In the Shadow of the Hanging Tree

by Michael A. McLellan

  “This monkey’s gonna be right tall, I reckon, Mister Fallwell, but he looks underfed,” Frederick Abbott said to the man in the fancy suit. “I’ll pay five hundred.”

  “Oh, I’ll have to respectfully decline, sir. I couldn’t part with Henry here for a penny less than six-fifty. He’s only eleven and already knows tobacco like the back of his own hand.”

  “It’s not the back of his hands I’m worried about, Mister Fallwell. Look here…” Frederick Abbott took Henry’s hands and turned them over. “This boy’s hands haven’t seen a single day of field work; not that I intend to use him for such, but how can I know I’m not going to have teach this boy what a day’s work is? I’ll pay six hundred or take my leave.”

  The man in the fancy suit—Mister Fallwell—quickly scanned the thinning group of possible buyers before saying: “You are a shrewd negotiator, sir. He is yours.” He stuck out his hand and Frederick Abbott shook it absently.

  “I’d be grateful if you’d have the niggers delivered to me by tomorrow.”

  “Of course, Mister Abbott. I’ll make the arrangements.”

  5

  Henry was allowed to gather his things before being led naked through the rear of the stable by the fat man with the ever-present cigar. It was a short walk past an already harvested corn field. Forgotten stalks, bent and brown, whispered to themselves in the light breeze.

  They entered a smaller barn which canted appreciably to one side. The interior was dim and dusty. The fat man pointed to an open stall.

  “You’ll sleep over there,” he said. Sunrise tomorrow I’ll be takin’ you and the big one down south of Boonville. C’mon now, get dressed.” The fat man waited for Henry to put on his clothes, then ushered him over to the stall.

  “Over here, boy,” he said, stepping over the legs of two other slaves sitting against the plank wall of the barn. “Sit on down here.”

  Henry did as he was told, sitting against the wall in the thick bed of sour smelling hay on the barn’s dirt floor. The fat man gathered up a length of chain that was attached to the other two men’s ankles and deftly fastened the cuff to Henry.

  “Got to protect Mister Abbott’s investments. Once I get you delivered, you’ll be his worry.”

  Henry began to cry. The fat man looked at him with something like wonder.

  “Wooo, whooo, whooo. Little nigglet missing his mama?” He slapped Henry across the mouth. “You shut that shit up, now. Mister Abbott ain’t gonna take too kindly to a sniveling nigger.” He leaned in close and exhaled a breath that reeked of whiskey, stale tobacco, and rotten teeth. “And hear me, nigger, you don’t want to get on Mister Abbott’s bad side.” He gave the chain a rough shake, then turned and walked out of the barn.

  “You and me going to the same place. You a field hand?” John Brown asked, eyeing Henry doubtfully from his place a few feet from Henry.

  Henry wiped his eyes. “I ain’t never worked a field, yet. I tied tobacco and hung it.”

  “What’s your name?”

  “Henry.”

  “You ain’t never wore chains before, neither.” It wasn’t a question.

  “No, sir.”

  “I ain’t no white boss, boy. You call me John, and I’ll call you Henry. This here,” John cocked his head to the man sitting next to him, “is Thomas. He’ll be travellin’ with us as far as New Franklin.”

  Thomas, who was younger than John Brown, nodded his head to Henry. “You ought’n not be crying lest you wanna git whooped.”

  “You never mind that,” John said, looking sternly at the younger man.

  The barn door opened and the fat man and a young slave woman entered. The fat man stood beside the open door with his arms crossed, and the woman, who was carrying a woven basket, walked over to the stall where Henry and the two men were chained. She removed large pieces of cornbread from the basket and handed them around without a word.

  “You’re right pretty,” Thomas said, smiling.

  “I’m not supposed to talk to you,” the woman whispered. “I’m sorry there’s no beans.”

  “Thank you for the cornbread, missy,” John said.

  “Thank you,” Henry said, already enthusiastically stuffing the cornbread in his mouth.

