Free The Kitchen House by Kathleen Grissom Page A

pivotal height, then jerked before its descent.
    No one was sure whether the child fell or jumped. When she landed, there was an audible snap; she lay still, her head pitched back from her body and her little arms stretched open as though to welcome the heavens.
    Even the birds stopped singing.

C HAPTER E IGHT

     
    Belle
    T HE FIRST TIME I SEE that little Sally, I don’t like her just for being who she is. She’s my sister, but I can’t tell her that. And just because she’s all white, she’s never gonna be moved to the kitchen house like me. But this summer, after I come to know the child, I see she got the same ways as Beattie, smiling and happy to give what she has. After a time I come to like her and think, Maybe when she gets older, I’ll tell her myself that we’re sisters. But then, just like that, she’s gone. After she dies, before the doctor gets here, Mama tells me to wash Sally and put on her best dress.
    I say, “No, please, Mama, let Dory,” but Mama Mae says, “Belle, you know how much Dory love that chil’. Besides, she nursin’, and that maybe stop her milk.” Then Mama looks at me real good before she says, “But you still want Dory to do it. I get her up here.”
    “No, Mama, you’re right. I just don’t like to touch something that don’t have life in it.”
    “Nobody do,” says Mama.
    When I was washing that child, she feels soft like a baby bird. It don’t seem right that she’s going in the ground. When I clean her little arm, I take off the bracelet that has a likeness of the cap’n. I put it in my pocket, thinking it’s mine now, but I start to cry and take it out again, because I know that thing was never mine, just like living in the big house is never gonna be mine. When Uncle comes, I’m crying so hard I jump when he touches my shoulder.
    “Come, Belle,” he says, “everybody die sometime or ’nother.”But his own eyes was wet by the time we finish. “She a good lil girl,” he says over and over. When we get done, I give him the bracelet. He looks at it, then he looks at me. He shakes his head real sad, like he knows everything I’m thinking, before he puts it in his pocket.

C HAPTER N INE

     
    Lavinia
    I T WAS SAID THAT M ISS Martha’s screams for her daughter were heard by the workers all the way out in the fields. Immediately after Mama gave her the terrible news, Miss Martha went into labor.
    Fanny, sure that she was the cause of Sally’s death, couldn’t stop shaking and wouldn’t let go of Beattie. Mama had Dory take them down to the kitchen to give Fanny a drink of brandy, then to stay with her. Papa carried Miss Sally to the house, while the tutor took a stunned Marshall to his room. Uncle Jacob and Belle stayed with the child’s lifeless body and waited while Ben rode out for the doctor. I was the only one left to help Mama when baby Campbell was born.
    I stood back at the doorway, trembling, unsure if Miss Martha’s agonized cries were for Sally or from the spasms that arched her swollen abdomen. Mama called me to her side, but when Miss Martha gave another ear-piercing scream, I froze, and my hands flew to my ears. Mama came to me and grabbed my arm. She whispered into my ear, “Miss Martha just lose one chil’, you want her to lose this baby? You here to help, and you helpin’ nobody when you actin’ like this.”
    Mama’s anger affected me more than the terror of Miss Martha’s screams, so I accepted the damp cloth that Mama handed me. “Go dry her head, Abinia. Easy now, Miss Martha. Easy with the push, easy with the push, there we go.”
    From what I have since learned, it was a quick birth, but that afternoon Miss Martha’s agony seemed to go on forever. Finally, the baby came.
    “Abinia, give me the string, now take the scissor, cut here, don’t worry, you not hurtin’ him. All right, give me the blanket.” My hands shook, but I was able to follow through.
    The baby coughed and choked as Mama cleaned him, then he began to cry.