The Long Song Read online

  ‘Miss July, is that a bed sheet you be holding?’ he asked once more.

  ‘No, Mr Godfrey, it be a fine tablecloth,’ July replied.

  ‘Then go put it ’pon the table,’ Godfrey told her as a hog ran past him, chased by the dog. ‘Wait, the hog not dead yet?’ he suddenly cried. ‘Catch up the hog, where is Miss Patience? Catch up the hog.’ All at once, Patience was there, bending low, her apron outstretched as she sought to corner the squealing pig against the walls of the kitchen. While Miss Hannah, at the kitchen door with a pan in her hand said, ‘What, the hog not dead yet, Mr Godfrey?’ And Godfrey, kicking the dog away from the confusion called, ‘Byron, where is that boy? Why the hog not dead yet? Byron!’

  CHAPTER 8

  CAROLINE MORTIMER WAS RESOLUTE; nothing would be allowed to mar this Christmas dinner for her. Mrs Pemberton of Somerset Penn and her two cousins from England had sent word that they were unable to grace her table. Why? Caroline was never to know, for the small negro boy who had been despatched had tucked the note containing the precious explanation into the waistband at his trouser. This urchin had then run so far, so fast, that his soppy sweat had rendered the note into nothing more than a spreading grey stain upon Mrs Pemberton’s fine laid paper.

  ‘What did it say, boy?’ Caroline had asked.

  And in front of the Anglican clergyman, Reverend Pritchard, John had replied, too tersely indeed, ‘Oh, for pity’s sake, Caroline, look at the shabby wretch, do you believe he can read?’

  Yet Caroline had merely laughed off this reproach, and the clergyman’s look of discomfort. Then, as the sun had set, the startling pink hues of that dusk had so reddened the sky that Henry Barrett, the tiresome old attorney from Unity, had left off slurping upon the malt liquor, (his third glass), to comment that it appeared that they were all caught beneath a sheet soaked in thinning blood. ‘Fine aspect you have here, though,’ he added, finally heeding the appalling image he had left upon his listeners’ mood. John, remembering a similar sunset that occurred the night his wife Agnes had died, whispered noisily into Caroline’s ear, ‘Bloody fool.’

  And oh, oh, oh! Caroline Mortimer had been assured by Godfrey—not once but twice, perhaps even three times in the asking—that the group of negro fiddlers engaged to play pretty tunes such as ‘Whither My Love’ or ‘The Red, Red Rose’ could also play ‘Silent Night’ tolerably well. An extra shilling Godfrey had asked, to bribe them from a Joncanoe masquerade in town. Yet the clatter they made as her guests changed their shoes, was unrecognisable as a tune. Come, throughout the whole melody an ugly buck-toothed negro at the front thrashed his tambourine as if to fright crows from a field. Yet it was a silent enough night for some, for the old negro poised upon the triangle looked to be asleep.

  ‘My dear, everyone knows these slave musicians play better asleep than awake,’ Elizabeth Wyndham from Prosperity had said before rolling her eyes to her husband, with no qualm that Caroline might witness the rebuke. Charles Wyndham added that, next time she needed music, to let him know and he would see to it that one of the brigade’s bands came from the nearby barrack or enquire if there were a ship in dock that could supply some excellent naval or merchant players. ‘Niggers cannot render civilised music,’ he told her.

  ‘Some play a wee bit by ear,’ Tam Dewar said. All spruced up, with the small amount of hair he had slicked against his head as if drawn on with a quill, the overseer had intended the comment as a comfort. However his smile, although meaning to be gracious, reminded Caroline of her grey mare when she bared her gummy, brown teeth.

  ‘But they do not know of sharps and flats. They are like small children in that respect,’ was Evelyn Sadler, the skinny mistress of Windsor Hall’s, pennyworth of wisdom upon the subject.

  ‘I’ve suffered worse,’ her husband George added. Upon which note this exchange but not the negroes’ rumpus was brought to a close. And, once the sunset had stopped eclipsing Caroline’s elaborate room decoration, all the guests agreed, as they took their seats for dinner, that the profusion of candles rendered the room quite magical . . . if not a little hot.

