Shifted By The Winds (66 page)

“President Johnson’s policies have created a country that is unsafe for every black person. We cannot afford to forget that as we fight for change. We need to be bold, but we also need to be careful. We must assume that most of the white people around us are committed to maintaining white supremacy.” He saw the scowls mixed with blatant fear.

“Every person in here is strong and resilient,” Moses continued. “You have lived through slavery. You have lived through a long war. Now you are fighting to rebuild your life in the midst of continuing racism. We are going to take big steps forward, but sometimes we will crash into walls. Sometimes we will fall back.” He paused and looked around the room. “But we will never quit moving forward.” His heart pounded with the certainty that he was telling the truth. “We will never quit moving forward!”

“Amen!” one woman called.

“We’ll never quit,” a man hollered, raising his hand for emphasis.

The call went up around the schoolhouse. “
We will never quit moving forward!
”

Moses held up his hand again until silence allowed him to continue. “Each of you is the only person in charge of your future. Yes, the government plays a role, and yes, things are about to change, but that doesn’t mean it’s not up to you. If you don’t know how to read yet, you need to get yourself into this school and let my wife, Rose, teach you.” His voice rang out with authority. Suddenly, he was no longer nervous. He felt strong and confident. He knew he could help his people. Whether it was here on the plantation, or on a larger scale as an attorney, he was going to do whatever it took.
As a politician
? Moses stiffened for a moment as the thought flitted through his mind, but he pushed it aside.

“If you already know how to read, my guess is that you aren’t using that knowledge. You should be reading every book you can get your hands on. White people believe we are ignorant. It’s up to you to prove they are wrong. You need to learn everything you can so that you can take control of your own life. No one else should do it for you.” Moses paused. “We already know there are people eager to step up and take control of everything about your life. It’s up to
you
to make sure they don’t do it again.”

He gazed around for a moment, letting his words sink in. “I already know you all have a long list of excuses as to why you can’t learn more. You think knowing how to read should be enough. You think you’re too tired after a long day of work in the fields. You think you have too much to do to take care of your families. You believe learning more won’t make a difference.” He stopped and watched everyone’s faces. He could tell many of the crowd did indeed believe the excuses he was listing. “I have some questions for you. What percentage of the crop would it be reasonable to ask a plantation owner to pay you at the end of a long year of work? Can you do the math to make sure you are being paid fairly?”  He spoke slowly, letting the questions burn into his listener’s minds “Can you read a legal contract and understand it enough to make sure you are not being taken advantage of? Can you help your children with their homework so they have a good chance at a better life?”

A thick silence filled the schoolhouse as most of his listeners either lowered their eyes or shifted to stare out the window into the darkness. “I already know the answers to those questions,” Moses continued. “The answer is no. How do you expect to create a new life if you simply let the whites continue to control how you make a living? How do you expect to demand respect when you aren’t doing the things to
deserve
that respect?” His voice filled the room. “I don’t care how tired you are at the end of the day. Read. Learn. I don’t care how much you have to do to take care of your families.
Read
.
Learn
. I don’t care if you believe what I’m saying or not, though if you’re smart you will…” He allowed his voice to trail off with a hint of humor.

A ripple of laughter relaxed the audience a little but didn’t diminish how avidly they were listening. “Read. Learn,” Moses repeated once again. “There are books here in the school. Borrow them. We’ll keep adding more.” He fell silent and let his words take hold. Then he said it again. “Read. Learn. It’s the only way you can take control of your life.
Your
life.”

Moses correctly interpreted the looks on some of the faces. “I know slavery robbed you of so many things. It stole years of your life. It means the rest of your life is going to be a struggle to undo the things done to you.” He watched as many people nodded, a look of something like relief flitting across their faces. They thought he was giving them a way out of taking responsibility. “So what?” he continued, watching as the looks of relief wilted as quickly as they had appeared. “You can’t go back and undo the past. Making your choices today based on the past won’t get you anywhere. Whites believe blacks are stupid and incapable of being educated. It’s up to you to prove them wrong. Whites believe blacks are incapable of caring for themselves. It’s up to you to prove them wrong,” he thundered as his passion took hold.

“You can spend the rest of your life feeling sorry for yourself for what you experienced, or you can allow your anger to fuel your determination to change your life. I would be the first to agree that the whites in this country owe the freed slaves many things, but I’m certainly not waiting around for it to happen. I’m going to fight to make that happen, but I’m certainly not going to wait for it.”

Moses let silence fill the schoolhouse for several moments. “You shouldn’t wait around either. I encourage you to keep moving forward.”

“Keep moving forward,” several people called back to him.

Moses was thrilled by the looks of determination firing the faces all around him.

“We will never quit moving forward,” an elderly woman sang out. “I might have had most my life stole from me, but I still got breath inside me. As long as I do, I plan on moving forward!”

“Yes!” a man from a neighboring plantation yelled. “I’m gonna be in here every week to claim some of them books. I’m gonna prove I ain’t stupid!”

Moses grinned as the comments continued to ring out around the room. He exchanged a look with Rose, thrilled with the pride he saw in her eyes. “
I love you
,” she mouthed, her eyes glistening with tears.

“We gots to keep having these meetings.” The elderly woman who had ignited the outburst peered at him intently as the voices quieted.

