Stealing Freedom (3 page)

Arabella swatted at him. “Joseph, hush now! You've heard that story enough.”

They had heard the story several times in the weeks since Uncle Abram had returned: How he'd fashioned himself a knife with the tools and materials he worked with as a blacksmith. How he'd planned to make it all the way to the North, find work, and earn enough money to buy Aunt Mimi's freedom
and
a farm, and build a house. They all knew Uncle Abram's dreams were much too grand for a slave, especially when, after just two days of traveling, he'd been attacked by the slave hunter's hounds. When he'd returned, Master had
cussed the hunters he'd hired, because they'd promised to bring Abram back without tearing him, and yet Ann's uncle had returned so bloody and weak that for a while they weren't sure he'd live.

Arabella turned to her brother with a look to silence him. “I don't want these children hearing more tales about running off. You're just a lucky man. No telling what Master would have done to you if the hunters had brought you home instead of you bringing yourself home.”

That was the rule on most every farm: Run away, think better of it, and come back on your own, and the punishment would not be severe. But run away and get caught while your nose still pointed north, and the cruelest treatment awaited you at home—a foot chopped off, leg bones broken so they couldn't mend right, or sometimes outright murder, just to discourage anyone else who might be thinking about running off.

Uncle Abram just chuckled. “But I outsmarted them all— killed the hounds, walked on back home myself, and cheated those hunters out of their reward. Never even got locked up, Master was so glad I'd come back on my own.”

Arabella clucked her tongue. “You had no business running off like that. Your family is here nearby, and you were leaving us all!”

Uncle Abram's face grew serious for the first time since he'd come in. “I can't abide this life of working for another man's profit, Arabella. Maybe you can, but I can't.”

Augustus cleared his throat. He looked steadily at his uncle for a moment, then said, “If you decide to go again, Uncle, take me with you.”

The room erupted with emotion.

“That's the very kind of talk I don't want you bringing to this house!” Ann's mother cried.

“If he takes anyone next time, it better be his
wife!”
Aunt Mimi exclaimed. Her cheeks were flushed and she was fanning herself.

“But I don't want Augustus to leave,” Joseph complained.

“This family is staying together,
right here,”
Ann's father said firmly.

An uneasy quiet settled over the room. Addison touched his mother's arm.

“Mamma?” he asked quietly.

“Yes, baby.”

“If we're not going to run, then why are we feeding the dogs?”

Heaviness hung in the air of the tiny cabin. Ann's mother, who always knew what to say, always knew what to do, sat with her eyes cast down, blinking rapidly. Finally, she spoke. “Just in case, baby. That's all. Just in case.”

Aunt Mimi managed to change the mood by telling a story about a runaway slave she'd heard about. He was being chased by hunters and hounds, and heard the hunters shouting to the dogs, “Get him, boys! Go get him!” So, when the dogs caught up with him, the slave yelled, “Go get him! Catch him!” The dogs looked at him, wagged their tails, and then ran on ahead, eager to find out who everyone was chasing.

Ann and her family laughed at the story. Then, as both children and adults had begun to yawn, Uncle Abram said they had a long walk home and had better start on it.

Ann's father announced, “Well, before bed
I'm
going out to fetch wood for
my
wife.”

Ann jumped up to help.

On their way to the woodpile, she heard Uncle Abram and Aunt Mimi talking as they headed toward home.

“If I start hauling wood and water for you, Master will think I'm strong enough to run again. Better he thinks I'm like an old lame goat—he hardly even watches me now.”

“I'll show you wood and water….” Aunt Mimi's tone was of gentle teasing, and their voices drifted away in the night air.

Ann's father hoisted a small log off the woodpile and handed it to her.

“Papa, is that bad, what Uncle Abram tried to do—steal his freedom like that?” Ann asked.

Her father stopped and stared at her. “He wasn't stealing anything that wasn't rightfully his,” he said very softly. “Anyone born a slave gets their freedom stolen the day they're born.”

“But what's the difference?” Ann asked.

“Between what?” Her father bent to lift a larger log.

“Between you and the rest of us? You're free, but you still have to work from first light to last light for the Prices so you can have clothes and a house and food.”

