Spirit Ran Free
Chapter Three / Page Three

Phillip Cartier wearing his long brown hair styled to hang past a wide-brimmed Stetson type hat wasn't difficult at all to read. Marcellus thought the man was wearing his severe attitude quite superbly. Phillip clamped his thin cigar in his teeth and glared at the new slave with chilled steel blue eyes. And Mr. Phillip Cartier had Marcellus' serious attention. He knew instantly that this White man was far more corrupt than Jack Marceau.

Now then, the Black prince from Savannah, Georgia, wanted to make his presence clearly understood as well. He wanted everyone to know that he wasn't anybody's slave as he stepped from the carriage and stood there prettier than god. So extremely tall and divinely sleek. Prince Marcellus, a Black man never seen as so before, a proud man, looking down on everybody with his long curly hair and shaded-beard.

The women standing on the veranda could not believe what they were seeing and they couldn't stand it.

"Lord . . . Lord, have mercy, Isabelle. Joy, girlfriend, do you see that?"

"Yes . . . okay. Yes I do, Jada. Okay . . . I see it."

At that, the pretty women heard the beautiful piano music move into a soft arpeggio movement then abruptly suspend.

A few seconds later, Master George Cartier himself graced the veranda. Marcellus took a hard look at the old stoutly built White man. For whatever reason, he wasn't all that surprised to see old George. But now then, Mr. George Cartier had given him some mixed feeling when they met in New Orleans and he wasn't sure whether to applaud or run for his life. He did recall, however, that this old Mississippi slaveholder had somewhat confessed to having a moral conscious regarding slavery.

"Young man," George spoke out with his Southern dialect distinctly clashing with his ancestral French accent. "You've no doubt made yourself acquainted with my elder son, Michael. Well this gentleman, nonetheless, is my younger son, Phillip."

"Mr. Phillip, a good morning to you, sir. My name is Prince Marcellus. Yet the pleasure is mine, I'm sure."

Phillip exhaled his cigar smoke without a single word, but he was clearly appalled that his father had blatantly introduced him to a common slave as if he was merely another White man. And hearing such fine, proper eloquence coming from a Colored slave gave Phillip Cartier a cold chill.

Cont. / Page 4

the author


Forest Hairston