“What’s your name?” Moses asked. He had never seen her before, but he was drawn by her enthusiasm.

“Corabelle,” she responded, emotion radiating from the black eyes set deeply into her wrinkled face.

Moses gazed at her. She could be eighty or fifty. Slavery had a way of aging people far past their actual years. “Where are you from, Corabelle?”

“I came from down in Florida,” she answered.

Moses stared at her. He couldn’t imagine making a trip like that at her age. “And what are you doing now?”

Corabelle smiled. “Nothing, thanks to you. My boy, Jamison, worked for you this summer. Because of you we got enough money to make it through the winter if we be real careful. I know most of the men be moving on to look for new jobs, but my Jamison is staying right here because he knows I ain’t got another move left in me,” she confided. “He figures he’ll work for you again next year.”

Moses nodded as his eyes roamed the crowd. He smiled when he found Jamison standing back against the wall. The man had worked hard for him all season. “Jamison will have a job,” he promised Corabelle, not mentioning he would not have to wait until next spring.  He was going to make sure her son was added onto the crew at Blackwell Plantation.

“That’s real good,” Corabelle said with an even warmer smile, “but I still want to know if you gonna keep having these meetings. It gets to where folks think they all alone sometimes. The fight to make a better life seems to be more than folks believe they can handle. We need to be reminded just like you did tonight. It would be nice if folks needed to hear things once to really get them, but that ain’t the way people work, Moses.”

“I believe you are right, Corabelle. We are going to keep having these meetings every two weeks.” He smiled as applause broke out from the crowd. “Here’s the thing, though. It’s not enough for me to come up here and get you excited about what you can do with your life. It’s up to you to go home and actually do something with it. As long as I see changes in people I will keep doing these meetings. If there comes a time when I think I’m wasting my breath, I’m going to stop,” he cautioned.

“You ain’t gonna have to stop, Moses,” Corabelle replied in a firm voice. “You do your part. We’ll do ours.”

More applause filled the room. “We will never quit moving forward,” a man called out. Within moments, it was a unified call bursting from every throat. “
We will never quit moving forward
!”

Moses reached for Rose as soon as she crawled under the covers. She sighed and snuggled up to him, relishing his warmth after settling John and Felicia in for the night. Moses had rocked Hope for almost an hour when they arrived home. Their daughter had been asleep in just a few minutes, but Rose knew Moses loved to simply hold her. She never tired of watching the two of them together. She had longed for a daddy the whole time she was growing up. To know Hope had Moses was sheer joy.

Rose cuddled close, relaxing as she warmed. She reached up to caress Moses’ face. “I was so very proud of you tonight,” she said, careful to keep her voice low so she wouldn’t wake Hope. John had been such a heavy sleeper, but his little sister seemed to awaken at just about any unexpected sound.

“I would have been too terrified to say a word if you hadn’t been there,” Moses admitted.

Rose cocked her head and gazed up at him. “No one would have ever guessed,” she assured him. “You looked just like you were meant to be up there.”

“It felt that way once I got over my terror,” Moses agreed, a small smile playing across his lips. “I liked the way it made me feel, but I liked the looks on people’s faces even more.”

Rose smiled. “Most of them stopped on their way out to tell me they would be back for books this week. I’m sending a letter to have Abby bring back more books from Philadelphia if she can. If it doesn’t reach her in time, I know more will arrive from her friends soon. I predict our little school will have the best stocked library in Virginia.” She reached for Moses’ hand and squeezed it tightly. “They all heard what you said, Moses. Because of you, they will be more prepared for the future.”

Moses shook his head. “Because of
us
. I can give them the determination to learn, but you’re the one who will teach them.”

“Well, me and your lovely daughter, Felicia,” she said with a chuckle. “She was talking to me on the way home about her plans to help the girls and women prepare to fight for equal rights. That is, when she is not teaching them about astronomy.” Rose shook her head. “That little girl never ceases to amaze me.”

Moses smiled. “Felicia had her first mama to give her a hunger for knowledge. Now she has a mama that can help her learn everything she needs to know. She is a lucky little girl.”

Rose shook her head. “I appreciate that, but Felicia is learning so quickly that I’m close to feeling behind her. All I can do is say yes every time she asks if she has played outside enough to earn library time.” She smiled, feeling a fierce pride. “I’m so glad you brought that little girl home.” She paused. “I didn’t want you to at first,” she said hesitantly. She had never confessed this to her husband. She wasn’t sure why she was now. Moses lifted a brow, waiting for her to continue.

“I thought Felicia would be something else to hold me back from doing what I wanted to do,” Rose admitted, the words coming easier when she realized how completely she didn’t feel that way now. “I couldn’t imagine being able to go to college if I had three children.” Her gaze strayed to where Hope slept peacefully, her thumb tucked securely in her mouth as the dim flicker of a lone candle on the nightstand next to the bed played across her face.

“And now?”

Rose shrugged. “You could bring another one home,” she said. She slapped her hand over her mouth when she forgot to speak softly, but the continued silence said Hope was sleeping soundly for once. She sighed with relief. “I realize nothing is going to stop us from going to college,” she whispered. “There will be more things to juggle with three children, but between both of us we can handle it.”