He left late at night with a lantern, two medium-size valises, a basket of food, and a jug of strong, sugared coffee, not that he needed it, as sleeplessness tormented him. If Dori had packed him a jug of spirits along with the coffee, he would have drunk it, let inebriation take him over, climbed in the back of the wagon, and allowed the gray mares to lead him wherever they wanted: Hellfire. The bottom of a river. The town where the train station was. Back to his mother’s womb, where something would recognize his malevolence and mercifully kill him. In his daze, Matthew could not be shocked by anything—and so, when he arrived at the crossroads, encountering the same small Negro man from his dreams did not trouble him. He signaled to the horses, and they stopped.
“Greetings, comrade,” the small man said. “My name’s Joe. Might I trouble you for transport?”
Matthew nodded his head, and in case the night had shielded his response, he spoke as well. “Yes, you can ride with me.”
When the small man asked if they possibly could take a detour, Matthew handed him the reins. For some time, the horses trotted on, and then, they arrived at Wood Place, in time for them to witness the fire eating the left cabin, and ravenously at that.
Matthew saw several Negroes run into the woods, and then there was his beloved Rabbit holding the hand of a young woman. They were walking away in the other direction, away from the burning cabin. And Matthew didn’t care about the consequences, that he’d face the weight of the law. That his money could be taken, and possibly his freedom. This was his chance to make the right choice, and Matthew allowed the small man to drive the wagon toward the woman he loved.
XI
And when we call for education we mean real education. We believe in work. We ourselves are workers, but work is not necessarily education. Education is the development of power and ideal. We want our children trained as intelligent human beings should be, and we will fight for all time against any proposal to educate black boys and girls simply as servants and underlings, or simply for the use of other people. They have a right to know, to think, to aspire.
—W. E. B. Du Bois, “The Niagara Movement Address”
“Ah wanted to preach a great sermon about colored women sittin’ on high, but they wasn’t no pulpit for me. . . . Ah said Ah’d save de text for you.”
—Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God
Who Remembers This?
The ticket agent squinted at my driver’s license. I estimated him to be no more than twenty-five, but he was balding already. There were dashes of pink scalp under his red hair.
Though she knew I slept late on the weekends, my mother had rung me two weeks before in the morning, too close to dawn.
“I’ve been waiting for you to tell me your travel plans for Root’s ceremony on Founder’s Day.”
“Mama, I don’t think I can come. I was gone drive, but my transmission is tripping. I’ll see you for the reunion.”
“Is that all? I’ll just order a ticket for you.”
“No, Mama! I’m thirty-three years old. You can’t keep spending money on me.”
“Diane pays all the utilities in the house, so I’m all right.”
“But, Mama—”
“Uncle Root is a very old man, and he hasn’t seen you since last July. You have to come. You know you’re his favorite.”
“I call him every week.”
“It’s not the same. Now, I know you’re writing that dissertation, but you have to show your face sometimes. You weren’t even there when we buried Nana.”
“You expected me to stop work for that?”
“Yes, I did. She was your father’s mother. That’s what people in families do. They come for the funerals of their grandmothers. You gone want somebody to be at your funeral one day.”
“No, I won’t, Mama. I’ll be dead. You can cremate me and flush me down the toilet, for all I care.”
“I wish you knew how stupid you sound. And stop trying to change the subject. I’m buying you that ticket, so I expect you to be there at the airport on Wednesday. David James is coming to get you. You know him and that girl got divorced, with his cheating self.”
“Miss Rose told me they weren’t together anymore, but how you know he stepped out?”
“’Cause I got some sense! All them James men cheat. It’s in their blood.”
“So after you low-rate him, you gone ask him to pick me up from the airport? Dang, Mama. That’s cold.”
“I didn’t say David wasn’t a nice guy. All I’m saying is look at the facts. Mr. J.W. was a cheater. His son Bo cheated on his first wife with David’s mother. And David is Bo’s son, so there you go.”