by Alex Myers
Hercules’s eyes showed the first light since Jack met him. He stepped forward and took the reins. “She does be lookin’ like a goodly horse, Mr. Jack. I’d say you got you a fine animal here.”
“I gave it to you.”
“You means to take care of?”
“No Hercules, I’m giving it to you.”
He assessed Jack warily. “Don’t no slave I know go having a horse this fine.”
“Hercules,” Jack said stepping closer, “you’re a free man. From my understanding, all I have to do is sign-off on these papers and you’re free. You can go wherever you want. Go back to your home.”
“Ah, Mr. Jack, I don’t knows what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything you don’t want to anymore. You’re your own man with your own mind.”
Hercules shook his head and rubbed his whiskered chin. “Mr. Jack, no disrespect, but I be not sure it be working like that.”
“What do you mean?”
“If’ I takes off heading back to Louisiana on a fine horse likes this, I won’t be making it far—papers or no papers. There be men that’ll take it from me for sure. Probably rip up my paper an’ keep me for they own.”
“Well, what if I bought you a train or boat ticket and had the horse shipped?”
“That be assuming there be something in Louisiana to go back to.”
“Don’t you have family somewhere, a wife or children or friends?”
“Mr. Jack, I be sold twelve times in the last ten years and I don’t know nothing ‘bout no family since then. I had me a wife once. A real fine woman, real educated, came from England, taught me to read and write. We had us a mess of children. Then they sold me and last I be hearing she still working for the boss man’s wife in New Orleans. I haven’t heard word from her in ten years.”
Jack’s plan to turn the man free collapsed. He thought for a moment and said, “Hercules, you can work for me and earn a fair wage and come and go as you please. I’m not really sure what your duties would be, but whatever they were, it wouldn’t be too tough.”
“You be living here in Virginia?”
“Yes, I sort of have a factory in Norfolk. There’s a man working there with me you might remember, his name is Kazmer.”
“Course I knows Mr. Kazmer. He be a good man. Treat me and Robbie Turner very nice.”
“Robbie is there too.”
There was fear in the man’s eyes. I can’t go back with you if’n Miss Mattie is there.”
“She’s not, we haven’t seen her in a long time. Almost a year in Virginia, at least, I’m pretty sure she won’t be coming around any time soon. There’s a problem, though. I think some bad folks here in Williamsburg kidnapped Kazmer. My aim is to get him back. What do you say? I’ve got a little business to take care of in Norfolk, and you’re more than welcome to accompany me back to the complex. You can work for a little money, room and board, until you figure out what you want to do.”
“I can come and go as I please?” Then after a pause, climbing deftly onto Arapaho, “I might likes you being the bossman. Lil’ Robbie be living there, you say?”
“Yes, since right before Christmas of last year.” Jack had more trouble mounting his horse, despite being thirty years younger. He watched the man handle the horse with deft and skill. “When did you learn to ride?”
“I used to be an overseer on a plantation in Louisiana. My job be riding round keeping them other niggers in line. If’n one of them runs away, lots o’ times it just be me an’ the dogs that brings them back. I works there for years and not make no friends, but a passel of enemies. I did learn to ride mighty well.”
“Is that where you learned how to read and write?”
“No, I knows how before that. My wife, she be a right smart woman—educated—you knows. She be working in the big house with the little white children. She always be saying, ‘Hercules, if’n you going to do anything other than being a field hand, you needs to learn to read and write like the white folks.’ So, she works and works with me ‘til next thing you knows it, ole Hercules read and write too. Anyways, we gets married up. Hoping to haves smart little children of our own, ones that can do the reading and writing too. It not be long after our third child be born that I gets sold.”
The Southern forests here were mostly yellow pines and mature hardwoods, with trees such as white oaks, chestnuts, and walnuts reaching over ninety feet tall, with branches spreading just as wide. The trunks they saw were often sixteen to twenty feet in circumference, and the limbs didn’t branch out till twenty or more feet into the air. Jack and Hercules found it easy traveling because the undergrowth was so sparse and not having to duck for the limbs.
