Hogarth II

by Vicky Saari

  Chapter 3

  After an evening with her grandchildren Jessie rose more tired than usual. The children wore her out, but she would never admit it. She enjoyed them too much. While Caleb did the milking, she went about fixing biscuits, eggs, and gravy with ham for breakfast. Caleb carried in two buckets of fresh milk. “I don’t know how much longer old Blue can keep this up. She came up with almost half a bucket on her own,” he declared. “I figure she’s almost twenty years. She was old when we left Virginia.”

  “It’s too bad she and Bob could never have mated. That might have solved many of our problems,” Jessie commented absently as she set three tin plates with three wire forks on the table and placed a wooden trivet on the table for the gravy skillet.

  “Or made them worse. It’s good that we got Bonnie when she was still a calf,” noted Caleb somewhat sarcastically. “What’s your plans for today?”

  “Me and Mittens are plannin’ to go huntin’ for greens. I have this nice piece of fatback out in the icehouse that I’ve been savin’ for fresh greens. Up on the hill across the creek there’s a nice patch of mustard and poke.”

  “Well, I’m takin’ a walk around the fence line to see if any more bears, deer, or that wild boar have been into the cornfield. Mittens and Brad got that fence around the garden fixed back pretty good,” Caleb announced as he put on his floppy brimmed straw hat and picked up his old flintlock rifle just in case he needed it.

  Soon after they had cleared away breakfast and fed the animals, Mittens, Caleb’s pet name for Little Jessie, and her mother had armed themselves with baskets and the special paring knives that Zeke had made for them. He called them his “greens cutters.” They were one of his many experiments with metal that he often passed on to his family for testing. Once he’d mastered a tool or blade, he sometimes made copies that he offered for sale in the Parsons’ store.

  The sun was straight overhead by the time Caleb had reached Jed’s road at the end of their lane— Jed’s road is what he always called it, since Jed had built it. A stagecoach from Louisville to St. Louis came through three times a week. Occasional freight wagons were always going north and west. Then there were the pioneering families hauling all their worldly goods in a cart or a wagon, just as he had done when he and his family first settled in the wilderness. Caleb sometimes wondered how far west you could go. But most people he met seemed eager to have someone to talk to, even if it was just in passing. Every now and then, an odd one came through who refused to speak, maybe out of fear or maybe just out of being odd. He reckoned that some people were just born to be loners. He’d been that way to some degree himself, but the circumstances of his life just didn’t let him stay alone for very long.

  In the distance, he saw two riders with dogs tethered to their saddles. Something about these men made him feel uneasy. He just didn’t know why until they came closer. He was downwind from them, and their smell made his eyes water. He might have been able to avoid them if he had moved faster, but it was too late. They had sped up their gait and were trotting toward him. The dogs wore muzzles and looked like they had the mange; one was limping seriously. Something told him these two men were bad news. “Howdy, mister,” called the grizzliest. “We’s alookin’ for a run-away darkie and wuz wondering if you seen anyone who might match ’is ’cription. His name’s Big George. He snuck away from a steamboat in Kaintuck, and we’s alookin’ for ’im.”

  “Can’t say that I have,” Caleb responded warily. “What’s wrong with the dogs?”

  “Them’s darkie dogs. Their job is to catch darkies,” snarled the other rider.

  “They caught this Big George, and him and this big boar did that to ’em,” he said as he pointed to a fresh, open wound festering on the hip of the dog that limped. “He wuz my best dog, too!”

  “Ain’t you heard? We don’t have slaves in Indiana. That’s why I come here,” Caleb offered. “I been here nigh on to sixteen years, and I ain’t never seen a darkie go by here!”

  “Well, we aims to catch this George fella. He’s got a reward on his head—daid or ’live!” slithered the first man. “By the way, what’s wrong with this here town back there? We went to the blacksmith shop and to the grocery store, and there wasn’t a soul around. They wuz a couple of wagons and a coach at the inn, but the doors ’re locked.”

