Free A Mercy by Toni Morrison

night, another place of wet ground. But it is summer then and the damp is from dew not snow. You are telling me about the making of iron things. How happy you are to find easy ore so close to the surface ofthe earth. The glory of shaping metal. Your father doing it and his father before him back and back for a thousand years. With furnaces from termite mounds. And you know the ancestors approve when two owls appear at the very instant you say their names so you understand they are showing themselves to bless you. See, you say, see how they swivel their heads. They approve you also, you tell me. Do they bless me too, I ask. Wait, you say. Wait and see. I think they do, because I am coming now. I am coming to you.
    Lina says there are some spirits who look after warriors and hunters and there are others who guard virgins and mothers. I am none of those. Reverend Father says communion is the best hope, prayer the next. There is no communion hereabouts and I feel shame to speak to the Virgin when all I am asking for is not to her liking. I think Mistress has nothing to say on the matter. She avoids the Baptists and the village women who go to the meetinghouse. They annoy her as when we three, Mistress, Sorrow and me, go to sell two calves. They are trotting behind us on rope to the cart we ride in. We wait while Mistress does the selling talk. Sorrow jumps down and goes behind the trader’s post where a village woman slaps her face many times and screams at her. When Mistress discovers what is happening, both her face and the village woman’s burn in anger. Sorrow is relieving herself in the yard without care for the eyes of others. The argue is done and Mistress drives us away. After a while she pulls the horse to a stop. She turns to Sorrow and slaps her face more, saying Fool. I am shock. Mistress never strikes us. Sorrow does not cry or answer.I think Mistress says other words to her, softer ones, but I am only seeing how her eyes go. Their look is close to the way of the women who stare at Lina and me as we wait for the Ney brothers. Neither look scares, but it is a hurting thing. But I know Mistress has a sweeter heart. On a winter day when I am still small Lina asks her if she can give me the dead daughter’s shoes. They are black with six buttons each. Mistress agrees but when she sees me in them she sudden sits down in the snow and cries. Sir comes and picks her up in his arms and carries her into the house.
    I never cry. Even when the woman steals my cloak and shoes and I am freezing on the boat no tears come.
    These thoughts are sad in me, so I make me think of you instead. How you say your work in the world is strong and beautiful. I think you are also. No holy spirits are my need. No communion or prayer. You are my protection. Only you. You can be it because you say you are a free man from New Amsterdam and always are that. Not like Will or Scully but like Sir. I don’t know the feeling of or what it means, free and not free. But I have a memory. When Sir’s gate is done and you are away so long, I walk sometimes to search you. Behind the new house, the rise, over the hill beyond. I see a path between rows of elm trees and enter it. Underfoot is weed and soil. In a while the path turns away from the elms and to my right is land dropping away in rocks. To my left is a hill. High, very high. Climbing over it all, up up, are scarlet flowers I never see before. Everywhere choking their own leaves. The scent is sweet. I put my hand in to gather a few blossoms. I hear somethingbehind me and turn to see a stag moving up the rock side. He is great. And grand. Standing there between the beckoning wall of perfume and the stag I wonder what else the world may show me. It is as though I am loose to do what I choose, the stag, the wall of flowers. I am a little scare of this looseness. Is that how free feels? I don’t like it. I don’t want to be free of you because I am live only with you. When I choose and say good