Maggie shook herself and dropped to her knees, draping herself around Horace and spreading her nightclothes across his lap.
“Now you happy?” Maggie hissed. “You done discovered my big secret. Horace here is my man.”
As he looked at Horace, Augustin’s face grew dark. A shiver racked his frame. He focused on Hickox. “Take your brute and never enter my property again.”
Hickox, his body rigid and sidearm still in his hand, met Augustin’s outraged gaze and then cast a murderous eye on Dr. McCooke.
“That boy may be hidden,” argued the doctor. “Question her, not me.”
“To all of us comes our moment of reckoning,” said Hickox. He turned to Galway. “The wolf may already be at your door.”
“Go!” yelled Augustin. The slave catchers withdrew.
Maggie nodded to Horace, who wrapped the blanket close and disappeared into her room.
Another shiver racked Augustin.
“Too much excitement for you,” said McCooke lightly, as if nothing extraordinary had happened. “We must get you back to bed.” He took his patient’s arm.
Helen stepped forward. “Is that it? Dr. McCooke brings those villains into our house and nothing happens?”
“Your husband is an ill man,” said the doctor, smartly. “He needs my services and can’t be disturbed any further.”
“Both of you, be quiet,” said Augustin, teeth chattering. He turned to his wife. “Just get me back to the library.”
Helen’s mouth opened to oppose her husband, but she saw fear and pain in his eyes. She took one arm. McCooke took the other. Together the two bore the weight of the man and moved slowly toward the front of the house.
“Maggie,” Augustin called, “get Horace out of here.”
“Yes sir, Mr. Augustin,” she said.
Within a few steps, Helen felt a discomfort in her abdomen. It must be from the day’s exertions, she thought. With difficulty, she continued to the library and helped settle her husband in bed, carefully lifting his injured leg and setting it on soft feather pillows.
“Get me that opium,” said Augustin, breathing hard and gritting his rattling teeth. His hands quivered as he raised the sheet, making it seem as if a wintry breeze had blown through the room.
“Mrs. Elizabeth Preston McDowell Benton also grew very fatigued,” said the doctor as he rummaged through his medicine bag. “But all she needed was steady doses,” he pulled out a vial of brown liquid and counted drops into a tumbler, “until she completely recovered herself.”
“Shut up and give me the opium,” said Augustin.
Helen put her hand on her husband’s shoulder, head close to his ear. “This man is not your friend,” she said in a low tone. “He has … other designs.” She felt fever radiating from his core.
He started to cough and suddenly turned his head and vomited into a towel.
“Doctor,” Helen cried.
McCooke sauntered over, the dose of opium-laced brandy in his hand. “We must let the spasm pass,” he said. As Augustin retched, Mc-Cooke leaned toward her and spoke quietly: “Older people are so difficult. I wonder how you … Well, we endure what we must. You’re so beautiful. The respectful thing would be for you to be surrounded by the proper servants. And I don’t mean ignorant Negroes.”
Helen turned away from him and put her hand on Augustin’s shoulder as he heaved and coughed.
McCooke again bent to her ear. “You must understand the danger that cook represents. My mother made the mistake of trusting an African. Father died and she put the black boy in charge as overseer of the plantation. I was away, of course. Medical school. Nothing I could have done. When I got back that presumptuous nigger had lost everything. We were worse than poor because we knew what we lost. I sold that boy so fast.” He smirked. “He found himself chained up and walking to New Orleans to the slave market there. He had the vanity to think he was as good as my father. I kicked his black ass all the way to hell.”
“Doctor,” Helen snapped. “Your patient.”
He stepped to Augustin’s side. “You don’t know how the blacks are. Smile in your face and stab you in the back,” he whispered. “I have my eye on that cook. She’ll soon be on the street. I promise you. I’ll get you a proper lady’s maid. Won’t that be nice? A nice white girl to style your hair? Someone to talk to?”
She stared at McCooke, her hand unconsciously brushing back some stray curls.
He cocked his eyebrow and smiled. “You really are lovely. You deserve what’s due a lady. Let me assist you.”
