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“I’ll be back at night.” He reached beside himself and carefully dropped a flask of water and a basket of the peaches that grew behind the house into my hands. “They’re for her, you hear me, boy?”
I nodded. I was more than happy to give them to her. “I’ll never forget this Dr. de Noëlle. I’m forever in your debt.”
He didn’t say anything in reply. He didn’t get the chance to. He quickly placed the plank over us and the branches over it, allowing only the slightest amount of sunlight to reach us.
“It’s almost over, Francis,” Mary-Margaret whispered as she rested her blonde head on my dark, bruised chest and ran her small white hands over the scars. “This life ain’t the easiest we’d ever had, it may very well have been the hardest, but we’ll make it. You’ll see, this is the last one. Our last life.”
I wanted to tell her she'd said those words before, that we'd fought the odds just like this before and lost. And yet here we were fighting once more. But I couldn't say those words ‘cause her hope gave me hope. Instead, I wrapped my arms around her and held her close. And the tighter I held her the more comfortable I became which is why I didn’t hear them.
“You’ha dirty nigger!”
“FRANCIS!”
It happened quickly, too quickly for me to even gather my thoughts. Hands were everywhere, white hands, smacking me, beating me, pulling her away from me.
“FRANCIS!” She screamed but I didn’t see her, though I tried to. I tried to protect my head, I tried to see her, to make sure they weren’t hurting her. It was her scream next that reassured me she’d be okay. “DADDY PLEASE! DADDY! STOP! FRANCIS!”
Master Bondurant was an evil man to just about everyone, but even evil men loved their daughters, so I figured Mary-Margaret wouldn’t die here. I didn’t think about the pain. In fact I’d lost the ability to hear anything, which was a shame, cause I wanted to hear her at least. I prayed I’d get to see her face one more time before I went…and that prayer was answered when the noose came around my neck and I was being dragged across the forest floor before being pulled. That’s how I saw her, her face bright red due to all her screaming and tears. Her younger brother, Adam, was holding her back as she kicked and fought to get to me, while her elder brother spat into my face. I wanted to say “Mary-Margaret stop fightin’ ‘em!” as there wasn’t anything she could or say or do but hurt herself at this point but I couldn’t on account of the rope…they hadn’t tied it right, or maybe they did and wanted me to suffer, cause it felt more like my throat was closin’ in than my neck breakin’.
“FRANCIS!” By her voice I was able to hear again, fight on longer.
“He ain’t even human, Mary!” Adam shook her but she didn’t stop, not ‘til she was free and then she ran to me…stubborn to the very end that one was.
She grabbed her father’s fallen pistols and pointed one towards Adam and the other towards her father.
“Let him go, Daddy!” Her face was streaked with dirt.
“MARY!” Master Bondurant called out to her in shock. “Mary, this ain’t you. What it do to you? Mary…”
“DADDY, LET HIM GO! I ain’t gonna miss…just like you taught me.”
Master Bondurant grunted and pushed her brother out of way so that he could pull the rope tighter.
“NO!” She screamed and pointed both guns at him, causing Adam to charge after her in anger, which was never good for someone who wasn’t bright. He took the butt of his rifle and hit her as hard as he could, which for someone his size, was much harder than he should have. Her blonde hair spun as she recoiled from the blow and she fell face forward into the dirt right under me as the guns fell from her hands.
“Mary! Mary-Margaret!” Master Bondurant hollered as he let go of the rope and I fell to the ground. I saw red in the pool of her blonde hair among the dirt and grass. “What have you done?! Adam, what have you done! Mary! Mary!”
“What is this?” Dr. De Noëlle came riding in on horseback. “Is this from the riot?”
“Riot?”
“A bunch of niggers are rioting upstream, I was on my way to help.” He lied. He was good a liar. Even I believed him. He hopped off his horse and rushed to Mary-Margaret. “Rush to my house tell my wife I need the blue vial,” he said to Adam, then to Bondurant and his other son, Sam, he said, “She’s going to need to be wheeled in. I need a barrow and as many sheets as possible!”
They were about to hop to it when they remember me. Their compassion and worry now gone again. How did people turn it on and off like that?
“We don’t have much time! He’ll bleed out soon enough! GO!”
They took satisfaction in that before running into the forest and to their horses. It was only then that Dr. de Noëlle came to me and I tried to speak again. “Save…”
“She’s gone.” He frowned hovering over me. “She felt nothing. But she’s gone.”
I think I knew that but hearing it hurt. Knowing she went first hurt.
“I’ma go.”
“When and if I can, I’ll bury you two together,” he said to me. “You want me to pray with you?”
“I’ma go….” I said as my eyes closed. I’d meant to say I’ma going to see her again. But it he wouldn’t understand anyway so it was okay.
