Chapter 11
MAGIC—BLACK AND WHITE
Philip Bolling's summer had been one of unceasing labor, mental and physical. He felt that if he could not assert his supremacy on his father's farm and make Old Abe understand that he was master he would deserve to be ruled by the blacks, having been weighed in the balance and found wanting. If his superior mentality and education could not make him the master then it was proof that he lacked character. Philip's boyhood had been one of meekly giving up and doing what his father commanded. It had been the only way to keep the peace, and peace for his mother had been the one idea. She had always entreated him to avoid quarrels, as she feared the vindictiveness of Aunt Peachy and her influence on Rolfe Bolling. She still feared it, and begged her son not to be rash in his treatment of Aunt Peachy's son, Old Abe, and his swarms of lazy, thieving offspring, headed by Young Abe and Little Abe.
Philip smiled at his mother's fears.
"What could a crazy old negress do to me?" he asked. "She is so feeble she can hardly get out of her chair."
"She is not so feeble as she pretends, and she can make Old Abe and his kind do her bidding."
"Well, so can I," said Philip quietly. "How many children are there over in the quarters?"
"Goodness only knows! It looks like an ant hill."
"Well, every child there is going to school next term if I have to haul them myself."
"School! Why, Philip, they are bad enough as it is, and school would make them unbearable," cried Elizabeth. "Are you in earnest?"
"Dead earnest, Mother dear! You felt an education was important for me, and I feel it is even more important for the colored people. Look at them on the other side of the river, all of Uncle Si's kin and Aunt Testy's children, all of the people connected with Mill House and the ones who work in the hub factory. They are a fine lot, good workmen and good citizens. Major Taylor has seen to it that they were taught something at school. His father and mother before him gave some education to their slaves. Look at the contrast between our colored people and his!"
Philip might have added a comparison between the master of The Hedges and the master of Mill House, but he refrained.
"We won't say anything about it until a few weeks before school starts in the fall, but I am going to get busy with the County Superintendent and see to it that what law for compulsory education exists in Virginia shall be enforced right here on our farm."
Old Abe was too old to educate, but he was not too old to be taught something and the day after Philip got home Abe was to learn that matters were not going to be quite so easy for him and his lazy sons and grandsons as they had been for the many years since Rolfe Bolling got so fat he had turned over the management of the farm to him.
Old Abe's attitude at first was one of amusement towards his master's young son, who had been so busy learning how to read that he had let the farm get out of his hands.
"I 'low you is done forgot what lil' you know'd 'bout farmin', Phup," he said slyly, as he and Philip started to make the rounds of the farm on a tour of inspection.
Philip looked keenly at the stalwart old man at his side. Surely, he had come of a powerful race. He was over seventy, but as straight as an arrow, with not an ounce of superfluous flesh on his huge bones. He walked a little unsteadily, as though he had had a little too much drink. His hair and beard were grizzled and his eyes were growing dim, but otherwise he looked as Philip remembered him when he was a child and Old Abe used to let him ride the horse while he plowed. Old Abe had always been kind to him, although in a furtive way as if he did not want anyone to see him. Perhaps he felt that his mother, Aunt Peachy, would have disapproved of his showing any attention to the boy, whom she always had resented as a person who was rivaling her "baby."
"No, Uncle Abe, I haven't forgotten a thing you taught me while I have been off trying to get an education, not a thing, and what's more, I have been learning more things about farming—things I am going to introduce here at The Hedges. You are going to help me, too, aren't you, Uncle Abe?"
"Well, I ain't no hand ter be takin' up new notions," hesitated Abe. "I'm a gonter run this farm lak I been a runnin' it an' lak Marse Rolfe runned it, an' his paw befo' him. You might take a lil' piece er lan' down in the bottom ter 'speriment with," he suggested, as though Philip had been a child who wanted to play at gardening.
