Together is All We Need

by Michael Phillips

  ‘‘Yeah, it’s still safe and sound. But what do you want with that?’’ he asked as he mounted his horse.

  ‘‘Mayme will never believe me if she doesn’t see it. She can be stubborn sometimes when she thinks she’s acting for my best. And once she’s made up her mind about something, we’ll never change it unless she sees proof of what we say!’’

  She galloped off in the direction we’d gone, and her uncle, still more than a little confused, followed her.

  ‘‘Hey, Kathleen . . . hey—wait,’’ he called after her. ‘‘This poor horse of mine’s bushed. At least let me give him a drink.’’

  ‘‘There are plenty of streams along the way!’’ Katie shouted back over her shoulder. By now she was halfway to the trees, and her uncle dug his heels into his horse’s flanks, shouted a couple of commands, and did his best to catch up.

  COMING AFTER US

  30

  BY THE TIME IT HAD GOT ON TO ELEVEN O’CLOCK, the sun was high and we were tired. Poor Josepha had been slowing down for a while and was sweating a lot. We’d only just left and I was already getting worried. How we’d ever make fifty miles I couldn’t imagine. Emma and William were about tuckered out too. So we walked off the road by where it crossed a good-sized stream, found a nice shady spot under a big oak, and sat down to rest and have something to eat. We all drank our fill from the stream, and after some bread and cheese and another drink, it didn’t take long for a few folks to get sleepy. In fact, in about ten minutes both Josepha and William were sound asleep, and Emma and I weren’t far behind them. A warm day always seems to put you to sleep.

  Katie rode hard. She and the new uncle she’d just met didn’t have the chance to talk much as they went, so whatever explanations she’d intended to give him had to wait until later. Whatever he thought, he didn’t object too much and kept following, though who could tell what he was thinking.

  From what she’d overheard Josepha and me saying, Katie had a pretty good idea which way we’d be going, though once the road north passed the Thurston plantation it went in two directions. The way they went at first didn’t happen to be the same way we’d gone, and so they saw nobody, and after about twenty minutes of fast riding Katie was sure we couldn’t have gotten that far. They turned around and retraced their way back to where the road split and this time took the other road.

  They stopped a couple of times for their horses to drink, though by now Katie’s uncle’s horse was showing signs of slowing down regardless. But still Katie kept riding at a gentle gallop as hard as the two horses would go.

  I don’t know how long we slept, probably not too long. It was such a warm day, and with the sound of the stream and a gentle breeze in the oak leaves above us, it was just about as nice and as peaceful as you could imagine. But we had such a long way to go, and we’d never get there if we slept four hours every day. And besides, we had to get far enough away so we wouldn’t have to worry about still being in the vicinity of the McSimmons place. So when I woke up and remembered where we were and what we were doing, as peaceful as it was, I knew we had to be getting on our way.

  ‘‘Emma,’’ I said, shaking her gently where she lay next to me. ‘‘We gotta be going . . . Josepha, time to get on our way.’’

  Slowly we all roused ourselves. As I was coming back from the woods from doing my necessaries, all at once I heard the sound of horses. I listened real intently and realized there was more than one. I ran back to the others.

  ‘‘Horses coming,’’ I said. ‘‘I think there’s several. Let’s get out of sight behind that shrubbery and everyone keep quiet. Can you keep real still, William?’’ I said as I hurried them out of sight of the road.

  Ten or fifteen seconds later, the sound of two horses echoed on the wooden bridge over the stream that we’d crossed a while earlier.

  We waited till they were by, but then Emma stuck her head up and glanced toward the road.

  ‘‘Emma!’’ I whispered. ‘‘Get down.’’

  ‘‘I jes’ wanted ter see who it—’’

  Suddenly she jumped to her feet. ‘‘It be Miz Katie!’’ she cried. ‘‘Look . . . hit’s Miz Katie!’’

  Before I could even think about what she’d said, Emma was off like a shot, running up onto the road and shrieking at the top of her lungs.

  I ran after her, and by then Josepha had struggled to her feet too. By the time we reached the road, the two horses were well past us. But Emma was making such a racket that not even the sound of horses’ hooves could drown it out. I saw the second rider rein in and look behind him. I didn’t know him any more than he knew any of us. A strange look came over his face as he saw two colored girls chasing after him and yelling what he could hardly make out a word of. And when a huge colored woman waddled up out of the brush after them, I can’t imagine what he must have thought!

