She obeyed the order with pleasing readiness.
"Ratie," said the master, "how do you like this gentleman?"
The child smiled, but made no answer in words. The master also smiled as he added: "He thinks that you sing very prettily, and he has bought you. He will be very kind and good to you; and as soon as you have had breakfast, you must get your things ready to go off with him. Here is a present for you"; and he tossed her a bright, shining, silver coin.
The child seized the money, but did not seem to comprehend her master's words. To be sold to her implied some sort of disgrace or hardship, which she did not think she deserved; besides, she had always lived on the "old plantation." She knew no other home; she did not want to leave "the people" of the quarter; nor did she feel happy in going away from the "white folks," particularly the "young mistresses," who had always been so kind to her. She had also some vague yearning of heart to be close to her mammy's grave, rough as it was; and near also to Grandpap's cabin, where she roasted apples and potatoes on winter nights.
She looked around upon the familiar quarter, the well-known people, the row of cabins; and strained her gaze far away to the rolling fields in the distance, where the negroes, like a swarm of crows, were busy at their morning's work; and as she gazed, the whole landscape flushed with the bloom and beauty of the risen sun. Then the wild, pealing horn called the "sons of toil" from their morning hour's work to their frugal breakfast.
Ratie's little heart began to beat in its narrow limits as the word "sold" wrote itself there, and broke through her comprehension with all its horrors. She started quickly after her master, and, with the freedom of a petted slave, caught hold of the skirt of his coat. Colonel Williams turned suddenly round; and there, crouching on the earth at his feet, was the hunchback child. She held up the money which he had given her, and, in a sweet, tremulous voice, asked: "Massa, why has you sold me? I has not behaved bad, as de boys did dat you sold last year. I doesn't steal nor tell lies. Is it bekase I'se lazy? I do all de work dey gives me to do. I'll do more. I'll go into de fields. I'll plant and pick de cotton. Please don't sell me. I doesn't want to leave de ole place. Mammy is buried here; so I wants to be when I dies. I wants allers to live here."
The stranger and Colonel Williams were much moved. They did not venture to speak to the child, but tried to get away from the sound of her plaintive cries.
When the negroes drew around their morning meal, and learned that Ratie was sold, they were unhappy, and refused to eat anything. They looked sorrowfully at one another, and turned away from their untasted food. "Poor Ratie!" exclaimed the old negroes, as they shook their heads in mournful discontent, "we shall not hear any more her sweet songs in de evenin' time."
The young mistresses came to Ratie with kind gifts and kinder words. They told her, with tears in their eyes, how sorry they were to part with her, how good they knew she had been, and how much they wished their papa would allow her to stay. Words and acts like these softened the blow to the unfortunate child, and strengthened her for the coming trial. She looked up smilingly through her tears, as she said to her young mistresses: "Please not to cry for me. God is good, and de preacher says he is everywhar; so I shall not be fur from de ole plantation."