Race for Freedom (22 page)

Clutching the wood with both hands, Jordan walked still deeper. The icy water reached his shoulders, then touched his chin. Terror filled his eyes as he struggled to hold the branch between them.

Three feet still lay between Libby and the end of the branch. As the current swirled around him, Jordan wavered, almost going down.

In that instant Libby found her feet against the trunk of the cottonwood. With all her strength she pushed herself toward Jordan. When she caught hold of the branch, he stepped back.

“Hang on!” he called, moving back again.

Libby clung to the branch. As the current pounded against her, Jordan drew her toward shore.

When at last Libby’s feet touched bottom, the branch guided her in. Only when Libby stumbled onto land did Jordan stop.

Safely above the raging creek, Libby fell onto the ground. With great, long gasps she struggled for breath. Her heart still pounded when she felt the cold air on her wet clothing. Desperate again, Libby pushed herself up and looked around. Through a haze she saw Jordan kneeling on the ground.

His arms stretched high above his head, he gazed up at the sky. “Thank you, Lord! Praise you, Jesus! Hallelujah!”

As if she were still living it, Libby remembered the terror in Jordan’s eyes, the water up to his chin. “How did you get here?” Libby asked through chattering teeth. Already she felt chilled to the bone.

“I run with all my might.” As though just feeling the cold, Jordan started shaking.

Still unable to take in all that had happened, Libby stared at the bluff above them. Where the ravine emptied into the creek, water poured over straight-up-and-down rocks.
Did I fall that far?

Then she saw the steep hill next to the rocks.
Jordan ran down that and lived?

“We gots to move, Libby.” Jordan struggled to speak. “We gots to move, no matter what.”

Libby’s wet clothing clung to her. When she took her first step, she felt bruises in every part of her body. As she looked down, she saw blood oozing from jagged cuts on her arms. But the blood seemed to belong to someone else.

Then Libby remembered. “Where’s Caleb?”

Jordan shook his head. His helpless shrug said more than words.

Libby moaned.
Maybe the chunk of ice hit Caleb’s head. Maybe he was right in front of that wall of water. Maybe he was washed downstream
.

Forgetting all the times she and Caleb hadn’t gotten along, Libby only wanted to be sure he was safe. But her mind felt numb with shock.

Then through a growing haze, Libby saw a boy making his way down the steep hill. Hanging on to small trees and bushes, he dropped rapidly from one level to the next. Still feeling confused, Libby finally realized it was Caleb.

When he reached them, he stared at Libby as though unable to believe what he was seeing. “Are you all right?” he whispered. A strange mixture of fear and relief filled his eyes.

Quick tears welled up, blurring Libby’s vision. Caleb had never looked better. As her tears spilled over, he spoke.

“I saw everything from above. I’m mighty glad you’re still with us, Libby.”

“You too,” she answered when she could speak.

Caleb clapped Jordan on the back, helped him to his feet. “Thanks, my friend,” Caleb said simply. “I wouldn’t have liked the job of telling Libby’s pa.”

Quickly Caleb glanced around. “C’mon,” he told Jordan and Libby. “I found a cave. I’ll make a fire.”

Taking Libby’s hand, Caleb drew her arm across his shoulders. Giving her support, he angled his way up the steep hill. Staying close by, Jordan staggered so he could barely walk. More than once, Caleb waited to encourage him on.

Libby’s shoes sloshed with water. As though she were walking on a thousand needles, her feet prickled. But soon the climbing grew worse. Clutching at bushes and small trees, Caleb helped her up, then stretched out his free hand for Jordan.

In the rubble of the limestone hillside, Libby’s feet sank in. When she slid and would have fallen, Caleb clung to her hand. Pain shot up Libby’s arm. Step by step, her misery grew.

As though looking for patches of grass or flat rocks for footholds, Caleb paused often. Then, tugging and pulling, he drew Libby on. Gradually she felt warmer. When the hill grew even steeper, she started to perspire. Turning around, she looked for Jordan. Climbing not far behind them, he, too, looked warm. Beads of sweat stood out on his forehead.

The moment they reached the cave, Caleb lit a match and checked inside. Then he drew Libby into the darkness. As she started to fall, Caleb caught and lowered her to the ground. Kneeling down, he pulled off her shoes. From the bag on his back, he took out dry clothes.