  By then Katie had heard something too and realized that her uncle had stopped. She reined in and spun her horse around, and the next instant was galloping back past him and straight up to us.

  ‘‘Mayme . . . Mayme!’’ she cried excitedly. Dust was flying all over and the horse pranced about as she jumped off, not even bothering with the reins. ‘‘You’ll never guess what happened!’’ she went on as she ran to meet us. ‘‘This is my uncle . . . the uncle I thought was dead, my uncle Ward! He came right when that lawyer was about to turn Rosewood over to Uncle Burchard, and everything stopped and he pulled out the deed to the property. You remember the deed they were looking for but couldn’t find . . . Uncle Ward had it! My mama gave it to him . . . Rosewood belonged to my mama not my daddy, and she gave it to Uncle Ward when he gave her the gold . . . and so he owns it . . . and he still owns it, not Uncle Burchard . . . and he said we could stay!’’

  Katie was nearly out of breath from talking so fast. I had only understood about half of what she’d said, but the expression of happiness on her face told me everything there was to know. By then we were all clustered around, and her uncle had ridden up slowly behind us. I glanced up at him and saw the resemblance between him and my papa right off. I smiled and he smiled back.

  ‘‘You must be Mayme that Kathleen’s been telling me about,’’ he said.

  I nodded. ‘‘And this is Emma and Josepha,’’ I said, pointing to the other two.

  ‘‘An’ William!’’ added Emma, because just then William, who’d been suddenly deserted down by the stream, trundled up behind us.

  ‘‘Well, I must say, Kathleen,’’ said Mr. Daniels, ‘‘this is quite a little troop you’ve got here. Maybe now I understand why your other uncle back there made them leave—they’re all colored.’’

  ‘‘Yes, sir,’’ said Katie.

  ‘‘Well, that don’t matter none to me. Takes all kinds to make a world, I always say. Heck, I ain’t even sure how long I’ll be staying myself. I just came for a visit after hearing what had happened.’’

  Now that the dust had settled, so to speak, although it was still dusty where we were standing, Katie and her uncle had a little more chance to talk about what had happened.

  ‘‘How did you hear about what was going on, Uncle Ward?’’ asked Katie.

  ‘‘You don’t know?’’

  ‘‘What do you mean?’’

  ‘‘I read about the two of you in a paper up north. That’s how I found out Richard and Rosalind were dead, and I figured I ought to come down and see if there was any way I could help out, you being kin and all.’’

  ‘‘Did you know about Uncle Burchard’s saying Rosewood was his and having a new deed drawn up and everything?’’

  ‘‘There was just a mention of a brother of Richard’s in the paper taking over ownership. But I didn’t know any more than that till I got to Greens Crossing. I saw a notice up on a signboard and I asked somebody about it. That’s when I figured I’d better hightail it out there so I could have a say in the matter.’’

  ‘‘I’m sure glad you did!’’ said Katie.

  ‘‘And just in the nick of time, b
y all appearances of what was going on,’’ he said, now getting down from his horse and walking it to the stream. ‘‘So that was your pa’s brother, huh?’’

  Katie went to get her horse. ‘‘But I still don’t understand about the deed, Uncle Ward,’’ she said as she led the horse after her uncle and we all followed. ‘‘Why did Mama give it to you and sign it so that Rosewood would be yours?’’

  ‘‘She and Richard were always a mite worried about that Burchard fellow. And then when I got back from California and asked her to keep my gold for me, she figured it was only right to give me something in exchange. I told her she didn’t need to, but she insisted. She said it was only fair, something like giving me a note in exchange for the gold, and she wouldn’t take no for an answer.’’

  ‘‘I’m sorry about us using up all the gold, Uncle Ward.’’

  ‘‘I already told you, I didn’t come back for the gold. But tell me again what happened with it?’’

  ‘‘We used it for Rosewood,’’ answered Katie. ‘‘My mama had taken out two loans when my daddy was away at the war, and after they were killed the loans came due. Mayme and I found the gold and paid off the loans.’’

