An Elderberry Fall

by Ruth P. Watson

  I couldn’t help noticing how the trees had started to turn colors. The buildings were old and colonial with large columns. When I walked right past the John Marshall hotel which had been the lodging place for the president and other dignitaries, I slowed my pace in hopes of seeing someone of importance, but the only person around was a doorman in a top hat, and he didn’t even smile. There was something special about Richmond and I loved the buildings and how they towered over the city with authority. The white folks stared at me. One gazed so long I thought she might pop an eye vessel, but not one of them stepped off the sidewalk or acted like I was an animal, like I’d seen happen in front of the Seed and Feed store in Jefferson. The white folk in Jefferson felt we black people had a disease; at least they acted like it, despite the fact that some colored women were wet nurses for white children. The Richmond Whites appeared used to the colored folks and we seemed used to them. Some of the merchants in Jackson Heights were even friends with many of them. Not all colored folks were servants and laborers. Besides, my papa told me I was as smart and important as the whites were.

  As I continued to the trolley station, I couldn’t help wondering about Ms. Pearl and what would happen if she and Momma were to see each other on the street. Would they speak? Or would they scrabble? I know Momma didn’t like Pearl, and thus it was hard for me to like her. But, when we heard her sing at the club, she was nice to me and appeared better than all the stories people told. I took the trolley down near Virginia Union Normal School, and got off and walked the three blocks to the campus. There were only a few students on the yard.

  A man came up and introduced himself to me. “Hi, I am Adam Murphy.” Adam was about my age, studying to become a minister at Virginia Union. He was a dark fellow with light-brown eyes, a fine bridged nose and full lips. He was what I’d call a distinguished-looking, beautiful man. He was polite as well.

  “I’m Carrie,” I said. “I’m here trying to find out about taking classes.”

  “So, you want to be a minister?”

  “No, I’m interested in teaching,” I answered, admiring his enunciation of each syllable, taking me back to Mrs. Miller and her deliberate repetitions in sounding out vowels.

  “I can take you to the office, but most people who want to teach go to the Virginia Normal School in Petersburg.”

  As we walked toward the building where the administration office was, I felt comfortable asking him about school. And he didn’t mind giving me advice, pointing out the buildings and speaking with confidence about being a student.

  “How far is Petersburg from here?” I asked.

  “It is not far. The train can get you there in thirty minutes. Most of the people I know go there on Sunday and return home on Thursday evening. Many of the students stay in rooming houses.”

  “I don’t have money for a room. I don’t know why I thought I could go to school.” The money Simon left each month was only enough to maintain our apartment with a little left over. And I’d been saving it for school.

  The closer we got to the front door of the brick building, the faster my heart was beating, tiny beads of sweat popping up on my nose. I was jittery. The building was the home of the administrators and classrooms. I’d heard about college from my brother, John, and everything he said was exciting, but being married and with a child, I knew for me it would not be the same. This was the first time I’d made a decision on my own in my life. I decided I wanted to go to school and for some reason felt it would happen. The fellow added, “Most of us have to work. The school will help you with a job if you can’t find one on your own. I work right here on the yard. I help keep the grounds. It’s not a big position, but it helps pay for school and gives me a little extra.”

  “That’s encouraging.” I said, thinking I could make do with any amount of money. Country girls knew how to make their own clothes and all I wanted was a safe place for Robert and me to stay during the week and enough money for food. The thought of me making a decision without Simon was scary. Even though I hated it when Simon packed his bags to go back on the road, I sincerely admired him. He knew what he wanted to do and nothing, not even his family, could prevent him from pursuing his goals. I was a bit selfish.

  The schoolhouse was a mansion compared to the one I’d received my learning in. It was a brick building off the road, isolated just for education. Adam escorted me right up to the office. It was as if he’d known me and agreed I needed to be in school. As I waited to speak to the lady in the glasses sitting behind the desk, he excused himself. “I’ll be outside waiting for you.”

  I was the only girl in the line. I finally got my turn to sit down and speak to the lady, who appeared to be stressed by the questions asked by the fellow ahead of me. “What can I do for you, young lady?” she asked, with a little frown on her face.

  “I want to go to school and become a teacher. Can you help me?”

  “This is not a school for teachers. Most of the students here come to learn about religion and the sciences.”

  “Ma’am, I want to teach school.”

  “You need to go down to Petersburg. I will give you a referral. They will get you enrolled and you will be on your way.”

  “Are there students in school with babies?”

  “You got a baby?”

  “Yes, ma’am. My son is eight months old.”

  “Who is going to help you watch him?”

  “I was going to take him with me.”

  “Going to school is not easy. You will have to give your full attention to your studies. Can your momma help you with the child?”

  “We don’t have family here, only my husband, and he is away most of the time.”

  “You are going to need some help, dear. Schooling is not easy. You are going to at least need someone during the week. The classes at the Normal School meet three, sometimes four, days a week. I will give you a name over there. She will help you get enrolled. But, listen, dear, you are going to have to find someone to sit with your baby. Like I said, schooling is hard.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I said, and got up to leave. She handed me a piece of paper with a name and address on it. Before I could leave, she said, “Now cheer up your face. You can do it. Women have it hard, seeing to the children and all, but anything you want badly enough, you can do.”

