To Love a Spy

by Aileen Fish

  “And I, Mrs. George Damon.”

  George leaned down and kissed her cheek. “Please be cautious, my darling. Take care of yourself.”

  “You too, George. Do not let anything happen to you. If you do...” Anna did not finish the words, but her chin firmed and her eyes narrowed.

  “You look angry.”

  “I will be if anything happens to you,” she said darkly.

  He chuckled. “Well then, I pity the man who harms me. I truly do.”

  She curved her lips in a smile, and the anger dissipated from her face.

  “How many children shall we have?”

  George sputtered and choked on an embarrassed laughed.

  “Oh, my dear, as many as you want.” He chuckled. “As many as you want.”

  ~*~

  George left two days later at dusk for Missouri. He could not tell Anna more about his destination, and she understood. He too found it easier to travel at night to escape detection.

  With plans to leave as well that night, Anna followed George out to the barn to say good-bye while the Napiers remained discreetly inside.

  He eyed her trousers, at first with surprise and then with a grin. He had not seen her traveling clothes, as she had worn her blue dress during her stay at the Napiers’.

  “My goodness!” he said. “You are a sight!”

  Anna could not tell if he meant his words as a compliment or an expression of shock.

  “It is the safest way for me to travel. Though my passengers know I am a woman, strangers whom I pass on the roads often do not.”

  “Very sensible of you, my dear, and quite, quite charming.” He folded her into his arms again, and she succumbed to his kiss.

  “Good-bye, my love,” he whispered against her ear. “I will return to you.”

  “You must, George,” she mumbled against his chest. “I do not think I can live without you.”

  “Nor I, you. Please take care of yourself,” he whispered. He set her from him brusquely and turned to bound up onto his horse. With a tip of his hat and a tight smile, he turned his horse and spurred him out of the barnyard.

  Anna fought back the tears that blurred her vision so that she could see the last of George’s straight back as he disappeared into the night. She swallowed hard, took a deep breath, determined she would see her husband again, and set her mind to her own journey that night.

  After a heartfelt good-bye to Mrs. Napier and the girls, Mr. Napier helped Anna hook the horses to the wagon, and they drove to a nearby farm to collect the escaped slaves. Mrs. Napier, as was her habit, had packed food and water enough for Anna and the two young men.

  Mr. Samuels, a small, portly man who reminded Anna of her father, led the emaciated and weak men out to the wagon. Anna wondered if they would survive the journey. She had never lost a passenger to death yet, and she had no intention of doing so on this journey.

  “I thought the slave catchers were a thing of the past, but there’s been a couple of fellas around asking about runaway slaves. They say they’re from Missouri, and it’s still illegal to harbor slaves. They say they caught one man trying to make it across the border with a couple of slaves.” Mr. Samuels kept his voice low.

  “That must have been the conductor, Mr. Biggs,” Mr. Napier said in a whisper. “I wonder if he has been arrested.”

  A shiver went up Anna’s spine, but the look of terror on the faces of the young men gave her strength.

  “Come, get in the wagon. We must cover you with blankets. This will be a long journey, but we will stop for rest breaks.”

  “Yes, miss,” one of them said. They looked alike, and Anna wondered if they were brothers.

  “What are your names?”

  “Sam. This here’s my brother, Joe.”

  “So you are brothers!” she said. “Well, cover up and stay quiet. Everything is going to be all right.”

  “You taking us to the Promised Land, miss?” Sam asked.

  “I’m taking you north for a while. Other people will take you the rest of the way.”

  Sam nodded, and he and Joe turned on their sides and pulled the blankets over their heads.

  “Please be careful, Anna. Mr. Samuels says he does not know where the slave catchers have gone or if they returned to Missouri.”

  “I will, Mr. Napier. I am in the mood to shoot any slave catchers I encounter, so more is the pity for them.” She was cranky. She already missed George, hated the Civil War that took her from him, and wanted to shoot anyone who tried to enslave another human being.

