Chasing the North Star

by Robert Morgan

  Jonah studied the mountains to the north and the mountains to the south. Roanoke was in a trough between two long chains of mountains running to the northeast and southwest. He knew he’d have to run to the northeast. He’d have to go soon if he was to make it to the North before winter came. Because it was getting cool at night, Miss Linda bought him a jacket of heavy jean cloth. It was the kind of coat called a Negro Jacket, the color of blue ink. When he ran away he’d need a jacket, and maybe long underwear. He thanked Miss Linda like she’d bought him his freedom.

  Before he tried to escape, Jonah had to do some thinking. A little thinking beforehand could save a lot of effort and danger later. The trick to getting away was to go through water as much as possible, to throw the dogs and trackers off. An idea came to Jonah that was so good he wondered why he hadn’t thought of it before. What if he left Miss Linda’s during a hard rain? His tracks would be washed away and his scent would be melted away long before they knew he was gone. Why had he not thought of that before? In hard rain it would be difficult for a sheriff to gather his men and set out, much less see the trail. The risk was that he’d get lost in the dark in a heavy rain, or get struck by lightning during a bad storm, but it was a risk he was glad to take. He couldn’t carry a torch in a heavy rain. Even a lantern might get drowned out.

  Jonah knew the best time to leave was in the evening after supper. When guests were arriving in the parlor, Miss Linda would be busy serving drinks and entertaining. He would help Lonella and Hettie with the dishes and carry in wood and water for the next morning, same as always, and then while the girls were busy upstairs, he’d be gone. It was better not to try to hoard things to take with him. That would only arouse suspicions. He had more than eleven dollars Miss Linda had paid him. He would take that and some matches and his knife and fishhooks, and maybe a bite to eat. He’d carry his writing tablet and pencil inside his shirt. Jonah wished he had a map, but it would be too obvious if he bought a map at the store or cut a map out of the atlas in the parlor. Instead he tried to memorize the maps of Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania in the atlas when he got a chance.

  One day, while he drew water from the well, Jonah looked up and saw someone standing in the bushes at the corner of the yard. He put down the bucket and stepped closer, and saw black hair and golden skin, and a big, wide shoulder.

  “What are you doing here?” Jonah said.

  The person hiding parted the limbs of the yew bush, and Jonah saw it was Angel. He was so surprised he took a step back. “How did you get here?”

  “Come up the long road, same as you.”

  “You can’t stay here,” he said. With a chill he saw that Angel’s arrival might interfere with his plans for escape. It seemed impossible she’d followed him all the way to Roanoke.

  “You get away from here,” Jonah said.

  “That’s a fine welcome, after all your good help on the French Broad,” Angel said.

  “Ain’t nothing for you here,” Jonah said. But he must have spoken louder than he meant to, for Lonella called from the back porch and asked who he was talking to.

  “Ain’t nobody,” he called.

  “Yeah, I see it ain’t nobody,” Lonella said. “You talking loud enough to raise the dead.”

  Before he could stop her, Angel stepped out of the bushes and said to Lonella, “I be looking for a piece of cornbread; I be looking for some work.” She walked right up to Lonella on the porch. Though she’d lost some weight in the weeks since he’d last seen her, Angel was still big. Instead of the feedsack dress, she wore a gold frock that she must have stolen from a clothesline. Her skin was the color of dark buckwheat honey, and her feet were bare.

  “What can you do, girl?” Lonella said.

  “I can do most anything,” Angel said. “I’ve done most anything.”

  Lonella looked the big girl up and down like she was inspecting a piece of pork, looking for maggots. Miss Linda stepped out on the back porch at that moment and saw Angel. She beckoned for her to approach the house. Angel said her name was Sarepta, like in the Bible. “Come with me,” Miss Linda said. Jonah watched helplessly as the women started to walk into the kitchen. Lonella turned back and told him to bring that water.

  There were four buckets of water to carry into the kitchen, and each time Jonah came inside he heard Lonella and Miss Linda and Angel talking in the parlor. He edged near to the door in the hallway to hear better. He would pretend he’d never seen Angel before, and if she had any sense she’d act like he was a total stranger, too.

