the washtub alone. So she resigned. But she was well fixed–
rich, as she would have described it; for she had lived a steady life,
and had banked four dollars every month in New Orleans as a provision
for her old age. She said in the start that she had “put shoes on
one bar’footed nigger to tromple on her with,” and that one mistake
like that was enough; she would be independent of the human race
thenceforth forevermore if hard work and economy could accomplish it.
When the boat touched the levee at New Orleans she bade good-by to her
comrades on the _Grand Mogul_ and moved her kit ashore.
But she was back in a hour. The bank had gone to smash and carried
her four hundred dollars with it. She was a pauper and homeless.
Also disabled bodily, at least for the present. The officers were
full of sympathy for her in her trouble, and made up a little purse
for her. She resolved to go to her birthplace; she had friends there
among the Negros, and the unfortunate always help the unfortunate,
she was well aware of that; those lowly comrades of her youth would
not let her starve.
She took the little local packet at Cairo, and now she was on
the homestretch. Time had worn away her bitterness against her son,
and she was able to think of him with serenity. She put the vile side
of him out of her mind, and dwelt only on recollections of his occasional
acts of kindness to her. She gilded and otherwise decorated these,
and made them very pleasant to contemplate. She began to long to see him.
She would go and fawn upon him slavelike–for this would have to be her
attitude, of course–and maybe she would find that time had modified him,
and that he would be glad to see his long-forgotten old nurse and treat
her gently. That would be lovely; that would make her forget her woes
and her poverty.
Her poverty! That thought inspired her to add another castle to her dream:
maybe he would give her a trifle now and then–maybe a dollar,
once a month, say; any little thing like that would help, oh,
ever so much.
By the time she reached Dawson’s Landing, she was her old self again;
her blues were gone, she was in high feather. She would get along,
surely; there were many kitchens where the servants would share their
meals with her, and also steal sugar and apples and other dainties
for her to carry home–or give her a chance to pilfer them herself,
which would answer just as well. And there was the church.
She was a more rabid and devoted Methodist than ever, and her piety
was no sham, but was strong and sincere. Yes, with plenty of creature
comforts and her old place in the amen corner in her possession again,
she would be perfectly happy and at peace thenceforward to the end.
She went to Judge Driscoll’s kitchen first of all. She was received
there in great form and with vast enthusiasm. Her wonderful travels,
and the strange countries she had seen, and the adventures she had had,
made her a marvel and a heroine of romance. The Negros hung enchanted
upon a great story of her experiences, interrupting her all along with
eager questions, with laughter, exclamations of delight, and expressions
of applause; and she was obliged to confess to herself that if there
was anything better in this world than steamboating, it was the
glory to be got by telling about it. The audience loaded her stomach
with their dinners, and then stole the pantry bare to load up her basket.
Tom was in St. Louis. The servants said he had spent the best part
of his time there during the previous two years. Roxy came every day,
and had many talks about the family and its affairs. Once she asked
why Tom was away so much. The ostensible “Chambers” said:
“De fac’ is, ole marster kin git along better when young marster’s
away den he kin when he’s in de town; yes, en he love him better, too;
so he gives him fifty dollahs a month–“