  The woman gave them a nod then hurried back to where the fat man was waiting. He gave her an impatient shove through the door.

  After the meager meal, Thomas began singing softly, under his breath. Henry couldn’t place the song but thought he’d heard it sung by Harriet. Listening to the familiar but unnamable melody, he looked forward with apprehension and a child’s hope. He wondered what his life with his new master would be like.

  6

  “Where’d you get those scars on your back?” Henry asked, breaking the silence. He and John Brown were sitting in the back of the buckboard eating stale biscuits and waiting for the fat man to return from delivering Thomas to his new master. They were both chained to a thick, metal ring fastened to the side of the wagon. The fat man hadn’t allowed any talking on the trip from Fayette to New Franklin, stating that there was nothing surer to get a man’s head to aching than listening to a bunch of niggers conversating for three hours.

  “Tied to a tree is where I got them. If you’re askin’ why I got them, it’s because I’m a slave. Masters don’t need no reason to give a whippin’.”

  John could see by Henry’s expression that his answer wasn’t satisfactory. He sighed. “I reckon I got the worst of ‘em on account of I couldn’t keep my mouth closed when I was young—not young like you, young like Thomas. I had to learn the hard way, you don’t back-sass the free folks. You ain’t been whipped yet?”

  “No. I ain’t never. Amos Caulfield sometimes swatted me with a willow switch if’n he thought I was moving too slow.”

  John Brown looked at Henry with something like pity. “Well, you gonna get hit with somthin’ worse than a willow branch from time to time, but not so much if’n you do what you’re told an’ be quiet when you’re supposed to and make noise when you’re supposed to.”

  “When am I supposed to make noise?”

  “Some places, they want you singin’ while you’re workin’. That ways they can know you ain’t run off, even if they can’t see you.”

  “Have you lived in a lot of places?”

  “Yes, I have. More’n I care to count.” John caught movement out of the corner of his eye and glanced without turning his head toward the big house where the fat man had taken Thomas. “Quiet down now. He’s comin’.”

  The fat man strode up. “You two comfy back there?” he asked sarcastically as he climbed into the wagon’s driver’s seat. “The missus served up some fine tea and cakes.”

  7

  They arrived at their destination less than an hour later. The house was a huge, two-story timber-frame—much larger than Master Fordham’s, which Henry had thought grand—and was situated majestically among manicured hedges and a sprawling lawn. The gabled roof extending over the porch was supported by six towering, white pillars.

  The fat man turned off the main road and coaxed the horses slowly up the neat drive to the house. When the wagon was close, a man strode down the porch steps and waved the fat man off to the left. “Take them around back!” he called, walking in that direction himself.

  They rounded the house. The rear’s appearance wasn’t given quite as much care as the front, and tools of plantation living were scattered here and there.

  The fat man stopped the wagon in front of a long hitching rail with two large water troughs at either end. “You niggers are home,” he said, stepping down from the wagon and walking to the rear. He reached over the side and began unlocking the chains that held Henry and John Brown.

  “Any trouble?” the man who had come from the front porch asked as he walked up and regarded Henry and John with a flat expression.

  “No. No trouble at all,” the fat man replied, continuing to work the shackle on Henry’s ankle.

  “Well, you can leave them wit
h me as soon as you get them loose. You water your team and I’ll have the kitchen girl bring you out a glass of beer and a couple boiled eggs.”

  “I’m grateful, Mister…?

  “Lawrence Townley. I’m Mister Abbott’s responsible order.” He extended his hand.

  The fat man turned from his work and shook the other man’s hand. “David Cornish,” he said.

  “I’ll see to that beer, Mister Cornish.

  The fat man—Cornish— finished unshackling Henry and John Brown. He then led the horses to one of the water troughs and stood there while they drank. Soon a girl of about Henry’s age came out of the back door carrying a tray with a blown glass mug full of beer and a small bowl of boiled eggs on it. The girl set the tray on a knee-high cedar round next to the water trough and hurried back to the house. Henry looked after her curiously.