  “We are just a family here,” Miss Linda was saying. “You will help Lonella and Hettie, or whoever else needs help. Looks like you have come a long way.”

  “I come over the mountain,” Angel said.

  “And you will go back over the mountain if you give us any trouble,” Miss Linda said. “Come, I’ll introduce you.”

  Jonah dashed back to the kitchen just in time to make it look as if he’d been working there, not eavesdropping in the hallway. He tried to avoid looking at either Angel or Miss Linda.

  “Sarepta will be joining us,” Miss Linda said. “This is Ezra. You will help him when Lonella and Hettie don’t need you.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” Angel said.

  “You can sleep in Hettie’s room until we can fix up a place for you,” Miss Linda said. “Now come upstairs to meet the girls.”

  Jonah was so surprised by Angel’s sudden appearance he couldn’t decide if it was a good thing or a bad thing. He was pretty sure it was a bad thing, for two runaways had to create more suspicion than just one. He couldn’t have the fat girl following him and getting in the way of his plans. It was possible they might help each other, but it was hard to see how that might be. He needed to find out what her plans were, and how she’d gotten as far as Roanoke.

  Because there were so many people in the house, and because she pretended to ignore him, Jonah found it hard to get alone with Angel. She worked in the kitchen with Lonella and cleaned the rooms upstairs with Hettie and rarely came outside. She slept next door to him in Hettie’s room, but Hettie was always there. It was four days before Jonah got a chance to speak with her alone. It was late at night on Saturday night, and the guests were noisy in the parlor. Someone was playing the piano. Jonah slipped out into the backyard to relieve himself, and then he stood in the dark by the maple trees pondering his escape plans, wondering when a heavy rain would come. He saw Angel step out on the back porch and called to her in a loud whisper to come out in the yard.

  “What do you want?” she said.

  “Come out here,” he said.

  “You ain’t my boss,” she said and giggled. But she stepped off the porch and came to the maple tree. She was wearing a new dress, lavender, with bows on it.

  “What are you doing here?” Jonah said.

  “Same as you, I got a job.” Jonah could smell perfume on her. Her hair was done up in a ribbon.

  “Are you working upstairs?” he asked.

  “None of your business,” Angel said. “Mr. Wells, he likes me.”

  “You ain’t planning on going up north?” Jonah said.

  “What if I am?” Angel said. “Don’t have to ask your leave to do nothing.”

  “You followed me here.”

  “I followed the Drinking Gourd,” Angel said. “You think you’re the only one know where the North is?”

  “You’d better not get in my way,” Jonah said.

  “You can’t do nothing to me, Jonah Williams. You’re just mad ’cause you know I’m lying in bed right next to you but you got to sleep alone.” She laughed and started back to the porch. In the weeks that followed, there were light rains some mornings, and more colored leaves fell in the yard. But a shower was of no use to Jonah. He needed wind and rain and heavy darkness that would hide him and cover his trail. Only heavy rain would quickly wash away his tracks.

  Angel had moved out of Hettie’s room to a little room upstairs. She had two fine dresses and new shoes and a r
ed silk scarf. She still worked in the kitchen from time to time, and waited at the table in the dining room. But she did less and less work with Lonella and Hettie and Jonah.

  “That girl be putting on airs,” Lonella said one day in the kitchen.

  “She got what some men want,” Hettie said.

  “Some mens like black skin and fleshy gals,” Lonella said.

  Jonah decided that Angel’s presence didn’t make any difference to his plans. She seemed happy at Miss Linda’s, and as far as he knew she hadn’t told anybody that she’d known him before. But late one night when he got up to have a dipper of water, he found her on the back porch.

  “Ain’t you the fancy woman,” he said.

  Angel ignored his sarcasm. “When you go north I’ll go with you,” she said.

  “Who says I’m going north?”

  “I got money, and I can help,” Angel whispered.

  “I ain’t going nowhere,” Jonah said. “And if I was, you’d be the last person I’d go with.”

  “Bet you could use a little company,” Angel said and brushed her hip against his.

  “Listen, girl, don’t get in my way.”

