by Cathy Gohlke
“How far?” I asked, when we’d ridden a good hour.
“Settle back,” the boy ordered. “It’s near thirty miles, all told. Be dark when we get there, I hope.”
“We’re not going to the mountains?” I’d heard that slaves sometimes ran there to hide and make their way north.
“Not now. Pattyrollers and bounty hunters on every pass. They expect runaways to take to the hills, especially since John Brown’s hanging. They won’t expect you to go east, then north. Besides, you could get holed up in those mountains for weeks if snow comes in deep.”
Stargazer pulled true and smooth, like he was born to the harness, like he understood his role in all of this and would not let us down.
I must have dozed, for the sun moved across the sky. Jeremiah lay so still I wanted to check on him from time to time. Each time I did the boy with no name nearly snapped my head off. “Stop lookin’ under that rug! You got to be careful!” I offered to drive for a spell, but the boy scoffed me off, even though Stargazer was my horse. We passed few travelers on the road. I held my breath each time we came close, but no one stopped us to ask about runaways. We forced cheer to call our Christmas greetings to every soul we met, pretending we hadn’t a care in the world.
By midafternoon, some of the snow had melted. I wondered if the road would be solid enough for the boy to sleigh home when it came time. And when we took Stargazer on with us, how would the boy get home? But I knew better than to ask more questions.
The sun sank, our hands numbed with cold, and most of our food was gone by the time we reached Jamestown. We slid to a stop behind a hatter’s shop. A single lamp burned in the back window. “Squat down and wait here.” The boy jumped down and rapped softly on the window. The little man who opened the door took one look at the boy, peered nervously from side to side, then grabbed his coat and jerked him inside, slamming the door between us.
“WHAT’S HAPPENING?” Jeremiah whispered from beneath the rugs.
“Don’t know. Stay down. Our driver just got yanked in the back door of a hat shop.”
“Say what?”
“Hush,” I hissed. The back door opened.
“Can’t stop here. There’s already patrols out looking for runaways, and bound to come back this way,” the boy said, swinging up into the driver’s seat.
“Us?”
“Don’t know, but they ain’t picky about who they haul off. There’s another place, about a mile from here.” We were on our way again. “Both of you listen good. I’m taking you to a Quaker farm.” I thought of Mr. Heath and felt relief, knowing the welcome he or Miz Laura would have given, and they were only influenced by Quakers. “But don’t think you’ll get inside.”
“What?”
“Quakers are stopped near every week now, and sometimes their houses are searched. Patrols suspect they help runaways but can’t prove it. Quakers won’t be caught in a lie, so you can’t let them see you. That way they can say, ‘No, haven’t seen them.’ But they’ll help.”
“How can they help if they don’t see us?”
“I drop you near the woods by the river, then stop by their house and tell them you’re coming. You’ll have to give me that loaf of bread so’s I can give it to them in case anybody’s visiting, like it’s a Christmas gift I brung. You follow the river, till you come to a barn. Go through the downstairs, where the livestock keep, and climb the ladder to the main floor. Look on the wagon seat. You’ll find food and blankets. The Quakers leave it for you, but don’t want to see you. Past the barn is a smokehouse and a springhouse, then a ten-foot drop. In the clearing at the bottom of the drop is a marble tannin’ table. From the tannin’ table walk directly back toward the bank, maybe ten or twelve feet. There’s a brush pile. Behind the brush there’s a cave. Stay the night there. Don’t strike no light—it might be seen. Just before daylight go back to that wagon in the barn. Lift off the plank in the back, and—”
“And there’s a false bottom!” I shouted.
“Hush up, you fool!”
The boy and Jeremiah both glared at me in the dark. I didn’t need light to know that. “Sorry.”
“Do you realize how many people be risking their necks to help you?” The boy pushed back his cap, angry.
“I’m sorry,” I said again. “It’s just that my pa uses one to help—”
“I told you, I don’t want to know. And that’s something you need to heed. If you mess up now you could get that whole Quaker family in big trouble. It might be a few days before they can move the wagon if the roads ain’t clear. Just keep check for food and make sure you’re in before daylight.” He pulled to the side of the road. “Here’s where you get out. Follow the river. Just past these woods is the barn. Keep low. Keep quiet.”
