The Night Angel

by T. Davis Bunn

  “What you said about Joseph, you wasn’t jesting?”

  Falconer walked to the edge of the veranda, where he stood in full sunlight. The poplar grove looked empty. He waved his arm back and forth over his head. And waited.

  A man stepped from the shadows. Falconer pointed and asked, “Do you see him there?”

  From the doorway, the woman clasped her hands to her chest and murmured, “Never in all my born days.”

  Falconer motioned again, and the man disappeared. “Do you think your master will speak with me?”

  “For gold, Massuh Moss, he’d rise from the grave.” She turned back toward the inside, then said, “You be wantin’ to come inside, suh?”

  Even standing in the doorway was enough to hint at the foul odors inside. “I’ll stay where I am.”

  “I’ll have the girl bring you a pitcher of spring water and some biscuits.” She left the door open and shuffled away.

  Falconer tested a high-backed porch chair before easing down. Truth be told, he was as weary as from a night of hard fighting. He was not made for a horse’s back, and the trek from Richmond had tired him mightily. He pulled the chair forward to where he could prop his feet on the railing. In three minutes he had fallen asleep.

  “Who wants to talk with me about gold?” a voice demanded.

  Falconer dropped his feet with a thump. It was unlike him to give way so easily to slumber, especially when in unknown surroundings. He rose to his feet. “My name is Mr. John, at your service.”

  “John? Uncommon strange last name.” Moss was a pudding-faced man, lumpish with fat and foul ways. His hair was a scraggly mess and so pale as to be translucent. His eyes held a greedy tightness. “You’re not from around these ways.”

  “No, sir. I hail from Washington now, but I have spent the past decade on the island of Grenada.”

  “Is that a fact.” The man’s interest faded. He turned to the woman hovering in the doorway. “Where’s that coffee?”

  “Done put it on to brew, suh.”

  “Well, be quick about it.” He turned back. “You’ll be wanting a drop of something stronger than that well water is my guess.”

  “The water will do me fine.”

  “Hmph.” Moss frowned his opinion of a man who did not drink. “Well, I’m a busy man, Mr. John. The girl said you wanted to talk some business.”

  “Indeed, sir. I wish to buy your slaves.”

  “Which one?”

  “All of them.”

  Moss laughed until he coughed. “All? That’s absurd, man. How would I live?”

  “I’ll answer that,” Falconer replied, “after you hand over my gold coin.”

  Moss started to object, but something he must have recognized in Falconer’s face kept him silent. Even so, his hand only hovered over his watch pocket. Finally he pulled it out and dropped it into Falconer’s hand. The act left him angry. “I asked you a simple enough question.”

  “And I shall answer in kind. You will not require your slaves, sir, because I wish to buy your plantation as well.” Falconer held up his hand to halt the protest. “I will pay in gold.”

  The eyes tightened further. “This land has been in my family for five generations.”

  Falconer said nothing. He merely glanced down at the broken front step.

  Moss flushed but held his anger in check. “A place this fine, I’d expect top dollar.”

  “Which I will pay.”

  The negotiations took the better part of two hours. They would have taken far longer if Falconer had not been impatient to be off. He could feel the homestead’s misery like a stain in his heart. Finally Moss brought out the yellowed deeds and land surveys and signed a covenant agreeing to sell Falconer the land, buildings, and slaves. “I’ll be taking your remaining farm workers with me now.”

  Moss’s hands itched for the gold still in Falconer’s fist. “Now, why would you be thinking I’d agree to any such thing?”

  “Because they’re the ones you would most likely sell again before I return.”

  Moss started to protest, but something in Falconer’s gaze halted the words unformed. “You ain’t taking my house women. I ain’t keeping my own table for the three weeks you got to return with the rest of my payment.” He reached out. “Now give me my gold!”

  Falconer handed over his remaining coins. He had twenty-one days to return with the remaining sum. He had fought hard for more time. But Moss had burned with resentment over needing to sell the farm at all. The tight timing was his prized bargaining chip, the only reason Falconer was able to leave with any of his slaves. “You can keep one house servant, long as it is not Geraldine. She comes with me.”