  “Thank you,” I said, and turned to walk away.

  She reached out to me and stroked my forearm. “Now come back to see me after you get that teacher’s diploma and I will help you find a job.”

  When I left her, I had tears of joy and concern dripping out the corners of my eyes.

  I wiped them before I made it to the door. I didn’t want Adam to see the me that way.

  “You all right?” he asked.

  “I’m fine,” I lied.

  He walked me across the grounds and into the street. It was a comfort having this stranger with me and disappointing that I had not been honest with him. Adam told me where he lived, which was across the road from Union College. I told him I’d stop by when I could. He asked where I lived, but I ignored him both times.

  When I made it back to my house, Mrs. Hall was on the porch even though the summer season had started to change. The extremely warm days became cool with breezy nights. The coolness was perfect for a good night’s sleep. When she saw me dressed up in my Sunday dress and shoes, she couldn’t resist commenting.

  “Where have you been? You look very nice.”

  “Thank you!” I answered.

  “Well, where have you been all dressed up?” Aside from being nice, Mrs. Hall was also inquisitive. Momma said she was a nosey white lady. Momma had witnessed Mrs. Ferguson, the lady she worked for, listening to her husband and a few other men at the barn door one evening. She told Momma it was best to know what was going on for yourself rather than to hear the story from a man, who often fudged the truth.

  “I have been to town. I went to see about going to school.”

  “What kind of school you talking about? A
lot of people trying to get to the Madam CJ Walker school of beauty, and learn how to do hair.”

  “I want to teach school.”

  “Well, you are certainly smart enough,” she said. “I taught a class or two in my day too.

  I didn’t expect her to react positively about school since most colored folk worked as servants in white folks’ homes and education was not something they supported.

  “What are you going to do with little Robert if you decide to go school?”

  It was as if she had been reading my mind. Robert is all I’d had thoughts about the entire trolley ride and walk home. Would he know I was gone? I hoped he would not feel like I didn’t love him. How could I go to school with a son? How could I take him with me? How would Simon handle it all? Would I be able to study and raise a child? All of these had been questions I needed to provide answers to.

  “I don’t know, Mrs.Hall. I want him to go with me. He is my child. I’ve got to figure things out.”

  “We are here for you. I know it is hard to be out in the world alone. Look at me. I’m a white woman with a big colored husband and living with him in a colored community. Yes, indeed, I know what it feels like to be alone.”

  Momma was up in the window watching me. With her hands she was coaxing me to come on in.

  “I have to get on upstairs. My momma has had Robert all morning.”

  “If you need somebody to help with Robert while you are in school, we are here. Colored folk have been deprived for too long. You need to get your education and help other coloreds get ahead. Right, Mr. Hall…”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I answered, thinking about what Mrs. Hall had just said and her offer to take care of Robert.

  Momma was frustrated when I returned.

  “You’ve been out all morning. Where have you been, chile?”

  “I went to check on a school. I was going to be a teacher.”

  “You ain’t got no time for teaching. You have a baby to take care of and a husband now. You need to get all of that out of your head.”

  “Momma, I thought you wanted me to get an education,” I said as I sat down at the kitchen table.

  “I did before you went and got yourself pregnant.”

  “You still don’t get it, do you?” I asked as the tears rolled down my cheeks.

  “I know it really wasn’t your fault, but I don’t understand why you can’t be happy being a wife and mother.”

  Everything she was saying was disturbing to me. I had expected more. As a child, she’d encouraged my brothers and me to learn as much as possible. Now she was telling me to be a mother and accept my responsibilities, forget about school.

  I wiped my tears with the back of my hand, sucked my teeth and tried to find the correct words.

  “I want Robert to be proud of me. I want to teach colored folk how to read and get a skill. I want to be there for him in every way. I want him to see me as a strong woman who does not live in the shadow of a man.”

  “What? We women should take care our children and our homes first. You don’t want your responsibility. You took off out of here this morning without asking me to watch your son. You are going down the wrong road, I tell you. Simon is off working for you, and you are out in this big city looking for a way to stay away from home and go to school.”

  Every word flowing from her mouth was negative. She had a smile on her face, but was still as rigid as ever. I hated disrespecting her like I had the many times in Jefferson County, sneaking up to the school yard with Simon, allowing him to rub his hands up and down my stockings.

  “I am a responsible momma!” I raised my voice.

  “Well, why did you go out this morning chasing a dream you know don’t make a bit of sense.”

  “I am going to school, Momma, and I will be a teacher!” I shouted back at her knowing at anytime she could slap me sick.

  “You need to try to hold on to your husband. He is a good man taking on you and Robert. Now Nadine is waiting to get next to him and you running off to chase your dreams is a bunch of mess. Good women don’t do things like this.”

  “Momma, please! How long are you going to put me down?”

