absent. Elizabeth gurgled and chuckled and reached up to grab James's
whiskers, and was perfectly happy in his arms. Later, when Sarah changed
Elizabeth's linen, James watched the simple domesticity, and yearned for
it in his life.
Toward sunset, when the mosquitoes came out, they realized they had
talked too long, and made a hasty departure. It was five miles to the
Polk residence, and Sarah should be home before dark. Cap'n Jack went
back to the house, and James drove the gig, his horse hitched to it,
pointing out the parameters of his land to Sarah, as if assuring her of
his financial eligibility. They arranged to attend church together the
following Sunday, and to picnic again, at the same spot.
They saw each other every Sunday of the summer after that, and when her
period of mourning was over, James began call-
BLOODLINES 109
ing on her at her home. His suit received the full approval of the Polks,
who wrote to Sarah's father, informing him of their hopes for a union
between his daughter and this splendid bachelor.
Mr. Moore came to visit his daughter, and his heart was touched by what
he found. The dull grief that had enshrouded Sarah was cast aside with
the black dress and veil. Now his daughter was herself again, as she had
been in the happier days of her life. She still thought fondly of her
late husband, but looked forward eagerly to her next.
All of James's many friends indicated their approval of the union, and
voiced their confidence in James. Mr. Moore questioned James most
carefully, and if he found a certain lack of flamboyance in his
prospective son-in-law, that only added luster to him, for Mr. Moore was
concerned that Sarah should make a solid and reliable marriage rather
than a spectacular one. There was enough flamboyance, enough cavalier
behavior, in the other men of the frontier, with Andrew Jackson as the
most grandiose of all, and while Mr. Moore was delighted by Andrew's
company, he was pleased that Sarah had chosen a quieter man.
Before Mr. Moore left Nashville, he had given his blessing to James, who
then formally proposed to Sarah, and she, as gravely, accepted. They had
a party at the new Nashville Inn, and danced until dawn, and were happy.
Perhaps because Samuel had been the first love of Sarah's life, she had
spent her youthful romance in that love, and what she felt for James was
deeper, more secure, and less intense. Sarah was the first true
reciprocated love of James's life, but he found her when he was older,
and had lost the foolishness of youth. They approached each other and
their marriage as adults, delighting in each other, but with a deep
concern to lay the foundations for a lifelong partnership. Their great
gift was laughter. James's Irish sense of humor touched some Celtic chord
in Sarah, and others regarded them enviously, for their heads were always
together, and their eyes were always smiling. They didn't seem to need
anybody but each other, although they never excluded anyone else from
their company.
Because of the confusion between Sarah, his fianc6e, and Sara, his
sister, the family began calling their new relation
110 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN
Sally, and it pleased her, because it made her feel young.
Sally, who had been Sarah, returned to South Carolina to visit her many
relations, to put her affairs in order, and to show Elizabeth to her
aunts and uncles and grandparents. She went to Baltimore and Philadelphia
to buy her trousseau, and she met James's relatives there, who welcomed
her into the family. She returned to Nashville the following spring, and
in October, James Jackson married Sally Moore McCullough in a simple
ceremony attended by two hundred friends and relations.
Andrew Jackson was James's best man.
Friends loaned them a small house not far from town so that they might be
alone, apart from several slaves, for the first few days of their
marriage. They drove there late on their wedding night, Cap'n Jack and
other slaves riding beside them with lanterns. At the house, Angel had
made ready for her Missy and new Massa. A supper was laid on the table,
and candles lighted the scene. James carried Sally over the threshold, and
once the couple were comfortable the slaves drifted away to the kitchen,
and made their own party.
Sally went to the bedroom first, and made herself ready. James undressed
in another room, and came to her after a decent interval. He was oddly
nervous. He had no doubt of his ability in the marriage bed, but he did
not want to disappoint his bride, who had been married before. She had
talked to him of Samuel, and he understood her passion for him, but he
was anxious to prove himself the better man.
Sally was standing by the window staring out at the room. She looked
ravishing in oyster silk, with her hair loose. James came to her, put his
hands gently on her shoulders, kissed her elegant neck, and swore that
he would do everything in his power to make her happy. She turned and her
eyes told him that she believed him, and she swore a similar vow.
He bent to her and they kissed, and her mouth seemed to melt around his
tongue. He picked her up and carried her to the bed, laid her down and
lay beside her, stroking her, running his hands through her hair, and did
not want his mouth ever to be separated from hers. He freed her breasts,
and could not resist a whispered joke, that these were the reason that
he had fallen in love with her. To his relief, Sally laughed, and
BLOODLINES 111
told him that was why she had shown herself so boldly. The laughter was
the key that unlocked James's passion. He buried his face in her breasts
and explored her body with his hands and his tongue. With gentle hints and
subtle persuasion, all modified by smiles and giggles, Sally guided him
to those places that pleased her, and was expert enough in the ways of men
to know what he needed.