  ‘‘Well, no matter. I’m glad it got put to good use. I came back to see if you were okay and to tell you how sorry I am about your ma. If my hard work in California helped save the place from some banker, well, then, I figure maybe that’s worth it.’’

  ‘‘He kin hab dat fifty-five dollars you dun gib me, Miz Katie,’’ Josepha now said. ‘‘I don’ need it. Lan’ sakes, dat’s more money den mos’ black folks eber see in dere lives!’’

  Katie and I looked at each other and laughed. Her uncle looked back and forth between us, then started to chuckle too.

  ‘‘We’ve got about two hundred dollars between all four of us, Uncle Ward,’’ said Katie. ‘‘You can have it if you want. I split up the money between us all before they left, since they helped pick the cotton. It won’t make up for the gold, but it’s something.’’

  ‘‘You picked cotton too!’’

  ‘‘Yes, we made over four hundred dollars.’’

  ‘‘That’s a lot of money! But I don’t want your two hundred dollars, Kathleen.—That’s just about more money than this white man has ever seen in one place either, ma’am!’’ he added to Josepha.

  Josepha’s eyes went wide and she just stared back at him. It was the first time she’d ever been called ma’am by a white man.

  ‘‘And I ain’t so sure a plantation’s what I want either,’’ Katie’s uncle added. ‘‘I just kept the deed all this time out of respect to Rosalind and figured one day I’d sign it back to her whether she liked it or not. So maybe I ought to just sign it back to you, Kathleen. Then Rosewood will be yours and nobody can take it away from you.’’

  I glanced over at Katie and there were tears in her eyes. I knew she wanted to give the man in front of her a big hug. But she barely knew him and couldn’t quite bring herself to it. But it didn’t make what he’d said any less important.

  ‘‘What about Uncle Burchard?’’ said Katie. ‘‘Aren’t I too young? Couldn’t he come back and make trouble again later?’’

  ‘‘You might be right. How old are you, Kathleen?’’

  ‘‘I just turned seventeen.’’

  ‘‘All right, then, we’ll wait till you’re eighteen, and then I’ll sign it over to you . . . or twenty-one if you like. We’ll do it all legal-like so he can’t do nothing to bother you.—But what are we all standing around here for? Didn’t we come find these folks so you could take them back to the house with you?’’

  ‘‘Yes, but—’’ Katie began, then stopped and looked around at all of us. ‘‘But what are we going to do—we’ve only got two horses. We’ll have to go back to get a wagon.’’

  ‘‘You want me to go?’’ said her uncle.

  ‘‘Can you find your way?’’

  ‘‘I reckon so.’’

  ‘‘Henry—he’s the black man who was there that I was talking to—he should still be there. Tell him what we’re doing and that I asked him to help you. He’ll know which wagon is best, and can hitch it to one of our other horses so that yours can rest. Henry will know what to do. You can take my horse if you want.’’

  ‘‘And you want to wait here with them?’’

  Katie nodded.

  ‘‘All right, then.’’ He paused, glanced briefly at me, then back at Katie. ‘‘She didn’t ask to see the deed,’’ he said with kind of a twinkle in his eye, nodding in my direction.

  ‘‘What is he talking about?’’ I asked.

  Katie hesitated. An embarrassed expression came over her face. ‘‘I told him you wouldn’t believe me about what had happened if we didn’t have the deed to show you.’’

  ‘‘I don’t suppose I had any reason to doubt it,’’ I said. ‘‘But I reckon I would like to see it.’’

  Her uncle opened his saddlebag and handed Katie the deed. She showed it around to the rest of us. ‘‘You see,’’ she said, ‘‘it was in my mama’s name, not my daddy’s. So that means that Uncle Burchard’s got nothing to do with it. And then when Uncle Ward gave mama the gold to keep, she signed it here—see, there’s her signature signing the deed over to Ward Daniels.’’

  ‘‘That’s me!’’ said her uncle.

  ‘‘So Uncle Ward’s the legal owner of the plantation. And he says I can stay, and all the rest of you can too.’’

