Therein.
So there we were, moving along together, me matching him step for step. Which was not easy. His legs were long. I extended my legs, to match his, and extended all of myself, and we were the same size, and out, upon horseback and (forgive me) the thrill of once again riding a horse was too much, and I—I stayed. Therein. What a thrill it was! To be doing what I wished. Without having been ordered to do so, without having sought anyone’s permission. The ceiling of a lifelong house flew off, if I may put it that way. I knew, of the instant, vast tracts of Indiana and Illinois (full towns in their complete layout and the nature of the hospitality of specific houses therein, though I had never been in either of those places), and came to feel that this fellow—well, my goodness, I will not say what office it seemed to me that he held. I began to feel afraid, occupying someone so accomplished. And yet, I was comfortable in there. And suddenly, wanted him to know me. My life. To know us. Our lot. I don’t know why I felt that way but I did. He had no aversion to me, is how I might put it. Or rather, he had once had such an aversion, still bore traces of it, but, in examining that aversion, pushing it into the light, had somewhat, already, eroded it. He was an open book. An opening book. That had just been opened up somewhat wider. By sorrow. And—by us. By all of us, black and white, who had so recently mass-inhabited him. He had not, it seemed, gone unaffected by that event. Not at all. It had made him sad. Sadder. We had. All of us, white and black, had made him sadder, with our sadness. And now, though it sounds strange to say, he was making me sadder with his sadness, and I thought, Well, sir, if we are going to make a sadness party of it, I have some sadness about which I think someone as powerful as you might like to know. And I thought, then, as hard as I could, of Mrs. Hodge, and Elson, and Litzie, and of all I had heard during our long occupancy in that pit regarding their many troubles and degradations, and called to mind, as well, several others of our race I had known and loved (my Mother; my wife; our children, Paul, Timothy, Gloria; Rance P., his sister Bee; the four little Cushmans), and all the things that they had endured, thinking, Sir, if you are as powerful as I feel that you are, and as inclined toward us as you seem to be, endeavor to do something for us, so that we might do something for ourselves. We are ready, sir; are angry, are capable, our hopes are coiled up so tight as to be deadly, or holy: turn us loose, sir, let us at it, let us show what we can do.
thomas havens
XCVII.
Elson and Litzie had been by the chapel door, listening in.
Now they trot-skimmed over, holding hands.
That little white boy? Litzie said.
Said we are dead, said Elson.
mrs. francis hodge Goodness, said Mrs. Hodge.
elson farwell All these years, in our pit, I had treasured up the notion that someday Annalise and Benjamin, my children, would— Would what? Join me? Someday join me? Here? It was ludicrous.
Suddenly I saw just how ludicrous.
Poor me.
Poor me, all of those years.
They would never join me here. They would age and die and be laid to rest there, in those far-flung locales to which they had been taken (when taken from me). They would not come here. And anyway, why would I want that? I had wanted it, somehow, while I only waited, believing myself paused. But now, now that I— Now that I knew I was dead, I wanted for them only to go to where they should. Directly there. Wherever that was. And feeling that way, saw that I ought to go there myself.
I looked at Litzie in our old way, as if to say: Lady, what do you think?
I’ll do what you do, Mrs. Hodge, Litzie said. You always been like a mother to me.
mrs. francis hodge Sad though.
I’d only just got my voice back, and now it was time to leave.
litzie wright Elson? I said.
No, he said. If such things as goodness and brotherhood and redemption exist, and may be attained, these must sometimes require blood, vengeance, the squirming terror of the former perpetrator, the vanquishing of the heartless oppressor. I intend to stay. Here. Until I have had my revenge. Upon someone.
(Such a dear boy. So proud. So dramatic.) We are dead, I said.
Here I am, he said. I am here.
I said no more—for if he wished to stay, I would not impede him.
We all must do what we like.
Ready? I said to Litzie.
As if for old times’ sake, she gave me the double-eyed blink, which had always meant: Yes.
mrs. francis hodge