Home by Morning

by Kaki Warner

  With a strained smile, Pru broke the tense silence. “Thank you for keeping an eye on her, Mr. Marsh. But we should go now. I can see she’s tired.”

  “All that singing, no doubt. Our Lillian made a big impression on Senator Brooks.” Marsh gave Lillie’s head a pat, despite her attempts to duck out from under his hand. “He’s quite an advocate for orphaned Negro children, you know. On the board of the Riverbend School for the Disabled. An asylum, really, but they have several fine programs for the blind. And luckily they accept Negro children.” A not-so-friendly tug on one of Lillie’s braids, then he looked at Pru, his reptilian eyes cold and unblinking. “He’ll be at the tent meeting tomorrow night. Be sure to bring Lillian along so the senator can meet her.”

  Pru couldn’t seem to draw in enough breath to form an answer. He’s using the child to get at me. Her stomach rolled. Bile rose up the back of her throat.

  When she didn’t—couldn’t—answer, Marsh’s pale blond brows rose in twin arcs. “You are coming, aren’t you? It will be our final gathering, after all.”

  Pru nodded, scarcely able to think.

  Thomas moved up beside her, menace rolling off of him like sweat.

  Panicked, she reached down and squeezed his arm in warning, terrified of what he might do.

  She had to think. Come up with a plan. Keep him safe, protect Lillie, find out where the next station was, then send Chester and Mose Solomon on their way.

  But how?

  Run? Or stay?

  By morning, they could be on the first train headed to Colorado. But was she ready to leave her work unfinished? Perhaps she should send Thomas and Lillie on to Heartbreak Creek without her. Yet, she sensed that if she sent Thomas away again . . .

  Marsh’s voice cut through the terror buzzing in her ears. “Then there’s the fund-raiser on Monday, which the senator will also attend. Perhaps after the gospel service tomorrow evening, you can discuss with the reverend how best to present your initiative.”

  Tomorrow evening, she would be meeting with Chester again. “Y-yes,” Pru choked out, her mind reeling. “I-I’ll talk to him tomorrow.”

  “Excellent. Well then, I bid you good night.” A tip of his hat, then he turned and sauntered back toward town.

  “Oh, God.” Releasing Thomas’s arm, Pru bent, a hand over her mouth, her heart pounding so hard she felt light-headed. Somehow, Marsh had guessed why she had met Chester earlier. He knew about Mose. And he was using threats of sending Lillie to an asylum to make her stop.

  Dimly, she felt Thomas’s hand on her shoulder. “Prudence?”

  With effort, she straightened. “He knows.”

  “Knows what?”

  “I not like Mr. Marsh. He mean.” Lillie stuffed a handful of popped corn into her mouth, then cocked her head. “What an asylum?”

  Pru couldn’t fathom how Marsh had found out about her work with the Underground Railroad in the first place. Or why he suspected she was still involved. But somehow, he knew. How could he lock Lillie away? What had a blind orphan ever done to him?

  The impulse to flee shattered as rage exploded inside her. Arcs of heat shot through her body with such force she began to shake.

  No! Not again!

  This time she wouldn’t simply endure. She wouldn’t run away to Heartbreak Creek or hide behind her sister or Thomas or fears of making a scene. This time she would stay and fight back.

  “What is wrong, Eho’nehevehohtse?”

  She saw the strength and concern in Thomas’s dark eyes, and everything settled into place. She knew what she had to do. If Marsh wanted a fight, she would give him one . . . using the deadliest weapon she had.

  Filled with cold resolve, she took Lillie’s hand. “Let’s go.”

  As they moved past the carts and into the street behind the depot, she glanced at the man walking silently at Lillie’s other side, his expression stony, his lips drawn into a tight line.

  She hated pulling him deeper into danger, but she couldn’t do this alone. And the best way she knew to keep Thomas safe was to arm him with the truth.

  “Thomas, we need to talk.”

  Six

  An hour later, Pru slipped into Thomas’s room. “She’s finally asleep. But I don’t want to be away long in case she wakes up with night terrors.”