They slowed to cross a small river. The thick forests of the Williamsburg area were yielding to the flat marshlands of tidewater. Here the large stands of pitch pines and cypresses formed the pine barrens. Small plantations of fifty to two hundred fifty acres were everywhere. Jack was thankful for the distraction from Frances. The past few days had been filled with hardly a thought of anything other than rescuing Kazmer, Sam, and Hercules. Now that they were safely out of Williamsburg, it gave Jack’s mind time to drift back to the troubles with Frances. What was she doing right now, he wondered. Was she thinking about him? He was on his way to a potential deathtrap, and yet he felt more vulnerable concerning Frances. To turn down the noise in his head he turned to Hercules, who was smiling and whistling at the same time. “How did it come about that you left the Turner Place?”
Hercules stopped whistling and his face grew grim. He cast his eyes downward and finally said, “I run away.”
This surprised Jack. “You ran away?”
“Yes, things got to be getting mighty bad there.” He looked at Jack, and Jack could see fear. “You ain’t going to send me back, are you?”
“No, of course not. Mattie is gone. What happened?”
“It don’t feels right talking about people. Seems Miss Mattie like to takes her troubles out on ole Hercules. Things happen make her powerful mad. Chicken would run away, and she need to beat me. The plow break down and she beat me some more. And if she not beating me for this or that, she be making me feel like I’m not a man no more.”
They rode for a while without talking. Jack would occasionally look at Hercules, who looked deep in thought.
“It sure be feeling strange to be talking to a white man in just such a normal way.”
“I come from a place where all people are equal, at least in theory. That was always the way I thought, at least. So you liked Kazmer?”
“Mr. Kazmer, I like him. Then Mr. Kazmer, he stops coming round and then more other men do. Men who be not so nice to me, me and the boy too. Then she start seeing this one man quite regular. This man, Adkins.”
Jack thought how to word this to the old slave. “Were they courtin’?”
Hercules thought about this, spread his hand regretfully and shrugged, “I really can’t be saying, but I know they be doing it.”
“They were a couple then?”
“Lordy no, she be doing it with a lot of different men. She especially liked sea captains, or she especially liked their gifts.”
“What like jewelry or candy or flowers or such?”
“Nothing like that at all, same men be coming with they big boats, or sometimes small, and give her new stuff like little machines, or tools and the like, and she keep them in that fancy barn of hers all to give all the stuff to this man Adkins.”
“Abner Adkins?”
“That be her boyfriend.”
Jack tried to conceal surprise, confusion, and the growing anger. “I’m sorry, Hercules, go on with your story.”
“Well this Ad—“ he hesitated and finished the word with Jack’s help, “Ad-kins. He not a big man, but he mean like the devil. And strong as a mule. Mr. Abner like to take up sport of beating me. And man, he could sho’ lay on that rawhide lash. Like I said, he be treating little Robbie bad too, first slapping the boy, then he take
to beating little Robbie with his fists.”
“Did Mattie know about this?”
“I went to her with the story and she tells Mr. Abner that I told her and then he says he need to teach me some respect.” Hercules lifted his shirt and showed Jack the scars on his back. “In all my born days, that be the only time I gets beat so hard my mind just goes away. When I be waken-up, I be still tied to the whip’n post and little Robbie be untying me. I knew I had to gets away. At first I thinks to take the boy with me, and then thinks better of it. They catch a runaway that steals a white boy, they kill him for sure. It pains my soul to have to be leaving him like that, but they be nothing else I could do.”
“So how did you end up with those men in Williamsburg?”
“I takes off running with no idear where to go, but I know I needs to skedaddle off someplace else. I live in the wilds for a month, eating nothing but fruits and berries I be finding, sleeping during the day and running at nights. I always hears about this thing called the Underground Railroad, that takes negroes to places Up North where there ain’t no slavery, but try as I may, I can’t find it nowhere. I wasn’t as far as Suffolk and these men and their dogs find me, and they sell me to a farmer there, and he sees I be too old to work hard in the fields and he sells me to those two you met back there. That’s how I be ending up here. They knew I be a runaway and they want to get me far enough that my true owner can’t find me.”