  “Eh, what’s that?” Moss was so intent upon counting his money he took a long moment to look up. “How’d you come about knowing the name of one of my women?”

  Falconer gave the answer he had just formulated. “I acquired Joseph from the Burroughs innkeeper. I intend to make him my overseer.”

  “Here on the farm?”

  “No. At a mine down in Carolina. I find my men work better if their families are intact.”

  Moss pondered that a while, then waved his hand in dismissal. “Take her. And good riddance to the both of them.”

  Falconer rose, for to stay a moment longer would have risked him breaking his vow. He folded the deed of sale, stowed it in the now-empty pocket, and said, “I shall see you in three weeks or less.”

  “You don’t, the gold you done left here is mine, we clear on that?” Moss pitched his voice loud enough to chase after Falconer. “Come dawn on that twenty-second day, you done lost yourself a passel of coin.”

  Chapter 12

  In the end, they took the old woman they called Mammy along with them as well. Joseph claimed Moss wouldn’t notice the loss, as he had never come down to the quarters since his father’s demise. And Geraldine was loath to leave the old woman. Nobody else looked after her. So she came. There were twenty in all, less the young man who had vanished into the forest, and not counting Joseph. They were aged from nine to years beyond count. Mammy had no idea how old she was. She rarely spoke at all. Geraldine rode the mare and Mammy was on one mule, while the second mule toted their gear. They held to a slow pace and made only a few miles before they stopped for the night.

  Geraldine was by then too weary to help her husband cook up their remaining provisions, so Falconer joined Joseph by the campfire. The three sacks of cornmeal and side of fatback were swiftly cooked and consumed. But no one would take it from Falconer’s hand. They might have been starving, yet none would meet his eye or take his food. So Falconer tended the fire while Joseph set his two children to gathering up large leaves on which to serve the meal. The others accepted their fare and ate without once looking Falconer’s way. They all sipped from Joseph’s one cup, refusing to touch Falconer’s, though he left it on the rock by the pot. Joseph shared his plate with Geraldine and the boys. Falconer took his own provisions to one side and ate alone, knowing it was wrong to feel ashamed, yet feeling it just the same.

  Most of the group curled up and slept, long trained to take rest when and where they could. Joseph’s two boys nestled up to either side of their mother. Falconer heard a few soft words from the trio, then nothing. From the surrounding forest he heard one lark. Or perhaps a mockingbird. From farther still came the faint rumblings from the Petersburg Turnpike. But they were alone here in their small clearing. Which was a good thing, because Falconer needed time to plan.

  Joseph refilled Falconer’s cup and used it as an excuse to approach. Falconer took that as a gift of trust and returned it, saying, “I need to discuss something with you. Ask your advice.”

  Joseph remained standing to one side. “Don’t recall ever hearing a white man say those words to me before.”

  “We have twenty souls in need of safety. Twenty-one, counting yourself.”

  “Twenty-two,” Joseph corrected.

  “I didn’t count myself.”

  “I wasn�
�t neither.” Joseph motioned with his chin toward the forest. “The boy’s been back since you started frying up that meat.”

  “The one who ran?”

  “The very same.” Joseph raised his voice slightly. “You don’t come on out now, Aaron, I’ll eat this food myself.”

  The shadows among the trees were still a moment longer, and then a youth of perhaps sixteen stepped into view. He stood at the outskirts of the circle, his eyes glittering in the firelight. Joseph kept his voice low enough not to disturb the others. “You see where the vittles is at. Go on now. Eat up and get some rest.”

  The boy moved like a frightened animal, keeping the fire between himself and the two men, hunching over and taking the food in fierce gulps. He retreated back to the edge of the woods and, to Falconer’s eye, simply vanished.

  “Is he gone?”

  “Gone to sleep.” Joseph obviously saw what Falconer could not. “He’s smarter’n I reckoned. He’ll be with us from now on.”