  This news alarmed Caleb, but he tried to hide his concern. “I don’t know anything about it, but I sure am gonna check it out. Thanks for tellin’ me.” He turned and began walking calmly toward Sethsburg. Both the men and the dogs snarled, but he didn’t turn back. Right now he was wondering himself what was going on in town. It wasn’t like Zeke or Jacob to close the shop or store this early in the day.

  As he reached the edge of town, he saw a fancy coach behind the store loaded up with boxes, and several people appeared to be gathered at the inn. He looked toward the blacksmith shop but didn’t see any sign of life there. As he approached the wagons at the inn, Zeke stepped outside, met his dad and shared the somber news about Priscilla’s mother. He also told him that her pa is also asking her and Jacob to move back to Louisville with him. That’s what they were loading up in the coach behind the store. This news came as a surprise to Caleb. He knew that Priscilla’s father had never approved of her marriage to Jacob and had forced them to run away years ago. They came to Sethsburg when Alice was a newborn. Jed had brought Jacob to Sethsburg when he hired him to help him finish building the road. In learning their story he knew about the bad blood that had always existed between Jacob and his father-in-law; he couldn’t imagine the two of them giving up all they had worked for to go back to live with such a man. After a few moments with Zeke, Caleb excused himself and walked back to his house. He sure hoped those bounty hunters were gone. He’d plumb forgot to tell Zeke about them.

  Both Jessie and Mittens had hiked up their dresses and removed their shoes to wade across the creek, which was knee deep in spots. They enjoyed the warmth of the sun, and with every other step Jessie would point to a plant or sapling and explain to her daughter what benefits each had for cooking or healing. At sixteen, Little Jessie had already acquired an extensive knowledge of plants growing in the wild. She was even learning to make her ma’s potions, which she sold to the apothecary. Across the creek, the sun seemed to hit this side better, and there seemed to be a greater variety of wild greens to pick. Jessie found herself some poke right away. Little Jessie looked at the nearly purple leaves and gagged. It was no secret that she hated it when her mom messed up good greens by mixing in poke. She preferred mustard and kale. “Okay, I’ll cook ya some separate without the poke,” her mother grumbled. “I’ll save the stalks and fry ’em up.”

  The daughter smiled gratefully and turned her attention back to the patch of wild mustard she had been eyeing. Within minutes, her basket was full to overflowing, and she was ready to turn back toward the house. Instead, she wandered up the hill just to see what the view was like when she stumbled over something hidden by the weeds. At first she thought it might have been the carcass of a deer or another animal because it was so large, but as she pulled the tall grass aside, she recognized it as a human form. “Ma!” she screamed. “It’s a man; I think he’s dead!”

  Jessie jerked up from the dock she was cutting and dropped her basket as she ran toward her daughter. She pulled the grasses away from the man’s dark face, felt of his neck, and found a faint pulse against his throat. Then she noticed his ragged clothes and bare feet. They were badly cut and bruised, and the brown flesh on his hands was torn away in places and looked like it was trying to fester. He needed care immediately, but she had nothing out here with which to work. “Do you think we could carry ’im up to the cabin?” she asked her daughter.

  They abandoned their baskets, and, with one at his head and the other at his feet, the two women attempted to half carry and half drag the unconscious man across the creek to their old cabin. They had only travele
d a few feet before they realized they needed a new plan. “Why don’t you go up to the barn and bring back that handcart Pa and Zeke built,” Jessie suggested. “While you’re up there, go into the round room and bring my medicine bag.”

  Little Jessie grabbed their baskets of greens and ran. She didn’t know where Pa was, but for some reason, she tried to make as little noise as she could so as not to draw attention to herself. She never realized how heavy her mom’s bag really was until now. She found the cart leaning against the wall inside the barn and began pushing it and the bag back toward the creek. She had covered almost half the distance when she heard someone call her name. She turned and saw her oldest brother, Jed, coming down the hill toward her. “Where you goin’ with Pa’s cart?” he asked curiously.

  “Ma found this big thing across the creek, and she wants to bring it home and work on it,” Little Jessie stammered. She wasn’t accustomed to lying and keeping secrets.

