The Color of Your Skin Ain’t the Color of Your Heart Read Free

walked back toward the house.
    Too quiet, her uncle was probably thinking. Like me, Katie’s mind was racing in lots of directions, wondering what to do, and wondering if suddenly everything was going to change because we were about to get found out. He kept talking about her mother like she was going to come walking into sight any minute, and asking questions about Katie’s daddy and brothers and why Katie was out picking cotton with a ragtag little group of kids and darkies. He hadn’t seen Emma disappear into the plantation house itself, where she was now trembling for dear life as she hid with William. If he’d seen her, that would have stirred up even more questions.
    Katie had hardly paused in her thoughts to notice how different her uncle looked than when she had last seen him when the war was still going on. It hadn’t really been that long, only about a year and a half, but he had changed almost as much as Katie had. She told me once that he never came calling on his sister, Katie’s ma, unless he wanted something, which riled Mrs. Clairborne a good bit. But Katie said that he always looked dapper as he could be, with ruffled shirts and jewelry on his wrists and wearing expensive coats and hats and boots.
    And I reckon he was dressed that way now too. Yet his nice clothes were a little dirty and frayed. His black hair wasn’t too well combed, and if I wasn’t mistaken, both he and his horse had the appearance of having ridden hard and a long way. Both were dusty and tired and looked like they needed rest, water, and food. He didn’t look like a man altogether at ease but almost like he’d been trying to get away from something.
    They came past the barn and Katie’s mind began to wake up a little. Just then she remembered the rest of us.
    “Wait just a minute,” she said to her uncle, then turned and ran partway back to the field.
    “Mayme!” she called in a loud voice. “—Mayme … please come to the house.”
    “Who’s that you’re yelling at,” asked her uncle, “—the little kid?”
    “No, the colored girl who was out there with me.”
    “What do you want with her?” he said.
    “She’s my … well, I just want her, that’s all.—Do you want to water and feed your horse?”
    “Yes … that would be nice.”
    The minute I heard Katie call my name, I dropped my satchel and ran toward the house. Aleta didn’t know what to do and slowly followed me a minute later. I didn’t run all the way. I didn’t want to seem too eager. Before I came into sight I slowed to the more lazy-looking gait that white men expected and tried to catch my breath. As I got closer, there was Katie watching for me with a frantic look on her face, glancing back and forth between the barn and the fields.
    She ran toward me. “Mayme,” she said in an urgent voice, “what am I going to do!”
    “I don’t know,” I answered. “He’s your uncle. What did he say?”
    “He’s just asking questions—mostly where everybody is.”
    We didn’t have time to discuss it further. Her uncle came back out of the barn from feeding and watering his horse. He glanced toward us standing there together, and again that peculiar feeling came over me.
    “Stay with me, Mayme,” Katie whispered. “Whatever happens, I want you with me.”
    She walked toward him and I followed, keeping a step or two behind. They both kept going toward the house and I kept following, feeling mighty awkward and out of place, wondering what he was thinking about me.
    They went inside. Katie’s uncle took off his hat and pumped himself a big glass of water, then sat down on one of the chairs at the table almost like he owned the place, which for all we knew maybe he did now. I didn’t stop to consider that he was Katie’s mama’s brother and wasn’t kin to Katie’s papa at all, which, now that I know how things work a little better, would make a big difference. All I knew was that he was kin and acted familiar and like Rosewood was his