Emily stubbornly finished the nine remaining problems before going back to check her answers with multiplication. She hoped the boy would grow tired and wander off, but he sat patiently beside her and watched her work. And just as he warned, most of her answers did not match. She threw her pencil down in frustration.
“Can I show you now?”
Emily shrugged, not really caring.
He spun the tablet and began reworking the problems, pointing out errors and fixing them. And time and again his answers proved correct.
Malachi handed back the pencil. “Think you can do them now?”
She bit her lip, irritated. Instead of answering, she shoved the pencil and tablet into her bag, along with the blanket and the math book. “I’m ready to go home now.”
Malachi grabbed up the bag and flung it over his shoulder. He was quiet as they walked the few blocks to the inn. Emily peered in a couple store windows, but mostly she just focused on the road in front of her, trying to understand why this colored boy could figure division problems and she couldn’t.
Back in her own room, she opened the math text and rechecked the problems, trying to recall the steps Malachi had shown her. But if she had been given a blueprint and been asked to recreate the White House she couldn’t have been more mystified.
That evening after dinner, as Julia wiped down her spotless kitchen, Emily spread her history text on the table and pretended to study as she waited for Malachi to appear. When he entered she called him over. “Malachi, can you read?”
He laughed. “Shoot, I sure hope I can. I’ve been going to school six years now.”
She pointed out a random passage in her book. “Read that to me.”
He shrugged. “‘In 1835, an assassination attempt was made on President Andrew Jackson. A man named Richard Lawrence approached Jackson and aimed two pistols at him. Both misfired. The angry Jackson then attacked Lawrence with his cane until his aides restrained him.
“‘Lawrence was apprehended and later told authorities he was King Richard III of England, who had been dead some three hundred and fifty years. Clearly insane, Lawrence was placed in an institution and never punished for his crime.’”
Malachi looked up. “Is that enough, or do you want me to go on?”
“I’ve always been told that colored people don’t have the ability to learn to read.”
“You didn’t think I could figure math either,” he pointed out. “Mama said black people aren’t allowed to read where you come from because white men are afraid the slaves will revolt if they learn too much. And I suspect they’re right.”
“That’s absolutely ridiculous!” Emily burst out. It couldn’t possibly be true. Could it? She glanced down at the book. Were blacks purposefully kept ignorant to maintain control over them? Were there others as smart as Malachi?
“Can your mama read?”
“She can now.”
“Can your daddy?”
He shook his head. “I taught Mama after school each evening.”
Ezekiel entered the kitchen at that moment. “Mr. Whittaker in room eight asked for three of yo’ oatmeal cookies, Miss Julia.”
The woman smiled and handed him the treats and poured a glass of milk as well.
“Zeke,” Emily called out. “Can you read?”
“No, miss.”
“Malachi, do you think Zeke could learn to read?”
“Sure he could, if someone taught him.”
“Zeke, can any of the slaves at Ella Wood read?”
The old man grew guarded. “Colored folk not ‘llowed to learn, miss.”
“Would you want to read, if you could learn?”
He shook his head and smiled. “No, no. I’s too old for all dat now.”
But Malachi argued with him. “Zeke, inside a book, you can travel anywhere you want to go and experience things never open to you before. You could read the great classics. And just think, Zeke, you could read the Bible for yourself, instead of just hearing someone else’s interpretation of it.”
At that, the old slave’s eyes grew softer. “It would be nice to see what de Good Book say ‘fore I pass on t’ Glory.” He went out the door with the snack.
“Malachi, could you teach Ezekiel to read?”
“’Course I could, if he wants to learn.”
“Good. Do it,” she demanded.
Julia wiped her hands on a towel and crossed her arms disapprovingly. “Miss Emily, why you doin’ this? You want dat old man to better hisself, or you just tryin’ to prove somethin’?”
Emily didn’t answer.
The woman continued. “You know, I tol’ Ezekiel he could jus’ disappear into the crowds one day. It would be easy fo’ him to gain his freedom. They’s lots of folk would help him.”
