Jump Ship to Freedom (14 page)

When he put it that way, it seemed clear enough that I ought to be pushing for the new constitution as hard as I could. But there was another side to it. For according to the compromise Mr. Fatherscreft was carrying down to Philadelphia, the new country would have slavery in the South and a fugitive-slave law that said anybody who knew I was a runaway had to turn me in. And sooner or later I'd get caught, sure. Captain Ivers was bound to put out a reward for me. He was sure to be having handbills about me made already. That's what they always did. Somebody was certain to turn me in for the reward and feel he was doing the right thing, too.

Oh, it was a puzzle. On the one side of it, if the convention agreed, and we got a constitution, I'd have the soldiers' notes to buy me and Mum free. But on the other side of it, as soon as the constitution was signed, I was likely to be captured and turned back to Captain Ivers. The first thing he'd do would be to take those notes away from me and sell me South. And that would be the end of me forever.

And that's when something else came to me: why was I helping Mr. Fatherscreft bring a message down to Philadelphia that could put me into the cane fields for the rest of my life?

Talking about this seemed to give Mr. Fatherscreft the idea that we shouldn't waste time, so we finished up breakfast quickly and started off again. We figured on reaching Trenton by nightfall and then crossing the Delaware River into Philadelphia the next day. Trenton was where my daddy had fought, and I wanted to see it.

We went along through some little places called Spanktown and Bonhamtown. There was beautiful farms along through here, especially orchards, with about every kind of fruit tree you could think of. I didn't know the names of them all, but Mr. Fatherscreft did, and he told them to me. About one o'clock in the afternoon we came into New Brunswick, a pretty big place on the Raritan River. There were lots of fancy houses here, mostly brick or stone.

We pulled through town and up to the ferry landing on the Raritan. There was lots of little boats out in the river going up and down. On a hill in the middle of town was a great brick building. Mr. Fatherscreft said it had been used for a barracks during the Revolution. I wondered if my daddy stayed there. While we were waiting for the ferry, we stopped at a little inn called The Lion and ate some pork and beans. Then we crossed the Raritan on the ferry and headed for Princeton, seventeen miles farther south. We got there at ten at night. I could see that Mr. Fatherscreft was pretty tired from the traveling. It wasn't doing him any good. His cough was worse, and I had to sort of help him along from place to place. We ate supper and went right to bed.

Mr. Fatherscreft woke up coughing three or four times in the night. I went downstairs for some rum, but there wasn't anybody around. The place was dark and shut up tight. I found a pitcher of beer somebody had left and brought that up to Mr. Fatherscreft, but it wasn't the same. “Daniel,” he said in his weak voice, “I must rely on thee for everything now.”

“You ain't that bad off, Mr. Fatherscreft,” I said to cheer him up. “Once we get to Philadelphia, you can get a good long rest.”

He reached out of bed, took my hand, and gave it a little squeeze. “Daniel, thou art a good lad. Don't ever let anybody tell thee otherwise. Take pride in thyself.”

“Yes, sir,” I said. “I will.” I meant it, too. My daddy, he was good as any white man, and I was determined that I would be, too.

In the morning I told Mr. Fatherscreft that we ought to go a little slower and maybe take a good long rest at noontime, so's he wouldn't get so tired out. He wouldn't hear of it. He was coughing pretty bad when we started off for Trenton, where we'd cross the Delaware River to Pennsylvania. But he was all fired up to get to Philadelphia as soon as we could. He'd rest when we got there, he said. I knew what he was thinking. He was thinking that he was bound to die soon, and he wanted to get to Philadelphia with his message before he went.

So he sat up, and coughed and dozed between times, and I tried to enjoy the view out the window. It was rich country; there was rye and oats and barley growing in the fields, and here and there they were reaping the wheat and tying it up in shocks in the fields to dry. But worrying about Mr. Fatherscreft maybe dying took most of the fun out of looking at the scenery, so after a while I lay down on my seat and tried to doze, too.

By the end of the afternoon Mr. Fatherscreft wasn't so much coughing as just lying back gasping for breath. He was hot and sweaty, too. We still had three or four miles into Trenton. Twice I had the driver stop by streams to get Mr. Fatherscreft some cold water. It didn't seem to help much. He went on gasping.

