Daddy’s adoring words always melted my heart,
and I was certain he would never waiver from his deep devotion and
affection for me, and I would always hold the key to his heart -
the key I was given after Mummy died. The only person I planned to
share that key with was Mammy. She, I would share Daddy with.
By 1858, when I was thirteen years old, Daddy
was one of the wealthiest men in Savannah and was not like most
other plantation owners. They were all married, and their wives
were as beautiful and sophisticated as the men were pompous and
arrogant, unlike Daddy, who remained unpretentious and unspoiled
and didn’t like any but one of them.
Mr. Niles Montgomery and his wife Catherine
were frequent visitors to Sutton Hall. They were old friends of
Daddy’s from England, and they all got along famously. They were an
older couple who often visited their grown son, Perry, and his
wife, Myrna on their nearby plantation. Perry and Myrna Montgomery
had four girl babies in four years, and expecting their fifth
child.
“They breeding like rabbits,” Mammy snickered
one evening as she waited on me. I had to wear my finest dress to
supper, for the Montgomery’s were bringing a new guest. “I bet that
man ain’t never gonna get a son.”
“I don’t want to dress up,” I complained.
“Your daddy is expecting you.”
“I hate these suppers!”
“Now, Miss Amelia, you just gonna have to get
used to it.”
I didn’t understand why several times a week
I had to wear my finest dress, with a chemise, petticoat, and hoop
under my lace skirt, to attend formal, boring, stuffy suppers with
people who talked about things I wasn’t the least bit interested
in. And this supper in particular, because Daddy insisted Mammy was
not to attend. Normally, she waited in the corner and tended to me
when necessary. Never once was she not permitted to be in the
dining room.
“It be just fine,” Mammy whispered, and
nudged me forward, then fell back into the shadows.
I stood beside Daddy and greeted each one of
our supper guests with a proper curtsey as they spilled from the
parlor into the dining room. All were familiar, all but a tall,
regal woman who strolled in with Mr. Montgomery. I immediately
noticed Daddy’s spine straighten and press his firm chest
outward.
“Mrs. Norton, this is my daughter, Amelia,”
Daddy introduced me after placing a quick gentlemanly kiss on her
gloved hand.
The tall, older woman’s brow lifted as she
looked me over and then said in a dry voice, “Pleased to meet you.
My, you are certainly as lovely as Thomas mentioned.”
“Thank you, ma’am.”
“Mrs. Eugenia Norton is Mr. Niles
Montgomery’s eldest sister. She is visiting from London,” Daddy
said. He took her arm and led her to the seat that had been
unexpectedly reserved next to him. That was my seat.
Daddy noticed my surprise and discreetly
motioned for me to take the seat down at the end of the long
table.
I noticed Mammy watching us from out in the
hall as we were served. Louis and Cordelia stayed on their toes all
night and made certain the meal was exactly as Daddy had ordered.
They served green pea soup, stewed sea bass, a French ham pie, and
baked tongue. For desert there was plum pudding and peach ice
cream.
The air was stuffy, the night dragged on. The
conversation was typical of our supper parties: politics, civil
unrest, business, travel. Daddy gave more of an ear to the stately
woman beside him than I thought was necessary. He laughed when
appropriate; his attention was undivided. I tried numerous times to
get Daddy to look my way, to notice how miserable I was, but he
didn’t glance my way once.
Mammy had apparently seen enough and made an
entrance that caused quite the commotion.
“What is that slave doing in here
unannounced?” Mrs. Norton spat.
Daddy, looking extremely uncomfortable,
reprimanded Mammy.
“I didn’t call you in,” he stated, though
Mrs. Norton was displeased at how mildly he spoke to her. She
rolled her pale, stone-colored eyes, and scowled.
“I’m sorry, Masta Arrington, but it past Miss
Amelia’s bedtime,” she stammered, and proceeded to take me out
without permission. Mammy never, ever, had to ask permission from
Daddy to do anything when it came to my well-being.
“Thomas, aren’t you going to stop her?”
Catherine asked in distress. They all knew Mammy, and I couldn’t
understand why everyone, including Daddy, was acting as if the
president of the United States of America had joined us for
supper.
