by Mikki Sadil
They thrashed through the forest underbrush, going more slowly than usual because of Ben’s ankle. He kept pushing them on, feeling the need to get as deep into the woods as they could. He still feared Phineas and his gang might decide to come back and start searching the area.
When they came to a spot where a large outcropping of rock hung over a small area totally enclosed by tall trees and thickets, Ben stopped. His ankle was sore and swelling, and very painful. He needed to rest his leg and this seemed like it would be somewhat sheltered from the rain.
“I reckon this might be a good place to bed down.”
A loud clap of thunder reverberated through the forest accompanied by heavy raindrops.
They pushed their way past the thickets and huddled underneath the outcropping. Ben and Jesse scooped up fallen leaves and pushed them into a heap against the trees, making the ground a bit softer to lie on. Tree branches hung close enough to the ground to hold off some of the rain, but not all. They snuggled as close to each other as possible and pulled the big quilt over them. The rain fell in torrents all night, making sleep difficult.
Hours later, Ben raised his head above the cover of the soaked quilt and looked around. The rain had stopped, dawn was breaking, and the forest was coming alive again with birds calling and screaming, frogs croaking, and the snuffling sounds of small animals. He looked over at Jesse, who was also awake.
“Jesse, it’s time to get moving. We best be trying to find out where this forest goes.”
Jesse woke Bess and Josiah. Bess looked at the wet quilt. “What we do with this quilt? It plumb soaked through, same as our clothes.”
“I reckon we should keep it. Jesse and me’ll wring it out best we can and fold it up. Our clothes will dry out somewhat while we walk.”
Bess looked up through the trees. “Ben, it be daytime. Why we walk now, instead of the dark? Hunters be able to see us if they come.”
“I don’t think they’ll be back right away. I figure they might be out looking for the Andrews instead of us. We best be getting as far away from here as we can, and that means going in daylight.” Ben didn’t let on that his stomach had twisted in that tight knot again, or that his ankle was on fire.
“Mama, I be powerful hungry.” Josiah stretched his bad leg out in front of him and started to rub it. “You reckon this here woods got any berries to eat?”
Ben laughed. “Josiah, what makes you think you’d find berries in the forest?”
“Don’t laugh, Ben.” Josiah was indignant. “One a’ them books you give me to read told as how forests got berries.”
“Oh, I’m sorry, Josiah!” Ben made an elaborate bow. “Well, we best be going, and you can be our lookout for berries!”
Ben had thought he was playing with Josiah, but as the morning wore on, Josiah found several bushes with berries. Ben had no idea if the first ones were edible or not, but they were all so hungry it didn’t make much difference.
After awhile, Josiah laughed and called to Bess, “Mama, come see what I find! Looky here, Ben, them’s blackberries, lots of them. See, I know the forest gots berries.”
It was true, for as far as they could see, blackberry bushes rambled on through the woods. They stopped and ate the berries until they all had blackened lips and full stomachs. Finally, Ben said, “We’d best be getting along now. Let’s put some berries in our pockets for later, but we’ve got to keep moving. We need to find a stream so we can get a drink.”
Bess put her hand on his arm. “Wait, Ben. You be limpin’ some bad. What’s wrong?”
“I twisted my ankle when I fell yesterday. It hurts, and it’s swollen. I don’t think I can even get my boot off. But I can walk, and that’s what we have to do now. We have to keep going.”
Time passed, and they kept fighting the heavy underbrush of the forest. Once Josiah stepped on a red anthill, and they had to stop to swat the ants that had clung to his shoes. An hour or so later, when Ben stopped to rest his aching ankle, Bess came up to him.
“You takes a big chance, teaching my boy to read. But I be thanking you, Ben. Now maybe he can make something of hisself when we gets to Ohio.”
Ben smiled. “Josiah’s been my best friend ever since I met him, the second day after we moved to the plantation. I like teaching him. And besides, it’s …” He stopped. “Listen. Hear that? It sounds like running water.”
