The Soldier's Lady

by Michael Phillips

  As they approached the bank, Jeremiah untied his shirt and tossed it across the bent trunk of a tree. The tree’s exposed roots grasped the bank while its misshapen trunk curved sharply and reached out across the river, a few feet above its slow current. It was Jeremiah’s favorite spot to fish. Dipping the bucket full of water, Jeremiah said, “Mayme and me came—”

  Abruptly he stopped.

  Micah looked at him closely. “You two sweet on each other, Jake?”

  Jeremiah stared out at the sun, where it hung lazy over the treetops in the western sky. Then he shrugged. “We came here to talk, dat’s all.”

  He handed Micah a pole and a new subject. “We should hab brought William wiff us,” he said. “Dat boy loves ter fish.”

  “Good idea. Next time we will.”

  Micah held out the baking-powder can. Jeremiah wiggled his fingers inside and came out with a nice fat worm. He laced it on his hook. “Now, let’s git down ter business.”

  Soon both men were standing at the river’s edge, baited lines in the water.

  “Now, what you wants to do,” Jeremiah said, “is give da line plenty er slack. Let da worm go deep.”

  Jeremiah watched as Micah did as he suggested.

  “I hardly ever went fishin’ till I come here. Slaves don’ git much time fer fishin’.”

  Micah nodded, eyes on his line. “I tried fishing in the Chicago River once with nothing but some twine and a twisted-up hatpin I’d found.”

  “Any luck?”

  “I snagged an old hat.” Micah shrugged. “Guess I had the right hook for it. Kept my little head warm all winter.”

  Jeremiah grinned. “Dat’s better den we’s doing right now.”

  They stood for several minutes without speaking, the silence broken only by the occasional birdcall.

  “William is some boy,” Micah said after a time. “Imagine what life will be like for him. He won’t grow up on the street like I did, nor as a slave as you did.”

  “Dat’s right.”

  “No one will ever take a whip to him or take him from his mama.”

  Jeremiah nodded. “He kin fish and play instead of workin’ sunup to sundown. When I wuz his age I was already workin’ fo da master. Not in da fields, but around da place, stacking wood and slopping pigs.”

  “William can be anything he wants. Do things you and I never dreamed of. Maybe even go to college. He could even be a doctor or lawyer someday.”

  “You really think dat cud happen, Duff?”

  “I don’t see why not. Everything is changing for blacks.”

  Jeremiah thought back to his recent near-hanging at the hands of an angry lynch mob. “Not everything,” he said.

  Suddenly, Micah’s line went taut. “I’ve got something!” he said. After about a minute he hauled in a green, whiskered, nine-inch catfish.

  “Beginner’s luck,” laughed Jeremiah.

  Micah extracted the hook from the cat’s lip and dumped the slippery creature into the bucket.

  “Didn’t even get my worm,” he said, then cast his line back into the river.

  Several minutes later Micah’s line went taut again.

  “Oh, man, got me a big one this time!” he shouted, excited as a boy. “But I think he’s wrapped my line around one of those branches.”

  Jeremiah looked up, and Micah nodded toward the bent tree. Struggling to keep the slack out of his line, Micah stepped up onto the trunk and walked a few feet out over the water, trying to get closer to the place where his line was snagged.

  “I’ll get you yet. Don’t you think I won’t,” Micah cheerfully called down toward the water. “Micah Duff always lands his catch.”

  Micah jerked the pole, then leaned forward to angle the line away from the submerged branches. Suddenly he lost his balance and fell headlong into the river.

  Jeremiah couldn’t help bursting into laughter as Micah hit the water—pole, pants, boots and all.

  Duff came up sputtering. “Guess that’s what I get for bragging,” he shouted, trying to catch his breath.

  “Cudn’t happen to a nicer feller, I’d say,” Jeremiah said, still chuckling. He stepped out onto the tree with practiced ease and grinned down at Micah.

  “Think it’s funny, do you, Jake?”

  “Dat I do.”

  “You’re just mad cause I caught all the fish and you got skunked.”

  “Looks to me like dat last fish caught you. Hook, line, and sinker.”

  “Yeah?” Micah reached low and splashed a full armload of water up at Jeremiah, drenching his pants legs. “How about that?”

