A Perilous Proposal

by Michael Phillips

  “Haven’t you heard, Jesse—that lady there’s half white. Ain’t that right?” he said, now breaking into a run and jumping up onto the boardwalk in front of me. I had no choice but to slow down. I tried to keep moving and get by him. But he wouldn’t let me.

  “I asked you a question, girl,” he said, pushing at me. “We hear you’re half white. That must be why you’re so pretty.”

  By now the others caught up and gathered round me and surrounded me. “You like white men, little black lady?” said the boy who had stopped me. “How’d you like it if you and me get to know each other a little better?”

  Some of his friends laughed and made bad comments. They inched closer and closer and started touching me and saying horrible things. I was terrified. There was no way I could escape.

  “Get away!” I screamed. “Leave me alone . . . please, stop touching me!”

  Jeremiah had come out of Watson’s Mill in time to see me walk away from the livery. He was just about to go back inside and ask Mr. Watson if he could take five minutes to go see me when he saw the group of boys heading across the street. Immediately he started toward me. The moment I screamed, he bolted toward us.

  My screams brought a rude slap across my face from one of the white boys. But the next instant Jeremiah burst into the center of the group, sending a couple of them to the ground. They got up and began pelting Jeremiah with their fists. But he knocked them away and turned toward Deke Steeves.

  “Leab her alone, Deke,” said Jeremiah. “She ain’t done nuthin’ ter you.”

  The only answer he received was a charge like a bull straight toward him.

  The two exchanged several blows, blood poured from Steeves’ nose, and I yelled for help. The rest of the boys jumped back into the middle of the scuffle, trying to grab Jeremiah and hold him so that Steeves could hit and kick him. Dust was flying and there were yells and curses and a few cries of pain whenever someone landed a blow.

  Suddenly another figure rushed right into the middle of the fight.

  “Stop . . . stop it!” she cried, whacking at Deke Steeves’ head and trying to push several of the smaller boys aside.

  It was Katie! She seemed to be afraid of nothing!

  Their surprise, and their natural reluctance to hurt a white girl, temporarily put a stop to the fight. Everyone looked around, breathing heavily and sweating. Jeremiah stood and regained his balance. Slowly he began to back out of the center of the fray.

  “Come, Miz Katie,” he said, “you git out ob here. You don’t want ter be gettin’ hurt.”

  But now Deke advanced on Katie. Slowly a menacing grin came over his lips. “Well now, who’s this?” he said. “You be Miss Clairborne I heard about? Why don’t you come with me. You’ll find that I’m not such a bad fellow.”

  A few lewd cracks and whistles sounded from Steeves’ friends. Never dreaming that Jeremiah would go to such lengths to defend a white girl, Steeves reached out his hand and began to feel Katie’s hair. She shuddered and backed away. The move angered Steeves. He took another step forward and reached toward her again.

  “Don’t you go be getting unsociable when Deke Steeves is talking to you, you nigger-loving white girl!” said Steeves. Rudely he grabbed hold of her arm.

  “Ow!” cried Katie. “Ow . . . stop—you’re hurting me!” She had been carrying a letter ever since leaving Mrs. Hammond’s. Now it fell to the ground.

  The next instant Jeremiah’s fist crashed against Steeves’ jaw and sent him staggering backward. He tripped over the edge of the boardwalk and fell in the street, swearing in a violent rage.

  Jeremiah took hold of Katie and eased her behind him. The two slowly began backing away as Jeremiah kept his eyes on the rest of the group.

  Incensed almost more to see Jeremiah touch a white girl than for what he had done to him, Deke Steeves jumped to his feet.

  “You cowards!” he cried to his friends. “Don’t you see that? Get him!”

  The whole group rushed forward. Katie and I ran backward to get out of the way, yelling and calling for help. There were quite a few people gathered around from the surrounding stores by this time, but no one stepped forward to help. Nobody seemed to mind if they killed Jeremiah!

  In less than a minute Jeremiah was on the ground surrounded by Deke Steeves and five others pounding and kicking at him.

