Part 3 (2/2)

I already had my bundle in my hand, and Ned followed me with the flint and the iron. When I got on board I felt scared and funny. I thought these two little old legs was go'n buckle under me now for sure.

The ferry pushed away from the landing out on the river, and it looked like none of it was real, like I was dreaming all this. I felt all funny and giddy and tired as I was I wanted to laugh, but I didn't.

”Where y'all headed?” the man in the black suit asked me. He didn't sound like a Secesh at all. I had never heard n.o.body talk like him before.

”Ohio,” I said.

He was smoking a pipe. He jecked it out his mouth quick. I could hear when it hit against his teeth.

”Ohio?” he said. ”Y'all got people there? Ain't that a bit far for just two children? That one over there, that's you little bitty brother?”

”Just a little boy I know,” I said. ”We ain't got no people. My mama been dead. Overseer killed her. Secesh killed his mama yesterday.”

”Oh, that gang,” he said.

”You know them?” I asked him.

”Know of them,” he said. ”Well, you don't have to go to Ohio. I'll find you a place to stay till you find somebody'll take care you. Where you from?”

I told him. I told him about Old Master reading the Proclamation to us and us starting out. Told him about the Secesh or patrollers who had killed the people. Even told him about Mr. Brown.

”Well, you don't have to go to Ohio, now,” he said. ”And your friend Brown might not even be there. I'll find you a place to stay till you find yourself a home. I still think the best thing for both of you is going back, though.”

”We ain't going back there, Master,” I said.

”Well, I'll find you a place to stay tonight,” he said. He looked at Ned holding the flint and the piece of iron. ”I say, Little Man, what them rocks for?” he asked.

”Fiyer,” Ned said.

”I say,” the man said, and smoked on the pipe.

It was pitch black on the river, but I could see lights on the other bank. Looked like even before we got on the ferry good it had landed again. The man in the black suit took my bundle and got on his horse and told me and Ned to come along. Now, I was on the ground again, and it looked like I had never been on a ferry.

”Ohio far from here, Master?” I asked.

”Afraid so,” he said. ”This Luzana you in.”

”What?” I said. I stopped and looked up at him there in the dark. He held back on the reins and the horse stopped. ”All the walking me and this little boy been doing, crossing a river on a ferry, you trying to say we still in Luzana?” I asked.

”Afraid so,” he said.

”Luzana must be the whole wide world,” I said.

”No, not exactly,” he said.

”Then how come we still in it?”

”Nature more likely,” he said.

I could hear him smoking the pipe. We started walking again.

”I want go to Ohio,” I said.

”Afraid you'll have to change your mind,” he said. ”Ever hear-d tell the Freedom Beero?”

”No, Master.”

”Well, 'cording to the Fedjal Gov'ment, they sending Yankees down here to help y'all out. See that y'all have something to eat, clothes, school. Everything Brown promised you, you go'n have right here in Luzana.”

”You a Yankee?” I asked him.

”Afraid so,” he said. ”Call me a gov'ment investsagator. Hail from New York.”

”That's farther than Ohio?” I asked.

” 'Pending on where you standing when you ask that question,” he said. ”Maine, no; Luzana, yes.”

”I'm standing right here,” I said. ”Right here in Luzana where it look like I ain't go'n ever leave from.”

He smoked on the pipe. I could hear it there in the dark. ”Afraid so,” he said.

We came up to a big house where children was playing in the yard. The invessagator got off the horse and told us to follow him. Another white man met us at the door. The two of them talked awhile, then the other white man called over his shoulder for somebody named Sarah. Sarah came in. She was a big black woman who looked after the children. The white man nodded toward us, and she told me and Ned to follow her. She took us upstairs to another big room. They had pallets spread out all over the floor. Sarah told me that's where the girls slept, and she pointed out a pallet for me. Then we went to another room where the boys slept, and she pointed out a pallet for Ned. She asked us if we was hungry. I said yes but we had food. She told me we didn't have to eat that no more, I could leave my bundle side my pallet, or, better yet, dump it in the trash. She told Ned he could leave that flint and iron by the pallet or he could dump that in the trash, too. She had good food in the kitchen for both of us, she said; and she would find something else for Ned to play with. I told her we would eat her food, but we wanted to keep what we had. Where we went, they went. She looked at me a little while like she thought I was getting sa.s.sy with her, then she said suit yourself, follow me. We went downstairs to the kitchen and ate, then she told us we had to take a bath. I said I didn't want one. She said I had to take it if I wanted it or not, and she stuck me in a tub of soapy water and tried to wash my skin off. She even ducked my head under two or three times-and I'm sure she did it just because she thought I had sa.s.sed her upstairs. After she had wiped me off, she stuck me in a little white gown made like a sack-it wasn't nothing but a sack-and she told me to go upstairs to my pallet. Little while later Ned came back upstairs in his little gown. He still had that flint and iron in his hands.

”Feel better?” I asked him.

He nodded his head.

”Get yourself a good night sleep,” I told him. ”Tomorrow morning when n.o.body looking, we getting out of here.”

All Kinds of People.

Little while after I had laid down, the rest of the girls came in, making more noise than a pack of jay birds in a chinaball tree. But when the white man came in the room everything got quiet. ”All right-knees,” he said. Everybody knelt down side their pallet; I was the only one still laying there. ”That go for you, too,” he said. After I knelt down he said prayers, then he blowed out the lamp and went to the other room. ”All right-knees,” I could hear him saying. Then little bit later-”You with them rocks, that go for you, too.” He prayed over them, then he blowed out the lamp and went back downstairs.

I was sleepy, but I felt too good to go to sleep. I just wanted to lay there and feel how good freedom was. I kept thinking to myself, ”So this is freedom? This is freedom? Well, if this all I got to do, I don't mind putting up with that bathing a few more days.”

While I was laying there thinking how quiet and peaceful everything was, somebody round the other side started hollering. I thought it was Ned and I jumped up and made it for the door. The white man got to the door same time I did and went in and lit the lamp. It wasn't Ned, it was the boy on the pallet next to Ned. Ned was laying on his pallet with the flint and iron in his hands.

”What happened?” the white man asked the boy crying.

The boy was crying too much to answer. He didn't even try to answer. Ned was still laying there with the iron and the flint. The rest of the children was sitting up looking.

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