Kindred by Octavia Butler Page A

roles you gave us.”
    “You’ll say you belong to him?”
    “Yes. I want you to say it too if anyone asks you.”
    “That’s better than saying you’re his wife. Nobody would believe that.”
    Kevin made a sound of disgust. “I wonder how long we’ll be stuck here,” he muttered. “I think I’m getting homesick already.”
    “I don’t know,” I said. “But stay close to me. You got here because you were holding me. I’m afraid that may be the only way you can get home.”
    3
    Rufus’s father arrived on a flat-bed wagon, carrying his familiar long rifle—an old muzzleloader, I realized. With him in the wagon was Nigel and a tall stocky black man. Tom Weylin was tall himself, but too lean to be as impressive as his massive slave. Weylin didn’t look especially vicious or depraved. Right now, he only looked annoyed. We stood up as he climbed down from the wagon and came to face us.
    “What happened here?” he asked suspiciously.
    “The boy has broken his leg,” said Kevin. “Are you his father?”
    “Yes. Who are you?”
    “My name’s Kevin Franklin.” He glanced at me, but caught himself and didn’t introduce me. “We came across the two boys right after the accident happened, and I thought we should stay with your son until you came for him.”
    Weylin grunted and knelt to look at Rufus’s leg. “Guess it’s broken all right. Wonder how much that’ll cost me.”
    The black man gave him a look of disgust that would surely have angered him if he had seen it.
    “What were you doing climbing a damn tree?” Weylin demanded of Rufus.
    Rufus stared at him silently.
    Weylin muttered something I didn’t quite catch. He stood up and gestured sharply to the black man. The man came forward, lifted Rufus gently, and placed him on the wagon. Rufus’s face twisted in pain as he was lifted, and he cried out as he was lowered into the wagon. Kevin and I should have made a splint for that leg, I thought belatedly. I followed the black man to the wagon.
    Rufus grabbed my arm and held it, obviously trying not to cry. His voice was a husky whisper.
    “Don’t go, Dana.”
    I didn’t want to go. I liked the boy, and from what I’d heard of early nineteenth-century medicine, they were going to pour some whiskey down him and play tug of war with his leg. And he was going to learn brand new things about pain. If I could give him any comfort by staying with him, I wanted to stay.
    But I couldn’t.
    His father had spoken a few private words with Kevin and was now climbing back up onto the seat of the wagon. He was ready to leave and Kevin and I weren’t invited. That didn’t say much for Weylin’s hospitality. People in his time of widely scattered plantations and even more widely scattered hotels had a reputation for taking in strangers. But then, a man who could look at his injured son and think of nothing but how much the doctor bill would be wasn’t likely to be concerned about strangers.
    “Come with us,” pleaded Rufus. “Daddy, let them come.”
    Weylin glanced back, annoyed, and I tried gently to loosen Rufus’s grip on me. After a moment, I realized that Weylin was looking at me—staring hard at me. Perhaps he was seeing my resemblance to Alice’s mother. He couldn’t have seen me clearly enough or long enough at the river to recognize me now as the woman he had once come so near shooting. At first, I stared back. Then I looked away, remembering that I was supposed to be a slave. Slaves lowered their eyes respectfully. To stare back was insolent. Or at least, that was what my books said.
    “Come along and have dinner with us,” Weylin told Kevin. “You may as well. Where were you going to stay the night, anyway?”
    “Under the trees if necessary,” said Kevin. He and I climbed onto the wagon beside the silent Nigel. “Not much choice, as I told you.”
    I looked at him, wondering what he had told Weylin. Then I had to catch myself as the black man prodded the horses forward.
    “You,