  “Feels good. I’s still hot from digging.”

  “Then this ought to feel even better.” Micah jumped up and pulled Jeremiah off the tree, sending him sprawling into the river.

  It was Jeremiah’s turn to come up sputtering. He lunged for Micah and dunked him under the water.

  “Yer right, dat do feel good,” he said when Micah resurfaced. “I don’t know why we didn’t just jump in the water in da first place.”

  We’d left Rosewood as early as we could that day, but even traveling at a pretty good clip we didn’t get to Charlotte till two or three that afternoon. Uncle Ward had made an appointment with a lawyer for late that afternoon. He wanted to get the business out of the way first before we went to the hotel we’d stayed at before and then spend the next couple of days having fun.

  I don’t know what I’d figured, that he’d go into the man’s office alone, or maybe with my papa. But he wanted all four of us to go up in the building to see the lawyer with him, even me.

  It was a fancy office, the finest I’d ever been in, with dark wood walls and paintings and leather chairs. It even smelled expensive!

  We all sat down. The man looked at me a time or two with an unpleasant expression, like he didn’t like the idea of a black person being in his office.

  “Like I told you in my letter, Mr. Snyder,” Uncle Ward began, “we’re all kin here and we own a plantation north of here that’s sitting on about seventy or eighty acres. My name’s on the deed, but I want to get it changed so that all our names are on it together, or make a will or something so that if something happens to me, the property will go to my brother here, and the girls.”

  “The . . . girls?” Mr. Snyder repeated, glaring at me. “Surely you don’t mean her too.” He nodded his head in my direction.

  “I do mean her, Mr. Snyder. She happens to be my niece.”

  “And my daughter,” added my papa with a little annoyance in his voice.

  “I see,” said the lawyer. “And just what is it you want me to do—I could draw up a new deed, and a will—whatever it is you want.”

  “Maybe both, then,” said Uncle Ward. “Can you make a new deed with all our names on it?”

  “That can be done. In what shares of ownership?”

  “Hmm . . . yeah, now that I think on it—equal shares might not be altogether right, would it?”

  “I would think not. Surely a black girl—”

  “That’s not what I meant,” interrupted Uncle Ward. “The place belongs more to Katie than to any of the rest of us.”

  “Uncle Ward, I don’t want to own more—” began Katie.

  “Can you make the share of ownership anything?” Uncle Ward asked the lawyer.

  “I suppose so,” replied the lawyer.

  “Then it ought to be mostly yours, Kathleen, and Templeton’s.”

  “But, Uncle Ward,” said Katie, “Mama gave the deed to you. And your money saved Rosewood. I won’t let you make me more owner than you. If you are determined to put all our names on the deed, then that ought to be enough.”

  Uncle Ward thought a minute, and slowly nodded.

  “Maybe you’re right, Kathleen,” he said. “Four equal shares—that may be the best way.”

  “But surely,” began the lawyer again, “you don’t mean to suggest that a colored girl—”

  “Look, Mr. Snyder, I thought we had all that settled—she
is not a colored girl, she is a girl, a young woman, and my niece. She is as much a part of this family as the rest of us.”

  “But, Mr. Ward,” I now said a little timidly, “the man is right—I don’t deserve—”

  “Mayme,” interrupted my papa, “you let Ward and me decide what’s fair here. You two girls worked to keep Rosewood going when he and I were off gallivanting around the country. You and Kathleen deserve as much as either of us. Isn’t that right, Ward?”

  “That’s right.”

  Katie and I looked at each other, but neither of us spoke again.

  When we left the man’s office half an hour later, Mr. Snyder had instructions to draw up a new deed to Rosewood in four equal shares, and single wills for my papa and Uncle Ward to leave their portions to Katie and me when they died.

  And that’s how I got to be a one-fourth owner of a big plantation in Shenandoah County. I still can hardly believe it.

  Our business completed, we left for the hotel.

  The following morning was ironing day. Emma and Josepha stoked up the kitchen stove good and hot with wood right after breakfast and got their two irons heating and kettles of water boiling for steam. Henry went into the livery for the day, but Jeremiah didn’t have to work at Mr. Watson’s. He and Micah left for the pasture with a wagon of supplies to finish digging the fence holes and setting the posts in place.

