"From the language of the universal social republic and harmony of mankind, it is evident that it would be benevolent to deprive a criminal of all natural rights, and to condemn him to penal servitude for life. Therefore, all provisions granted by the Bill of Rights shall be denied to him, and shall be substituted by those outlined in a separate list of Amendments."

– Thomas Jefferson, The Slave Theory

MY GRANDFATHER—a retired Confederate soldier— was an unusual type, yet one pretty frequently to be met with, a type hot-tempered, bold, and possessive of remarkable physical strength. The Battle of Gettysburg had been fought almost forty years before my birth, but to him it might have been yesterday when a cloud of dust enveloped frightened and fleeing Yankee troops, leaving his battalion to fly a Confederate banner over Cemetery Ridge. The Confederacy has won. The war may have changed my grandfather's habits of living, but his manners it would not change: his clear hand, his accurate figures and his shrewd ability in bargaining always won the respect of every person he met. And here in this new country, with its new laws relating to delinquents, he wanted to see his own acres stretching green before his eyes. From the war he learned what he found useful, and the rest he dismissed. He found slavery the most useful of all Southern customs, slavery and a steady hand in poker; it was his courage in a bluff that brought to him two of his most prized possessions: a vast vegetable plantation near Fort Sumter and later his son, Henry. You can easily imagine what a father such a man could be and how he would bring up his children: Henry Laurens, my father, turned out to be his exact copy.

My mother was a frivolous girl from the capital, charming as she was, whom Henry married in his early and unthinking youth. She was a salad of racial genes: an American, of mixed French and Puerto Rican descent. Somebody told me once that she had been madly in love with my father, and that he had lightheartedly taken advantage of it one rainy day and forgot about her by the time the weather cleared. She knocked on his door weeks later, hopelessly pregnant with me. I was brought forth in the year 1900, thirty-five years after the war. I was their first and only son, since all of my mother's future pregnancies ended in stillbirths. She was a loony, my mother. As soon as the sun of my infancy had set, Henry had to pluck me out of her arms and undertake my education and the whole intellectual development in the capacity of a superior sort of mentor. Around me the splendid coastal plantation revolved as a kind of private universe where everyone loved and petted me. I was tutored at home every morning until noon, studying exact sciences, French, and economics. The only prose I knew was the Bible, and the only history the manifold wrongs of the North. I knew no poetry save that of hymns, and no music except old war songs.

I was five when my father introduced me to his trade. On the first Friday of every month, the train bearing convicts from the North pulled in to the Charleston Station. All of them had committed unforgivable crimes – among them were murderers, perverts, traitors. Such was the great compromise proposed by Mr. Lincoln himself, which was meant to keep the country together (that is, that slavery shall exist in all the states, but only as punishment for grave offenses). I will mention in passing that people back then were not divided into two categories, like they are now. The 5-year-old me admired the drawling elegance of the wealthy planters, who drove their thoroughbred cars all the way from West Virginia, followed by carriages for their slaves. As they worked swiftly in the hot sun, transferring the criminals into covered wagons, their lazy, blurred voices fell pleasantly on my ears, and the implications of the practice eluded me.

By the age of ten, I adopted my father's ideas and customs, as I understood them, for my own—hunting and horse racing, red-hot politics, the 13th Amendment, contempt for all criminals and exaggerated repulsion towards women. He wanted me to become a planter, like him and his father before him. "Though the dear God alone knows when that may be," as my mother always interpolated whenever he tried discussing my future with her. She died in a freak accident (automobile, brandy) when I was twelve, and, save for a pocket of warmth in the darkest past, not much of her subsists within the hollows and dells of my memory. I was never really fond of her.

After her death, father made the decision to send me away to study law in an all-boys academy in Buffalo, New York. He thought I was becoming "too dreamy". I left home with a suitcase bigger than myself, my father's fervent Protestant blessing in my ears, and a parting admonition, "Remember who you are, John, and be the man I taught you to be."

Ever since then, I'd done nothing but cause him grief and frustration.

***

If a man has never been to Long Island, there's no point in my telling him about its geography: he won't understand anyway. And for anyone who has, I don't even want to call it to mind: I don't wish to make a mistake. I'll state briefly: Hamilton's residence stood in the coastal village of Northport, two hours away from the Pennsylvania Station. It took us exactly two hours to travel, and the exactness was even something curious: at nine o'clock in the morning of 2nd September we got off the train, and at eleven of that same unforgettable day I was standing on the trampled, fresh lawn of the residence. It was a two story Victorian mansion, shaded by shrubs of lilac, with brickwork new under a thin beard of raw ivy. The house was on a small hill, partly surrounded by tall pine trees; one could look down on the lights of the village and hear the thud of the passing trolley. I'd never been to this part of New York before.

"Welcome home," Hamilton declared almost solemnly. "You may as well come in."

The parlor was dark, cold, and was well, almost pretentiously, furnished, with its heavy raspberry curtains on French windows, along the murky green walls, its velveteen sofas, a wide marble staircase, a mantelpiece flanked by two pairs of golden candlesticks on each side, with a white china Cupid centered between them, and a bronze clock under a heavy glass shade. The room smelled of lemon oil, heavy cloth, floor wax, and of cologne: narcissus ombre. It made me feel slightly ill, as I was in a closed car on a hot muggy day with an older woman wearing too much face powder. Hamilton sat down, rigidly, his elbow on the arm of the armchair and his chin in his hand. I stood in front of him, arms folded.

"Are you hungry?" he asked. "I can order my cook to make you a sandwich."

"I'll do without. I don't think I'll be able to hold it."

"Why, a weak stomach?"

"You could say that."

He gave what might have been a laugh, then coughed.

