Thoreau in Phantom Bog

by Oak, B. B.

  “Have no fear,” my assailant whispered. “I am your friend Henry.” I relaxed, and he released me. “I have runaway slaves with me, Julia. Will you give them shelter?”

  “Of course,” I whispered back.

  Henry waved over two figures waiting in the shadows at the edge of the yard. When we went through the back door and stepped into the kitchen, I lit a lamp and saw that in addition to a young male and female Negro, a baby made three. All had much lighter skin than the only other Negro I knew, a man who had come directly from Africa named Mawuli. Indeed, this couple and child had nearer my own coloring, and if I were to paint their portraits I would blend yellow ochre, vermilion, and white with only a smidgen of burnt sienna to capture their skin tones. The man’s eyes were large and thickly lashed, of a dusky umber hue, and the woman’s eyes were gray tinged with viridian green. The baby’s eyes were closed. It was sleeping peacefully in the woman’s arms but appeared rather thin and frail.

  Henry introduced me to the couple as Mrs. Canvas. “In the Underground Railroad, we go by the names related to our occupations for prudential reasons,” he explained. “It’s safer for all concerned.”

  “If we don’t know the real names of folks that help us,” the man said, “slave hunters can’t make us give ’em up if we get caught.”

  “And it’s best that runaways don’t use the names they were called by their owners,” Henry said. “Those names are posted in notices offering rewards for their capture.”

  “My wife and I go by the name Cooper now,” the man said. “I was made to cooper casks and barrels on the plantation and hope to make my living by it when we get Canada under our feet.”

  “What name do you go by in the Underground?” I asked Henry.

  “I call myself Mr. Measure,” he said.

  “Most apropos,” I said. Not only does Henry use measurements in his work as a land surveyor and carpenter, but he has a natural aptitude at estimating weights and measures by eye. I have heard it said that he can take the measure of a man at a glance, too.

  “Mr. Measure met up with us on a lonesome lane tonight,” Mrs. Cooper said.

  “And Mr. Cooper near brained me when I came out of the woods and approached them,” Henry added with an amused expression.

  “We thought you was a slave hunter!” Mr. Cooper said.

  “But when they saw I had no weapons or shackles,” Henry continued, “they realized I meant them no harm.”

  “It was when we saw your kind eyes, sir,” Mrs. Cooper said.

  “They were headed for the farm near Phantom Bog,” Henry said, giving me a pointed look. “I told them that the Conductor who lived there could no longer help fugitives, and I had been sent to take his place. I dared not take them back to Concord, however. The Stations there are being watched. So I brought them here.”

  “I am so glad you did!” I turned to the Coopers. “You are welcome to stay for as long as need be.”

  “I shall return tomorrow night to escort them to Mr. Mill’s house in Acton,” Henry said. He paused, held my gaze, and then spoke in a low, confidential voice. “Mr. Mill has a goat named Capricorn.” He then bade us all farewell and went off into the night.

  I invited the Coopers to sit down at the kitchen table and fetched bread and cheese and dried fruit from the pantry. They ate this simple fare with such eagerness and appreciation that I wondered how long they had been without sustenance. Between bites they told me a bit of their history. They had been raised on the same plantation on the Eastern Shore of Maryland and had loved each other since childhood.

  “It was just a matter of time afore we jumped the broom together,” Mrs. Cooper said. Seeing my puzzlement she explained that because slaves weren’t allowed to marry legally, a ceremonial jumping over a broom in front of witnesses was their way of sealing their vows. Their master, however, did not recognize such a union. As far as he was concerned, slaves had no right to any family ties, and the children they bore were just part of his stock. Being hard-pressed for money, he meant to sell Mrs. Cooper and the babe to a slave trader who would auction them off in Georgia.

  “Both my wife and my child would be lost to me forever,” Mr. Cooper said. “I could not let that happen.”

  “And I could not bear never seeing my husband again,” Mrs. Cooper said. “So off we ran! If we get caught and returned, we will be flogged for sure and most likely imprisoned, but it is worth the risk to stay together.”

