The Return of the Dragon (10 page)

When Sallie arrived home, her family was in the cabin, gathered around the rough wooden table, too upset to eat their evening meal.

“Where have you been, Sallie?” her mother asked as Sallie opened the door. “They’ve been looking for you all afternoon up at the Big House. Miss Harriet is mighty angry, Eliza says.”

Sallie sat down on the bench next to Jamie and reached for a piece of corn bread. She took a big bite.

“I don’t care,” she said. “I’m not going to do what Harriet says anymore.”

Her mother frowned. “Sallie,” she began gently.

Sallie got up from the bench and walked to the door. She opened it and peered out, to make sure no one was listening. There was nobody nearby. She came back to the table and sat down again.

“Mama,” she said. “Daddy. Please. Are we going to run away?”

Sallie’s parents exchanged a long look. Sallie’s father put an arm around Sallie’s mother and hugged her close.

“Yes,” Sallie’s father said. “It’s the only way.”

He grinned ruefully. “I’m a very valuable property, you know. I’d go a long way toward paying for the master’s poker games.”

Sallie’s mother put a hand on his arm.

“We’ll go tomorrow night,” she said. “As soon as it’s dark. We were waiting until the last minute to tell you. I know it’s going to be hard on you children, and it’s dangerous — but it will be far worse if we stay here.”

Sallie’s father turned to the children. “And you cannot say anything about this to anyone,” he said. “Not one word, even to your best friends. Not to Amanda, Sallie, or to Samuel, Jamie. Especially not to Martha Jane. No one must know.”

“There will be trouble enough when they find we’re gone,” Sallie’s mother said. “It will be safer for all our friends, the less they know.”

Sallie spent the next day working at the Big House. Harriet was cross with her.

“Where were you yesterday?” she said. “I wanted you. You’re supposed to do what
I
say. I could have you whipped, you know, if you don’t do what you’re told.”

“Yes, Miss Harriet,” Sallie said meekly. She fanned Harriet while she practiced the harp. She made Harriet’s bed and dusted her bedroom and mended her pink dress, which had a torn hem. And all the while she counted the hours until night would fall.

I’ll never work in this house again, she thought to herself, hugging her secret close. I’ll never see
you
again, she thought, helping Harriet dress to go downstairs for supper. On the way home, she slammed the back door of the Big House behind her. Never again, Sallie said to herself. She repeated it to herself over and over again, like a little song. Never again. Never again.

Back in the little cabin, Sallie and her family collected a very few things to take on their long journey. A bundle of tools for her father —“They owe me that much,” her father said grimly — a few scraps of clothing, some pennies Sallie’s mother had earned selling eggs, a package of cold corn bread, and a bracelet of carved wooden beads.

“That belonged to your great-great-grandfather,” Sallie’s father said. “It came all the way from Africa.”

Soon it was dark and the slave quarters were silent. Nothing stirred.

“You can’t make a single sound,” Sallie’s father whispered. “Even if you stub your toe, Jamie, and it really hurts — you must stay absolutely quiet. If you make a noise, they might find us and bring us back, and that would be terrible. We would be beaten, whipped. We would all be sold. We would never see each other again.”

Jamie’s eyes were wide and frightened. “I’ll be very quiet,” he whispered.

Sallie nodded.

Silently they slipped out the cabin door, around the side of the house, through the garden, and into the woods, the way Sallie had gone the day before. Sallie’s father pointed up at the sky.

“That’s the way we’re going,” he said. “North. See the Drinking Gourd?”

“Where?” Jamie whispered.

“Those seven stars,” his father explained. “See how they’re shaped like a dipper? See the long handle and the cup? As long as we keep those stars in front of us, we’ll know we’re going in the right direction.”

“Hurry,”
Sallie’s mother said. “We want to get as far as we can before daybreak.”

They walked for many nights. Often they walked through streams, and once they crossed a muddy swamp, in water up to their waists. Sallie hated that swamp. The sticky bottom felt awful.

“It’s the best thing we could have found,” her father said. “Sometimes slave catchers chase after escaping slaves with dogs. The dogs are trained to follow a person’s scent. But they can’t follow a scent through water.”

They were hungry all the time.

Sometimes they found nuts and berries in the woods. Sometimes Sallie’s father caught fish, but not often, because it was very dangerous to light a cooking fire.

