Les Blancs (29 page)

Outside the cabin
,
HANNIBAL
and
SARAH
linger a moment before going in
.

SARAH
(
With a sense of conspiracy
) I seen you this morning, Hannibal.

HANNIBAL
(
Who is tuning his banjo
) Where—?

SARAH
You know where! Boy, you must be crazy!

HANNIBAL
looks frightened. Then waves it away and smiles at her and takes her by the arm and leads her to join the others
.
HANNIBAL
begins
to accompany on his banjo
.
JOSHUA
is in the center of the singing circle, rendering the verse
.

SARAH
pantomimes gleefully helping “Mistress” along to her grave with a shoving motion of her hand. The chorus of the song is repeated by all. A man is now pushed out to the center. He gets the first line out—

His eyes suddenly grow wide as the camera pans to a slave who has just entered the cabin. It is
COFFIN
,
the driver. The others follow his gaze and the song dwindles down and goes out completely, and the people start to file out of the cabin with disappointment
.

When the last of the guests are gone, including
SARAH, HANNIBAL
settles in a corner on the floor, and
COFFIN
turns his attention to
RISSA
,
who has been sitting apart from the festivity, mending by the light of the fire
.

RISSA
’Spect you better get yourself to bed, Joshua. H’you this evenin’, Brother Coffin?

COFFIN
There ain’t supposed to be no singin’ of them kind of songs and you knows it good as me!

RISSA
H’I’m supposed to stop folks from openin’ and closin’ they mouths, man?

COFFIN
This here your cabin.

RISSA
But it’s they mouths. Joshua-lee, I told you to get yourself in the bed. Don’t let me have to tell you again.

COFFIN
(
To
HANNIBAL
who has been sitting watching both of them with his own amusement
) Wanna see you, boy.

HANNIBAL
I’m here.

COFFIN
Yes, and it’s the only place you been all day where you was
supposed
to be, too.

HANNIBAL
looks uncomfortably to his mother, but she studiedly does not look up from her mending
.

HANNIBAL
Reckon I don’t worry ’bout it gettin’ picked.

COFFIN
(
To
RISSA
) Why don’t you do something ’bout this here boy! I tries to be a good driver for Marster and he the kind what makes it hard for me.

HANNIBAL
And what gon’ happen when you show Marster what a good, good driver you is? Marster gon’ make you overseer? Maybe you think he’ll jes make Coffin marster here—

COFFIN
You betta stop that sassy lip of yours with me boy or—

HANNIBAL
Or what, Coffin—?

COFFIN
You jes betta quit, thas all. I’m—

HANNIBAL
“—one of Marster Sweet’s drivers”—

COFFIN
And thas a fact!

HANNIBAL
Get out this cabin ’fore you get smacked upside your head.

RISSA
(
Looking up from her sewing
) I ’spect that’ll be enough from you, Mr. Hannibal.

HANNIBAL
I say what I please to a driver, which, as everybody know, next to a overseer be ’bout the lowest form of life known.

COFFIN
Why? ’Cause I give Marster a day’s work fair and square and don’t fool ’round. Like you, f’instant, with all your carryin’ ons. Draggin’ along in the fields like you was dead; pretendin’ you sick half the time. Act like you drop dead if you pick your full quota one of these days. I knows your tricks. You ain’t nothin’!

HANNIBAL
Coffin, how you get so mixed up in your head? Them ain’t my fields yonder, man! Ain’t none of it my cotton what’ll rot if I leaves it half-picked. They ain’t my tools what I drops and breaks and loses every time I gets a chance. None of it
mine
.

COFFIN
(
To
RISSA
,
shaking his head ruefully
) Them was some wild boys you birthed, woman. You gona pay for it one of these days, too.

RISSA
(
Putting down her sewing finally
) What was I supposed to do—send ’em back to the Lord? You better get on back to your cabin now, Coffin.

COFFIN
exchanges various glances of hostility with them and leaves. As soon as he is gone the mother turns on the son
.

RISSA
Where you run off to all the time, son?

HANNIBAL
That’s Hannibal’s business.

RISSA
(
With quiet and deadly implications
) Who you think you sassin’ now?

HANNIBAL
(
Intimidated by her
) I jes go off sometimes, Mama.

She crosses the cabin to his pallet and gets a cloth-wrapped package from under it and returns with it in her hands. She unwraps it as she advances on him: it is a Bible
.

RISSA
I
S
that when you does your stealin’?

He sees that the matter is exposed and is silent
.

HANNIBAL
If he’s a just Lord—he’ll think more of me than them I stole it from who don’t seem to pay nothin’ it says no mind.

RISSA
H’long you think Marster Hiram have you ’round his house if he thinks you a thief?

HANNIBAL
He ain’t got me ’round his house and I ain’t aimin’ to be ’round his house!

RISSA
Well, he’s aimin’ for you to. Said last night that from now on you was to work in the Big House.

HANNIBAL
(
In fury
) You asked him for that, didn’t you?

RISSA
He promised me ever since you was a baby that you wouldn’t have to work in the fields.

