LIZZY

by Jim Wetton

  Lizzy inhaled and smirked at herself. It had been almost forty years ago. She thought of her brothers. Her father. Martin. So much has happened since then. So many lives have been affected.

  Lizzy turned again to look at the monument. She thought of Jacob and Hannah almost a hundred years ago. She thought of her father and his own quest to see the West and then deciding to follow after his own father’s dream of being a preacher. So much changes. It all goes by so fast. A chilling thought pierced through her. It’ll never be over. More and more will change. Life will never sit still. Culture will change. Wrongs will need to be made right. We all are just a bit of sand, placed on this little place to do what we can with the very short time that we have. Some longer than others, but. . . .

  She thought of Mary Elizabeth. Of Martin and James. Thoughts came to her as far back as her little brother, gone missing for so many years.

  Yes, Johnny Russell. He’s out there, I just know it. He doesn’t know that I exist, nor do I know where he is. But until the day that I know for sure, he will forever be alive in my mind. Wherever that may be.

  Lizzy shook away her deep thoughts and looked again at the tall monument. She marveled at the vastness of unused land around her. This would be a perfect spot to honor more of our great men. Ah yes, and our great women! She laughed at her thoughts. Silly as they were, she knew she was on to something.

  She looked to the riverbank just this side of the Potomac. Need to put a bridge there. Perfect spot for a nice memorial, too. To whom, I could only guess, but it would be grand, yes indeed. She smiled in deep thought as she looked across the basin in front of her where the children had been playing. They were long gone. The ducks swam around waiting for the next child to come along to fill their stomachs. This too would be a wonderful spot to honor someone. Maybe make a riverfront statue of someone. Who, I know not. But if it were up to me, it would be someone like Lincoln or Jefferson or who knows? Maybe this whippersnapper Teddy Roosevelt.

  The thought of it all made her laugh out loud. A couple walked in front of her and scowled. She shrugged their look off and laughed again. “Central Park all over again, Lizzy girl. You’d better watch yourself. Some may think you to be a bit on the looney side.” Her laughing continued and it felt good. It had been so long since she’d been able to laugh that way and she didn’t want it to stop. She slapped her thigh and continued to laugh.

  *  *  *  *

  “Your daughter said I’d be able to find you out here.”

  Lizzy gasped. Startled by this sudden intrusion, she jerked her head around to where the voice was coming from.

  “I told her that she looked a lot like you did back when. About the same time that you used to call me ‘Moses.’”

  Lizzy’s jaw dropped and her muscles tightened at the familiar term. Her head whipped around as she jumped to her feet.

  “Oh, my God!” Lizzy exclaimed. “Is that really you, Harriet?”

  “It’s really me, child. A much older me, but, yes, it’s really me.”

  The two women hugged tightly and the warmth of the embrace caused Lizzy to break down and cry.

  “There, there child, you just go ahead and let it out. We’ve been through a lot, you and me, so we’ll just get through this one together as well, OK?”

  Harriet Tubman had aged well for being in her mid-seventies. She was dressed in a long black dress with a bleached white collar. An orange and black bandana covered her entire head but it was the smile that was as radiant as Lizzy had remembered. It was a familiar look. The same look that Lizzy recalled from the days of the Underground Railroad.

  “I, I don’t understand,” Lizzy choked out between cries. “How, I mean, who . . . ?”

  “There now, child, sit and I’ll explain,” Tubman said gently. “I knew something was amiss when you didn’t come to my presentation last year. I did a pretty good job, if I do say so myself, but I knew that you’d have been there, so something was up.”

  Tubman sat next to Lizzy and continued. “It was for the opening of the National Federation of African American Women. I’d tell you the acronym but heck, it’s too long and I always misspeak the letters, much to everyone’s dismay. Anyway, I was the keynote speaker, you know.”

  Lizzy smiled and wiped her cheek. “I, I’m sure you were splendid and I do hope you know how much I wanted to come; I really did, Moses.”

  “I know you did, child,” Tubman said as she reached for Lizzy’s hands. “Your daughter was at your place when I came looking for you. She told me all about your, well, that horrific night.”