They headed toward the sound and a short distance away found a stream running swiftly over some rocks. They rushed to the bank and cupped their hands to drink the cold water. After taking a long drink, Ben raised his head, letting water seep between his fingers. Something was wrong. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up, and a shiver crept across his shoulders that had nothing to do with the cold. He put a finger to his lips. “Shhh. Someone’s here. Stay still and don’t move.”
Bess grabbed Josiah and pulled him close to her. A small figure stepped out of the woods on the other side of the stream. A young white boy, about Josiah’s age or a bit older, stood looking at them. He had a cap made of raccoon fur pulled down over his ears, and a heavy coat buttoned up to the scarf that wrapped around his neck and covered the lower part of his face. In his arms, he cradled an old rifle.
“Howdy. I reckon y’all them runaways ever’one’s talking about, huh. Well now, you just come with me, you hear?”
Jesse stood slowly, his big hands clenched into fists. The boy calmly raised the rifle and pointed it at Jesse. “I ’spects you’d better not do that, mister. My daddy aims to talk to y’all, and I’m gonna brang you to him. He told me if any of y’all give me guff, I should just shoot you.” He cocked the weapon.
Ben put his arm in front of Jesse to stop him from moving. He shook his head at the big man and turned to the boy across the stream.
“Who’s your pa, and why should we go with you?”
The boy shifted the rifle and shuffled his feet.
“I reckon you’ll meet up with my pa soon enough. Y’all should come with me ’cause I’m the one who gots the gun. You gonna come peaceable like?”
“Well now, I don’t know. There’s three of us, and only one of you, and you’re just a little guy. I reckon if we don’t want to go with you, we don’t have to.”
Immediately the boy took a stance and shouldered the rifle.
“You comin’ or I hafta get mean?”
Jesse looked at Ben, who shrugged. “I reckon we’d better go. We don’t seem to have much choice, unless you want to get shot.”
“Maybe dyin’ be better than goin’ back a slave what’s gone be whupped and my boy sold.”
Ben put his hand on Jesse’s arm. “Jesse,” he whispered, “no slave hunter is going to send a boy to get us. He’d come himself, with other men and dogs. Let’s go with the boy and see what his pa wants.”
They picked and slipped their way across the wet rocks of the stream until they were on the other side. The boy gestured with his weapon that they should walk in front of him. Bess held Josiah’s hand tightly and stayed close to Jesse, as Ben led the way. This time there was a path, and before long the path led straight out of the forest and became a wide dirt road running in front of several farm houses, all spread out from each other. Ben stopped and looked around. He was afraid they would be close to the Andrews’ farm, or that the boy was leading them back to it. The boy came up close behind Ben, nudged him with the gun, and pointed at the first house.
“That’s my daddy’s place. Hurry up, don’t want nobody to see us.”
He hustled the group down the dusty street and around the back of the farmhouse. He led them up on the wide porch and opened the back door. They walked into a large kitchen that was warm and cozy and smelled of fresh coffee.
The boy put his weapon down in a corner and pointed to a formal dining room just off the kitchen.
“Sit, my daddy be here soon.”
Bess and Jesse sat down, with Josiah leaning close to his pa. Ben stood, his hands restlessly smoothing first one jacket sleeve and then the o
ther.
The boy brought out three mugs of coffee and one with half milk and half coffee for Josiah. He looked at Ben and motioned to a chair. “You might as well sit, you ain’t going nowhere.” He grinned and walked out of the room.
Ben pulled out a chair across from Bess and Jesse and sat down on the very edge of the seat. He had no idea what this was all about, and he was afraid they had just walked into a trap.
Chapter Sixteen
Jesse and Bess took big sips of their coffee and looked at each other.
“Good morning! Welcome to our home!” A big, booming voice announced the arrival of the boy’s pa.
A huge man walked in, although Ben thought that this man probably never just “walked” anywhere. Ben figured he must be close to seven feet tall, with arms and legs that seemed to barely fit into his heavy overalls and long-sleeved woolen shirt. His gray hair slouched over his shoulders and mingled with a curly beard that curved down over a rotund belly.
