Leapholes

by James Grippando

  "I see the head!" said Abigail. "One more push, girl. On three! One… two… threeeee!"

  The scream that followed was unlike anything Ryan had ever heard in his entire life. It was filled with pain, filled with relief, filled with life, itself. And then there was only crying- a baby's crying. Hannah was crying too, but these were happy tears.

  "It's a boy!" shouted Abigail.

  Ryan smiled. All was well.

  Abigail said, "Ryan L'new, where on earth is that boiled water I told you to fetch?'.'

  Ryan hurried inside and handed her the pot. Abigail sterilized her bandana in the boiling water. She waved it in the air to cool it just a bit and wiped the naked baby clean. Then she handed the infant to his mother, who cradled him in her arms. Ryan had never seen more love in a young woman's eyes.

  Hezekiah approached tentatively. Hannah motioned him forward. None of them had known Hannah long, but Hezekiah seemed to swell with a grandfather's pride as he approached.

  "What are you going to name him?" he asked.

  Hannah held her baby tight, considering it. Then she glanced at Ryan and said, "I'm gonna name my boy after this brave young man right here."

  Ryan blushed. Abigail nodded and said, "Ryan's a nice name."

  "Not Ryan. L'new. I like that name. L'new."

  They all smiled, and Ryan tried not to laugh. He didn't want to break Hannah's heart and tell her that L'new came from LNU-last name unknown.

  "That's a good name, too," said Ryan.

  They watched in silence as the young mother kissed and stroked her newborn's face, whispering his name. "L'new. I love you, L'new."

  Ryan could not stop watching them. It reminded him of the way his mother looked at his baby sister Ainsley, and he imagined that she had once looked at him the same adoring way. He was suddenly feeling the pain of separation from his own family-until Jarvis entered the sod house.

  "Someone's coming," he said in a solemn voice.

  Hezekiah took charge. "Abigail, you stay here with Hannah and her baby. Ryan, Jarvis, come with me."

  He led the way out of the sod house. Standing by the campfire, they spotted the cloud of dust rising on the horizon. It was perhaps two miles off, though distances were hard to gauge on the ocean-like flatness of the prairie.

  "Definitely looks like riders," said Hezekiah.

  "Lots of riders," said Jarvis. "No way one or two horses kicks up that much dust."

  "Kill the fire," said Hezekiah. "No sense sending up smoke signals to guide them to us."

  Ryan pitched fistfuls of dirt onto the fire until it was extinguished. "You think it could be a slave-catcher posse?"

  "No way to tell just yet. All we can do is wait," said Hezekiah, his voice trailing off. "And be ready for the worst."

  Chapter 31

  The cloud of dust in the distance was no longer moving toward them. Slowly, like a ship on the horizon, it faded off to the west and dissolved into the setting sun. As dusk fell over the prairie, the dust cloud completely disappeared. In its place was a gentle wisp of white smoke that curled into a dark purple sky.

  "They set up camp for the night," said Hezekiah.

  "I wish we knew who they were," said Ryan.

  "One way to find out." Hezekiah suddenly looked like a man with a plan. "Jarvis, you stay here and help Abigail watch over the new momma and her baby. Ryan and I have a little spying to do "

  Taking only a water canteen with them, they walked side-by-side in a west-northwest direction. This was new terrain, as they had reached the sod house earlier from the south. It all looked the same, however-waves of prairie grass dotted with wild yellow blossoms, well-suited for a sod house. It was an especially dark night, which made it difficult to see. Occasionally, the skies would brighten as spears of moonlight broke through the shifting clouds. They walked at a strong, steady pace for about ten minutes, and then Hezekiah started to limp.

  "Are you okay?" asked Ryan.

  "I'm fine," he said. But his voice had a slight edge. He didn't sound fine.

  They walked for another half hour, and Hezekiah was noticeably tired. His limp was worsening. Ryan suggested that they stop to rest. Hezekiah didn't object.

  "You sure we're going the right way?" asked Ryan.

  Hezekiah put his nose in the air. "Don't you smell that smoke? That's their campfire. We're definitely headed in the right direction."