“What about Stargazer?”
“Who?”
“My horse.”
“Say good-bye.”
“What do you mean? What do you mean, ‘Say good-bye’?” Even while I argued, I knew I had no choice and that there was no time. Jeremiah dragged me from the sleigh. I reached for Stargazer’s bridle, wanting to hold his head in my arms. “This is not the end, Stargazer. I’ll—” The boy clicked the reins and Stargazer pulled away.
Jeremiah shook me, but I stood, rooted in the snow, staring after the sleigh. I wanted to chase after it, but my feet wouldn’t move. Jeremiah grabbed both my arms and pulled me into the ditch. We stumbled down the steep bank, through the woods, toward the river. I bit my lip until tears blinded my eyes; their frozen streams stung my face. The rock in my throat burned like hot coals. I wanted to scream, to scream and scream. It wasn’t fair! None of it was fair.
I fell. Jeremiah pulled me to my feet. I must have followed him. I know he pulled me into the barn. That’s when I caught my senses and ran to the stalls, full of sudden hope. But there was no sign of Stargazer. I slammed my fist into the doorpost, angry with myself for not seeing this coming, angry for letting the boy take Stargazer, angry because I didn’t know how to change it.
A basket of food, woolen blankets, and a warm pot of coffee sat just where the boy had said they’d be. “Bless they souls,” Jeremiah whispered. But I couldn’t bless anybody.
Crouched low, we felt our way downhill to the tanning table, then backward, toward the brush pile. It took some time to find the small cave opening in the dark. Our fit into the narrow tunnel was tight, but it kept us from eyes and wind.
It wasn’t long before five gray-and-black-cloaked children trooped in front of the cave, whooping and hollering as they dragged sleds and shovels over the snow, around the tanning table. They hung lamps on low tree limbs and chased each other by lantern light and moonlight, stomping and kicking paths this way and that from the house to the barn and along the lower meadow in front of our cave. Our tracks would never be noticed. They’d thought of everything. The sounds of their merrymaking took my mind from Stargazer for a time, like when you stop worrying a splinter in your eye. While they played we ate thick slices of warm bread slathered in butter and raspberry jam, then chased it down with sweet, creamed coffee.
A little one, not more than three or four years, peeked in the cave and hollered, “Is thee home?”
An older boy ran by and swooped the little one into the air, tickling him and laughing. “Thee is always home with me, Jedediah!”
At last a woman’s voice called from the hill above us and the children stomped out of sight. We heard the farmhouse door latch. The laughter cut off, and the stillness hung heavy. My heart turned to Stargazer. Where was he now? Did the boy plan all along to take Stargazer, or was it just the way things worked out at the last? I wished I’d told him how Stargazer liked to be nuzzled, how he wanted his oats and mash, that he liked apples better than carrots, and a lump of sugar once a day. I wrapped my blanket tight around me and laid my head on my saddlebag. I thought of Pa back at the church, of William Henry, and Miz Laura, and now Stargazer, how the losses kept piling up, pulling me lower and lower. I wondered if there was any end to
sadness.
“You asleep?”
“Huh?” I mumbled, nearly gone.
“Merry Christmas, Robert Glover.” I heard the smile in Jeremiah’s voice.
“Merry Christmas, Jeremiah.” And then I knew no more.
It’s a good thing Jeremiah was a light sleeper or we might have missed our chance to reach the wagon before daylight. “Wake up, Robert. We got to go.”
“How do you know what time it is?” I tried to sit up but sleep called me back. Jeremiah shook me.
“Old moon’s lower in the sky. We can sleep in the back of that wagon.”
“All right. All right, don’t push.” But he did, and that’s what got us collected and back through the shadows and barn. I checked each stall, just in case the boy had come back in the night with Stargazer, but neither was there. We climbed the ladder again, pulled up the plank in the wagon, and spread our blankets along the bottom. We each used a saddlebag for a pillow and climbed in side by side. I pulled the plank back into place as best I could. “What if they don’t take the wagon out today? That boy said they might not if the roads aren’t good.”
