The Letter Writer (4 page)

"We'd better get to sleep now," she told me, "or we'll both get in trouble before we even do anything."

I was just about bursting to tell someone I was going to one of Nat Turner's baptisms. Of course, to me, Nat Turner was part real and part fancy. Isn't that the way he was to everyone in Southampton County? I'd heard rumors and I'd heard fact. He was a nigra minister who'd had visions. He was a slave who'd invented a privy flusher, flushed by water. He was a preacher who held
Bible class for his own kind, and he could repair an oak table better than a trained furniture maker.

You could die to meet him and at the same time you were frightened beyond belief at meeting him. He was a slave, sold and resold, hired out at premium prices. Mother Whitehead wanted him but couldn't get him. Oh, I wanted to tell someone I was going to see him do a baptism. So I wrote inside my head:

Dear Uncle Andrew: Tomorrow is Sunday and I am going with Violet to watch Nat Turner do a baptism. I am so excited. You know who Violet is. And I've written to you before about Nat Turner. He is a real renegade in these parts, like your Robin Hood. Don't worry for me. Violet and I are going to bring Owen home! I hope all is well with you.

Your loving niece, Harriet Whitehead

Before breakfast the next morning, which was Sunday, Mother Whitehead was up and about and insisted on dictating a schedule to me to be posted on the wall inside the large barn.

It was a plan for the year of the planting and harvesting, and it even told how many horses and oxen and laborers were to be used.

Calendar of work for 5 laborers, 2 horses, 4 oxen, 3 great and 3 small ploughs on a farm of 6fields of 40 acres each, hiring aid in harvest and hay time.

Sept. 1 thru 17—plough in the stubble of the first wheat field and sow buckwheat, 40 acres in 13
ploughing days. Sept. 18 thru Oct. 1—plough and sow wheat after clover, 40 acres in 13 days with 3 double ploughs...

And on it went: when to haul corn, firewood, coal, wood, rails, when to deliver wheat. It was Mother White-head's yearly calendar of work. I found it fascinating. She said I was to make two copies and put one on Richard's desk.

Richard was put out with her for working on the Sabbath, but she told him that this was God's work as well as was his sermon writing. What, she asked him, could be more God's work than planning on sowing the wheat in the fields?

Richard had no answer for that so he couldn't argue.

At breakfast Violet served and was careful not to look at me. I moved my eggs and bacon around on my plate but none of it reached my mouth.

"She isn't eating, Mother," Richard complained. "She's planning some mischief. Look at the appetite Margaret has."

Margaret did some simpering thing at him, which pleased him enormously. I gave a look of disgust. Margaret had his approval, and I knew that I'd rather have
Richard's rage than his approval. To have his approval would mean that I'd failed in life.

I forced myself to eat, lest he make Mother drudge up some ungodly chore for me to do this morning. Richard went back to reading the
Richmond Constitutional Whig
newspaper. He'd been up since six, going over his sermon, and until he gave that sermon he was not to be borne.

"Leave her be, Richard," Pleasant said. He sat at the head of the table and she on his right. The baby, two-year-old William, sat between them. He was playing with his egg, shoving it into his mouth with his fingers. "Da, Da." He waved a spoon at Richard.

I loved William. And Pleasant. With the exception of Mother Whitehead, whose presence always brought peace, they were the only light touch we had in the house, because they melted your heart. Pleasant with her beautiful light brown hair around her shoulders and William toddling around getting into everything. They were the only ones who could soften Richard up. William, with his fat little legs and dimpled face, could toddle over to his father and mellow all the meanness. I know now why God gave us babies. They required constant
attention, of course. They made messes and disturbed the peace, but their cuteness and smiles were sometimes the only reminder of God we had in the house.

And Pleasant had the privilege that a loved wife had. She was the only one who could scold Richard, make him mind, point out the error of his ways. I loved her, because without her we might all consider ourselves in hell.

She came from a family of eminence in Petersburg. She was well schooled and had tutored wealthy girls before marriage. I respected her, for many reasons, but mostly because she could handle my brother.