  “I’d like to have me some of those eggs,” John whispered quietly to Henry, who smiled and nodded his assent.

  Lawrence Townley reappeared a short time later and addressed Henry and John: “You can climb down now. Follow me. Good day, Mister Cornish.” Townley tipped his rather misshapen, felt hat at the fat man and started off toward a series of outbuildings several hundred feet behind the main house. He didn’t look back.

  “C’mon, Henry. Follow along, quickly now,” John said, getting up and hopping down from the wagon. Henry glanced at the fat man, who was leaning on the front of the wagon looking at him with a smirk and also jumped down.

  They followed Townley past what appeared to be two large supply sheds and a massive barn before stopping at a cleared-out area where four wood stakes had been driven into the ground to make a large rectangle. There were several stacks of planks and timbers, some as tall as a man, laid out some feet away.

  “The master should be along shortly,” Townley said, then pulled a pipe from his pocket and knocked it several times against the palm of his hand before retrieving a small leather pouch from the same pocket and refilling it.

  “I see they made it,” Frederick Abbott said walking up from the barn. He addressed Townley without even looking Henry and John’s way. “Are those stakes at forty feet and sixty feet as I asked?”

  “To the inch,” Townley replied, striking a match and lighting his pipe.

  Frederick Abbott turned to John. “You’re a carpenter?”

  “Yessir, Master Abbott.”

  “You remembered my name.” He looked John up and down. “You are a smart one, aren’t you? Are you really thirty-two years old, boy?”

  John lowered his eyes. “I don’t rightly know, Master Abbott, sir.”

  “I knew that hornswoggler Fallwell was just spinning a tale. You can build me a drying barn, though?”

  “Yessir, Master Abbott, sir.”

  “Then you can begin tomorrow. This boy,” he cocked his head toward Henry, “will be your helper and will remain your charge until I instruct you otherwise. I will provide you with additional labor when it is required. Do you understand?”

  John’s eyes darted briefly to Henry then back to his owner. “Yessir, Master Abbott, sir.”

  Frederick Abbott turned back to Townley. “Lawrence, lash this nigger ten…and five for the boy, then quarter them in the tack-barn until they can build a suitable place for themselves—” Townley began to interrupt in protest, but Abbott put up a hand and cut him

  off.

  “I don’t want these two fraternizing with the field hands and I’m certainly not going to quarter them with the house help. They can work on the barn six days and do their own work on Sunday after I read from the good book. Do as I ask, now.”

  “I’ll see to it, Mister Abbott.”

  Frederick Abbott started down the path toward the house. “Oh, and Lawrence, when you’re finished, have Eliza tend to their wounds and get their supper.”

  Two

  1

  Henry awoke with a start. It was fully dark. He gave Eliza a gentle shake and crawled out of the lean-to. He walked several feet away and urinated into the thicket. He didn’t think it was very late—possibly nine o’clock—but he wanted to get moving right away nonetheless. He was a good deal more afraid of being discovered than he’d let on to Eliza.

  “Do you want to eat something before we go?” Eliza asked, poking her head out of the lean-to.

  “I’d like to eat everything we have,” he replied, finishing his business. He walked back and crawled back into the lean-to. “A little of that molasses would taste good.”

  “I can’t see a thing and I’d just get it all over the place. Have some bread.” She cut two more slices off the dwindling loaf—a thick one for Henry and a much thinner one for herself—and stowed everything away. A short time later they were on their way.

  They kept as close to the river as they could, circling well around any lamplight given off by homesteads and farms. Not long after midnight, after veering inland, away from what appeared to be a ferry crossing—Chaney’s they assumed, though neither of them had ever actually been there—they came across a small apple orchard. The apples had already been harvested, but they were able to find a few pithy, worm-eaten stragglers as they nervously searched the trees by the light of the moon.

  “You brought me the first apple I ever ate,” Henry said quietly, putting a pair of the apples in his coat pocket for later. “Not long after I first came to Master Abbott’s.”

