Which Way Freedom

by Joyce Hansen

  “I ain’t goin’, Obi,” she said in a muffled voice.

  “Why?’ he asked hoarsely. “You still angry?”

  “No, but I feel near to Jason if I stay here.”

  “We look for Jason together. I promise, Easter. I won’t rest till I find he.” He rubbed her face with one hand and held her around the waist with the other. “Suppose Wilson still lookin’ for us an’ find he way down here? I want us to be together.”

  “I do too, but I ’fraid if I go to the island, I never see Jason.” She wiped her eyes. “He waitin’ for us, Obi.”

  “Easter, we find him together. Please come with me,” he pleaded.

  “I stay this side of the river, Obi. Maybe a chance come for me to get to Jason.”

  “But then we be apart,” he said sadly, still holding her to him.

  “We are apart long as Jason not with us.”

  She had to tiptoe in order to rest her face on his shoulder.

  “I love you, Obi. But I love Jason too. He need me. You know I here, or on the Phillips plantation, or with Master and Mistress—if they ain’t gone west.”

  “If you don’t come, then the three of us apart. I hear the Yankee don’t turn slave away no more. Maybe we get to the Yankee an’ be free.”

  “I never free without Jason. I never free till we three be like a family again. You understand me, Obi?”

  His large, deep-set eyes stared at her intently. “No. I don’t understand.”

  “But I understand why you have to leave. Maybe you find your ma. And these soldier—they work you to death, then they give you back to Master or sell you to someone else.”

  He bent down and they kissed. “I comin’ back for you—and Jason—.”

  When he left the shed, he heard the rumble of distant thunder. He looked behind him and saw the gunboat floating in the river. Suddenly, he heard a soldier yell “Fire!” and saw black smoke spew out of the raised barrels of the artillery at the riverbank. The gunboat returned the fire. The roar of the guns mingled with the rumbling thunder, and he couldn’t tell one from the other as he ran to the inlet.

  Daniel looked confused. “Where Easter?” he asked when he saw Obi.

  “Not comin’.”

  They put the boat in the inlet. “Can you swim?” Daniel asked, handing Obi a paddle.

  “Why?” Obi asked, trying to steady himself in the boat.

  “In case this thing don’t stay on top the water.”

  “Can’t swim,” Obi yelled over the sound of exploding shells.

  “I can’t neither. Only know how to float.”

  Fortunately, the raft stayed afloat and the current helped them downriver. They stayed as close to the shore as possible. “We movin’ farther from the island,” Obi said nervously, taking a quick look behind him. The camp was covered with smoke.

  “We can’t get near the island, anyway—we get blown to pieces. Main thing is we get clear of the camp,” Daniel shouted.

  Obi looked to his right. Soldiers from the camp were coming to the river’s edge. Daniel swore when he saw them.

  “Got to go farther in the river. They comin’ to hide in these reeds,” he said.

  They paddled as hard as they could farther out into the river.

  “It’s our only chance. Soldier’s muskets can’t reach us in the middle of the river,” Daniel said, barely catching his breath. “Let’s head for the gunboat.”

  It was beginning to rain harder. Obi knew heading for the gunboat was a crazy idea, but that seemed to be the only choice they had. His arm ached as they struggled against the current in the teeming rain. Looking at the silvery thread of water was one thing—actually being on the river was another. Obi could sense the power of the river now.

  The firing stopped and the silence seemed strange. Suddenly the river became their enemy as rain fell heavily and claps of thunder rang out. The river churned under the light boat as they paddled toward the gunboat, now retreating.

  Obi and Daniel were no match for the river’s strength. A gust of wind caught the boat and flipped it over on top of them. Daniel reached for Obi, but Obi was carried away from his grasp.

  When Obi went under, Daniel battled the river and finally grabbed Obi’s head. Then he kicked, holding Obi up with one arm and waving madly with the other.

  Eleven

  [General] Ben Butler acted, welcoming slaves into his

  line, putting them to work and grandly dubbing them

  “contraband of war.”

