Margeret caught his arm with a command to silence.
“Hush! You got a kind master––a kind mistress. The people who laugh at that table are not to blame on account of Rosa’s master, who holds your child.”
“You stand up fo’ the race that took yo’ chile from yo?” he demanded, fiercely. “That held yo’ a slave when yo’ was promised freedom? That drove yo’ wild fo’ years with misery? The man is in that room who did all that, an’ yo’ stan’ up fo’ him along of the rest?”
He paused, glowering down at her as if she, too, were white enough to hate. When she spoke it was very quietly, almost reprovingly.
“My child died. What good was freedom to me without her? Where in all this wide world would I go with my freedom if I had it? Free and alone? No,” and she shook her head sadly, “I would be like a child lost from home––helpless. 236 The young folks laughing there never hurt me––never hurt you.”
The people were leaving the dining room. Captain Masterson, who had time for but a brief call, was walking along the veranda in low converse with the Judge. Judithe had separated herself from the rest and walked through the sitting room into the library, when she halted, surprised at those two facing each other with the air of arrested combat or argument. She recovered her usual manner enough to glance at the clock, and as her eyes crossed Margeret’s face she saw traces of tears there.
“It is time, almost, for the mail up from Pocotaligo today, is it not, Pluto?” she said, moving towards a book-case. Receiving no reply, she stopped and looked at him, at which he recovered himself enough to mutter, “Yes, mist’ess,” and turned towards the door, his trembling tones and the half-groping movement as he put his hand out before him showed he was laboring under some emotion too intense for concealment, and involuntarily she made a gesture of command.
“Wait! You have grief––some sad misfortune?” and she glanced from his face to that of Margeret, questioningly. “Poor fellow––is it a death?”
“No death, and nothing to trouble a white lady with,” he said, without turning, and with hopeless bitterness in his voice; “not fit to be told ’long side o’ white folks merry-maken’, only––only Rosa, my boy’s mother, died yeah ago ovah on Larue plantation, an’ now the chile hisself––my Rosa’s baby––gwine to be sold away––gwine to be sold to the traders!”
His voice broke in a sob; all the bitterness was drowned in the wave of grief under which his shoulders heaved, and his broken breaths made the only sound in the room, as 237 Judithe turned questioningly to Margeret, who bent her head in confirmation of his statement.