  “That’s the spirit, Miss Douglas.” Mr. Samuels laughed quietly. “Safe travels.”

  “Good-bye, Mr. Samuels. Good-bye, Mr. Napier, and thank you for everything.”

  “It was a pleasure, my dear. Good-bye.”

  The men stood back while Anna urged the horses forward. She headed north out of town under the light of a full moon. She could have wished that the moon were less full, but she had little choice. The horses knew their way.

  An hour north of Salem, Anna noted that Sam and Joe were quiet, and she wondered if they had fallen asleep. That was probably the best way to travel, she thought, to sleep through it.

  Suddenly, she heard a sound separate from the plodding hoofs of her own horses—the sound of other horses coming up the road. Anna thought quickly. She often encountered other horses on the road near dawn, especially farmers, but not normally after sunset and not so far distant from a town.

  Anna scanned the road as best she could in the dark. She could either pull the wagon off the road and hope that whoever passed did not see her under the light of the moon, or she could simply keep moving and hope that the rider or riders simply nodded and kept going, thinking little of a farm lad taking his wagon of goods to the next town for the morning market.

  The flat fields on either side of the road did not lend themselves to concealment, but she thought that might be her best option, given that Mr. Samuels had reported some slave catchers had been in the area. She guided the horses off the road and bumped along in a field for a bit until she brought them to a standstill.

  No sooner had she stopped, then two riders on horses galloped past and headed up the road at a dangerous speed, Anna thought, given that it was night.

  “There is nothing to fear, gentlemen,” she whispered. “Just two riders. I thought it best to pull off the road. Are you all right?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” someone said.

  Anna waited for about five minutes before returning to the road. The pounding in her heart slowed, and she wished that George were beside her. But he was not, and she must proceed on with fortitude.

  She firmed her trembling chin, stiffened her spine and returned the wagon to the road. She positioned the rifle squarely at her side and listened carefully for the sound of hooves other than those belonging to her own horses, but heard none.

  After an hour passed, Anna relaxed her grip on the reins. Whoever the riders had been, they had raced ahead, hopefully never to be seen again.

  “Hold there!” a shout came from behind a thicket of bushes to her right. Anna gasped and flicked the reins hard to urge the horses into a gallop. Two riders raced out from behind the bushes. She knew the wagon could not outrun them, but she was not about to surrender.

  With one hand on the reins, she felt for the rifle at her side. She would have to let go of the reins to fire, and she could not yet see her pursuers.

  “Stay down!” she muttered over her shoulder to Sam and Joe.

  One rider raced past the wagon and rode ahead of her horses, grabbing one by the reins.

  “Let go!” she shouted. “Let go of my horses!” She looked over her shoulder to see the other rider coming up on her right.

  Anna urged the horses again, but they could go no further. Both riders held their reins and brought them to a halt.

  Even in the night, she recognized Mr. O’Reilly. He had changed little in two years. She did not recognize his companion, a dark-bearded, brawny man.


  “Well, well, Miss Douglas, so it is you!” he said. “I heard that a white woman had been running fugitives north, and I wondered if it was you. I see you’re wearing men’s clothing, but I can see it’s you, right enough. I’m not likely to forget you.”

  “Oh, I remember you too, Mr. O’Reilly! You have no right to hold my wagon like that. Let go at once!”

  When no man made any effort to do so, Anna dropped the reins and reached for her rifle. She cocked it and raised it, aiming directly at Mr. O’Reilly’s chest.

  “I will shoot you if you interfere with me,” she growled.

  Mr. O’Reilly, hardly looking intimidated, smiled. “We’ve been here before, you and I. You scared me off with that gun once before, missy, but not again. I don’t think you have the courage to shoot. Let’s see what you’ve got in the wagon.”

  “No!” she shouted. “This is my wagon! Let go of my horses.”

  “Now, Miss Douglas, a right proper lady like you ain’t gonna shoot me. We are searching for two slaves who ran away from the Damon hemp plantation over in Lafayette County.”

