Bear Bob's Story as told to Edward Summer

Chapter Twelve
The Little Girl
 

There were many people looking down at me when I opened my eyes. They covered the sky above me.

      “No. No. No.” I could hear Mittie saying somewhere. “No. No. No. He did not chase me. He did not.”

     I tried to move, but my feet were tied together. I tried to raise my head to see what was wrong, but it hurt too much. So I stopped trying.

      “Lay still child.” The big woman was one of the many people who looked down at me. She turned to them. “Shoo. Shoo!” she said to all of the people.

     They began to drift away, and I could see the sky again except for where the big brown woman’s face was.  She was looking down at me.

      “Don’t you move, child.” she said.

      “I tried to pet the cub, and the mother came,” I could hear Mittie saying to someone. “He pushed me out of the way. He saved me. He saved me.”

     The little girl walked over to me and looked down.

      “Is he still bleeding?” she said.

      “It is slowing down,” the big brown woman said.

      “Here, take this.”  Mittie handed her red scarf to the brown woman.

     I could see the brown woman smile. She took the scarf and bent down and tied it around my head.

     Then a black man came and picked me up in his arms. He carried me to the horse buggy and lay me down flat in the back.

     Then they drove me home.

     Picnic was over.
 
 

     For many days I lay in bed. My head hurt very much. The big woman came and fed me soup. The big woman came and washed my head many times. It hurt very much. So I slept.

     Finally, I could get up and go outside.

     The little girl was there. Mittie was standing there.

     She smiled. Then she laughed.

      “They have cut off all your hair!” she said and laughed again.

     I reached up and felt my head. My hair was all trimmed away.

      “They have bobbed your hair.” Mittie could not stop laughing. “They have bobbed your hair!

     I tried to smile. I was feeling very wobbly. My head was dizzy.

      “We must call you ‘Bob,’ Mittie said. “Bob.”

     She looked at me for a moment. “Yes,” she said. “Bob. Bear Bob. For the bear has part of your scalp. Bear Bob.”

     So that was my new name in this new place. Bear Bob. Not Masa, not boy, not child, not my secret name, but “Bear Bob.” It was not a bad name. It had a nice sound to it. It had a kind of rhythm to say it.  I did not know what the meaning of “Bob” was, but I would never forget the bear. Never.
 

     Soon I was emptying out the chamber pots once again. Everything was back to normal except for my head and my name. Everyone called me “Bear Bob” now. And I had a big scar on my head where the mother bear had taken away the flesh with her paw. The little girl would not have hurt the baby bear. No. But the mother bear did not know that. I could understand her fear. I could understand.

     After a time, my hair grew in. Unless you knew, you could not see the scar.

     One morning when I came to Mittie’s room she was still in her bed.

     “Look here, Bear Bob,” she said to me as I bent down to go under her bed. “Look here.” She held up an object that was thick and square. She spread it apart and it had white leaves inside. I had seen these once through a door in the house. A white man held one in his hand while he talked.

     “This is a book,” she said. “It is The Bible. Look here.”

     She pointed to some strange marks on the white leaves. They were in neat rows. They were all black.

     “Do you know what this says?” she asked.

     “No.” I answered. “I do not even know what this is.”

     “It is a book, I told you. The Bible.”

     “Yes,” I said. “Yes, Ma’am.” They had taught me to say that word to the female white people. They taught me to say “Yes, Sir” to the rest.

     “Read this sentence,” she told me.

     I smiled and shook my head to say “no.”

     “It says: ‘Romans 13:8 Owe no man any thing, but to love one another: for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law…’” she stopped. She said each word slowly as though it was hard to move her lips. “’… if  there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in this saying, namely, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. Love worketh no ill to his neighbour: therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.’”

     I had no idea what she was talking about. So I smiled and shook my head to say “yes.”

     “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” she said again.

      I recognized that word from Reverend. It was one of his words: “love.”  It went with “freedom” and “hope.”

“What does it mean?” I asked finally.

     She shook her head at me. “You will learn” she said. She seemed very grown up and deep suddenly. She spoke in a serious voice that was not like her. I think she was pretending, but I did not say.

     “What does it mean?” I asked again.

     “What are you doing there, you?” The big brown woman was standing in the door.

     I turned immediately and carried the pot out of the room.

     “You must get out of bed, little miss,” the brown woman said to Mittie. I heard this as I went down the stairs to empty the pot.
 

     There came another day when I was walking past Mittie’s door.

     “Pssst!” she made a strange noise. Then she whispered. “Pssssst! Bear Bob! Come in here!”

     I looked around. No one was watching. I went into her room.

     “I am not supposed to read to you. They told me I was not supposed to read to you. Books are wrong for you people. That is what they said, anyway. So you must not tell. Do you promise? Cross your heart, Bear Bob. Promise.”

     She drew her hand from her left shoulder to her right shoulder. Then from her forehead down to her tummy.

     “Promise, Bear Bob.” she said again.

     I did the same with my hand as she did with hers. Shoulder to shoulder. Head to tummy. I did not know what she meant, really, but she smiled.

     She took out her book again. It was the Bible book that she had the other time.

     “Listen to this,” she said. “Listen. ‘Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. I Corinthians 13:4-8a ‘ “

     She looked up at me and smiled proudly. “There,” she said. “there.”

     I smiled. I still did not know what she was talking about.

     “Come here!” she said. “Come here.” She sat down on the floor and pulled me down next to her.

