Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2005 04:56:34 -0800 (PST) From: Lance Kyle <lokiaga@prodigy.net> Subject: Master Tom He pulled back on the reins of his horse, squinting at the few visible wooden boards behind the tangle of bush and briar. Was this the place? Looking around him, James Thomson Callender decided that it must be, there were no other structures around that could possibly be dwelling-places. Dismounting, he tethered his horse to the trunk of a small ash tree, then pushed gingerly through the ring of patchy shrubs. Then the tumble-down house was clearly visible behind a broken wooden fence and gate, but could it possibly be occupied? There were no lights inside, even though this late spring day in 1801 was overcast and threatening rain. The door was weatherbeaten, hardly any paint left on it. Callender knocked tentatively, then again, harder, and stepped back He absently brushed his knuckles with a handkerchief he pulled from his pocket while he waited. There was the sound of glass clinking inside, a thud, a chair being scraped on a wooden floor, and then footsteps--irregular footsteps. Callender took a step back as the steps approached the other side of the door. It opened a crack, revealing darkness and one bloodshot eye. Callender heard a deep sigh and some muttering, then the door opened. There stood a stooped, disheveled, light-brown skinned man who struggled for a moment to focus on Callender, then nodded and shuffled backward, opening the door. The white man clutched his valise tighter, gulped, and stepped inside. Again he retrieved his handkerchief to hold over his nose, as a wave of whiskey stench rolled over him. He turned toward his host. "I am James Thomson Callender," he said, then dug in his pocket to produce a grubby small rectangle of cardboard, which he held out. "Journalist," he added. "And you.... sir.... would be James Hemings?" The brown skinned man swayed a little, looked at the card that Callender offered him, shrugged, croaked out a simple "Yes" and shuffled over to a small nearby wooden table. There were two wooden chairs at the table, which held a bottle and two glasses. Hemings sat down heavily in the chair, clutched the table to steady himself, then grunted and gestured toward the other chair. Callender perched on the edge of it and looked around, his eyes becoming accustomed to the gloom. Hemings was all but camping out; it was clear the building had been abandoned, and that its occupant now slept on the filthy sack of bedding in the corner. Besides the table and chairs, there was no other furniture in the room. Callender's gaze returned to the man on the other side of the table. His age was hard to determine. Callender believed him to be about thirty-five or six based on information he had received, yet the man looked older--perhaps the effect of drink. Hemings looked at Callender looking at him, grunted again, and waved the bottle over the second glass, arching his eyebrows inquisitively. "No, no thank you, sir," said Callender. "I... I do not wish to take up your, uh, your valuable time, sir, so perhaps we may come down to business." Hemings nodded and put the bottle back down, then changed his mind and poured more of the whiskey into his own glass. Then he returned a bloodshot gaze to Callender, and waited. "Our mutual, uh, friend tells me that you have some information concerning our newly inaugurated president. Some information concerning his relationship with your, uh, sister, I believe. With Sally Hemings." Callender leaned forward, a wolfish look on his lean face. "Is it true, sir? Can you confirm....improprieties? As was previously communicated to you, I believe, I can make it worth your while to share information with me." Unexpectedly, a laugh broke out of Hemings, high pitched and hysterical at first, then degenerating into a bitter chuckle. "My sister, sir? You want to know about Master Tom and my sister?" Callender, taken aback by Hemings's outburst, leaned forward again and nodded eagerly. Hemings slumped a little, then took a gulp of the whiskey. He looked back at Callender, assessing and weighing what he could read in his face. Then he seemed to gather energy and focus, seemed to have made a decision. He sipped the whiskey again, then leaned forward toward Callender. "So far as I know, Master Tom never touched Sally Hemings." Callender sat back as if slapped in the face, a look of puzzlement on his features. Hemings spoke again: "You want to know about Master Tom and Sally and....us? Let me tell you about it," he said, refilling his glass. He looked into the middle distance as he began his story, and it did not take long before Callender had paper and pencil out of his valise to take notes as quickly as he could. .............................................................................. It was September of 1783, and the tall, red-haired man sat in his chair by the window, looking out at a grey world distorted by the imperfect glass as much as by the rain that came down in sheets. He sipped tea from his cup, barely registering the opening and closing of his dressing room door. "Master Tom, about your clothes today, sir," said the eighteen