  By midmorning the kitchen itself was a steam-filled oven from the heat of the stove and steam and irons . . . and it was going to be a hot day outside too. Emma and Josepha were both dripping with sweat.

  “Lan’ sakes, I gots ter git a breath of air!” exclaimed Josepha, setting the iron in her hand back on the stove. She folded the trousers she had finished and placed them on the pile. “We gots ter open some doors and windows and git some air in dis place! Whew!”

  She walked out just as Jeremiah bounded up the stairs of the porch.

  “It’s parful hot in dere, Jeremiah,” said Josepha.

  “I kin see dat,” he grinned. “You look like you been standin’ under a water pump.”

  “What I looks like’s none er yo neber mind!”

  “Den I’s jes’ pop in an’ git somefin’ fer me and Micah ter eat.”

  “You jes’ had breakfast! Whatchu be needin’ wiff mo food so soon?”

  “We’s growin’ boys, Josepha. We gots ter eat.”

  “You grow much more, son, and you’ll be a blamed giant!”

  Jeremiah laughed and continued inside.

  “Howdy, Emma!” he said.

  “Now you finish dem dresses like Mayme and me taught you,” Josepha called back to Emma through the open door.

  “Yes’m . . . hi, Jeremiah.”

  “Anythin’ ter eat aroun’ here?”

  “Help yourself—dere’s always milk an’ cheese and bread an’ you kin look in da pantry ef you want.”

  “Mayme taught you to iron?” said Jeremiah as he got out a loaf of bread and sat down to slice it.

  “Dat she did.”

  “I thought you wuz a house slave, not her.”

  “I wuz, but I wuzn’t too smart,” said Emma. “Reckon Mayme taught herself here at Rosewood. Mayme had ter teach me everythin’ after I come here. She even taught me ter be a mama.”

  “You’s a good mama, Emma. I doubt she had to teach you dat.”

  “Well, I don’t know, I wuz a ninny when I come here—jes’ a babblin’ ninny.”

  “I doubt it wuz as bad as all dat!” laughed Jeremiah.

  “Oh, wuzn’t it! You din’t know me den!”

  “Well, it don’t matter. You ain’t one now.”

  “You really think so?” asked Emma.

  “Of course, Emma. Besides it don’t matter none, anyway. Sometimes we gotta learn from folks dat’s smarter’n us. Maybe dey’re better’n us, but den maybe dey got sent ter us ter help us git better ourselves, who can say? Look at me—I wuz a mess too. I reckon I learned as much from Micah as you done from Mayme. He taught me a lot ’bout life too afore I got here, though I wuz too stupid ter know it at da time.”

  He paused and glanced over at Emma where she stood at the stove, switching irons in her hands.

  “You want ter go out an’ sit on da porch an’ hab a glass er tea, Emma?” he asked.

  “Dat sounds right fine, Jeremiah. But Josepha’ll git after me fo not finishin’ dis dress er Miz Katie’s.”

  “You let me take care er Josepha!” laughed Jeremiah. “Katie won’t be needin’ dat dress fo days. An’ it’s hot an’ steamy an’ ef Josepha needs some fresh air, why not you? Come on out ter da porch wiff me, Emma. You pour us some tea an’ I’ll go fetch us a couple chunks er ice from da icehouse.”

  When Josepha walked back toward the house ten minutes later from the direction of the outhouse, she heard laughter and conversation coming from the porch. As she came around the side of the house, there sat Jeremiah and Emma on the porch bench together, each holding a cold glass of tea.

  “What you two doin’ dere?” she said.

  “Jes’ havin’ some tea an’ talk, Josepha,” answered Jeremiah.

  “I thought I tol’ you ter finish up dem dresses,” she said to Emma.

  “An’ I tol’ her Katie’s not gwine be needin’ dat dress anytime soon an’ ter come out an’ hab some tea wiff me,” said Jeremiah.

  “Well, dat ain’t none er yo concern dat I can see, Jeremiah,” retorted Josepha. “I told her ter do it, an’ dat’s dat. Come on inside, Emma.”