  “Help!” I cried at the people watching. “Why won’t any of you help him!”

  Suddenly a gunshot rang out.

  The beating stopped and the heads of the ruffians all turned toward it.

  There stood Papa with his pistol in his hand! Katie and I ran to him.

  “Get away . . . back away from him, all of you!” he yelled at the white boys.

  Slowly they got off Jeremiah, hatred in their eyes.

  “Get out of here, you no-goods!” said Papa.

  A few eyes turned toward Steeves. He stepped back, wiping at the blood on his face with his shirt. They looked like a pack of wild dogs deprived of their prey. He looked straight at Jeremiah.

  “You’re dead, nigger!” he spat, then shot a glance of hatred at Papa. Finally he slunk off, followed by his friends.

  Papa walked over and helped Jeremiah to his feet.

  “You okay?” he said.

  “Yep, I’ll be fine,” said Jeremiah. “I gib Steeves da worst ob it.”

  Jeremiah and I clasped hands briefly, then Jeremiah went back to work. Katie went over and picked up the letter she’d dropped that she’d gotten from Mrs. Hammond. It was all crumpled and wrinkled from the fight. Then Papa helped her and me back to the carriage, twenty or thirty silent onlookers watching us. Then we headed home.

  “Who’s the mail from?” Papa asked, no doubt trying to distract us from the ordeal.

  “I haven’t read it yet,” said Katie. “I don’t want to open it until I’ve calmed down. I think it’s from Rob Paxton in Baltimore.”

  Wonder what he’s got to say, I thought to myself, remembering the young deputy who’d helped bring my papa home. I figured Katie would tell me about the letter when she was ready, but in the aftermath of what came next, the letter was soon forgotten.

  ABDUCTION

  56

  Whoever planned these kinds of things didn’t wait long to carry out the threats Deke Steeves had yelled during the fight with Jeremiah. It was almost as if the white men who had been listening, or those who heard about it, had gotten together that day to take revenge on Jeremiah for hitting a white boy and touching a white girl.

  A few evenings later Henry and Jeremiah were at Rosewood after helping us with the cotton harvest that we’d just begun. We were eating a late supper after a day in the fields. It was already dusk and probably nine or nine-thirty.

  “If you’d like our help in da mo’nin’,” said Henry, “Jeremiah an’ I cud sleep in da barn an’ gib you anudder half day afore gittin’ back ter town.”

  “We would appreciate that very much,” said Uncle Ward. “You two pile up the cotton faster than all the rest of us combined, don’t they, Templeton!” he added with a laugh.

  “You’re right there, Brother Ward!” said my papa. “There’s no way we can express our gratitude, Henry. And to you too, Jeremiah,” he added. “We’ve got the two of you to thank that Rosewood’s on its feet again.”

  “What ’bout us?” said Emma. “An’ Miz Mayme an’ Miz Katie, dey dun did everythin’ afore anyone else come roun’.”

  “Of course, of course, Emma!” laughed my papa. “We all know that and love them for it, don’t we?”

  “An’ me too!” said Emma’s William, who was now just over three and never let an opportunity pass to add whatever was on his mind.

  “You’re all right!” laughed Mr. Ward. “It’s a family adventure all the way around!”

  “It may be a family advenshur,” now said Josepha, “but you ain’t gwine git me out in dose fields er cotton!”

  “But you have the most important job of all,” said my father with his familiar
smile and a brief wink in my direction.

  “An’ jes’ what dat be, Mr. Templeton?”

  “You keep us fed!”

  When we were through with supper, we were all tired after the long day. Henry and Jeremiah went out to the barn, the rest of us went upstairs to our beds.

  The last thing I remembered about that night before falling asleep was how dark it was outside. There was no moon. It was just black and quiet. Little did I know what would soon approach Rosewood through the night.

  Several hours later, somewhere in my dreams I heard a few barks from the dogs. But I rolled over and continued to sleep. But when the sound of galloping horses intruded into my dreams, at last my brain began to come awake. The dogs were howling now.

