Good Fortune (9781416998631)

by Carter, Noni

  We lifted our voices high, filling the building with a joyous sound. During the sermon, Florence and I joined in with the amens and yesses that rang throughout the room. At the end, a deep plate was passed around to collect what money the folks in Hadson could spare. If someone in the neighborhood had a problem, we would stay and continue praying and praising until the plate was filled with enough money to get them through it.

  Finally, the feast came. Tables had been pulled out and set up in front of the church to seat all the people, and the yard rang with laughter and talk. The size of the celebration compared with the festivities for the two holidays we celebrated at Masta’s.

  After the activities had simmered down, I wandered around, searching for Florence. I came upon a group of young folks who were laughing and clapping around a tree. Henry stood at the center of the group, holding a hat. How silly Henry looked to me as he squatted by the tree with a half-serious, half-amused grimace. He was shaking the hat this way and that, regarding whatever was in it with amusing intensity.

  “Any more buyers? Say, Anna, give me a few coins an’ I’ll show you the trick! Reckon if you figure it out, you get your coins back, but if not …” Laughter burst from the group as Henry set his large lips in a deep frown and shook his head.

  “You clever, Henry, but not that clever. I ain’t givin’ up no money to you!”

  “I suppose Florence wouldn’t want to try it?” he said as Florence approached us.

  It was hard to hold back laughter. “Henry, stop!”

  “I’ll give you a coin!” Hattie-Mae, a young woman around my age who worked with her aunt in the stitching shop in Hadson, tossed a coin to Henry.

  “Y’all ain’t no fun!” Hattie-Mae said, turning to us.

  “No, we just got sense, that’s all,” Florence responded.

  “Well, that kinda sense ain’t gonna get neither of you married.”

  Florence laughed. “You always talkin’ about marrying, Mae.”

  “What else we suppose to be doing?” Mae said as she fluttered her eyelids.

  Florence laughed, and I joined in, a little less heartily, keeping my thoughts to myself. Five months in freedom, and I had done little more than attempt to keep John’s bobbing image out of the forefront of my mind. I was waiting for him.

  “I’m not marrying nobody right about now,” Florence said in reply. “It ain’t no use. An’ ain’t nobody around here suitable for me nohow.”

  “Don’t matter to me.” Hattie-Mae said, shrugging and turning back to the fun.

  As I looked around, my eyes rested on a slender figure in a nice-looking long dress that ruffled at the bottom edges and buttoned all the way up to the neckline. The woman’s black hair fell loose and curly by her shoulders. Her arms were crossed, and her lonely stance called out to me. She was leaning against the church building a short distance away from Henry and the others. I made my way over to greet her.

  “You from around here?” I asked kindly, walking up to her. She turned her head toward me. The woman was most likely a few years my senior. She had very light skin, and her eyes were an intriguing, waterlike blue.

  Hearing no response, I said, “I’m Anna.”

  “Anita,” she said simply, looking at me with almost no interest.

  “You bin round here long?” I asked.

  “I’d rather not tell my story. It’s no different from anyone else’s around here.” She looked away, in the direction of whatever had been catching her interest before I started speaking with her. Her words sounded kind of educated-like. But I sensed irritation, an unkindness I didn’t feel I deserved. However, just as quickly as the notion entered my mind, it left.

  “Why don’t you join us?” I asked.

  “I don’t prefer to,” she said simply, holding strong to her rigid stance.

  “Ah, c’mon. Those folks aren’t that bad.” She eyed me for a long moment, and then, still looking irritated, turned her head to the side.

  “You’re from the South?” She asked it like a question, but her matter-of-fact tone brought a chill up my spine.

  “I was freed,” I said, forgetting about making friendly conversation with her.

  “I saw you reading in the church,” she continued, as if she hadn’t heard me at all.

  “I like learning. Plan on getting educated someday.” She laughed a laugh that turned my heart cold.

  “And then what? You get educated, and then what?”

  I frowned. “Gotta get educated first to know,” I said softly, feeling very small next to her words. She pushed herself lightly off of the building, and stood at her full height.