Bright brown eyes smiled from under bushy eyebrows. “I be Thaddeus Jefferson. Hope my boy Willie didn’t scare you too bad. He be a good boy, just takes his responsibilities a mite too serious, what with that gun and all. For sure he’s harmless, ’lessen he gets cornered. But say, I know who you be…you be Benjamin McKenna, Bess and Jesse, and this here’s little Josiah. That right, folks? Oh, no reason to lie, there be posters all over about y’all.”
Ben stood and said, “We’re not going to lie, Mister Jefferson. We are who you say. Now, are you aiming to return us to my father, or what?”
Thaddeus reached out a ham-sized hand and patted Ben on the shoulder, nearly knocking him down in the process. “No, no, me boy, I’ve no thought to do that. I have a right nice place for you to rest up, get some vittles in you, and then we talk about how to get you on to freedom’s trail. That’s where you are headed, isn’t it?”
“Yes sir.”
“Well now, be it me or some other who takes you, it’s going to take some deep thought first. Seems you got some ways off track when y’all got outta that tunnel. Didn’t you know to follow the North Star?”
Ben was startled. “How do you know about the tunnel, Mister Jefferson?”
Thaddeus cackled, but it sounded more like a peal of thunder than a laugh. “Hell’s bells, boy, most everyone knows about that tunnel now. When it fell in on itself, all of Woodford County heard it. Then the news of what it was spread like pouring syrup on pancakes. What nobody can figger out is how you got plumb away so quick. Why, there for a while, your daddy thought you be buried there, ’til them dogs picked up your scent. And it’s Thaddeus, not ‘Mister’ anything.”
Ben’s heart dropped to his toes when Thaddeus mentioned the tunnel. He tried to keep his voice steady. “Well, Thaddeus, it seems like you know enough about us to be interested in that poster, huh? The one that offers a reward for us. I reckon maybe we should just walk out of here, no matter that your boy has a gun.”
Thaddeus scowled at him. “Boy, you best not be taking me on, you hear? Now, you listen good to what I got to say. Word gets around mighty quick like when a white boy helps some of his pappy’s slaves run away. When that there tunnel collapsed, why, it made the newspapers and so did some of what your daddy say. You just come down off your high talk, and listen to what I done told you. We’ve got a nice place for you to rest, the missus will fix you some food, and you’ll be safe.”
Ben clenched his fists. “Yeah, that’s what the Andrews said, too, until Phineas Taylor and his gang of cutthroats came and Mister Andrews decided to join up with them. I heard them talking, that’s why we had to run.” Ben’s stomach was tied in knots, but he was fed up with people saying they would help when all they wanted was the reward money.
Thaddeus scowled even more. He sat down heavily on a chair, making the table shimmy. “Now, look ahere, boy. The Andrews are gettin’ a bad name for themselves, seeing as how you ain’t the first ones to show up for help and then got sold back. But Thaddeus and Maggie Jefferson ain’t them. I said you were safe here, and I mean it.”
He looked back into the kitchen and yelled, “Maggie! Maggie, you got them vittles fixed yet? These people are hungry!”
His wife appeared in the doorway, and Ben almost knocked over his chair. Thaddeus’s wife was as petite as he was huge, with dark blue eyes in a small round face, and a tiny white day bonnet covering pale blonde hair. She put her hands on her hips and said sternly, “Then thee best get thyself in here and help with these platters, Mister Jefferson!”
A smile lit up the big man’s face. “Sure thing, Maggie me love, I be there straight away.”
The woman came into the dining room as her husband passed her. She smiled at the four people sitting huddled around the table. “Thee are welcome in this house. Please, relax and take off thy coats. My name is Maggie, and thee are quite safe here.”
Thaddeus appeared with trays, one with four bowls of porridge, each swimming in milk, raisins, and brown sugar, and the other with a basket of hot biscuits. He set them down on the table.
Maggie said, “We don’t have much to offer, but thee is welcome to all we have. While thee eats, the mister and me will see to a safe room for thee to rest.”
The knot in Ben’s stomach was still there. Jesse and Josiah had begun eating immediately, but Bess was looking at Ben with a frown on her face. “Ben, what you think?”
