Always & Forever: A Saga of Slavery and Deliverance (The Plantation Series Book 1) (21 page)

When the patrol turned into the gate at Toulouse, the coffle
of slaves behind the white man’s horse shuffled to keep up. The rattling of
iron on iron had accompanied Remy’s every step since the patrol had caught him
eight days before.

Seeing the place of his birth again, Remy swallowed hard.
His maman rested here in the cemetery behind the quarters, the smell of hickory
smoke rose from the cabins, the new blacksmith shop Remy had helped build with his
own hands shone with fresh timber. The place was home, and Cleo waited for him
here. Yet Toulouse was the place of his bondage, and he was in chains.

For two months and eleven days, Remy had been a free man.
He’d run and he’d hidden, he’d been struck at by a sleepy copperhead that was
slower than he, he’d been chased by a pack of dogs, and he’d starved when he
couldn’t steal a pumpkin or corn out of some farmer’s crib. But he’d never
known such exhilaration as he had those nine weeks. Every moment Remy breathed
free air, he knew he was alive.

The runaways followed the slaver into the back yard. Remy
heard Cleo’s voice before he saw her. She was yelling “Madame,” and then she
came running down the gallery stairs and across the ground toward them.

He didn’t call to her. He was so weak, and he was ashamed.
But Cleo found him, grabbed him in her arms, and when he swayed on his feet,
she held him steady. Infection oozed from the crusted blood on his brow, yet
Cleo put her hand on his swollen face and whispered to him, “You’ll be all
right now.”

With no warning, the white man’s whip lashed into Cleo’s
back, cutting through her blouse and ripping the flesh. “Get away from there,
gal,” the man on the black mare said. No malice in his voice, just the
assumption of obedience from a black slave.

Remy, though emaciated, his hands bound behind him, his
ankles manacled, his neck circled by an iron collar attached to another man’s
collar with five feet of heavy chain – Remy drew himself up and blazed
defiance.

“You, boy, what you looking at?” The slaver raised his arm
to lash Remy with the whip, but Cleo hurled herself against the mare’s side.
The toe of the man’s boot was in the stirrup and couldn’t find Cleo’s ribs, but
he began to club her with the butt of the whip. The horse stepped back and Cleo
hung on, absorbing the blows from the slaver.

Remy leapt, his only weapon his body as a ram against the
flank of the horse. The black man chained to him fell to his knees and the man
behind him staggered. The other slavers drove their horses into the chained men
and women, wielding clubs and whips, the cursing and the cries commingling.

Remy shielded Cleo with his body as well as he could.

LeBrec ran from the overseer’s cabin, pistol in hand. Madame
Emmeline intercepted him and took the pistol from him. No longer
stoop-shouldered, she stood erect and fired into the air.

The men and women jerked at the blast, a horse reared and
neighed, and then it was over. Remy leaned over his knees, stunned from the
blows the slaver had delivered. Cleo scrambled to her feet and helped to
support him.

The plantation people nearby all came running when they
heard the shot. Louella, her big bosom heaving as she ran, cried, “Wha’s
happning? Who been shot?”

Madame Emmeline handed the gun back to LeBrec. “No one is
shot. Bring water for these people.” Then she turned her attention to the
slaver on the black mare.

“I see you’ve found my boy, Mr. Hayes,” she said.

“Yes’m. I reckon he’s the one.”

“Well, cut him loose. Monsieur LeBrec, you will put him out
of this wind. The storehouse will do.” She turned back to the patrol leader.
“You may wait here until I return with the reward money.”

The slaves, almost as one body, sat down. They were in the
sun, and the cookhouse blocked some of the cold wind. Louella began ladling
water for the poor souls who’d marched barefoot through icy mud puddles, their
ankles and wrists bloodied from the manacles.

“Thibault,” Louella said, “go get dem other ladles from de
quarters. We needs to get some water in dese folks.”

One of the white men unlocked the chains from Remy’s throat,
hands and feet. He shoved him hard against Cleo, and both of them went down.
The slaver laughed and idly kicked at Remy’s bloody leg.

Remy struggled to his feet and extended a hand to Cleo to
help her up. Then LeBrec roughly moved Cleo aside and pushed Remy toward the
storehouse.

“M’sieu, you gone let me give dis boy some water first?”
Louella said.

“He’s got plenty of sass in him without no water. Move on,
boy,” LeBrec said.

