At last the grown-up sisters absorbed all of Mammy's spare time. Sympathy was kept up between them after her bond with us was loosened, and they even took hints from her in matters of the toilet that were souvenirs of her stage days.
In the course of time reverses and bereavements came to the family. The girls had grown to womanhood and matrimony, and had begun their new lives in other places. Then came the inevitable to the elders, and it became necessary to convert all property into cash.
We were happy in being able to retain a good many of our household gods, and they are the Lares and Penates of our several homes to this day. We had long since ceased to think of Mammy Becky—she was never Rebecca—as property. In fact, we younger ones never thought of her as such. By law we were each entitled to a fifth in Mammy.
This came upon us in the nature of a shock at a family consultation on ways and means, and there was a disposition on the part of every party to the ownership to shift that responsibility to another.
I must do ourselves the justice to say that such a thing as converting Mammy into cash, and thus making her divisible, never for a moment entered our minds. It seemed, however, that the difficulty had occurred to her.
We all felt so guilty, when Mammy served tea that last evening, that we were sure she read our thoughts in our countenances. It would be nearer the truth to say that it was rather our fears that she should ever come to the knowledge that the word “sale” had been coupled with her name.
The next day we were to scatter, and it was imperative that some disposition should be made of Mammy. The old lady—for old we deemed her, though she could scarcely have been fifty—went calmly about the house looking to the packing of the thousand and one things, and not only looking, but using her tongue in language expressing utter contempt for all “lazy niggers” of these degenerate days—referring to the temporary “help.” The eldest sister was deputed to approach and sound Mammy on the momentous question.
The deputy went on her mission in fear and trembling. The interview was easily contrived in the adjoining room.
We were exceedingly embarrassed when we discovered that Mammy's part of the dialogue was perfectly audible. As for the sister's, her voice could be barely heard. So that the effect to the unwilling eavesdropper was that which we are familiar with in these days of hearing a conversation at the telephone.
“Don't you bother yo'self 'bout me, Miss Frances.”