Free Wench by Dolen Perkins-Valdez Page A

the white women uttered a high-pitched “oh” and placed a handkerchief to her mouth. But neither of them stopped looking. A line of blood trailed down Mawu’s thigh.
    When he was done, he said in a hoarse whisper that carried above the wind as he turned toward them: “If I hear word that any of you other niggers is thinking about escaping, I swear as God is my witness I will do that and worst to every last one of you. I will make you wish you was in the fields under the lash. I will make you wish you was dead. And I won’t leave a mark.”
    Lizzie tried to stop the pain in her head. The resort had lulled her into feeling human again. Had she glanced around at the others, she would know it had done the same to them. They had forgotten to protect themselves.
    “Don’t touch her. Don’t nobody touch her,” Tip said, stumbling back to his cottage.
    The slaves started to move off, heading back to their unfinished tasks as if nothing had happened. Only Lizzie stood rooted. Her eyes clung to the ground a few feet away from Mawu’s still body. She put her forearm into her mouth and bit down until she tasted blood. She wanted to hurt herself.
    She sucked at the blood until it no longer flowed, until she felt dizzyingly empty.

ELEVEN
    S omewhere between Mawu’s beating and Philip’s disappointment and Reenie’s long walks to the hotel each evening, their spirits buckled one by one. Sweet allowed her pregnancy to get the better of her and simply sat down. Reenie’s lips set into a straight, emotionless line. Mawu no longer talked back, the words she did speak taking on an air of vapidity. Philip was chained at night, no longer trusted. So it was no wonder that Lizzie sought out the white woman then.
    Although they never said it outright, it was clear to Lizzie the women were upset that she had told. Yet even their anger could not compete with her guilt. She was the one who took tense breaths each time she saw Mawu’s bruised face. She was the one who recoiled when one of them turned a stiff, humped shoulder in her direction.
    Shame stretched Lizzie’s face into false smiles, placed a kind word here and there on her lips, extended a ready helping hand.She imagined them talking about her in the quiet when she wasn’t around.
    She had been dreaming of the path to Glory’s farm, so she found it without a problem. After catching sight of the lone figure in the field and glancing around for watchful eyes, Lizzie rapped on the door. Glory answered and stared at her evenly, either unsurprised or hiding it. Only when the two women had settled comfortably in the main room of the cabin near the window where Glory could keep an eye out for her husband did Lizzie shake off her head scarf, swat at the fly that had been nagging her since she entered, and relax her hands in her lap.
    Thin, faded quilts sagged across the backs of each chair. Out of respect, Lizzie tried not to lean back into the one on her chair. In the corner, a pot-bellied stove sat rusted, still full of the ash of the winter, as a reminder the hot, sultry summer would soon end and snow would fill the cabin doorstep once more. Three hooks on the wall, two holding overalls for a smallish man, freshly washed, as if each morning Glory’s man stepped into his slops, laced up his boots, spooned up his meal, and walked out the door.
    “Thirsty?”
    Lizzie nodded and started to get up, but Glory beat her outside and returned in a moment with a tin of cold water.
    “Best thing about living around here.”
    “What?” Lizzie patted her neck dry with her scarf. The air in the room felt oily.
    “The water.”
    Lizzie took the cup, announced a clear distinct thank you. She felt she was mimicking somebody else’s manners. It was odd, having this waxy-faced white woman serve her. The cup might even be the same one Glory’s husband drank out of. Northern white folks were something else entirely.
    “Something bothering you?”
    Lizzie hadn’t known it until that very