Walking Into The Unknown

by Ginny Dye

  Peter gazed at her with admiration. “I wish you had been in my seminary classes. You seem to be struggling with your beliefs now, however. Why?”

  Abby knew that was the crux of the issue. Why was she struggling? “My friend seemed quite certain that the Bible supports her beliefs.”

  “I certainly believed the Bible supported my beliefs about slavery,” Thomas said. “I was wrong.”

  “That’s true,” Abby murmured, disturbed that she was so shaken by her earlier encounter.

  “It seems rather a denial of responsibility,” Peter added.

  “What do you mean?” Abby asked.

  “God gets blamed for so many things that are done by humans. The Bible gets blamed for so many things…on both sides of the equation. One of the reasons I left the church and became a journalist was that I became so weary of people using God or the Bible to promote their own agendas.”

  “So, what is the answer?” Abby asked. She held up her hand to silence him when he opened his mouth to answer, suddenly sure she knew. “Love,” she said softly.

  “Go on,” Peter encouraged her.

  “Love is the answer.” Her certainty grew. “I don’t care how many scriptures or beliefs can be used to justify something. If the end result is not love, then it is wrong. God does not tell me to condone something that is wrong simply because someone is in a position of supposed power. I don’t have to support the president of the United States if what he is doing is wrong. Johnson has done many harmful things. Blacks are being killed and tortured by the KKK because of things he has said, and things he has done. Our country is in turmoil because of the agendas his ego has mandated, just like slavery existed in this country for so long because of decisions made by people in power.”

  “And your friend?” Thomas asked.

  Abby sighed. “She is wrong. “I know she believes she is right, but if love is not the result of your belief, then it is wrong.” All the confusion that had fogged her mind during the afternoon cleared. “I believe the only responsibility we have as humans is to support people and policies that make America a better place—not a place of division and hatred.”

  Thomas reached over to take her hand. “I agree with you.”

  “As do I,” Peter assured her.

  Abby smiled. “I’m glad for that, but it doesn’t really matter. I don’t even know why this shook me so much. I stood up against politicians and policies for many years while I was involved in the Abolition Society. I didn’t care because I knew I was doing the right thing.” She shook her head. “I’m not sure where I started to doubt myself, but the doubt is gone.”

  Peter waited a moment and then said, “You realize President Johnson doesn’t act on his own, don’t you?”

  Abby nodded. “I do. The Democratic Party is responsible for what is happening to our country, but it’s also the people who go along with it. Politicians make laws, but people don’t have to comply. The government passed laws saying that slaves couldn’t escape. The result was that even more slaves found freedom through the Underground Railroad than before.” She watched as the snow fell harder outside the window. “There were people who went along with the laws, and then there were those who stood up and acted from love. They did what they believed was right.” She smiled. “I believe God applauds those people.”

  *****

  Felicia burst through the door. “Mama! Mama!”

  Rose, home only a few minutes since picking up Hope and John from the neighbor who watched them during the day, stiffened with alarm. She tucked Hope close and hurried into the kitchen. “Felicia! What is wrong?”

  “Nothing, Mama,” Felicia said. “It’s good news!”

  Rose forced herself to relax. “Could you perhaps not scare me to death the next time you have good news?”

  “I’m sorry, Mama. I was just so excited to tell you.” Felicia’s voice was full of remorse, but her eyes were still sparkling.

  Rose shook off the fear that threatened to send her spiraling back to the need for constant awareness on the plantation. She was in Oberlin now, not waiting for the next attack on her school. She took another deep breath and then sat down at the table. “Tell me the good news,” she invited.

  “I’m going to college!”

  Rose wasn’t sure she had heard her daughter right. “Excuse me?”

  Felicia laughed. “You heard me right. I’m going to college.”

  “Your father and I plan on that when you are old enough,” Rose agreed, not sure where the conversation was going.

  “No. I’m going to college now,” Felicia said.

  “Perhaps you should start at the beginning,” Rose said faintly. “Your daddy should be home in a few minutes, and I suspect he will want to hear this. I’m going to fix some tea and make a batch of cookies. Can you manage to contain the news until he gets home?”

  “Sure I can,” Felicia said, her eyes glowing with happiness. “I’m going up to my room. I’ll come back down when Daddy gets home.” Humming as she went, she ran up the stairs.

  Rose stared after her with a bemused expression, and then began pulling out ingredients for cookies.

  Moses sniffed the air when he walked in a short time later. “Nothing smells better than your molasses cookies,” he said. He reached for one, took a big bite, and closed his eyes in ecstasy. “Cookies will help me study,” he said solemnly.

  Rose heard Felicia start down the stairs. “No study until we talk to our daughter. She has news.”

  “About?”

  Rose shrugged. “I made her wait until you got home. All I know is that she said something about going to college.”

  Moses turned around to smile at Felicia when she entered the kitchen. “Big news?”

  “Yes,” Felicia said excitedly. She reached for a cookie and sat at the table. “I’ve been invited to go to college.” She waited expectantly for their reaction.