Mammy shot Daddy a look of defiance. They
locked eyes for a moment as we all waited to see what would happen
next. Then Mrs. Norton chimed in. Her voice was sharp and her tone
inconsiderate when she gasped, “How dare that slave girl disrespect
you!”
Daddy didn’t have a mean bone in his body,
and he ruled Sutton Hall with gloved fists. However, something
happened to him that night that seemed to change the way we all
lived and breathed from that day on.
Daddy’s eyes revealed displeasure toward
Mammy, and he excused himself to deal with “the matter,” as he
called it.
He whisked passed me and took hold of her arm
as I hurried after them. The guests were left aghast and as they
whispered, I stopped and listened, just as Daddy swept Mammy
outside into the heat of the oppressive August evening.
“Why does he keep such an unruly slave?” Mrs.
Norton asked in disgust.
Niles Montgomery cleared his throat and
shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Catherine dabbed her mouth with
one of our fine silk napkins, shot her husband a look of
disapproval, and whispered something in Mrs. Norton’s ear that made
her face turn bright red and her mouth fall wide open in
astonishment. “That wench?”
The women nodded in unison as the men excused
themselves and headed for the smoking room for some after-supper
drinks and cigars. I scurried away and ran up to my room where from
my bedroom window I could hear Daddy talking to Mammy.
“I am trying to deal with all the pressures.
You need to understand,” were his last words before he took her in
his arms under the dim light of the early evening sky and placed a
long kiss on her lips. Then they parted ways.
Hattie rushed in, followed by Mammy.
“We caught ten fish!” she exclaimed with a
wide smile.
“You get washed up now, you hear!” Mammy
snapped. Hattie’s smile faded, and she looked from her mother to me
and dashed back out of the room.
Without a word, Mammy helped me undress and
took me to bed. I sensed her tension, I felt her unhappiness, and
most of all, I saw pain and trouble in her dark, sad eyes. I wanted
in the worst way to ask why Daddy had treated her so badly, why all
of the sudden he’d spoken to her as if she were one of his ordinary
servants. I was almost afraid of the answers, and instead of
asking, I closed my eyes and curled up with my goose down pillow.
Although I wanted to wait for Hattie to return and climb into bed,
my eyelids grew too heavy to keep open, and I found myself drifting
off into a deep sleep.
The air was heavy and dewy as I stepped
outside into the light of the following day. Hattie trailed behind.
She was a heavy sleeper and extra slow in the morning.
“Hurry, Hattie, or we’ll be late for school,”
I called, running ahead.
With her lunch pail, slate, and chalk in
hand, she hurried to catch up.
“I hate school,” Hattie mumbled. “And church,
too.”
Hattie’s favorite thing to do was wade in the
river and fish. She didn’t have to work in the cotton fields like
the other slave children. She had the same luxuries as I, although
school for Hattie didn’t seem like a luxury. Some of the other
children on the plantation were envious of her and often teased
her. They tormented her incessantly, to the point where she would
often run off to be alone. I felt sorry for Hattie and when she
returned with red, cried-out eyes, I would throw my arms over her
shoulders and bring her close and tell her that I was her best
friend, that she shouldn’t mind their taunting, and that she should
remember that being special sometimes comes with a heavy price.
That’s what Daddy had often told me in my
most weary nights, when I felt displaced and gloomy because I
didn’t have a mummy of my own, and the children at school would
ridicule me.
“They aren’t taunting and teasing you for not
having a mum; the children are envious and jealous of your beauty.
They know how exceptional you are, that you stand out amongst them.
That, unfortunately, is a small affliction you have to live with,
for your own mum felt the same burden when she was a young
girl.”
It surprised me that the beauty I had
acquired without asking for it would keep the children at school
from wanting to play with me, from being my friend, and from
sharing anything at all with me. Hattie and I were outcasts; we
were shunned and mocked, and through all the torment, we grew close
and formed a bond that would forever go unbroken.
Typically, school days for Hattie and me were
long and exhausting, and they grew especially worse when a new
schoolmaster came to replace our aging teacher, Mr. Bolls. He had
taught for all the years that I attended the school, before he
became too ill to teach and then Mr. Giles was hired. When he
stepped into the hot, stuffy schoolhouse, the hairs on the back of
my neck immediately stood on edge. Hattie looked at me with unease,
as the other children sat up straight - we all felt uncomfortable
in the schoolmaster’s austere presence.