  “I understand how you feel,” I told her.

  She shook her head. “How can you, ma’am? You are a free-woman.”

  Free? Little did she know that I was bound as if by manacles and chains to a man I abhorred. But Mrs. Cooper was right to question my assumption that I could understand a slave’s feelings. I had not been born a human chattel, and my own dismal situation was of my own making entirely.

  “I only meant that I too would be willing to risk everything to stay with my man,” I said. “We too have loved each other since childhood.”

  “Where is your husband tonight?” Mr. Cooper asked, assuming he was the man of whom I spoke.

  “Away,” I replied and hoped he would not take offense at my curt answer. I turned my attention to the sleeping babe in Mrs. Cooper’s arms. “Girl or boy?”

  “A girl! Can’t you tell?” Mrs. Cooper drew back the blanket so I could fully appreciate her child’s feminine features. “She is but three months old. Would you like to hold her?”

  I had not considered doing so, but it seemed rude to refuse. I held the babe stiffly at first, but then, when she opened her big brown eyes and stared up at me, every muscle in my body softened and a heavenly warmth radiated through me. I had dandled a baby once or twice before, but never had I experienced such bliss whilst doing so. But then, no doubt upset to see a strange visage instead of her dear mother’s, the Cooper baby began wailing most furiously. Mrs. Cooper took her from me, and Mr. Cooper shook a wooden rattle to quiet her. But it did not.

  “She be hungry,” he said to his wife. His tone sounded scolding, but his expression was gentle and concerned.

  “I will try to satisfy her.” Turning from me, Mrs. Cooper unbuttoned her calico bodice.

  “My wife is not making enough milk for the poor mite,” Mr. Cooper told me. “Do you have a cow?”

  “No, but a neighbor across the Green does,” I replied. “I’ll go ask him for milk tomorrow morning. To do so this late at night would draw suspicion, I’m afraid.”

  Mr. Cooper nodded and moved his chair closer to his wife’s, wrapped his arm around her shoulders, and pressed his cheek against her turbaned head as she suckled their child. Not wishing to intrude on their intimacy, I left them alone in the kitchen and went upstairs to ready a bedchamber for them. When I returned about ten minutes later, Mrs. Cooper was pacing the room with the squalling baby, and Mr. Cooper was nowhere to be seen.

  “Has your husband gone out to the backhouse?” I asked Mrs. Cooper, thinking it would have been more prudent for him to have availed himself of a chamber pot.

  “He has gone to find a cow,” Mrs. Cooper said, patting the baby to soothe her.

  Less prudent still! I held my tongue but could not prevent a groan from escaping my mouth.

  “It will be all right,” Mrs. Cooper assured me. “He has done this a number of times since my milk started drying up.”

  But it was not all right. When Mr. Cooper returned with a bowl of milk he looked most anxious. “I fear I was seen,” he told us.

  “By whom?” I said.

  “An old white man who looked a bit balmy.”

  “Mr. Chadwick,” I said. “Did he say anything to you?”

  “No. He just rubbed his eyes and shook his head.”

  “Let us hope he thinks you were just part of his dream. He walks in his sleep.”

  “From the look on his face, he thought me a nightmare.” Mr. Cooper turned to his wife. “We should flee from here right now.”

  “No!” I said. “You cannot go running off into
the night.”

  “We’ll head for the next Station. Mr. Measure mentioned that it was in a town called Action.”

  “Acton, not Action,” I said. “Do you even know where it is?”

  “We will ask along the way. And when we get there, we will seek out Mr. Mill.”

  “All that asking and seeking will make you far too conspicuous,” I made haste to point out. “You might as well wear a signboard declaring yourself a runaway slave.”

  “Then what should we do?”

  How I wished Henry were there to give us the answer! But Mr. Cooper apparently expected me to. “If need be, I will guide you to Acton tonight,” I said as calm as you please. “But if Mr. Chadwick does not report what he saw to anyone and just goes back to bed, which is entirely possible, you are far safer to stay the night here. Keep watch at a front window through a slit in the curtain if you please, Mr. Cooper. And you, Mrs. Cooper, please wait in the pantry with the baby so her cries won’t be heard if someone comes to the door.”