“Snow don’t usually last long in these parts. If we don’t go we’ll be spending another night in that cave.”
“I guess there’s worse things.”
“They is,” Jeremiah agreed.
Even though the space was hard and tight, at least we were out of the wind, and the lowing of cattle below comforted me. I lay awake for a time, staring at the dark planks inches from my eyes, wondering how they’d fill the wagon. Thinking on it, I remembered that Pa sometimes filled his with straw or apples, potatoes or corn or tobacco, whatever was in season or just harvested. I must have dozed.
“Coffins! They’s coverin’ us up with coffins!” The terror in Jeremiah’s whisper grew, slapping me awake.
“Thee must drive this load of coffins to Petersburg, Brother Peter, and wait for the packages to be unloaded. There are two packages.” The strange voice spoke from the back of the wagon.
“Should I expect more along the way?” A second voice spoke from the driver’s seat.
“I do not know. Perhaps at the next stop. God will provide.”
“I don’t like this!” Jeremiah whispered. “What if they’s dead bodies in those coffins?”
“Hush!” I didn’t like it either, but that didn’t matter now.
“Speaking packages could cause a great deal of harm if thee be stopped along the road, Brother Peter. It is a good thing that packages do not speak, would thee not say?”
“It is a thing I hope is true, Brother.”
I stared at Jeremiah in the filtered light. We made motions not to speak again.
The barn doors opened and the driver, Brother Peter, clucked his tongue. The wagon lurched, found the frozen ground, and rolled forward. Icy wind bore its way through cracks in the sides and bottom of the wagon. We pulled our blankets over our heads and huddled back-to-back.
Hour after hour we rolled on. Brother Peter hummed tuneless ditties. Jeremiah and I talked in low voices when the wagon moved on open roads. He asked me about William Henry. I told him everything, about growing up together, about skinny-dipping and skunking and fishing and teaching him to read better than me, or that maybe it was reading that gave William Henry wings. He loved it so, he just took off. I told Jeremiah more about Miz Laura and how she loved William Henry, and how he was the best friend I’d ever had. Then I told him again about the night William Henry died, and why, how it was my fault. Jeremiah didn’t say anything. I rolled over and let the tears fall silently onto my saddlebag. A long time passed before a hand touched my shoulder. “It weren’t your fault, Robert. William Henry chose.” I couldn’t answer. I wanted to believe that, but I couldn’t.
I thought about Stargazer, but pushed it away. The pain was too raw. I wondered what Ma and Pa were doing, and Andrew—Rev. Goforth. I wondered what kind of stir our leaving had made. I wondered what Ma thought when she read my note, and what Pa would say when he learned about Jeremiah, and Ruby, and Grandfather. I wondered if Ma would tell him, and if she’d tell him she’d refused to help Jeremiah when I’d asked her. I wondered if Pa’d stay at Ashland or go home to Laurelea, and if Ma would go with him. I wondered what Emily would say once she learned I’d run away with Jeremiah. I sighed. Maybe it was better not to know.
Eventually, even though we traveled north, there was less snow and more solid, frozen ground, making the ride bumpier. Even with the blankets, I ached all over, and figured we’d be black-and-blue by the time we reached our journey’s end. Jeremiah never complained, and I thought well of him for it.
The first night we stopped just before dark. Brother Peter drove the wagon directly into a barn. Someone pulled the doors closed and began to unhitch the horses. “Thee will want a hot meal. I will care for thy horses. Mother wants to know how many packages?” It sounded like a boy, maybe nine or ten years old.
“Two,” Brother Peter said. “Two packages could be stored in the loft, could they not?”
“They could,” the boy replied. “Quilts are stored there, as well. Mother’s basket will soon be placed above the manger.”
“I need be on my way at first light,” Brother Peter said.
“And I will be here to help thee harness. But thee will want to speak with Father. The patrols are combing the road north. Our house was searched earlier today.”
“Are my packages safe here?”
“Father will know. He’s just returned from town.”
