Thomas Jefferson Dreams of Sally Hemings (21 page)

. . . I could have said no to Mr. Jefferson. Even at sixteen, when I knew so little of him, I still understood this essential fact. If I had said no, emphatically, and on every occasion when he first began to broach his intentions, he would have respected my virtue, both because he himself was ashamed of his desires, particularly when he considered the feelings of his daughters and dearest friends, and because, as ardently carnal as his nature might have been, he was ultimately less interested in sensual pleasure than in love. This was one of his greatest weaknesses. He craved adoration, not just of the people he knew but, in a very real sense, of the entire world—which was why he couldn't stay away from politics, even though he detested political life.

But I didn't say no—“no,” of course, being a word Negroes simply never speak to white people. That said, I could easily have conveyed my feelings without having to actually speak the word. I could have pretended, for example, to be indifferent to his small kindnesses and continual readiness to engage in conversation. Had I done so, then none of the events that now seem a poison in my soul would have come to pass. The difficult relations that followed his having come into my bedchamber would certainly have continued a while longer, but I still would have been his daughters' maid throughout the remainder of our time in Paris and, most likely, at Monticello as well.

And what is more, even had I rejected him when his expressions of desire became more emphatic and overt, I knew that the worst I would have had to suffer would have been life as a scullery maid or a washerwoman. Mr. Jefferson would never have sold me away from my family or subjected me to any form of severe punishment. Had he done so, he would have had to face the fact that his supposed love for me was a sentimental sham and that he was as capable as the most brutal slaveholder of acting out of revenge, cruelty and spite. It was essential to Mr. Jefferson's self-esteem that he believe himself to be nothing like the majority of his neighbors. . . .

O
ne morning, as Sally Hemings is walking past Thomas Jefferson's study on her way to the kitchen, he calls out, “Mademoiselle Sally!” And when she looks in his door, he says, “I've been thinking. . . .” He makes a circular gesture with his hand. “Come in! Come in!” She takes a step inside the door but goes no farther, and he does not insist. “I've been thinking,” he says, “that you have too good a mind to be so entirely unlettered. What's happened with Jimmy? Has he been teaching you to read and write?”

“Not really.”

“Did you ask him?”

“I did, but he didn't seem very interested.” She sighs. “I think he doesn't see the point of a girl learning to read.”

Thomas Jefferson slaps his hand down on the table. “That's absurd! Go ask him again. And if he continues to be so contrary, you must tell him that I order him to teach you reading and writing.”

Four or five times over the next several days, Thomas Jefferson asks Sally Hemings if she has commenced her reading lessons, and on each occasion her answer is the same, that her brother has agreed to teach her but that he never seems to have the time. “Nonsense!” Thomas Jefferson invariably replies. “All you need is fifteen minutes a day. He must have fifteen minutes!”

But then one day, when Sally Hemings gives him the same report, he says, “Well, I suppose
I've
got fifteen minutes. Come by the parlor after you have finished your duties, and let's see what we can do.”

S
ally Hemings finishes her labors at 9:00
P
.
M
.
and arrives at the parlor to find that Thomas Jefferson actually went out that day to buy her a primer, which he has placed open on the same table where he showed her how to write her name. There are two chairs beside the table, so close to each other that she could barely fit her fingers between them. The table is lit with a candelabra and an oil lamp.

Thomas Jefferson commences by going through the alphabet letter by letter, explaining the possible sounds that each might make. When it becomes clear that she is confused by all the variations, he assures her that it will be much clearer when she actually tries to read.

The primer consists of twenty-six rhymed couplets, each featuring a different letter of the alphabet. He begins by reading aloud several of the easier ones—those without biblical or classical names in them. First he reads the couplet and then goes through it a second time, making the sound of each letter as he passes a pen point underneath it. The sounds he makes, especially as he exaggerates them for clarity, are nothing like English, and Sally Hemings cannot help laughing. “You sound like you're talking in your sleep!” she says.

Thomas Jefferson also laughs. “I'll get my revenge when it's your turn!”