“You can relax now Hercules. Your running days are over, my friend.”
CHAPTER 9
Monday, June 29, 1857
Jack was starving by the time they got to Norfolk. The first two restaurants they tried refused to let Hercules enter. At a place called The Ship’s Captain Supper Club, they made up a chicken dinner for two. He and the old black man ate it on a bench next to the Harbor.
Looking out upon the drawbridge, they were able to take in the waterfront of the city. Wharves and warehouses, with the names of occupants painted in large letters upon their fronts; and the wharves, where many vessels lay, with some lining the wharf-heads five and six deep. From the drawbridge to Town Point, the dual slender masts of dozens of fishing-smacks danced on the gentle waves of evening’s growing twilight. The fine salty smell of the exposed sea walls filled their lungs. The burnished, sun-gilded water made the stones shine with the orange light of dusk. The warmth and radiance of the perfect summer day was yielding to the fresh and cool air of the night. Jack and his companion seemed suspended in time, a time of peace and a sense of rightness, a little interlude of rest. The seagulls swooped to beg for food and landed on pilings and nearby gas lamps, sitting wing-to-wing, waiting for handouts. Lights twinkled on in the Naval Hospital across the harborage and in the distance children hooted and giggled with delight in their last few minutes of playtime for the day. Jack’s head was right and his heart was struggling to pull his drifting emotions together.
When they arrived back at the complex, Jack learned from Elisha Root that the Wrights were settled into a cabin closest to the dune. When Jack asked him about a place for Hercules, he was surprised at the man’s answer.
“I can’t put him in the dormitory, the other men wouldn’t have it. Same thing if he was an Indian or a Chink.”
“I’m surprised to hear you talk like this,” Jack said.
“I don’t care about a man’s skin, it’s all about his character. But unfortunately, not everyone feels that way. I think there’d be trouble even if you set him up in one of the apartments. We have that big house on the other side of yours further up the creek. We can set that up as a house for negroes. It’s just not ready yet, it’ll still be a couple of days before it’s set up.”
“Fine, Hercules can stay with me until it is.”
Jack could learn nothing at all about the facility on the Lynnhaven Inlet. Several times when he asked questions, he could tell the people were keeping something from him.
The way Hercules spoke, the way he formed sentences and the lazy southern drawl, subtly started changing from the almost clichéd prattle of a deep-south plantation slave into a more easily understandable and better educated pattern. He thought that it was easier for him to use the old method so as to not appear a threat to the white people he encountered. Hercules held the reins to their two horses and was soaking up the warm spring sunshine.
“I came up with nothing, we need to go investigate for ourselves. We can be on our way.”
“Gonna be doing some more look sees around today, Mr. Jack?”
“No, we are going to wade into the thick of it,” Jack replied.
“Whatever you say, you the bossman.” Hercules had thoroughly enjoyed their lazy rambling around the city yesterday. Jack let him pick out a red, ruffled shirt, a snuff-colored monkey jacket, and a pair of Nankeen trousers. Along with the new set of clothes, he chose a pair of good strong brogans—heavy, ankle-high work shoes with broad bottoms and big, flat heels. He had declared it the finest outfit he had ever owned and said he considered himself a dandy. Jack had also purchased two pistols, ammunition, and two gun-belts. He handed one of the pistols and belts to Hercules, who just stared at it.
“What’s the matter?”
“Not sure I should be having this. It be against the law for a slave to have a gun.”
“I told you, you’re not a slave anymore.”
“But everybody we see still thinks I be.”
“Then stick it into your pants and put your shirt over it. I don’t know what kind of people we’re going to run into. Maybe more like Brose and Bolton, or worse. Are you sure you want to go with me?”