  Godfrey clapped his hands as a signal for the food to be brought in upon the table. When none of his wretched boys appeared from the kitchen he stood within the doorway to yell like a market caller, ‘Byron, come bring the food, nah. You no hear me clap?’ Elizabeth Wyndham found this cause once more to roll her eyes. But soon all the dishes—a delicious-looking boiled turkey, a ham, a platter of plump guinea fowl, several turtles and stewed ducks, pigeon and mutton pies with pastry that appeared passable, and a vivid abundance of fruit—were laid along the table.

  Henry Barrett may have leaned back upon his chair, tucked his napkin under his chin and commenced with what he considered conversation, but to all other ears was dreary sermon, ‘I suppose all of you have heard that the negroes have got it into their heads that the King has given them their freedom. Some say it spells trouble.’ Caroline’s brother John may have suggested to him that he save that thorny subject for after the ladies have left the room. And he, slurping down a whole glass of red wine, might have agreed, ‘Quite so, quite so,’ before carrying on, until only the pushing of thick slices of ham into his busy mouth gave any pause in his oration. ‘They believe it is only we planters standing in the way of them and some heaven on earth, once they are free. What do you think on this, Howarth? Those preachers have put it in their head that they are as worthy as white man. Baptists. They’re just a bunch of . . . Better not say with ladies present, eh, Howarth? I’m ready for them if there’s trouble. Good chance to put all those niggers back in their place . . .’

  Molly may have slopped most of the vegetable soup over the floor as she searched the table for somewhere to rest the tureen. And Evelyn Sadler may have whispered into her husband’s ear, ‘Oh no, not turkey again.’ Yet nothing, no, nothing, nothing was going to blight that coveted evening for Caroline Mortimer. Not even George Sadler quipping to general amusement that, ‘The boy on the triangle has just woken up,’ when the old negro musician tripped over a chair as the players were commanded to leave the room.

  But, reader, let us follow the fiddlers’ example and run from this place. For I fear you will never forgive your storyteller for resigning you to listen upon the puff and twaddle of such dull company. If you were to stay supping at that table you would soon feel yourself as wearisome as Caroline Mortimer’s dinner guests. Nothing was going to mar that dinner for her but, before she breaks a bite from Florence and Lucy’s crust upon that pigeon pie, come let us remove to the kitchen to see what arises there.

  On the stretch of ground behind the kitchen—out of the sight for any view from either the house or counting house, behind a row of sweet orange trees but boarded by the lemon and tamarind, in the area where the chickens roamed but the pigs and goats were tethered, was a noisy gathering of slaves. Let me make an amend. For some of those negroes gathered can now read. And should they perchance find themselves referred to in this publication as slaves, then trouble will chase me. No. The noisy gathering was composed of house servants. For none in that lordly flock ever enjoyed to be reminded that they were, in fact, white men’s chattel.

  Clothed in their fine livery of white muslin for the woman, white jean for the men and waistcoats in a fancy green and red chintz for both, the most pretty-pretty of the house servants were, doubt me not, those from Prosperity Plantation.

  When that crowd of neighbouring negroes first stepped in upon the land by the kitchen, those that were present from Amity turned their view from the setting sun that blushed overhead to marvel instead upon those dress-up guests. July’s mouth did water, for they appeared to her like a sweet confection. Of course, Molly’s mouth did sneer, but Hannah’s mouth did gape at the one, two, three, four . . . Oh Lord, why so many servants is come?

  But the massa of Prosperity and his huffish wife could not travel that short distance to Amity—along the town road that rose over the hill—without their groom to drive the barouche. Their g
room, James, was a short, stout fellow who was prized for miles about for his ability to bleed all malady from the most suffering horse. Although befitting of the owner’s vanity, that puff-up barouche was unsuited to the terrain as it had a faulty wheel that must be watched. So James could not manage this carriage without his boys to accompany him. He needed Cecil and Sam to climb down to remove obstructions from the road and, now and then, whack the bolts upon the roguish wheel with a hammer.