year old youth who had entered. "It was a year ago yesterday, as you know, sir. How about a change? You can put black aside now, here's your nice brown suit. Hasn't been worn in a year. Mistress, she always liked that one. Here, feel what a nice hand it has." He ran thin, light brown fingers over the nap of the fabric, offering it tentatively to the man in the chair. Thomas Jefferson glanced at the suit, then up at James Hemings, smiled and shook his head. "Black will do a while longer, James," he said, and sighed heavily. "A year seems like such a short time. I will always miss her, James," he said. He looked back up at the youth dressed in the Monticello livery who stood beside him: thin, slight, with short curly black hair, bee-stung lips, and skin of a light coffee wash. Undeniably male, but a girlish and willowy curve of the body, curl of the hair, and maybe--manner? The boy looked as if he might be sixteen or even younger. "But, James," he said, putting out his hand and laying it on the youth's arm, "it was kind of you to think of it. However, just black today." The youth nodded but remained standing there, the freckled hand still on his forearm. Jefferson looked at his hand, too, as it lay on the livery cloth, and then removed it, sighing again. The feeling of warmth through the cloth, the evidence of another living creature.... Thomas Jefferson decided that what he missed the most was the small things, the presence of touch. Oh, he embraced his daughters in a fatherly way, but not often enough. Just.... just the contact of skin, hand on hand....or on arm. His glance flickered at James, who was now preparing a black suit for the day. Then he looked back out the window, yearning for something that he could not quite name, or allow himself to name. The rain fell harder and harder throughout the day. Jefferson's correspondence and studies occupied him for most of the day, but boredom crept up on him in the afternoon as the approaching twilight seemed hastened by the gloom of the autumn downpour. Stepping outside to take some air, he decided to walk the short distance on a covered walk to the detached kitchen. There, amid Mother Hannah--very round and very black in her white cook's uniform--and two of the serving maids, he found James, an apron around his middle and his sleeves rolled up as he wrestled with a lump of white dough. Jefferson walked over, poked the lump, broke off a piece and tasted it. "Brioche?" he asked, cocking an eye at James. The youth's thin, handsome face crinkled into a smile and he nodded. "I am trying, Master Tom, but French cooking is so difficult when one hasn't really been trained." "Hmmmppph" rumbled Mother Hannah, "foreign notions. Why, master, don't we have good enough food here in Virginia?" Jefferson smiled. "We do, Mother Hannah, but French food is another matter entirely. Now, James," he said, "show me what you are doing here." So often we come to crossroads, to ways diverging. Was this when it happened? There were so many casual touches, so many occasions... it was hard to tell. James took a fresh bowl and a new collection of ingredients and showed his master how to make this strange, new dough. Interested...in more than one way?.... Jefferson stirred the dough, touched it, touched the butter, touched..... touched his slave. Was this the moment when brioche became irrelevant, when some new revelation crept over the white man as his light brown slave showed him how to make French pastry? Surely, at the start, the white master shrugged it off. It was unnatural. He could not mean it. Yet.... it had been so long. When did Thomas Jefferson look sideways at the beautiful youth beside him more than he looked at the dough? When did an unaccustomed stirring rise in his loins as the youth eagerly explained the process? Was it this time, or later, or some other lonely afternoon or evening? Sally Hemings? Oh, she came and went on the fringes of his consciousness. She spent most of her time with Jefferson's daughter. Did she remind her master of his deceased wife? No, nor was he looking for such a thing. Consumed with his grief, he paid her very little attention. It might have been another stormy night, but it was not. It was a warm summer evening. It might have been any evening; why that one? Why that moment? These things are unanswerable. James, in just a shirt and breeches, came to serve his master as he prepared for bed. Off came the white man's boots, then the shirt. Then Thomas Jefferson stood and the young slave knelt and slipped off the white man's trousers and... and the man extended his hand. Cupped the back of the youth's head, the soft, short curls. Let his fingers linger there, tentatively entwining in the thick hair. The white man felt the young man's head shudder. From fear or disgust? No.... the youth held very still, his head down, still on his knees. His breath came a little faster, his thin chest rising and falling beneath the white shirt, his beating heart almost moving the fabric from beneath. They stayed like that for a long minute. Then softly, once, the slave youth breathed the word, "Master." He brought a slim, tan hand up and placed it on his master's undergarment, just