by Marian Wells
“And you pay my uncle back by running off with his slaves?”
Alex winced. Turning, he said, “Look, I’ve got to get upstairs. Let me explain this—” He waved at the bunks. “I can’t shove those people into one cabin; there’re too many of them. It isn’t fair. So unfortunately, we’ll all have to share this cabin. I’ll bunk in the pilothouse.” There was a slight smile on his face as he added, “After all, it will only be for six weeks or so.”
“Six weeks?” she cried as he hurried out the door. She turned to Matthew. “Why did you let him talk you into this?”
“He didn’t really talk me into it,” he said slowly. “I pushed him to tell me what was going on. Remember, he skipped out while we were in Boston. I hadn’t heard a thing from him, and probably wouldn’t have. He said he’d scrapped his plans to visit me when he started to pick up runaways.” Matthew paced the cabin. “His excitement just—Olivia, I’ve never been taken by an idea in quite the way I feel about this one. I’m beginning to think, as Alex does, that there’s some divine mandate in the whole thing.”
“Divine? Oh, Matt, how could you?” she cried.
“Cut it out! Obviously I’ve done a little thinking. Do you think I would be involved in such a project if I weren’t struggling with the problem of slavery myself?”
“But what about me? I can live with slavery.” Her voice wavered, “I mean, I haven’t spent much time thinking about it. But this situation has me most concerned. Matt, I honestly can’t say I support the project. After all, it’s like stealing horses or something.”
She saw the expression in his eyes and felt like squirming. “Support or not,” he said, “you’ll have to endure it.” He headed for a bunk. “Better crawl in; it could be a long, hard day tomorrow.”
****
With the first morning light, Olivia became conscious of the motion of the boat, the pounding paddles, and the soft passage of feet. She turned and slept again. Later, once or twice she raised her head to listen, but it was nearly noon before she left the cabin.
She wondered what she would find as she cautiously stepped out the door. Squinting in the midday sun, she looked down the passageway. It was bordered on one side by the deck railing and by cabins on the other. In all she counted three doors down the length of the steamboat. Behind her, outside the door leading to her cabin, was the stairway curving up to the pilothouse.
Down the corridor she could see the door she had forced open last night. The door was closed and the deck deserted. At least, at first glance it appeared so. As she moved toward the bow of the boat, she noticed a figure under the stairs. Walking forward she peered cautiously through the steps. Behind a coil of rope, Alex was sprawled in the sunshine, with one arm draped across his face.
She noted his neat beard, the boyish curve to his lips, and the ridiculous earring. How does he expect to be taken seriously with that silly earring? She watched him until he moved restlessly on his hard bed. Sympathy conquered. Going behind the stairs, she nudged him with her toe and leaned over him. “Go sleep in the cabin; I won’t bother you. Where’s Matthew?”
He heaved himself to his feet, rubbed his eyes and muttered, “Down below. They cook next to the boilers.” As he entered the cabin, she went downstairs.
“Good morning, ma’am.” The black woman met her by the woodpile. “There’s porridge.”
“I think I’d rather just have fruit.”
Matthew came out of the shadows by the engine room. “Olivia, you’ll have to settle for common fare,” he stated. “There’s porridge, period. Come see the arrangements.” He led the way. “This boat is a sternwheeler. As you can see, the rear of the boat is given over to the paddlewheel housing, with the engine room and boilers in front of it. The woodpile and these levers have us hurting for space down here.
“You probably noticed up above the bow is the pilothouse. Alex and Caleb pilot the boat. Right now I’m helping the roustabouts and teaching some of the men how to stoke the firebox. This thing? It’s the speaking tube, but Caleb tells me Alex yells his orders down.”
She turned slowly, looking at the remainder of the space. “So here’s the cookstove. I suppose that’s the best place for it, but it’s funny to see a kitchen in the middle of a woodpile.”
He chuckled. “It isn’t the best of accommodations, but it works.”
She nodded, pointing, “I’m guessing those funny arm-like poles turn the paddlewheel.”
“Yes,” he waved at the engine room, “they’re connected to the pistons on the steam engine.”
“Oh, Matthew, look!” She pointed to the logs lined with small children. They flashed shy smiles at her.
The woman who met her on the stairs came with a bowl of porridge. “I’m Maggie. There’s a chair over here. We’ve been sittin’ here enjoying the view. Looks like high water. Musta had a mighty rain; see the water standing in that farmer’s field?”
The porridge tasted good to Olivia and when she finished, the line of tiny dark children moved forward. The tallest addressed her. “You escaping to Canada, too?”
“I don’t think I’m escaping anywhere,” she said ruefully.
There was sympathy on the small face lifted beside her knee. “I’m sorry.” But the child’s face brightened as she said, “We all go. That way Daddy won’t be sold away from us.” The child pressed closer. “Mammy say up there we learn to go to school.”
“Naw,” another voice chimed in, “That ain’t right. We go to school to learn. My mammy say when we grow up we do what we want to do, live where we want to live, and have jobs with money.”
Another face pressed close. “Can you read? Do you have picture books with stories?”