  Ryan opened the canteen, and they each took a long drink. Hezekiah reclined in a thick of prairie grass. Ryan watched him for a moment, then said, "Can I ask you something?"

  "Sure."

  "How did you end up in St. Louis?"

  "Same way you did. I used a leaphole through the Dred Scott decision. March sixth, 1857. St. Louis, Missouri."

  "I understand that much," said Ryan. "I was wondering why you were researching the Dred Scott decision."

  He drew a breath and let it out slowly. "Because I'm running out of time."

  Ryan felt a rush of concern. "You mean you're…"

  "No, no. I'm not dying. No lawyer can die before he golfs at Pebble Beach. It's against the rules. I'm just retiring. I told you that before."

  "So, you're running out of time to do what?"

  "I'm a good lawyer, Ryan. I've been doing this for more years than I can count. Soon, it will be time for me to move on. That's why I picked you as my replacement. You have a lot of years ahead of you."

  Ryan didn't say anything. Kaylee had already told him how much he'd hurt Hezekiah by rejecting the invitation to become a Legal Eagle.

  Hezekiah continued, "When you turned me down, I didn't know what to do. I had a terrible feeling inside that I was leaving no one in my place to continue the good fight. That left only one thing for me to do."

  "What?"

  His expression turned very serious. "I decided to come face to face with Legal Evil myself. Right at its root."

  "That was Kaylee's guess," said Ryan. "She asked me to come with her and find you. She was afraid you would be overpowered, that something horrible might happen to you."

  "Obviously she was right. I ended up a slave."

  "She hoped that if I came and told you that I was reconsidering your offer, maybe you'd come back."

  The old man raised one bushy white eyebrow. "Are you reconsidering?"

  Ryan paused, not because he didn't know the answer, but only because he wanted his words to have the proper impact. "Yes, I am," he said firmly.

  Hezekiah smiled. "That's exactly what I wanted to hear."

  "Of course, not that it makes much difference anymore. None of us has any leapholes."

  Hezekiah shook his head. "That's the strangest thing of all. My entire career, I have always carried an emergency leaphole. But when I landed in St. Louis, I had no return leaphole, and no emergency back up. I guess that's just one more sign than it's time to retire. I'm starting to forget the most important things."

  "Maybe it will turn up."

  "Maybe," said Hezekiah. "Leapholes are powerful things."

  They each took another sip of water, and Ryan packed away the canteen.

  "Come on," said Hezekiah. "We got a campsite to spy on."

  As they traveled farther west, the landscape began to change. It was a far cry from a forest, but Ryan saw more trees and bushes, and even a few rolling hills. The cloud coverage was blowing east. Soon, the stars twinkled in the black sky above them. Hezekiah continued to follow the scent of campfire smoke. His nose took them west, then northwest. Finally, they reached an east-west trail. It looked well traveled, and Ryan was tempted to take it.

  "No way," said Hezekiah. "A well-traveled road like this is no place for a slave on the run."

  They cut across the trail and continued toward the campsite. As they climbed another hill, Hezekiah's limp was worse than ever. Ryan was about to ask if he was okay, but Hezekiah staved off the question before the words could cross Ryan's lips.

  "I told you I'm fine, Ryan. Don't ask me again."

  Despite his protests, Hez
ekiah had even more trouble going down the hill. They stopped at a swift stream that curled around the foot of the hill. Hezekiah was steadily deteriorating. He was lying on his side near the stream. Ryan watched, curious, as the old man lifted his shirt and splashed handfuls of cold water onto a sore spot on his lower back.

  "What's wrong?" said Ryan.

  "Nothing," said Hezekiah.

  Ryan went to him and took a closer look. An open gash stretched across Hezekiah's back. It was yellow with infection.

  "Let me see that," said Ryan.

  Hezekiah tried to resist, but he was too weak. Ryan pulled up the old man's shirt and saw a half dozen thick welts across Hezekiah's back. Ryan couldn't speak at first. Finally, the words came like a reflex.

  "They beat you, didn't they?" said Ryan. "They beat you like an animal."

  Hezekiah smiled, but it was a weak smile. "You don't think I let them drag me into slavery without a fight, do you?"