Emily stiffened. Would the faithful old servant betray her parents’ trust?
“But he gots a powerful love fo’ you and yo’ family, and I hopes you ’ppreciate it. ’Cause he tol’ me he a’ready gots his papers. He a’ready free.”
Chapter 7
The road wasn’t as muddy today, but Emily took careful steps to avoid the piles of manure. Over the last week, Malachi began accompanying her to school as far as her turnoff then continued on through the center of town. She didn’t mind his company so much anymore. It was better than walking alone. They never said much, just trotted along in silence, but it was comfortable. Different than time spent with Sophia, where every second must be filled up with chatter.
But today she was eager for him to be on his way. Today she was not about to suffer the righteous indignation of Angelina and Helen. Nor was she going to endure the crowded classroom and an endless string of assignments. No, today she had other plans.
She bid farewell to Malachi as usual and waited half a minute before slipping back the way they had come. She knew her uncle was leaving that morning to help a friend fix his roof; he had said as much at breakfast. So she waited in an alley until he led the horses down the street to his storage barn and rode out in that awful wagon. Then she zipped around the hotel—the side opposite the kitchen—and slipped into the stable.
She went immediately to the beautiful black mare and offered her the carrots she had pinched at breakfast from the pile Julia was peeling. It was one of four horses left in the barn. Her uncle’s team was pulling the wagon, but three guests were boarding animals.
The mare, she had learned, was named Coal Dust and belonged to a neighbor. Which one she didn’t know or care, though she was pretty sure it was a woman, because last night she had found a lady’s saddle in the tack room beyond the stalls.
That discovery had started the cogs in Emily’s mind to spinning. She had visited the beautiful mare several times, missing the long rides on Chantilly and longing for the open fields of home. But finding that saddle had moved her out of the realm of dreaming and into the possibility of acting. She was up half the night planning.
Emily entered the tack room and pulled out the riding habit she had hidden there. Her mother had tried to talk her out of packing it, claiming she would have no use for it in the city, but Emily had insisted. Now she was glad she did.
She slipped out of her dress, stashed it in the hiding place, and stepped into the lovely habit and a pair of low-heeled boots. She laid a saddle cloth on the mare’s back and centered the lady’s saddle on top, raising the single stirrup as high as it would go. The horse stood quietly as, with a few expert loops and tugs, Emily tightened the girth strap. Then she slipped the bit into the mare’s mouth, grabbed up her gloves and a riding crop, and led the horse to a granite mounting block at the door of the stable.
This was the risky moment. If Julia chose to look out the window now, her fun would be over before it even began.
She climbed smoothly onto the saddle, slipping her left foot into the stirrup and securing her right leg above her left, between the two pommels. Firmly seated, she tugged on the reins, spinning the horse toward the lane. But just as she passed the kitchen door, it ope
ned and a washtub full of dishwater cascaded to the gravel beneath the horse’s prancing hooves.
The black woman’s eyes widened in surprise, and she called out, “Miss Emily, what—?” but she was too late. With a wild cry and a slap of the crop, Emily urged the mare around the hotel and out to the road.
After a block or two Emily pulled back to a slow trot, guiding the horse through the labyrinth of streets her uncle had taken on the way home from the train depot. When she got to the open market, she turned down Michigan Avenue, recalling that it followed a straight route to the countryside.
Morning traffic was heavy, but after a few blocks it began to lessen. Emily had ridden ponies since she was three years old and had received Chantilly for her tenth birthday. She felt confident and in control, and Coal Dust was behaving like a lady, so at the outskirts of town Emily laid on the crop again.
The mare was eager to run. They flew past the last few streets and were suddenly out of town, the confining prison of buildings receding quickly behind them.
The road was broad and level, and as long as she stayed on it Emily had no fear of becoming lost. The tightly packed neighborhoods gave way to sprawling farms with fields of green and gold, and the trees—how she had missed seeing trees!—were arrayed in their autumn coats of many colors, just like Joseph in the Bible story. Back home the foliage would still be lush and green, with hardly a thought yet for winter.