They slept in thickets and in caves, and once in a deserted barn in a little clearing, its roof half fallen in.

“We must be almost there,” Sallie’s father said one day, when Jamie complained that his feet were tired. “It can’t be much farther now. We’ll come to a big river. It’s called the Ohio. And on the other side, it’s all free country. Once we get there, we’ll be free.”

But the very next night disaster struck. They were walking along a little grass track through the woods, single file, their way lit only by the moon. There was no sound but the rustle of wind in the leaves. Then, behind them in the distance, there came the sound of barking dogs.

Sallie’s mother looked back in alarm.

“Amos!” she whispered. “What’s that?”

“Let’s go faster,” said Sallie’s father. “There’s nowhere to hide here.”

They hurried along the little path, as fast as they could go, tripping and stumbling. Sallie’s heart began to pound with fear.

We’re so close, she thought, so close. They
can’t
catch us now.

Behind them the barking of dogs got louder, and there was a sound of horses’ hooves and the jingling of harnesses.

“Those dogs smell something, boys!” a man’s deep voice shouted. “Runaways!”

The trees suddenly gave way to a long grassy field. Far across it, Sallie could see the dark gleam of flowing water. It was the river.

“Might as well give it up,” the deep voice shouted. “We’ve got you now!”

A dog howled.

Sallie’s mother stumbled and fell. When she tried to get to her feet again, her face twisted with pain. “It’s my ankle!” she gasped. “Amos . . .”

Sallie’s father handed his bundle of tools to Sallie, and bent and scooped Sallie’s mother up in his arms.

“We’ll never make it,” Sallie’s mother said.

“Run!” Sallie’s father shouted. “Sallie! Jamie!
Run!
”

Oh please, Sallie thought to herself. Oh please, let us make it across the river. Oh please . . .

And then, miraculously, above them in the sky, where a moment ago there had been nothing but moon and stars, appeared a great flash of glittering gold.

“Dear Lord,” said Sallie’s father.

It was the dragon. It hovered high above the trees, long golden neck arched, golden wings outspread.

Sallie’s mother hid her face in her father’s shirt front.

Jamie burst into tears.

Sallie stepped quickly forward. “It’s all right,” she said. “It’s a dragon. And a friend. I met her in the woods before we ran away. I should have told you. But I know she won’t hurt us. I think she’s here to help us.”

“We could use it,” Sallie’s father said. Behind them the baying of the dogs was growing louder.

The dragon reared back in the air. There was a whooshing sound of indrawn breath and a sudden roar of flame. The night exploded with light. The dragon shone sun-golden in the air, blowing a blaze of blue flame. At the edge of the wood, the thicket began to burn. Fire licked across the grass. Bushes crackled and burst into flame. Light flickered across the faces of Sallie’s parents and brother. Jamie had stopped crying.

There was now a wall of fire between Sallie’s family and their pursuers. They heard, faintly, the sound of startled yells and of dogs retreating, yelping now in terror.

A hot wind struck them. The dragon landed before them in the grass. Politely it inclined its golden head.

Sallie’s father stepped forward.

“We have no words to thank you, sir,” he began.

“Ma’am,” Sallie hissed hastily behind him.

“Ma’am,” Sallie’s father said. “You have saved our lives.” He paused. “More than our lives. You have given us our freedom.”

The dragon impatiently shook its head. “You have
taken back
your freedom,” it said. “It was yours all along.”

It gestured toward the river with a golden claw.

“There on the bank,” the dragon said, “near that little clump of trees, you’ll find a rowboat. It was left there by the farmer who lives in the house across the river. You can just see the light in his window from here. He leaves the boat there for runaways like yourselves. He is a conductor on the Underground Railroad. He will help you.”

Slowly Sallie and her family began to walk across the field toward the river, with the golden dragon pacing by their side. The wind in their faces now was cool and fresh, blowing toward them off the river. It smelled sweetly green.

Sallie’s father took deep breaths.

“Smell that,” he said. “The air of freedom.”

Sallie’s mother suddenly gave a little laugh. “I just realized,” she said, “we don’t even have a name. Our old master — we certainly don’t want his anymore.”

“No name?” Sallie said. “You mean we can just pick one of our own?”

The dragon had paused in the grass. It held its golden head very high, staring off across the dark river.

“In the matter of a name,” the dragon said solemnly, “I would be most honored if you would take mine.”