  “Perhaps you could expound a little,” Rose prompted. She was all for anything that would put a look of such joy on her daughter’s face, but she still didn’t understand.

  “My teacher asked me to stay after class today. She told me she didn’t think there was anything else the teachers at my school could teach me that I don’t already know.”

  “I understand that feeling,” Rose muttered.

  Felicia giggled, sounding much more like an excited little girl than a college student.

  “You’ve only just turned thirteen,” Moses said carefully. His expression said he was not thrilled with the announcement.

  “Sarah Kinson was very young, too,” Felicia said. “She was a captive on the Amistad.”

  Rose was totally confused now. “Felicia, I want you to pretend that your father and I know absolutely nothing about what you are discussing. Now, I want you to explain the situation to us.”

  “I’m sorry, Mama. I’m very excited.” Her eyes grew huge. “I knew life was going to be different here, but I never thought I would be starting college now.”

  “Neither did I,” Moses said ruefully. “Could you focus on pretending we know nothing about what you are talking about?”

  Felicia grinned. “My teacher told me there is precedence for my starting college because of Sarah Kinson. Actually, Sarah’s name was Margru in the beginning. Have either of you heard of the Amistad?”

  Rose frowned in thought. “Yes,” she said slowly. “Wasn’t it a slave ship brought over to the United States in the Thirties? I remember reading something about it when your father and I were living with Abby in Philadelphia.”

  “I remember the name, but I bet you can tell us far more,” Moses said as he took another molasses cookie off the plate.

  “I can,” Felicia agreed. “I made my teacher tell me all about Margru. She was born in Mandingo, a region of West Africa called ‘Mende.’ She grew up playing with her brothers and sisters, but when she was six years old, her parents sold her to Spanish slave traders to repay a family debt.”

  Rose stiffened with disbelief. Sh
e would never sell one of her children for any reason.

  “When there were about fifty people who had been purchased or kidnapped, they forced them all to walk one hundred miles to the coast. They found hundreds of people crammed into slave pens,” Felicia said sadly. “They put her in a boat called the Tecora with a bunch of adults and three other children.” She shook her head. “They were treated very badly.”

  Rose shuddered, remembering the stories her mother had told of her own ocean crossing. She knew how horrible the slave ships were.

  “The boat took them to Havana, Cuba. A bunch of them were sold off to some Spanish men, including Margru and the other children. Their next boat was called La Amistad. They were only going to the other side of Cuba, but one of the Mendian men staged a revolt. They killed the captain and the cook, and drove the other two crew members overboard. Then they ordered the two new Cuban slave owners to sail the boat back to Africa.”

  Rose was both fascinated and horrified. She was also remembering more of the story. “They didn’t sail the boat back to Africa. Neither of those Cubans were sailors so I’m sure they had no idea where they were going. They ended up off the coast of New York. The Amistad was in such bad shape that people thought it was a pirate ship.”

  “That’s right,” Felicia confirmed. “There was a lot of publicity about the captives,” she said disdainfully, “and they were treated very badly. A man named Lewis Tappan found out about it.”

  “Of course!” Moses exclaimed. “Tappan has been a chief benefactor of Oberlin College for years. He is also the man who pressured Oberlin into admitting black men and women into school. I’m remembering more of this story now. When he found out what was happening with the captives, he organized other abolitionists into an Amistad Committee to raise money for their legal defense.”

  “And that committee became the American Missionary Association that sent me to the contraband camp,” Rose added.

  Felicia nodded. “Tappan also took Margru under his care. He couldn’t set her and the other children free, but he did arrange for them to live with the jailer and his wife.” Her expression darkened. “They were better off there, I suppose, but they were servants and not treated very kindly.” She turned to Moses. “Daddy, that could have been me,” she said. “If you hadn’t taken me away from Memphis when my parents were killed, I probably would have ended up as a servant somewhere.”

  “You might have,” Moses agreed. He reached over and took her hand. “But it didn’t happen. You will always be our daughter.”

  “I’m so glad,” Felicia said fervently. “Anyway, there was a big court battle about whether the captives still belonged to the Cuban men, or whether they were free and could return to Africa. It lasted two and a half years, and went all the way to the Supreme Court.”

  Moses nodded. “Where former President John Quincy Adams defended them. I remember now. It was in one of the books I read this winter. It was quite the victory when the Supreme Court declared they were free.”

  “Thank God they were not sent back to slavery after all they had been through,” Rose said, nestling Hope against her chest. She could only pray her own children would never have to face such an ordeal.

  Felicia continued. “It took a while for Tappan and his friends to raise enough money to send them back to Africa. One way they raised money was by doing tours up and down the East Coast with Margru and some more of the Mendians. They read from the Bible, they did dramatic enactments, and they sang African songs and Christian hymns. Everyone talked about how smart Margru was. Anyway,” she said impatiently, “it’s quite a long story how all that happened, but the important thing is that Margru, who Tappan had renamed Sarah, went back on the ship with all the captives and some missionaries. She was ten when she got back home.” She pursed her lips.