  Anna gasped. Damon? George’s family? Hadn’t George said that his father would not pursue escaping slaves?

  She kept the rifle pointed, but her aim wavered.

  “The Damon plantation? What do you mean?”

  “Oh, you know them? Well, now, if this isn’t a small world! It would be a lot easier for us to talk if you’d lower that gun,” Mr. O’Reilly said.

  Anna shook her head. “How do you know the Damons?”

  “Don’t rightly know the Damons. It was their neighbor, Mr. Wilson, who hired us. Sent us off in search of two slaves who escaped from Damon’s hemp plantation. Old man Wilson thinks Mr. Damon sets a bad precedent by not pursuing his slaves, and he wants to teach folks a lesson.”

  “That does not make any sense,” Anna spat out. “Why would one man chase another man’s slaves?”

  “Because some of Mr. Wilson’s slaves are kin to Damon’s slaves, and he’s heard rumblings of a mass escape. He wants to bring these two back to show that escape is impossible.”

  Anna noticed Mr. O’Reilly had moved his horse closer to her as they spoke. He was almost within reach of grabbing the gun. She had promised herself that she would shoot if a slave catcher pursued them, and that time was now.

  Just then, a shot rang out in the darkness, and it did not come from her. The horses bolted, and Anna dropped her rifle and fell back against her seat, hitting her head on the bench board. As her wagon raced past Mr. O’Reilly, she saw his mouth open. A dark stain appeared on his chest, and he fell from his horse. Another shot sent her horses into another frenzy of speed, and she fell to her knees in the buckboard, clinging to the bench seat and trying to orient herself. She could not find the reins and feared they had slipped from her hands and now dragged in the dirt behind the horses.

  “Sam, Joe, get ready to jump. I have lost control of the wagon!” she screamed. Trying to scramble back onto her seat, she looked over her shoulder to find Sam and Joe on their feet, hanging on to the back of the bench.

  A rider raced past her, and she searched for the gun. Perhaps it was not Mr. O’Reilly, who looked to have been shot, but it could have been his companion.

  A voice shouted, and the rider reached over to grasp the reins of the left horse. She recognized the dark hat pulled low over his face.

  “George!” she shrieked. The horses slowed and came to a halt. George rode up beside her and jumped onto the wagon to take her into his arms.

  “Oh, George!” she sobbed against his chest. “You are here! You are here!” she cried. “I did not want to shoot them, but I was going to.”

  “Hush, my love. It is over now. They will not bother you again. Not those two anyway.”

  “How are you here? I saw you ride away to the south.”

  “I heard horses riding fast, and I pulled off the road to see what the commotion was about. I saw O’Reilly go by, and I recognized him instantly. I knew he must have been searching for the two men you were taking north. I followed.”

  “I am so grateful that you did. Sam, Joe, this is Mr. Damon, my husband.”

  Sam and Joe stiffened.

  “Damon?” Sam asked hoarsely.

  Anna turned back to George and whispered.

  “George, these two men are from your father’s plantation. A neighbor, Mr. Wilson, hired Mr. O’Reilly to track them down. Said something about an escape and teaching people a lesson.”

  George nodded. “Yes, my father has a vast plantation. I do not know Sam and Joe, but I have been gone for years. I wondered if I would encounter runaway slaves from the plantation one day. Slaves have been slipping away from his plantation for years. Wilson is an evil tyrant who bullies even my father, and I do believe he thinks he can teach the slaves a lesson by hiring thugs to bring them back.”

  He rose to his feet and turned to Sam and Joe, who had dropped to their knees in the bed of the wagon as if defeated.

  “I am not taking you back to the plantation, men. That is my father’s plantation, not mine. Do not fear me. Do as Mrs. Damon instructs, and she will carry you to safety. You are free now.”

  “Free?” Sam asked. “You not gonna take us back?”

  George shook his head. “No, of course not. I do not believe in slavery. I wish I could free you all, but my father owns the plantation, not I.”

