The Black Rose by Tananarive Due Read Free Book Online

put the briers around his neck, telling her he thought it was an old wives’ tale.
    “Lou,” Mama said, licking her dry lips, “you go run an’ find me that Bible-book Ole Missus give me.” This time she almost sounded like she wasn’t sick at all.
    Louvenia must have forgotten Mama was sick, too, because she sucked on her teeth just like she did anytime she was asked to do something she didn’t feel like doing. Except usually Mama would cuff her if she did that, and now Mama didn’t do anything except lie shivering on her pallet. “I don’ know where that ol’ book at,” Louvenia complained.
    “Chile, go find it. Quick, now, ’fore …” Mama paused for a long time, then she sighed. “… ’fore I forgit.”
    “I’ll find it, Mama,” Sarah said.
    Suddenly Mama’s hand was tight around Sarah’s arm. The grip was so strong it almost hurt, and Sarah was shocked Mama still had so much strength. Maybe Mama was putting all the strength she had into holding on to her, she thought, and that thought made Sarah feel better. “No, Sarah. You stay. Stay.”
    The way Mama was looking at Sarah reminded her of the doleful gaze from the girl sitting between Mama Nadine’s legs, with her eyes full as if she were seeing something big, terrible, and sad, something she wished she didn’t have to see. Tears sprang to Mama’s eyes.
    “The baby … Ain’t even quite seven years old …” Mama whispered, then she began to speak so quickly that Sarah almost couldn’t keep up with her words. “Seem like you was talkin’ ’bout as soon as the midwife slap you to life… . You could ’member all them words an’ numbers … ’an you could make Owen laugh, chile… . You brighten that man life so … yes, you did … time you took that stick in yo’ hand, wavin’ it an talkin’ … you ’member? You was so little… .”
    Sarah listened as hard as she could, but she was afraid Mama’s mind was going to sleep again. She didn’t understand what she was talking about. Then, just that quickly, Mama seemed to be praying. Her eyes drifted away.
    “Lord, I promised I’d learn to read all them words in yo’ Good Book … or one of these chillen would read it to me … an’ I thought it’d be Sarah, ’cause seem like she could do it … an’ me an’ Owen talked an’ said we’d take her out the field … put her in one of them freedmen schools … but we needed her back ’fore long. Lord, we ain’t have the chance. Fo’give us, Lord… .” Mama’s eyes snapped back to Sarah’s, seeing her. “Sarah … you hear me?”
    “Yes’m,” Sarah said.
    “When Lou bring that Bible-book … you keep it, hear? That’s the Lord’s book. All them words in there … I want you to read ’em. I want you to read His word… .”
    Sarah didn’t know anybody who could read, except for white folks, or maybe Mama Nadine and her son with the Creole name. She’d learned the letters in her name when Mama and Papa let her go to the school in the woods when she was little, but that was all. She’d stayed in school for only three months, then she’d stopped because Mama needed her help. Sarah had flipped through the pages of Mama’s Bible many times before, but the tiny symbols on the pages were a mystery. “Mama, how I’ma … ?”
    “Shhhh,” Mama hushed her. “You go to school. Tell Alex and Lou I say you goin’ to school, hear? They gon’ take you out them fields … an’ you gon’ learn to read all them words. Jus’ like I promise God … Jus’ like I promise … You hear me, Sarah?”
    “Yes’m,” Sarah said. “I’ma read all them words.”
    “An’ then you come read ’em to me. You come back, hear? Come see me.”
    Come see her? What did Mama mean by that? Was Mama sending her away? Even though Sarah suspected Mama was speaking foolishness again, she felt flames licking inside her throat. Her eyes burned, too.
    “The par’ble of the seed and sower, like Preacher say …” Mama said, her whisper