And, indeed, when he asks her to read “Whales in the sea / God's voice obey,” the only words she manages to read on her own are “in” and “God's” and even those require a lot of help. By the time they have decoded the couplet together, she is exhausted and embarrassed.

“It takes time,” says Thomas Jefferson, smiling. “You'll catch on after a while.”

“Maybe it would be easier if the words weren't so silly,” she says.

His brows buckle. “My dear Miss Hemings, I am beginning to suspect you are something of an atheist.”

“A what?”

“An atheist. Someone who doesn't believe in God.”

“Oh.” She is not entirely sure he is joking. “Why do you say that?”

“Because you have laughed at every one of the religious couplets!”

He is smiling. She smiles, too.

“That's because they are so funny. What language does God speak to fish? Bubble language? And what does he say, ‘Thou shalt love the man with the harpoon'?”

Thomas Jefferson leans back in his chair and tugs on the bottom of his waistcoat as if he has just finished a good meal. He looks her straight in the eyes—his own coppery bright in candlelight. “So you
do
believe in God?” he asks.

“Yes,” she says. “I think so.” She is worried that she shouldn't have spoken so freely, that she might come off as impious, but Thomas Jefferson seems pleased by her remarks.

“Do you believe that God is good?” he asks.

“Perhaps. In his heart.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean God wants to be good. And he tries to be good. And he is good a lot of the time. He made this beautiful world, after all. He made babies. He made sunsets and roses. But he also makes mistakes. He created diseases. Earthquakes. He made it possible for people to be cruel. People are cruel all the time.”

“But is that God's fault? Or are people alone to blame?”

Thomas Jefferson continues to look at her intently, a slight smile on only one half of his face. Sally Hemings blushes.

“You must think what I am saying is stupid,” she says.

“Not at all. In fact, I have just been reading a dialogue by an eminent philosopher who seems to share your opinions, though he is not nearly so forthright.”

Her blush intensifies, and her right ear goes hot.

Thomas Jefferson smiles, leans forward and lifts his hand in her direction, but then he draws it back and folds his arms across his chest. “So what do you think: Is God the cause of cruelty?”

“Well . . .” For a moment Sally Hemings doesn't know what to say, but then her original point comes back to her: “The preachers are always saying that God controls everything. And that he knows all, sees all. So if that's true, then God is making people do cruel things, and so their cruelty is God's fault. But that's the thing I'm not sure I believe. I can't believe that God would intentionally make people do cruel things. So maybe God
doesn't
control everything. And people do cruel things on their own. But even if that is true, I still think that God is partly to blame, since he put the ability to be cruel into human beings.”

“Why would he do that?”

“I don't know. It doesn't really make sense. That's what I mean about mistakes. Maybe God wasn't paying attention when he made people. Or he didn't think it all the way through.” She glances at Thomas Jefferson, then looks away. “Or maybe he was just in a bad mood.”

“That makes him sound a lot like a human being.”

“I suppose. Except that he can do so much more than a human being can. He's just not perfect.”

“But if he's not perfect, then why worship him?”

“Because he made so many beautiful things, too. How could I not be thankful for those things? But maybe ‘worship' is the wrong word. Maybe all I really feel is thankful. Though sometimes I'm also angry and disappointed.” She looks down into her lap, where she is massaging the center of her left palm with the thumb of her right hand. She glances up and shrugs. “But I probably shouldn't say that.”

Thomas looks at her a long moment, then speaks in a measured voice. “I think everything you are saying is extremely courageous and rational.”

Sally Hemings does not know how to respond.

“Do you believe in the Devil?” Thomas Jefferson asks.

“I don't know. I mean, of course, that could explain why bad things happen. God and the Devil are fighting over everything. But I don't know, I find it harder to believe that someone would want only terrible things. That just seems too pointless to me. If I think about the Devil, if I really try to imagine him existing, he ends up seeming a lot like God—or a human being. Someone with good and bad sides. Good and bad moods. Maybe wanting to do right but also wanting other things. So . . . The main thing is that I don't see the point in there being a Devil . . . or in there being two mixed-up magical people controlling the universe. So it makes more sense that there be only one. God.”