Her father looked up at the glittering stars, and Ann thought he seemed small under the wide sky. “Baby girl, someday I'll show you what it feels like to be free. We won't have to run, because I'm going to buy your freedom just like my mamma bought her own freedom before I was born. Soon as I've got the money saved up, I'll show this whole family what
it feels like to be free.” He straightened his back. “There's no other feeling in the world like it. I work just like you, but the master
pays
me with the food and clothes. And on Sunday, folks pay me with money. How do you think we got the seeds for our garden?” He handed Ann one more piece of wood and balanced several large logs on his shoulder.

“Most folks get just cornmeal and fatback all year. And no garden,” said Ann.

Her father nodded. “And the master can't whip me like I was his horse, either. I work for him, but he doesn't own me. And he can't sell me off from my family. I'm staying right here.” He smiled down at her as they walked toward the cabin.

“But he can still sell us away from you, right, Papa?”

“Aw, Master Charles wouldn't do that, baby girl. Ellie still has her Benjamin, and Tom and Lizzy have all eight of their young ones. The Prices aren't the kind of people to go breaking up a family.”

“But he can still whip us, right, Papa? Like he did Augustus when he let the oxen loose by accident?” She shuddered, remembering the blood dripping down Augustus's back, running down his legs to his heels before Master Charles finally stopped swinging the whip.

Her father set his jaw and was silent. And in that silence Ann heard it: the rhythm she'd been drowning out all day. It said, “Look out, look out, look out…”

Sunday. Today there would be enough to eat.

Ann itched from her Saturday night bath with the strong soap her mother had just made from rendered lard and ashes from the hearth. She squirmed a bit as she helped tie bits of white lace into Catharine's braids.

“You look lovely, Catharine,” Arabella said. “And to think Mistress Carol threw that lace in with the kindling.”

First there would be church, then food. Ann thought she would likely enjoy church more if her mind wasn't so distracted by the thoughts of food, but church came first and there was no arguing.

Church wasn't a building. The law said black folks weren't allowed to have a church meeting without a white person to oversee everything. So church was a clearing in the woods near the slave cemetery, where tall trees protected them from sun and gentle rain. It was aunts and uncles and friends come from the neighboring farms. If anyone were to discover them, it just looked like a picnic.

Church wasn't the preaching of some white minister telling them how the Bible says slaves should obey their masters. That's what Ann heard when Master Charles hired a visiting Methodist minister to hold services for the local slaves. No, their church was singing and chanting and sometimes shouting, letting their prayers move from their hearts to their throats and rise up to God until the clearing was filled like a cathedral with rich deep notes and clear high notes and all of them intertwining until the blend felt like pure joy, pure light, and Ann felt immersed in love. And when the singing and intertwining voices died down, because the Spirit had moved and it was time to bask in the afterglow, the little clearing felt like a grander place than any cathedral. Someone might still be humming softly, and others whispering, “Thank you, Lord,” and calls came here and there from the few birds that had dared to stay and join in that ocean of song.

And with the magic still clinging to the branches, church
did
turn into a picnic, as the men built fires and fried fish in big iron skillets, the women sliced tomatoes and cucumbers and cabbages, and the children ran to fetch watermelons that had been placed in the creekbed to turn ice-cold. It was the one day of the week they didn't eat corn mush and fatback for three meals.

Ann loved the singing, and she loved the eating, and she loved seeing all the neighbors, cousins, aunts, and uncles.

“Ann Maria, you grew since last week.” Aunt Mimi gathered her into a bosom that smelled like lye soap and fresh fried tomatoes.

Ann gave her aunt a quick squeeze. “I'm going to pick
huckleberries with Addison and Joseph,” she said, and turned to run off with her brothers.

“Ann Maria.” Aunt Mimi's voice was insistent. “Come sit with me a moment.”

Ann settled on a large stump next to her aunt. “Where's Uncle Abram?” she asked.

“He's talking to your mother and father.”

Across the clearing, Ann saw her favorite uncle deep in discussion with her parents. Her mother had her apron twisted in her hands and was wringing the life out of it.

“What's the matter, Aunt Mimi? Is his leg bad again?” Ann asked.