  A minute later a dozen riders galloped into Rosewood. The dogs ran about in a yowling frenzy. Chickens were cackling and the cows mooing. I heard my father and Uncle Ward stirring in their room, then running for the stairs. Torches of flame from the riders’ hands cast eerie shadows on the house and open space in front of it. But the torches would burn no crosses on the ground tonight. The hooded riders had other plans.

  “Hey you inside!” called a voice. “You got a nigger in there—we’re here for him!”

  I snuck to the window and glanced outside. The band of men sat waiting. I felt Katie creep up beside me and look out. She was trembling. Hearing the word nigger filled me with dread. Were they after me?

  After a long minute, we heard the door open downstairs. My papa stepped out onto the porch holding a lantern.

  “We’re here for the nigger . . . you know why!” said the rider.

  “You know who we’ve got here,” replied my father. “We’ve got an older Negro woman and a girl that’s half white, half colored. They’re none of your concern.”

  “That young buck made himself our concern the other day,” the man spat back. “This is what comes of being too friendly with that little white girl of yours. Now he’s going to pay! Hand him over or these torches’ll be through your windows and your house be cinders come morning.”

  “You know as well as I do that he doesn’t live here.”

  “Word has it he’s been out—”

  “Hey, Dwight—” interrupted another voice.

  “Shut up, you fool,” spat the spokesman, turning in his saddle. “— I told you . . . no names.”

  “But I got him . . . he was in the barn!”

  All eyes turned toward the voice of a tall slender youth whose white cape barely went down past his waist. He was dragging Jeremiah, struggling and kicking, out the barn door into the torchlit night.

  “That’s him!” cried another of them.

  Half the saddles emptied and the small crowd began kicking and beating Jeremiah viciously into the dirt. In the upstairs window, I couldn’t watch. I looked away and buried my face sobbing in Katie’s arms. She comforted me for a few seconds, then stood, hurriedly dressed, and left the room.

  “That’s enough—plenty of time for that later,” yelled the leader. “Get the rope around him and put him up on that horse.”

  “All right, you boys have had your fun,” said my father. “He’s done nothing to any of you.”

  “He forgot what color his skin is—that’s enough!”

  “Ain’t no good can come to a nigger-lover around here, mister. You and your kind ain’t welcome in these parts.”

  The door of the house opened again. I wiped at my tears and looked out. There was Katie walking outside toward the fidgeting horses!

  “He meant nothing by what he did,” she said to the lead rider. “It was my fault, not his. I shouldn’t have interfered.”

  “Then he should have known better, miss—and you should have yourself. Now that it’s done, he’s got to pay.”

  The others were shoving Jeremiah onto the back of a horse. They had already tied his hands behind his back. One of the other men forced a noose over his head and down onto his neck.

  “Get it tight!” yelled a voice, which I now recognized as the voice of Deke Steeves.

  “You can’t do this!” cried Katie in a pleading voice. “He’s done nothing wrong! He was just trying to keep me from getting hurt!”

  But rude hands yanked her away. My papa took several steps forward, struggling to hold back his anger. There was nothing he could do against so many. Katie ran to his side.

  I couldn’t stand it anymore! I jumped up, threw on a robe, and flew down the stairs.

  “Let’s go, Dwight,” yelled one of the men, “—we got him!”

  The riders swung their horses around.

  I ran through the door and straight for Jeremiah. Before they could stop me, hardly realizing what I was doing, I threw myself against the horse, clinging to one of his legs.

  Jeremiah looked down and tried to reassure me with a smile. But the look of it broke my heart! I started crying again, terrified that I would never see him again.

  Our eyes met but for a moment. Though the noose had already begun to choke his neck, Jeremiah tried to speak.

  “I love . . . we’ll—” he began.

  A rude slap across the mouth from the nearest of the horseman silenced him. The same instant, a booted foot from another shoved me away.

  “Get away from him, nigger girl!” he yelled as I stumbled and fell. “Otherwise we’ll string you up beside him! We got plenty of rope for the two of you.”

  A few shouts and slashes from whips and reins and they galloped away. On the ground, I picked myself up and ran after them.