“Why not only the Devil?”

“I do think that sometimes, but it scares me, so I hope that I'm wrong. But on the other hand, if the Devil is running the world, he's still made all the beautiful things, so maybe he's just like God, and not that scary after all.”

“Do you ever think that there may be no God?”

“Sometimes. But how could this world just be here? Someone had to create it.”

“You could ask the same question about God. How could God just be here? And if it is possible for God to just be here—this being who is
infinitely more complex than the earth, since he created it, just as the watchmaker is infinitely more complex than the watch—if it is possible for God to
just be here
, why not the earth?”

An openmouthed half smile comes onto Sally Hemings's face. She shakes her head. “That's an interesting idea. I never thought about that before.” Her smile broadens, and she is silent a moment. “I guess the real reason I believe in God is that it makes me feel happier to believe that someone is there, behind everything. And sometimes I feel his presence. Every now and then, when I am in a particularly beautiful place or I am feeling especially sad or afraid, I feel that God is there somehow.”

“Does he ever talk to you?”

“No. Not really. I just
feel
that he is there. But I don't know if he really is. Maybe I only feel him because I want to.”

Now Thomas Jefferson is the one who seems not to know what to say. He shifts uneasily in his seat.

“What do
you
think about God?” Sally Hemings asks.

“I'm exactly the same as you. Except sometimes I think there is no God, but that God's existence doesn't matter, because we have the idea of God. Or rather, we still have the idea that God is good and that we should also be good. And the idea that we should worship the beauty of the world. And as long as we have such ideas, it almost doesn't matter whether God actually exists.”

Sally Hemings makes a small grunt and then thinks for a moment. “The only thing is that I don't see God as good—or good enough. That's my problem.”

Thomas Jefferson smiles weakly, but then disconcertion crosses his face. He looks down. He pushes the primer an inch or two away with the tips of his fingers. “I'm sorry, Sally, but I think we had better stop this.”

Her forehead darkens, and her mouth falls open. He sees that he has hurt her.

“You must think I'm an idiot,” she says.

“No! Not in the least. You have nothing to apologize for—on the contrary.”

She closes the primer. “I'm sorry I have been such a bad learner. It's just that there are so many letters and sounds.”

“That's not it,” he says, still looking away. “I have enjoyed our time tonight.”

He casts her a furtive glance, and all at once she becomes aware that their calves are not more than an inch apart. She thinks that she should move her leg away from his, but she doesn't. Instead, in a soft voice, she asks, “Then why?”

“I just think it would be better if Jimmy taught you after all. I will speak to him myself. It's his duty as your older brother.”

“He won't do it. Jimmy's not like that. He just won't.”

Thomas Jefferson throws himself back in his chair. Half in despair, half in entreaty, he says, “Oh, Sally.”

“What?”

“I shouldn't say this.”

She remains silent.

“You are so beautiful,” he says. “You are utterly beautiful, you have an excellent mind, you are so kind and full of life—but this is impossible. I had thought that I would be able to keep my feelings within the bounds of decency, but I was—” He cuts himself off, looks at her with sad and yearning eyes. “Oh, you dear girl!”

After a moment he sits up and tugs once again at the bottom of his waistcoat.

“So I think you had better leave, Sally. For your own good. I'm terribly, terribly sorry. I will talk to Jimmy. Or maybe Patsy. Perhaps
she
could be your teacher. But if neither is willing, I will hire you a tutor. I am determined that you shall read.”

Sally Hemings feels as if something is spinning inside her head. She stands and speaks breathlessly, almost whispering. “Thank you, Mr. Jefferson.”

Thomas Jefferson squeezes his lips together. His face is red, but the skin about his lips is yellow. His eyes look enormous. As Sally Hemings puts her hand on the latch of the door, he calls out her name. Then he says, “Please understand that this has nothing to do with you. You are a darling, darling girl and entirely innocent of blame. I am the one who is enslaved by feelings he ought never to have conceived.”

Sally Hemings lifts the latch and leaves.