Philip laughed. "Oh, I don't ask you to run it differently. I am going to do the running and you will take orders from me. Of course, my father had to turn things over to you while I was away, but now I am home, naturally I will take charge." Philip looked Abe squarely in the eye and the old man endeavored to return his stare, but his eyes finally fell before Philip's clear gaze.
"I am going to ask you, Uncle Abe, to call me Mr. Philip. It makes no real difference to me where you are concerned, but I feel that it will make a difference to the hands on the farm. I have no idea of allowing any familiarity from them and I am sure if you set the pace for politeness that they will follow you. It will make things easier all around if you begin immediately to call me Mr. Philip."
"Ye-ye-yes, sah!" hesitated Old Abe.
"Not only are you to speak to me respectfully, but you are to speak of me respectfully. This is important and I am going to trust you to attend to it. Tell Young Abe and Little Abe and any of the others who expect to work on the farm at any time, I am not going to put up with any impertinence."
"Sho', Mr. Phup, th'ain't nobody gonter sarse you nor none er the Bollin's. We'd have my mammy ter fight if any er us chillns tuck ter sassin' a Bollin'," whined the old man.
Philip laughed. "Of course you won't. I am just telling you, you won't. As for Aunt Peachy: I'd be very glad if you tell her exactly what I have told you."
"Fo' Gawd, Phup—Mr. Phup, Mam' Peachy'd lay me out if I carried any sich tale ter her. You think I's been a bossin' this here fawm, but I ain't never bossed none, Mr. Phup, no mo'n yo' paw ever bossed it, er yo' grampaw befo' him. Mam' Peachy air a been bossin' The Hedges fer goin' on a hundred years. We takes our orders fum her. To be sho' she gits Marse Rolfe ter han' it on ter us, but she air the maindes' pusson ter be reckoned with."
"Well, after this you take your orders from me." Philip said no more on the subject, but continued his inspection of the farm. He carried a pencil and tablet with him and carefully noted the things that needed his immediate attention. The fences were in a deplorable condition and the outhouses were crying out for new shingles or to be propped up. The silo was on the slant of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Neither paint nor whitewash had been applied to any of the buildings for at least twenty years. Stables and barns were dirty. Farm implements lay in fence corners, or even in the middle of fields, where horses had been unhitched at the sound of the dinner horn, and that particular bit of plowing or cultivating never taken up again. All of these things Philip noted in a systematic way.
There was shed room enough for any and all farming implements, but the natural shiftlessness of the darkeys, born on the Bolling place with generations of shiftless masters, had prevented their ever seeing the necessity of order and care in such matters. Philip had forgotten how absolutely careless the running of the farm was. It seemed strange to him that anybody as parsimonious as was his father should be negligent in such things things that represented money. Rolfe Bolling's one idea had been to save cash, but his natural slothfulness always had been his handicap. He could drive a hard bargain in a trade and demand a huge rate of interest when someone sought a loan. This lending money was always done as a neighbor and kept very quiet. If the rate of interest was illegal the authorities never were informed of it.
The farm had been mismanaged until it was only by luck that it furnished food for the family; what with the overworking of certain parts of the land and the useless lying fallow of other parts, and the constant drain of the swarm of lazy darkeys who inhabited the quarters, working when it pleased them and thieving at all times.
"Why do you leave the harrows out in the weather to rust?" Philip asked Old Abe as they stumbled over one in a field. It had been there long enough to be covered with morning glory vines and grass had grown over it in thick mats.
"’Taint' gwine ter hurt the harrow," the old man explained, "it's gwine ter do it good. The timber in all them boughten impelments needs weatherin' an' what rus' fawms on the pints er the harrow jes' preserves 'em. That there rus' is jes' as good ter preserve them harrow pints as a coat er paint."
Philip smiled and Old Abe congratulated himself that he was able to impart some wisdom to the young man who had taken such a superior tone with him. The old man was rather pleased that Mam' Peachy was to be dethroned. He had been under the thumb of his powerful mother for so long that it would be pleasant to know that no longer was she to be the boss of The Hedges. He was desperately afraid of his mother, but she could hardly blame this affair on him. If she was going to work any of her charms she would naturally work them on the young master.
