The Furies

by John Jakes

  “I’d say your sense of duty has become a fixation.”

  “Call it anything you like. I won’t stop now. He blocked me once, because I was careless, but he won’t a second time. You must understand how I see it, Michael—Louis behaved inexcusably. But every step I’ve taken against Stovall, I’ve taken for a good and sufficient reason—”

  “You could lecture Louis for days, Mrs. A, and I don’t believe you’d get through to him. He’s not old enough to comprehend the subtle difference between an appetite for a woman and an appetite for revenge. If there is a difference—”

  “There is!”

  His shrug said the question was debatable.

  “Michael, what Louis did to Kathleen was pointless and—”

  “Forgive me again,” he interrupted. “I may be expressing a narrow male attitude, but a boy with a physical craving hardly considers the craving pointless. It’s the most important thing in the world to him. It took me months to work up nerve the first time I—well, never mind the details.”

  “I am talking about the despicable way Louis went about it!” she insisted.

  Michael’s gaze rested on Mr. Mayor sleeping in a ball on the marble in front of the fire. “You wouldn’t call my planned expedition to the Five Points despicable?”

  “I was very explicit on that subject. The material from the Phelans would only be used in an extreme situation, so let’s not permit that to confuse the discussion.”

  He flushed. “I think it’s very pertinent to the discussion. You did ask for my suggestions—”

  “Well, I don’t agree with them. Hamilton Stovall and my son’s behavior have nothing to do with one another.”

  “Who are you trying to convince? Me? Or yourself?”

  “Michael, you’re overstepping—!”

  “The hell I am! You’ve enrolled me as your son’s disciplinarian!”

  “I told you I intend to punish—”

  “For God’s sake, Mrs. A, why won’t you recognize that it’s your obsession with Kent and Son that’s damaging the boy? Until you reach that conclusion, no punishment will make a whit of difference in Louis’ character. If you change, he may. Otherwise—”

  “Enough, Michael.”

  “No, goddamn it, I want to have my say about—”

  “The subject is closed.”

  There was a heavy silence.

  “And you’ll take charge of Louis as I instructed.”

  “Ordered!” he growled, turning toward the fireplace. He saw the white cat lying in front of him. He kicked it.

  Mr. Mayor woke with a start, nearly as astonished at the young man’s cruelty as Amanda herself. Michael slammed a fist down on the mantel, then bent to stroke the cat, murmuring apologies almost as if he’d struck a human being.

  She couldn’t admit Michael was right. Or Jared. Or Bart McGill. She couldn’t admit she was being destroyed by her own dedication to owning the printing house. She was strong. She’d survived challenges before. Survived and overcome them. She would survive this one; bring Louis into line and gain her objective—

  Michael’s back was still turned as she said, “Be sure Louis is wakened at six. I’ll inform him before I go to bed that you’ll be—”

  A commotion at the rear of the house whirled them both toward the doors.

  Michael started into the hall, only to step back as the butler, Mr. Hampton, rushed into sight, still struggling to slip his arms into his black coat. He smelled of gin; he’d evidently been relaxing downstairs before trudging home—

  “Mrs. de la Gura, there is an Adams Express wagon in the alley.”

  “At this hour?”

  “I hardly believed it myself when I saw the accumulation of snow. Nevertheless, two deliverymen are bringing in a large crate.”

  “We’ve ordered nothing big enough to be delivered in a crate—” Michael began.

  “I can’t help that, Mr. Boyle,” Hampton said with a dogged shake of his head. “The crate has come from the railroad station, addressed to this house.”

  “Oh my God,” Amanda exclaimed, an incredible suspicion forming in her mind. “Jephtha’s letter—”

  “What’s that to do with a crate from Adams Express?” Michael wanted to know.

  But Amanda had already dashed past him toward the butler’s pantry. With astonished looks, he and Hampton hurried after her.

  iv

  The crate, dripping melted snow and exuding a faint acrid smell, had been brought down the rear service stairs into the room at the rear of the raised basement.

  The room was a cheerless place without gas fixtures, used principally for storage.

