Phebe

Mama said the words, but it was Cilla's stony face that told Phebe it was true. She was leaving Tuckahoe in the morning with Miss Nancy.

"You is still with the family." Mama cupped her cheeks. "You not lost. Could be worse. Could be a whole lot worse."

"Look after Miss Nancy real well," Cilla told her. "So's she'll look after you."

Sixty miles or more, someone said. She had no idea what that meant. Her stomach swayed with nerves. Sixty miles in a coach. She'd never seen the insides of one in her life. She didn't enjoy it. Found it hard to keep her seat. Every bounce rattled her jaw.

Miss Nancy surprised her. She leaned across the space between them and took her hand. "I'm so thankful you're with me, Phebe. You've no idea!"

The girl heard her grandmother's words roll and echo, as though her mind was an empty room. "Yes, Miss Nancy. I's very glad to be here."

Her mistress grinned. "It's going to be wonderful."

Not for Phebe it wasn't. Soon as they arrived, she was led to the kitchen house by a slip of a girl, name of Lottie. Her mother — Sarah Ellis — looked Phebe up and down and made it clear she found her wanting.

"You're alls I needs," she huffed. "Another mouth to feed. Sure hopes your Miss Nancy ain't gonna be no trouble. I've one fancy missus givin' me orders as it is. Don't need her sister too. Lottie, git her a roll-up bed so she can sleep near her mistress. We ain't making room in our cabin for no stranger."

When Miss Nancy didn't need her, Phebe was mostly alone. Oftentimes, she'd sit under the old wooden porch out front. It was cool in the summer months, with the stone foundation against her back. No better place for shade existed. Voices reached her down there. Oh, the things she heard!

Only Syphax took notice of Phebe. Called her out from under that porch. Took her to sit on a rocker outside his cabin. Poured her a tumbler of water. Asked about her family.

"Always wanting to be someplace else is no way to live," he said when she finished answering. Close up, he wasn't as old as she'd believed, the gray in his beard and at his temples belied by a smooth forehead and sharp brown eyes. She'd seen him around the plantation, walking with a stick, often talking to Mr. Randolph.

"Why don't you work? Like the rest of us?" She spoke without thinking. Was relieved when he smiled.

"Oh, I works, Miss Phebe. I works just like anyone. I'm Mr. Randolph's man, as I was his father's, from before the war and through it. I suppose since my leg got broken and didn't heal right, it might seem to a young'un like you that I'm not working. But I certainly am. Keeping an eye on those Ellis folks. Checking on Johnson and Rachel, the negro he keeps." Syphax nodded in the direction of the overseer's home, a wooden house set a little apart from the slave houses but with a clear view of every building.

"You watch Johnson? A White man?"

"I watch everyone. Mr. Randolph relies on me. When the time is right, he'll free me, mark my words. For now, I watch."

"Are you watching me?"

"Do I need to be?"

"No!"

He laughed then, and for the first time since leaving Tuckahoe, Phebe felt easy.

"But I will watch out for you," he said, patting the arm of her chair. "And if you is ever troubled or lonesome here, you just come to Syphax."

For the longest time, seemed he was the only person that saw her. Back at the house, the White folks, excepting Miss Nancy, ignored her like she didn't exist. And yet there she was, flesh and blood like them, with ears as sharp and eyes as keen. In time, she knew them better than they knowed themselves. Mrs. Randolph, fearful, lips always mouthing some prayer. Mr. Theo Randolph, all swagger and noise, not seeing how the reaper reeled him in with every breath. Mr. Jack Randolph, his eyes on her mistress like a fly on sugar. And Mr. Dick Randolph, who wanted to be a good man, but was as bad — no, worse — than any of them, for he was the master, and yet he couldn't even master hisself.