Suppose it was so—what Betsy had said about her brother's being able to work better charms than Mam' Peachy! The rumor had gone forth that she had said so. Someone had overheard it and it had spread like wildfire over the place. For his part Old Abe had never heard of a white man's working charms, but then, white folks were mighty peculiar. Philip—Mr. Philip—had been away four years and he had come back with a mighty independent way with him. He didn't seem to be in the least afraid of the dread Mam' Peachy. He even wanted her to know what he intended to do about the management of the farm. Was he so scornful of her and her charms because he could do better ones? The old man scratched his head and gazed at his young master. Perhaps it would be safer to throw in his lot with the stronger.
"How many hands does my father employ regularly?" Philip asked.
They had climbed to the top of a hill which was planted in corn, following a path by the fence. Below the hill stretched flat, grassy fields which bordered the river.
"Well, in co'se I's reglar an' Young Abe an' Lil' Abe; then thar's Jim Strong, what was kinder married ter my gal Sukey, an' his son Jeemes. That's all what we has ter say on the steady pay roll."
"What are they all doing right now—to-day?"
"Well, Young Abe air kinder po'ly with a tooth what done been botherin' him off an' on fer nigh on ter thirty years. I 'member it wa' befo' I jined the chu'ch he had the fust beginnin' er pangs an' he wan't mo'n about twenty-five then. He air the skeerdes' nigger I ever seed 'bout that there tooth. He done swo' up an' down 'tain't the same tooth, but I tell you, Phup—Mr. Phup—Young Abe ain't ter say right bright 'bout tellin' the diffunce in his teeth."
"What is he doing for it?"
"Mam' Peachy done fixed up a cha'm poultice, but his wife done 'lowed she's gonter fetch him over ter the blacksmith an' have it pulled. She's wo' out with his gruntin' an' groanin'."
"Where are the other hands?" asked Philip, patiently.
"Well, Lil' Abe an' Jeemes air done tuck the clay-bank mule over ter the Co't House ter git him shoed."
"Why did both of them go?"
"Laws-a-mussy, Mr. Phup! I cyarn't trus' them ter go all by theyselves. They's good enough boys on the whole, but they's better when they's got one another ter spy on them."
"And Jim Strong? Where is he?"
"He's a seekin' an' th'ain't no wuck in him till he comes through or don't come through. My Sukey done tol' him time an' agin ter wait till Big Meetin' time, but the notion tuck him an' he went ter seekin' las' week. He ain't never gonter come through. I done seed him try too many times ter take no stock in that nigger's ever landin' in the mo'ners' bench. I tell you, Mr. Phup, he got too big er mouth ever to go through the appinted time 'thout ever bus'in' out larfin'. I done seed him go up till the very las' hour an' then sompen done tickle him an' he open up he big mouth an' holler an' larf hisself back in ter sin."
Philip laughed outright. He remembered of old the desperate "seeking" of the grinning Jim Strong and the impossibility of his "coming through" because of the fact that laugh he just and one laugh while "seeking" put one out of the running.
"Well, you tell Jim to report to me, and I will give him some ploughing to do to keep him so busy he won't have time to laugh. I can't see any reason for his neglecting his work while he is trying to be good."
"No, sir! 'Tain't no reason 'tall—'cept'n when Jim air a-ploughin' he jes' nachully cusses an' cussin' air mos' as bad as carpin' to keep a po' sinner fum the Heavenly throne. Them there mules ain't got no 'ligion er they own an' they won't gee nor haw 'thout a few cuss words is so ter speak put in fer 'couragement."
"All right, then, far be it from me to discourage Jim's seeking! There is plenty of work besides ploughing. You send him to me!"