  Lerone Bennett Jr., author From Before the Mayflower

  The first thing Obi noticed was the sour smell of his own damp clothes. The ground under him was wet, and for a moment he thought he was back in the swamp with Buka and Easter.

  “We on the island, Obi,” Daniel said when Obi opened his eyes. “The gunboat pick us up an’ bring us here.”

  “We at the plantation?” Obi asked weakly, looking at the rows of shingled slave cabins.

  “No, not at Green Hills. The gunboat drop us off at the Reynolds plantation near Green Hills.” Other black people sat or lay on the ground, even though there was a slight drizzle. Some walked aimlessly up and down the narrow path between the rows of cabins.

  Daniel stood up. “These people escape from the mainland too,” he said. “I was waitin’ for you to wake so we can go to Green Hills. That’s where Buka was takin’ you.”

  Every bone in Obi’s body ached as Daniel helped him to his feet. They left the rows of cabins, Obi feeling weak and dazed. “Yankee soldier here?” Obi asked as Daniel led him past a grove of palmetto trees toward the woods.

  “Yes. When the boat dock, two soldiers take all of us off an’ bring us to the slave quarter.” He stopped walking and shook his head.

  “Let me tell you, it a good thing I eat as much food as I can find or kill, to give me strength. I carry you all the way here from the boat.” Though his eyes looked tired Daniel managed to smile a little. “You the heaviest skinny man I ever carry.”

  “I thought I dead when the boat turn over. You save my life.”

  The light rain barely seeped through the dense growth of vines and trees twisted together. Roots, almost the size of tree trunks, protruded and coiled out of the damp ground.

  “Didn’t want to lose you an’ the boat too. Couldn’t catch the boat, so I grab you,” he joked.

  As the woods thinned, they came to fields covered with stubble from the rice harvest and thick clods of dirt. A scattering of men trudged behind oxen, plowing the rich dark earth. One of the men waved to them as they approached.

  “That you, Daniel? How you get back?”

  “Almost swim.” Daniel smiled slightly, patting the man on his shoulders. “Plowin’ up under the stubble, eh, Joshua?” Obi could tell that Daniel was forcing himself to be jovial.

  “Daniel, Yankee come an’ take over the whole island,” Joshua said excitedly. “The overseers gone, Master an’ Mistress gone, all the white people gone ’cept for some who hidin’ in the woods from the Yankee. Yankee soldier only white people ’round here now.”

  “Minna an’ little Daniel here?”

  Obi knew immediately by the sad look in the man’s eyes what the answer would be.

  “They leave Green Hills. They with Master an’ Mistress on the mainland.”

  Daniel’s round face sagged. Joshua continued. “Minna ain’t want to go, Daniel. First they try an’ force she, but she put up a fuss. Say she have to stay here till you come back. Then Master tell she that they goin’ across the river to the farm where you an’ Gabriel is. I knowed they lie an’ was goin’ farther inland.”

  Obi put his arm around Daniel’s broad shoulders, wishing there was something he could say to comfort his friend.

  “They probably went to Master’s house in Charleston,” Joshua said. “Don’t fret, they be fine. You see them again.” Daniel stared blankly at the bleak, drizzling sky.

  Obi looked around him. He wanted to ask this man if he knew a tall, black woman named Lorena, but
Daniel’s questions were more important for the moment.

  “So many runaways come from the mainland when they learn the Yankee here. They think the Yankee go free them. They’s a mess of ’em camped up in the high ground on the plantation. The soldier tell us to do our usual task. Say now we grow rice for the Treasury Department, whatever that be,” he said, shaking his head. “Them Yankee soldier don’t know nothin’ about runnin’ no plantation.”

  Daniel looked dazed. “My cabin gone too?”

  Joshua nodded. “We tell the Yankee don’t put nobody new in there ’cause that cabin belongs to somebody. But they don’t listen. Say they needs someplace to put all the fugitive peoples.” He tugged gently at Daniel’s sleeve. “Come, rice in the pot. You and your friend eat somethin’.” Joshua had his small, three-legged iron skillet in the field with him.

  He smiled kindly at Obi. “You an’ your friend can sleep in my cabin till you find someplace.”