  Their massa having heard rumours that the road they were to travel may not be safe after daylight had commanded Giles—his slave who could shoot a bolting steer between the eyes from seemingly any distance—to travel behind the barouche in the old pony cart, carrying both a fowling piece and a big stick. Throughout the whole of the journey to Amity, Giles complained loud to the one-armed driver of the cart, Bailey, to keep the ‘raas-t’ing’ from bumping. Giles had an aching head. He had spent the days before at a masquerade with his face chalked white with clay, strutting about upon tip-toe, pointing over here and there whilst barking, ‘Is it ready to strike? Is it ready to strike?’ in mimic of his white massa inspecting the teaches in the boiling house.

  Now, despite each servant Elizabeth Wyndham asked, replying to her, ‘Me no know, missus. Me long way from there too,’ that missus kept enquiring of her slaves as to the condition of the ground at Amity. Would it be puddled with rain water, squelching with mud, or firm as a level of logs? In the end, Clara had to accompany her missus to carry not only her kid, satin, and leather shoes, but also her missus’s silk stockings, her shawl and her wooden box containing all the dressing for her hair lest her curls droop in the damp breeze.

  Clara was not only a lady’s maid, she was a quadroon. Clara’s mama was a handsome mullatto housekeeper to her papa, a naval man from Scotch Land. Her papa died just before he was to manumit her and her mama. The papers were drawn; she has them in a box, if you care to see them. So, although still a slave, on some days, in some lights, her skin did appear whiter than her missus. And haughty! When commanded to travel in the pony cart between the rum-soaked Giles and the one-armed sambo, Bailey, alone, she screamed, fainted away, and had to be brought around with salts. Clara insisted to bring her own girl Mercy (who was a stupid negro, still sucking upon her thumb when there was no one to see it, but what could Clara do for that was who she had been given), to help her carry all those missus’s things and, lest she faint away again, to yell upon Giles to watch his mouth.

  Of all the servants that had come from around and about—including the two from Windsor Hall, Frederick from Unity, the housekeeper of Tam Dewar from just down the path—it was Clara that July could not take her eyes from.

  ‘Is me dress you like or me pretty fair face that make you stare so?’ Clara asked July.

  July shrugged nonchalant at Clara’s words, yet persisted to gawp upon her like Clara were a blue flower blossoming upon a bush with only yellow blooms. For the tip of Clara’s nose pointed upwards like a white woman’s—no matter that she were peering down that slender feature to sneer upon July, the black pips of her nostrils could still be seen. Her lips were so thin they looked to have been embroidered upon her face in padded satin stitch. And when she lowered herself upon a chair, it was with the gentility of a missus perching side-saddle upon a delicate horse. July was wearing her best—a new blue kerchief upon her head, her pale-blue cotton blouse stitched with lace and two pearl buttons, recently fallen from her missus’s garment—yet within the shade of Clara’s distinction, she felt as ragged as a half-plucked turkey.

  It was a thought escaping when July exclaimed, ‘Me missus give me cloth to make a new dress,’ into Clara’s proud face.

  ‘Cast-off ?’ replied Clara wearily. ‘I cannot abide to be dressed in cast-off. ’

  The cloth July had been allowed was indeed her missus’s discards; a worn-out cotton dress drained away from bottle-green to an exhausted grey. And, because it had once wrapped all of her missus, unpicked and pulled out, the ugly fabric stretched for yards!

  ‘No,’ July snapped, ‘it be the finest white muslin from a ship that just come in from England.’

  The sound of Clara sucking upon her teeth was as delicate as the chirp from a tiny bird. ‘You no tell me true,’ she said, ‘Your massa have no money for white muslin for you.’

  ‘Me massa have plenty money,’ July replied.

  ‘Me hear that not be so,’ Clara said.

  ‘Is so true,’ July said. ‘Him make plenty hogshead. And they do come from town and buy them. And him does take all the money in a big chest. Him can hardly lift it. Him must call Mr Godfrey to help. But not even them two can carry this chest, it be so full up with coin.’ July stopped to look upon Clara’s face and saw two scoffing green eyes staring back at her.

  ‘You no be telling me true, for what your missus be wearing is bad. No worthy white missus be wearing cotton printed with stripes,’ Clara said, flicking her hand to shake July from her.

  ‘But your missus does have an ugly face,’ July retorted.