Philip's whirlwind method of going to work almost took Rolfe Bolling off his feet. After all, it did not make much difference to him, just so he was left in peace to sleep and eat and drink. It was rather pleasant not to have Old Abe come bothering him about the farm. Philip had tact enough to let his father alone and any trouble he had with the hands he kept to himself—and he had trouble enough to discourage a less patient man.
Many and baffling were the obstacles to overcome. He recognized Aunt Peachy's cunning hand in much that happened, but he quietly and intelligently downed each trouble that arose. First, he made the darkeys on the place respect him, by showing kindly sympathy with them in any sickness or trouble that came to them. To be sure, he insisted upon a full day's work for full pay and called them to account sharply for time stolen from their work. He was rather astonished to find how easy it was to gain their allegiance and to overcome their feeling of superstitious loyalty to Mam' Peachy. What she commanded was no longer looked upon as law, to be obeyed willy-nilly. Old Abe had given up going to his mother for orders, and the younger generations kept away from her as much as possible. Her room, which was in the L behind the kitchen, was not besieged by old and young in search of charms for ailments as had been the case before Mr. Philip returned.
Young Abe's toothache had been the crucial test for the potency of the new regime at The Hedges. He had already given Mam' Peachy's charm poultice a fair trial, and when the young master had kindly asked to look at the tooth and had immediately injected something into the gum that sent a pleasing numbness through the suffering jaw, and then with no more ado than pulling out a splinter had deftly extracted the offending molar, absolutely without pain, Young Abe was sure Mr. Philip was a better charm worker than Aunt Peachy.
The next thing that happened firmly established Philip's supremacy in the minds of the colored contingent. It was the custom at The Hedges to cure great quantities of meat—much more than was needed by the family—because it was a well-known fact that Mam' Peachy's descendants must be fed, and when they needed a piece of salt pork, a fat back or maybe a shoulder, several young men were detailed to go over to the smokehouse belonging to Rolfe Bolling and simply help themselves. Mam' Peachy had instructed them for years in the ethics of this lifting. They must never take hams—unless for some special occasion. Shoulders, jowls, and fat backs were good enough for the likes of them. To be sure, the smokehouse was locked and the key kept carefully by the mistress, but keys and locks were small matters to Mam' Peachy's descendants.
It is not well for man to live on salt pork alone, so there were times when Elizabeth's henhouse was visited instead of the smokehouse. The theft of her poultry was the thing that distressed her even more than the loss of the pork, as the money she made from eggs and chickens was all that she had ever had to call her own.
Philip had been home only a few days when he installed electric burglar alarms on the smokehouse door and the henhouse door. He said nothing about it even to his mother. In the night, the first one after the installation, the bell rang out sharply at about midnight. Philip sprang to his window, from which he had a good view of the smokehouse. In the moonlight he could plainly see two frightened negro youths standing spell-bound for a moment and then fleeing as though the devil himself were after them.
That incident placed Philip in the first rank of charm workers, and Mam' Peachy was forced to take a back seat.
The old woman hated him with a hatred as deadly as she did his mother, but she feared him, too. She tried desperately to reinstate herself with her own people. It was hard to have been paramount for a hundred years and then have a slip of a white man come and with a few simple, straightforward words and some toothache medicine and some silly little bells take all her prestige from her.
Sending all the colored children to school was the last blow. Education was something Mam' Peachy had fought persistently. She had tried in her early womanhood to learn to read, but in spite of her keen intelligence and powerful will she could not learn. Perhaps it was the fault of her teacher, a young woman who was living at The Hedges at the time; or it may have been that the wild African strain was too strong in her veins for anything quite so civilized as the alphabet. At any rate, she could not learn, and conceit, which was one of her strongest characteristics, made her determine against education. If she, the all-powerful sorceress, could not learn to read and write, then reading and writing was foolishness and the persons who pretended to make head or tail of the alphabet were foolish.