  "You need a doctor."

  "I'll be fine."

  Ryan wanted to believe him, but like any Legal Eagle, he couldn't ignore the facts. The beating from the posse, the forced servitude, the leaphole disaster, the miles of hiking-it was all taking a terrible physical toll. "We should turn back," said Ryan.

  "No," he said as he forced himself onto his feet. "I've come this far. We need to know if those are slave catchers on the other side of that hill."

  Ryan understood his point, but that didn't make it any easier. "Look, you have to save yourself. I'll go with Abigail and make sure Hannah and her baby find their way on the underground railroad. But you are in no condition to keep running."

  "How can I not run?"

  "You're a lawyer, not a slave. We have to figure out some way to make these slave catchers understand that. Even under the twisted laws of Legal Evil, they had no right to take you into slavery. You were never a slave in the first place."

  The old man drew a breath, then let it out. "That's not exactly right, Ryan. I was a slave."

  "What?"

  "I was a slave at one time in my life. So if I'm recaptured, I go back into slavery. At least that's what the Supreme Court said in the Dred Scott decision."

  "Wait a minute. Slavery ended with the Civil War. How could you have been a slave? How old are you?"

  "Time travel slows the aging process, but I'm still much older than you think. That's why I need you to take my place. The battle isn't over, but I'm old and tired."

  Ryan didn't know what to say. He was honored, he supposed, if only because he was so taken with the old lawyer's sincerity and integrity. There was much he didn't understand, but he found himself wanting to be like Hezekiah.

  "Okay," said Ryan. "But if I'm going to take over this fight, I need to know more. I need to know where leapholes come from. I need to know where you come from."

  A somber expression came over his face. He wasn't looking directly at Ryan as he spoke. He was looking past him, and the words seemed to come from somewhere deep within him, some place rich with tradition.

  "I was born a prince," said Hezekiah, "in a land now known as the West African nation of Burkina Faso. My father was the tribal ruler. When I became a man, I was given a bracelet that had been handed down from generation to generation within our tribe. Many centuries ago, the first slave hunters came to West Africa to capture slaves. They put men and women in iron shackles and carried them off to the ship. One of the tribesmen captured was a very brave man. In fact, he was the tribe's rainmaker. It was said that he was a very spiritual man. Whenever there was drought and people were starving, the rainmaker would call upon the heavens to sprinkle their lives with precious rainwater-and the rain would fall."

  "They made a man like that into a slave?" said Ryan, his tone underscoring the tragedy.

  Hezekiah shook his head and said, "They tried, Ryan. But somehow, even after the slave hunters had bound his ankles with shackles, the rainmaker managed to escape. Vanished, is a better way to put it. The legend says that he simply disappeared, leaving behind only his iron shackle. This slave's shackle-this ring of metal-was the bracelet I was given by my tribal elders."

  "Do you still have it?"

  "I do. I keep it in a very special place."

  "It would be a terrible thing if you were ever to lose it, I suppose."

  "A terrible, terrible thing. I know this is going to be the really hard part for you to believe, but it's true. That bracelet- that shackle of my greatest ancestor-became the first leaphole. All leapholes derive their power from that very first one. Through the mystery of this brave rainmaker's escape and sudden disappearance, the leaphole was imbued with a magic that it has taken me over a century to understand and use."

  "But how does it work?"

  "I don't know, exactly. I've spoken to physicists, some very intelligent scientists. Time travel is possible, but you must create negative mass."

  "You mean weightlessness, like when the astronauts float inside their space shuttle?"

  "Below weightlessness. Negative mass, meaning less than zero."

  "How is that possible?"

  "That's beyond me, Ryan. But I'm told that sometimes when two pieces of metal are close together, negative mass can be achieved in the space between them."

  Ryan thought for a moment, considering the implications for leapholes. "So the two shackles, the two rings of metal around the ankle of your ancestor, that created negative mass?"

  Hezekiah shrugged. "Perhaps. But that still doesn't account for the energy that is necessary to launch time travel. Scientists tell me that it would take every bit of energy our sun could produce, and then some, just to make one trip."

  "Where could that much energy come from?"