Finally, as the sun was going down, we came into Trenton. There was a little creek through it, and a big stone mill. We didn't stop but went right on through the town and out the other side to the ferry crossing on the Delaware. There was a tavern at the ferry landing called Vandergrift's. We pulled in here, and I hauled Mr. Fatherscreft out of the coach and into the tavern.

He had got so weak from coughing that I had to sort of drape him over my shoulders to get him up to his room. I propped him up in bed to ease his coughing, and wrapped him up good in a blanket. His face was soaked in sweat, and every once in a while he gave a big shiver. “Daniel,” he said in a voice so low I could hardly hear it, “we can be in Philadelphia tomorrow if we get an early start. I must live that long. I must.”

“Don't worry, Mr. Fatherscreft, you ain't going to die. I'll see to that. You just rest now and don't do no more talking. I'm going to get you some rum.”

I got a full bottle so I'd have enough for the night. He had trouble swallowing it, but I got some in him, and he dozed off. I was feeling pretty nervous and shaky, so I had a dram of it myself and lay down on the floor to sleep.

But Mr. Fatherscreft's breathing was coming so hard I couldn't doze off. It was loud and raspy as somebody sharpening a saw with a file. After a bit I got up and stood looking out the window at the Delaware River. It was three-quarters of a mile wide, as near as I could judge. The sun was going down in the west, laying great patches of red on the water. A ferry was coming across, loaded down with two or three wagons. Every little while a rider would come down the road to the tavern, tie up his horse, and come in for his dinner. It was a pretty sight, but I couldn't take pleasure in it for the rasping of Mr. Fatherscreft's breath behind me.

Finally the sun went down, and I lit a candle and had a look at Mr. Fatherscreft. His face was wet, as if somebody'd flung a bucket of water on him, and his hands was outside of the blanket, sort of picking and clutching at it, as if he was trying to hang on to something. I wondered if I ought to wipe his face off for him. I didn't want to wake him up, but I thought maybe he'd rest easier for it. So I set down the candle on the chair near the bed and took out my handkerchief. I guess it was the light shining in his eyes that done it, for before I touched him he gave a sudden jerk and sat half up, his eyes big as eggs staring out into the room. Then he blinked and fell back and lay there gasping.

“Daniel,” he said in the low, hoarse voice, looking straight ahead. “I'm dying. Wipe my face.”

I did it. “You ain't dying yet, sir. We'll make Philadelphia. Here, take some more rum.”

“No, no, it's too late for rum,” he said. “I'm dying, Daniel. It's up to thee now; I've gone as far as I can go.” Slowly he turned his head over to look at me. “Daniel, thou sayest thou knowest William Samuel Johnson.” His voice was weak and low.

“Yes sir,” I said, feeling pretty shaky. “I seen him around Stratford since I was born. My daddy worked for him sometimes. He said he'd help us after my daddy got drowned.”

“Thou must find him. Thou must give him the message. Only him. Dost thou understand? To nobody else.” He stared into my eyes hard.

“Yes sir,” I said.

He took his hands off the blanket and snatched at my wrist. “Only to Johnson, Daniel, dost thou hear?” he said, all whispery, still staring into my face.

“Yes sir. I won't tell anybody else.”

“Give me thy word,” he said, his eyes wide in the middle of that pale, wet face.

“Yes, sir, you have my word on it.” I took the handkerchief and wiped his face dry.

“Daniel, tell Johnson that Congress will bar slavery north of the Ohio River, with nothing said about the South, new states or old. Tell him that if they give us this, we must accept a fugitive-slave law and leave the matter of slave importation till later.”

His voice was so low and whispery now that I could hardly hear it, and I had to bend close over him to make out his words. “Yes, sir,” I said. “There's to be no slavery north of the Ohio River, but you won't make a claim about the South.”

He turned his face away from me. “And they can have their godless fugitive-slave law,” he whispered. “They can have their slave law.”

“Yes, sir,” I said low. “They can have their fugitive-slave law.”

