Free A Different Sun: A Novel of Africa by Elaine Neil Orr Page B

your most private thoughts,” he said.
    Currents flowed through her like the brown waves in the wood. She closed the box, hushed. She slid her palm across the top. “What is this?” she said. In the center was a single scallop, worked out like the perimeter groove but deeper.
    “The sway of your back,” Henry said.
    * * *
    E MMA COULD NOT sleep . “What is it?” she said to herself after hours of restless tossing. The moon threw sheets of light into the room. As she sat up, she had a sense of her bed as a small boat at sea.
    For her March wedding, Emma wore a blue silk dress with a white rush at the neck. She imagined she might look pretty coming down the family staircase and was disappointed when Henry averted his eyes as she entered the parlor. But when she reached him, he put his hand to her elbow and held it like an exquisite object coming down on a current. They stood so close her bouquet was crushed, and the scent of evergreens and camellias filled Emma’s senses. She had invited the Pilgrims School, though the children remained outside in the yard. After the ceremony, she greeted them, giving each a flower. One of the older Negro girls pushed a tag of bark into her hand.
JESUS
, it read, the letters made with a charcoal shard. It tore at Emma’s heart. What of these children right here in Georgia? Didn’t they need her? Was she running away? She felt dizzy and closed her eyes.
One two three four remember.
When she looked out again, the girl was gone.
    Indoors, Emma sought Henry and found him standing before a display of boxed gifts in the hallway. He was rapping them with his knuckles as he might a watermelon.
    “A silver tea set,” Aunt Lou said, her voice as large as her satin-banded dress.
    “It’s not something I would think of,” Henry said.
    “You’ll take it for your wife.”
    “We hope to,” Emma said in a rush, fearful Henry might say something about the extravagance of silver in Africa. “But we can only carry so much.”
    “Of course we’ll take it—for Mrs. Bowman,” Henry said, a sly glance at Emma.
    “Good,” Aunt Lou finished. “It won’t break.”
    Emma felt someone’s eyes upon her. Mittie Ann stood at the door to the butler’s pantry. She looked stately in her brown empire dress. “My father’s expecting you to come by,” she said. “He has something.” The woman started out and Emma followed.
    At the cabin door, Emma waited for her eyes to adjust and took in the smell of camphor and ash. In a moment she saw Uncle Eli sitting in bed, looking toward the window that offered a view of the garden. Several of his bundles—what she had taken long ago for stars but were to him warnings against evil—still hung from the ceiling. She chose her steps so as not to bump her head against one of them.
    “I feel you a-comin’,” the old man said when she moved around where he could see her.
    “Good afternoon, Uncle Eli.”
    He gestured with his chin toward a rocking chair. She preferred to stand because of her skirts, but she sat anyway. The old man’s white hair was huge, as if he had decided against ever cutting it again. It ranged and peaked, the liveliest part of him.
    “Been some while,” he said, “since you call on this old friend.”
    She knew how she had recently avoided him. She was going to Africa. He was taken from there against his will. He would die here. She felt her pity roused for him. She was even bitterly sorry. Yet this was her wedding day. She should not be asked to feel sorrow like this. “I’ve been busy preparing for my journey. You’ll remember to pray to Jesus, for his mercy, and pray for me and my husband going into your homeland.”
    “I don’t forget to pray,” he said. “I pray all the time.”
    She had a sudden urge to ask what he remembered. “What’s your favorite memory, Uncle Eli?”
    “You mean my country?”
    “Yes.”
    “A big yard where I run around with my brothers and sisters, my mother there cooking. Oh, we had a good