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Updated: May 14, 2025
She didn't care very much what it might be that Missy Sylvia would give her, it was delight enough for Estralla to follow after her. But when the little girl saw the things spread out on Sylvia's bed she exclaimed aloud: "Does you mean, Missy, dat I'se to pick out somethin'? Well, then I chooses the shoes. I never had no shoes."
"Well, put on your things and run after them, that's a good girl," said Mr. Fulton. "Why, here is Estralla now," he added, as the little colored girl appeared at the door. "Tell Miss Sylvia to come down to the landing; I'll meet you there," and he hurried away, thinking his little daughter was safe with Mrs. Carleton.
She decided that her father could answer a question much better than Miss Rosalie, and resolved to ask him the meaning of the word. "Come up-stairs, Estralla," she said, finding the little negro girl at the gate as usual waiting for her. "I have some things my mother said I could give you." Estralla followed happily.
"Gerald, send Sally right in with hot milk," she directed, and the officer vanished. It was not long before Sylvia was sitting up in bed wrapped in a gay- colored blanket and drinking milk so hot and sweet and spicy that it seemed as if she could never have enough of it. Estralla was curled up in a big scarlet wrapper on a rug near the fire with a big mug of the spiced and sweetened milk.
She was always quite ready to smile, but she could not understand why Sylvia had wanted her to come so mysteriously to her room. "And I am going to teach you to read and write," Sylvia added. "Is you, Missy?" Estralla responded in a half-frightened whisper. Now, she thought, she knew all about Missy Sylvia's reasons for the secret visit.
An' don' yo' know all 'bout a boat? Course yo' does. Now yo' can sail us right off home. An' when yo' pa comes home 'mos' skeered to def, 'cos he cyan't fin' yo', thar' yo'll be," and Estralla chuckled happily as if all their troubles were over. But Sylvia was not so sure.
"Mornin', Missy," said Estralla, coming into the room, and setting down the pitcher of hot water very carefully. She had on the pink gingham with one of the white aprons, and as she stood smiling and neat at the foot of Sylvia's bed, she looked very different from the clumsy little darky who had tumbled into the room a few weeks ago. Sylvia smiled back.
Estralla did not question the command, and in a moment, carrying dress and towel, she had vanished through the open window. "Why, child! What has happened?" exclaimed Mrs. Fulton, coming into the room and looking at the overturned footstool, the pieces of the broken pitcher, and at Sylvia standing in the middle of the floor with an anxious, half-frightened expression.
Fulton had been glad that her little daughter wished to do so. "Estralla has never had ANYTHING," Sylvia had urged, "and she is always afraid of something. Of being whipped or sold. And I would like to see her have clothes like other girls." Estralla wanted to try on the shoes at once, and when she found that they fitted very comfortably, she chuckled and laughed with delight.
For a moment neither Sylvia nor her mother made any response to this wonderful statement. "Truly, Father? Truly?" exclaimed Sylvia with shining eyes. "Yes. These papers have been recorded. Estralla and her mother are no longer slaves. They are free," said Mr. Fulton, as he folded the papers. "Mr. Waite has made you the finest gift in the world, little daughter," he added seriously.
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