  “You a kind man, Joshua. Where you find room for us when you have a wife an’ four children?”

  He shrugged his shoulders. “We find a chink of space for you on the floor.”

  Thanking him, Daniel said, “We go to the quarter an’

  find a place to clean ourselves and rest.” They left the rice fields and walked along the supply canal used for flooding the fields during the growing season.

  “I know this happen, Obi,” Daniel said as they continued walking. “Slave don’t have nothin’ belong to he—not he woman, child, cabin—not even he self.”

  When they reached higher ground, Obi couldn’t believe his eyes. Green Hills was twice the size of the Phillips plantation.

  Behind the large, two-story family house, with its porch running almost its entire width, stood stables, barns, a lake, and a terraced garden. Another field, where peas, okra, corn, and other crops were grown, ran parallel to the family house and ended near the slave quarters.

  An avenue of oak trees shaded the large lawn that let to the house. Blue-coated men milled about the lawns and gardens. Tents in the background reminded Obi of the camp they’d just left. Obi stared at the soldiers, realizing this was the first time he was seeing a Yankee in the flesh.

  They headed for the slave quarter but were stopped by two soldiers posted at the edge of the field, just beyond the row of cabins.

  The men watched Obi and Daniel as they approached. “All fugitives have to report to the superintendent and the captain.”

  “Then you have to go to the camp with the other fugitives,” the second soldier added.

  Obi and Daniel looked at each other, both of them having trouble understanding what the soldiers were saying.

  “I live here, but my cabin give away to someone else, suh.”

  Now the soldiers stared at Obi and Daniel as if they didn’t understand them. Obi was thinking that the biggest difference between the Yankees and the southern whites was the way the Yankees talked. It sounded as if the words were trapped inside their noses.

  Daniel tried to explain again. “Suh, we not runaways. We belong to Master Turner.”

  A portly older man with long, red sideburns came toward them from the direction of the fields. Instead of a uniform, he wore a black frock coat.

  “More fugitives?” he asked, peering closely at Daniel and Obi.

  “They claim they belong here,” the soldier said. “At least I think that’s what they’re saying.”

  “We not runaways. We belong to Master Turner, suh,” Daniel sighed wearily.

  The man in the frock coat talked slowly to Obi and Daniel, as if he were addressing very young children. “Your master is a traitor. The United States government therefore has seized any property belonging to him. Do you understand?”

  Obi didn’t understand and neither did Daniel.

  “Suh, you returnin’ me to Master Turner?” Daniel asked patiently.

  “I just told you,” the man said calmly. “Your master is our enemy. Anything that belongs to him, we have the right to take.”

  Now Obi understood. “We ain’t free, then, suh?” Daniel asked.

  “That’s not for me to say.”

  Daniel stared intently at the man. “We belong to you, suh?”

  The man’s face reddened. “No. You belong to the Treasury Department.”

  Obi recalled that the man in the field had also mentioned this Treasury Department thing. Obi wondered what it was.

  “I have to get back to the mainland, suh, to find my wife an’ baby.”

  “What? I don’t understand. You—”

  “Master send me to work for the Confederates. Then he leave an’ take my wife an’ baby with he.”

  “You were at the camp on the other side of the river?” The man stared intently at Daniel as if he didn’t want to miss a word he said. “You were both there?”

  “Yes, suh,” Daniel answered.

  “Could you tell us how many artillery there are? And men?”

  “Yes, suh. I know all that.”

  The man looked at the soldiers. “Maybe the captain could use these two.”

  “Maybe,” one of the soldiers said. “These blacks know the territory. Maybe they could show us where there’s a weak spot in the Rebel shore defense.”

  Obi lost interest in the conversation. He wanted to eat, sleep, and then scour the island and find Lorena.

  The man looked at Obi. “What do you know about this area?”

  “Don’t know nothin’, suh,” Obi answered.

  Daniel continued. “Suh, can I go to find my wife an’ baby?”

  “I think that’s dangerous.”

  “I know how to find my way, suh.”

  “Could you guide someone through these swamps?”

