124 was quiet.
denver, who thought she knew all about silence, was surprised to learn hungercould do that: quiet you down and wear you out. neither sethe nor beloved knew or cared about itone way or another. they were too busy rationing their strength to fight each other. so it was shewho had to step off the edge of the world and die because if she didn't, they all would. the fleshbetween her mother's forefinger and thumb was thin as china silk and there wasn't a piece ofclothing in the house that didn't sag on her. beloved held her head up with the palms of her hands,slept wherever she happened to be, and whined for sweets although she was getting bigger,plumper by the day. everything was gone except two laying hens, and somebody would soon haveto decide whether an egg every now and then was worth more than two fried chickens. thehungrier they got, the weaker; the weaker they got, the quieter they were — which was better thanthe furious arguments, the poker slammed up against the wall, all the shouting and crying thatfollowed that one happy january when they played. denver had joined in the play, holding back abit out of habit, even though it was the most fun she had ever known. but once sethe had seen thescar, the tip of which denver had been looking at whenever beloved undressed — the little curvedshadow of a smile in the kootchy-kootchy-coo place under her chin — once sethe saw it, fingeredit and closed her eyes for a long time, the two of them cut denver out of the games. the cookinggames, the sewing games, the hair and dressing-up games. games her mother loved so well shetook to going to work later and later each day until the predictable happened: sawyer told her notto come back. and instead of looking for another job, sethe played all the harder with beloved,who never got enough of anything: lullabies, new stitches, the bottom of the cake bowl, the top ofthe milk. if the hen had only two eggs, she got both. it was as though her mother had lost her mind,like grandma baby calling for pink and not doing the things she used to. but different because,unlike baby suggs, she cut denver out completely. even the song that she used to sing to denvershe sang for beloved alone: "high johnny, wide johnny, don't you leave my side, johnny."at first they played together. a whole month and denver loved it. from the night they ice-skatedunder a star-loaded sky and drank sweet milk by the stove, to the string puzzles sethe did for themin afternoon light, and shadow pictures in the gloaming. in the very teeth of winter and sethe, hereyes fever bright, was plotting a garden of vegetables and flowers — talking, talking about whatcolors it would have. she played with beloved's hair, braiding, puffing, tying, oiling it until itmade denver nervous to watch her they changed beds and exchanged clothes. walked arm in armand smiled all the time. when the weather broke, they were on their knees in the backyarddesigning a garden in dirt too hard to chop. the thirty-eight dollars of life savings went to feedthemselves with fancy food and decorate themselves with ribbon and dress goods, which sethe cutand sewed like they were going somewhere in a hurry. bright clothes — with blue stripes andsassy prints. she walked the four miles to john shillito's to buy yellow ribbon, shiny buttons andbits of black lace. by the end of march the three of them looked like carnival women with nothingto do. when it became clear that they were only interested in each other, denver began to driftfrom the play, but she watched it, alert for any sign that beloved was in danger. finally convincedthere was none, and seeing her mother that happy, that smiling — how could it go wrong? — shelet down her guard and it did. her problem at first was trying to find out who was to blame. hereye was on her mother, for a signal that the thing that was in her was out, and she would kill again.
but it was beloved who made demands. anything she wanted she got, and when sethe ran out ofthings to give her, beloved invented desire. she wanted sethe's company for hours to watch thelayer of brown leaves waving at them from the bottom of the creek, in the same place where, as alittle girl, denver played in the silence with her. now the players were altered. as soon as the thawwas complete beloved gazed at her gazing face, rippling, folding, spreading, disappearing into theleaves below. she flattened herself on the ground, dirtying her bold stripes, and touched therocking faces with her own. she filled basket after basket with the first things warmer weather letloose in the ground — dandelions, violets, forsythia — presenting them to sethe, who arrangedthem, stuck them, wound them all over the house. dressed in sethe's dresses, she stroked her skinwith the palm of her hand. she imitated sethe, talked the way she did, laughed her laugh and usedher body the same way down to the walk, the way sethe moved her hands, sighed through hernose, held her head. sometimes coming upon them making men and women cookies or tackingscraps of cloth on baby suggs' old quilt, it was difficult for denver to tell who was who. then themood changed and the arguments began. slowly at first. a complaint from beloved, an apologyfrom sethe. a reduction of pleasure at some special effort the older woman made. wasn't it toocold to stay outside? beloved gave a look that said, so what? was it past bedtime, the light nogood for sewing? beloved didn't move; said, "do it," and sethe complied. she took the best ofeverything — first. the best chair, the biggest piece, the prettiest plate, the brightest ribbon for herhair, and the more she took, the more sethe began to talk, explain, describe how much she hadsuffered, been through, for her children, waving away flies in grape arbors, crawling on her kneesto a lean-to. none of which made the impression it was supposed to. beloved accused her ofleaving her behind. of not being nice to her, not smiling at her. she said they were the same, hadthe same face, how could she have left her? and sethe cried, saying she never did, or meant to —-that she had to get them out, away, that she had the milk all the time and had the money too forthe stone but not enough. that her plan was always that they would all be together on the otherside, forever. beloved wasn't interested. she said when she cried there was no one. that dead menlay on top of her. that she had nothing to eat. ghosts without skin stuck their fingers in her andsaid beloved in the dark and bitch in the light. sethe pleaded for forgiveness, counting, listingagain and again her reasons: that beloved was more important, meant more to her than her ownlife. that she would trade places any day. give up her life, every minute and hour of it, to takeback just one of beloved's tears. did she know it hurt her when mosquitoes bit her baby? that toleave her on the ground to run into the big house drove her crazy? that before leaving sweethome beloved slept every night on her chest or curled on her back? beloved denied it. sethe nevercame to her, never said a word to her, never smiled and worst of all never waved goodbye or evenlooked her way before running away from her.
