scoll slept well the night he saved his house minions from
going down the river, but no wink of sleep visited Roxy's eyes. A
profound terror had taken possession of her. Her child could grow up and
be sold down the river! The thought crazed her with horror. If she dozed
and lost herself for a moment, the next moment she was on her feet flying
to her child's cradle to see if it was still there. Then she would gather
it to her heart and pour out her love upon it in a frenzy of kisses,
moaning, crying, and saying, "Dey sha'n't, oh, dey _sha'nt'!'_--yo' po'
mammy will kill you fust!"
Once, when she was tucking him back in its cradle again, the other child
nestled in its sleep and attracted her attention. She went and stood
over it a long time communing with herself.
"What has my po' baby done, dat he couldn't have yo' luck? He hain't done
nuth'n. God was good to you; why warn't he good to him? Dey can't sell
_you_ down de river. I hates yo' pappy; he hain't got no heart--for
niggers, he hain't, anyways. I hates him, en I could kill him!" She
paused awhile, thinking; then she burst into wild sobbings again, and
turned away, saying, "Oh, I got to kill my chile, dey ain't no yuther
way--killin' _him_ wouldn't save de chile fum goin' down de river. Oh, I
got to do it, yo' po' mammy's got to kill you to save you, honey." She
gathered her baby to her bosom now, and began to smother it with
caresses. "Mammy's got to kill you--how _kin_ I do it! But yo' mammy
ain't gwine to desert you--no, no, _dah_, don't cry--she gwine _wid_
you, she gwine to kill herself too. Come along, honey, come along wid
mammy; we gwine to jump in de river, den troubles o' dis worl' is all
over--dey don't sell po' niggers down the river over _yonder_."
She stared toward the door, crooning to the child and hushing it; midway
she stopped, suddenly. She had caught sight of her new Sunday gown--a
cheap curtain-calico thing, a conflagration of gaudy colors and fantastic
figures. She surveyed it wistfully, longingly.
"Hain't ever wore it yet," she said, "en it's just lovely." Then she
nodded her head in response to a pleasant idea, and added, "No, I ain't
gwine to be fished out, wid everybody lookin' at me, in dis mis'able ole
linsey-woolsey."
She put down the child and made the change. She looked in the glass and
was astonished at her beauty. She resolved to make her death toilet
perfect. She took off her handkerchief turban and dressed her glossy
wealth of hair "like white folks"; she added s