  Tubman put both hands on Lizzy’s cheeks and looked squarely at her. “Oh, dear Lord, Lizzy, I am so, so very sorry. I just ache at the thought of how terrible that must have been for you. And just to think it had only been a few years since you lost. . . .”

  “You, you saw my Nellie, did you?” Lizzy cut off Tubman and wiped her nose. “Did you see my granddaughter, too?”

  “I did, and by the way your Nellie looks, I’d say that a new grandbaby will be here before you know it.” Tubman laughed.

  “Yes, she’s been a life saver for me lately,” Lizzy began. “You see, when I lost Martin and James in ’93, I only survived because of my two girls. Don’t know if you knew, but my oldest, well, he’s settled in California, of all places. He’s busy and he rarely writes so it was my two girls that helped me tread the raging waters until I could carry on. Now it’s Nellie who’s been my hero. She’s always there for me and, pray tell, she’s got her own issues to deal with. A husband, a youngster and one on the way. Heaven knows where she finds the time to manage her little family, let alone deal with her very emotional and unpredictable mother. But I can tell you, Moses, she has saved me from the depths of despair and I just don’t know what I’d do without her.”

  “Well, child, speaking of that, I just may have something that may help you along, and maybe help Miss Nellie as well,” Tubman began. “As I recall, you were hot as Hades behind the Underground Railroad and if anyone was to ask me, you and Martin were the spearheads to many fine folks finding their freedom. Well, child, if you can be as passionate about what I’m proposing as you were about saving a bunch of colored folks, then I think you’re going to fit in just fine. Trust me, though, this isn’t in no way going to take away the sting of what you’ve gone through in the past few years, but it’ll be a heap of help in moving through it.”

  Lizzy stared at Tubman, anxious to hear more. They repositioned themselves on their bench and took a moment to look around. The sun had shifted and was now shimmering off the Potomac. The star-filtered reflection off the water reminded Lizzy of the view from her great-grandfather Jacob’s back porch. Tubman pointed to a flock of geese taking flight. They marveled at their perfect formation with the one bird leading the rest. As if in sync, both Lizzy and Tubman turned to one another and commented on the lead bird:

  “Got to be a woman!”

  After a moment of relaxed laughter, Tubman turned towards Lizzy. Her expression changed from gaiety to a most-determined look.

  “The thing is, Lizzy, I’m going to ask you to pull all of that passion that you once held to freeing us colored folks into the same kind of passion, but this time for all of us womenfolk.”

  Lizzy turned her puzzled face towards Tubman. “What are you saying, Moses? “

  “Come on, child. First of all, you’ve been through the Railroad and you know how to organize and if my mind serves me well, you also used to be quite the talker.”

  Lizzy began to object but Tubman’s narrowed eyes told her not to bother. “But, you know what convinces me the most?”

  Lizzy shrugged.

  “Damn girl, look at who you are!” Tubman laughed.

  “Uh, a mother?” Lizzy’s naïve response caused Tubman to choke with laughter.

  “Oh, dear Lordy, give me strength!” Tubman called out. “Lizzy, you’re a woman for Christ’s sake! What better credentials do you need? You’re a woman, with the voice for women!”


  “I’m a woman,” Lizzy whispered the words slowly at first then repeated them. “I am a woman now, aren’t I?”

  Lizzy raised her voice with her last comment, ignoring the looks from a group of what looked like college students walking by. After they’d passed, she looked sadly at the ground and exhaled, remembering those same words. “That’s exactly what Martin told me just before he died.”

  “Martin say that?”

  Lizzy looked over at the Washington Monument and her thoughts turned away from Martin and towards Hannah. “Yes, Martin did tell me that, but this is Hannah talking to me, Moses. I hear it loud and clear. This is definitely Hannah.”

  “Hannah?”

  “Oh dear, do I need to tell you about my Hannah!” Lizzy’s eyes widened at the thought of telling Tubman all about her great-grandmother.

  “Well you can tell me later, ’cause we need to get over to Constitution Avenue. There’s a heap of women that I’d like to introduce you to.”