to the side of the center of the groin. And then he looked up. The tall white man looked into the youth's dark eyes and saw there--inevitability? surrender? love? At any rate he nodded and with his own hands tugged down on the garment a bit. Quickly, as if he had practiced doing so in his imagination, both the young slave's hands grasped the cloth and pulled it down, where it bunched around his master's ankles. The long, slim penis sprang out, growing quickly to full erection from out of a bush of dark red pubic hair. Thomas Jefferson gasped, stunned at the turn the course of events had taken, helpless to ask, powerless to tell. Quickly but gently, James Hemings wrapped his slim brown hand around the reddening white penis and began stroking it. The white man gasped again and stifled a cry. Three strokes, and the youth's full, bee-stung lips encircled the man's penis and sucked it into his warm mouth. Shaking his head in a frenzy, the white man's legs began shaking. Both hands grasped the youth's head through the thick, short curls. Unable to breath, the white man mouthed "O! O! O!" and then the torrent came, almost by surprise. A year of abstinence, of dreams denied and thoughts turned away, came to an end. Groaning deep in his gut, the white man bucked out long ropes of semen, hungrily swallowed by the slave youth who still knelt before him. The ecstasy passed. The white man, his eyes closed, still clutched the head of the youth who gently, thoroughly sucked the penis clean. The master opened his eyes and pulled his penis out of the mouth that surrendered it. The man looked aside, still clutching the youth's head. James Hemings, breathless himself now, waited on his knees, his gaze unavoidably fixed on the long, wilting organ before him. His master found a croaking voice. "Thank---thank you, James," he said. He removed his hands from the slave's curly head, hands that fluttered uselessly for a moment. His head was still turned to one side, his gaze averted from the slave kneeling before him. "I---I will retire now. I do not need your help any longer. You may go to your bed." "Yes, master," whispered the youth who rose, clutching quickly at the discarded clothing, mindful to perform his duties even as he was being dismissed. His own thoughts he had to keep to himself. Was he grateful that he had done what was wanted? Was he fearful that the master might regret that moment? Was he happy for the realization of something he may not even have admitted to himself before this? Perhaps all those things. The slave youth gathered the master's clothing and quickly scurried into the dressing room next to Thomas Jefferson's bed chamber where he would hang the clothing up--the dressing room where the slave himself slept on his cot at night to be near should the master call. "Good night, then, master," he whispered, and slipped from the room. Thomas Jefferson's mind was a perfect tumble of thoughts and emotions. He could not reply, could not look at his slave yet. He stood there for another moment, and then decided to surrender his inner turmoil to the night. Without bothering to put on the dressing gown that lay on a nearby chair, the man slipped into his bed and extinguished the candle that stood on a nearby table. In sleep comes clarity. In the middle of the night, Thomas Jefferson awoke with a raging erection. Decided, he threw the bedclothes back and sat up at the side of the bed. He lit the candle. "James!" he called. The youth must have been waiting, unable to sleep, for he immediately appeared at the door of the dressing room clad in a simple, rough, long nightshirt. "Master?" he asked in a soft, reedy voice. "Come here," said the white man. James stepped up to the side of the bed. Thomas Jefferson looked him in the eyes once, then looked at the nightshirt and tugged at it. "Remove this," he ordered. James quickly pulled it off over his head. He wore nothing else. His own penis, not as long as his master's but thicker, was beginning to rise, its medium brown color darkening as it arced its way up and out of a sparse patch of tight, black peppercorn curls. Thomas Jefferson looked the slave youth up and down, then once in the eyes again. "Turn around," he said, "slowly." James Hemings did so, and the white man looked and appraised, his eyes taking in the willowy slim body, lean but not overly muscular, the body of a house slave rather than a field hand. The buttocks were rounded and firm, flat sided. The slave youth turned slowly, eyes downcast but watchful for a signal from his master. Thomas Jefferson pushed himself back into bed and against the wall on the far side, and patted the space on the sheets between him and James. "Come," he said. With a sigh and a shy smile, the youth lay down and was gathered into the arms of the white man. Jefferson rolled on top of him and began humping him slowly, grasping his shoulders, his buttocks. Tentatively, then more assuredly as he was not refused, James pulled into his own brown body the white man who writhed above him. Then their positions were reversed and the slave youth squatted astride the man who lay flat on the bed. A white hand grasped the youth's thick, brown penis. "O! master, thank