  Thomas whirled from the window, his expression thunderous. “He hurt her?”

  “No. But he scares her. Being blind, she’s sensitive to the emotions around her. Especially those of a threatening nature.” With a sigh, Pru sank down into the chair beside the bed. The earlier rush of fury had subsided, leaving her feeling drained and weary.

  “Katse’e is wise for one so young. The People see it often in those touched by the Great Spirit.” He walked over and sat on the bed beside her chair, feet planted, arms folded over his chest. A stubborn pose. One that told her he was ready to act, not wait. “You will explain this school Marsh spoke of.”

  Brushing a hand over her brow, she struggled to gather her thoughts. “They call them schools, but many are little more than asylums . . . places where they lock away people who are different or disabled or insane.”

  “Marsh would cage Lillian because she is blind?”

  “Not if I can help it.”

  “How will you stop him?”

  “Not me. You.”

  He let his hands fall to his thighs and smiled. It wasn’t a pleasant smile.

  She had come up with the perfect plan—one that got Thomas away before he killed Marsh and still left her free to concentrate on this latest threat to Lillie. The hardest part would be to convince Thomas to agree.

  “What do you want me to do?” he asked.

  “Meet with Chester tomorrow night and take Mose Solomon on to the next station.”

  He studied her for a moment, then shook his head. “No. I will kill Marsh instead.”

  This was what she had been afraid of. She sighed, wondering what she could say to steer him away from violence. “If you do that, Thomas, you’ll bring every lawman within a hundred miles down on our heads. You think people haven’t noticed the bad blood between the two of you? If something happens to Marsh, they’ll know it was you.”

  He shrugged.

  She wanted to strike him.

  “I was once a lawman, too, Prudence. And when we searched our canyon for the murderer in Heartbreak Creek last year, Brodie explained to me that without a body, there is no way to know if a law has been broken. It is called proof. Another of the white man rules. So if they never find Marsh’s body, they will have no proof that he is dead, and can make no arrests.”

  Were they truly having this conversation?

  “It doesn’t always work that way, Thomas.” The stubbornness that had amused Pru earlier now infuriated her. Jumping to her feet, she paced the room, trying to find the right words. “And while they hunt for Marsh’s body, where do you think you’ll be? In jail. Me, too, probably.”

  “Why would they put you in jail?”

  “Because of my association with you. Because I’m colored. Because I’m a woman. What does it matter? If they want to put someone in jail, they’ll invent a reason to do so.”

  Thomas shook his head. “You are wrong, Prudence. Declan Brodie taught me much about the white laws. They cannot lock a person away without a strong belief that they have broken the law. He called it ‘just cause.’”

  Pru almost snorted. How he could be so naive? Didn’t he know that Indians and blacks were the first people whites looked to blame if something went wrong?

  Quelling her bitterness, Pru stopped pacing and looked at him. Declan Brodie might be an honorable man, but many lawmen weren’t, especially if politics was involved. “Marsh is a powerful man, Thomas. The law wouldn’t take his disappearance lightly. And since neither of us would have enough money for bail, we’d be stuck in jail for weeks whi
le they searched for Marsh. Months, even. And what would become of Lillie then?”

  He shrugged as if it didn’t matter, although she knew the thoughts of hurting Lillie or of being caged in a cell were intolerable to him. “If you will not let me kill Marsh, then leave with me now, Prudence. Come home to Heartbreak Creek. Put this man and his threats behind you forever.”

  The fight went out of her. “I thought of that.” Wearily, she sank back into the chair. “But I can’t do it, Thomas. I won’t.” Reaching out, she lifted his hand from his thigh and held it between both of hers. It was so different from hers, with the raised tendons and ropy veins along the back, the knobby knuckles and callused palm. Warm and big and capable. Strong enough to rescue her from Lone Tree. Capable enough to pull her from this quagmire and save her from Marsh and all the dangers surrounding them.