     She pointed at the marks in the book.

     “It – all- ways – pro – tects – all – ways – trusts – all - ways – hopes – all – ways – purr – suh – veers.  Love – nev – er – fails.!”

     I watched her finger move over the marks. The marks must mean the sounds, I thought. The marks must mean the sounds.

     “All – ways – trusts – all - ways – hopes – all – ways – purr – suh – veers.  Love – nev – er – fails.!” she said again. “Now you!”

     She pointed to the marks and said one more time: “all - ways – hopes – all – ways – purr – suh – veers.  Love – nev – er – fails.!”

     Then she pointed again and waited for me.

     I copied her the best I could.

     “All - ways – hopes – all – ways – purr – suh – veers.  Love – nev – er – fails.!” I said copying her sounds. “Hope.” I said. “Love.” I said. “I know those words: Hope, love.”

     She smiled.

     “Go away, now, Bear Bob.” she told me.

I got up and left the room.

     I did not know the meaning of the words, but I knew she was trying to be my friend. I could tell she was nervous to be with me. I knew from the way she looked out the door from time to time to see if anyone was coming. But I knew that she was trying to be my friend.

     I smiled as I went down the stairs and outside.
 
 

     At night the women sat just outside the cabin and made quilts. Quilts were like blankets. Some of the tribal people slept under them at night to stay warm when the air was cold. But a blanket was very plain. A quilt had many, many colors.

     The women used sharp needles. And they used thread. And they used little pieces of cloth that the white women threw away. They cut and they stitched and they made the quilts. The quilts had flowers and shapes and took many, many nights to make. Sometimes I would watch them through the window until I fell asleep. They were still working in the light of the oil lamps and sometimes in the light of the moon.

     None of the tribal people had a book like Mittie had. None. But they made the quilts, and sometimes when the moon was bright they danced the tribal dances. And sometimes when the moon was not so bright, they sat near the oil lamps and sang the tribal songs. They were in many languages, these songs. Many languages. And sometimes they took the words from the Reverend and put them into their songs. There were the tribal words and the tribal songs and the Reverend’s words. The one word I heard the most on those quiet dark nights, the one I heard most was “freedom.” It meant to go back home. At least I think that is what it meant. It was a sad, sad word, freedom. It meant to go back home when you wanted to.
 

     My head was all healed now. It did not hurt any more at night when I tried to sleep. I did my job. I carried the pot. And from time to time, Mittie made me sit on the floor while she pointed at the black marks, while she pointed at the words and made me make the sounds as she pointed. She called the marks “alphabet.” There were many of them. They were all different and had different sounds.

     Sometimes I would repeat “A B C D.” Those were the names of the marks. Sometimes I would say words. Those were many marks all together.

     “Very good! Bear Bob!” she would say. “Very good!”

     I would smile and repeat the words. They went along with those certain marks that were on the white pages over and over again in the Bible book.

     But the first word I learned to find no matter where it was on the pages was “love.” I could find it again and again. And sometimes I found the word “hope.” That was there, too. But on all those pages, in all those marks, I did not see the word freedom. That was a word that only came from the mouth of Reverend and from the tribal people in their songs. I did not learn to read that word for many, many years.
 

     One day after weeks of her help, I finally asked the little girl why she did this.

     “Why do you teach me to read?” I asked. “None of the other brown people can read. They are not allowed to read. They have no books. I do not even think Reverend has a book.”

     She looked at me, puzzled. Her forehead and her nose almost met near her chin. Then her face relaxed. She almost smiled, almost, but not quite.

     “I can read,” she said. “I can read, and I do not see why you cannot read. I tried to show Toy, but she is not interested. You are different. I do not know why. I do not know how, but you are different. I could always see it in your eyes.”

     She stopped and looked at me for a moment. I felt very strange when she did that. I turned my eyes away for a moment.

     Then she talked some more, and I looked back. “Our Creator tells us to love one another. We must love one another. No matter what,” she said.  “The grownups, my parents, they thought you did something to me. But I said no. I do not think they believe me. You never said a word to them. You never said ‘yes.’ You never said ‘no.’ That is love, I think. That is love. When you do a thing because it is the right thing to do even if no one asked you, even if no one believes that you did it after you did it, even if people hate you for it. That is love. I do not know where it comes from.”

     Even though I did not really understand all the words that she said, this word love was beginning to have a meaning to me. Perhaps it was like our word from my home: debein. A word my mother had said to me on the day I went away to the baobab tree.

     I thought about all her words. I thought about them inside my head. I thought about what my mother had said. ‘.  Jaa debein - debein ni hwe gbo. True love is without end, Masa,' she had said.

      “My mother said words to me,” I said to the little girl very softly. “I do not really know your words, but I think they mean what my mother’s words said.“

      “Do you understand them, Bear Bob? Do you understand?” Mittie said.

     I paused. “I am not sure, Ma’am.” I said. “I am not sure. I will think about them.”

     She looked at me.

      “Must I do something for you?” I asked her.

     She looked at me and once again her forehead and her nose almost met near her chin. Then her face relaxed. She almost smiled, almost, but not quite.

      “No.” she said firmly. “No. You have done much for me already. Do you understand?”

     I was not sure. Truly I was not sure. So I smiled nervously and looked at her and smiled some more.

      “I will tell you when I understand,” I said to her softly. Then I stood up slowly and smiled again and left the room.