  “I haven’t seen him before now.”

  “Aaron’s half wild. But he’s a fine worker when he sets his mind to the chore. And he can hit a turkey on the wing with a slingshot. Surest eye I ever did see.”

  “Can he shoot?”

  Joseph looked down at where Falconer sat. “You truly don’t know nothing, do you.”

  “I take that as a no.”

  “I reckon the boy could shoot the eye from a piney wood at five hundred paces if ’n somebody trusted him with a gun.”

  Falconer nodded slowly over all that comment contained. “We are out of money and out of provisions. Slow as we’ll be moving, I can’t see us making safety in less than a week.”

  Joseph hunkered down beside him. He pitched his voice lower still. “Where you aim on heading?”

  “That’s the problem. The map in my saddlebag shows the territories west of Virginia to be closer. But the mountains look formidable, and the roads are sketched out. Like they might be there, or they might not. Maryland is no help. They’re neither fish nor fowl on the slave issue. Back in Washington a black man walking on his own is as good as sold. Pennsylvania is our other choice, but that would be quite a trek.”

  “Did your map show you where the night riders is at?”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Night riders and bounty hunters both. Any Negro north of Richmond is fair game. You know what they do to a white man caught helping a Negro leave the slave states?”

  “We’ve spoken of this already.”

  “They brand ’em. They lash ’em. And they hang ’em.” Joseph shook his head. “Don’t head north.”

  “Then where?”

  Joseph picked up a stick and carved in the dust at his feet. The firelight revealed a man in the throes of hard choices.

  Finally he spoke. “You hear talk ’bout places that’ll help any slave that makes it to their land.”

  “Can you be certain about them?”

  “Ain’t never met no slave who’s got free and come back to talk.” Joseph continued writing in the dust. “There is one name. I heard about it since I was just a little child. Often enough and from enough different people, I reckon this might be real.”

  “Where is it?”

  “South,” Joseph replied. “Four days hard walkin’. Down the Catawba Trail.”

  Dawn found them well beyond Petersburg. They continued on the main route, headed now for a town with the unlikely name of Roanoke Rapids. The turnpike was home to every manner of folk, from wagonloads of settlers to dandy carriages and fast-moving postal riders. Falconer kept his people to the drovers’ trail that ran alongside the turnpike. That was how he thought of them now. His people. They did not trust him, and none save Joseph would either meet his gaze or speak his way. Which was not altogether bad. Already he was gathering the wrong sort of attention by being the only white slaver he’d seen on foot.

  The morning after he and Joseph spoke, Falconer had entered Petersburg with his mare and the two mules and returned on foot, leading mules piled high with provisions. Whether it would be enough to feed his people for five more days, Falconer had no idea. But it was all the merchant had been willing to offer for the gray mare, and also all the animals could carry. Falconer had not been sorry to see the last of that horse, at least initially. But the miles stretched far longer on foot, and by the time he arrived back at camp, he bitterly regretted both the decision and the need.

  The day remained overcast and close. Falconer distributed the sacks of goods among his people so that Mammy could ride one mule and Geraldine the other. The wagoners they passed frowned at the sight of a white man walking while his servants rode. The drovers spat his way. But Falconer soon grew too tired to notice.

  Their progress was slow, painfully slow. The people were bone weary in a manner that no single night’s rest could vanquish. The children in particular suffered. The fact that they did so in silence granted Falconer no peace. He kept his impatience to himself and urged them forward only in prayer.

  At Five Forks they halted for a cold midday meal. Aaron slipped away into the forest and once again was gone. Falconer glanced at Joseph, who shrugged a silent reply. The boy would return.

  Falconer walked alone into town. He traded his dagger, a fine instrument of damask steel with a hilt chased in gold cord, for two sacks of coffee, a round of cheese, and a bushel of pears. Even more than provisions, though, Falconer needed information. While the cheese was being wrapped and tied to the bushel, Falconer said, “I’m told I need to take a route called the Catawba Trail.”