And so it was going to be me was to carry the fugitive-slave law down to Philadelphia. It gave me a mighty queer feeling. But I didn't have time to think about it then, for Mr. Fatherscreft gave a big gasp, his breath stopped, and his body braced up into an arch and quivered there. I couldn't think of nothing to do but give him a shake. He stopped quivering, sucked in some air, and lay back down. “I'll get a doctor,” I said. I raced out of the room and down the stairs into the taproom. It was filled with people at long benches eating and drinking and talking and laughing.

The tavern keeper was standing by the door, talking to a man who had just come in. The man was carrying some handbills and a hammer. I slipped across the room and touched the tavern keeper on the sleeve. “Sir, I need a doctor.”

The tavern keeper swiveled around and gave me a hard look. “What do you mean interrupting, boy? Can't you see I'm talking.”

“Sir, my master's dying,” I said. “He needs a doctor.”

“Dying?”

“Yes sir. He can't get his breath.”

The other man gave the hammer a quick shake. “Where'll I put the handbill, then?” he asked.

The tavern keeper pointed toward the stairs. “Over there, by the stairs,” he said.

“Sir, he's dying,” I said.

“That's the old Quaker?” Yes, sir.

“It don't sound to me like a doctor'll be much use.

“Please, sir.”

“I'll see what I can do.”

“Thank you,” I said. Then I turned away and slipped back to the stairs. The man with the hammer was standing at the foot of them, nailing the poster to the wall. I gave it a quick look. It said:

£10 REWARD

RUNAWAY SLAVE, AGE FOURTEEN, NAMED DANIEL ARABUS. TRAVELING IN COMPANY OF ELDERLY QUAKER. 5'6: OF MEDIUM DARK COMPLEXION—

I didn't want to read any more but took off up the stairs.

I slipped up the stairs as quick and quiet as I could, got into our room, and threw the bolt. Then I looked at Mr. Fatherscreft. He was lying where I had left him. His eyes were open and he was staring up at the ceiling. His face had gone gray under the sweat. He wasn't breathing anymore. I slipped across the room and touched him. His skin was cold and clammy, and I knew he was dead.

Oh, he was an old man and sick, and bound to die soon anyway. But still I felt awful bad. He'd wanted to get to Philadelphia so much and now he never would. I felt like I'd let him down. I'd promised Mr. Fraunces that I'd take care of him, and I hadn't done it. Oh, I knew it wasn't really my fault, there wasn't any way I could have kept him alive. But I wished I could have.

Still, it was making me feel kind of spooky being alone with a dead man, and that handbill downstairs. I decided the best thing for me to do was just leave. There wasn't anything more I could do for him. Anyway, the important thing was to get to Philadelphia with the message for William Samuel Johnson.

I didn't want to take a chance on going out through the tavern with that handbill hanging there. I went to the window and looked out. It was full night, but there was plenty of stars. There was light coming out of the tavern windows, too, and some lanterns down by the ferry landing. A wagon road ran down a hundred yards from the tavern to the ferry. On either side there was open fields, and along the river, a thin row of trees. The river was flowing so quiet that I could see starlight shining silver on it.

I opened up Mr. Fatherscreft's trunk and took out my soldiers' notes. Then I slipped open the window. I looked back at Mr. Fatherscreft. He was still staring up at the ceiling. I didn't want to touch him again, but I knew what was right, so I went over and closed his eyes for him. Then I slung myself over the windowsill, dropped out onto the ground, and began to trot along down toward the ferry.

On both sides of me there was open fields with split-rail fences. I veered off toward the left, vaulted over the fence, and headed out across the field. The moon wasn't up yet, but there was enough starlight so anybody who was looking could see me running out there. I kept on going, fast as I could, toward the line of trees along the river, where I would be more in shadow. In a moment I was by the river. I didn't know exactly where I was, but the one thing I knew was that the Delaware River wound down to Philadelphia. All I had to do was follow it along.

But that was risky. There were handbills up for me. A black boy traveling by himself was bound to look suspicious, anyway. All anyone had to do was begin to ask me a few questions about who I was and where I was going, and I'd be done for.

Working my way along the riverbank was going to be slow, too. I had about thirty miles to go. It would take me more than a day, which meant I'd be traveling by day a good deal of the time. I looked at the river. It was about three-quarters of a mile wide and moving pretty swift. In a boat I could make pretty good time. The idea of stealing a boat was scary, though. If I got caught I'd be in a peck of trouble, all right.