Marlon James: The Book of Night Women

Lilith stop. The man regard her but she couldn’t see him face since he didn’t take off him hat. He swallow some more lime and sugar-water and give Circe the glass. Him shirt open and him chest hair white and bushy. Him breeches cream and dirty and loose and he swing a little when he walk right past her, that old man swing. Lilith jump out of the way but the tobacco air reach her. That night Circe laughing when she recalling what he say.

— What a thing! Seem you free paper burn. And to think of all people, he be the one that burn it. You to report to the field tomorrow morning. Don’t make cock crow and you still in you bed.

Fear jump up and snatch the words out of Lilith mouth the whole night. Everybody know ’bout the life of a field nigger. Before sunrise she hear them — one, two, three hundred foot hitting the ground and rumbling like slow thunder. They used to wake her and scare her so much that she thought they was a militia marching to hell. The slave coffle. The field niggers. Before sunrise they in the field and by moonrise they still working. And when crop time, no nigger leave. Sun burn they black bodies blacker. Ants, mosquito, rat, snake and scorpion bite them in the bush. Womens screaming, No, massa, no whip me no more, and mens screaming as backra chop they two little toe off. She see the slaves when they come back in the evening, tired, crying, limping and bleeding and some that come back in a sack.

And she hear other things too. Of the time in 1785 when they burn a nigger girl alive right in the middle of the cane field and how every year, right before crop time, she scream. And when the overseer chop off another nigger head and stick it on a pole until it rot off. And when they send five slave to the treadmill where them niggers run themself to death. The word was that Jack Wilkins wield the whip and do as he please. He instruct him slave-drivers to do the same and since then a month don’t pass where they don’t kill a nigger and gone to Spanish Town to buy a fresh one. Montpelier have deep pockets and a new nigger always better than a lazy one, Jack Wilkins was known to say.

The field was where Jack Wilkins was sending her.

Lilith ’fraid of sleep ’cause tomorrow was goin’ come right after. She think that if she try her hardest to stay awake, then night would be force to stay and tomorrow would never come again. Lilith don’t care if that was little girl thinking and she supposed to be woman now. She hold on to the awakeness for a long time before sleep beat her. The next morning she sick.

Circe frown, tapping her foot. The girl lying flat on the mat.

— Me say what sick you?

— Me, me don’t know.

— You no know. Then how you know you sick? You belly hurtin’ you?

— Yes.

— And you head woozy-woozy?

— Yes.

— You feel fat like you goin’ burst?

— Yes.

— Then you either with child or you dead. Mayhaps you breeding. Me know you was taking man, you know, you at the time now.

— No! Is sick me sick. Me can’t feel nothing, and, and, me just weak. Weak bad.

Circe look at her hard.

— Well. Make me ask one fool-fool question. You think overseer care if you sick or you well? Answer me direct. You think he care a raas? Unless you sick until you deading, you still have to get you—

— Then me deading.

Circe not one for backtalk.

— That you goin’ be for sure once the overseer come here.

Circe step outside. The girl wait a while, then listen if she nearby. She move slow to the door. Circe gone. The fire still going, so she lean over it until her neck and chin well hot and some sweat start to rise out her skin. She raise her arm and let some of the heat work her armpit. But then she drop her left hand too low and near burn herself. Fire catch her skin hair and the room smell like burnin’ goat. She cuss and dip her hand in the bucket and rub it hard, trying to get the smell off. She hear people talking and run back to her mat. Then the abeng shell blow.

Circe come back. Right behind her was the thin woman who slap her once, the woman called Homer.

— See it deh she say she sick. Me no want no problem with slave-driver, you know, me no want no problem. You know how backra go on when nigger say she sick and is lazy she lazy. Me no—

— Quiet, Homer say.

Circe hiss and go outside.

Homer stoop down. The girl try to not look too ’fraid. Homer eyes thin and sharp and her cheekbone high. Her lip thin like white woman but dry and chappy. Homer have the longest neck she ever see and smell like mint one moment, lemongrass the next. None of the pickneys ever go near the big great house, not because they forbidden to play near the massa or mistress, but because they all scared of Homer. The girl feeling the same scaredness and shame and she angry that part of her still be little girl who easy to frighten. She want to be tough and hard like Circe or move slow and sure like nothing can bother her. Homer regarding her for long. The girl can’t hold her gazing so she look ’way. Then Homer touch her forehead and feel her neck. The girl hide her left hand but Homer still frown like she smell something foul. Homer touch Lilith neck again and mutter, then get up and go to the doorway.

— She have the marsh fever. Give her plenty cerasee, but don’t put no molasses in it, she say.

Circe make a big pot of cerasee tea and give Lilith to drink. Cerasee is the bitterest tea ever make and the girl cough and hack and cry but she didn’t dare spit. Circe regard her again, then say she going to town. She put on her green calico frock and shoes, one of the only negro anywhere with a pair and gone. As soon as she think Circe far away, Lilith go outside and blink at the high sun. She out there a good while, looking if she can see the negroes working from where she be. She step out further and see pickaxe and hoe swinging up in the sky, then down in the ground. Just then a cart come from round back and she jump out of the way. A niggerwoman was cursing and driving and whipping the horse hard.

Lilith go back inside to find a Johnny-jumper waiting for her.

— Word ’pon de field say you sick.

She couldn’t move. The man whip on the floor beside him cutlass. Every time the flame flicker the cutlass blink.

— Me come over, me meself fi give you de bettering.

— Me, me mother, she soon come back.

— You mama who me jus’ pass goin’ to town?

Lilith quiet. She think to run through the door but the thought of other Johnny-jumpers coming still her. She try to think like a woman.

— W. . what you want from little girl? she say.

— Who tell you say you little? Penelope have two young’un and she look younger than you. Anyway, since you make me come all the way over yah fi de cho-cho me nah run round no more.

The Johnny-jumper take off him shirt and pull down him pantaloons. She remember him now, the same boy who say the day before that he was coming for her. She try not to look at how he ready. Plenty man come to Circe hut with it already sticking through they breeches, but they keep them on when Circe tell her to get out. And though that madman Tantalus show him cocky all the time it swing low like lame dog. Lilith thinking ’bout her bush, and how nobody tell her that is man who must decide what happen to it.

— What you name? she say.

— Dem call me Paris. You know who Paris be?

She don’t answer.

— Big, big hero. Massa Jack say dat Paris stop the Trojan War.

— Circe say—

— Circe already get what she lookin’ for. Me no care ’bout she. Anyway, hear what. Pussy not doin’ me no favour all de way over deh, so get you black arse over yah.

She don’t know what to do. The Johnny-jumper on the floor with him hand waking up him cocky. She try to think that she is Circe who choose who she rut. She try to think she is Circe who don’t care when Lilith walk in on her and a free coloured from in town. If she just think ’bout that or anything else. The bat in the ackee tree, the pretty great house that just whitewash, mayhaps when she done think, he done rut. She make one step.