  Jed grinned and wondered what new project his mom was up to now. “Here, let me help you,” he offered as he took command of the cart handles. “What kind of thing has she found this time?” Jed asked.

  “We-l-l, it’s this big, dark thing that’s all chewed up.” She was trying to keep honest.

  Jed chuckled at his memories of his mother and some of her antics. More than once she had found herself in a predicament from which Jed would have to save her. It wasn’t until he saw the huge, dark man lying on the ground and his mother working over him feverishly that he realized how serious his ma’s dilemma was this time. Together, they lifted the runaway slave into the cart and carefully transported him to the cabin. Little Jessie ran ahead and began arranging an old corn-husk pallet on the floor where they could care for him. It took all three of them to lift the limp man from the cart and carry him into the cabin. Little was said between mother and son or sister until after they had settled their patient onto the makeshift bed. “I’d send Sarah over to help, but I don’t think she’s up to much. The baby seems to be tryin’ to get here before its time. Are you and Mittens going to be all right?” Jed asked.

  “Get me a bucket of water from the spring and bring in some wood for a fire,” was his ma’s only response. She searched through her basket of herbs and began assembling a poultice to draw out the infections around the man’s wounds. He looked like a man who had once been robust, but as she drew away his shirt to examine him more closely, she was stung by the lash marks across his chest that disappeared around and onto his back. Some of them even looked infected.

  Even Jed was repulsed by what he saw. He had heard about the cruelty laid on slaves when he was a boy in Virginia, but he’d never seen it himself. Since coming to Indiana, he’d hoped that part of life had been left behind. “Do you want me to go get Minnie?” he asked as he watched his mother swab the wounds of the strange man.

  “I think we’ll be okay for a while, but one of us is goin’ to have to stay with him. As soon as he is able, we’re gonna have to get some nourishment into him. He looks half starved,” the aging medicine woman thought aloud.

  “Ma, I heard Pa comin’ up the road. What are we gonna tell him?” Little Jessie interrupted.

  Jed looked questioningly at his mom and his sister and quickly made his excuses. “Guess I’ll head back home,” he said.

  “Mittens, you stay with him while I talk to your pa!” spoke their mother. “I need to be seein’ about supper anyway.” She grabbed the greens and headed to the spring, where she could wash and clean them for dinner.

  *****

  Hogarth smiled wryly at the memory of Jessie trying to act calm and collected when she faced Caleb with her latest dilemma. He still remembered the time Jed and Caleb had to free her from the bee tree where she was trying to steal honey. She would have been all right if her dress hadn’t got caught on a broken limb. She was a determined woman, that was for sure. He peeked out from under his blanket of snow and found to his delight that most of the snow and slush were gone. He looked forward to spring, when his family came home for the children’s spring break. Then his memory took him back to events of the past.

  Chapter 4

  As Caleb neared his house, he caught sight of Jessie rushing around the old cabin to the springhouse. Then, he saw what looked to be Jed half running up the hill. He could have sworn that he’d seen Mittens jump back into the cabin when she saw him. He could not help but feel that something was going on, but he had no idea what. He started toward the cabin, but Jessie intercepted him before he got that far. He probably wouldn’t have thought much about it except for the way Jessie began babbling about needing him to make her a new mortar and pestle for grinding her herbs. All the while she was talking she never took her eyes off the ground and trotted on into the house. She had never been any good at lying. Mittens was no better. Normally she’d be in the kitchen with her ma, but right now she seemed to be preoccupied with something in the old cabin. There was smoke coming from the chimney, but he knew Jessie wasn’t doing the wash. When she did, she heated the water outside. When she made soap, she usually did it outside too. In fact, most of the time she preferred to work outside. But he’d learned the hard way that it wasn’t wise to interfere with a woman’s work.