  “Everything will be all right,” Anna said softly. She took George’s hand and rose. “Come, let us take a break.”

  Sam and Joe climbed off the wagon and disappeared into the grass to perform the necessaries. At this point, Anna wondered if they would run away in the darkness. She hoped not.

  She turned to George and wrapped her arms around him, relishing the safety of his strong frame.

  “Oh, my husband, I am so glad to see you again.”

  “Your husband,” George whispered against her ear. “You do not know how happy those words make me.”

  “What an awful coincidence that Sam and Joe should come from your father’s plantation,” she said.

  “Yes, but perhaps destiny has played a part in this night, as the son of the slave owner fights for their freedom. And his wife carries them to the Promised Land.”

  George smiled tenderly and kissed her.

  “When I left, I wished that you were beside me,” Anna said. “I know it is wrong and selfish, but I longed to see you again only moments after you had left.”

  “It is not wrong or selfish, my darling. It is love. We will endure these hardships, and we will go on to have a happy life. I promise you.”

  To Anna’s surprise, Sam and Joe returned, albeit as if with reluctance. Anna could reassure them no more, but she directed them to take some water and a bite to eat.

  “Do you want something to eat, George? I noticed Mrs. Napier packed you quite the box of delectables before you left.” Anna smirked and George grinned.

  “No, I cannot. I must turn back. I think it prudent to hide the bodies lest you be implicated in their murder, and then I must be on my way.”

  Anna shivered. Bodies, murder. So, George had killed them. And so he should have.

  “I understand,” she said. She reached up to cup his face in hers.

  “Be careful, George Damon. You are my life.”

  He kissed her thoroughly and turned to mount his horse.

  “Sam, Joe, congratulations on your newly found freedom!”

  They nodded but only stared at George.

  He looked down at her and tipped his hat.

  “Good-bye, my love. I will see you soon!”

  Anna reached for George’s hand and gave it a last squeeze before watching him trot away.

  With a heavy heart, she urged Sam and Joe back into the wagon, and away to the Promised Land they went.

  Chapter 12

  Anna returned home at dawn four days later with Sam and Joe in tow. The signs of their emaciation had lessened, and in the days of enforced rest in the back of the wagon wit
h ample food and water, their cheeks had filled out.

  Her father came rushing out of the house.

  “My dear, I am so glad to see you home safe and sound.” He embraced her and turned to greet Sam and Joe.

  “Welcome, welcome,” he said. “You will stay with us for a few days until you can be delivered to your next stop. Mrs. Brickman will show you to your quarters.” He nodded to Mrs. Brickman, who embraced Anna.

  While Mrs. Brickman led Sam and Joe into the house, Anna and her father unhitched the horses and led them into the barn to feed and water them. She apprised her father of the events at the Napiers’ regarding the missing conductor, the arrival of George and the pursuit by Mr. O’Reilly. She also mentioned that Sam and Joe were slaves from the Damon plantation. She delayed, however, in telling him that she was now married.

  “While I am sorry for the death of any man, I choose you over them,” her father said. “I am forever grateful that George happened to be there.”

  “Well, he did not simply happen to be there, Father. He was coming to Jones County to see me.”

  “Was he terribly angry to find you transporting escaped slaves?”

  “Yes, he was,” she said with a faint smile. “Very, but he resigned himself to it.”

  “That was my last hope,” her father said with a sigh. “I prayed that once George found out and forbad it, you would give up this notion and let us find a worthy man to act as conductor.”

  “Father, you know full well that I do not like to be forbad anything, and certainly not by a man who is not my father or my husband.”

  She held up her left hand and wiggled her fingers.

  “Do you see anything different about me?”

  Her father studied her face.

  “No, not really, my dear. You look tired.”

  “My hand, Father.”

  He studied her hand with a perplexed expression and shook his head.

  Anna sighed. “I know Mrs. Brickman would decipher this immediately. Did you know that Mr. Napier was a minister?”

  Her father’s mouth dropped, and he stared at her hand.

  “You are married?” he gasped.