  “I’m not putting you down. I don’t want you to be without a husband. Somebody to take care of you…”

  “Robert and I will be just fine. Mrs. Hall said she’d help me with him.”

  “You can’t trust no white woman, I told you. She don’t want to see about a colored child. Are you losing your mind?”

  “No.”

  “Well. If you think a white woman gonna take care of a colored child, you are fooling yourself.”

  “I believe her. She and Mr. Hall help me all the time.”

  “You need to stay from down there. I seen ya standing there talking like they were in the family. You don’t know them.”

  “No, ma’am, I don’t. I know you, though, and everything you have said has been mean. You don’t have any faith in me. You have always turned your back on the truth. When Papa was living, you never showed him any love, but you giggled and took care of another man. I don’t understand you. Right now, Mrs. Hall is being more of a mother to me than you have ever been.”

  “You don’t know what you are talking about. I should have left you where I found you,” she said.

  Again tears filled up my eyes. I reached over and grabbed Robert out of her arms. She sat there with a blank stare on her face, like I had done something so irritating she couldn’t move.

  I did feel bad. I had never talked to my momma like that before.

  “Momma, please pack your bags and get the hell out of my house!” I shouted.

  It didn’t feel right saying those things to my momma. I had held my feelings in for too long. And, from her words, she’d done the same. Momma jumped up and went into the bedroom. After a few minutes, she came out of the bedroom, with her bags packed, and headed to the depot to take the evening train back to Jefferson County.

  She walked out the door and down the street without saying goodbye, her head stuck high in the sky. She didn’t even wave goodbye.

  Chapter 8

  I ran in to Pearl Brown all dressed up in a canary-yellow dress leaning on the arm of a tall, slender, distinguished-looking white man. They were coming out of the Jefferson Hotel one morning at the corner of Broad and Adams Street. It was strange seeing a colored woman clinging so tightly to a white man, and I was not the only one staring in my shoes. I glanced around and noticed two colored men whispering like women. Several white men standing in a huddle gave them a stern look, but neither Pearl nor the man seemed bothered. I was on my way to enroll in school. The white man was pale, with brown hair and bloodshot, gray eyes. He appeared to be in his forties, maybe even fifty. Pearl gave me a blissful stare, and then a sly grin while she gripped his arm like he was about to run off. I caught myself gaping at her. I was surprised to see her with another man so soon after Herman Camm. I suppose I believed she had changed since her days in Jefferson. I guess it is like folks say, “You can’t teach ole dogs new tricks . . .”

  The train to Petersburg ran several times a day. Some brave folks caught the early train to Petersburg to work and the late train home at night. Most students stayed the entire week and only came home on the weekend. I figured I would come home on Thursday after my class was over. It felt strange that I was carrying this out. That I was doing all of this without the consent of Simon or my momma. I was doing it for me. I wrote a letter to my neighbor Hester, who had chosen to finish college in Washington, about it. She said to do my best to get away from the ways which the white folks had inflicted on coloreds. She said colored folk deserved to be happy too. She had always been the wiser of us two.

  Nadine’s husband was standing in front of the train when I arrived on the train platform. He glanced over at me, smiled, and threw up his hand and waved. As I started up the steps to the colored car, he called out, “Hey, neighbor, where are you headed?”

  Hastily, he walked over to me. I was standing at
the last car. Wrong but customary that most colored people sat in the rear cars. “I’m going over to Petersburg for the day,” I answered.

  The last time I had seen him had been months earlier when he was sitting on the front porch watching Nadine prance back and forth. Nadine grinned every time he tapped her on the rear end. I thought it was a strange way of showing affection, but I would since my husband was never home with me.

  There was something dignified about Jessie in a uniform. His mannerisms were serious and professional. Colored folk could never be anything but serious considering that most white people still resented that the slaves had been freed in 1864.

  “If you need anything, let me know. I will be in the rear of the last car. I’ll look for you when we reach Petersburg.” He walked away with his shoulders leaning back and his chest sticking out. The uniform had that effect on most men; it gave them a sense of entitlement. Lord knows, colored men needed something to make them feel special.

  “Thank you,” I replied, and sat down in a seat beside a middle-aged lady who had her head back and eyes closed. She never mumbled a word when I accidently pushed against her. “Good morning,” I said. She didn’t even say good morning. She kept her eyes closed and never flinched.

  It was early, though; the sunlight had just begun to break. I was also sleepy. The jerks and swerves of the train could wake a dead person, and the rumble was subtly annoying. She was dressed in a formal maid’s uniform. My guess was she worked in Petersburg, and probably at some white person’s mansion. For a minute, I remembered going with Momma to Mrs. Ferguson’s and how she would scrub her clothes clean with her bare hands, and then dry and iron them before returning home. Once she was home, she’d do the same for us. She even made sure Mrs. Ferguson’s dinner was warming on the stove and the table set before putting on her hat for the trip home. Mrs. Ferguson was an uppity white woman. I never cared for her, and especially the way she’d look down her finely chiseled nose at the people making her life easier. I doubt she liked me either.