“I knew when I picked you you’d be the man to change things. You really mean all those things, don’t you, Mr. Jack? I really am free I suppose, or else you wouldn’t be handing me no gun.”
“I may not be good at a lot of things, Hercules, but let me promise you this: I always tell the truth. And yes, you are free, and I’d die to keep that promise to you.”
Hercules smiled and placed the gun out of sight. “I won’t be needing this, though.” He handed Jack back the gun-belt.
They took the Beach Road that ran right by the front of the complex to Virginia Beach and traveled north along the oceanfront, around Fort Story and the small First Landing Park. They moved along Lynnhaven Bay east of the inlet, trying to see the research facility from across the bay.
He thought if cash was “king” in his century, it was something approaching the ‘Undisputed Supreme Ruler of the Universe’ now. The entire country was feeling the effects of a depression, and the South was feeling it most. He found that people were only too happy to share information—whenever he mentioned ‘cash’.
They met a man along the beach road driving a wagon.
“You’re that inventor fella from Norfolk, huh?”
“That’s me all right, grew up round here.”
“It looks like we’ve got two inventors in the neighborhood then. Across the Bay not far from the Thoroughgood House—you haven’t seen all the construction going on?”
“No, I’ve been in Norfolk and came up from the beach. What’s going on?”
“Ken Barnett is back from Chicago and building a huge plant and research facility over there.”
“Ken Barnett? I’ve never heard of him.” Jack knew that in his version of the future there had never been a research facility located there. As far as he could remember, the property was always a huge dairy farm owned by the Thoroughgood family, and remained so into the twenty-first century.
“He was a big shot, I guess some sort of idea man, with the McCormick Corporation. He and old man McCormick had a parting of the ways and he decided to set up shop here. He’s from here, you know. Don’t really know where he got all the money; someone mentioned the Fire-eaters, and if so, well that’s plenty fine with me. It’s a pretty big operation he’s got going on, I tell you.” The farmer then hitched his horse, preparing to go.
Yet another thing had changed in Jack’s future and he wondered if he had somehow
set this in motion. “I’ll have to stop by and say hello. Thank you once again.”
“No, thank you.” The man said, patting the five dollar gold piece in his pocket.
Hercules had been silent, yet seemingly happy for most of the trip. But as they got off the ferry that crossed the mouth of Lynnhaven Bay, Jack heard him singing a song:
Oh, freedom! Oh, freedom!
Oh, freedom over me!
And before I’d be a slave
I’ll be buried in my grave
And go home to my Lord and be free.
No more moaning,
No more moaning,
No more moaning over me!
And before I’d be a slave
I’ll be buried in my grave
And go home to my Lord and be free.
“That’s a mighty sad song you’re singing there.” Jack said.
“It be one that my people have been singing for years. I’ve never sung it in front of a white man before.”
“You can sing whatever you like from now on. But if I can put in a request for a little happier one next time…”
Spanish moss hung from giant swamp cedars, roofing the wet, peaty acid soils of the small bogs. Sawgrass covered the encroaching windswept dunes closer to the beach, neither though quite obscuring the view of the Chesapeake. Having passed Fort Story, where the saline ocean became the brackish water of the bay, their moods had changed. Hercules stopped singing and they rode in silence, both knowing something terrible was coming.
CHAPTER 10
Wednesday, July 1, 1857
There was a sand dredge in the bay and a massive dock leading out to a channel. The sounds of construction were loud and plentiful. There was pounding, hammering, and teams of horses pulling loads of lumber. Hundreds of men, most of them black, were erecting buildings of every sort; houses, bunkhouses, cabins, small and large outbuildings, and storage sheds. The massive airplane hangar-sized structure in the middle of the property dominated and dwarfed all the others. Small gauge railroad tracks lead from the building down to the water to a large pier jutting out into the bay. A large, three-masted ship sat at the dock, being unloaded by a throng of black men. Near the pier a large house looked out over the water, presumably where Barnett lived. He saw a man and woman, two older looking girls and two boys sitting at a picnic table in the yard.