  “Ain’t scared of you,” Angel said. “Besides, you think you the only one want to go on to freedom. You’re dumb as shit. You gone need my help.” A lamp was lit upstairs and Angel slipped back into the kitchen.

  Two days later he passed Angel in the hallway and she muttered, “You don’t take me with you, I turn you in.”

  “What if I was to turn you in before I left?” Jonah whispered back.

  “I’d send your sorry ass back to South Carolina,” Angel said.

  The storm he was waiting for never came at the time he needed it. He hoped to escape in the early evening as things got busy upstairs, but no such coincidence of weather occurred. Instead he woke one night around eleven and heard rain lashing the windows above and wind shoving the shutters and roaring in the maple trees in the backyard. Jonah got out of bed and pulled his clothes on as quickly as he could. He laced and tied the brogans Miss Linda had bought him and got his money from under the cot, a box of matches, and his writing tablet and pencil. His fishhooks were wrapped in a folded sheet of tablet paper, and his knife was in his pocket.

  There was laughter and movement upstairs and someone was playing the piano. Jonah climbed the steps to the kitchen. If anybody saw him, he’d pretend he was going to the outhouse. No one was in the kitchen, and he hurried to the back door and opened it carefully to keep it from banging in the wind. As he closed the door, he saw the barn lantern hanging on a peg. He grabbed the lantern, hoping it was filled with oil.

  When he reached the steps, wind smacked Jonah in the face with cold drops. Rain stung his cheeks, and he pulled his hat lower. He skirted the edge of the yard, staying as far away from the front porch as possible, where guests might be coming and going. Lightning lit the air like magic blue powder flung from the sky. If anyone was looking out the window they’d see him in that flash. In that instant of illumination and flicker, he saw rain flung in sheets across the yard and across the valley. Other houses were dark. It had rained so hard, water stood in the yard and in the road. Puddles stretched to meet each other and appeared to spit and pucker with splashing drops.

  Jonah froze and then it was dark again. Thunder growled so loud, he could hear it over the roar of the wind and rain. Thunder was so deep and loud it punched his chest and echoed in his ears. As soon as the rumble passed he hurried to the road and turned to the right. Jonah felt exposed, naked to the wind and lightning. Rain whipped his face and soaked his chest. He carried the lantern under his coat. When he got far enough away, he would light the lantern so he could see the road ahead. In the dark he stumbled through puddles and tripped on ruts and roots and rocks. Only the occasional flares of lightning showed him the way ahead. Several times he wandered into brush beside the road, and once he stepped into a ditch. There was a barn about half a mile up the road, which he’d seen from Miss Linda’s yard. When he reached the barn he’d go inside and light the lantern. With a light he’d be able to walk faster. Speed was what he needed most now.

  The road was covered with standing puddles that would hide his tracks. In some places the road ran like a stream. Any creeks along the way would be flooded. This was the kind of rain people called a gully-washer. When he got to the barn, a lightning flash helped him find the door, but he was blind as he stepped inside. A horse whickered. Cows stirred somewhere in the dark.

  Jonah took the lantern out from under his coat and tried to dry his hands. Every inch of him was wet and dripping. The matches had to be dry and the wick had to be dry. In the dark he could see neither the lantern nor the matches. He would have to tell by touch whether they were dry or not. Whoa, he said to himself. If he made a mistake the matches could be ruined, or the lantern could be ruined, or he could set the barn on fire.

  He placed the lantern on the ground and got to his knees. With the inside of his jacket he dried off the lantern, relieved to hear oil sloshing in the bottom. The matchbox he took from his pocket was a little damp, but the sticks inside seemed dry. Jonah dared not try to strike a match on the damp box. He felt around the floor for a rock but found none. What he did find was what felt like a rusty nail. He’d seen Mr. Williams strike a match on his fingernail. Maybe a metal nail would work just as well. He gripped the match near its head and held the nail point to the match head.

  When he struck, the match head burst out in blue fire, and then yellow. The flame burned his finger and he put the match in his other hand. The flame faltered and he tipped the match down to make it burn brighter. Quickly he raised the glass on the lantern and screwed the tongue of the wick out longer. When he touched the match to the wick it didn’t light at first, and then he touched it lower where the fabric was soaked in oil. The light burst out and he turned the wick down and closed the glass door. As long as he could keep the wick dry, the lantern would burn. But it would be hard to hold the lantern in the high wind.

