Chariot on the Mountain

by Jack Ford

  Maddox did not answer but simply glared at Turner.

  “Mr. Maddox, did you somehow not understand my question?” asked Turner.

  “Didn’t need no court to tell me what I already knew,” Maddox growled. “She belongs to me, and I can damn well do whatever I like with her.”

  Turner took two steps toward Maddox. “So, you are telling this court that you are somehow above the law? That Sam Maddox can do whatever he pleases, regardless of what the law says?”

  “I’m tellin’ you that she was mine and was stolen from me, so I had every right to go get her and bring her back,” Maddox insisted heatedly.

  “And did that give you the right to brutally beat this defenseless woman?” Turner said, his voice dropping low and dripping with contempt. “To punch her repeatedly? To tie her up and throw her in a wagon? To chain her inside a shed and let her suffer, with no aid for her horrible injuries you had inflicted?”

  “Get this straight, Turner,” Maddox said, spitting out each word. “That ain’t no woman.” He pointed at Kitty, who squared her shoulders and seemed to rise up in her chair as she met and held his glare. “That there’s a slave—and my property. I own her. And I’m free to treat her any way I please. If I wanna beat her, I’ll beat her. If I wanna chain her up, I’ll chain her up. Only way to treat some of these niggras and make ’em understand who’s boss. And if you don’t like it, you can just move up north and join up with them lily-livered abolitionists.”

  There was a heavy mantle of tense silence in the courtroom. No one uttered a sound as the two men glowered at each other. Finally, Turner spoke.

  “You, sir, are no gentleman,” Turner said quietly.

  “Never pretended to be one,” Maddox answered.

  “Your Honor,” Turner said, turning his back on Maddox, “I have no more use for this witness,” he said scornfully.

  “Mr. Maddox, you are excused as a witness and may step down,” Judge Field said stiffly. “Mr. Strother, do you intend to call any further witnesses?”

  “No, sir,” said Strother, scrambling to his feet. “With the court’s permission, the defense would rest its case.”

  “Gentlemen,” Judge Field said, turning toward the jurors, “that will complete the presentation of evidence in this matter. Given the lateness of the hour, we will recess until tomorrow morning, when the lawyers will present their closing arguments. Following that, you will begin your deliberations toward a verdict.” He rapped his gavel once on the bench. “Court is adjourned until tomorrow morning.”

  CHAPTER 66

  THE FOLLOWING MORNING, THE CROWD BEGAN TO ASSEMBLE OUTSIDE the courthouse even before the shimmering blood-orange summer sun peeked above the horizon. The hopeful spectators, fascinated by the unfolding of this unlikely drama, staked out their territory early in front of the broad double doors, their numbers larger than the first day of the trial, drawn like ants to a picnic by word of the explosive courtroom confrontations of the previous day.

  Lingering silently on the periphery of the gathering was a handful of free black men and women, curious to witness the rare spectacle of bloodless combat between one of their own and the powerful and deeply entrenched traditions of Piedmont Virginia society.

  When the doors were flung open, the crowd surged forward and, like flowing water seeping into an open crevice, filled every available space inside the building. The black spectators, knowing that they would not be allowed to sit in the downstairs chamber, immediately climbed to the upstairs gallery, where they found seats. However, they rose and submissively relinquished their spots soon after, when several white men, finding no available space in the first-floor courtroom, climbed the stairs to the gallery, looking for a place to view the proceedings. Despite having arrived there first, the blacks were exiled to the farthest recesses of the gallery.

  Inside the courtroom, the combatants were settled in their places, awaiting the next clash—the closing arguments—which would be launched in just minutes. Zephania Turner sat calmly at the counsel table, conversing earnestly with Kitty as he sought to quiet her nerves. Across the room, Moffet Strother was a study in contrast, squirming in his chair, shuffling through notes, steadfastly avoiding any conversation with Sam Maddox, who had shed his veneer of anger from the previous day and was now smiling and nodding at supporters in the audience. Meanwhile, the jurors, some of whom seemed to be basking in their accidental and temporary celebrity, were seated in the jury area, anxious to resume the trial.

  The door behind the bench swung open, and Judge Field entered, accompanied by the clerk and his announcement that court was once again in session. After taking a moment to carefully arrange his books and files, the judge looked up and began to speak.

  “We are at that stage in this matter where the attorneys shall present their closing arguments to the jury.” He shifted his focus to the audience. “I shall once again remind those members of the public who are attending this trial that I will tolerate no outbursts or expressions of support. If you are unable to comply with this order, I shall have you removed immediately. I hope that I have made myself perfectly clear.” He then turned to the lawyers. “Mr. Strother, are you prepared to proceed?”

  “I am, indeed, Your Honor. Thank you,” Strother said as he stood and faced the jurors. “Gentlemen of the jury, I would like to begin by thanking you for the time you have devoted to this case. And I know that my client—and your neighbor—Mr. Maddox, thanks you also.” He paused and took a deep and theatrical breath. “When I spoke to you at the start of this trial, I suggested that you might be wondering why there was any necessity for a trial at all. That you might be asking yourself why you had been summoned to sit in judgment of a neighbor—indeed, of one of you—who has been accused of the assault and kidnapping of a slave. Not of a citizen, mind you, but of a slave! A slave who has no rights, a slave whose very existence depends entirely on us—and yet a slave who dares to enter this hallowed hall of justice, seeking punishment against one of us. If it was not so very offensive to our social order, it might almost be comical.