Soon it was time to go. Mother Whitehead knew where we were off to, and Richard had reluctantly given permission after breakfast, which meant I would miss his church services. He gave permission only because he, himself, wanted to know what a baptism of Nat Turner's would be like and he, of course, could not, because of his position, attend.

I excused myself and left the room. But he followed me out into the hall. "Be respectful," he admonished. "I don't know where this outrider of a minister was ordained, but it's still a baptism. You hear me?"

"Yes," I said.

He looked at Violet. "You hear?"

"Yes sir, Massa Richard."

"You riding?" he asked me.

I said yes.

"Give Violet a horse. Blackie. William could ride him, he's so docile."

I said yes to everything and he went back to the dining room. We went to the kitchen, where we collected our food, then out to the barn where Chancy the groom readied our horses.

When we got to the pond where the baptism was to take place, we were surprised to see it surrounded by at least seventy-five poor whites and negro people, come to see Nat Turner the minister, just as we had come. Word had traveled, as it does in these parts, on some grapevine that never stopped growing and could never be cut.

"There he is," Violet pointed out. "There's Nat Turner, with Ezra Bentley."

I looked to where she pointed. And sure enough there was a tall, young negro man with short hair, broad of shoulder, and dressed in trousers that were torn at the knee and a shirt that needed buttons in front. Immediately I saw that there was something about him that drew the eye and the mind. But I could not say what.

Without stopping, he grasped Ezra Bentley's arm and together they walked right into the pond in water up to their shoulders. Then, of a sudden, Nat Turner grasped Ezra by the shoulders and pushed him under the water. While he held him there with one hand, he recited something from the Bible, something long enough that I thought Ezra might drown. Then he shouted, "I baptize you, in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen."

Ezra came up like a hooked fish, sputtering and choking and yelling at the same time. "I am saved! Thank the Lord God, I am saved!"

No sooner had he shouted that than some white boys from the shore splashed into the water, all of one mind, and waded over to Ezra and grabbed him and pushed him again under water.

"Stop it." Nat Turner reached under to rescue Ezra. "Hear me! How dare you interfere with a sacred ceremony!"

But they were not afraid of him. They did not consider him a true minister. I thought of my brother and how those boys would cower if he spoke to them in such a tone. These boys hooted at Nat Turner. They splashed water at him. And when they finally let poor Ezra up out of the water, they shoved him at Nat and the two of them
fell and went under again. The boys left, calling Nat names as they went.

It was then that I noticed a lone figure on the shore, pacing up and down.

"There's Owen," Violet said to me. And she waved him over.

He came, head down, eyes casting around, like one who was hunted and did not want to be found.

"How are you today, Owen?" Violet asked.

"I'm all right, Violet. Why did you bring Harriet?"

"Is that any way to greet someone who cares about you?" Violet asked.

"Hello, Owen," I said.

He nodded at me. At home he'd often spoken to me. His job had been to keep the many hearth fires burning in the house, to clean the chimneys when they needed it. And Mother Whitehead had been training him up to answer the door when someone knocked.

He was even learning to send the person around to the back door if they were negro or looked disreputable.

"Are you coming home today?" I asked him.

"No. I'm not comin' 'til Nat Turner brings me."

There was a surprise. I hadn't known Nat Turner was coming to our house. Violet grabbed me by the arm
then, and pulled me over to where Turner was standing, wiping himself down with a dry piece of flannel. "Nat," she said, "this is Harriet Whitehead. I want you should meet her. She's one of the Whitehead daughters."

He stopped rubbing his head with the towel and gave a little bow. "Pleased, Miss Harriet," he said. His English was perfect. His yellow brown eyes took my measure.

"I've heard a lot about you, Mr. Turner," I said.

He laughed then, a not unpleasant sound. "Mr. Turner? You do me an honor. I can't remember ever being called Mr. before."

"Should I call you Reverend?"

"You should call me Nat, like everybody else does. Unless they're calling me 'boy.' Or 'you there.' Or something worse. You saw the crowd. Nobody thinks I'm a reverend."

"I've never seen such a wonderful baptism," I breathed. "My brother does baptisms, and they're so proper you could sleep through them. He doesn't immerse people in water, of course."