  “I wish you well, then,” she said with a nod. Without another word, she turned on the heel of her boot and left.

  “Don’t worry about that one,” Florence said, slipping up behind me and pulling me back to the gathering. I looked back, watching the young woman walk off into the distance.

  I headed back to Mama Bessie’s a few hours later, after we had cleared the church grounds. Florence was still in conversation, so I went back alone.

  Once I was far enough away, I voiced my questions and agitation to the heavens.

  “Don’t worry about Anita too much,” a deep voice erupted. I nearly jumped out of my shoes. I had thought I was alone, but Henry had quietly come up behind me.

  Turning back around and starting to walk again, I said, “I don’t think it’s mighty nice to scare a girl like that.”

  “Ain’t scarin’ nobody.”

  “An’ didn’t nobody say I was worried ’bout nothin’.”

  “Ah, Anna, I heard ya. You might not have said it straight like that, but I can tell. She’s like that with most everyone. Ain’t much for social talking and all that. She live with old man Joshua some ways away from here. Got a right fine house, very large. Man got him a lot of money. Worked his way from poor to wealthy.”

  “She his daughter?” I asked.

  “Naw, just been working for him for a while now. Maybe they relatives—I wouldn’t know. She the closest thing he got to life, bein’ that his wife died an’ he stuck in that house from sickness. Anita don’t make it her business to get out much.” I nodded in silence. “She ain’t too nice to folks, though most of us figure that’s all she knows. So don’t worry yourself with her.”

  “I ain’t worryin’,” I said, picking up my pace.

  “Hey, why you walking so fast, Anna? Ain’t I good comp’ny?” Henry asked, taking a couple of large steps to catch up with me. “You know, with those quick legs and that smart head of yours, I see life taking you a long ways!”

  I looked over at him. “Henry, you tell me. How far can we go in this place called Freedom?” I still heard Anita’s mocking comment about education, about the idea that education offered nothing for us.

  “Well, that’s easy! You find you a job, build a house, start a family in this place, and live life just like that. My pappy told me, when he was still living, that that’s the farthest life will take us black folks…. Slow down, would you, Anna? I can’t think right, trying to keep up with you and looking at how pretty you are at the same time.”

  I felt relieved when we came to Mama Bessie’s house. I turned to face Henry.

  “You know what I think?” I asked him.

  “What?”

  “Well, sometimes, this place called Freedom seems to get me down when I think ’bout what I want the most. But I think life’ll take you as far as you wanna go. You can have that job, that house, and that family. But if you wanna fly farther, then shouldn’t nothin’ stop you.”

  Henry laughed. “Well, then, guess you right about that. You gotta lay your eyes on what your really want,” he said with more amusement in his voice than seriousness. I looked at Henry for a moment, saw the way he was laying his eyes on me, then frowned at him.

  “You know, Henry, I’ve laid my eyes on education. I’ve seen it, I’ve dreamed of it, but it’s not mine. It seems the white folk don’t want me to have it. So that just goe
s to show, you have to do a little bit more than laying your eyes on it for it to be yours.” With a smile, I retreated into Mama Bessie’s.

  CHAPTER

  32

  “I WONDER WHY THE DEATHS OF THE COMMON BLACK FOLKS round the city never make it into the papers,” I said.

  “Reckon you shouldn’t think on that too hard,” Florence replied.

  It was a sunny Friday morning, and I sat near Florence reading the local papers. I had come across a section highlighting the loss of a certain servant to some kind of milk sickness. Continuing as I yawned, I found that the white woman had spent part of her day working for the school in Dayton. I stopped short and ran back over the words I had just read. A grand idea hit me then, and I quickly sat up.

  “What is it?” Florence asked, immediately attentive.

  “Flo, it says here that a woman servant they had helpin’ out at the school ain’t there anymore. She died.” Florence’s excitement waned significantly as her eyes fell back to the stitching in her hand.

  “Flo, did you hear me?” I asked, wondering why she didn’t see the possibility lurking behind the words.