There was one troublesome boy in class - John
Mason. He was the oldest son of the plantation owner nearest to
Sutton Hall. John was thirteen, but stood as tall as any grown man
and had a way of behaving like an ill-mannered fool. He was always
contemptuous and disrespectful of Mr. Bolls. He played tricks on
him, mocked his lessons, and aged Mr. Bolls years before his time.
The other children were more mindful, especially Hattie and I. John
hated that about us. John hated everything about us.
When Mr. Giles stood, his cold, steel-gray
eyes scanned the class. Then, he cleared his throat and said with
an ice-cold tone, “Good day. My name is Mr. Giles, and I am here to
serve as your new schoolmaster.”
He then sat down at his desk, opened his
ledger and proceeded to call out each of our names for attendance.
I was the first, Hattie second. When he gazed up at Hattie, his
eyes narrowed onto her, and he appeared somewhat perplexed. Then,
he looked back down at his book and continued until John Mason
reached from behind and around our bench and gave Hattie a painful
pinch.
“Ouch!” Hattie yelped.
Mr. Giles stood abruptly, his face red with
fury.
I bit my lower lip and sucked in my breath as
the schoolmaster extended his long arm and pointed his thin finger
at Hattie. “You there, come here.”
John snickered and the others giggled.
“SILENCE!” Mr. Giles hollered.
Everyone, even John, went still. Mr. Giles
pulled out a switch and demanded that Hattie approach him. Hattie’s
eyes grew wide, and she grabbed hold of my hand and squeezed it
tight.
Without a thought, I stood to protect Hattie.
I couldn’t bear to see her in trouble; I could never tolerate the
sight of Hattie being punished.
“Sir, it was John Mason who pinched Hattie,
and that caused her to cry out,” I explained. I kept my head high
as I challenged his judgment. Hattie tugged my hand, indicating I
should sit down.
“Is that so, Miss Arrington?” he said in a
dry, cool manner. He slowly walked over to me, tapping the switch
continuously in the palm of his hand, while Hattie continued to try
to get me to sit.
“I see we have some rebels, some
disrespectful pupils in my schoolhouse,” he began as he stopped
before my bench. I sat back down and looked down to the floor, now
very afraid.
“It was the Negro who shouted out,” John
called out from where he sat behind us. “She ain’t even supposed to
be in school. She is a slave!” The other children nodded in
agreement.
“You boy . . . rise,” Mr. Giles commanded.
John rose, kept his head straight, and refused to meet the
teacher’s cold stare.
“I see what she is. And perhaps, since you
are so fond of reaching out and touching the Negro girl, you should
take her in your hand, proceed to the corner, and face the wall,
FOR THE REST OF THE DAY!”
John didn’t flinch, his jaw tightened, and
his hands clenched into fists. He gave Mr. Giles a sly smirk and
said, “I ain’t touchin’ no Negro.”
In an instant, the schoolmaster cracked John
across the face with the switch, sending him reeling back down into
his place on the bench. Mr. Giles did an about face, sat back down
at his desk, and continued taking the attendance as if he hadn’t an
interruption.
Hattie remained shaken and ashamed, as she
always was when the kids would say awful things to her. Hattie
indeed was a Negro, but she lived exactly the same way as I did. We
wore the same clothes and slept under the same roof. She even went
by Daddy’s last name. Daddy, more than anything, wanted me to be
happy, and if that meant giving me the closest thing to a sister by
taking in Hattie as his own, he was willing to do so. Daddy’s
unconventional ways, however, had a tendency to creep into his
fine, structured world and to create more problems than he was
sometimes ready to deal with.
Daddy received news of what happened at
school from John Mason’s father. He was a distinguished but
arrogant man, who had no fondness for Daddy. Hattie and I were just
about to dress for bed when Daddy knocked on the door. Mammy had
excused herself to see to lighting the lamps throughout the
mansion.
“Girls, I need to have a word with you,” he
said, standing near the tall windows. He briefly gazed outside
before he drew the drapes in for the night.