  The servants clustered around the crate. One of them, Brigid, the downstairs maid, held a flickering oil lamp that cast slow-moving shadows. Two sodden and distinctly unhappy draymen stood eyeing the box as Amanda entered, Michael and the butler right behind.

  The outer door blew open, whirling snow and freezing air into the room. The flame of the lamp jumped in the sudden gust. Grotesque shadows leaped across the walls and ceiling. One drayman kicked the door shut while Amanda surveyed the crate. It had been crudely addressed in black paint:

  MRS. A. DE LA GURA

  MADISON SQUARE

  NEW YORK CITY

  It also bore a return address—j. jared, clifton forge, Virginia—and, across the ends, an additional legend:

  BOOKS & HOUSEHOLD MERCHANDISE

  The contrived name of the sender—meaningful to Amanda but to no one else—strengthened her growing conviction about the crate’s contents. With a sinking feeling, she recalled a passage in Jephtha’s letter about regular destinations for freight being unsafe—

  “Come off the train from Baltimore,” one of the draymen informed her. “We ain’t to blame for the stink. One of the handlers down at the terminal must have pissed on—”

  His companion nudged him, then held out a scrap of paper and pencil to Amanda. “You’ll have to sign.”

  “Why did you deliver it on such a bad night?” she asked, scribbling her name.

  “ ’Cos the goddamn sender paid extra,” the first man grumbled. “Special delivery within an hour after it arrived—”

  The draymen left. Outside, wheels crunched snow. Hoofs clopped softly. The sounds faded.

  Amanda circled the box, spotting three small holes neatly drilled through the wood. She didn’t know whether to laugh or weep over the additional burden thrust so unexpectedly on the already disturbed household.

  Michael voiced the confusion of the whispering servants. “Who in God’s name would be shipping you books and such, Mrs. A?”

  “That J. Jared is the Reverend Kent in Virginia. Jared was his father’s name. I’m sure he painted that on the box so we’d identify the sender.”

  “Well, we can leave it sitting till morning, anyway—”

  Amanda shook her head. “We have to open it. Fetch a crowbar.”

  “Why?”

  She pointed. “Do you notice those holes?”

  “What of them?”

  “Do you remember reading in the paper last year about a black man in Virginia who had himself shipped to the Philadelphia Antislavery Society? The Underground railroad’s used the trick several times before.”

  “Oh my Lord!” the cook exclaimed. “Is your cousin mixed up in that, ma’am?”

  “I’ve had hints of it in his letters—Michael, bring the crowbar!”

  In half a minute, the young man returned and fell to prying one side off the case. Amanda was outraged that the Reverend Jephtha Kent would make her a party to his illegal work without so much as a word of warning—

  But there had been warning, she realized belatedly. In Jephtha’s delayed letter, hadn’t he made a reference to calling on some we wouldn’t otherwise burden or endanger? If those weren’t the exact words, the sense was the same. He’d been telling her in a cryptic way that he might need her help. Perhaps he’d avoided saying it straight out in case mail from suspected underground railroad operators w
as tampered with. At the time she’d read the lines, she’d simply been too dull-witted to grasp his meaning.

  A nail squealed as Michael worked the crowbar. He was starting to pry loose another when the bar slipped from his fingers and clanged on the floor.

  “Can’t hold on to the blasted thing. There’s a bit of grease on it—”

  “Spit on your hands,” Amanda said.

  Bent over and reaching for the length of iron, Michael stared. The reaction was more pronounced from the servants. The butler uttered an audible gasp.

  Amanda snapped at him, “Haven’t you ever used a little spit so you could get a better hold on something, Mr. Hampton?”

  “No, madam, I have not,” the butler said, plainly horrified by the idea.

  “Well, you’re not taking advantage of the saliva God gave you. For heaven’s sake, Michael, get that damn thing open!”

  “Right away, Mrs. A—I was about to do the very thing you suggested.”

  He moistened his palms while Mr. Hampton raised his eyes to the ceiling.