  Rose could tell she was getting tired of telling the story and was ready to get to the point.

  “My teacher told me a lot more things, but what matters most is that Sarah wanted to come back to America and go to school. So”—she paused dramatically— “she came back to Oberlin and went to school. She was behind at first, but she caught up quickly with tutors, and then she started college. After she graduated she went back to Africa and taught school!”

  Rose shook her head. “That is an amazing story, but the Oberlin policy clearly states now that students have to be at least seventeen years old, and they have to pass an entrance exam.”

  Felicia nodded. “That’s true, Mama, but policies are made to be altered.”

  “Is that right?” Moses murmured, his eyes shining with amusement and admiration. “You still have to pass the exam.”

  “I already have,” Felicia retorted. “My teacher asked me to take a test the other day. Mrs. Cook didn’t tell me what it was for. When she asked me to stay after today she told me I scored very high.”

  Rose knew they had finally reached the critical moment.

  “Mrs. Cook said that if both of you agreed, she would ask the college about me becoming a student.”

  Rose exchanged a long look with Moses and then turned to her daughter. “Is that what you want?” she asked gently. “I know you are smart, but it will be hard being so young. All the students will be much older than you.”

  “Mrs. Cook talked to me about that,” Felicia admitted. She stared into Rose’s eyes. “You’ve told me many times that I am not a normal little girl. Is that true, or do you just tell me that to make me feel good?”

  Rose smiled. “I told you the truth. You are most certainly not a normal thirteen-year-old, Felicia. You are quite extraordinary.”

  “Then why should I be treated like a normal thirteen-year-old?” Felicia demanded, her eyes blazing with intensity. “The other kids at my school seem so much younger than me—even the ones that are older. I know what I want to do with my life, and I would like to start preparing for that now. When I’m seventeen I will be able to make a difference, rather than just starting college after being bored for four years.”

  Rose sighed. “She has a point,” she told Moses.

  Moses was watching his daughter carefully. “I know you are very special, Felicia, but part of my job as your father is to protect you while you are growing up. I know you are smarter than everyone in your school, but it takes more than being smart to be an adult, honey. You have to learn how to be with people.”

  “I’ve thought about that too, Daddy.”

  Moses blinked. “You have?”

  “Of course. I walked home very slowly so I could think about all this,” she said very seriously.

  “And what did you think about?” Moses asked.

  “I’m tired of being a child. When I went through the Cocooning Rite I became a woman, didn’t I?”

  “Yes,” Rose assured her, “but you are still a very young woman.”

  “Yes, but I am a woman. One who is not normal. I would still like to have friends my age, and I’m hoping you can both make that happen. I also want to have people over for dinner almost every night so I can learn more about being with all types of people.” Her voice sounded uncertain for the first time. “I know I can handle the schoolwork, but I’m going to need both of you to prepare me in the other ways.” She hesitated. “Will you do that?”

  Rose met Moses’ eyes over the top of Felicia’s head. She saw what she was expecting. She stood and walked behind Felicia to wrap her arms around her shoulders. “Yes, Felicia, we will do that. We are both so proud of you. We’ll do our best to be the parents you need.”

  “Really?” Felicia’s eyes ignited with happiness. “You too, Daddy?”

  “Me, too,” Moses assured her. “I’m so proud of you I could almost burst.”

  Rose could barely remember the frightened little girl who had arrived on the plantation two years earlier. Felicia truly had transformed from a caterpillar into a glorious butterfly ready to take flight. She gazed at her proudly, trying to push down the certainty that Felicia’s life was going to be one hard challenge after the
other.

  Tonight they would celebrate.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Carrie trotted Celeste up beside Captain Marley. “Do those clouds mean what I think they do?” They were close to the Colorado border now, but surely the signs of a snowstorm were the same everywhere. After a relatively mild day, the wind had picked up, and dark gray clouds were collecting across the wide horizon.

  “That it’s going to snow? Yes,” Captain Marley said.

  Carrie stared at him, hearing something more in his voice, or perhaps reading more in his eyes. Their daily conversations during the long days of riding had turned the captain into a close friend. “You’re not telling me everything.”

  “I’ve learned the signs for a blizzard,” he admitted. “Snow is one thing, but when a blizzard hits, they can be very dangerous. I’ve seen wagons overturn. Oxen can be lost, and horses killed.”

  “I’ve never experienced a blizzard,” Carrie admitted, trying to push down the anxiety rising within her. “We have plenty of snowstorms in Virginia, but I don’t believe we’ve ever had a blizzard.”

  “You would know it if you had,” Captain Marley assured her. “A snowstorm qualifies as a blizzard when you have sustained winds of more than thirty-five miles per hour, and the temperatures are below twenty degrees, though here on the plains they can plummet far below zero. You also know you’re in a blizzard when the snow is blowing so hard you have visibility less than a quarter mile.”

  “I see,” Carrie murmured, feeling more anxious than before. While it had been cold, the calmness of the last four weeks had led her to believe they would make this trip without any major weather disturbances. She had been wrong.

  “They can be very dangerous,” Captain Marley said.