Madame Emmeline handed an envelope up to the slaver on the
black mare, who hadn’t the courtesy to dismount.

“I’d keep an eye on that one, Madame Tassin,” he said. “He’s
a tough one. Don’t got no respect for whip nor cane, neither one.”

“I’m sure we know what to do with our own people, Mr. Hayes.
Good day to you.”

Hayes touched his hand to his hat, then flicked his whip
over the heads of the seated slaves to get them on the move again.

“Madame,” Cleo began. Her knees barely held her she was so
afraid for Remy. “Madame, you won’t let Monsieur LeBrec …”

Remy heard her, and he turned back. He couldn’t bear to see
her beg for him. His voice hardly carried across the yard. “Don’t, Cleo.”

Madame Emmeline looked coldly at Remy. “Go to the house,” she
told Cleo.

LeBrec shoved him toward the storehouse, and Remy shuffled
on, his gait awkward from the miles he’d walked in chains. Why didn’t he run? He could take that pistol away from him, knock him out, and be in the swamp before they called the slavers back.

Remy swayed, feverish and dizzy. He was too weak. Beaten and
starved as he was, he’d die before the day was out if he ran now.

Remy stepped into the dark storeroom. It was cold, but dry,
and it smelled sweet from the grain sent by generous neighbors after the flood.
When LeBrec put a hand in the middle of his back and shoved him toward the
corner, Remy lost his balance and fell on the hard floor.

For light, LeBrec opened the six-inch window slit next to
the door. When Remy rolled over to face the overseer, LeBrec stood above him
with a knife in his hand. The sunlight glinted on it, but Remy barely saw it
flash before LeBrec was on him.

The blade slashed into the gristle of his ear. Remy
screamed, and then fainted.

Moments later, Remy roused, alone in the room, and Cleo was
pounding on the locked door. “Remy,” she shouted.

He put a hand to the bloody stump of his ear and nearly
passed out again. Through the door, he heard LeBrec say, “Don’t cross me, gal.”

“Remy!” Cleo screamed. Remy knew what an overseer could do
to a slave girl; LeBrec was out there with Cleo, and Remy was on the wrong side
of the door.

“Cleo, I’s all right,” Remy called though the tiny window.
“Go on ‘way from here. Go on, ‘fo you in trouble.”

“This the one you sweet on, is it?” LeBrec growled.

Remy felt the impact as Cleo’s back slammed against the
wall. He pushed his face against the window slit to see LeBrec’s
tobacco-stained teeth grinning at Cleo.

“I guess you know how to keep him from the axe, don’t you?”
LeBrec said.

“Cleo,
non
. You don have to do dat.
Non
,
Cleo.”

Remy could smell LeBrec’s stink, like mule piss steaming in
the cold. He pounded his fist against the inside wall of the storehouse. “I
kill you, LeBrec,” Remy yelled as the overseer mashed his reeking mouth against
Cleo’s.

“Monsieur LeBrec.”

LeBrec whirled around, and for a moment stood witless.
Madame Emmeline’s face was stiff, her black eyes hard.

“This black gal trying to get in to the runaway. She don’t
hear ‘no’ lessen it’s said with a couple of knocks.”

Madame looked at Cleo. “I told you. In the house,” she said.

Louella came up behind Madame carrying a pail of water and
some cloths. Madame said, “I should like to tend to the boy now, Monsieur
LeBrec. Open the door and leave me the key. You may return to your work.”

LeBrec surrendered the key and slunk off. Remy watched Cleo
all the way to the gallery steps, the bloody blouse stuck to her back. Then
Madame was inside with him and insisting he lay down against a rice sack.

Madame herself washed the wound where LeBrec had cut away
half of Remy’s ear. She staunched the flow with a medicinal paste she had
concocted after years of trial and error. He remembered when he was a child,
his maman had been so worried about the pain in his ear that she’d sent for
Madame Emmeline. Then Madame had poured warm sweet oil in his ear, and he had
been able to sleep at last. Now he closed his eyes and let her do what she
would with his wounds.

In the big house, Cleo peeled the shirt from her back and
peered over her shoulder in Josie’s mirror. The gash was six inches long and
deep, just between her shoulder blades. There would be a scar. The mark of
slavery.