“Nothing's wrong, baby. It's just right.” She smoothed Ann's hair back away from her face. “Let me get a good look at you.” She cupped Ann's chin in her hand. “You're getting so pretty, child. Someday I'm going to make you a calico dress. What color do you want?”

Ann's eyes grew wide. She'd only ever worn dresses made of slave cloth, which was just as dirty brown and rough as the sacks Master Charles's hybrid seed corn came in. She looked from her aunt's face to the sky above her. “Blue,” she said.

“Someday I'll make you that blue dress,” said Aunt Mimi. “Someday.”

The way she said “someday” sounded sad, and Ann knew that the dress was only a dream, the way Uncle Abram's farm and house and freedom were only dreams.

“Ann, we're leaving—you coming or not?” Joseph called to her from where he and Addison were on their way into the woods.

“Now you say hello to your uncle Abram before you run pick those berries, you hear?” Aunt Mimi ordered.

Ann said, “I will,” but when Addison called, “’Bye, Ann. We won't save any berries for you!” she resolved to see her uncle later and ran to catch up with her brothers.

The huckleberry bushes formed a thick covering on the forest floor. They were filled with green berries, and an occasional ripe purple one. Ann had eaten so much of the other good things, she was glad to eat just a few berries rather than the handfuls they would find later in the summer.

“Pssst.”

“What do you want, Addison?” Ann asked without looking up from her berry search.

“Wasn't me,” said Addison.

“Wasn't me, either,” said Joseph, his mouth already purple.

“Pssst!”

The three of them stood and listened.

“It came from over there.” Addison pointed toward a place where thick vines formed a curtain and dappled sunlight shifted.

Suddenly the curtain erupted with a shriek and a dark form lunged out at them. Ann jumped, Addison shouted, and they both ran. They tripped over each other and fell in a heap in the huckleberry bushes.

The next thing they heard was Joseph's voice. “Richard, you are one sorry excuse for an Indian.”

Richard was laughing so hard his feathered headdress had fallen down over one ear. “You're nothing but a bunch of scaredy-cats!”

“You didn't scare me one bit,” said Joseph. He stood with
his arms crossed, right where he'd been standing when they'd stopped to listen.

“Did too. I saw your face—all big eyes and mouth hanging open.”

“That's because I couldn't believe how ugly you look in those feathers,” Joseph shot back.

Ann and Addison brushed themselves off. “Come on, Richard,” said Addison. “Hush up and pick some berries with us.”

Any other Sunday, teasing like this would blow over and they would soon find themselves wading in the Hawlings, trying to catch minnows in their cupped hands. But today Richard was in a fighting mood.

“I'm not picking berries until Joseph admits he was scared.” Richard carefully folded his headdress and stuffed it into his back pocket.

“You might as well go on home, then,” said Joseph, and he crouched down to continue his berry picking.

Ann expected Richard to pull out a bag of marbles or a slingshot or any of the other toys he had and they hadn't. But he didn't pull out a toy. He stepped up to Joseph and kicked him hard in the ribs.

“You think you're so tough?” Richard taunted. “I hear you think you're bigger than me. Prove it.”

Ann cringed.

Joseph drew himself up to his full height, a couple of inches shorter than Richard. “I am tougher than you and braver than you every day of the year,” Joseph declared.

Richard shoved him in the chest. “You are not. You're a yellow belly.”

“Joseph, leave him—” Ann began, but it was too late.

It started as shoving, back and forth; then Richard swung his fist squarely into Joseph's jaw. Joseph staggered, felt his lip, and spat out blood. Then, like a racehorse out of the starting gate, he lit into Richard with his fists, pummeling his face, his stomach, his ribs. Richard punched back, but Joseph was too quick, and Richard was soon doubled over, protecting himself.

Ann watched in horror. She wasn't sure what made her hesitate—possibly the strange pleasure of watching Richard get what she thought he deserved—but she knew it must be stopped. She rushed at Joseph, grasped him by the shoulders, and yanked him backward. They fell to the ground together.

Addison came up behind Richard. “Come on, Richard. It's hot. Let's all go swimming and cool down.” Addison's voice was as calm as he could make it.