Chapter 8In Which I Relate the Circumstances Surrounding My Departure from Rose Hill Plantation
The day the truancy officers came for the children of Rose Hill Plantation, I hid in the summer kitchen with Auntie Aggie. That wasn’t the first time the white men with their long beards and narrowed eyes had come to Rose Hill, taking every Negro boy and girl away to be educated. But it was the first time it was obvious to the naked eye that I was of an age to get carted off along with the rest.
So Momma had grabbed me by the arm and dragged me around the back of the house when she heard the chug and wheeze of the government ponies coming into the front yard, the federal seal painted on the side of the steam-powered metal carriages. “Keep her away from those bureaucratic bastards. Keep her safe,” she said to Auntie Aggie before sweeping out to greet the truancy officers. She was, after all, the lady of the estate, and it fell to her to pay for one of the better combat schools for her charges, should she be so inclined.
The government called it an investment. Momma called it extortion.
Either way, Momma had entrusted Auntie Aggie to hide me, to keep me at Rose Hill Plantation. I’d been hiding every year since I’d been eleven, and now at fourteen I was more than old enough to get carted off to one of the government schools. Momma wasn’t about to let that happen.
Auntie Aggie had other ideas.
“Jane, come here.” I walked over, and she held me out at arm’s length, an expression equal parts sadness and acceptance working across her dark features. “You got to go with the officers, girl.”
“Momma doesn’t want me to go.” I didn’t much want to go, either. There was a big scary world beyond the boundaries of Rose Hill. I was bold, but not so foolhardy as to think there was something worthwhile on the other side of the barrier fence that kept the dead out.
Auntie Aggie nodded, as though she’d heard my unspoken thoughts. “Yes, but your momma don’t always do what’s best for you. Sometimes your momma can be powerful selfish, and this is one of those times.”
I knew that what Auntie Aggie said was the truth. I’d witnessed Momma’s fits firsthand.
“But if I go, I’ll die,” I said, my voice half a whine.
“No, you won’t, Jane. Don’t you know that you’re special? Ain’t your momma told you as much?”
I shrugged, because Momma did always tell me what a special girl I was. But I didn’t always feel special. I mostly just felt different. After all, no one else could claim the plantation’s mistress as their momma and an unknown field hand as their poppa.
“Come here, Jane.” She swept me up into a fierce hug. “You are special, girl.”
“How do you know that?” I asked, my words muffled by her generous bosom.
Auntie Aggie laughed, voice husky. “Because I know things. I know that you got a great destiny ahead of you, just like your momma, and that Rose Hill ain’t no place for you, not anymore. You need to go out in the big, wide world and find yourself. And the big, wide world needs to find you. There’s a whole bunch of folk out there trying to figure out this plague, and ain’t nobody done it yet. You ask me, they might be wanting for some fresh ideas.”
I stepped out of the hug and frowned at Auntie Aggie. “Being out in the world ain’t gonna do me much good if I get gobbled up by shamblers.”
She nodded and reached into the pocket of her skirt. “That’s why I got you this. Miss Fi-Fi made it for you.” Auntie Aggie held out a necklace. It was simple enough, a penny with a hole in it so it could hang on a string. But I knew well enough that if Miss Fi-Fi was involved the necklace was more than what met the eye. Miss Fi-Fi was the woman you went to when you wanted to catch the attention of a handsome fellow, or when your menses were late but you weren’t looking to carry a child. Some folks called Miss Fi-Fi a healer. Most weren’t so kind.
“Momma don’t like hoodoo,” I said, but I still held my hand out for that necklace. I ain’t never been one to turn down a gift, even if it could be cursed.
“Your momma ain’t got to know. Miss Fi-Fi said you should wear this at all times, that it’ll warn you when there’s danger about. Now hurry, put it on before the truancy man comes and gets you.”
I took the necklace and slipped it over my head. The penny settled in the hollow of my chest, its weight warm and comforting.
“Now,” Auntie Aggie said, kissing me on each cheek, “go out there and tell that truancy man you’re ready to go to school.”
The one drawback to attending Miss Preston’s is the quiet. It is ever so calm and safe here, with most of us having not a care in the world beyond our studies. . . .
Chapter 9In Which I Have an Accomplice and We Skulk in the Shadows
I’ve snuck out of Miss Preston’s many times. In the beginning it was because I was homesick, and it was a comfort to be able to lie on the sprawling lawn and know I was under the same big moon as Momma and Auntie Aggie back in Kentucky. I’d lie in the grass in my white hand-me-down nightgown and stare up at the sky, the occasional growls and moans of the shamblers at