"That's very odd. I read this morning in the paper that you used to be an alcoholic."

I looked at him with ill-disguised contempt.

"Does my father know?"

"What, that you're an alcoholic? I thought everybody knew."

"No. That I'm here."

"He probably does by now. If you read the papers you know your escapade made you a big sensation." He smiled with condescension, and added: "Some sensation. I've been hearing the dog-gonedest stories about you all year long."

"Listen, Hamilton–"

"Don't call me that," he said irritably. "You are not my friend."

I didn't ask what I was supposed to call him, because I could see that he hoped I would never have the occasion to call him anything at all.

I studied him. A somewhat grandiloquent style of speech outed him as a politician of sorts. Whatever he was, I felt that I wasn't mistaken in my conclusions about him if only from the fact that he was my natural enemy. I could not get over my dislike of many things in him, even of his elegant appearance, maybe because it was too elegant for such an unattractive man. He was slightly taller than I, slender, with greasy hair and tragic black eyes; his face was rather long, pale, and nosey; his lips almost always had a grave expression, and this gave a weird impression to the malicious smile which would sometimes appear on them.

"Now," Hamilton continued. "I do not know whether you are an alcoholic or not, and I do not know whether you are insane or not, and I do not care for the moment; there's one thing you need to know about me, and it's that I can't tolerate disrespect. I want that to be perfectly clear. As far as I'm concerned, this arrangement is like a working contract. You do what I say, and I give you room and board. But if I get trouble, I'll give trouble back. I want to see as little of you as possible, and I expect you to be quiet. Absolutely no outbursts of character. Understand?"

I didn't answer, as a yes would have been obvious, a no contradictory.

"What's going to happen to me?"

"What do you mean?"

"Just what I say. What do you want me to do?"

He got up from his place absent-mindedly.

"I don't know yet. I'll give you a more elaborate assignment tomorrow. For now, go find the maid and ask her to show you around."

"Which maid?"

Already half-way up the stairs Hamilton turned and gave me a finely critical glance.

"I've only got one."

And suddenly I was left all alone in the middle of the parlor, looking about me in a kind of a nervous hurry. All the windows were overdraped with plum-colored plush hangings that shut out most of the sunlight, and for that reason it was dark within, and as uninviting as the interiors of empty court buildings usually are in the middle of the day. This house was stale, silent, and dead. As far back as I can remember, in my turbulent household there had always been more servants than family members, and our home was never quite this empty. I could never imagine my mother embroidering unaccompanied by one of her three maids, whose sole function in life was to remove basting threads and carry the sewing box. I recall now a gentle pot-scrubber named Sybil, who served in my family as an unpaid nanny and housekeeper. Perhaps Aunt Sybil wanted to make of me, in the fullness of time, a better person than my father. She showed me the wounds on her hands. She wrote poetry. She told me she knew she would die soon after my eighth birthday, and did. Tuberculosis.

Upstairs I found multiple bedrooms. Of the three bedrooms I inspected, one had obviously been slept in that night. There was a dressing room. There was a rather bare room with an ample and deep mirror and a bear skin on the slippery floor. One room was locked. There were still other ones, and I satisfied myself that they could easily hold fifteen people or more. Everywhere It smelt of yesterday's tobacco, of sourness; and of something else indeterminate, uninhabited, of which places that are lived in only temporarily always smell. In every room stood out of the green murkiness bunches of flowers in ancient-looking vases, but they were just colorful spots, then, at the edges of my eyes. Later I would have more than enough time to take them in. In a strange agitation I walked from room to room, and rubbed and kneaded my trembling hands, and for some reason was stooping and felt cold.

I came back downstairs. The feeling of intense misery, which had begun to oppress and torture my heart a long time ago, had by now reached such a pitch and had taken such a definite form that I didn't know how to escape from it anymore. My legs were suddenly heavy. This new world I had gotten myself into was dark and dull and full of bleak wind, and all the logic of life screamed in my ear: Now is the time! But, reader, I just couldn't. The pain grew more and more acute as I realized the melancholy fact that neither today, nor tomorrow, nor any other day or night, could I find the courage to take my own life. I wasn't scared of death, even then. But where to lie down? Death, the tenuous passage between two opposite worlds, demands dignity. There's no dignity in servitude.

I was in need of fresh air. I walked towards the muted glare of the back door, which happened to be unlocked, and out a few steps onto the veranda.The veranda had a view of the garden and the fence surrounding it. It was beautiful, heart-rendingly beautiful, with heavenly-hued blossoms in full plumage. I once had a garden. I can still remember the smell of the turned earth, the dry rustle of seeds through my fingers, Aunt Sybil with a damp cloth thrown over her wide gardening hat. We even had the same sort of lilies, orange, spilling out color. But there was something different about this garden; a strange sense of buried things bursting upwards. It was heavy with scent, languid; I could almost feel the heat rising from the flower beds.Their insinuating whispers made my head swim. Parties, they said, terraces, playing with other kids, reading with mother. I had to lean on the wall to breathe, but even then the bricks of the house began softening.

"Are you Mr. John Laurens?"

I opened my eyes, and without the least warning my salvation was staring at me from a pool of sun, with garden shears in her hand and a smudge of dirt on her chin. Let me primly limit myself, in describing her, to saying she was a lovely dark-skinned child six years my junior.

"Good day!" She greeted.

"Good day."

A light of infinite geniality came into her eyes. She quickly adjusted the skirt of her stiff maid dress and wiped her face with her elbow. There was still a shriveled leaf trembling in her hair.

"His Excellency told me to find you. I'm so terribly sorry you had to search for me. I always lose track of time when I'm here."

What a title!