  ‘How dare you impudence me missus,’ Clara said. Her umbrage rose her from out of her chair, so July quickly sat down upon it. Folding her arms, July then planted her feet down firm as a tap root so she could not be moved. Clara, even more piqued, shouted rough as a washerwoman, ‘Well, your missus has a big-big batty.’ And oh, how July desired those gold buttons upon Clara’s waistcoat as they shimmered in the skirmish. She may have made grab for one or bit it off with her teeth, if it were not for Byron running to her to say, ‘Them finish with first course. Mr Godfrey say come.’

  Despite all the candles that lit up the group of servants as they entered the room, none of the guests at that table, not even Caroline Mortimer, paid any heed to that parade of gentle scavengers as they began lifting the plates from around them. Godfrey, standing by the table, ordered with a silent sweep of his hand what was to be lifted and taken where. Leaving only fruit in the centre of the table and laying down two platters of cheese, he bowed and left the room, walking backwards. (He may have somersaulted or jumped high, clicking upon his heels, reader, but there would be none to report it, for no one did see him.)

  The feast of food was then carried from that high table within the dining room and laid out upon a low table that rested upon four large stones in the yard by the kitchen, until the makeshift table—wilting with the weight of food—had to be propped with a fifth stone before it snapped in the middle. And Molly again did slop the soup over the floor—the turtle soup this time—while looking for somewhere to place the tureen.

  Godfrey, looking to finally fill his glass with a big slop of forget-all brew, sucked his teeth as Giles, James and two of the musicians—numb with rum and slurring words about them soon to be free men—passed his now empty bottles between them. Godfrey called July to him, ‘You can take Byron and get us some rum?’ July, her cheeks swollen with pigeon pie, nodded and ran off as Godfrey called after her, ‘Or anything that you can get. No come back with nothing. You hear me, nah?’

  July usually performed her pilfering within the dining room when, with only the brass candelabra upon the table, the two candlesticks upon the sideboard, and her massa and missus chewing their food in silence, the room was quite gloomy. With the massa’s stock of drink unlocked for this big-big dinner, July thought to slide herself invisible as a duppy towards the cabinet that held it. But all those candles saw her dark corners chased away. She had to step cautious—pressed flat as the pattern upon the wall. At one step she stood still when she thought her missus did spy her and the tip of her kerchief was singed within the flicker of a candle flame. But her missus’s head was merely resting upon one hand, her eyelids drooping with the effort of staying attentive to the talk from that wearisome old man from Unity. Her massa, although nodding to this man’s chatter, idly banged a spoon against an empty decanter in front of him. While the other guests, paying this man no heed at all, continued to nibble and drink at what they could. Except for one, for if July’s eye was seeing tru
e, the massa from Windsor Hall was sound asleep.

  The fiddlers, now playing in the yard for the servants’ gathering, began to strike up a song. No more clatter or unrecognisable tune—the sound of a sweet melody came whispering through the open window. For, like most slave fiddlers, it only amused them to play bad for white ears.

  July had been promised by Patience that, when the fiddlers struck up a good quadrille, then she would teach July all the steps to the Lancers. And it was a quadrille July could hear. It was just the confusing question of which was her left hand and which was her right, that stopped July from skipping this dance very well. Once she had that matter learned, then she would dance it better than Molly—for with only one eye Molly did lose her partner on every spin; it did mess up the set for everyone. July yearned to return to the kitchen before the dance was done for Cupid, the old fiddler, had promised her that she might get a bang of his tambourine, and she was hungry for more pie.

  Byron hissed at the window, ‘Miss July, you there?’ so loud that July feared Tam Dewar had heard. For suddenly the overseer declared, ‘Not so. We won’t have trouble with negroes here. There are good negroes and there are bad . . .’ Although Byron was hidden deep as a shadow upon black velvet, still July held in her breath, then waved her hand out of the window as signal for him to hush up and wait.

  Hordes of night creatures lured to the candles’ open flames dropped upon the wooden top beside her—scorched and smoking, they whiffed of baking food. As the talk-plenty old man from Unity said, ‘Well, I hope you’re right, Mr Dewar . . .’ July whipped a bottle from the cupboard top and passed it quickly out of the window. Another bottle she picked up was already empty. She shook it, then placed it back. But two more that were full, soon sailed over the window’s ledge into Byron’s tiny grasp.