  "The human spirit, maybe. The desire to be free. I don't know of anything more powerful than that."

  Ryan considered it. Coming from anyone but Hezekiah, it might have sounded corny. But how else could leapholes be explained?

  Hezekiah was on his feet again. "See that," he said. "Just talking about it has me energized and feeling better."

  Ryan was not entirely convinced by his sudden recovery, but he knew that it was pointless to argue.

  "Come on," said Hezekiah. "Let's have a look at that campsite."

  They continued up the final hill. As they neared the top, Ryan heard something that sounded like static from a television set. He knew that was impossible. Even if television had existed in 1857, what would it be doing in the middle of nowhere? Still, the higher they climbed, the louder the static hiss. Finally, they reached the hill crest, and immediately they saw the source of the strange noise.

  "Look," said Hezekiah, pointing.

  Ryan looked straight west, toward the wide body of noisy, rushing water, glistening in the moonlight. "That's quite a river," said Ryan.

  "That's not just a river. That's the river, as in the Mississippi. Do you know what that means?"

  "We're east of the Mississippi."

  "Yes, exactly. And that road we crossed on the way over here had to be the St. Louis-Vincennes Trace."

  "The what?"

  "The St. Louis-Vincennes Trace was a major transportation route in the nineteenth century. It ran from Vincennes, Indiana to St. Louis Missouri. Do you understand what I'm saying, Ryan? It cut across southern Illinois."

  A smile came to his lips. "Kaylee's leaphole whirled us east of St. Louis. We landed in a free state."

  "You got it, buddy."

  "That's… that's awesome. Hannah's baby was born in a free state. L'new was born free!"

  "Never underestimate the power of leapholes," said Hezekia!"

  Ryan was about to shout with excitement, but Hezekiah quickly covered the boy's mouth with his hand. The old man's eyes filled with concern as he whispered, "Look down."

  Ryan's gaze shifted from the river in the middle distance to the base of the hill directly below them. They had found the campsite on the bank of the river. Through the tree branches, Ryan counted eight men seated around the glowing campfire.


  "It's the posse," Hezekiah whispered. "Come on. Follow me."

  Slowly and very quietly they descended the hill for a closer look. A twig or two snapped beneath Ryan's step, but steady noise from the flowing river water was more than enough to drown out the sound. They hid behind a stack of gray boulders at the bottom of the hill.

  Hezekiah whispered, "Look at the man third from the right. The one with the beard."

  Ryan peered out over the top of the boulder. He and Hezekiah were hidden in darkness, but the men were plainly visible in the light of the campfire. Ryan's gaze locked onto that third man from the right, and shivers went down his spine. He recognized that long, gnarled beard and that broad felt hat. But the eyes were the clincher. Ryan had seen those eyes before, when that slave owner in Missouri had let his slaves in the cotton field drink from the mule's water bucket. Ryan would never forget those black, shark-like eyes.

  "That's old man Barrow."

  "You bet it is," said Hezekiah. "He's come to get me."

  "But how could he find us? We spun clear out of Missouri with Kaylee's leaphole."

  "I told you before. He's evil-with a capital E."

  This time, there was no misunderstanding Hezekiah's implication. "Legal Evil," said Ryan. "Is this the place you told me about, where the brood follows the dam?"

  "No," said Hezekiah, "but we're getting close. Let's go. We have to get back and warn Hannah."

  "Are you going to be okay walking all that way?"

  Hezekiah chuckled lightly, then pointed with a nod toward the team of horses hitched to a tree by the river. "Who said anything about walking?"

  The old man had a sudden burst of energy, and Ryan hurried to catch up. They kept low to the ground and approached the horses slowly, careful not to startle them. A big weeping willow tree stood between the horses and the campsite, which only made their job easier.

  "Should we turn them all loose?" whispered Ryan.

  "No, no. The men will come after us with guns blazing. We'll just take one."

  Hezekiah quickly untied the reins from the tree. He chose one, then reconsidered. He took the biggest, fastest-looking horse in the pack. Standing a good fifteen hands in height, its gorgeous black coat shone in the moonlight. Hezekiah stroked its powerful neck, and the horse let out a soft, throaty neigh.