HANNIBAL
And ever since I could talk I done told you I ain’t never goin’ be no house servant, no matter what! To no master. I ain’t, Mama, I ain’t!

RISSA
What’s the matter with you, Hannibal? The one thing I allus planned on was that you and Isaiah would work in the Big House where you kin get decent food and nice things to wear and learn nice mannas like a real genamun. (
Pleadingly
) Why, right now young Marse’ got the most beautiful red broadcloth jacket that I heard him say he was tired of already—and he ain’t hardly been in it. (
Touching his shoulders to persuade
) Fit you everywhere ’cept maybe a little in the shoulder on account you a little broader there—

HANNIBAL
(
Almost screaming
) I don’t want Marster Everett’s bright red jacket and I don’t want Marster Sweet’s scraps. I don’t want nothin’ in this whole world but to get off this plantation!

RISSA
(
Standing with arms still outstretched to where his shoulders were
) How come mine all come here this way, Lord? (
She sits, wearily
) I done tol’ you so many times, that you a slave, right or not, you a slave. ’N’ you alive—you ain’t dead like maybe Isaiah is—

HANNIBAL
Isaiah ain’t dead!

RISSA
Things jes ain’t that bad here. Lord, child, I been in some places (
Closing her eyes at the thought of it
) when I was a young girl which was made up by the devil. I known marsters in my time what come from hell.

HANNIBAL
All marsters come from hell.

RISSA
N
O
, Hannibal, you seen what I seen—you thank the good Lord for Marster Sweet. Much trouble as you been and he ain’t hardly never put the whip to you more than a few times.

HANNIBAL
Why he do it at all? Who he to beat me?

RISSA
(
Looking only at her sewing
) He’s your marster, and long as he is he got the right, I reckon.

HANNIBAL
Who give it to him?

RISSA
I’m jes tryin’ to tell you that life tend to be what a body make it. Some things is the way they is and that’s all there is to it. You do your work and do like you tol’ and you be all right.

HANNIBAL
And I tell you like I tell Coffin—I am the only kind of slave I could stand to be—a
bad
one! Every day that come and hour that pass that I got sense to make a half step do for a whole—every day that I can pretend sickness ’stead of health, to be stupid ’stead of smart, lazy ’stead of quick—I aims to do it. And the more pain it give
your
marster and the more it cost him—the more Hannibal be a man!

RISSA
(
Very quietly from her chair
) I done spoke on the matter, Hannibal. You will work in the Big House.

There is total quiet for a while
.
HANNIBAL
having calmed a little, speaks gently to his mother
.

HANNIBAL
All right, Mama. (
Another pause
) Mama, you ain’t even asked me what I aimed to do with that Bible. (
Smiling at her, wanting to cheer her up
) What you think I could do with a Bible, Mama?

RISSA
(
Sighing
) Sell it like everything else you gets your hands on, to them white-trash peddlers comes through here all the time.

HANNIBAL
(
Gently laughing
) No—I had it a long time. I didn’t take it to sell it. (
He waits, then
) Mama, I kin read it.

RISSA
lifts her head slowly and just looks at him
.

RISSA
is speechless as he gets the book and takes her hand and leads her close to a place in front of the fireplace, opening the Bible
.

He halts and looks in her face for the wonder which is waiting there. With the wonder, water has joined the expression in her eyes, and the tears come
.

RISSA
(
Softly, with incredulity
) You makin’ light of your old Mama. You can’t make them marks out for real—? You done memorized from prayer meetin’—

HANNIBAL
(
Laughing gently
) No, Mama—(
Finding another page
) “And I said … (
With longing: the words reflect his own aspiration
) “Oh, that I … had wings like … a dove … then would I … fly away … and … be at rest …”

(
He closes the book and looks at her
)

RISSA
Lord, Father, bless thy holy name I seen my boy read the words of the Scripture!

She stares at him in joy, and then suddenly the joy and the wonder are transformed to stark fear in her eyes and she snatches the book from him and hurriedly buries it and runs to the cabin door and looks about. She comes back to him, possessed by terror
.

HANNIBAL
(
Smiling still
) It ain’t no miracle, Mama. I learned it. It took me a long time and hard work, but I learned.

RISSA
That’s where you go all the time—Somebody been learnin’ you—

He hangs his head in the face of the deduction
.

HANNIBAL
Mama, that’s one of two things I can’t tell nobody … I’m learnin’ to letter too. Jes started but I kin write a good number of words already.

RISSA
(
Dropping to her knees before him almost involuntarily in profound fear
) Don’t you know what they do to you if they finds out? I seen young Marster Everett once tie a man ’tween two saplin’s for that. And they run the white man what taught him out the county …

HANNIBAL
(
Angrily
) I took all that into account, Mania.

RISSA
Y
OU
got to stop. Whoever teachin’ you got to stop.

HANNIBAL
(
Tearing free of her
) I thought you would be
proud
. But it’s too late for you, Mama. You ain’t fit for nothin’ but slavery thinkin’ no more.