  Jonah buttoned his jacket, gripped the handle of the lantern, pulled down his hat, and stepped out into the storm. The lantern threw a patch of light on the puddles ahead of him, and he hurried to the road and began walking. Terrible as the rain was, Jonah felt a new strength and elation with every step he took. The rain was washing out his tracks as quickly as he made them, washing away any scent the dogs could follow. If he was lucky, Miss Linda wouldn’t even know he was gone until next morning. By then he could be fifteen or even twenty miles down the road. He’d heard a man could walk thirty miles a day on a good road. Fifteen miles would be plenty in the dark, in a storm.

  Jonah splashed through puddles and strode ahead into the lantern light. Wind lashed his back and pushed him along. The storm roared in the trees above him. After he’d gone a few miles, he saw lightning strike a tree, and the tree fell with a crack and crash into the road ahead. He had to pick his way through brush around the steaming trunk. His shoes were muddy and soaked, but Jonah didn’t worry about them. An animal ran in front of him, and from the flash of white he thought it might be a deer. Whatever it was, it was gone in an instant. Thunder banged the ridge above like barrels and hammers, and seemed to tear the sky to pieces.

  As Jonah hurried over the top of a hill, a ball of fire shot out of a lightning bolt and bounced through the trees. And then another and another fireball ricocheted through the woods. One roared over his head and he ducked and looked behind him. A fireball was following the road, and he dropped to the ground, holding the lantern above the puddle. After the fireball hissed by, the woods were dark again and he had only the weak lantern light to guide him down the muddy track. He hurried a little faster. Jonah had always heard of balls of lightning, but he’d never seen them before. He’d assumed it was just an expression people used, a story people liked to tell. But the fireballs had bounced between the mountains and over trees. They’d whizzed just over his head. It was all like a thrilling dream, the storm, the wind, the lightning, and his esca
pe from Miss Linda’s.

  Jonah walked through the rain mile after mile. He could hardly see the houses he passed or the little hamlets he went through. He crossed a swollen, leaping river on a wooden bridge, and waded through furious creeks and branches. He stalked the little puff of light from the lantern the way a hunter followed prey. He was hunting the way ahead at every step, the way to the North. He knew that somewhere above the rain and wind and thunder, the North Star was shining, calm and bright and everlasting.

  As the sky began to lighten over the trees and above the mountains, the wind and rain didn’t let up. He turned down the wick in the lantern and blew out the flame to save oil and stumbled ahead through the gray early morning light. He was getting tired and his feet were sore from walking in wet shoes. Jonah knew it was time to stop when he saw a barn at the edge of a field with no house visible nearby. He hurried along the edge of the woods and entered the barn, which he found was used to store hay. A broken-down wagon leaned against a stall. Harness covered with dust hung on pegs. He climbed the ladder to the mow and found in the shadows a pile of hay on one side and a heap of cane and millet on the other. Setting the lantern on the floor, he flopped onto the hay, pulling straw around him and over him. His coat was soaked but the hay would help keep him warm. Rain drummed on the roof and wind whistled in the cracks and made the barn creak. But Jonah was so tired, the barn seemed cozy. He’d traveled at least fifteen miles and had left no tracks that could be traced. He sank into a deep sleep.

  When Jonah woke he thought it must be late afternoon; without the sun he couldn’t really tell. But he knew he’d slept a long time. The rain on the barn roof was loud as ever, and wind shoved on the walls and banged a loose board. Jonah was hungry and thirsty, but there was nothing in the dusty barn to nourish him. Not for the first time, he wished he’d thought to put a biscuit in his pocket when he left Miss Linda’s. He wished there was a store nearby where he could buy cheese and crackers, or a can of sardines or a jar of sausages. After he climbed down from the loft with the lantern, it took Jonah a moment to recall which way he’d come. Yes, the field and the barn had been on the right of the road. He needed to turn right when he reached the track. Only hunger and willpower made him step out into the cold rain again. He pulled his hat down and stomped into the rutted road.