  Presently the last nail came free. Michael scrambled back as the side of the box crashed to the floor. One of the maids shrieked softly. Amanda almost felt like crying again. Not this on top of everything else!

  Huddled inside the crate in a tangle of cheap blankets was a light-skinned colored girl. Her frayed cotton dress barely covered her emaciated thighs. Amanda judged her to be sixteen or seventeen. She looked undernourished and nearly frozen. With the crate open, the smell of urine was much stronger.

  The black girl started to crawl out, tears in her eyes. “I thought I die in there. I thought I die from the cold and the shakin’ on the train—”

  Amanda forced herself to stay calm. She knelt and slipped an arm around the trembling girl. “You’re safe, child. Safe. What’s your name?”

  “Mary, ma’am.”

  “Mary what?”

  “Mary’s the only name I got.”

  “I’m Mrs. de la Gura—”

  “Praise God! The Reveren’ Kent, he took me over to Clifton Forge hid in Mr. Syme’s wagon. He stopped in some woods outside of town, an’ before he nailed me in the box, he say you help me get to Canada—”

  “Christ, that’s all we need—black contraband!” Michael groaned.

  “Hush, Michael.”

  “But you can be arrested for concealing a runaway sl—”

  “I said hush! Mary—how long have you been shut up in that box?”

  “Mos’ part of two nights an’ all day, I guess—what day’s this?”

  “Friday night—Saturday morning by now.”

  “The Reverend, he drove me to the Virginia Central depot Wednesday—trip’s almos’ thirty miles—”

  “Why couldn’t they simply have shipped the creature to Canada?” Mr. Hampton asked, disdainful.

  “Watch your tongue, Mr. Hampton,” Amanda warned. “She’s not a creature—she’s a human being. And a hungry one at that, I imagine. Have you had anything to eat, child?”

  “Biscuits. No drinkin’ water. Breathin’ was the hardest. Breathin’ and bracin’ my hands an’ feet so I wouldn’t roll around and make noise when men lifted the box—”

  “Does that answer you, Mr. Hampton?” Amanda asked in a waspish voice. “If they shipped her all the way to Canada, she’d probably suffocate before she got there—or make such a stink in the box someone would surely open it.”

  The girl grew agitated. “I couldn’t help wettin’ myself. I tried and tried not to—I tried hard, but I couldn’t—”

  “That’s all right, that’s all right,” Amanda whispered, patting her. “You did just fine, Mary. Who do you belong to?”

  The girl blinked. “To me. I get to Canada, I won’t belong to nobody ever again.”

  “But who did you belong to in Virginia?”

  “Cap’n Tunworth.”

  “The Reverend’s father-in-law?”

  “Yes’m. He a proper gentleman with other white folks, but he can be mean as hell to his niggers when the spell’s on him.”

  Amanda nodded, her anger at Jephtha all but erased by the courage and fragility of the young girl who had entrusted her life to two white men, and ridden rattling trains in a lightless wooden cage with mortal fear for her companion.

  “I’ve met the captain,” she said. “You’ve confirmed my impression of him—”

  “I knew Mr. Syme could get me started to Canada. Mos’ every nigger round Lexington knows that. I never wanted to go till the cap’n sold my mama and papa to a man in Carolina. But the cap’n wouldn’t sell me. I figure I never see my folks again, so I might as well take a chance on bein’ a free person—”

  “But why did the Reverend send you here?” Michael asked. “Why not to an organization like the local anti-slavery society?”

  “Jephtha’s letter indicated that was getting too dangerous,” Amanda said.

  Mary nodded. “He an’ Mr. Syme say they got slave-catchers watching those places now. Watching for colored—even for boxes like the one I come in—”

  Suddenly she hugged Amanda, burying her head on the older woman’s shoulder.

  “I hate that old box! It was all dark an’ I made it smell bad—I couldn’t help it—I’m so glad I’m here—I’m so glad—”

  “Someone bring a couple of clean blankets,” Amanda said while the girl sobbed. “We’ll put her in the third floor bedroom next to Michael’s until I decide what we can do with—”

  She froze. At the storeroom door beyond the cluster of servants, she saw Kathleen McCreery.