She had an odd chanting accent of Southern children brought to live in the North. I felt a sudden yank, a momentary loss of equilibrium, at the sound of her voice.

"Why, don't worry yourself," I smiled with some effort. "I finally had the pleasure of... being alone for a little while."

"Wonderful. Well, let's go. My name's Vella. I'm His Excellency's maid."

"Pleasure to meet you, miss... Wait, when did Hamilton give orders? I thought he went upstairs."

"His Excellency called me from the upper window, as he does."

She locked the door behind us as we entered the parlor.

"So, have you explored the house yet?" she asked.

"Briefly. Where's everyone? It's so empty..."

"We only have a cook and me. We cook on an electric stove. Isn't that terrific?"

I frowned.

"Quite... What, only you and the cook in the entire house?"

"In the entire house, yes. His Excellency enjoys peace and quiet. He suffers from terrible migraines. So don't question him too much about anything if you see him frown. Anyhow, all our men work and live outside."

"Outside? What do they do?"

"They heat the house during winter, and grow vegetables during summer. We've got a vegetable garden. Care to take a look?"

"Maybe later."

I was restless. All I remember is that while Vella and I walked upstairs, my knees were like reflections of knees in rippling water, and my lips were dry, and—

"We should find some clean clothes for you first," she said pensively. "And then—"

"I'm really tired," I admitted.

"Oh, you are? I forget myself. Don't you worry, I'll take you to your room afterward."

We passed quickly through the dark hallway, and entered the dressing room, where the air was warm and stagnant, and the window was round, like the eye of a fish, red stained glass. On the side of the room, from a long bentwood rack, hung a dozen maid dresses, similar to the one my companion was wearing. Next to it was a mirror. I was left sitting on the edge of a bedraggled chair in front of it, drowsily raising my feet, fumbling at the shoelaces of my new ill-fitting shoes, while Vella plied me with questions about my life. My life! Who cared about my life? I didn't think she cared very much for that subject either.

"Are you from the South? Gee, that's swell. Me too. Which part? Hold on a second, this isn't your size— Anyways, my momma was a slave too, but I never got to know her because she died the night I was born. I never met my daddy either. Do you know your mom?"

"Yes. But she is dead."

''Ah!' She clicked her teeth in sympathy. "That is sad. And your dad—is he dead, too?"

I hesitated.

''No. He is in South Carolina".

I had to repeat my answer twice because something was obviously preventing her from giving me her full attention. It seemed to me that she was talking feverishly just for the sake of talking.

Her choice of clothing surprised me: she handed me a starched dress coat, a waistcoat, a white shirt, and stiff looking trousers. It resembled the attire of a lackey, maybe even a private secretary, and didn't look like clothes for gardening. Aunt Sybil certainly wouldn't wear an evening gown to the garden. Even if she was allowed to own one.

"Am I really going to work like this? In the garden?"

"Why do you think you'll be working in the garden?"

"Because you said all your men work there."

"Well, not in your case. I'm pretty sure His Excellency wants you to be his butler."

"Is that so? I wonder why he didn't tell me that." I said suspiciously.

Vella shrugged her shoulders and opened two hulking patent cabinets which held all kinds of suits, dressing-gowns and ties.

"Since we're here," she began. "And since you are to become the butler, you must have some knowledge about His Excellency's wardrobe. Everything you might need is in there. There are some wardrobes in the attics for things he doesn't often wear. Traveling clothes and such."

"What about the cufflinks? Do I choose them or does he?"

"Lay them out unless he asks for something in particular. These for parties, these for meetings, and these only in New-York."

"I'll try to remember."

"Yes, you'll have to."

"You're a slave. Not a worker. A funny work, isn't it?"

Vella paused.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, you live in all of this. The luxury is within your reach, but none of it is yours. Strictly speaking, nothing is yours."

"I don't understand, Mr. Laurens," said Vella. "I am a slave, but what of it?"

"Doesn't it bother you? The injustice?"

Vella frowned and uttered slowly:

"Slaves, in reverent fear of God submit yourselves to your masters, not only to those who are good and considerate but also to those who are harsh. For this finds favor— if for the sake of a consciousness of God one bears-up—"

"While suffering sorrows unjustly, and so on, and so on," I finished for her. "So it doesn't?"

"It doesn't at all," the girl answered confidently. "Do you believe in God?"

"I do."

"Do you pray?"

I wondered if I could stand this another moment.

"No. Not often. I don't always agree with His word."

Vella bore my words with a wide-eyed childlike expression of disbelief.

"You are crazy."

Why on earth would I bring that up, I thought, while we were walking down the stairs.

The little room into which we walked, with dark paper on the walls and yellow curtains in the window, was brightly lighted up at that moment by the sun. The furniture consisted of a plain bed, a nightstand, a wardrobe, and an old arm-chair that had lost its arms.

"Your room," said Vella. "The restroom is the opposite door. Would you like to wash?"

"Ah, no, I– I'll do it tonight. Thank you."

Vella nodded slowly. It seemed like our conversation made a vague impression on her. We were silent for a moment.

"I didn't mean it," I said seriously. "Trust me, without offense, my belief doesn't differ from yours. I believe that Jesus Christ is the son of God, and I believe in the kingdom of Heaven. And I... I'm not judging you for anything. You are very nice. You are very nice to speak to me this way."

Vella smiled and shrugged it off.

"It's alright. Have a rest, Mr. Laurens."

With that, she left the room and closed the door. I sat down on the rigid mattress and wiped the corners of my eyes. Then I undressed, got under covers, and soon sank into a deep, yet anxious sleep.

"Get up, you! How long have you been asleep for?"

I woke up instantly, hair soaked with perspiration.

"Get up!"

