Alice's Tulips: A Novel by Sandra Dallas Read Free Book Online

woman. After that, she got one dress a year, a shift made out of rough material, like a gunnysack. The slaves ate at a horse trough, she told us. The gruel was dumped into the trough, and they set to, using their hands or shells to scoop up the food. She worked in the kitchen of the plantation, and her life should have been better than the others in bondage, but it was a misery. Her mistress held her hand over a hot fire until it blistered, in punishment for burning the biscuits. One day, she was sent on an errand, and when she got back, her children had been taken to the slave auction and sold, and to this day, she does not know where they are. Lizzie, she cried, and I cried, and even Mother Bullock wiped her eyes. I know the Negroes are different from us, but still, I thought about your little Eloise and Mary and how you would feel if someone snatched them away from you.
    The Ole Massa got tired of her crying for her lost children, so he tied her to a fence post and set the dogs on her. When she recovered from the wounds, the female contraband and her husband ran off. She told us she could stand any punishment they gave her, but she was pregnant, and she would rather die tryingfor freedom than see them sell off another of her flesh and blood. Then she motioned to a little girl to stand up, and there was a murmuring, because the girl was not a sable hue, as you would think, but as white as you or me. Well, Lizzie, we didn’t have to ask how that girl came to be fathered. How do you suppose a master could sell his own child, even if it was begot from a slave?
    When the meeting was over, the collection plate was passed, and Mother Bullock put in a dime. Outside, Mr. Frank Smead, who I think is as worthless as my old shoes, made a racket, cussing and hollering that God had cursed the whole Ethiopian race by making it black. He said the Confederates had it right when they drove their wagons over the bodies of Negro soldiers to see how many nigger heads they could crush. There was grumbling from folks leaving the church, as everyone disrepects Mr. Frank Smead. Someone began to sing, “We’ll hang Jeff Davis from a sour apple tree,” but before a fight could break out, Nealie and Mr. Samuel Smead quieted Mr. Frank and drove away. On the way home, I asked our Negro his name. It is Lucky. “Lucky what?” I asks. But he does not know.
    I wrote to cheer you up, and I misdoubt I have done that. Instead, I told you as sad a story as you ever heard. I guess there is a lesson, and it is that others are worse off than me and you. Of course, it is human nature to put our problems first, no matter how bad others’ are.
So accept my love in place of any cheerful thoughts.
Alice
     
    May 21, 1863
    Darling Lizzie,
    There never was a person so mean as Myrtle Lame. You had every reason to think you were included in the invitation she issued to the others at the tea. I do not understand why you takethe blame and make excuses for her. You have always been easier on everyone than you are on yourself. She shamed herself, not you, with her rudeness. I never heard of anybody telling a guest she was not wanted. And after all the trouble you had gone to look so presentable. You must cut her dead for a hundred or two years. You may be sure I won’t tell Mama. We have always kept each other’s secrets.
    Please excuse this mean little apology for a letter. I will quit and call it a bad job. Mother Bullock is hitching the buggy to go to Aunt Darnell’s and has promised to leave my letter at the post office on her way.
With much love and in haste,
    Alice
     
    May 30, 1863
    Dear Lizzie,
    Charlie writes that things are bad. One of his messmates died. The man had stepped on a piece of iron that cut through his foot, and his leg swoll up and turned black, and he died of the gangrene. Another has gone to the surgery because he says he is coming down with the cancer, but Charlie thinks he is just a hospital bummer. They have not had any fighting yet, but