  “But it is not comical. Indeed, it is real—and it should be frightening to all of us. Let me take just a moment, for just a moment is all it deserves, to dispose of the laughable legal claim that is made to attempt to justify this farce. This slave claims that Mistress Maddox—who is a longtime neighbor but is sadly misguided in this instance—was granted the power to free her by the late Samuel Maddox’s will. And she further claims that the late Samuel Maddox wished her to be freed, offering a slander on his name by claiming, with no proof whatsoever, that she was sired by that good departed soul. And, based upon this act of slandering the good name of a man who is no longer here to defend himself, she asks you to be complicit in this act of slander by agreeing that she is somehow now free.” Strother paused, shaking his head in bewilderment.

  “I would ask that you simply review the language of the will in question, and you will undoubtedly conclude that the late Samuel Maddox intended that his beloved nephew, Sam, should have a role in the administration of his estate. And that there is no evidence whatsoever of any intention to part with valuable property—to simply allow valuable slaves to walk away, with no recompense whatsoever. You will conclude that this is merely a farce, a baseless charade that is attempting a fraud on the justice system.”

  “But there is something more sinister at work here,” he added ominously as he stepped closer to the jurors. “This is not just an attack on the law—this is an attack on the sanctity of our way of life,” he proclaimed, his voice rising. “This is an attempt to disrupt and destroy our very social order. Slaves are slaves! They are not our equals, because God has chosen to make them less than our equals. God has chosen to place these inferior creatures in our care and control. Because that is the natural order of things. It is the order that God has provided, as we are taught in the Bible, and it is not within our charge to change that order. And Sam Maddox’s conduct toward these slaves—his slaves, as he sought to recap
ture them after they had been stolen from him— is most certainly justified by that natural order of things.” Again, he paused, looking pointedly at each of the twelve men seated in the jury chairs.

  “Gentlemen of the jury, your ancestors would roll over in their graves if you were to choose to punish a white man—one of you—based upon the unjustifiable claims of not another person, but of a slave. We would ask you—indeed, we would beg you—to reject this assault on our way of life, on God’s established order, and on who we are as a people.”

  CHAPTER 67

  A SOFT MURMUR OF APPROVAL RIPPLED THROUGH THE COURTROOM as Strother strolled back to his seat, a self-satisfied smile creasing his broad face. A rap of the gavel by Judge Field swiftly silenced it.

  “Mr. Turner, are you prepared to proceed?” asked the judge.

  “I am indeed prepared and, I should add, anxious to proceed, with Your Honor’s permission,” Turner said, inclining his head toward the bench. After rising majestically, resplendent in a powder-blue suit and a fawn-colored waistcoat, he strode confidently across the room and stopped in front of the jurors.

  “It is a curious system of justice that we have created in this country,” he began. “In creating this new nation a mere generation ago, we chose to reject much of what had been imposed upon us as colonists and, instead, created our own enlightened system. And the hallmark of that system—the element of which we are most proud, and appropriately so—is our reliance upon juries to dispense justice. We have made the decision that what is most fair is to ask jurors such as yourselves—our neighbors, who share our experiences, our aspirations, our frustrations—to determine what is right and what is wrong. To essentially act as the conscience, individually and collectively, of our community. It is a brilliant approach to the administration of justice, but one that can function only if we can, indeed, count on the fairness and impartiality of those chosen to resolve our conflicts,” he mused softly. “And that is what we ask of you today.”

  “Make no mistake,” he continued, “we are asking a great deal of you. We are asking you to do what is right, not what is merely expedient. We are asking you to make a decision that you might not be entirely comfortable with, that you might be criticized for by your neighbors—but one that is the correct decision, the fair decision, to make. We are asking you today to exhibit the courage that justice sometimes requires.

  “Miss Kitty is free,” he said in a firm and loud voice, gesturing toward her. “We have proved that to you beyond any doubt. It was Mistress Maddox’s decision to free her, following the deathbed wishes of her late husband. She has bared her soul to you—to all of us here in this courtroom—in disclosing the reason for these wishes. It could not have been easy for her to reveal, so publicly, such a distressing and embarrassing fact as the infidelity of her husband. She should be admired for her courage in doing so.

  “And I would suggest to you that a simple perusal of the terms of Samuel Maddox’s will makes it abundantly clear to anyone that he had invested complete control of his estate—along with the ability to part with any assets she chose—to his wife. That, gentlemen, is beyond dispute, despite the illogical and unfounded meanderings of the defendant.