  “Now?”

  “Come on, girl, as you once told me on the Railroad. ‘The train’s not going to slow down for nobody, so hop on or hop off!’” Tubman turned her head and shifted her eyes toward Lizzy. “Ever hear of Susan Anthony or Elizabeth Stanton?”

  “No! Those two women are with you on this?” Lizzy shot up from the bench. “Harriet, you really want me to rub elbows with the likes of them? Come on now, I’m a nobody! I’ve no clue how to do what those women have done. I’m just a plain old woman. A woman who has no husband.”

  Lizzy slowed her last words as her eyes filled with tears. “With no husband and now without one son and a daughter.”

  “Child, you still have a daughter and many granddaughters coming your way who need your help! You still have a son in California who is married to, well, let me think . . . a woman!”

  Lizzy looked down but smiled at Tubman’s humor.

  “Oh, dear Lordy, Lizzy! Martin said it plain as day. You are a woman, with many of those women who need you. You don’t need Martin; bless his soul, but you don’t need him. You are a woman and your women need you!”

  “I am a woman,” Lizzy mumbled softly. She thought of Mary Elizabeth’s comment about being a spinster. “She didn’t need a husband; she really didn’t. She too was a woman.”

  “Who, child?” Tubman’s left eyebrow raised.

  “Mary Elizabeth was worried that she’d never get married.”

  “So why don’t you make a stand right here and now for all the Mary Elizabeths in this great country of ours? Dedicate yourself to joining up with us. You, me, Elizabeth Stanton and Susan and all the other women who have dedicated their lives so women can finally have the same voice as our menfolk.”

  Tubman took in a deep breath and looked to the sky before continuing. “Dear God, Lizzy, I waited and was blessed to see my kind set free.”

  Lizzy listened carefully as she watched Tubman rub a tear away from under her eye before continuing. “I received an answer to a prayer when I saw our menfolk become citizens and receive their right to vote.”

  Awkward silence permeated the air around them as Lizzy’s eyebrow’s furrowed with anticipation.

  “But damn, child! That’s where the buck stops if you ask me! How is it that our colored men received their freedom, their citizenship and then their right to vote when all the women of this country, black or white, have yet to be given the dignity and right to cast a single vote. No, child, it’s time to build that next railroad. Not for the colored no more. No, this railroad needs to be for all women to have the right to speak up and be heard through the vote of our conscience.”

  “Is that how you sounded at that conference last year? My God you’re good!” Lizzy teased with a smile.

  “No teasing, child. Are you with us?”

  Lizzy pondered the question and looked once more toward to the top of Washington’s monument. Is this what you’ve been trying to ask of me all these years, Hannah? Is it? If so, I’m all in. I do ask though, that you hold my hand as I move forward and ask Mary Elizabeth to send her angels down to guide my way, will you?

  Lizzy reached out to give Tubman a hug. When she leaned back, she wiped a stray tear from her cheek and cleared her throat. “Harriet Moses Tubman, if you and your high society women will have this plain ol’ Jane, well, I’m as in as I ever can be. But Hannah has to come with me.”

  “Someday, you’re going to have to tell me all about this Hannah,” Tubman laughed as she began to rise. “For some reason, I feel like I know her better than you may think. Is she still living?”

  “Oh, she most certainly is,” Lizzy giggled. “She’s in a diary. She’s in a cedar box. She’s in that monument over yonder, but you know what? She’s right here.” Lizzy lifted her hand to place it over her heart and smiled lovingly.

  “Never knew her, Moses. But in some ways, I know her all too well. She’s asked me to carry on the Monroe name; but more importantly, she’s asked me to make sure that the Monroe women have a voice. Martin had always encouraged me. Mary Elizabeth was going to be my partner in crime and through all of the tears and heartache. It will be Hannah who will pave the way for me to carry on.”

  Lizzy turned away from Tubman and looked over at the Washington Monument. She stood silently and could sense that Tubman was looking in the same direction as she was. She shook her head slowly and breathed in hard and exhaled. Thank you, Hannah. I am a woman and I intend to make you proud.

