Huberts Wife | Page 2

'specially when he's had dat sweet saint all to hisself now
dese so many year--no, neber."
And Amy reiterated this over and over, as if to kill the secret thought
which haunted her against her will.
"She persume to come here and order you dis way an' I dat way, an' all
us all 'round ebry which way--oo--but I gived her a piece o' my mind,"
spake Margery, the weaver, very irate.
"Umph! I never seed ye speak to her," said Amy, doubtingly.
"Not wid my tongue, mind ye. I knows better den dat. But I jes spit fire
at her out of my eyes."
"Fire neber burn Miss Rusha; she too ugly for dat. S'pose fire burn de
ole Nick? Den he be done dead and gone, which ain't so; derefore
nuthin' ever fall Miss Rusha; she never sick, nor die, nor drown, nor
burn up. Miss Ellice she sick, she die, 'cause she be an angel; she go
home to glory; but Miss Rusha she live, jes to trouble white folks, jes to
torment niggers."
Wrathful Amy, as she said this, glanced triumphantly at Margery, who
was about to speak, when Chloe took the floor, figuratively.
"Tank de Lord, we ain't de niggers what she's got to torment; and she
needn't be setting her cap for our own good Massa Duncan; she may jes
hang up high her fiddle on de willows o' Bab'lon; she sit down an' weep

on de streams; she neber hab good Massa Duncan; neber while de trees
on Kennons grow and de stars 'bove Kennons shine."
Kennons was the name of the Lisle plantation.
"She'd like to jine the two plantations. One is too little for her to rule.
She's allus wanted our south 'bacco patch. Her hundred niggers and
Massa's hundred would make a crew. O, she's a shrewd one; she sees
further than her nose. She'd make my shettle fly fast as Aunt Kizzie's."
"Somebody ought to make your shuttle fly faster than is its habit,
Margery," returned China, usually quiet and gentle. "But what if you
are all mistaken, and Mistress Rush has no idea of making a rush upon
Kennons and our good master."
"O, you poor innocent," quoth Chloe and Amy at the same time.
"Haven't we eyes? What's they for if not to see with? They ain't in the
backs of our heads neither. We've got ears too; we don't hear with our
elbows. What for did she bring nice things and pretties for Hubert? and
what for did she take such a wonderful interest in de poor baby? Bress
us, is de baby wake or sleep, or what is come of it? We's all forgettin'
de dear precious objec. Sakes alive, an' its nearly smuddered in its soft
blankets, worked so beau'fully wid its own moder's hand."
A sleeping-powder, administered to the three days' old infant had, for a
time, quieted its incessant cries. This sudden mention brought every
dark face to bend low over the cradle, which Bessie, the nurse, had
brought hither from the house, that she might share the gossip of her
companions.
Worn out with weeping and watching, Bessie lay prone and sleeping
upon the floor at the cradle's side. Satisfied that the baby still breathed,
Chloe, Amy, Margery, China and Dinah settled back into their seats,
like so many crows upon a branch.
Dinah, the last-named, had been thus far fast asleep; and provoked with
herself that she had lost a share of the gossip, she gave Bessie a
vigorous push with her foot as she passed her, not through charity, nor

yet through malice, but through a sudden spasm of ill-nature.
Bessie gave a groan and sat up. She gazed around wildly--slowly
comprehended the scene, the present, the past, and, with another groan,
flung herself upon the floor again.
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Dinah, to disturb Bessie in that
way," said China, between whom and Bessie was a warm friendship.
"She has cried so, and broken her heart."
"She needn't be in people's way, then--who's going 'round Robinhood's
barn for sake o' likes o' her?" said Dinah, complainingly.
"Shut your mouth, black Dinah," cried Amy authoritatively. "Ye's a
pretty one to knock around a sleepin' nigger. You's been asleep yourself
the last hour. S'pose we'd all been like you--you'd been kicked into a
heap--but we ain't--and you never did have a drop o' human kindness."
"O, go 'way wid your quarreling. Dinah is jis like a firebran'; let her
'lone. What she got to do wid dis subjec-matter in han', I like a-know?"
queried Aunt Chloe, swaying up to the mantle, filling her pipe with
tobacco, and adding thereto the smallest glowing coal upon the hearth.
Meantime, while she is preparing for a smoke, her companions have
taken from