  Relieved that they both followed my instructions, I ran up to the attic with a lantern, and from a storage trunk pulled out a pair of pantaloons, a jacket with brass buttons, tasseled boots, and a wide-brimmed hat that had belonged to Grandfather Walker. He was a slight, slender man, and his garb fit me well. Before departing my chamber, I left a quickly scrawled note for Adam on my bed and returned downstairs disguised as . . . well, as a most unfashionable lad, I suppose.

  The baby was no longer crying, and when I looked in the pantry I was happy to see her peacefully sucking milk from a dishcloth. Mrs. Cooper smiled at me, and for one brief moment I thought all would be well. But then Mr. Cooper ran into the kitchen and told me he had espied a very fat man dressed in a night shirt and britches approaching the house. Immediately thereafter came a pounding at the front door.

  “Let me in, Mrs. Pelletier,” bellowed Constable Beers.

  “What do you want?” I shouted back through the door.

  “I want that shlippery thief of a shlave you are hiding,” Beers replied, his speech slurred. “Mr. Chadwick roused me to report that milk has been stolen from his cow. He saw the culprit, a Negro, run to your house. I am here to arrest him for thievery, and if he turns out to be a fugitive I will do my best to return him to his rightful owner. That is the law!”

  “There is no one here but me,” I loudly avowed. “And you have frightened me most terribly, Constable Beers. I am trembling in my nightdress as I stand here.”

  “Open the door!” he demanded.

  “I pray you, allow me to make myself decent first. My nightdress is exceedingly thin.”

  This gave Beers pause for a moment. “Very well then. I give you permission to go dress yourself properly.”

  “Thank you, sir. You are a true gentleman.”

  Leaving him to await me at the front door, out the back door I slipped with the Cooper family. Mr. Cooper took the baby from his wife, and we ran down the yard toward the woods. The branches of the mountain laurel bushes poked and scratched at us as we clambered over the stone wall, and Mr. Cooper covered his child with his jacket to protect her. I glanced back, half expecting to see the rotund figure of Beers bowling down the yard toward us in pursuit. There was no sign of him.

  When we were on the other side of the wall I led the Coopers through the stand of beeches and deeper into the woods.

  “Do you know where we are going?” Mr. Cooper asked me.

  “Of course,” I replied. “The road to Acton lies on the other side of this woodland. We will get there easily enough if we head due west.”

  “Have you a compass?”

  “Yes, right here,” I said, tapping my forehead.

  I was not half as sure of myself as I attempted to sound, however. Although Adam and I had explored the area often, we had never done so at night. And the terrain I’d been familiar with as a child had changed over time. Indeed, nothing looked familiar to me as I led the Coopers onward until I spotted an old friend standing still in the moonlight. Hugo the Elephant! Or so Adam and I had dubbed this particular boulder because of its size and configuration. I recalled that the section of the rock formation shaped like an elephant’s head faced west and noted that when I too faced west the moon was over my right shoulder. I let that serve as my compass for the rest of our trek through the dense woodland, and we eventually reached the road.

  We picked up our pace. Behind us we heard dogs howling, but I doubted Beers would have had time to gather together a hunting party to chase after us. I doubted too that he would have had the inclination or energy to do so. He had no warrants for anyone’s arrest, for one thing. And he had sounded quite drunk, for another. It was far more likely that he had fallen asleep on my front stoop as he waited for me to open the door.

  Even so, when I heard a wagon coming fast toward us I told the Coopers that we must run off the road and hide behind a large elm tree standing in a field. The wagon passed us right by, the driver looking from side to side as he whipped his horse to urge more speed. Was he on the outlook for us? Or was he carrying word ahead to Acton to alert the constable there to be on the lookout for fugitives? Perhaps neither. When there is danger we see everything through the distorting lens of our fears.