I turned around, and saw a big lady standing in the doorway. I see her features far less distinctly today than I did last month. Remember, I'm sick. Two summers ago I composed a charcoal portrait of her, a madrigal to the soot-black lashes of her pale-gray eyes, to the five asymmetrical freckles of her wide nose—but I tore it up and cannot recall it today. All I remember now is her fat chin, the color of her headscarf, the silky shimmer of sebum above her temples, and her distant resemblance to Aunt Sybil.

"You should've woken up two hours ago!" the woman swooped down on me like a hawk. "What, Vella didn't tell you?"

"She didn't..."

"Get up and go to the kitchen. There's plenty of people, I ain't got time to make breakfast for you. And you'd better souse your head in cold water."

Obediently I went into the bathroom. The sleep had not refreshed me at all: I woke up in a broken and devastated state, even worse than the day before. I wanted to get under covers and hide, like a tortoise in its shell. I went downstairs, then through the dining room at the end of the hall, on the right side of the house—the side where also the library and the parlor were (under "my" room, on the left, there was nothing but a walk-in supply closet) – and entered the kitchen. The sunlight, bright on the floor and dull on the curlicues of Vella's hair, glinted along the room in a nebulous pattern.

"Good morning, Mr. Laurens..."

Like the thrilling flush of children after their cold morning baths, Vella's brown cheeks were lit to a lovely flame.

"Mornin'."

Cursorily I inspected a rude table with a fruit vase in the middle, containing nothing but the still glistening stone of one pear. Vella gave me a worried look.

"We haven't seen you all day yesterday... But how pale you are! And your hands are trembling too..."

"Didn't get much sleep." I said abruptly.

"Here, we've made you coffee."

I was going to thank her, but at that moment a heavy tread shook the floor, and the woman from before swept into the kitchen, as if a dozen chefs awaited her orders here.

"These people! You have to keep after them all the time." She flounced over to the stove and checked one of the pots. "Blecher eats for three, a savage! Nothing's left for me. But do you know what I'll tell you..."

"His Excellency got us a chicken, Ms. Batrow, have you seen?" Vella nodded towards the sink, and there it was: headless, feetless, and featherless, as though shivering. "You might as well have the whole thing."

"Scrawny," Ms. Batrow prodded the chicken. "But it'll do for the soup. You know what I'll tell you, our men must have tape-worms. When a person has a tape-worm, he always eats for two: half for himself, half for the worm."

"I don't think it's tape-worms," Vella said in a tone of solicitude. "I think they're just hungry."

"Certainly it's you, then, who has the tape-worms, that's why you're so skinny."

I considered it necessary to defend Vella.

"Well, at least you visibly don't have any. Am I right?"

Mrs. Batrow looked at me directly for the first time, sniffed angrily and answered in a bass which came as a surprise from one of her stature, and through her nose:

"Ain't like you're the one to speak, boy. You're as bony as this chicken."

"Come on, Mrs. Batrow!" Vella interrupted helplessly. "Don't be mean. Will you have coffee?"

"No, thank you," Ms. Batrow said to the coffee-pot on the stove. "Bring this upstairs. Mr. Hamilton asked to bring him coffee."

"Fact is, It's for Mr. Laurens."

"Fact is, Mr. Laurens will be fine," Mrs. Batrow said calmly without so much as a blink. She took a cup from the cupboard. "Mr. Laurens should have begun his work two hours ago, anyway.."

"He doesn't have anything to do."

"That's a damn shame. He could at least wash the dishes."

How I used to despise such talk. Now I longed for it. Vella and Ms. Batrow talked at once, unobtrusively and with a bantering inconsequence that was never quite genuine. They were here, and they accepted their position, making only a tiny pleasant effort to distract one another from the terrible fact of their servitude. And I could not understand, among other things, how these people—with life itself taken away from them— found the strength to banter. It encouraged me. But my animation vanished as quickly as it appeared.

"I beg your pardon."

All those present turned to the doors, in which stood the owner of the house. Hamilton looked positively exhausted: there were dark bags under his eyes, and his jaw looked like a stiff greyish brush. Still, he was dressed rather exquisitely, in a light and loose dress coat, light summer trousers, and everything about him was fashionable and spick and span.

"I asked you to bring me coffee, did I not?" said Hamilton with an air of strong fatigue. His speaking voice, a gruff feminine alto, added to the impression of fractiousness he conveyed.

"Graciously forgive us, Your Excellency."

"It's fine, really. Vella, dear, fix me some honeyed pears for breakfast, will you?"

Hamilton walked towards Ms. Batrow, took a cup from her, poured some coffee and drank hungrily. Then he wiped his lips and fixed me with his dead pale eyes.

"Good morning, John. How are you doing?"

My mood, which had almost risen after hearing the conversation between the women, sunk back down.

"Jolly good."

He stood for a time, looking straight at me, motionless.

"Have you eaten?"

Mrs. Batrow intervened:

"Sorry, Mr. Hamilton, I was preparing dinner for the men. Nobody has had breakfast yet. Besides, he overslept."

"Let him have breakfast, then. I shall wait in the parlor."

He left without saying another word.

"Today His Excellency is in a wonderful mood..." Vella remarked.

"Yeah," agreed Mrs. Batrow. "Nothing pleases him more than returning home."

I sat at the table like a block and stared in silence, completely confused.

After breakfast, which consisted of a bowl of runny oatmeal, I went to the parlor. Hamilton sat in the armchair with his left hand resting on the back of it, and was reading the morning newspaper.

"Have you managed to get to know Theodosia?" he asked, not taking his eyes off the page.

"Theodosia who?"

"Missus Batrow," explained Hamilton. "She is a spirited lady, yes?"