  But she was tired of being saved. Of running away, or of simply enduring. She had to take a stand someday. And with Thomas beside her, she had the courage to do it. “I can’t leave yet, Thomas. I won’t let Marsh chase me away from doing what I must. And the Underground Railroad still needs me for this final mission.”

  In a furious gesture, he yanked his hand from hers and slammed his fist against his chest. “I need you, Eho’nehevehohtse! Lillian needs you! You seek someone to teach? Teach her! Someone to save? Save me! Are we less to you than these strangers?”

  “No!” She drew back, shocked by his vehemence. Thomas needed no one. He was the most self-reliant person she knew. “But they need me more, Thomas. Just this one last time.”

  Muttering in Cheyenne, he rose and stalked to the window, his shoulders stiff, his hands fisted at his sides.

  “Give me until Monday night,” she said to his back. “Until after the fund-raiser. By then, you will have taken Mose to safety, I will have put the education initiative before people who can see it through, and Marsh will no longer be a threat. Just two more days. Three, at the most.”

  “I grow tired of hearing ‘one more day.’”

  “Please, Thomas.”

  He turned to face her, anger radiating from his rigid body. “Time does not last forever, Prudence. Patience is not boundless.”

  “I know.” She looked away, hating that she was doing this to him again. But she saw no other way out of this mess she had gotten them into. “This will be the last time I ask this of you.”

  “Yes, Prudence. It will.”

  She looked up, hope rising. “You’ll do it?”

  He studied her for a moment, then let out a deep breath. “I will take the black skin to safety.”

  “Thank y—”

  “Then I will take Lillian home to Heartbreak Creek.”

  Without me? She realized she was twisting her hands, and forced herself to stop. She would worry about all that tomorrow. The important thing right now was to put Thomas and Lillie out of danger, and get through the next two days. “I’ll find out tomorrow where the safe house is.”

  He turned back to the window.

  Realizing he would say no more, she rose from the chair, her legs shaking beneath her. The distance between them seemed wider than ever. Unbridgeable.

  A panicky feeling pressed against the walls of her chest. “Thomas . . .”

  “Go, Prudence. Before Katse’e wakes and finds you gone.”

  * * *

  Things were still cool between them the next morning when they went downstairs to the dining room for breakfast. Thomas had reverted to his silent self, his face expressionless, his mouth a hard seam in his stern face. Even Lillie seemed subdued. Luckily neither the reverend nor Marsh was in the dining room.

  After a quiet meal, Pru suggested they take a walk through town.

  “I gets a peppermint stick?” Lillie asked.

  Pru glanced at Thomas, but he avoided her eyes. “We’ll see. Come along. Let’s get our coats.”

  The day was brisk, but sunny, and the breeze was gentle. With Lillie between them, Pru steered them toward Main Street and the shop where she had met Chester the previous day.

  It was through the bookstore that messages were exchanged between workers on the Underground Railroad. She had been there several times, but as far as she knew, had never met her contact.

  On an earlier trip to Indianapolis, after she had given a talk at a local church about her education initiative, a woman, who introduced herself as Wisteria Price, had stayed behind. They had spoken for some time, then, apparently feeling Pru was trustworthy, Wisteria had asked her if she wanted to help with the Underground Railroad.

  Delighted, Pru had quickly agreed. After explaining how Pru would be contacted through the bookstore, she left and Pru never saw her again. Since then, the only way she had communicated with anyone in the organization was through notes hidden inside one of the store’s more obscure books—The History and Art of Phoenician Blown Glass During the Roman Period.

  When they neared the shop, Pru turned to Thomas. “Will you mind taking Lillie to the Sweet Shoppe while I look for a book I saw earlier?”

  He pointed to a bench in front of a store two doors down. “We will wait there.” The first full sentence he had spoken to her since the previous night.

  Pru nodded and stepped into the bookstore. With a smile to the proprietor—an older, bespectacled white man with a kind smile and the largest ears she had ever seen—she wandered idly along the narrow aisles between the tall bookcases at the back of the store. After leafing through several dusty tomes—happily finding one featuring watercolors of First Nation Indian tribes—she slipped her note into the glassworks history, then carried her art book up front.