  “Now, then, let me speak a moment about this same defendant,” he continued, offering a disdainful glance at Sam Maddox. “About this man who would so brutally assault a defenseless woman—a free woman—and her young children and then seek your approval by claiming that not only was his conduct acceptable but that, in fact, each of you would have acted in the same fashion. That, gentlemen, should be an insult to each and every one of you. No society, and especially not our society, should allow the type of senseless brutality espoused by this defendant. He believes, as you heard from him yesterday and from his counsel today, that God has empowered him to inflict pain on others—not just on slaves but also on people who are free—if he so chooses, claiming somehow that such abominable conduct is God’s will. That is not the will of our God, a God of compassion and concern for those who are less than us. Rather, such a statement is a slander on our God! And, make no mistake, this is not about the boundaries of discipline imposed upon a slave—this is about viciously assaulting a woman who is as free as any one of us in this courtroom!

  “Our God,” Turner continued sternly, “has entrusted us with the welfare of those in our care, the lesser among us. And that trust requires kindness and fairness—and sometimes firmness—but always a commitment to God’s will. And it is most definitely not God’s will to brutally assault, kidnap, and then cruelly imprison a free woman and her children, even if she is a woman of color.”

  Turner paused as he turned and gestured toward the seal of the Commonwealth of Virginia that was affixed to the wall behind the judge’s bench. “Virginia,” he continued, “this great state of ours, is the birthplace of Washington, of Jefferson, of Madison. It is the birthplace of great ideas and ideals. In many ways, it is the very birthplace of our democracy and our cherished freedoms. It is the place that we are proud to call our home. And here in Virginia, we are a land of laws—laws based on wisdom and fairness, and not based on the coarsest instincts of evil men.”

  Turner took a step closer to the jurors and looked carefully into the eyes of each one. When he began to speak again, his voice was low and solemn.

  “Despite what many in the North may think of us, we are civilized men. And we must make it clear to those, near and far, who are watching what we do here in this courtroom today that as civilized men we cannot—and will not—countenance acts of violence against any free person, regardless of the color of their skin. You must act as the conscience of this community—of this commonwealth, of this very way of life that we have chosen—and declare for all to hear that we are not barbarians, that we are a civilized people, and that we will not allow such ungodly conduct to go unpunished.”

  Turner paused dramatically, gazing skyward, as if drawing inspiration from the heavens, and then continued in a quiet, deeply impassioned voice. “We are counting on your courage, on your willingness to stand up and proclaim that the principles of fairness and liberty, which had their birth right here in our colony and gave rise to the creation of this great nation, are alive and well. We are counting on you to tell this defendant—and everyone else who is watching—that justice exists for all free people in the Commonwealth of Virginia. I thank you, gentlemen.”

  CHAPTER 68

  THE JURORS HAD BEEN DELIBERATING FOR NEARLY THREE HOURS WHEN they summoned the court clerk. Following the closing arguments, Judge Field had instructed them about the law relating to each of the charges leveled against Sam Maddox and had discussed with them their role as jurors. He had then directed them to begin their deliberations and had sent them—a parade of twelve perplexed, uncomfortable white men—off to the small private room situated in the back corner of the courtroom. For the past hour, loud and sometimes angry voices could be heard inside the room, the tenor of the sounds rising and falling like the rhythm of waves crashing on a beach.

  When the court clerk exited the jury room a few minutes later, he was carrying a note written by the jury foreman. He scurried immediately into the judge’s chambers. Minutes later he emerged, with orders to gather all the participants in the courtroom.

  Kitty had been waiting in her room at the jail, playing with the children and attempting to focus on anything other than the trial. Meanwhile, Mary and Fanny had joined Zephania Turner in his office across the street, and all had been pacing restlessly as they awaited some word from the jury.

  Once the lawyers and parties had resumed their places, and the anxious spectators had come streaming back and had scrambled again for every seat, Judge Field materialized on the bench.

  “Gentlemen, I have received a communication from the jurors,” he said somberly, addressing the lawyers and holding a piece of paper in the air. “It appears that they have been unable to reach agreement on a verdict and are seeking assistance from the court. In this letter, signed by the jury foreman,
James O’Bannon, they outline their discussion of the contested facts of the case and then write as follows . . .” The judge read from the letter.

  But whether or not upon the facts in evidence the decision should be for the plaintiff or for the defendant, the jury cannot say, and therefore they pray the advice of the court. If, upon consideration of the facts and law, it shall seem to the court that the case should be resolved in favor of the plaintiff, then the jury finds for the plaintiff, and in that case they assess damages of one cent. But if, upon consideration of the facts and law, it shall seem to the court that the resolution should be in favor of the defendant, then the jury finds for the defendant.

  “According to the wishes of the jury, then,” the judge said, “I will provide the court’s opinion of the facts and the law in this matter, and that opinion will effectively serve as the verdict. Would either attorney be inclined to offer an objection to this procedure?”

  Both attorneys nodded their heads in agreement.

  “Thank you, gentlemen,” the judge said. “In that case, I will ask all of you to remain in your places while I retire for just a brief period to review my notes and organize my thoughts. I will then resume the bench to offer my opinion forthwith.”

  Once the judge had retired to his chambers, there was an explosion of sound in the courtroom. A cacophony of whispers and louder exclamations reverberated throughout the chamber as all gathered there struggled to understand what was to happen next.