you!" the youth breathed as the hand slid up and down. One white hand ran up and down the slim abdomen and chest while the other hand moved faster over the iron cock. It did not take long before the black youth cried out, his thighs stiffening, his hips pushing forward, and two heavy gouts of semen shot out onto the white man's belly and chest. As soon as they did, the white man stopped pumping. "Clean it up," he commanded, and the youth leapt off the bed to find a rag to do so, still heaving with ragged breath himself. The white man's abdomen and chest was dabbed clean, the rag put aside. Once more Thomas Jefferson reached up to his slave youth and pulled him into the bed again. Covering the brown body once more, he slid his stiff rod between the slim thighs and began pounding his hips up and down, his fingers around the youth's rounded shoulders as if to save himself from drowning, his head to one side. Quickly it came, the tingling in the thighs and lower belly, then the eruption as he slammed forward into the slave's body, filling the space between his tightly closed thighs with semen. The white men held that position as he recovered breath, then he slumped. The slave youth held him, whispering out a crooning sound. The master drifted off to sleep, still covering the black youth, who soon followed him into slumber. And that is how they spent that first night. So it began. To others at Monticello, or in places they would visit, their relationship was nothing other than the proper one of master and slave. James continued to learn to cook. Master Thomas Jefferson continued to manage the weighty affairs of his household, and to participate in the affairs of the newly forming republic. They were careful--so very careful!--in public, keeping close custody of their eyes, being careful not to touch any more than was necessary. But how often at a formal dinner around the long table did their eyes meet in a flash, for but an instant, as James helped the company to a dish, clothed in his splendid livery. How often did they find themselves alone in the house, or fields, or one of the farm's buildings, and held a gaze for a moment before breaking it off, unwilling to risk what an accidental observer might see. And yet at night---both of them novices in the ways of their love, they learned together, teaching each other, experimenting. And always, Jefferson was the master. Always, he directed their couplings. Always, he made his slave to turn slowly, naked by candlelight, to admire the slim planes of his body, the soft glow of his oiled, light brown skin. Always, he achieved his own ecstasy last, or sometimes he was the only one to do so, slumping into sleep over the willing brown body in the night. Always, except for the nights when he was tired or ill, and did not call James to him--and then James waited, listening, ready, far into the night. The next year Thomas Jefferson was named envoy to the fledgling republic's most important ally, France. Of course, he took James, now nineteen. Jefferson told the world that the young man was going so as to learn better how to cook the French dishes that Jefferson loved, and no story could be more plausible. It was also true, Jefferson would put the young man to work learning to be a chef during the day, while at night the white man still summoned the brown youth to his bed where they struggled in passion far into the night. They had not been long in this arrangement before Thomas Jefferson, always alert to his public image, began to wonder whether some of the French servants who came in and out of their world were beginning to---well, to whisper. Jefferson had another two or three slaves with him, but also some hired French servants. It would be impossible not to notice the closeness of master and servant. People in Virginia would see it as the natural result of having a valet, a close body servant, but would the French see it so? Were those looks of interest or speculation he saw, did he interrupt whispered conversations as he turned into hallways of his own house? So was hatched the "Sally" ruse. Jefferson sent for Sally Hemings to attend his daughter, who was also with him in Paris. The young woman, child really, arrived soon and was established as his daughter's servant. Jefferson saw to it that he would be observed to flirt with the young, coffee and cream colored slave. He made a point of going into the same room with her alone and shutting the door, when that might be observed by French visitors and servants. He also did nothing at all to discourage the calls that Sally received from young French male servants of neighboring establishments. So when, in the natural course of things, Sally became pregnant, he likewise did nothing to discourage speculation that he was the father of the little one. Sally Hemings gave people something to gossip about, and diverted attention entirely from James--whether there had ever truly been such attention, or it was all in his imagination, would be difficult to say. And all this time, James Hemings--when his master called softly to him in the night, he was always quick to go. Although the white man always brought the brown youth to orgasm