The Cottoncrest Curse: A Novel

Chapter 29

101 Chapter 29 Marcus trudged down the road cautiously. He had been careful to slip out the back of the big house. Jenny and Sally were right. If anyone saw him, it would be all over. It had been a good life. Not a great life, but a good life. No money, of course. Slaves didn’t get money before the war, and even now, what was a house servant to expect? They got what they needed, as long as they stayed where they were. Credit at the Cottoncrest sharecropper store; of course, they had to shop there during the permitted time—a half-hour before the store opened for the white sharecroppers and only if they used the back door and didn’t go inside. They also got a small cabin with a tin roof over their heads and a real wooden floor. That was something he and Sally really liked, that wooden floor. Plenty of food; there were always leftovers they could have after Sally had finished serving Little Miss and the Colonel Judge in the early years. And after Miss Rebecca came, she even made sure that Sally took back some of the sweets as well, to share not only with Marcus but also with Cubit and Jordan and their families. But now all of that was over. After these many years on Cottoncrest, their time here was ending. Jenny was right. They had to get ready now to move. Tonight. The Knights were going to ride, and that meant nothing but trouble. But that wasn’t the worst. No. The worst was that thing with the usufruct and all. He hadn’t understood it at first, and he made Jenny explain it to him three times before it began to sink in. He hadn’t ever paid any attention before to what the law said about when people die. Didn’t want to. The law never helped him, and he knew all he ever wanted to know about death anyway. He had seen more than enough. Sometimes it still haunted his dreams. That’s why he hated foggy days and smoky fields. 102 But Jenny knew a lot about what the law said about when people die. She said that whether someone like the Colonel Judge had children or not, the law controlled what happened to what he owned. If you had children, Louisiana forced you to leave at least half, and sometimes more, to them. But if you don’t have any children—if you can’t have children or if you had them and they have disappeared and gone forever— then it goes to your nearest blood relative. If your momma is alive, as the Colonel Judge’s was, then one fourth goes to her and the rest to your brothers or sisters, or if there are none of these, to your brothers ’ and sisters’ children, and if there are none of these, to your nearest cousin. This was all too confusing. Jenny said it all made sense, but it seemed just a waste of time. Who, but a few white people, would ever have enough after they died to worry about leaving anything but debts? But it got even more confusing. Jenny had said that the Colonel Judge really didn’t own all of Cottoncrest anyway. Now, that didn’t seem right. The Colonel Judge had been the General’s only surviving son. He ran the plantation. He made all the decisions. But Jenny said that the Colonel Judge only owned half. The other half was owned by Little Miss, and even the Colonel Judge’s half was subject to what sounded like something dirty. “Usufruct,” she said. Marcus made her pronounce it again and again before he got it right. Strange word. Meant something about Little Miss not only owning half of Cottoncrest on her own but her also having the right to use and live and get all the profits from the Colonel Judge’s half as long as she was alive. And now, whoever got the Colonel Judge’s part was getting it subject to Little Miss’s usufruct. But with the Colonel Judge dead and with Little Miss not in any condition to make decisions about anything, who would take over the plantation? If Jenny wasn’t there to feed and bathe and clothe Little Miss every day, Little Miss would forget to eat and would waste away, not that she wasn’t already as thin and bony...