Ellen Foster

One day at school, during naptime, Ellen hears a car and physically reacts to the idea that her father has come for her: “My whole self knew at the same time and my eyes had spots,” she says (53). He waves money and shouts for Ellen to come out and he will “pay for it” (54). Ellen wonders what the other children think when they see her father waving dollars and unbuckling his pants. Ellen says she can make him stop if the teacher will give her a pistol. She yells for her father to put the dollars on the ground and leave. The police take him away in handcuffs.

Ellen feels better when Julia hugs her, takes her home, and gives Ellen the money. Roy comes to inform Ellen that the court believes Ellen should be with her family. Julia puts Ellen in a dress for her court appearance, warning her that she’s learned the hard way that sometimes you have to play the game. Mama’s mama is in the courtroom, and two police officers stand beside Ellen’s daddy. The judge rules that Ellen should be with her family and so gives her to the custody of her grandmother, whom Ellen thinks wears an “I got you now” look (56). With all his talk of families as the cornerstone of society, Ellen says, the judge must have mixed them up with other folks.

Ellen says the food at her new mama’s on Sunday is especially good, but they have to go to church first. They all behave because new mama gets part of the collection money for their support, and they want to show people the money is well spent. Dora and her mother attend this church for holidays, which is how Ellen spotted her new mama. As soon as she saw this woman, Ellen says, she started thinking of tricks of how to have her, and she pats herself on the back each Sunday that it worked.

After Sunday dinner, they all pitch in to make food for the coming week: Ellen, Stella, Francis, new mama, and Jo Jo. Ellen says they are a regular factory, and she is proud to have “hardy” food to show off in the lunchroom when the other kids have a measly tray. Jo Jo practices ballet dancing, and Ellen admires her skirt and top, but would rather shake a leg. She does homework at the donated desk in her room, and sometimes if she does not shut the door, baby Roger will crawl in. Ellen gives him something to gnaw on and keeps her microscope out of reach. He has a mama here, but he did not get a daddy, Ellen says.

In summer, Ellen went to her mama’s mama’s house, which she remembers as a sad time. Julia gets fired and writes letters after she and Roy move away. Ellen brings a box of her things and the money she’s saving. Her grandmother is not welcoming when she picks Ellen up, and Ellen says, “if I knew then all I know about her now I would have jumped out of her car moving and high-tailed it” (61).

Ellen hopes her grandmother will soften in time. The house amazes Ellen with its many collectibles and furniture as well as the two Black women hired as domestic help. Ellen is given her mother’s old room, which she realizes is not a treat; Ellen says that she sees things dancing around in the fireplace and needs to turn the lights on at night. She wonders why her grandmother is so mean.

Her grandmother says she has a job for Ellen, drives her to the cotton field, and drops Ellen off. Ellen is instructed to grab a hoe and start chopping. She doesn’t know what to do because her parents hired Black people to work their farm while Ellen played in the fields with Starletta. A woman named Mavis introduces herself and, when Ellen asks if she knows Starletta’s family, says they attend the same church.

Mavis shows Ellen how to chop and fans Ellen with her apron when she gets hot. The next day, Ellen brings a straw hat. She recites poems in her head and wonders how Roy and Julia are. Mavis helps Ellen catch up when she falls behind. Ellen loves to listen as Mavis talks and is pleased when Mavis says Ellen looks just like her mother. Mavis describes Ellen’s mama as sweet and smart as a whip, laughing all the time, with the same black hair down her back. Mavis says ever since Ellen’s mama died, the boss lady has been acting “touched.” Ellen knows this means her mental health has been impacted. As she gets tan, Ellen imagines she could pass for a Black child. She learns that Mavis and the other Black farm workers are not paid well, and Ellen wonders why they don’t just leave.

After Ellen eats the plate of food left out for her at night, she walks up the “colored path” to observe Mavis and the other Black families. She envies how they fight, play, laugh, and get along. She wants a family like Mavis’s, but thinks she will choose one white, with more money and running water. Ellen plots ways to earn money so she can escape. Her grandmother accuses Ellen of being and looking like her father so often that Ellen begins to doubt she is her own self: “So many folks thinking and wanting you to be somebody else will confuse you if you are not very careful” (69).

When she informs Ellen that her father is dead, mama’s mama slaps Ellen on the face and challenges her to cry for her father. Ellen says for all the times she thought about him dying, she did not expect to feel what she does. However, she will not give mama’s mama the satisfaction of shedding more than one tear.

They do not attend the funeral, but Ellen’s uncle Rudolph brings the flag from her father’s coffin. Ellen hopes the coffin is nailed tight so he cannot get out and grab her again. She imagines a magician making her father disappear. When Rudolph comes, Ellen’s grandmother reminds him that she holds the deed to his land. She burns the flag. Ellen wishes she could have the encyclopedias from the house.

Mama’s mama fires her domestic help because she says they were stealing, so Ellen is alone with her when her grandmother becomes ill with the flu. In her fever, her grandmother warns Ellen to take better care of her than she did of her mama.