“Take off your wet clothes and use these,” he said. “When you come out, I’ll have a fire.”

The moment he left, the cold again struck Libby. After her warmth during the climb, the cold air seemed even worse. As it crept into her inner being, Libby fumbled with buttons and fingers too numb to work.

Trembling in every bone of her body, she pulled off her wet clothing. Again she saw the blood on her arms and legs. Yet she couldn’t take in what the bruises and cuts meant.

When at last she finished dressing, Libby had only one thought.
Caleb promised a fire!

Near the entrance of the cave, he had it going. Feeling dazed, Libby sank down next to the flames. Caleb wrapped a dry blanket around her.

Already Jordan huddled as close to the fire as he could get without being burned. Caleb had given him his jacket and cap and every dry piece of clothing he had left.

In spite of the fire, Libby felt she would never be warm again. As her numbness started to wear away, her bruises came alive. Only then did she see the scrape marks on her hands.

Using the small pail he had carried, Caleb was heating a chunk of ice. When the water was hot enough, he poured it into tin cups. The warm liquid flowing down Libby’s throat made her feel better, but her teeth still chattered.

Across the fire, Jordan also shook with cold. Seeing him, Libby remembered what he had done. As though living it again, she saw his terror, the water up to his chin, the branch he held out to her.

“Jordan?” Libby struggled to speak. “You don’t know how to swim, do you? You waded out to save me, and you don’t know how to swim.”

As though it were nothing, Jordan shrugged. But the shrug ended with his whole body shaking.

Watching him, Libby remembered the slave catchers.
Hutton! Not Riggs like we thought
.

“Where are they?” Libby could barely get out the words.

But Caleb understood. “The slave catchers? I hope they’re on the other side of the ravine.”

Caleb’s voice was quieter than usual, as if he still couldn’t believe that Libby was alive. “From what your pa said, the creek spreads even wider below where we were. If Hutton and his bullies try to cross the mud flats, they’ll find standing water. If they try it the way you did, they’ll be in just as much trouble.”

Unless the stream slows down
. Suddenly Libby knew she was thinking again. “Hutton fooled us.” This time Libby’s shiver did not come from cold. “He lied. He pretended he was something he wasn’t.” Libby felt angry now. In spite of her misery, questions plagued her. “Won’t the smoke give us away?”

“Take a look!”

As Libby turned in the direction where Caleb pointed, Libby saw the smoke drifting back into the cave.

“There’s a crack in the limestone drawing the smoke,” Caleb said. “Somewhere back there, it’ll escape—away from us.” For the first time since Libby’s accident, Caleb grinned. “Maybe it’s God’s protection.”

Soon Caleb divided his remaining sandwiches between Jordan and Libby. “That’s the last one,” he said when they finished eating. “You can’t be hungry tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow!” Libby exclaimed. “By now we should have found Doctor Sweney. Look at the time we’ve wasted because of Hutton!”

“But we’re this far,” Caleb told her. “We still have the hope of getting help for Elsa.”

With each minute that passed, Libby discovered another bruise. When she touched her face, she felt dried blood on her cheek.

Taking a clean cloth from his bag, Caleb wet it in the last of the warm water. “Hold still,” he said as he knelt down next to Libby. Gently he washed the cut on her cheek.

While melting more ice, he checked her arms. Here, too, she had scrapes and bruises. “Does anything feel broken?” Caleb asked.

When Libby shook her head, he spoke softly. “It’s a miracle that you’re alive. You know that, don’t you?”

Carefully he washed the cuts on her arms, then set her shoes next to the fire. When they started steaming, Caleb took warm soil from near the fire and put it in her shoes.

“Hey! What are you doing?” Libby asked.

“Drying up the insides.”

As soon as Libby stopped shaking, she spread out her wet clothes. Deep down, she ached. “I thought we could trust Hutton!”

Libby looked across the fire. “But Jordan knew better.”

“I ain’t never had no likin’ for that man,” he muttered.

Libby remembered Jordan’s words. She wished she had listened to him. “Do you think Riggs hired Hutton to be a slave catcher?” she asked Caleb.

“I’m sure of it,” he answered. “Why else would Hutton have come on the boat when he did?”