  “Yes, suh. Know them well.”

  The man turned to Obi. “Could you do the same?”

  “No, suh. Don’t know about no swamp nor how to do nothin’.”

  “These slavers wouldn’t have you if you didn’t know anything,” he snapped.

  “He a first-rate carpenter, suh,” Daniel said.

  Obi glared at him. He didn’t want these men to know what he could do. He wasn’t going to be around here for long. Daniel reminded him of Easter’s letting the Colonel know that she was a cook.

  “We may need carpenters,” the man said quickly. “But until that time comes, you go with the others tomorrow to the rice field.”

  “And you,” he said, turning to Daniel, “come and see me. Superintendent James. Got that?”

  Daniel nodded. “Yes, suh, but I have to go back to the mainland.”

  “Well, maybe we can help each other. You come see me and the Captain tomorrow.”

  Daniel nodded. “Yes, suh, Super … Super …”

  The soldiers laughed at him.

  Got a nerve to laugh, funny as they talk, Obi thought.

  “Superintendent James,” the man repeated.

  “Yes, suh,” Daniel mumbled.

  “The slave quarter is filled up,” the man said. “You’ll have to stay in the camp with the others.” He pointed beyond the terraced garden to an area Obi hadn’t noticed before. There were makeshift shelters—sticks with pieces of old cloth and canvas thrown over them—lean-tos with canvas over the space where a door would normally have been, and a few stick-and-mud shacks.

  Instead of going to the camp behind the garden, Daniel walked silently to the slave quarter, and Obi followed. Daniel stopped in front of a small, weather-beaten cabin. “That was our cabin,” he muttered sadly.

  Obi felt too sorry for Daniel, too weary, to be excited about finally reaching the island. He missed Easter, Buka, and Jason too. They should all be there with him. After all the years of planning and dreaming of breaking free, he still felt like Obi, the slave of John Jennings.

  Twelve

  The sons of thousands of white mothers were dying,

  and people were beginning to say that blacks could

  stop bullets as well as white men.

  Lerone Bennett Jr., author />
  From Before the Mayflower

  May 1862

  Imitating the movements of the other men and women in the field, Obi dropped the rice seeds into the small trench and, with his bare foot, covered it over with dirt. He repeated the same process at the next trench, about twelve inches away.

  The songs of the yellow and black rice birds created a kind of music to accompany the sowers’ “dance” across the field. Obi looked anxiously at the position of the sun. It was about four o’clock—only a few more hours to work.

  For five months now, Obi had spent his free time searching for Lorena. He’d managed to talk to the older slaves at Green Hills, as well as the slaves on the other plantations on the island.

  Until yesterday, no one had heard of his mother. Yesterday, however, he’d found an old woman who’d told him that yes, she’d definitely known Lorena and that Lorena had been sold years ago to a plantation on another island.

  Obi hoped that Daniel would return this evening. He needed to talk to him. He felt he should leave Green Hills so that he could continue his search for his mother, but he wanted to talk to Daniel first. Daniel had been working as a guide for the captain. He led small groups of soldiers through the swamps so that they could gather information and draw accurate maps of the coastal areas. Recently his assignment was more dangerous.

  Given false papers stating that he was free, he travelled back and forth to the mainland, reporting on Confederate troop movements. Several times he’d sneaked to the camp to visit Easter, Mariah, and Gabriel before he returned to the island.

  The first time he returned from the camp, he had told Obi, “Easter say the Colonel think we drown in the river.”

  On his last assignment, he had stopped at the camp again. “Easter say she miss you,” he informed Obi. “I workin’ on her. I tell her the Yankee tell you to do your task, then he leave you be. Least he ain’t buyin’ an’ sellin’ your hide.”

  “What she say?” Obi asked.

  “Say she think on it. I sneak her out of there easy, Obi.”

  When Obi wasn’t thinking about Lorena, he thought about Easter. His mind kept drawing the same pictures: Easter as a little, barefoot girl in shirttails; Easter growing into a young woman. But the image that gave him the most pain and guilt was Easter crying because Jason was no longer with her.