Calypso's Island

Chapter 3 - OLD WIVES TALES

Trinidad

July 1812

This baby keeps coming and I'm heavy with care. I'm nervous on the steps, and I avoid the slippery places outside. I move as slow as ever, yet I'm graceful and I look the part. In my mirror, I'm an ebony woman with long springy hair that I keep in a stylish bouffant upsweep. I own dignified shoulders and a long neck and I'm tall, but not taller than my Monsieur. He calls me his noir belle femme, his beautiful woman of color. He says I'm smooth and to him I'm like the look of cocoa when it's still on the branch and full in the sun. It's always funny when he calls me that. Pure cocoa can be bitter sweet to taste and he knows the tease he gives me in the compliment.

Until a few months ago you could even call me slim. I had a pinched waist that showed up my healthy bust and wide skirts. Today? This child in my womb reshapes me. He makes me round and my pretty dresses don't fit anymore. But I'm a good sewing woman. That is my trade. I leaned it from my mere, my sweet mama. So I make myself dresses with puffed sleeves and flowing fabrics and ribbons with a deep plunge at the breasts.

I think the dresses are lovely but our washerwoman doesn't agree. Our washerwoman doesn't like me. She wants to work my last nerve and does it just for spite. She rips and snags three of my dinner dresses and ruins my nightgowns with too much cake soap and blue. I ask her to please explain but she swears it isn't her, with God as her witness and her hand on the bible.

"I doh know, Miss. I meet it jus so, Miss. It wasn't me, Miss."

"And what about these night clothes here?"

"I doh know, Miss. I use de proper amount of soap, Miss. I doh know why it come out so."

This woman doesn't know how close she is to tasting the bitter in this cocoa. She goes on like that and I threaten to give her six hours in the stocks. So she pretends to bow her head and be contrite, but then she walks off and cuts her eyes at me and grumbles under her breath. She calls me a boldfaced white man's whore, and a cow, and says I'm loose. That gets me vexed. I think of so many unkind things to say to her, but then I remember myself.

I'm a lady. My own mother was a slave once and slender chance is the only reason I'm walking free. So I let it go. I'm off to find a pleasant acquaintance for a change. I'm going to the big kitchen at the back of the house to sit by Granny and chew on her stewed preserved prunes and listen to her soothing talk. Granny is our cook born from the Ashanti. She's my blessing. She loves me on sight every day without reason. They call her Granny Goodwitch and say I should not keep her acquaintance. But I don't care what talk they give; she is my witch if it is true anyway.

I'm smiling at that and making my way there, when our house slave Kina, comes rushing through the backdoor, almost knocking me flat.

"Girl what's wrong with you?" I ask her.

Her eyes grow wide and her hands begin to talk just as loud as her mouth does. She's in all her glee.

"Viens ici, Madame. Quick! Is bacchanal, oui! If you see thing! Mimba slap down de slave driver man. Phow! And Bessy start ter cuss. Ester too. Hmm. Dem say they not moving anymore cane thrash from de mill fer de day. Wok done! And me? Je rire, Madame. I en finish laughing yet. But is best yer come quick before de slave driver kill them, oui."

I stare at her. I'm thinking she's half blind to almost knock me over or maybe she's fully blind to watch my condition and demand that I move quickly. She stands there with her arms folded, holding all her expectations. She wants me to do something, mostly for her own entertainment. I tell myself well, alright then. I turn toward the staircase and raise my voice.