Olivia nodded. As the faces brightened with hope, she added, “But I don’t have the books with me. Perhaps when Master Alex is awake we can ask for paper to make our own book.”
“Not Master Alex,” protested a youth, whose eyes were on a level with hers. “He said there no masters here; we are all friends.”
“Could you put writing on the book, too?”
Olivia looked down at the eager face. “You seem too tiny to learn.” The face clouded. Hastily she added, “But if you wish. Now come tell me your names.”
Olivia was still surrounded by children when Alex came downstairs. She was unaware of him until Maggie clapped her hands and said, “Now you all get yourself on the log. It’s time for Alex to read to us.”
Olivia stood up as the children scrambled for the logs. Alex gestured toward the crude table surrounded by stools. She looked up, wondering at the questioning look in his eyes.
Opening the book he held, he said, “Olivia, every day about this time, if there aren’t boats close enough to give us problems, we read and pray together. You are invited to join us.”
She knew the astonishment was showing on her face. For a moment more he looked at her, and that expression stayed with her as he began to read. Busy with her thoughts, the words slid past her without meaning, but a deep curiosity about this man began to grow in her.
When he closed the book, she discovered the familiar words had flowed into her mind with new meaning. “‘Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God…. The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God…. And the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.’”
“The mouth of the Lord is speaking, we shall be free!” came the response. Another voice resounded, “Everybody say, Amen!”
Olivia bowed her head in the midst of the dark heads and listened to Alex pray. And when he had finished, she knew a different side to this man. She watched him walk up the stairs with the Bible tucked under his arm.
Thinking of the laughing youth, tipsy and bold as he danced her around the school kitchen, she realized part of her understanding of him had crumbled. This new Alex left her uncertain and shy.
By the middle of the following week, the children’s book had g
rown to three pages. The penciled pictures they had drawn were worn with smudges, but at the same time, the big block letters beside them were beginning to be familiar to the students.
But even before that, on the second day of school the crowd of youngsters had been expanded by a timid but eager line of parents mouthing the letters and forming the words.
By the time the third week came, the trip no longer felt like an excursion. A routine had been established, and for the first time in her life, Olivia was part of the work force. Meals of the simplest kind were cooked. Laundry was done, with lines strung around the boilers for secrecy and heat. Part of the routine was vigilance. Everyone had become accustomed to disappearing into the cabins when the pilot shouted, “Ho!”
But just as Olivia was beginning to relax in her new role, another meeting with Alex occurred around the table in the cabin.
One morning Olivia had taken a chair and turned to the young woman leaning against the railing. “Tandy, will you bring my porridge now?”
Alex stopped with one foot on the stairs. Slowly he said, “Olivia, before you begin teaching the children, will you please come up to the cabin?” Glancing at his sober face, Olivia nodded.
After she had finished her meal, she went up to the cabin. Alex stood in the doorway waiting for her. She addressed the dismay in his eyes. “You asked me to come.”
Slowly he said, “Olivia, I don’t want to say this, but I must. I realize you haven’t thought this out, but there’s a whole new principle behind what we are doing.”
“What is that?”
“Just like the Declaration of Independence says—all men are created equal. The key idea is freedom. Not only from tyranny, but from any reminder of it. Olivia, I find myself walking more gently before these people simply because they have been abused by my people. And I find myself measuring their wounded spirit with a more strict standard.”
He took a deep breath. Turning, he went to place his hand on the Bible lying on the table. “It says here that ‘there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus.’ Olivia, please honor this request. Don’t ask them to wait on you.”
Olivia stared up at him, shocked beyond words. Finally, as he moved to leave the room, she said, “All my life these people have waited on me. Do you suppose it is easy to break the habit? Alex, this is your project. I am your prisoner. I can’t believe I am to be forced to conform to your ideas.”
“Then you have no sympathy with the plight of the slaves?”
She thought. “I suppose I do. Perhaps not so much as I would if I were also a slave.” She flashed a dimpled smile at Alex.
He frowned. “Certainly I won’t control your actions once you leave the boat, but for now—”
“When will I be allowed to leave?”
A strange look filled his eyes. “Is it that abhorrent?”
After that scene in the cabin, she made it a point to avoid the black-bearded Alex, and he seemed to make it easy for her. Except for his appearance at mealtimes and the daily Bible reading, she seldom encountered him. She knew that nearly always he was behind the wheel of the steamer or hunched over charts, studying the channels.
Her friendship with Caleb grew, keeping pace with her curiosity surrounding the mysterious activities involved with piloting the boat. Around the table she listened to the first mate’s talk about channels and sandbars, steamboat racing and river pirates, and his newest accomplishment—flanking. When her curiosity got the best of her, Olivia made her first venture into the pilothouse. On that occasion she learned how unwelcome a woman was in the male domain.
For days she had yearned for an excuse to climb the stairs, and Solomon’s mid-morning pot of coffee gave her the excuse.
“I’ll carry it up, Solomon,” she said, as she watched the black man gather mugs and lift the fresh pot of coffee from the stove.
He rolled his eyes and puffed out his cheeks. “Don’t worry,” she added, “you’ll not have to take the responsibility for my actions. The worst they’ll do to me is throw me overboard!”