“Anything,” she begged. “Just help him.”
“Of course. That’s why I’m here. Don’t worry. I’ll get him right.” The coughing stopped and McCooke handed the glass to Galway. “Here you go. Drink that down. That’s right.”
Helen backed away. He had somehow defeated her. As she left, the stitch in the bottom of her stomach sharpened. In the hallway, a frustrated sob escaped her. Just then, around the kitchen door, she saw a crack of light. Maggie waved her over and pulled her into the room.
“We’re getting her outta that cistern and into the bedroom,” she whispered, nodding toward Sylvanus, Stewart, and Horace, as they pulled Imari up through the trapdoor. “Mr. Augustin’s mad?”
“Aren’t you afraid that Hickox will return?”
“That white boy gone and followed them to be sure a where they’re going.”
Despite herself, Helen felt a twinge of disappointment. “Augustin had some kind of attack,” she murmured, “and the doctor is tending to him. You must be careful. Dr. McCooke said he’s watching you.”
“He gets too close to the stove, he might just find himself burnt up.”
“I’m sorry,” said Helen. “I tried to warn Augustin about the doctor.” Several tears fell down her cheek.
“You done good tonight,” said Maggie, patting Helen’s shoulder. She dabbed at the tears with the cuff of her nightgown. “We won ’cause a you. Nobody hurt or killed or captured. We got a ways to go, but tonight, we won.” Maggie held her candle high and studied Helen’s face. “You look tired. Go to bed. I’ll finish with Imari and take care a things back here.”
Pryce hustled to keep close to the two slavers as they rode toward the National Hotel.
“Whatta we do now?” asked Swift.
“You shut up,” said the older man. “Unless you’ve suddenly grown a brain.”
The younger slaver seemed to be trying to master a potent rage. They passed Chancellor Square, now empty of the comet-sighting crowd. Pryce thought back to his time with Helen. Had he just seen her helping with an escaped slave? It was impossible, but there she’d been. Who was she, really? Then he remembered: she was a married woman. He huffed in frustration.
Swift turned. Pryce’s heart suddenly accelerated, making itself felt in a most urgent way. He veered into the park.
“Now what are you looking at?” demanded Hickox.
Pryce thought he heard the muscular man say, “Nothing. Must have been a cat.”
Back on Bleecker Street, Stewart’s large form moved in Pryce’s direction.
“That them?” whispered Stewart as he approached.
“They seem to be heading to their hotel. Did you get that poor woman out of the cistern?”
“With some difficulty, yes.” Stewart shook his head. “To have illegal doings happen so close to the convention is unfortunate.”
“Does … does this sort of thing happen often?”
“No.” Stewart considered for a moment. “At least, not here. It’s better if I don’t know all that goes on, frankly. I have a job to do. A populace to enlighten. So charging around at midnight and narrowly avoiding men like those? It doesn’t help the two and a half million in chains.” He leaned over Pryce. “Must you go back home? Didn’t you say you have a debt to pay?” He thumped the young man on the shoulder. “Why not stay for a few weeks and help me? I’ll give you a fair wage and throw in boarding at my home.”
Pryce straightened. Could he? He had ne
ver imagined helping someone hide from the authorities. His heart was still pumping wildly in his chest. Such exhilaration. And Helen. He could see her again. And he’d be able to pay back Mr. Galway … Helen’s husband. His shoulders drooped. “I’ve strewn my path with follies that would have been completely avoided by a man following an honorable course.”
“Good works outweigh the bad,” said Stewart. “After the convention, you can pay your debt. Just think—you will be able to tell your friends that you were there at the founding of the New York State Anti-Slavery Society.”
Pryce’s father believed the round-trip journey should take two weeks, but he had allowed that his son might need to occasionally get off the boat so as not to go mad. This meant he might have as long as three weeks before he was expected to return to Little Falls. He would stay and help do something. As for his father, he didn’t need to know anything about the delay, not right away, at least. He would enlighten him—soon.
“I’ll do it,” Pryce said in a jolly tone. “Maybe Utica isn’t all bad.” He pumped Stewart’s hand.