  The merchant was clean-shaven and tall, which only accented the potbelly that was framed by his suspenders. “What on earth for?”

  “I’m after work in the mines.”

  The merchant humphed his opinion. “Well, for one thing, it ain’t called the Catawba Trail no more. It’s the Colonial Trading Route. Been that since my pappy started this here dry-goods store.”

  Falconer smiled in the direction of the woman bundling the coffee sacks together with twine. She was big boned where her husband was thin. She grew unsettled by his attention and bustled after a child crawling on the floor. Falconer asked the merchant, “Where did the original name come from?”

  “Catawba Injuns, I reckon. They’s still some down Carolina way. Used to be good trappin’ territory. Folks say Davy Crockett hisself carved out that road. Ain’t hardly used no more.”

  “Why is that?”

  Falconer was the only customer that overcast day, and the merchant appeared glad for the excuse to talk. “You know what they say about that region. God made the Carolina Piedmont last, and the good stuff was already done used up on Virginia.”

  Falconer waited through the merchant laughing at his own joke. “So how do I find this Colonial Trading Route?”

  “Ride west out of town. Can’t miss the trailhead ’cause there ain’t but one right-hand turning. Nowadays it ain’t hardly a road at all. You got wagons?”

  “Just mules.”

  “That’s good. On account of it being a ferocious bad route. Things get better once you make Burkeville and head south. Not a lot better, but some.” He slid Falconer’s knife from its scabbard, twisting and turning it so the blade caught the light. “This here’s some fine work.”

  “It was made in Africa, or so I was told.”

  The merchant caught Falconer’s wistful regret over losing the knife and made the weapon disappear under his counter. “So you’re after minin’ yourself some gold, are you?”

  “If I can.”

  “Well, you know what they say about a fool and his money. I was you, I’d stick to the turnpike far as Roanoke Rapids, then head west.”

  Falconer chose his words carefully. “I have friends along the Catawba Trail.”

  “Must be lonely folk is all I can say. Ain’t a town of any size between here and the state line.” He pushed Falconer’s purchases across the counter. “Keep a good watch at night. You carrying a musket?”

  “A Whitney.�
�

  “That should do ye. Tie them mules up tight. If the Injuns don’t get ’em, the bears will.”

  Chapter 13

  For Serafina, their voluntary quarantine became a time of remarkable contrasts. The weather closed down once more, as it had so often during that long winter. The downstairs front windows remained shuttered, while rain formed liquid bars upon the upstairs windows. Serafina was unable even to see the square’s opposite side at high noon. The street outside their home became a stone-bottomed river. There was little need for the Langstons’ three guards to warn anyone away. The downpour kept passersby to a minimum.

  She found the days almost comforting. The outside world was reduced to a distant worry. Each dawn she met with Mary and Gerald for a Bible study. Gerald had confessed to reading with difficulty, and Mary enjoyed this quiet communion together. Serafina found great peace in starting her day helping others to become closer to the Word.

  The study was halted each day when the Langstons’ carriage pulled up to their doorstep. An employee ran up the stairs and deposited two hampers outside the door. One was filled with the day’s provisions, and the other contained mail collected at the local post office, along with journals and an assortment of pamphlets. Alessandro Gavi spent hours pouring over the news. Their confinement weighed most heavily upon him. The fact that they were well cared for and were restrained by choice did not keep him from fretting.

  Together Serafina and Mary prepared a breakfast for themselves and the guards who had been on duty all night. Then Mary began her morning duties while Serafina prepared breakfast for her parents. It was another activity that gave her great comfort, one she insisted upon doing alone.

  The fourth morning after Falconer’s departure, Alessandro entered the kitchen as Serafina was unpacking the hamper of news and letters. He was dressed as usual in a smartly ironed dress shirt, cravat, vest, and street pants. He carried himself with a distracted air.

  Serafina kissed the top of his head as she set a cup of coffee topped with frothy hot milk in front of him. “Good morning, Papa. Would you like your morning papers?”