  “Yes.” She dragged out the word. “But I don’t see what that’s got to do with us,” she said, looking up again.

  I frowned at her. “Florence, this my opportunity to do what I wanna do! If I can get that job, an’ help out for a couple of hours a day, I’d be in the school buildin’ an’ I could hear the lessons an’ I could get my education …”

  “Anna!” Florence bellowed, cutting me off. “I don’t think you’re really hearing yourself. What you’re talkin’ of is dangerous, Anna. The last thing those folks like is black folks with an’ education. You know that!”

  “Education’s not banned here, Flo! There ain’t no laws sayin’ we cain’t have no education!”

  “But getting educated in white schools is against what they believe. An’ you kno’ their beliefs is more important than their laws. You know that. You can’t do no learning there.”

  “Well, just don’t look at it as an education, then, Florence. It’s a job as a servant. They don’t gotta know I’m learnin’.” Florence shook her head as Daniel ran up to us and leaned against the wooden porch rail. I turned to my brother for the support I needed.

  “Sebastian, when you headed to the city again?”

  “What you ask fo’?”

  “They need a servant fo’ the schoolhouse, so I’m goin’ to see if I can work.” His silence and the serious expression in his eyes baffled me. Why couldn’t the two of them understand what this meant?

  “They askin’ fo’ a black servant, Anna?” Daniel asked me. I shook my head, and his eyes traveled from mine to Florence’s. Florence shrugged at him as if to say, She’s your sister!

  “What’s wrong with you two?” I asked, irritation weighing down my words. “This a school—it’s my chance! All I wanna do is keep learnin’ wherever I can until we find a place that has a black school. Till then, the least I can do is listen in on lessons at the schoolhouse!”

  “Anna, that ain’t no school fo’ us. It ain’t safe fo’ me, it ain’t safe fo’ you, it ain’t safe fo’ any of us.” Florence mumbled in agreement. I stared hard at my brother as he looked sheepishly back.

  “All right, then. I’ll walk to the city,” I said, standing. Daniel grabbed my arm.

  “Now, Anna, don’t go an’ do that. Jus’ listen to what we sayin’. What we talkin’ of makes a lotta sense. An’ besides, I bin askin’ round fo’ you, tryin’ to find some black school somewhere.”

  My anger lessened a bit. “You have?”

  He nodded. “If it’s learnin’ you want, we gonna find it. But don’t go puttin’ yo’self in no danger. Now listen, I came here to see if Mama Bessie’ll let y’all come on wit me. I’m travelin’ to the Gibson community. Got some business to take care of, an’ I’m gonna need me some comp’ny. Should be back before dark.”

  “Think I’ll stay. Got some cleanin’ to do,” I said, turning to go into the house.

  “Flo?” Daniel said. I waited to hear her verbalize what she did and did not have to do that day, and finally agree to travel with him, and then I shut the door.

  Inside, I looked at the newspaper again, and felt Florence and Daniel’s warnings evaporate.

  This is just too right!

  As soon as Florence and Daniel were off, I washed up and put on my best dress. Finding Mama Bessie, I told her I was headed to town.

  “To Dayton?” she asked.

  “Yes, Mama Bessie.”

  “With who?”

  “Just me, Mama Bessie, but its important business an’ I suspect I’m already a little late.” Mama Bessie put her hands on her hips and eyed me closely.

  “Gonna let you go, but I want you to wait for Mrs. Eli an’ her sons. They come through here once a week, an’ I’m sure they’ll be glad to give you a ride.”

  I agreed but asked, “When they gonna be here, Mama Bessie?” She looked past me to the window.

  “Any minute now. Best be gettin’ on out there.” Suddenly, a smile formed on her lips.

  “There a dark fellow you meetin’ up with?”

  “No, ma’am,” I said, startled. “I ain’t meetin’ with nobody.” But I could tell she wasn’t convinced.

