understand all its workings,’ she said, her voice rising shrill enough to conjure that squeaking hinge anew.
So, reader, let me once more draw your eye to that road through the plantation named Amity—to the gig, to the single chestnut horse and the bumpy progress being made by John Howarth and his sister Caroline who sit within. Walking along this road in the path that the gig would eventually take, was a large black slave woman. Upon her head was a straw basket filled with unruly sweet cassava roots, poised so ably she looked to be wearing an ornate hat. Her skirt, once striped yellow and black was, from its years of being drenched in a river, pounded against rock and baked in the sun, only whispering its former lustre. But the child walking at her side was attired in a dress of the same fabric and, like a draper’s sample, this miniature displayed the cloth almost in its original hues.
The little girl halted her stride so she might better peruse a scrubby periwinkle that struggled to bloom dainty at the side of the path. She plucked the plant and waved it gently in the air in the hope that the woman might stop to look upon the purple petals. But the woman was unaware that the child no longer walked at her side. ‘Mama,’ the girl called, and as her mama turned upon hearing the cry, the girl ran to her, holding out the flower.
The woman, bending to look upon the bloom gripped tight in her daughter’s hand, tipped her head only enough so the balance of the produce would not be disturbed. She nodded a smile upon her child, then straightened once more and walked on. But the little girl began pulling ferociously at the cloth of her mother’s skirt to arrest her progress—planting her bare feet firmly into the earth for a solid grip. Although only pulling with one hand, the skirt nevertheless began to strain, almost to ripping. The woman, slapping the child’s hands from the feeble cloth, was forced to stop to take heed of her.
She removed the basket from her head to place it carefully upon the ground, then took the flower from the child between her finger and thumb. She lifted it to her nose before passing it under the nose of the child. Cupping her hands around her mother’s broad fingers, the girl inhaled deeply upon its scent. And as the mother began to brush the dainty petals of the flower across the cheek of the little girl, they both closed their eyes in the reverie of the soft strokes. At last the woman, straightening up to place the basket of produce once more upon her head, began walking on, while the little girl, still curious, dallied to find more flowers to pick.
‘Oh, how adorable,’ Caroline said upon seeing a little negro girl in a yellow and black striped dress, tenderly gathering up a posy of purple flowers. Her brother, however, observing only two slaves walking in this late morning upon a road that climbs out of the valley and off his lands, had concerns of a different kind.
‘Hey you, stop there,’ he commanded of the slave woman as the gig drew up by her side. And it was then that Kitty turned her eyes to look upon her massa.
‘Where are you going?’ he asked.
‘Me have pass, massa. Me and me pickney. Me have talkee-talkee, massa.’
John Howarth held out his hand so Kitty might deliver him the pass. She took the ragged piece of yellowing paper from the folds at the band of her skirt. His snatching hand almost ripped the precious consent. ‘Where are you going? It’s too late for market?’ he said.
‘Please, massa, me go Unity Pen.’
‘On what business?’
‘Me mus’ market me fruits.’
Caroline, alighting from the carriage, walked over to where the child stood. Standing over this little girl, Caroline watched her tiny black fingers as they plucked and gathered the pretty blooms. This girl was no more than nine years old perhaps, with wide brown eyes, fat rounded cheeks and a white kerchief upon her head. Caroline knelt down beside the child, who turned to gaze upon her. If her skin were not as dark as boot blacking, why she favoured one of Caroline’s childhood dolls. ‘Oh, how adorable,’ drifted once more upon a sigh from Caroline’s mouth. The little girl held her posy of flowers under Caroline’s nose so that she might better smell their scent. And Caroline was