  The proprietor smiled when she set it on the counter. “George Winter. One of our local artists, and very talented. A Christmas gift?”

  Pru nodded as she counted out her coins.

  “Then I’ll wrap it in colored paper.” He dug beneath the counter, then straightened with a sigh. “I’ll have to get more paper from the back. It might take a few minutes. Or, if you’d prefer, you can come back for the book later.”

  “Later will be fine. We still have shopping to do.”

  “Say, in about an hour?”

  “An hour it is, then.”

  As she stepped outside, Pru looked around, wondering if her contact was watching. Perhaps the kindly proprietor was her contact. Or perhaps he didn’t even know his store was being used by the Underground Railroad. The people in the organization were all quite secretive . . . which was probably why they had been successful for so long.

  Thomas and Lillie were waiting on the bench. Thomas, eyes closed, his head tipped back to the warm sunshine—Lillie, licking the last smear of peppermint from her glove. Pru walked toward them.

  “I’ll have to come back in an hour for my purchase,” she said, stopping before them. “It’s a gift, so I’m having it wrapped.”

  Lillie stopped licking. “A present? Fo’ me?”

  “Not this time.” Pru glanced at Thomas, but he was studying the road behind them. Smiling down into the child’s sticky face, she said, “But I hear they have a collection of musical snuff boxes at the Clockworks Store. Would you like to go listen to them?”

  Lillie bounced off the bench. “Oh, yes! I hear one once. It sound like angels playin’ they harps.”

  It did sound like angels. And was apparently just as rare: the owner of the store hovered nervously nearby as Lillie listened to each music box twice, her face the picture of awed delight. Pru didn’t know what worried the poor man more—the idea that the blind child would knock one of the precious boxes from the counter, or having Thomas staring at him.

  From the Clockworks Store, they went on to the General Merchandize Emporium. Leaving Thomas studying the knives and guns in a glass-faced cabinet by the front counter, Pru and Lillie went to the small selection of toys at the back of the store. She knew she was spoiling the girl, but the minute
Lillie’s hand fell on a yarn-haired rag doll, Pru had to buy it for her.

  “Daddy,” the girl shouted, waving the doll overhead as they returned to the front. “A doll! Of my very own. I think I call her Miss Minty. That a good name?”

  “Epeva’e. It is good.”

  “Yes, a very good name.” Pru hoped the child was naming the doll for Araminta—Minty—Ross, later called Harriet Tubman—rather than a peppermint stick.

  When they stepped back onto the street, Lillie grinning and clutching her new doll tightly to her chest, Pru checked the watch pinned on the inside of her coat. Over an hour had passed, so her package should be ready. If all had gone well, she would find an answer to her note waiting for her, too.

  This time all three of them went into the bookstore. Leaving Thomas and Lillie at the front, Pru went to the cases in back. There, in the history book, she found scribbled directions to the barn of a Quaker family on the outskirts of Westfield, a town twenty-five miles north of Indianapolis. With lawmen hunting Mose, taking the real train would be out of the question, so two horses would be waiting at the previous night’s meeting place. “Nine o’clock,” the note read. “A fresh horse will be supplied for the return trip. Go thee with God.”

  As instructed previously, Pru dropped the shredded note into the coal stove by the rear wall before going back to the front. After picking up her book and thanking the shopkeeper, she and Thomas and Lillie headed back to the Beckworth Arms.

  While Lillie kept up a running monologue with Miss Minty, Pru relayed to Thomas what was in the note. “How long will it take?” A fifty-mile round trip seemed a huge distance on horseback.

  “The horses will need water and rest along the way. One day. Maybe more.”

  “Assuming there are no problems.”

  “There will be no problems.”

  “If you don’t leave until nine tonight, that means you might miss the fund-raiser tomorrow night.”

  He shrugged.