  “All right. Would you buy somethin’ for me?” she asked as we walked outside. Mama Bessie dropped a few coins in my hand and described what she needed. “You go on now, but come on right back here.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  The school was situated at the outskirts of the city, almost isolated from Dayton. It was surrounded by grass and a few trees on an acre’s worth of land. This provided space for the children to play and run around in the mornings, and the separation between the school and the city allowed for fewer distractions. The building was smaller than the schoolhouse Masta’s children had attended in Tennessee.

  After thanking Mrs. Eli and her sons for the ride, I hopped out. I stood and took in the sight of the school building, then crouched in the shadows of the county jailhouse to think for a moment. The school seemed to call out to me, though the idea of approaching the place made me apprehensive.

  What if Florence and Daniel were right? What if this is dangerous?

  The questions came, but they settled uneasily somewhere out of my reach. This was my chance, my one chance to steal my education like I stole my freedom. Surely nothing could stop me in my pursuit.

  After staring at the school a few moments longer, I decided to go to the stitching shop to buy what Mama Bessie needed. After this, I paced the outskirts of the city for nearly an hour, going into the general store and otherwise busying myself in order to blend in with the people bustling around me.

  Eventually, I heard the faint sound of a bell ringing nearby, as though it were summoning me. I rushed back into the shadows of the jailhouse and watched as the young children spilled with enthusiasm from the school building. I waited there, following the last of the children with my eyes down the crooked, dusty path that led away from the school.

  As the last of them disappeared from view, I emerged, straightened my clothes, and made my way up the path to the school door. It took only two knocks before the door was jerked open. A young, plump face appeared in the doorway. Her cheeks were flushed red, perhaps from the heat within or from a long day of teaching. Upon seeing me, the woman furrowed her brows together and straightened her back with a slight, almost unnoticeable step away from the doorway.

  “There something you need, miss?”

  “Yes, ma’am, there is. I noticed that you’d do mighty good, here, with a servant of some kind, ma’am. I could clean up the school buildin’ an’ take care of the windows an’ the heatin’ durin’ the day an’—”

  “It’s a single room! What do we need a servant for? We especially don’t need black servants in this school. We have the help we need, and it’s best you stay away from the school.”

  “Yes, ma’am, but I done heard the woman who h
elped out done passed away, an’ I know I got the experience fo’ this an’—”

  “Do you hear what I say? We don’t need you here. The city doesn’t need you here, and the city is what pays. Now go on and leave. These folks around here don’t like to see you blacks near the school.”

  “But, ma’am …”

  As if to further emphasize her words, she placed both hands on her hips and stepped farther outside, pulling the door closed behind her. She moved toward me so swiftly that I almost stumbled backward.

  “I think I’ve said what I needed to say. Now you’re going to have to go. They have work down in the city. Find some place there.” I supposed I should have guessed from the start that the schoolteacher had no intention of listening to what I had to say, but I could not simply walk away so readily, still hoping, still feeling as if an education were possible. I stood on the steps, gazing around her at the building, the windows, the letters scratched conspicuously on the walls.

  God, all I want …

  “Go on now!” The woman said, interrupting my silent prayer and motioning for me to leave.

  I walked slowly back along the path, feeling the teacher’s eyes burning holes in my soul as I left. Sullenness crept upon me as my head pounded: I was hurt. But I kept my head raised high, my shoulders boldly pulled back, and my gait sure and focused. Her angry dismissal of me only made me more determined. I kicked up the dust and memorized the details of our exchange. Certainty hung in the air, and I hoped she could feel it.

  I would be back.

  But my thoughts of returning were suspended when I saw a finely dressed man turn onto the school’s path. I lowered my gaze and quickened my step, attempting, with no avail, to pass unnoticed.

  “Miss.” I lifted my head and stopped short, as if surprised. The man was tall, and I found myself looking up into what seemed to be a light-skinned, handsome face, though his hat made it difficult to see him clearly.

  “Yessah?” I responded nervously, glancing quickly away, and praying I could avoid trouble.

  “Perhaps it’s not my place …” The man had a strangeness about him, and I couldn’t tell what his intentions were. So I stood there, awaiting his words.