She loved him devotedly, but he
was so ugly, with his sunken eyes and his `fidgets,' that she hid him away
from people. All the dainties she brought down from the Big House were for
the blind child, and she beat and cuffed her other children whenever she
found them teasing him or trying to get his chicken-bone away from him. He
began to talk early, remembered everything he heard, and his mammy said he
`wasn't all wrong.' She named him Samson, because he was blind, but on the
plantation he was known as `yellow Martha's simple child.' He was docile
and obedient, but when he was six years old he began to run away from home,
always taking the same direction. He felt his way through the lilacs,
along the boxwood hedge, up to the south wing of the Big House, where Miss
Nellie d'Arnault practised the piano every morning. This angered his
mother more than anything else he could have done; she was so ashamed of
his ugliness that she couldn't bear to have white folks see him. Whenever
she caught him slipping away from the cabin, she whipped him unmercifully,
and told him what dreadful things old Mr. d'Arnault would do to him if he
ever found him near the Big House. But the next time Samson had a chance,
he ran away again. If Miss d'Arnault stopped practising for a moment and
went toward the window, she saw this hideous little pickaninny, dressed in
an old piece of sacking, standing in the open space between the hollyhock
rows, his body rocking automatically, his blind face lifted to the sun and
wearing an expression of idiotic rapture.
Pages:
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192