  “No!” I wailed. But my protests were lost in sobs. I hardly felt the arms of my papa and Katie as they led me whimpering back into the house, while the dozen riders disappeared into the darkness.

  LYNCHING

  57

  AS JEREMIAH BOUNCED AWAY FROM ROSEWOOD INTO the night, he thought back on his whole life and everything that had brought him to that moment—about his younger years and Henry’s sudden disappearance, how his anger had begun and how he and his mama had been sold, about what had happened to her and how he’d set off on his search to find Carolina and had finally arrived in Greens Crossing, and about the changes and healing that had come to him, and finally about him and Mayme and asking her to marry him.

  But the last few minutes were a blur. Jeremiah had awakened to the swinging light of a lantern and the sounds of a blow and his papa falling to the straw of the barn floor. The hooded man grabbed Jeremiah before he could get to his feet. Hand on his head, Henry had tried to rise. Fearing the man would strike his papa again, Jeremiah urged him to stay where he was. Then the hooded man had dragged him from the barn. When Jeremiah saw the riders, dread filled his heart. Were they here for him alone? For one terrifying moment, he thought they would take Mayme too. He could still close his eyes and see that tearful desperation on her face.

  Now, bound and riding farther and farther away from Rosewood—and from any hope of rescue—Jeremiah realized this was surely the end. Maybe it was better that he die alone. Still he wished he had lived long enough to marry Mayme. What might have happened had he never come to Carolina? What if he had stayed with the army and Micah Duff? But then he wouldn’t have found his papa, wouldn’t have known forgiveness, wouldn’t have known Mayme. No, he wouldn’t go back, wouldn’t change it, even if he could. If only he had left those white boys in town alone. He only hoped they would leave the others alone.

  He knew it was time to pray. Strangely enough, for once he felt no anger, not toward his captors, nor even toward God himself. Instead Jeremiah Patterson asked God for mercy, and to take care of the others—especially Mayme and his papa— when he was gone.

  Templeton helped Katie and Mayme, who were still crying, inside. Henry followed from where he had been watching from behind the barn door. He looked as shaken as they had ever seen him. The moment they were inside, Templeton glanced at the other two men.

  Without a word spoken, Ward turned and left the room. When he came back thirty seconds later he was holding Katie’s father’s prized
Spencer rifle and loading it with shells.

  Templeton looked at his brother. Their eyes met and they just stared at each other for a second or two.

  “But . . . I thought—” began Templeton.

  “I do,” said Ward. “I hate everything about them. I hate the feel of it in my hands. When I left California I swore I would never touch a gun again in my life.”

  As he spoke, the expression on his face and the sound of his voice sent chills through Katie and Mayme. They didn’t know what he meant exactly, or why he had made such a vow, but they could tell that whatever was behind the words, it went deep into him. That look on his face was one none of them would ever forget. It was almost . . . a look of death.

  “Put that thing away, Ward. Henry and I’ll go—” began Templeton.

  “Look, Templeton,” said Ward as he shoved seven bullets into the chamber of the rifle one after the other. “No offense, but you ain’t so good a shot. Not from the distance we’re going to be at. We’re only going to have one chance. I figure I’m the only one who can save the boy before a rope breaks his neck.”

  He strode toward the door and hurried to the barn to saddle a horse. Templeton glanced at Henry, then went to the gun cabinet himself and came back with two more rifles. Then they both ran out after Ward.

  The girls watched the three men gallop away two minutes later, following the faintly flickering torches still just barely visible as a glow in the distance. When they were younger, Katie and Mayme had done some daring and stupid things. But neither of them even thought about chasing after them now. They knew they could be no help. All they could do was wait, and cry, and pray. The men would come back sooner or later, and they would either be carrying Jeremiah’s dead body over the back of a horse, or he would be riding along with them. They would just have to wait to find out which.

  Templeton and Ward and Henry lashed at their three horses with whips and tore dangerously fast through the black night. If one of the horses slipped and fell, it could mean broken legs and death. But it was a risk they had to take. Jeremiah’s life was at stake.