Showing off was something Aunt Peachy scorned above everything. She declared that Philip was showing off in this business of sending all the colored children to school. For once she and Elizabeth were of one mind; that was concerning the education of the black race; but Elizabeth held her peace, loath to disagree in the slightest particular with her son. Aunt Peachy, however, loudly declaimed against the measure. She even gave out that she would work an evil spell against any child who attended school. Philip offered prizes to the children on the Bolling place for attendance and scholarship. His reward was more alluring than Aunt Peachy's threat, certain benefit pitted against vague disaster. The colored school was filled to overflowing.
Philip's mother could scarcely conceal her uneasiness over her son's methods. For so many years she had been trying to keep the peace and conciliate her husband and old Mam' Peachy, only coming out and fighting when a question such as her children's education or Betsy's having the proper school clothes was to be settled, that Philip's open warfare on dirt, ignorance and mismanagement made Elizabeth tremble.
"You don't know the old wretch as well as I do," she cautioned Philip. "There is no form of meanness or wickedness she is not capable of, and her influence over your father is as strong as ever."
"Yes, that is so, Mother, but remember she is very old and feeble and father doesn't really care much how the farm is run. I believe he rather likes to tease Aunt Peachy. Perhaps he is tired of having her boss him just as Old Abe is. My chief objection to the old woman is the way she snoops around. Sometimes she gets on my nerves when I find her right under my feet. Thank goodness, she never comes up here!"
Philip had fitted up a workshop in the attic, that being the one place where neither his father nor Aunt Peachy ever found their way. Here he kept his books and papers, his tools, and his medicine chest, with the simple remedies recommended by Dr. Price to be given to the ailing darkeys, instead of the "charm poultices" and "yarb" teas with which Aunt Peachy had been accustomed to hold them in fearful subjection.
The attic extended over the whole house, but only a part of it had been floored over. It was dimly lighted by small windows, close up under the eaves, but Philip had cut a skylight in the roof and neatly fitted in a sash which gave him plenty of light and much better ventilation. The discarded furniture of past generations had been pushed back in the dark corners of the huge room. Stored on the unfloored rafters were many rare pieces of mahogany, broken and marred by rough usage but proclaiming their beauty to anyone who might hear the cry.
As a boy, Philip had heard the cry but he had not understood what it meant. He had always loved the attic, always found a certain rest and charm about the place. What it was he had not known. He had thought it was because there he had been able to get away from the disagreeable cackle and scandal of Aunt Peachy. He had not realized that it was not only the quiet of the place that rested his outraged ears but that certain lines of beauty delighted his unconscious eyes and were as potent as the silence in restoring his sensitive nerves to normal poise.
Elizabeth loved the attic, too. When Philip was away from home during those long four years she used to creep up there and just sit and think, gazing into the dusty depths of the corners, vaguely determining that some day she would straighten things up, move everything and clean. She never had the time, however, which no doubt was just as well, as in her zeal she might have destroyed some of the charm of the place. As it was, she swept and scrubbed the floor every now and then, washed the little dusty windows and removed the cobwebs that the busy spiders festooned in the corners.
She had rubbed up some of the furniture a little with boiled oil and turpentine. An old highboy near a window had responded resplendently to her attentions. The light shone on its polished surface, bringing out the rich red of the mahogany and its fine rippling grain. On it, leaning against the wall, she had placed the portrait of the creator of the sunken garden.
Philip and his mother now came together to the attic for peace and quiet. Sometimes Betsy joined them there, but the place did not appeal so much to her joyous nature. She declared it was too spooky for her, although the skylight had helped it a little.
Lately Jo had begun to find his way to the retreat of his mother and brother. He would creep up quietly and watch Philip at work. But the person who loved the attic at The Hedges as much as either Philip or Elizabeth was the little neighbor, Rebecca Taylor. Whenever she felt sad and homesick for the studio in New York, for the old life there with her charming Daddy and the circle of pleasant friends, she would slip over the river by way of the coon bridge and knock on Mrs. Bolling's kitchen door.
And Rebecca always found an affectionate welcome when she came.