When James entered her, she locked him to her as if she would never let
him go, and called out his power and her surrender. James was filled with
a sense of his own masculinity, and her soft and yielding capitulation
to him made him feel, at his climax, the most sublime pleasure of his
life.
They slept very little that night, because he could not get his fill of
her. He no longer cared if he was a better lover than Samuel; he felt no
sense of competition with the dead, because he, James, was living, and
her master, and she had no alternative but him, now. When she whispered
her need for his baby, he shared the longing, and told her that the seed
he gave her was the seed of life.
The fact that he did not have to compete with anyone, anymore, for
anything, freed him from restraint, freed him from inhibition, and while
his conscious mind believed that she was giving herself, his soul knew
better. He was engulfed by her.
&n
bsp; They spent their honeymoon in idyllic circumstances. The house was a
charming, well-appointed log cabin, set among tall trees. The crisp,
chill weather and the riotous colors of autumn filled their senses in the
day, and the warmth and companionship of the marriage bed, and their lack
of coy reserve, made the nights endlessly delightful. There were very few
problems between them, and any that arose were solved with laughter,
which remained the constant fixture of their marriage. Still they each
kept a part of themselves closed from the other, believing that they had
a lifetime to discover those things, and did not want to become overly
familiar too soon.
After two weeks they returned to Nashville, and began the business of
building their family.
A year later, Sally gave birth to a daughter, who was named Mary, as the
biblical Mary had been the ftiend of Elizabeth. James was cock-a-hoop on
the day Mary came into the world, and bought endless rounds of drinks for
his friends at the inn,
112 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN
who ribbed him gently. Making a baby wasn't so difficult, they told him.
Most men could do it. Even niggers could do that.
When he came in to see Mary for the first time, his heart filled with
love for her. He could not believe that he had made this tiny, perfect
thing. He held her in his arms, and sat in a chair by the window, and
told her stories of how she was blessed by the fairies and leprechauns.
Mary seemed to believe him, and snuggled contentedly into her father's
arms.
James looked at Sally, and smiled, and thanked her.
"Are you disappointed she isn't a boy?" Sally asked him, for she had been
worried. Like all the women of the frontier, she knew sons were critical
to the family's survival, and James was obsessed by family.
James laughed and said no, but examined his conscience. In truth, he had
felt a mild twinge of disappointment, but had shrugged it aside. When he
held Mary in his arms, not even the memory of that disappointment
remained, but Sally's question had revived it.
"No," he said again, wanting to convince her that he wasn't lying. "She
is beautiful."
Then he gave Sally his most impish smile.
"And anyway, she's just the first," he grinned. "We can always keep
trying."
They tried very hard, but were not successful in their efforts at first.
Martha was born the following year, and Mary Ellen two years after that.
Everyone was kind, friends and relations, but they all longed for a boy,
and James began to understand Andrew's obsessive need for sons. He
consoled himself with the thought that at least he and Sally could
produce children, while Andrew and Rachel could not.
This time James's prayers were answered. Sally delivered a son, a
strapping, chubby boy, who was as healthy as anyone could wish.
The arrival of his son had an extraordinary effect on James. He held the
boy, and stared at him, and, against the strong advice of Eleanor and
Sara, took him outside into the warm night. He sat with his son for an
hour and dreamed of the future.
BLOODLINES 113
He had ensured the succession of his family. His son would have
everything that he did not. He would grow up surrounded by love, as James
had not, and flourish and be a fine man, and inherit his father's estate,
as James had not.
They would be friends, James swore to it, and while he would give his son
the discipline a man needed to survive in the world, and to prosper, he
would always know that he occupied first place in his father's heart. He
would be honest and reliable and adventurous. He would be well provided
for, he would want for nothing, but he would be given an appreciation of
the value of money and the glory of labor. He would own slaves, but would
be taught respect for the dignity of man. He would be given a sense of
independence, and the will to expand and develop what James had created.
He could be anything he wanted to be, a farmer or a general, or both,
like Andrew, but he would be a son any man could be proud of, and always,
he would be loved.
James felt the salt sting of tears in his eyes. He returned his son to
his women, and went and got drunk with his friends at the inn.
The son came to be known as A.J., to avoid confusion with his illustrious
godfather, but that was not his name. As if to give him a sense of the
majesty of which he was capable, of the heroism that was his patrimony,
through his father's dearest friend, as if to remind the boy always of
the man James wanted him to emulate, he was christened Andrew Jackson
Jackson.
Because always, there was Andrew.
14
Amdrew Jackson, orphaned himself as a youth, gathered young men unto
him, just as he gathered sons who were not his own. He awoke the
limitless horizons of the boy in all of them. He put his great,
embracing arms around them and swept them off to realms of
extraordinary adventure.
114 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN
An extravagant Pied Piper, his embrace was extensive and undiscriminating.