  Despite his curiosity, he changed directions and went to the barn to check on Belle. She was well past her prime, and the time would soon come when she’d be joining Blue. When his old ox had died, Seth, Opal, Zeke, and Jed had helped to dig a hole large enough to bury him in. If it hadn’t been for Jed’s mules, he’d have never been able to plow his fields after Blue died. As for what Jessie was up to, he figured he’d find out before the night was out. A rustling sound from the garden interrupted his thoughts—Jed’s pigs again. This thought made him laugh. Just as he shooed the pigs away and refitted the downed post, he heard a carriage coming down the lane.

  Jessie also heard the carriage and came out of the house to see Seth arriving, and she wondered if there was a problem at the Hodges’ place. She saw Caleb heading over to meet Seth, so she went to the cabin to check on her patient and deliver a pot of kale tea for nourishment. She sent Mittens to the house to finish dinner when she heard the man stirring about and starting to moan. He was still delirious, and she was afraid he’d begin making noise and bring unwanted attention to the cabin. She grabbed the cloth Mittens had been swabbing him with and resumed dabbing his head and chest with cold water, and as soon as he was alert enough to swallow, she intended to spoon the tea to him.

  Little Jessie had finished fixing dinner for her ma and was about to call her pa in to dinner when she heard her dad and Seth talking. She slipped away to the cabin and quietly said, “Ma, Seth says Priscilla’s ma has passed away and that she and Jacob were going back to Kentucky to help her dad.”

  Jessie looked at her daughter with surprise. This was one event that she had never expected to happen. Ever since they had known Jacob and Priscilla, they swore they would never go back. Jessie left her daughter to care for their patient and went to the house to greet their visitor and find out for herself what was going on.

  Seth and Caleb had found a seat under a tree and were enjoying the cool evening air when Jessie approached. “We talked about James and Lucinda taking over the store, but they have a baby on the way, so Martha has decided she wants to run the store herself,” Seth was saying. “It seems her weaving isn’t enough for her. Besides, she says it hurts her back.”

  “Well, Martha always has liked to meet people and talk,” was Caleb’s only comment on the situation. “I just hope she doesn’t have to deal with characters like I run into today,” he added. When Seth asked what he meant, Caleb explained about the two men with the dogs who were looking for a runaway slave. He then told Seth he’d gone into town and ran into Zeke while they were in the inn. Zeke had told him about Priscilla’s mother. “I figured you had enough on your minds, so I came home.”

  “You say they called him Big George?
” Seth asked.

  “You know something about this slave they were askin’ about,” Caleb wondered.

  “No, nothing for certain. It’s just that the name sounds familiar for some reason,” Seth replied. “Just be careful. I don’t know if these are the same two, but I kind of followed them from Madison. People told me in Salem about these two bounty hunters with two of the meanest dogs you ever saw. They had to keep them muzzled, they said. I don’t know if it’s true, but the story is they were so sure this one couple was hidin’ slaves on their place. They tied the woman up and turned the dogs loose on the man just to try to make him confess. They’re in it for the money and will do anything to get it. But more than anything, I think they just like being mean.”

  “But slaves ain’t legal in Indiana, are they?” Caleb asked. “Why do they come here?”

  “They’re not legal here, but there are a few slave owners and a lot of sympathizers who’d like to change the laws. I heard there’s a big brouhaha brewin’ out in the West over whether or not they can own slaves in the Missouri Territory. South Carolina threatened to cede from the Union last year over slavery,” Seth was saying. “Then there’s the Fugitive Slave Act, which allows bounty hunters to chase slaves into the Old Northwest Territory where we are and into other northern cities where slaves are illegal. There’s a $500 fine for anyone helping these runaways. Still, I hear there’s people who are hiding runaway slaves and helping them get north into Canada. How do, Miss Jessie,” he interrupted their conversation.

  Jessie had been so interested in what the men were saying; she hadn’t wanted to interrupt them. Before she could speak, however, another carriage appeared over the horizon.

  So far, nothing had been normal about this day, Caleb figured. Most of the time everyone was so busy, the only time they visited with their neighbors was on Sunday at meetin’ time. “Jessie, did you forget we were having the Sunday dinner this time? The parson’s supposed to stay with us,” he reminded his wife.