Carrying the pot of coffee, she climbed the steps. By the time she reached the pilothouse, a line of males waited, greeting her with silence.
The wind swept through the pilothouse, ruffling her hair. “Oh, there isn’t any glass in the window!”
Tersely Alex said, “There isn’t supposed to be glass in the window.” He turned back to the wheel.
Matthew took the coffee pot, “Look, Olivia,” he said carefully, “Women just don’t come up here.”
“I’m not women, I’m your sister.” She looked at the others. “Well, I’m not moving in,” she added. “Here’s coffee. Answer my questions and I’ll have a look and be gone.”
“No questions,” Alex said heavily, pulling on the wheel. “Just keep quiet, look, and be gone.”
Stung by his abruptness, Olivia hastily looked and left.
Matthew followed her down the stairs. “Olivia, we don’t know the channels,” he explained, “and we have only these charts to go by. We’re all scared to death that we’ll put the boat on a sandbar. Can you imagine what happens when the river patrol comes past and finds us with a load of slaves without papers?”
“Oh,” she murmured, “I see. I’m sorry; I just didn’t know. Is piloting a steamboat that difficult? Caleb made it sound like a lark.”
He stared at her, “The thing doesn’t respond like a horse when you tug on the reins. You’ve heard enough about steamboat accidents to know there are some problems connected with getting the rig from one port to another,” he added sarcastically.
“I thought such accidents had something to do with captains sleeping on the job.”
Ignoring the remark, he added, “One reason we don’t try to take this upstream after dark is because we’re all practically novices.”
“Even Alex?”
“He’s had a little experience. Enough to make him cautious.” He headed back up the stairs.
Early that evening, before sundown, Alex took the boat in close to the bank and tied onto the oak trees. Caleb ran to shut down the engine and in the twilight silence, they all lined the rail waiting for the frogs to resume their concert.
Leaving the table, Olivia went to listen to the gentle lap of water against the hull. Fish jumped with phosphorescent spray arching against the night sky, and Maggie said the words Olivia felt: “’Tis a picture that makes you believe everything’s right in the world.”
Late that evening when Olivia went into the cabin, Caleb, Matthew, and Alex were standing around the table. She could see they were bending over the pile of charts. Alex glanced up.
“I’m sorry; I’ll go—”
“No, stay,” he said. His eyes were unexpectedly gentle as he looked at her. “We don’t bite women all the time.” He grinned and added, “Just when they come into the pilothouse without being invited.”
“Do you ever invite them?”
“Not often.” He continued to grin down at her. “There must be a very good reason—such as her being the most beautiful lady on the boat.”
Matthew glanced at Alex and then Olivia. Dryly he said, “You notice he kicked you out.”
Alex turned back to the table. “Stay. We’ll be out of here in a few minutes. One reason we stopped early tonight is that we’re getting pretty close to the Ohio River, and there’s some charting of channels we need to do in order to get a handle on things.”
Shaking her head, Olivia leaned over Matthew’s shoulder to watch the pencil Alex drew along the eastern shoreline. “I was talking to some old-timers; they told me to watch this section. There’s a light-colored bluff about here. The next landmark will be a small village with a big white church. Halfway between the two spots there’s a post box. We’ll stop there to pick up information about the Ohio.
“But in addition, just midstream of the box, there’s rough water. So we’ll have to hug the shoreline beyond the village. There’s proba
bly a towhead there.” He added.
Matthew glanced at Olivia. “A baby island,” he explained.
Alex continued, “We’ll need to take a sounding before the bluffs. If it’s less than six, we’re in trouble.”
Olivia backed away from the table shaking her head. “I can’t believe progress should make life this complicated.” She paused and then said thoughtfully, “Maybe I understand now why there are accidents on the river.”
Chapter 18
The sounds of Natchez came through the windows, pricking at Crystal’s attempt to sleep. With a sigh of resignation, she sat up. “Auntie T,” Crystal said as she pulled the light wrap over her nightgown, “I’m feeling terribly lazy this morning. Will you please ask Joseph to bring some juice and perhaps a little fruit? I’ll not go down to breakfast.”
Tammera wiped the sleep from her eyes, got up, and found Joseph. He began putting together Crystal’s breakfast. No one questioned his presence on the plantation; everyone simply assumed that Crystal’s father had sent two slaves along with her. When Tammera came back into the room, Crystal turned from the window. “Oh, my, what a headache I have from the party last night!” She added slowly, “But it was lovely, and Natchez is beautiful. We’ve been here less than a month, and already I love it.”
“Don’t believe this June weather is as hot as May was in New Orleans,” Tammera said, nodding her head as she thumped pillows and smoothed the sheets on Crystal’s bed.
“Everyone has been so dear to me,” Crystal murmured with a catch in her voice. “Last night’s party was very special.”
“Your aunt had that look in her eyes. I ’spect she’s set on matchmaking. That fellow—” Tammera stopped and rolled her eyes. “He’s something special. All that pretty red hair. My, the girls are a thinking so, too!” She chuckled, adding, “I saw a couple of pretty little things looking as if they wished you’d go home.”