I nodded, shifting from foot to foot. Perhaps upon noticing some awkwardness in my behavior, Hamilton got up from his chair.

"Allright, let's go."

We wandered around the house for half an hour or more, through a labyrinth of unoccupied rooms, Hamilton muttering all sorts of wisdom and explaining why exactly he needed a butler. "You are permitted at the front door," he said, "But only when welcoming a guest. Otherwise I expect you to use the back." I was very absent; I was nodding, with no idea of what I was nodding about. Finally we reached his own bedroom. A heavy door gave way to a smoky, musty room littered with overbrimming ashtrays and god knows what else – his bathrobe, books, dirty socks, and a couple of dirty glasses, and a cup half full of stale tea lying around, all over the place: and the sheets on the bed a tangled mess. There was a ripe mystery about this room, of activities that were not stale and laid away already in lemon oil but fresh and redolent of a living person whose presence was scarcely withered. Next to his bedroom was his study, the contents of which would remain unknown.

"Never enter my study," he warned.

"Why?"

"It's a private space."

We stopped at the end of the corridor, and stood for a time partly wrapped in the dingy gauze of the window curtain. I listened with infantile pleasure to a lawnmower in the garden below. Hamilton was silent. It was characteristic that he waited for me to speak first, as if to allow me the reassurance of my own voice in new surroundings.

"You've got a nice garden, Sir," I said uncertainly.

"Vella's garden," replied Hamilton. "She won't let it alone—she nags it all the time, worries about its diseases. Any day now I expect her to bring chemicals and destroy it." He waved his hand indecisively, saying with a lightness seeming to conceal a paternal interest, "I'll have you help her—I'm going to give you a straw hat to wear outside..."

"Alright."

"She's a lovely girl, is she not? Such a soft, gentle creature..."

"M-m..."

There was a strange fixity in Hamilton's gaze. He had a cigar, and he put it between his lips and gripped it there while he lit it.

"Do you admire that sort of girl?" he asked, looking intently at me. "It's a wonderful face, really. She is smiling enough, but she must be suffering terribly—mustn't she? Her eyes show it—those two little points under her eyes, just where the cheek begins..."

"Why... Perhaps, Sir."

"And her smile is really very sweet".

The sudden sound of a doorbell filled a pause and my instinct was that something tactful should be said by somebody, but Hamilton made no attempt to break up the tension formed by his words.

"It must be the delivery. Come open the door, will you?"

Feeling vaguely confused, I ran down the stairs and headed towards the front entrance. In all this behavior of his there was something which really did bother me, but I could not understand what it was exactly.

I unlocked the door and opened it. A man in a broad-brim stood on the porch.

"Who are you?" I asked blankly.

"I have a shipment, Sir, from the grocer's..."

Pressing lightly on my shoulder to make me move, Hamilton stepped onto the porch.

"Wilson, good morning," he greeted.

"Mr. Hamilton, Sir," the delivery man raised his hat, "I brought everything as fast as I could."

"Just in time," Hamilton looked at his watch. "I have paid in advance, haven't I?"

"Yessir. I have unloaded the boxes, but if you wish, I could as well carry them to the porch."

"There is no need. My butler will handle it."

"Okay, then."

Later, having bade farewell to the delivery man, Hamilton showed me to the gates.

"Carry the boxes into the house. And try not to drop anything."

I crossed the yard, and at once saw near the gates a pile of boxes. The boxes were three feet long each, made of rough-hewn planks. I rolled up my sleeves and tried to lift one of them. My hands tensed, trembled, and the heavy box fell to the ground. I bent down and spent a seasick minute trying to pick it up.

"Goddammit, it's beyond anything..."

"What is taking you so long?"

I turned to the gates. Hamilton gazed down at me with an interested, yet almost irritated face. I straightened up and gritted my teeth.

"I'm sorry, Sir," I said distinctly. "I don't think I can do this."

"It's not right for a young man like you to give up so quickly."

I didn't answer, for I felt nothing but frenzied spite.

"Though the law states that you're not a man, indeed."

"What is it that you want from me, though?" I interrupted.

"Pardon?"

"You insulted me just because I couldn't lift up the box, Sir," I uttered with an effort. "If that's how it is, why don't you do it yourself, to show me how it's done?"

I was struck by my own frankness. Hamilton lifted his head, looked at me and laughed dryly as if reacting a bad joke. This horrible answer sent a cold chill through me.

"Go, John. I'm going to call somebody."

"I'm not going anywhere until you lift up this damn box."

"I won't bother."

I was staring at him for a time, silent. I felt a passionate desire to do something revolting, grotesque, positively scandalous. Perhaps, had I not said that, the rest of my life would turn out to be much different:

"Then you are no man yourself."

His face changed. I stood, looking insolently at him and taking a kind of pleasure in my own insolence.Out of nowhere, Hamilton broke into a nervous laughter. I drew back, more amazed than scared. An ominous hysterical note rang through his voice.

"You... Ungrateful fool," he cried suddenly and unnaturally, "No man, no man... And what right have you, indeed, to insult me?"

"I didn't insult you..."

"No, you did. Why would I shower benefits on a man who... curses them? What is wrong with you? You... Why, you shall crawl on your knees, that's how it shall be arranged. No man!"

"Can't you see that I don't want your benevolence?" I snapped. "I may be ungrateful, I may be mean, only let me be, for God's sake..."

"Come. Come, right now."

"Huh!"

"First of all we go upstairs," he cried—and simultaneously grabbed at me and pulled me up. We went inside and upstairs, where he coaxed me into the dressing room.

"What on earth are you doing?" I asked, awfully anxious now.