It made Libby angry. “We looked so hard for Riggs, and he sent someone else! Or do you think Riggs is still on the
Christina?
”

“We’ll find out when we go back,” Caleb told her. “Right now it’s Hutton and his two slave catchers we should worry about.”

If they come up the hill
—Libby tried to push the thought away. If the slave catchers suddenly appeared, she could barely stand up, let alone run.

Like a guard, Caleb sat on the outer edge of the fire next to the entrance of the cave. As the sun went down behind the bluff towering above them, the temperature dropped. In the gray twilight, Caleb gathered more wood. When he had a good-sized heap, he sat down again.

Jordan also faced the opening of the cave. Though his teeth still chattered, his eyes were watchful.

So the danger isn’t past
, Libby thought.
They’re still wondering. And waiting
.

As twilight deepened into darkness, Caleb often got up and prowled around, watching and listening. When Jordan straightened up as though finally warm, Caleb faced him. “Jordan, is Libby right? You don’t know how to swim?”

“I don’t know how, but I gots to learn,” Jordan said. “What if I need to help my family cross a river to freedom?”

As though still living that frightful moment in the creek, Libby remembered.
Jordan risked his life—everything—to get his freedom. Yet now that he has it, he almost gave his life for me
.

Libby couldn’t understand a gift like that. “Jordan,” she asked. “How could you wade in to save me when you don’t know how to swim?”

“I had to,” he told her.

“No, you didn’t.” The terror in Jordan’s face was still real to Libby. “Someone else might have let me drown. What if
you
had drowned?”

“If I did, I was ready.”

“Ready for what?” Libby asked.

“Ready to die.”

“You knew that you might die to pull me out?” she asked.

“Yes’m. But I didn’t think about it.” Jordan sounded as if his actions were a surprise, even to himself. “If I had thunk on it, I would have done the same thing.”

“Why?” Libby asked.

“For your pa’s sake.” Jordan grinned. “And for yours.”

Libby swallowed against a lump in her throat. Nothing could possibly say what she felt, but she had to try. “I can’t thank you enough, Jordan.”

He nodded, receiving her words. Yet Libby knew he still didn’t think he had done very much.

As the night grew deeper, Libby looked to the darkness beyond the fire, and her fear returned.
What if the slave catchers creep up the hill? In the minute they find us, Jordan loses his freedom
.

“Jordan, how do you stand it?” she asked. “How do you stand knowing that at any moment a slave catcher might find you?”

In the firelight Jordan glanced beyond the entrance of the cave. When he looked back at Libby and Caleb, his eyes were solemn. “If I was by myself, I couldn’t stand it.”

By myself. That’s it
! Deep inside, Libby felt an emptiness that never went completely away. Those moments when she could have died still seemed too real.

“I
do
try to do everything by myself,” she said softly.

“You needs to know how to be free,” Jordan told her. “I has been free for a long time.”

Libby felt puzzled. “I thought you just escaped from slavery.”

Jordan grinned. “That Riggs. That Old Massa of mine. They just look on the outside. They thinks, ‘I own that boy.’ But me, I knows better. In here—”

Jordan pointed to his heart. “In here I was free, even when I were a slave. It’s Jesus that makes me free, Libby. You gots to let Jesus git you!”

“But how?” Libby whispered. She wanted to pretend that she had all the right answers. Instead, she remembered Ma being strong even when she was afraid. Pa staying calm while Riggs came up the stairs, planning to arrest him. Caleb standing against what he believed was wrong. And Jordan risking everything to save her from drowning.

In that moment there was something Libby knew. She turned to Caleb. “It takes courage to believe in God, doesn’t it?”

His gaze meeting hers, Caleb nodded.

“But when you do, God
gives
you courage?” Libby asked. “Is that how it works?”

Again Caleb nodded.

A great sobbing rose in Libby’s throat. “Then how do I let Jesus get me?”

In the firelight Caleb leaned forward. “He’s already done everything for you, Libby. He died on the cross because He wants to give you His love and forgiveness.”

“And He does?” Hope filled Libby’s heart.

“Tell Him you’re sorry for your sins. Ask Him to forgive you. To be your Savior. Your Lord. Just ask Him.”

Just ask Him
. The words hung between them in the night air.

As Libby bowed her head to pray, tears ran down her cheeks. Yet by the time she finished praying, she felt peaceful deep inside.