"Ah, yes, your brother, the minister. Perhaps you could help me some. I'm planning on bringing Owen here home. And cajoling your brother not to whip him for running off. Tell me, can he be cajoled?"

I thought of Richard, thin and tall and prim, with his tight mouth and his stern demeanor. Richard was the last person on earth who could be cajoled. He would have to forgive Owen, and he had never forgiven anybody in his life for anything. The only one who could make him smile was William.

"It depends, Nat, on how persuasive you can be," I said.

He smiled, showing gleaming white teeth. His eyes smiled, too, and I thought I could never fear him like I fear some of the negroes on our place. No, this man has goodness in him. "When are you coming?" I asked.

"Perhaps later on today," he suggested. "At dusk. I have found men to be most mellow at dusk."

Suppertime, I thought. Richard is most mellow at suppertime. A glass of port, a good cut of meat, yes. He'll be mellow at dinnertime. "I won't say anything," I told Nat. "I'll keep it secret. I do know that Mother White-head thinks much of you. She always wants to hire you on. You have a friend in our house."

We parted. Violet chatted all the way home, but I scarce heard her. I could not yet wrap my mind around the fact that I had met the one and only Nat Turner. And he was coming, this very day, to our house. And then I
thought, Richard would not be rude. He would not dare. By tomorrow it would be all over the county that Nat Turner had come to our house and brought a runaway slave home and asked for mercy. One reverend to another. And no matter what people thought of Turner's power as a minister, well, they knew of Richard's. They respected Richard. And as their minister, he could do no less than be cordial to Turner, could he? Because Turner had come to him, beseeching him. And as a true man of the cloth, Richard could not turn him away.

It came to me then that it was just this that Nat Turner was counting on. That he had already figured it out in his head. And he was counting on the fact that Richard, a graduate of Hampden-Sydney College, would already know this.

We heard the knock on the back door half
w
ay through the repast that served as Sunday supper. The house, which was rambling and three story, with rooms that went off in directions that looked as if no architect ever drew up the plans, was large and comfortable. A newcomer could get lost in it. But it had that necessity every Southern mansion had—a center hall, which kept the air coming through on even the hottest of days.

At first, when I heard the knocking I thought,
Oh good, Nat Turner knows enough to come to the back door. That will give him points with Richard.
And then I thought,
No, it's Owen's idea. He was in charge of answering the door and sending negroes to the back when he was here.

Violet came into the dining room, careful not to look at me. She'd been "doing the doors" since Owen ran away. "Master Richard, there's someone to see y'all."

"Who is it?" Richard growled. "You know I don't like to interrupt my meals for guests."

"It's Nat Turner, suh. That negro preacher."

"I'm not interested in talking with him. Can't even control the onlookers at his baptism. Tell him to come another time. Offer him some iced tea and tell him to go."

Before supper Richard had cross-examined Violet and me about the baptism and had been outright horrified at the behavior of those boys who had come to see it. "What kind of a minister is that?" he'd asked of no one in particular. But I couldn't help feeling that he was glad to hear our report. And that he'd used me as a spy.

"But, suh," Violet protested now, "he's got
Owen
with him."

"Who?"

"Owen, suh, who done run off. He's got him."

Mother's knife and fork clattered onto her plate. She
had missed Owen dearly. She started to get up. "Richard, if you don't go, I will. It's our Owen, for heaven's sake."

"I know," he growled, and pushed back his chair. "Sit, Mother, I'll handle it."

But she insisted on getting up. I got to my feet and helped her.

Violet spoke again. "He says, suh, that he wants to see Miz Catharine. And Miz Harriet, as well as you."

Richard tore the white dinner napkin from his shirtfront. "Oh, he does, does he? Does he know he isn't quite running things around here?"

Violet simply curtsied and went out of the room to the glass-enclosed, plant-filled solarium in back of the house. Mother Whitehead and I followed.

They stood there like two lost travelers. Nat Turner had dressed in clean trousers and a patched but fresh shirt and weskit. His shoes were polished. Owen's old clothes had been replenished. They turned as we came in. I thought I saw Owen cower a bit at the sight of my brother and make a move as if to get down on his knees, but Nat held him up firmly by the shoulders.