Those who were prepared to follow his path were given spectacular rewards
of excitement; the others simply fell by the wayside, unmourned and
unnoticed by Andrew. Those who were in his way, he tried to eliminate,
honorably, through duel or the courts, or by the stinging whiplash of his
eloquent invective. He demanded discipline, obedience, and loyalty from his
apostles, but encouraged them to explore the outer limits of their own
individuality.
"He rides a streak of lightning."
James could never remember which of Andrew's entourage said that, but, oh,
it was true.
So Andrew Jackson, the restless, roving visionary, had gathered James the
merchant to him, and had shown him the places of legends, of chivalry and
honor and breathless daring. To the misty shores of Avalon, where dedicated
knights created the noble vision of Camelot, and quested the Holy Grail,
and to the plains of Olympus, where fearless warriors challenged the gods.
And standing in unquestioning support of the man who would be king was the
flawless Rachel, the loving woman and wife, who represented all that was
good on earth.
What James could not know was that he did not stand as high in his mentor's
firmament as Andrew did in his.
When John Coffee and Andrew purchased the prizewinning horse Pacolet, they
decided to offer shares in the animal to their loyal friends, those who
could afford it, as tokens of their esteem. The first five shares were
easily allotted, but they debated the sixth.
:'Why not James?" John Coffee said. "He can afford it."
'Which James?" Andrew asked. His mind was elsewhere, and he knew several
men called James.
:'James Jackson," John Coffee laughed. "The merchant."
'Oh, yes," Andrew agreed. "Let's give the
bookkeeper a share. "
Andrew's parents had migrated from Ireland, and made an arduous trek from
Pennsylvania to North Carolina. They settled on an adequate piece of land,
and began clearing their property. It was a hard life, and Andrew's father
strained him-
BLOODLINES 115
self grubbing tree stumps, and died in agony. A few days later, his mother
gave birth to her third son, and he was called Andrew in memory of his
dead father.
The widowed mother raised her son according to the creed of Sparta.
"My door is always open to brave men, and perpetually closed to cowards."
Young Andrew adored his mother and took her lessons to heart. Gifted with
a fearless bravery, a passion for the use of language, and a reckless
disregard for his own physical wellbeing, he had a hot temper and an
unshakable conviction of his own destiny. He was bom to be a leader of
men.
His Irish blood gave him a hatred of the British, and at the onset of the
American Revolution he offered his services to his uncle, who had formed
a small band of militia. At the age of thirteen, he was made a messenger,
given a horse and a pistol, and conducted himself with complete disregard
for his own safety. After an unsuccessful foray against British dragoons,
Andrew and some others took refuge in a house, but were found by the
enemy. Andrew resisted his arrest and received a blow to his head from
an officer's sword, a bloody gash that cut to the bone, and he carried
the scar of it for the rest of his days.
The death of his mother when he was fifteen devastated Andrew, but
impelled him to live up to the remarkable standards of masculine behavior
that she had set. At the end of the war he received a small inheritance
from an uncle in Ireland, and he promptly squandered the money in a year
of high living in Charleston, gambling, wenching, and cockfighting. He
was broke and alone in the world, his only talents his quick mind, his
gift of oratory, and an expert knowledge of horses. Relatives took him
in and sent him to school, where he studied law. At the age of twenty he
was made an attorney, attached to a traveling court. He found his way to
Tennessee, and the reckless frontier living suited his temperament
exactly. He settled in Nashville, practiced law, involved himself in
politics, fought Indian marauders, and fell in love with Rachel Robards.
He also made the first of several fortunes. He accepted land, valued at
ten cents an acre, in payment of fees, and with the
116 ALEX HALEY'S QUEEN
rush of settlers to the district, within three years the price of that
same land had risen to five dollars an acre.
The frontier adored him, a rollicking, roistering, gambling, dueling,
mischievous fellow, who argued successfully for Tennessee's admission to
the Union, and became, by popular vote, the state's first member of the
House of Representatives. In Philadelphia, which was then the capital,
he criticized George Washington, was the bane of the financial
committees, and became fast friends with Aaron Burr. At the end of his
term he was elected to the Senate, but he was a man of action, not
negotiation, and he quit the upper house to return to Nashville and his
beloved Rachel. His grateful state appointed him to the Superior Court.
He was a tough and respected judge, dedicated to rights of the individual
against the state. He despised bureaucracy, he despised the banks who
could hold an honest man in bondage, and he believed implicitly in the
manifest destiny of the white man to inherit the land of America, for it
was divinely ordained. His attitude toward the original inhabitants of
the country was disparaging.
"They are fickle, and will claim any and everything," he told James. "The
treachery in their character justifies our never having faith in them.
A few gifts, a few bribes, to the chiefs and to the interpreters, will
gain anything that should be ours. "
Yet he was ambivalent about them. He saw them as the sons of Cain, who