Tananarive Due by The Black Rose

Author:The Black Rose
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Cosmetics Industry, Historical, C. J, Historical Fiction, Biographical Fiction, African American Women Authors, Fiction, Literary, Walker, African American Women, African American Women Executives, African American Authors, Biography & Autobiography, Cultural Heritage, Businesswomen
ISBN: 9780345444417
Publisher: Tandem Library
Published: 2000-01-01T06:00:00+00:00

Madam

Love builds… .

—MARY MCLEOD BETHUNE

Only the black woman can say, “When and where I enter, … then and there the whole race enters with me.”

—ANNA JULIA COOPER

FEBRUARY 1919

VILLA LEWARO

IRVINGTON-ON-THE-HUDSON, NEW YORK

The Long woman was in her library, Sarah was told.

Sure enough, Sarah found Lillie Long beneath a lamp in one of the gold-trimmed, upholstered Italian-style library chairs, engrossed in one of the crisp new volumes, six hundred in all, that lined the library walls. Snow flurried outside of the large window behind her guest, but the house was warm. Sarah had contacted Anna Burney Long because she needed an affidavit proving her birthplace so she could get a passport for her planned trip to France with Lelia this summer; and it had been Sarah’s idea to have her daughter bring it to her in person. I have a brand-new home, Sarah had said in her invitation. Let her visit awhile.

Miss Long looked up, startled. “Madam Walker!” she said, closing the book. “They told me you would be resting today.” She began to rise to her feet.

“No, please don’t stand,” Sarah said. “I’ll sit beside you. I’m so glad you could come.”

Miss Long’s cheeks were flushed bright red. Sarah had not seen her in nearly three years, since her visit to Delta, but if anything Miss Long looked more vital, and her hair was pinned attractively. Sarah could see traces of Missus Anna in her daughter’s eyes. She seemed like a smart girl, and it was a shame she had never married, Sarah thought. I guess marriage just ain’t for everyone these days, she thought. Lelia had been too long without a husband, too.

Miss Long’s eyes sparkled. “Madam … in Delta, you told me and Mama you had a town house. Why, when your driver met me at the train station and drove me up that long driveway … I expect I could have fainted dead away. Those columns, and the marble! This house is … a palace. I feel like I need a camera or I couldn’t even describe it to Mama.”

“Yes,” Sarah said, smiling. “I gave the town house in Harlem to my daughter. I live here now. Real country life, ain’t it? It’s too bad it’s winter and you can’t see the garden and swimming pool. You would have liked a swim.”

“Oh, but I love to read, so I like the library fine. And that music room done up in gold! I tell you, Madam Walker, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a gold-leaf grand piano in my entire life, and I think I never will again.”

Sarah nodded, examining her library. Here her tutoring had truly paid off, because Sarah had selected many of the books herself, not only for their literary value, but for their preciousness. The fine leather bindings on her bookshelves housed the works of Twain, Longfellow, Hawthorne, Cooper, Lady Jackson, Dickens, Balzac, and, of course, Shakespeare. She’d also collected complete works she would like to read when she had more time: Rousseau, Casanova, Rabelais, and Plato, among others.

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