"I have clothes for you," Hamilton muttered hurriedly, and in a whisper. "Your new clothes."

He walked to the rack on the side of the room, ripped a dress from it and handed it to me. My eyes opened wide.

"You're out of your mind."

"You are not capable of being a butler. Therefore, If you can't behave properly, you are to undertake another role."

"But I'm a man..."

"No, John, you are no man. You are a slave."

"Is this a joke?" I was furious. "It was base of me to say that, yes! But still, Is cross-dressing a common thing around here? What kind of punishment is this, anyway?"

"You know, John, maybe I should have tried to beat you up, but it's done now. I have a very violent temper—" he looked closely at me as if he expected the statement to be challenged. Then with an aghast laugh he said, "Cross-dressing? Funny. Didn't you participate in public cross-dressing?"

"Firstly, it's all God damned slander; secondly, I never contended that all men are bound to wear dresses. I'd rather work naked!"

"Go ahead."

We were both silent.

"Just as I thought."

He pointed at the partition in the corner of the room.

"Go."

Reluctantly, I went behind the partition, holding up with an unskilled hand my new dress – long, concealing, a bib apron over it. I was still scrawny enough to fit in. All at once I fancied myself a prepubescent boy caught in the act of trying on his mother's clothes. But as soon as I undressed, abruptly, fiendishly, the tender pattern of childhood I had adored would be transformed into the disgusting vision of a male of twenty-one in his underclothes, thin, hairy, sickly. And the air was suddenly hot, and my skin felt damp, and the dress stretched immeasurably tight on my shoulders. I rubbed, fold on fold, the skirt at the knee, dispelling a trace of coal or something. Hamilton asked me to hurry up. A sudden frustration almost caught me in tears. I came out from behind the partition. The sun was coming out through the stained glass, falling in red across the floor, and my dress briefly filled with roses of light. I caught my reflection in the mirror – a parody of something, some fairy-tale figure in a red habit. My face was distant and white and distorted, with a pathetic little shadow of a mustache I had never quite decided to grow.

Hamilton raised his eyebrows. There was an expression of aversion in his look, a malignant enjoyment of my shame. He handed me a hair tie. Red. Not quite my color.

"You ought to put your hair up. You are quite frizzled."

I rumpled up with both my hands the coily hairs on my temples.

"You're revolting," I said.

"What you have done is revolting. But I, for my part, am ready to co-operate with your beginnings with whatever lies in my power. Will it not be better, if I lead you along the path of your natural inclinations and abilities, so to speak? Tell me, what do you know, what can you do? Well, now, some kind of work, or something. Sewing, knitting, embroidering?"

"I'm not a woman."

"This isn't what I asked."

"I don't know anything," I said in a whisper, letting my eyes drop low, all red, gritting my teeth. "I don't understand any of this."

"I must know what you are fitted for. Otherwise I'll send you off to clean toilets. Is that what you want?"

I gave him a hateful look. I was sorry, and rather mad at his tone, and his greasy hair, but I forced myself to laugh in a well-bred way. Often people display a curious respect for a man oligophrenic. Respect rather than pity.

"I can sew just the least bit," I said, "I can sweep up a room, wash a little, and, if you like, cook potato soup and sandwiches. Nothing more, it seems. Listen," the ebb of defensiveness, abetted by the unrealistic drabness of the red sunlight on the floor, crept over me and hummed within my temples. "I popped out with a stupidity and I regret it. But now I willingly admit that you are a fine feller, alright. I understand that you must have arranged this prior to my arrival. Whatever my father said about me and cross-dressing..."

Hamilton, now no longer patient, pounced upon me:

"I shall not condone insults, John. Whether I arranged this or not is none of your concern. A reckless, oblivious creature like yourself, a worthless little criminal, will not even deign to touch male clothing until it learns to follow my word. But It certainly makes you happy, doesn't it? You won't have to carry boxes, answer the telephone, or welcome guests. If you desire to wax floors and clean the bathrooms..."

"What, then, according to you, am I to become—a fucking maid?"

"Well, yes," calmly retorted Hamilton. "A pot scrubber, a laundress, a cook, a maid. All toil elevates a servant. You see, in accordance with the Slave Theory..."

"That's all bullshit! And I can't stand this 'Slave Theory' of yours. Yes, I allow myself to say anything and sometimes ask very frank questions. But I'm your slave, one is not ashamed with slaves, and a slave can't give offense. According to your own theory, I'm not a human being."

"So you admit it?"

"I speak of it as of a fact that does not depend on me at all," I said. "There is no point in taking offense. And why be offended? Have I actually insulted you?"

"You called me a woman. And do you mind very much cutting out the yelling? I have a headache."

"I— When? When did I say that? I never called you a woman."

"What did you call me then?"

"I said that you are no man. 'Cause you couldn't lift up the stupid box."

"Here! If I am not a man, then I am a woman. Which means you are a woman, too."

I rolled my eyes.

"Gather what you like. I already told you: if you believe in the Theory and if you don't think of me as a human being, there is no reason for you to be mad."

"You can't stand the Theory, and yet you hide behind it," Hamilton crossed his arms. "Your father would be proud."

I shuddered as if I had received a strong electric shock.

"Don't bring my father into this."

"Why? Your father is the reason you're still alive."

I felt myself blushing painfully. He knows, even about that, he knows, flashed through my mind.

"Enough," I snapped. "My father lied under oath. What are you even getting at?"

Hamilton scratched the back of his head.

"You must know, except for me there are only women living in this house. And, suppose your father's words were a smart trick... I don't want any incidents taking place around here, you know."

I didn't understand what he meant right away.

"I would never... Ever... if that's what you mean."

Hamilton shrugged.

"Who knows, John. Vella is pretty for a colored girl."