  And fear can be exhausting. The Coopers looked completely fagged out by now. I told them that we must all rest for a moment and catch our breaths. Mrs. Cooper leaned against her husband, and I leaned against the elm. The solidity of the tree trunk seemed to give me strength. My breathing evened out, and I felt a connection to the Divine Intelligence at the center of my being. I released my fears and doubts, trusting this Intelligence to guide us to safety. We regained the road and continued on our way. We saw no one for the next few miles, but then a lame man appeared, staggering toward us from the opposite direction. I told the Coopers to keep the width of the road between us as we went past the man. As we drew closer I saw that he was not lame but quite drunk, in an animated argument with himself punctuated with bursts of profanity. We came abreast of him, and I looked directly in his face, ready to stare him down or stand up to a challenge. But he did not even look at us! It was then I realized that he was so hammered as to be near sightless, and even if we’d been a trio of bellowing hippopotamuses parading past him he would not have remarked us. He staggered out of sight.

  Forward we marched down the road, three abreast under the descending moon. The eastern sky began taking on a rosy tint from the coming dawn when we at last approached Acton. I spotted a thickly wooded area a hundred yards to the side of the road and told the Coopers to hide themselves in it whilst I went to town to find Mr. Mill. I did not know how I was going to find him, only that I must.

  I walked into Acton, a pleasant place of some prosperity, with a millpond providing water power to turn the saws, looms, and equipment at small manufactories that bring employment beyond farming. Disguised as a boy, I attracted hardly a glance. It gave me some small pleasure to meet passing men’s eyes with a bold and direct look, which for a woman would be thought pert or even saucy. I lengthened my stride and gave it a bit of swagger. For all I know I looked quite the fool, but no one laughed and called my bluff, so I was satisfied.

  As I came on the row of mill buildings the air was full of the rumble and clatter of machinery. I strode inside the first, a sawmill, and walked right into a hefty brute, his beard and hair and eyebrows stuffed with wood shavings and sawdust.

  “Blind, are you?” he barked at me as he rushed past. The collision sent me back hard against a beam, and I felt a jolt of pain in my shoulder and well nigh yelped in pain.

  The mill rumbled with activity as a double pair of up-and-down saws chomped through long logs. I espied a man who looked to be the owner or manager sitting behind a desk strewn with papers and made my way to him, my tread kicking up sawdust. I had to shout to get his attention.

  “What is it you want?” he hollered back.

  I told him I was seeking work for want of anything better to say.

  He glared
at me with narrowed eyes and impatiently tugged at his white, scraggly chin beard. “Ever swung a cant hook, boy?”

  I shook my head.

  “Do you know how to use a crosscut to square up logs?”

  I shook my head again.

  “Well, can you at least use a race knife?”

  Another head shake.

  “Off with you then,” the mill boss said. “You can be of no use to me.”

  “Perhaps I can,” I stalled. “Would you like me to foretell your future?”

  He drew back in his chair. “You claim to be a fortuneteller?”

  “An astrologer,” I said. “And just by looking at you I can tell you were born under the sign of the goat.”

  “You think I look like a goat?”

  In truth, he rather did, but of course I did not say so. “The goat represents the sign of Capricorn in the zodiac,” I stated with a conspiratorial look and waited for him to signal me that he understood the code.

  He did not. “Get away from me with your Black Arts!” he shouted. “I am a good Christian.”

  Apparently I did not move fast enough, for he sprang up, came around the desk, grabbed me by the back of my collar, and half-lifted me off my feet as he hustled me outside.

  “Be gone, you gypsy imp! Be gone!” he shouted after me as I ran down the street. Other men stopped to glare at me, and I felt something hit me between the shoulders. A stone? A horse turd? I did not pause to look.

  The next mill I entered was a carding establishment with piles of raw wool just inside the door. The air was full of wool fluff as the needles on the rotating carding engines pulled and aligned the raw wool fibers to make them ready for spinning. An elderly man approached me, and, before I could say a word, he told me to show him my hands.