first, he never lost interest or grew impatient for his master to finish. As his master's body clenched and pushed forward into his upturned, pushed-back buttocks, the slave's slim legs would curve back, his ankles hooking over the white man's to hold him there connected to his body a little longer. And so months passed, and passed into years. But during the day, and the evenings when Master Tom was away at receptions and grand dinners, James Hemings perfected his craft of cooking. He studied with French chefs in Paris, and as he did so he saw how they lived. He saw how they accepted him as a fellow creature. James saw other people of African descent in the streets of Paris, free and freely going about their business. He knew soon after his arrival that slavery was not legal in France and that he was legally free. And he began to feel what that freedom meant deep inside of him. The night came when James lay on his back, his arms and legs crossed over his master's back as the white man lay above him, filling his anus with the long strokes of his hard, red cock. James's own penis had grown rigid again after his ejaculation a few minutes before, and leaked a clear liquid that lubricated the white and brown skins as they slid against each other. Harder and faster the white man moved in and out of his black slave's bottom and then, stifling a cry, pushed forward hard, his body clenching, his fingers digging into the brown flesh of the youth's shoulders. The white man lay there shuddering, and then relaxed. James felt perfectly at peace, and although a slave, he felt a kind of claim over the man who lay upon him panting, his long penis still inside of him. "Master," he whispered. "Ummmm," moaned Jefferson, his head resting on the youth's brown, rounded shoulder. "Master, I love you." A moment passed and again the white man grunted, "Umph," in a note of acknowledgement, and continued lying still. "Master, I'm learning to cook really well. When we go back to Virginia, I can be your cook. I can prepare all your favorite dishes. I--I can make you happy, master." A single nod of the head that still lay on his shoulder. "Master---master, I hear there is no slavery here. I hear I am free here. Master, I could be free back in Virginia if you wanted. We could love---we might---we could do this and it wouldn't be because I had to. Master---can I be free?" There was a moment of perfect stillness, and then the white man pushed himself up off of his slave's body to look into his dark eyes. His wilting penis slid out of the loose anus as he did so. "Free? Free! Boy, what's gotten into your head? What would you do if you were free? Put these silly thoughts aside." And the white man pushed himself off to the side of the brown body, then gave his slave a shove. "Go bring water and towels so I can clean up. And---and change these sheets while you are at it." James fled from the bed to do his master's bidding. But a snake had entered the garden of his mind. A little place of uncertainty, of anxiety, had been prepared in his soul, and it would grow over time. Two feelings on separate tracks grew stronger and stronger, two juggernauts heading toward the same vanishing point on the horizon: James breathed the air of freedom in France and it entered into his bones. But he also sought the gaze of his master more, planned his steps to take him near to the white man, found occasion to talk to Master Tom more often. Holding the shuddering white body in his arms at night, he never felt more love---and he never felt more desire to love him as a free man. James broached the subject of freedom--and of love--again, and then again. Jefferson was dismissive each time, and seemed to become a little testier with each dismissal. The soft whispers of love continued to be acknowledged by a muffled grunt, and then--by silence. As the white man seemed to grow a little more distant, James became a little more insistent. Love and a desire for freedom each grew stronger, two vines in a small plot of soil that might not be able to support them both. The two themes were rarely absent from James's thoughts. He decided to take more formal action. The slave came to his master's side a little earlier than usual in the evening, as the white man sat at a small desk in his bedroom, writing. "Master, may I speak to you?" he asked softly. "Well, James, what is the matter?" "Master....I need to be free, master. I need that, sir. I am free in France, and I want to be free in Virginia. You....you wouldn't need to pay me wages back home, sir. I could....I could live with you. I love you, master, you know that, we.....we could love each other better once I am free." The white man sat still for a moment, then slapped the pen down on the desk. He rose and turned to James, as the slave youth stepped back. "Enough of your importuning! You want your freedom, you shall have it. But you are my slave, sir, and I have invested much money in you and in your training here. I shall require that you continue to serve me for five more years after our return, during which time you shall cook and you shall train other servants to cook in the French manner. Then you may go your way." James was speechless