  “Now jes’ you wait a minute, Josepha,” said Jeremiah. “Ain’t nobody round here nobody’s slave no more. Or ain’t you heard dat? Who put you over Emma dat you kin boss her aroun’ like dat? How old are you, Emma?” he said, turning to Emma.

  “I ain’t sure exactly—I think somethin’ like twenty-one.”

  “Dere, you hear dat, Josepha—Emma’s a growed-up lady an’ she don’t need no bossin’ from nobody, ’less it’s Katie herself or Mister Templeton or Mister Ward, cause we’s all working for dem. But she don’t need no bossin’ from you, an’ dat’s da truf.”

  “Humph!” mumbled Josepha, too surprised at Jeremiah’s words to say a word.

  “So she jes’ gwine sit here with me a spell longer,” Jeremiah went on, “an’ ef you don’t like it, den maybe Emma an’ me’ll jes’ go fer a walk down by da ribber an’ you kin finish dat ironin’ yo’self!”

  With a look of speechless shock on her face, Josepha continued inside, muttering to herself what was best no one else heard.

  Emma looked over at Jeremiah and slowly a smile spread across her face. She leaned toward him. “Dat wuz brave, Jeremiah!” she whispered. “I’d neber dare talk ter her like dat!”

  “Aw, Josepha don’t scare me wiff all dat talk like she does.”

  Emma started giggling as she remembered the look on Josepha’s face. “I don’t think anybody’s eber talked to her like dat, except maybe Mistress McSimmons.”

  “Well, I reckon I’d better git back ter Micah,” said Jeremiah, gulping down what was left in his glass. He stood. “Thanks fo da tea, Emma.”

  “Don’t forgit da bread an’ milk you wuz takin’.”

  “Oh . . . yeah, thanks.”

  Jeremiah hurried back inside, grabbing up the parcel of food, dashed over and gave Josepha a quick kiss on the cheek before she could object, then darted from the house.

  “Bye, Emma,” he called after him.

  Emma sat for a minute more on the porch, slowly sipping her glass of tea, thinking about how good it felt to have a man stand up for her. Slowly she rose and went back into the kitchen where Josepha was waiting for her in silence.

  Late in the afternoon Emma heard a shriek and knew instantly that it had come from William. In terror she ran from the house, frantically looking every which way to see where the sound had come from.

  Another wild yell sounded. It had come from behind the barn! Her heart leapt into her throat as she thought of the woodpile out there. What if a rat or a snake had come out from hi
ding and bit him!

  She tore from the house and rounded the corner of the barn just as a third shriek burst from her son’s lips.

  Emma stopped at the sound and stood gaping at the sight in front of her.

  There was Micah jogging around in a wide circle, William on his shoulders laughing with delight.

  “Look, Mama!” he called to Emma. “I’s got me a horsey!”

  Micah glanced toward her and smiled broadly. As Emma’s fear subsided she could not help breaking into laughter herself to see William having such fun.

  “He’s gettin’ too big fo me ter gib him rides like dat!” she said.

  “He’ll be on a real horse before long,” rejoined Micah, cantering over to where Emma stood beaming.

  “This is quite a boy you’ve got, Emma,” he said as he slowed. “You ought to be real proud.”

  “I reckon I is at dat.”

  “You’ve done a good job with him.”

  “I jes’ want him ter hab da best life he deserves.”

  “You deserve a good life too, Emma.”

  “Me, I ain’t nuthin’. I want him ter hab better’n me.”

  “Well, you both deserve a good life.”

  “Whatever I got, I owe to Miz Katie and Mayme.”

  “Hey, horsey, gid-up . . . gid-up!” called William, growing impatient with their talk.

  Micah laughed and began running again across the ground.

  Emma stood watching and William continued to call out to her, enjoying his ride ten times more with his mama now watching his daring adventure.

  The unexpected sound of a carriage driving up behind them interrupted the ride and laughter. They ran around, William still on Micah’s shoulders, to the front of the barn to see Ward, Templeton, Katie, and Mayme approaching.

  “Whatchu doin’ home so soon?” said Emma, running up to greet us. “You jes’ left yesterday!”

  We climbed down from the wagon, weary after the long two days riding to Charlotte and back.