  “Ready to go, child?” Tubman cautiously asked.

  “Yes, I’m very ready.”

  Lizzy extended a hand to Tubman and helped her get to her feet. They turned and strolled arm in arm around the basin.

  “It really is a beautiful spot you come to,” Tubman said as she looked over at the basin. “I do wish, though, that next time you’d find something that’s a bit closer. I’m as tough as nails, but even so, I think I’ve aged ten years with that jaunt that I just took to get to you. You know, child, I’m not a spring chicken anymore.”

  “Oh, Moses, you’ll always be the youngest spring chicken I know. Plus, one of the most passionate and that, my dear friend, inspires me.” The two began to make their way towards the trail. “From the East Coast to the West Coast, mark my word: you’ll go down in history as the pioneer of pioneers for all women. Black or white.”

  They walked around the west side of the basin towards the Potomac. The air had shifted and was filled with moisture from the water. The path in front of them had been worn from the plethora of sightseers who, like Lizzy, loved to walk it on a daily basis. The quacking coming from the shoreline caused Lizzy to pause and observe with delight. “This really is such a beautiful spot, don’t you agree?”

  Tubman only nodded as she walked alongside Lizzy in silence. The only sounds around them were their feet cracking the hard dirt of the trail and nature.

  “I really would like to get my daughter-in-law involved somehow. She’s in California, but I just know that she’d be one to get on board with this type of movement.”

  “California?” Tubman asked as she suddenly and uncharacteristically stopped and gasped.

  “Oh Lizzy!” Tubman turned towards Lizzy. “I am so sorry; I just, well I just . . . !”

  “What is it, Moses? Are you all right?”

  “Oh, yes, I’m fine! A bit scattered most days, this day for example! It’s just. . . .” Tubman searched her belongings while scolding herself for her forgetfulness. “I just plumb forgot.”

  “Forgot what?”

  “Your daughter, uh. . . .”

  “Nellie?”

  “Yes, Nellie. Well, she, oh how could I have been so scatterbrained?”

  “Harriet, what is it? Is, is Nellie all right?”

  Tubman stopped and reached into her purse. “Your daughter’s just fine, child. It’s me you have to worry about! Heaven help me, but she gave me a letter to give to you. She said it would cheer you up more than anything could.” Tubman reached into her bag as she scolded herself out loud. />
  “Here it is child; here’s the letter.”

  As Lizzy reached out and took hold of the letter, she glanced at the return address:

  William Fester Monroe

  San Francisco, California

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  What Happened to My Son?

  1897

  The carriage ride earlier that morning took her past the Potomac Basin and into Virginia. She hadn’t spent much time in Alexandria but today was a much-needed meeting that she couldn’t miss. The breeze felt good on her face. She told herself that she’d never get accustomed to the summers in D.C. Hot, humid and plain old miserable.

  Harriet Tubman had set up a small meeting. Lizzy thought of it more as a “meet and greet;” nevertheless, it was a meeting that Tubman deemed essential in order to bring Lizzy into the fold with the other leaders for the suffragist movement.

  At the meeting was Susan Anthony, a stout woman with dark black hair. Her jaw was tight and square, her nose pointed and her eyes fiercely focused. She was in her mid-seventies but had the spit of someone half her age. When Lizzy was first introduced, she held out her hand with caution, not knowing if it would be shaken or bit.

  Elizabeth Stanton was the woman who stood out to her. At first glance, Lizzy noticed that she was short and maybe a tad plump but she hid it well with loose clothing. Her spunk had faded over the years but her demeanor still stood firm. Her hair had grayed and shimmered through the thin scarf she wore over her head. Her voice was hoarse but confident. Neither woman seemed anything like the stories that Lizzy had heard from Tubman.

  Tubman had told Lizzy, much to her chagrin, that when Elizabeth Stanton said her vows, she did so by deleting the phrase, “honor and obey.” She had given birth to seven children, which caused Lizzy to raise an eyebrow. Fighting for women’s rights, yet still populating the world as the Good Book says. . . . Impressive!