  Kathleen was bundled in a shabby coat. Her pale eyes rounded at the sight of the crate and the black girl in the circle of lamplight.

  “Michael—!”

  Amanda’s warning spun him toward the door.

  “Get her out of here! When you take her home, warn her that she’d better not say a word.”

  “I’m afraid we’re not in much of a position to issue warnings,” Michael whispered. He stalked to the door and thrust the dumbfounded Kathleen out of sight.

  The black girl began to cry in earnest, long wailing sobs. Whether of pleasure or pain, Amanda couldn’t tell. She was still fighting the impulse to cry again herself.

  That Jephtha Kent had relied on her willingness to harbor a runaway—a clear violation of the Fugitive Slave Act—was upsetting enough. That the McCreery girl had seen the runaway was an absolute disaster.

  v

  Michael returned to the house about half past one in the morning, reporting to Amanda in the library. “I did the best I could but she’s still in a rage. I promised her an additional two weeks’ wages one month from now—if she keeps silent about what she saw.”

  “Do you think she will?”

  Amanda wasn’t encouraged when he answered, “It depends on how angry she’s feeling in a day or two. There’s one commodity that’s not for sale in the Five Points, Mrs. A—an end to an Irishman’s wrath once he’s down on you.”

  “Well, let’s hope for the best.”

  “What are we going to do with the nig—the girl?”

  “Put her on the first steamer heading to Canada. You inquire at the piers in the morning.”

  “What about the disciplining of your son?”

  “That can wait a few hours. I still must go up and speak to him—”

  “You haven’t yet?”

  “No, I haven’t yet!” she lashed out. “I’ve been attending to the girl! We tried to feed her and she threw up everything. I finally got some brandy down her. That put her to sleep.”

  “You’d better sleep a little yourself. You look exhausted.”

  “I’ll see Louis first.”

  But even that went wrong.

  When she climbed the staircase and reached the door of her son’s room, she found it unlocked. She opened it quietly. The night sky had cleared. The winter moon shone. Its reflection on snowy rooftops cast a luminous whiteness into the room.

  Louis lay on his side in the soiled bed, fully dres
sed. His head was all but hidden in the pillows, as if he’d tried to burrow deep into them to escape the world.

  Her face drawn, Amanda stared at him for a long time, thinking.

  vi

  She found Michael still in the library. His legs were stretched out toward the dying fire. The white cat was dozing on his knees. He looked startled when she slipped inside.

  Her glance went briefly to the display case. Jared’s medallion reflected the last red gleams from the hearth.

  “Michael—”

  “Yes, Mrs. A?”

  “I want you to forget about going to the Five Points.”

  He blinked. “You don’t want me to contact the Phelans?”

  “No.”

  She expected him to smile. Instead, quite soberly, he nodded. “That’s good, because I had decided I’d resign rather than do that particular chore. I’m thankful you changed your mind. May I ask why—?”

  “I looked at Louis upstairs. And I thought of what you said about the high road. I—I don’t want the ruining of my son to be the price I pay for Kent’s.”

  “Why don’t you wipe the slate all the way clean? Forget the stock too. Dissolve Boston Holdings. You’ve more than enough money to start a new firm.”

  “It wouldn’t be the same. The stock acquisition is legal. I’ll go ahead with that and hope it succeeds.” She was very much aware of how much she was staking on a single strategy.

  Michael smiled then. “At least what you’ve decided should make you feel a mite better.”

  “In a way it does. At the same time, I think I’ve walked away from a fight. I’ve never done that in my life.”

  “I’d say your decision took more courage than any fighting ever could.”

  “I wish I believed you,” she said softly. As she turned to go, the admiration in his eyes was of little comfort.

  Chapter VIII

  The Slave Hunter

  i

  SATURDAY MORNING BROUGHT BRILLIANT sunshine and the drip of melting snow from the eaves. Amanda slept until nine—three hours past her usual time for rising. When she saw the clock on the mantel of her bedroom fireplace, she got up in a rush, drew on a fur-trimmed robe and went straight to the third floor.