"Don't you start with that!" I flared up. "God, she is no older than sixteen! Who do you think I am?"

I must have looked at him with a strange expression, or maybe said something special, because suddenly an unclear thought from before flashed in his eyes.

"How old are you?"

"Going on twenty-one."

"You look fifteen."

Observing unmistakable mockery in his voice, I was going to say something about how he looked at least a hundred, but it was too late:

"Anyhow, I would like to remind you: men are to live outside, in the barrack."

I turned cold and arranged my dress mechanically. The stiff cloth rustled against the flesh of my thighs.

"No way," I mumbled. "They'll kill me! Not because I run my mouth, but just so. You could simply send me back, you know, if you hate me so."

"So I spent five hundred dollars on you, and now I'm supposed to send you back?"

"Give me proper clothing. Didn't I tell you plainly enough that you are torturing me..."

"Shut your damn mouth, John," Hamilton interrupted. "Shut your mouth, before I get angry."

At that moment, I feel quite sure, my face was crossed by such a burning, twitching despair, that anyone, whether it be my father or even someone like Thomas Jefferson, would show mercy. Hamilton, however, did not even flinch, an insolent hag. I had already noticed a peculiar feature of his: even when he was excited and talking irritably, his eyes somehow did not follow his mood but betrayed something else, sometimes quite incongruous with what was passing. Then an idea entered my head; that, perhaps, I could just come to him and use another, more straightforward method of persuasion.

"Don't you dare," Hamilton warned. He must have noticed a special determination in my gaze. "Enough arguing. You better calm down and go to the quarters."

By that time, I already lost all hope.

"And zip your dress, please. I'll be waiting for you. I'll give you something productive to do."

With that, he left.

I ended up outside, following the gravel pathway surrounding the house. Hamilton's lawns were all so tidy, too green, the facades gracious, in good repair; there was the same absence of people, the same air of being asleep. It made me writhe with nervous irritation.

Yes, I must, I must escape! Yes... but where? And how? Suppose I'll steal money from him. Then I'll take his car... But what about the keys? What if he keeps them with him? Doesn't matter. Better escape altogether... far away... to Mexico, and forget about him! What else shall I take? Clothes? Documents? Only if I could cross the border! I've been there, on the border... Perhaps there are even more soldiers, now...

"Gee.."

I shuddered and looked back. A tall man was staring at me from behind the corner of the house. Thinking of him pains me terribly, but I think I had better describe him right away, to get it over with. The poor man was in his middle thirties, he had a shiny forehead, thin eyebrows and quite expressive features of a type that may be defined as a weak solution of a Hollywood actor. His face was long and mournful, like a sheep's, but with the large full eyes of a dog, spaniel not terrier, watery, although he was constantly on the verge of crying. Upon noticing the stranger, I, of course, was terribly alarmed.

"Well, I am..."

"Where are you headed?"

The man went up to me with his wide, rushed step. I froze in the middle of the yard.

"Please don't beat me, Sir. Let me explain."

The man stood further off, looking at me curiously.

"Are you a lady or something?"

"No, no, Sir. You see, there was a misunderstanding."

Here I related, in the shortest and most abrupt manner so that certain words could hardly be understood, everything that happened: about the delivery man, the boxes and the argument. The man listened carefully, nodding at times. When I finished my story, he waved his hand.

"Eh, we know all about him: a strange guy! It's hard to speak of anything before him. I bet he'll forget about it by tomorrow."

"Hopefully."

The man bent over and whispered confidentially:

"He's ill, they say."

"Ill? Ill how?"

"Why, It's clear," he paused for effect. "He's a snob!"

..And burst out laughing.

Despite the familiar expressions, which held ever more familiarity than needed, the man had created a certain redoubtable impression on me; his thickish, hardening body developed naturally through, I assumed, hard labor. I have seen such men in prison, and, needless to say, my meetings with those men never ended well.

The man brushed my shoulder reassuringly.

"I'm Lee. There's a trail down there between them two sheds. Just follow it. Me and the guys are workin' 'till noon — we'll be back by then."

We parted. So everything might turn out well and decently, I thought triumphantly, with a deep sigh of relief.

The barrack was a tiny concrete shed, and it was so low-pitched that a man of more than average height was ill at ease in it and felt every moment that he would knock his head against the ceiling. There were six wooden bunks, a big clumsy sofa occupying almost the whole of one wall and half the floor space of the room, and a painted table in the corner on which lay a few newspapers.The issues were all new: a paper on top of the stack was dated 15 September. In spite of the momentary desire, a risky and illegal desire, to feel for information of any sort, I decided to ignore it.

Right there, near the barrack, there was a bathhouse. Without any hesitation, I shed off my dress and took a much needed cold shower (not that there was any hot water). I wanted to wash off the shame, to somehow set free from the terrible burden of my slavery. I knew, of course, that nothing would change unless I wiped out the disgrace with blood– whose blood I wasn't quite sure yet. But in any case I could not remain a dirty sloven; I washed my hair, my neck and especially my face. When it came to the question of whether to shave my face or not (there were capital razors that had been left by someone on the sink), the question was angrily answered in the negative. Let it stay as it is. What if they think that I shaved on purpose to look like a woman...? They certainly would think so!"

By the moment of my return, other slaves had already come back from the gardens. On the bunks, opposite one another, sat five men — all of a remarkable physique and badly dressed. Not that I was afraid of standing up for myself, I was by no means that sort of a feller. But still I could not see the glowing light in their eyes without alarm. It was only the unbounded confidence inspired by a conversation with one of them which prevented me from trying to run away. I realized, too, that even running away was perhaps impossible now.