Ben spoke quietly. “I don’t know. Right now we don’t have much choice. We’re all hungry, might as well eat and see what happens next. “
Fear and resignation settled like a shawl on Ben’s shoulders. The Jeffersons seemed like good people, but then, so did the Andrews at first. He took a sip of coffee, knowing that at least for the time being, once again his fate and that of his friends was out of his hands.
When Ben stood up, he winced as his ankle gave way, and he slumped against his chair.
“Oh my!” Maggie has just come back into the room. “Benjamin, what is wrong? Are thee injured?”
“I twisted my ankle when we were running from the Andrews’ house. It’s been swelling a lot and I’ve been afraid to take off my boot. Didn’t think I could get it back on.”
“Well, we must see to that. Sit down, and we’ll take the boot off.”
Ben took his boot off, wincing at the pain, and exclaimed when he pulled off his sock. The ankle was badly swollen and very black and blue. It began to throb wildly as soon as the constriction was gone.
Maggie brought a washbasin filled with hot water and gently guided his foot into the water. “Let thy ankle rest here for ten minutes, afterwards I will wrap it.”
When the ten minutes was up, his ankle was feeling a little better. Maggie came back with a roll of brown paper and a jug of vinegar. She dried off his leg and began tearing long strips from the roll of paper. She soaked the strips of the brown paper in the vinegar.
“Tarnation, that smells! What are you doing that for, anyway?” The vinegar was so strong it stung Ben’s eyes.
Maggie laughed. “Thee best get used to it, my young friend. I will wrap thy ankle, foot, and leg with this brown paper and vinegar, and then wrap it in a binding. This will be changed several times a day until all the swelling and soreness is gone and thee can walk well once more.”
Once the ankle was wrapped, the odor from the vinegar wasn’t as strong, but even Josiah wrinkled his nose when he was near Ben.
In the days that followed, Ben and the slaves lived in real luxury. The large hidden attic room Maggie and Thaddeus had led them to had soft beds with real sheets on them as well as pillows, blankets, and quilts. Two large windows let in sunshine, and several high vents gave them fresh air. Maggie brought books to read and games to play, and sometimes she put a magazine on one of the trays she and Thaddeus brought up several times a day with their meals. Maggie prepared food that was always hot, wholesome, and delicious. It reminded Ben of the meals Bess had cooked for his family.
His ankle continued to improve until finally Maggie took the binding off,
threw away the last of the odiferous brown paper and vinegar, and pronounced him cured.
“Thee has been a model patient, Benjamin! And for not fussing over thy smelly bandages, our boy Willie has polished thy boots and washed thy stockings, so now thee is fully prepared to leave here when the time comes.”
He smiled at her shyly. “Thanks, Maggie. You took care of me like Ma would have. I didn’t know how bad the ankle was until we got here.”
Maggie and Thaddeus also brought bits and pieces of news from the outside world —
On October 18, 1859, Robert E. Lee’s soldiers captured John Brown after he raided Harper’s Ferry, and he was sentenced to be executed in December. There was still much talk about the possibility of a war between North and South, if Lincoln was elected in 1860. Ben’s father was still sending out posters and offering a large reward for Ben and the slaves’ return.
One day, more than three weeks after they had arrived, Maggie announced that Christmas was only two days away.
Christmas! Ben winced when he heard that. They had been on the run since September and he didn’t feel they were any closer to freedom. He thought about the Christmases he had always known. A big pine tree in the living room, decorated with bows made out of the colorful ribbons Ma used in her sewing, and long chains of popcorn and cranberries he and his brothers fashioned. Pinecones and candles scented with cinnamon were on all the mantles, tables, and even windowsills, wafting their fragrances throughout the house.
Christmas breakfast had always been hotcakes and brown sugar, fried potatoes, bacon, butter biscuits, and some kind of home canned fruit. There would be beef broth with vegetables, venison, turkey, corn pudding, and boiled onions for Christmas supper; and always fruit pies and fruitcake for dessert. Ben’s mouth watered as he thought of the wonderful food he’d had none of for so long, and his eyes teared at the thought of his family. He wondered if he would ever see them again.