One pair of footsteps left the barn. The lighter pair led the horses to stalls. We could hear the sounds of feed and water being poured. The sound of water nearly did me in. I thought my bladder would burst before the boy finished and closed the barn door.
“Get that plank out quick!” Jeremiah and I made one voice. Traveling all day in a box has its drawbacks.
We slept well that night, despite the worry of the patrols. I was grateful for the loft, for the quilts, for the freedom to move around. The hot beef stew and apple pie from the basket filled and warmed us. Even my aches and pains didn’t seem so bad. We woke in time to get in the wagon just as the boy and Brother Peter opened the barn door. The boy lifted the plank off the back of the wagon, shoving in a sack of food and jug of water. He grinned at us but didn’t speak—just replaced the plank as though he hadn’t seen four wide eyes staring at him from the dark.
Some days we traveled until nightfall, some days only a few hours. Once we stopped for five days. Then Jeremiah and I hid in the loft of the farmer’s barn. It was hard to stay still and inside that long. At times I feared we’d been forgotten or that they’d gone to fetch pattyrollers. I didn’t tell Jeremiah my fears, but I think he had his own. Brother Peter came out to the barn then, at least once a day, and talked to himself about this or that, I think so we’d know he was there. And we’d see the farmer’s wife, who would bring us food. Not everyone minded seeing or talking to us, and that helped our spirits. Sometimes we’d begin our journey by night, along back roads.
Jeremiah and I talked as we rolled along open roads. I talked about Laurelea and begged Jeremiah to tell me about his life at Ashland. He told me about Nanny Sara, and how she raised him, about the nights they spent telling stories to each other in their cabin when Grandfather would let her leave the big house. But he clammed up when it came to talking about Grandfather, or his mother that he never knew, or what it was like to be a nearly white slave—the son of the owner—and live in the quarters. “Someday maybe I talk about that. Not now. Not while it nips at my heels.” So we speculated on what freedom might be like for him, what kind of work he might find, and where he might live, building the hope in our minds that we’d make it.
Brother Peter spoke aloud to himself if he had something to say to us, like, “Rider ahead.” Then we’d know to hush up and lie still.
I couldn’t guess how far we’d come or how far we had to go. At first I’d kept careful count of the days. But soon, with all the starts and sto
ps, the pulling off the road to hide until patrollers went by, and the sleeping at odd times, I lost track.
I began to wonder if we were really going to Petersburg. I feared Ma and Pa might give me up for lost or dead. The only sure thing is that we were always cold, always sore, and always afraid. If I had any doubts how dangerous our mission was, they were crushed late one afternoon, in what might have been the third week.
Sounds of a town surrounded the wagon—people talking, horses and their buggies rattling past us in the street. We glimpsed folks’ feet through cracks in the wagon. A couple of times we crossed cobblestone streets that rattled our bones. We knew to keep still.
“Where you goin’ with that load, Quaker Man?” The voice was surly and slurred, edged with whiskey.
“These coffins are to be delivered to Mr. O’Leary and Sons, Undertakers. Dost thee know the way to their establishment?”
“Their establishment?” The voice scoffed. “You got business for them, Quaker Man?”
“They have business of their own. I only supply the coffins.”
“Say, Sheriff, wasn’t one of those O’Leary boys jailed just last week? Somebody seen a runaway slinkin’ round their ‘establishment.’ I ’spect all those O’Learys was helping him. Can’t have that, can we, Sheriff?”
“No, sir. Can’t have that.” The crude voice laughed. “You wouldn’t happen to have runaways in those boxes, would you, Quaker Man?”
“My coffins come empty. I have seen no runaways. Thee may search if the law requires it.”
“Might not hurt to open up one or two—make sure.” The new voice must have belonged to the sheriff because Brother Peter stepped from his seat into the back of the wagon. We heard him pry up a lid.
“Art thou satisfied?”
“Open up that other one.” We heard the lid come up. Jeremiah and I held our breath. I chewed the sides of my cheek.
“Where you from, Quaker Man?”
“South—a goodly way.”
“Why would O’Leary send south for his coffins?” the sheriff asked.