The silence didn't last for long: one of the men (Irish) burst out laughing.

"But can that be true?" cried the Irish man hoarsely. "Jesus, Hamilton must be crazy!"

"That's what I told you!" Lee went on. "I told you he walks around in a skirt."

It must have been that the details of the quarrel were now familiar to everyone. I mechanically arranged my dress, and fidgeted uncomfortably, eventually shifting to the exit.

"What d'you open up your mouths for, you pack of fools!" said an unidentified bearded man, rising in a corner where he had been crouching to inspect the newspapers, "Come, boy, sit. Give him a cig somebody."

He was kind of bald, I recall, his beard like a fan, vividly blue slumbrous eyes, and a thin, slightly hoarse voice. Everybody knew that he formerly served in the police and was the terror of crooks. His name was Belcher.

This, I said to myself, was the end of the ingenious. I went to the corner of the room and sat down.

"Want a cig?" said a young man in overalls, showing it to me from afar. I can't remember his name – ankle on knee, a cigarette between his stubby yellow-ended fingers. "Just don't get ashes on your bunk."

"Thank you," I took the cigarette from him and waited until he lit it up for me with a stale match.

They began talking, and I listened awkwardly, taking nervous drags from my cigarette.

"You know what?" said Lee. "I think His Excellency is having guests today."

"What made you think that, huh?" Another fellow, of my age, face pitted with smallpox, stared at Lee over his stale newspaper. Lee tapped his forehead.

"Have you seen the way he's dressed? It's his party suit."

"Well, do you see a party?"

"He's right," assented the bearded man. "I barely recognized him this morning. Since when has he got a goatee?"

"Now you've found somethin' to talk about. You wanna talk fashion to us, Lee?"

"He never dressed like this on a regular Tuesday. That's all I gotta say."

"Instead, tell us: when's the next issue? I'm gettin' bored with this one," lazily and contemptuously responded Smallpox, and directed the dart of his cigarette, index rapidly tapping upon it, toward the ashtray on the floor (where also lay the brown core of an apple).

"Whenever Theodosia brings it in," Lee shrugged.

"Pity. I can't wait to read what happened to that abolitionist guy."

At last, I couldn't help myself:

"Pardon me, where did you get all these newspapers?"

"Hamilton don't keep old newspapers," answered Smallpox. "He throws 'em away. We find 'em in the garbage."

"Slaves aren't allowed to read, aren't they?"

"Right. But how can you live without knowing what's happening in the world?" said Lee.

"What if he catches you?"

"Who? Hamilton? He would never punish us for that," shrugged Lee. "And indeed... He never punishes anyone at all. I tell you, he's a strange man. You must've infuriated him, buddy."

"I don't like him."

"What's the matter with you? What are you upset about? What if he wanted to make your acquaintance, and you spat him in the face? He is a capital fellow, budddy, a benefactor! In his own way, of course."

"Rather!" assented the bearded man. "He doesn't like to scold us, and he only does so out of obligation. He doesn't beat us, either."

"I'd rather he'd beat me," I interrupted. "It is true that it takes time and care to get to know a man, but there is no mistake about Hamilton. A benefactor, no doubt! Only a monster or a madman could own and sell living souls."

"You speak against the Theory?"

I nodded.

"You see, buddy," Lee did not take his glittering eyes off me. "Mr. Hamilton saved our lives; all because of the Theory. Any reasoned man would choose slavery rather than the gallows."

"You keep on like that because you are scared of death," I interrupted with heat. "But I'm not. Not one bit. I had better hang myself then take part in the revolting convention of the Theory."

I gazed round at the people in the room. For one second, everyone was strangely embarrassed.

"You are one of them abolitionist lot, aren't you?" asked Lee.

"I can't stand the Theory, and that's all you need to know about me."

For an instant, a serious and careworn look came into his face.

"Interesting..." he mused, "By the way, what's your name, buddy?"

They know... Of course, they know!

I swallowed and felt clearly, with all the intensity of sensation, a threat. A decision on my part was made immediately.

"My name is Henry."

Lee shook his head with great resolution. I said I had better go, regards, nice to have met them all.

I inspired a commotion in the kitchen by appearing clad in my new outfit. As I entered, the women stared at me silently for ten seconds or so. Then Theodosia snapped first and went off into her stout giggle. Vella covered her mouth with her hand. I answered their questions dying from embarrassment. When I finished my explanation, Vella gave me another tour of the house, this time telling me where and what and how to clean. I felt it almost pleasant to listen to her from the first moment, for her voice was filled with pity in which there was no trace of aversion.

"That's very bad," she said.

"I know."

We went to the supply closet.

"Brushes, broomsticks, soap, buckets... You are in charge of the upstairs, I suppose. Do you know how to wax floors?"

"Not really."

"I'll teach you."

There was a moment of silence; Vella turned around and gazed up at me with her clear wet eyes.

"Please, do not be angry at him," she whispered. "His Excellency isn't very friendly, but he's got a great soul. The Lord sent us a generous owner. Everything will be okay."

"Why are you so certain?" I replied, also in a whisper.

Vella shook her head.

"I just know, is all."

After a brief pause, she put her gentle hand on my arm.

'You must pray," she said, very soberly. "I assure you. Even just a little prayer, from time to time. If it weren't for the prayers of the blessed saints one could not live in this world at all."

I smiled. It was not even a patronizing smile, though, perhaps, I wish it could be.

"I guess."

"Even if your momma, she is dead—that is very sad!—your dad must be very happy to know that you are alive. It's all that matters, I think. Besides, the dress does not make you any less of a man."

My heart sank at once, then ached, and, quite suddenly, calmed down. For the first time I discovered the true kindness of this quiet, misguided soul.