Fence posts zipped along on both sides of the road. Emily passed a field full of pumpkins turning from pale green to brilliant orange. A little farther on, a herd of black-and-white dairy cows grazed in a sunny meadow, having been turned out to pasture after the morning milking.
After several miles, the distance between farms stretched longer, with more woodland in between. The road began to narrow and developed deep, muddy ruts. Emily pulled Coal Dust back to a walk.
They clumped over a wooden bridge. Off to her right, a small, wandering stream cut diagonally through a meadow of knee-high grass. Beyond the creek grew a fringe of vibrant foliage. Emily decided it was a perfect spot to dismount and let Coal Dust have a rest and a drink.
Still holding the end of one rein, Emily stretched out in the grass and wondered what her uncle was doing right now. She chuckled softly. She had intended to slip away unnoticed, but perhaps it was best that she had made a stir, since Isaac had been too dense to figure out the dog incident. She’d get sent home yet!
She was just wishing she had packed her paints and a bit of lunch when a shout brought her to her feet. “You, girl! Whot you doin’ on my land. Cain’t ya read!”
Jumping up, she spotted an old, grizzle-haired man peering at her from behind the bushes across the creek. He wore dirty, fringed buckskins, and his beard was as stained as a spittoon. Something in his hand gleamed silver.
“Civ’lization might be creepin’ in all ‘round me,” he muttered regretfully, “but I’ll be durned if I can’t keep it off my land!”
Emily regained her composure. “I don’t see any notice of private property,” she challenged.
“It’s there, sweetie, and I’m also tellin’ you straight out—you ain’t welcome.”
She lifted her chin smartly. “And you, sir, are an ill-mannered, indecorous old villain!”
A high-pitched cackle wavered across the meadow grass. “Reckon you nailed me proper there. Now get a move on ‘fore I need to make use of Hercules, here,” he ordered, and pointing the shotgun into the air, he fired.
The blast crackled across the meadow like shattering glass. Coal Dust screamed and reared, jerking the line from Emily’s hand. Before Emily could recover, the horse leaped the stream and streaked down the road in the direction of the city.
Wheeling, Emily shouted at the old man. “Now look what you’ve done!”
The cackle came again. “Best you start walkin’, girlie.” And still laughing, the man withdrew into the cover of the trees.
“Oh!” Emily steamed, stamping her foot. Her boot left a deep impression in the soft stream bank. She muttered curses at the despicable old man, but with nothing else for it, she recrossed the bridge and started for town, slapping her crop against her thigh in frustration.
She judged she had traveled seven or eight miles out of the city, and it was hours before she finally caught sight of any buildings stretching skyward in the distance. Stomach rumbling, she filled her pockets from a nearby apple tree and plodded on toward the first outlying neighborhoods.
For an hour she watched her shadow stretch in front of her, long and thin like a fast-growing weed. Now it suddenly disappeared. Glancing behind, she caught sight of a black cloud bank silently chasing her down. She began to run and gained the relative protection of downtown before the drops began spilling all around her, sending up little puffs of dust.
She sheltered in a doorway, panting, and watched the street lick up the moisture then begin to dampen and stream as the storm gathered intensity. She closed her eyes and leaned wearily against the building, her legs shaky and her feet feeling like two gigantic blocks of wood. Her carefully planned outing had turned disastrous. She wondered briefly where Coal Dust had gone off to.
Her ear was suddenly grabbed from behind, and she was dragged unceremoniously from her shelter. “Yo’ game be up, Miss Emily. What call you got to frighten Mr. Isaac like you done?”
She recognized the voice of Julia Watson. The woman wrenched her ear so hard she was forced to march up the street through the pelting rain on the tips of her toes. One misstep and the lobe was sure to rip clean off.