Cleo’s hands trembled as she tried to wash the wound. When
Louella came in with a basin and clean cloths, Cleo lay down on the floor and
let Louella take over. Cleo clenched her fists at the vinegar wash and gritted
her teeth as Louella sewed the gash closed. Finally Louella applied a soothing
paste and Cleo closed her eyes.

“You don’ be lifting nothing, Cleo, chile. Dis here open up
and spread, you be pulling at it. I bring in de dinner. You stay flat like
dis.”

“Louella, what’s going to happen to Remy?”

“Law, chile, I not de one to know dat. Maybe dat LeBrec, he
be happy wit cutting Remy’s ear. Maybe dat be enough.”

Cleo stayed in the bedroom while the moving shadows marked
the passage of the day. If only Josie were here, Cleo thought for the hundredth
time. Josie would save Remy from the axe on his foot. Josie would protect him,
Cleo was sure of it.

Thibault crept in and lay down next to Cleo. She held his
hand, and they were silent.

Late in the afternoon, Cleo heard LeBrec’s heavy boots on
the gallery stairs. Thibault had fallen asleep. She should go to the door to
let LeBrec in, but she lay where she was.

Madame herself admitted the overseer and led him in to the
office. Cleo eased herself from under Thibault’s arm. The motion pulled at her
wound and she held her breath as she rose from the floor. She padded on bare
feet to the office door and put her ear at the keyhole.

Madame was not happy with LeBrec. He had not only marked her
property, he had risked the life of her slave with the additional wound to his
ear in his weakened state. In future, LeBrec was to consult with her before any
punishment out of the ordinary was administered.

Cleo breathed easier. Madame would not allow Remy’s foot to
be maimed. That would further decrease his value, yes, but Cleo wanted to
believe that Madame cared for her slave as well as for her purse.

“We got to do something to show the other slaves what
happens to them if they run, Ma’am,” LeBrec said. “You know how one gets away
with it, there’ll be others try it.”

“Yes. I am aware of the need for punishment. However, there
will be no more maiming. And a slave beaten half to death at the whipping post
is of no use in the fields. Devise a punishment that does not damage my
property, Monsieur LeBrec.”

Cleo put her eye to the keyhole. LeBrec had not been invited
to sit down. He turned the hat in his hands nervously.

“I know what to do. Yes, ma’am.”

“Then you may go about your business, Monsieur.”

Cleo hurried back to the bedroom and peeked from behind the
drapes as LeBrec swaggered through the courtyard toward the smithy.

After dark, she slipped down the back stairs. She could take
Remy some extra food left from Madame’s table and talk to him, touch him
through the little window.

At the stand of crepe myrtles, their bare limbs smooth as
flesh, Cleo stopped to scan the grounds between her and the storehouse. As she was
about to cross the yard, lantern light shone from around the corner of the
building. LeBrec walked into view, carrying a shotgun, a hound at his heels.

He checked the lock on the storehouse door, shone the light
through the slitted window, and seemed satisfied. For a moment he stood still
and looked Cleo’s way. He held the lantern high, but she was part of the tangle
of shadows. If only the hound showed no interest in her, she would be safe.

LeBrec scratched his groin and spat on the ground. Then he
headed back to his own house. Cleo watched him step on to his porch, extinguish
the lantern and hang it on a hook before he went inside. The hound crawled
under the porch to make its bed.

Cleo scurried across the yard. “Remy,” she whispered at the
window. “Remy, are you awake?”

He put his hands through the little window, and Cleo grabbed
them in both of hers. She kissed every finger, and he cupped her face.

“Cleo, you hurt bad?”

“It’s just a welt. Don’t worry about me.” She pulled a
napkin out of her pocket. “I brought you a chicken leg, Remy. I know you’re
hungry.”

“I think I gone be hongry de rest of my life.” He took the
chicken leg and ate it in three bites, gulping it down.

“Louella gave me this for you, too. She said drink it all at
once and your ear won’t pain you in the night.”

“Dat be a blessing.”

“How far did you get, Remy? Before they caught you.”

“I hardly knows. Peoples was still blacks and whites,
everywhere I seen. I don’ reckon I make it as far as de North, but I musta been
close.”

“Madame told LeBrec no more cutting. He won’t be marking you
again, Remy.”

Remy was quiet a moment. “A man like dat. He have other
ways. It ain’t over yet. But I take it. I ain’t quitting.”

“What do you mean? You aren’t going to run again?”

“
Chérie
, I tole you. I goin to be a free man. When I
get my strength, I goin.”