“The jury has yet to decide that,” said Stewart.
* * *
Hickox threw his stony body against the door of his room at the National Hotel. The wood absorbed the blow and bumped him back into the hallway. The night had been a disaster. They had been ordered off the property and now the damnable key would not turn in the lock. It was all because of that murderess. He and Swift would not be allowed back in the house without solid proof and the sheriff. She might just slip through his grasp again. After Mr. Colby’s shocking death, he had pursued her using every resource he possessed and she was still nothing but smoke.
At best, chasing slaves was a thankless job, but one in which he took much pride. He was a bulwark against disorder and the return of the reign of Chaos. On the nighttime roads and trails of Virginia, he chased those who refused to accept the place the good Lord made for them. Occasionally the task took him farther. In his experience, only the most determined, the craftiest, the most ruthless runaways made it this far, and never without help. Were it not for men like himself the world would disintegrate and the final bloody battle—an insurrection led by a new Nat Turner and carried out by pitiless murderers—would surely begin.
“Let me try,” said Swift. He shouldered past Hickox, grabbed the key from his hand, and jiggled it in the heavy metal lock. “Sometimes it ain’t about power, but having the touch.”
“Judging from your ugly face, you got touched a little too often,” said Hickox.
Swift dragged his finger down the broken ridge of his nose then shook his hand. “You gotta relax sometimes. Learned that in the ring. Too rigid and you break your own bones.”
He turned his attention to the lock and tried the key. The mechanism clicked and the door sprang open. He stepped aside as Hickox stalked into the room, stopping at the window over the canal to peer out. Swift fell on his bed, the springs squeaking under his bulk.
Hickox noticed a sealed letter on the floor. He picked it up, recognized the handwriting, and ripped into it like a man might tear open a lacy privacy curtain in a whore’s bedroom. He threw the letter to the ground.
“Barnwell’s not a quarter of his father!” he shouted. “That imbecile.”
Swift rubbed his face in exhausted confusion. “What’d it say?”
“That nigger? The one Mr. Colby gave his very life to catch? He’s escaped again.”
“But you got your money, right?”
“You simpleton. He’s coming here. I know it.” Hickox stooped to grab the letter. “This is dated October 1. Why am I just receiving it?”
“We was in New York then.”
“We must prepare. That bitch might be having her baby right now. If she does, she and the boy will move on, or at least change locations.”
“How do you know they’s still even here? It looked quiet to me.”
“Because even a snail leaves a trail and that trail stopped at Galway’s.”
PART TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
IN THE DAYS AFTER the slave catchers had searched the property, it was as if three different fortresses had been erected in the house. Only necessary words were spoken across their borders.
Maggie ruled in the kitchen and her bedroom. From all appearances, she went about her normal duties. But most of her focus was on the two people in her room behind the locked door. She slept on the floor while Imari and Joe shared her bed. For their sakes, she partially ceded the care of Augustin to the doctor. All the curtains at the back of the house were drawn day and night. People with nothing to hide did not keep their windows obscured. That in itself was an admission of guilt, but it could not be helped. In her opinion, the woman was much too close to giving birth to be moved.
Imari had submitted to Maggie’s ministering and gained strength, but was still in much discomfort. Twenty-three lead balls had been removed from her body. After having poultices of comfrey leaves applied to each and every wound, and cleanings with the cook’s own witch hazel solution, her injuries had scabbed over, but remained very tender. The unborn child clung to life, giving Imari a daily reminder of its commitment to be born with hiccups and kicks that stretched the long bird shot wounds across her stomach. She and Maggie talked for hours. In the quiet times, when Maggie was at her work, Imari obsessed about her missing husband, imagining him hurt, or sold, or dead. Occasionally she had feverish visions of him coming toward her, finally catching up.
Joe paced the small bedroom feeling like a cat stuck in a tree whose lone view was of a pack of barking dogs. His only relief from his confinement was sleep. But if Maggie and his mother were talking, he closed his eyes, slowed his breathing, and listened to everything they said—learning much with every conversation.