“You’s a ungrateful chil’,” the woman continued. “Gots half de city out lookin’ fo’ you. Don’t you know any better than to go traipsin’ off without tellin’ a soul where you’s goin’?”
They found Isaac astride Barnabas in the middle of Washington Street. His face was hard and expressionless, like a sheet of iron. Emily wished he would just rant and rage at her. This unreadable emotion frightened her.
“She was sittin’ in the do’way of a lawyer’s office like some wretched little waif.”
One eyebrow arched skyward. “Are you planning to sue someone, niece?” he asked coldly.
Oh, she hated his mockery! It fueled her weary muscles and her temper. Her ear released, she planted her booted feet and faced him squarely. “What I do is no concern of yours!”
“It is when your mother entrusts you to my care. Coal Dust came home hours ago. She throw you?”
She lifted her chin proudly. “Of course not! She pulled free after I dismounted.” She wouldn’t tell him about the gunshot.
“And you’ve been walking all this time? How far did you ride? Toledo?”
She glared.
“You had no business on that horse. Climb up and I’ll take you home.”
But Emily’s dander was up, and her face burned like a furnace. “So you can work me like a field hand? So I can clean your hotel? ‘Yes, Marse Isaac.’ ‘No, Marse Isaac.’ Well, I won’t do it. I refuse to go one step with you!”
Isaac’s face hardened into flint and his voice was low and steady, like the rumble of a locomotive. “Emily, get on the horse.”
“I will not!” she screamed and stomped off in another direction.
His movements were as quick and fluid as falling water. One minute she was storming through the mud down the middle of the road. The next minute she found herself lifted onto the horse. She kicked and screamed, sobbed, struck out and whipped her sodden curls, but the unforgiving steel of Uncle Isaac’s arm encircled her waist and held her firmly in place.
Emily caught sight of Julia walking beside them, soaked through, with a mixture of annoyance and satisfaction on her face. She quit fighting, but she rode high and stiff and proud, as far away from Isaac as she could manage.
He chuckled humorlessly. “You are so much like I was at your age. And there was nothing I needed more than a stout hickory stick applied to my backside.”
She tensed with horror. He wouldn’t dare!
“The
world owed me everything, and if it didn’t work out as I planned, a good fit of rage usually set things right. But that’s no preparation for the real world. I suspect your mother knows it too; that’s why she sent you to me. And I don’t intend to disappoint her.”
Emily didn’t like the sound of that. She rode the whole way in stubborn silence, her back as stiff and straight as the trunk of a pine.
Isaac deposited her at the kitchen door. “I sent Malachi after your schoolwork. Your lessons are in your room where you are to stay until I decide your punishment.”
Emily pushed inside and found Shannon seated at the kitchen table with her head bowed. She looked up and Emily saw concern melt into relief. “Miss Emily, you’re home! I’ve been so worried! Are you all right?”
Emily showered her with scorn. “I’m fine,” she snapped. “I’m not a stupid pet dog that can’t find its way home.”
“Of course you’re not.” Shannon rose uncertainly. “May I help you out of those wet clothes?”
But Emily jerked away. “Go mother someone else.” She stomped to her room.
Dripping and muddy, Emily climbed onto her bed and shoved the school books to the floor. She considered making another break for it, but it felt so good to lie down. Soon the eerie strains of “Moonlight Sonata” came floating down the hall from the lobby, and her last thought before drifting off to sleep was that she’d never make it past her uncle anyway.
Chapter 8
The odor of fresh manure assaulted Emily’s nose like a right hook. She grasped the handle of the pitchfork, scratched a little at a wet pile on the barn floor, and could almost see the vapors rising from it. She was starting to wish her uncle had settled for the hickory stick.
She had changed into her traveling suit, which was fast becoming a ragged work dress, and covered it with one of Julia’s aprons. Not wanting to stain her hands, she’d sacrificed her white riding gloves, intending to throw them away afterwards. A hand-me-down pair of Malachi’s boots flopped on her feet, completing the ridiculous costume.
The Candle Star Page 5