  ‘‘We’s mighty thankful, Mr. Daniels, sir,’’ said Josepha. ‘‘I’s Josepha Black, an’ I’m right proud ter mak yer ’quaintance.’’ She held up a big fleshy hand. Katie’s uncle shook it and smiled. ‘‘I’s try ter please you, sir,’’ said Josepha, ‘‘an’ I’s work jes’ as hard as I dun fer Miz Katie.’’

  ‘‘And this is Emma,’’ said Katie. ‘‘She and William have been staying with Mayme and me right from the beginning.’’

  ‘‘And what about you, Mayme,’’ he said, turning to me. ‘‘I read in the story in the paper that you lost your family too, just like Kathleen. You want to stay on at Rosewood too?’’

  I looked up at him, realizing for the first time that he was my uncle too.

  ‘‘Yes, sir, Mr. Daniels,’’ I said. ‘‘Rosewood’s my home. This is just about the only family I’ve got left.’’

  ‘‘Well, I’m glad all that is settled,’’ he said. ‘‘So I guess I’d better get going so I can return with that wagon and take you all back to the house.’’

  He took Katie’s reins and handed his to her, then led his horse up onto the road, mounted, and a few seconds later was galloping away.

  ANOTHER HOMECOMING

  31

  WE WERE TOO EXCITED ABOUT THE SUDDEN change to be able to go back to sleep on the ground while we waited, even though we were still tired. Suddenly our fortunes and our futures had changed again! Though we weren’t altogether sure yet what it would all mean.

  We talked and talked excitedly and Katie told us all about what had happened and about how her uncle had ridden up right at the last minute and about how mad her uncle Burchard had been. We all laughed and asked so many questions that the time went by quickly. Before we knew it we heard the sound of the wagon coming along the road. And there was Jeremiah sitting beside Katie’s uncle on the seat board! Now I was even happier than ever!

  He turned the wagon around, and we all loaded up and began the ride back home. Jeremiah came and sat with me in the back and Katie sat up front with her uncle. Jeremiah didn’t say anything, but he couldn’t seem to stop looking at me and smiling.

  ‘‘Your uncle Templeton ever show up around here?’’ I heard Katie’s uncle ask as we jostled along.

  Immediately I perked up my ears to listen!

  ‘‘Oh yes—he’s been around a lot . . . I meant to tell you!’’ answered Katie. ‘‘There’s so much to tell. He’s been living at Rosewood. He even helped us pick the cotton.’’

  ‘‘My brother Templeton . . . picking cotton!’’ exclaimed Katie
’s uncle.

  ‘‘He’s really changed, Uncle Ward.’’

  ‘‘Then where is he? Why ain’t he around? How’d he let you get in this fix with that Burchard fellow?’’

  ‘‘That’s what I’ve got to tell you,’’ said Katie. ‘‘He’s in trouble.’’

  ‘‘What kind of trouble?’’

  ‘‘He’s in jail.’’

  ‘‘Jail!’’

  ‘‘We got a letter from him more than a week ago. We’d been worried sick about him because we hadn’t heard from him for a long time. He left before Uncle Burchard came claiming that Rosewood should belong to him. So Uncle Templeton doesn’t know anything about it.’’

  ‘‘Why’d he leave?’’

  ‘‘He said he had some things to take care of, people he needed to make things right with. I’m not sure what he meant.’’

  Katie’s uncle nodded. I couldn’t see his face from behind him where I was sitting. But I had the feeling he understood even if Katie didn’t.

  ‘‘You ever hear of a con artist?’’ he asked.

  ‘‘No, sir.’’

  ‘‘Well, that’s probably just as well, and there ain’t no need my trying to explain it to you. Let’s just say your uncle made a few enemies along the way, just like I did myself.’’

  ‘‘There were some men who came looking for you and your gold,’’ said Katie.

  ‘‘What kind of men?’’

  ‘‘One was called Hal, I think, and another named Jeb.’’

  Mr. Daniels didn’t say anything for a minute but got real thoughtful. ‘‘That’s them all right,’’ he said. ‘‘I figured I hadn’t heard the last of them. They cause any trouble?’’

  ‘‘Yes, sir. They had guns and came twice. The first time Mayme and I scared them off by shooting some of my daddy’s guns. The second time Uncle Templeton was here. He shot one of them and got shot himself. We thought he was going to die.’’