  “And you ate the whole thing, worm and all,” Eliza said with a laugh. “And you don’t have to call that wicked man master anymore, Henry. We don’t have to call anyone master ever again.”

  “I know. It’s gonna take some gettin’ used to, that’s all. C’mon, we should keep moving. We don’t want to get caught stealing apples.

  Even ones that have been left to rot.”

  As if cued, a dog started barking not far off. Henry grabbed Eliza’s hand and hurried around the orchard and back down by the river, upstream of the ferry crossing. Eventually the dog ceased barking.

  “I want goats,” Eliza said out of the blue as they briskly walked the high bank of the Osage river. They hadn’t seen a house in awhile, and they were on a stretch of riverbank that was more high grass than trees and brush. They were making good time.

  “What do you want an ornery old goat for? All they do is eat.”

  “For the milk. Adeline Holm brought some milk from her goat when she came to call on Missus Abbott one time. She allowed I could try some of it. It was wonderful.”

  “I expect we’ll be raising a goat or two then…once we get settled. Anything else you want?”

  Eliza stopped. “Yes. One thing.”

  “What’s that?” Henry walked a few more steps before realizing Eliza wasn’t next to him anymore. He turned and walked back to her; a dark silhouette against a moonlit sky.

  “This.” She took his hand in hers, pulled him close, and kissed him in the hollow of his neck, tasting his sweat and savoring it. Tightening her grip she lowered herself down into the grass, pulling him down with her. The grass was dewy but neither of them noticed. The love was heated, urgent—much more so than what had become routine for the young pair. All of the growing tension and uncertainty caused by their newly found freedom was relieved, temporarily at least, in a few frantic moments. And for those moments, they felt truly free.

  Afterward they held each for a time, staring at the moon and listening to the musical chirping of a thousand crickets. But as their bodies and their passions cooled, both Henry and Eliza soon felt the need to get moving again.

  “I love you, Henry.” Eliza said, kissing him softly on his temple before standing up.

  Henry stood and pulled up his trousers, cinching them tight with the hank of hemp rope that served as his belt.

  “You’re all I’ve ever loved. Now c’mon, we should look for a place to stay the day so’s I can set some snares before the sun comes up. It sure would be nice to catch us a couple rabbits for breakfast.”

  2

  They weren’t as lucky as the previou
s night and had to travel quite a distance away from the river to find a location where they felt confident no one would come across them while they slept. They settled on a large, downed hickory. The deadfall was in a fairly dense, mixed stand of trees and was surrounded by a lot of underbrush. Henry thought it looked like a fair spot to try some snares.

  It was still too dark for Henry to confidently set any snares that actually had a chance of working so he risked lighting a small torch he fashioned out of a stick, some dried moss and a bit of the salted pork. He rubbed the piece of pork all over the moss, then tied the moss to the stick with a bit of thread Eliza had included in her drawstring bag. After tearing off a small hunk of the bread to use for bait, he headed out.

  He walked several hundred yards from the downed tree—Eliza stayed behind to prepare their meager meal—and lit the torch with the chunk of flint and scrap of steel John Brown had given him before running off into the night three years before. John Brown; his only friend, outside of Eliza. He couldn’t believe it had already been three years since he’d last saw him. He wondered what became of him. He wondered if John had fared as well as Henry and Eliza had after that night.

  He rubbed at the jagged scar running from just behind his left temple to midway down his cheek.

  He wondered…

  3

  “Jes don’t wail too much, if you can help it,” John Brown whispered as he and Henry walked ahead of Lawrence Townley toward the split-rail pasture fence.

  “That’s good, now. Take off your shirts and just spread your arms out on that top rail. That’s it, reach up there, boy, you can reach it,” Townley called from behind them.

  Henry, although tall for his age, couldn’t spread his arms across the fence rail so he just reached his hands up and grabbed on. Townley came up and tied John Brown’s hands to the rail then began with Henry’s.