Augustin stayed in the library, floating between the intensity of his pain and the depth of his opium-induced oblivion. Maggie told him that “Job” refused to come back to work. No new boy would be hired, she said. “I’ll take care a everything. Like always.”
“That is what I prefer,” he replied.
Dr. McCooke kept Augustin supplied with medicine, and himself with alcohol. During the days, he sipped from crystal glassware or, while about town, took small nips from his brand-new silver flask. Evenings he drank his fill promising that come morning, he would abstain. But at sunrise his shaking hands would betray him and he’d keep at the spirits despite his best intentions. He often escaped the house and went downtown to restock, with Galway’s money in his pocket. A sliver of his mind wondered if having this much access to liquor was ruining him. The ghost of poor Miss Duphorne of Albany fluttered at the edge of his consciousness, but he turned his thoughts away before she fully materialized. At the house, he seemed to keep his distance from Maggie and Helen. If he dared to step into the kitchen, the cook picked up the closest knife and started hacking away at whatever food was in front of her. She took to carrying an impressively large specimen of cutlery, tucked into the strings of her apron, even while she served. He often lingered in the hallway outside Helen’s bedroom, but never attempted any communication.
Helen sequestered herself in her chambers. Using the fabric that she had bought in town, she sewed tiny nightgowns and infant’s dresses, decorating the garments with intricate needlework at the necks and hems. Mostly she imagined Imari’s baby wearing them, occasionally dreaming about how her own child would fill out the clothing. She took her meals alone. Maggie brought in food and gave her reports about Imari’s condition. Both women agreed that the doctor was actively watching them and so they did nothing to bring attention to the fugitives. Helen only joined her husband when summoned.
Pryce Anwell was much on her mind. She relived the time they’d spent together in Chancellor Square, conversing like equals. He had been part of Imari and Joe’s rescue, and in that he knew her greatest secret. And he had taken the risk of trailing the slave catchers so that the others would be safe. But would she see him again? The problem wasn’t just t
he watchful eyes of the doctor. It was the sin of it. Numerous times she resolved to not think of Pryce, but her mind was stuck deep in the mud of desire. With each rendition, the memories of him warped themselves into even more seductive fantasies. Every time she pushed out the lurid thoughts and worked to cleanse her mind of temptation, she found herself in another version, committing the same base actions. According to all she had learned in the church, she was now marked by the scarlet stain of intent.
Nothing she tried, not reading, not embroidery, not even prayer, washed her clean. One morning, she sat looking at the evergreen outside her window. The low autumn sun broke through the clouds, throwing streaks of light into the room. She became aware of the girls next door as they recited poetry. Their voices chimed in unison, the sound rising and falling with the breeze off Ballou basin.
“Nature imparts her gifts to all;
And every creature, large or small,
That frolics in the sea or strand,
Receives some favors at her hand.”
Helen recognized the verse of the Greek poet Anacreon of Ionia. She got up and opened the window, allowing invigorating air into the stale room and sending the dust swirling away. Her voice rose to join the others:
“To man, more bountifully kind,
She gave the nobler powers of mind;
And woman, too, was not forgot;
Both grace and beauty are her lot,
Whose potent influence will prevail
When wisdom, wit, and weapons fail.”
It was the fundamentum for Miss Manahan’s lecture on female influence. The lady had incorporated Reverend Austin’s notes for his book A Voice to Youth, which had been given to many of the city’s headmasters and mistresses in anticipation of its publication. The book, the reverend hoped, would become “mandatory material for each child to purchase and consult with frequency.”
Helen had never truly considered the meaning of the poem, but repeating it as an adult in her own home, she heard the words anew. Was it true that all she had was grace and beauty? Did women possess no wisdom or wit? It was absurd. She had been surrounded by girls with both those attributes, and more. Miss Manahan would never have been able to run a school without learning and cleverness. Maggie was more like a ship’s captain than a mere deckhand. Why, even a female runaway slave proved to have been a formidable adversary to Hickox.
The Third Mrs. Galway Page 19