old times now. I kiss Beauty because Jeems is a glorified stable boy and the Congressman is far away and because we both love R. One way of looking at it, all women are niggers. For sure, every woman I ever knew was a nigger-whether she knew it or not.
We dip toast into our coffee, and it is sacrament, benediction, and prayer.
I go home and pray for more.
Congressman sent his card 'round to me. I waited for him all the afternoon, and he did not come until evening, when R. received him and I sat in the drawing room keeping busy, not with my sewing but re-reading this diary. The men caught me at it. The Congressman feigned snatching it away. Mr. Chauffeur assured him that the sanctity of the little book would never be violated under his roof. The Congressman commended R.’s virtue, and I contradicted him. He possessed not virtue in .. r . surtelt, tut cunoslty m c enc lt Beauty and I were out in the shops together this afternoon. We passed the Congressman, and he lifted his hat and bowed in my direction. There was a sober look on his face and a smile of complete contentment that provoked restlessness in me. I want to taste what he tastes.
"I am feeling a touch poorly. My joints are aching almost all the time now, and I must be clever with my hair; I've lost quite a bit of it.
There is a doctor in Washington I particularly like. I've asked R. to make arrangements for me to see him. There's worry in R.’s eyes. His worry makes me worry more. ;t. has asked the Congressman to accompany me back up to Washington, as he is going in that direction and R. is tied by business to this city. The Congressman has further suggested that I stay at the home of his sister, a Mrs. Harris who lives in Le Detroit Park near Howard University. I am alarmed to be so happy.
Later, R. told me that he was touched by the Congressman's kindness and would seek to do business with the man even when he wasn't in office.
"Some of them are rather fine sorts of men," R. says. "Not the finest, but fine."
Strain has the same effect as a draught of laudanum. It excites and numbs at the same time. The shate shate shate of the wheels under you quiets the spirit, the monotony of sound quiets the soul, and the ever-changing scenery occupies the mind simply. Nothing remains in view long enough to hold on to. Another way of sleepwalking with your eyes wide open.
The Congressman doesn't dance attendance on me, but he makes his presence known. He brings an extra pillow, a glass of water, a cup of coffee. This morning when he offered the coffee, he allowed his fingers to brush over mine. It was the first time we had touched since we danced.
"Perhaps you'll take me dancing while we are in the Capital City," I venture.
"I don't think my fiancée would like that.”
“I'm not sure that I like that you have a fiancée." The Congressman laughed at that, big guffaws.
"Why are you laughing? Was she the gap-too the girl you danced with after you danced with me, the last time we danced?”
“Yes.”
“Had you asked her then?”
“No, then I was thinking of asking you." I blushed; my cheeks, my breast turned scarlet. "You hoped I'd marry you?”
“Yes. Given the choice between being my wife or his mistress, I thought you might choose-wife.”