for a moment. Somehow it seemed as if it had gone wrong. "Master, thank you.....yes, I will teach others, but only five years.....Master, I don't want to leave then. I want to stay with you. Master, I---" "Enough!" came a harsh growl. "You want your freedom, then take it, in five years. If you won't serve me, why should I feed you and clothe you?" It came as a stab in the heart to James--and what followed, was it worse? In a quick move Jefferson stepped to the slave and slapped him on the cheek, then tore the youth's shirt off. "Remove your garments," he ordered, and undressed himself as James obeyed, trembling. The two standing naked together, Jefferson appraised the slim brown body of the youth through narrowed eyes for a moment, then shoved the youth roughly toward the nearby bed. James tripped and staggered onto the mattress, then made as if to lie on his back to receive his master. But the white man roughly grasped the youth's hips and positioned him on his hands and knees, his bottom facing the white man as he stood by the side of the bed. With a tremendous whack Thomas Jefferson brought his open palm down on the coffee and cream bottom of the slave before him, and then again and again as James stifled a cry of pain and surprise. Stepping closer to the upraised bottom, now blushing a reddish brown, the white man positioned the slick and leaking head of his rampant cock at the wrinkled brown anus of his slave, and gave a mighty push. Lubricated only by its own slick sheen of clear fluid, the white man's stiff, long penis plunged entirely into the slave youth, who then did cry out in a voice that could not be stifled. "Silence" growled the white man as he pumped quickly back and forth, back and forth, and then with a tremendous push slammed his groin forward even as his hands pulled the youth's hips back toward him. He held that position, shuddering, then quickly withdrew from the slave's body. "Bring water and towels" he ordered. James, in pain, scrambled off the bed, his heart aching worse than his rectum, and went to do his master's bidding. It was all downhill from there. There were other moments of sexual contact, other whispers of unanswered love from James to his white master, but they became fewer. A cold wall of separation mounted higher and higher around the white man, and the black youth could only lay an unsuccessful siege to that wall from outside. In another few months the Jefferson household packed up and boarded a ship to return to their homeland. James slept in a cramped corner of the steerage by himself all the way back. ........................................................................................................ James Thomson Callender's pencil stopped, poised over the filling roll of paper. Beads of sweat stood on his brow, and he held his breath. "And when you returned to Virginia?" he asked. The thin brown hand reached yet again in the direction of the bottle, and missed. It slapped down on the table and slid toward the bottle, grasping it around the base, and dragged it near to the empty glass. It tipped and wavered, then the bottle upended. Some of the last of the whiskey went into the glass, some onto the table. James Hemings fought to focus on the bottle waving in his hand, then threw it against the wall. He turned his face to the white man, tears now streaming down the ruined, sunken cheeks from the dull, leaden eyes. "He kept his word. I kept mine. I taught others of his.....of his slaves to cook. Then he freed me, and bade me farewell and good luck. I found employment in a restaurant in Richmond and slept in a closet in the back of the shop---I was very lucky in that way---and sent letters to Master Tom, but he never answered any. I saw him in town sometimes. He saw me. He would nod and lift his hat. Nothing more. That was...a long time ago." There was a moment of silence. The black man grasped the glass with both hands, bringing it to his lips, and drained it, then let it roll away across and off of the table. "Two weeks ago he actually sent me a letter. Asked if I wanted....if I wanted to be his servant and cook for him in the city of Washington. If I wanted to be....to be his servant. To be his slave." Another moment, and then great sobs began silently moving in the thin, ragged body of the black man, sitting alone on his side of the table. Between sobs, he choked out: "He....he wanted me but not as a free man. Not as a man. I loved him so, O! I loved him so, but I had to be free. I had....." And then, still sitting upright, the sobs took over. Alarmed, unprepared for the raw emotion, Callender rose quickly, stuffing his papers into his valise. "I thank you, sir, for you help. I shall....I shall be sure to mention you in my story." He fumbled quickly in his pocket and threw a silver coin on the table. "For your trouble, sir." James had no voice, only tears, only the shaking of his body. Callender gathered his things. "Well, sir....I must be off, sir," cried Callender, unsure whether he had offended with the silver coin, unsure what would happen next. The white man fled through the door. Reaching the ruined gate, he turned to listen, but the house held only an empty silence.