Not a moment was lost by the three around that dying bed, chafing those cold limbs, administering the stimulants which the dead, exhausted system no longer felt.
“She doesn’t suffer! Thank God, at any rate, for that!” said Clayton, as he knelt over her in anguish.
A beautiful smile passed over her face as she opened her eyes and looked on them all, and said: —
“No, my poor friends, I don’t suffer. I’m come to the land where they never suffer. I’m only so sorry for you! Edward,” she said to him, “do you remember what you said to me once? — It has come now. You must bear it like a man. God calls you to some work — don’t shrink from it. You are baptized with fire. It all lasts only a little while. It will be over soon, very soon! Edward, take care of my poor people. Tell Tom to be kind to them. My poor, faithful, good Harry! Oh! I’m going so fast!”
The voice sank into a whispering sigh. Life now seemed to have retreated to the citadel of the brain. She lay apparently in the last sleep, when the footsteps of the doctor were heard on the veranda. There was a general spring to the door, and Dr. Butler entered, pale, haggard, and worn from constant exertion and loss of rest. He did not say in words that there was no hope, but his first dejected look said it but too plainly.
She moved her head a little, like one who is asleep uneasily upon her pillow, opened her eyes once more, and said,—” Good-by! I will arise and go to my Father!” The gentle breath gradually became fainter and fainter, — all hope was over! The night walked on with silent and solemn footsteps — soft showers fell without, murmuring upon the leaves — within, all was still as death!
“They watched her breathing through the night,
Her breathing soft and low,
As in her breast the wave of life
Kept heaving to and fro.
“So silently they seemed to speak,
So slowly moved about,
As they had lent her half their powers
To eke her living out.
“Their very hopes belied their fears,
Their fears their hopes belied —
They thought her dying when she slept,
And sleeping when she died.
“For when the morn came dim and sad,
And chill with early showers,
Her quiet eyelids closed — she had
Another morn than ours.”
CHAPTER XXXVII
THE TIE BREAKS
CLAYTON remained at Canema several days after the funeral. He had been much affected by the last charge given him by Nina, that he should care for her people; and the scene of distress which he witnessed among them, at her death, added to the strength of his desire to be of service to them.
He spent some time in looking over and arranging Nina’s papers. He sealed up the letters of her different friends, and directed them in order to be returned to the writers, causing Harry to add to each a memorandum of the time of her death. His heart sunk heavily when he reflected how little it was possible for any one to do for servants left in the uncontrolled power of a man like Tom Gordon. The awful words of his father’s decision, with regard to the power of the master, never seemed so dreadful as now, when he was to see this unlimited authority passed into the hands of one whose passions were his only law. He recalled, too, what Nina had said of the special bitterness existing between Tom and Harry; and his heart almost failed him when he recollected that the very step which Nina, in her generosity, had taken to save Lisette from his lawlessness, had been the means of placing her, without remedy, under his power. Under the circumstances, he could not but admire the calmness and firmness with which Harry still continued to discharge his duties to the estate; visiting those who were still ailing, and doing his best to prevent their sinking into a panic which might predispose to another attack of dis ease. Recollecting that Nina had said something of some kind of a contract, by which Harry’s freedom was to be secured in case of her death, he resolved to speak with him on the subject. As they were together in the library, looking over the papers, Clayton said to him: —
“Harry, is there not some kind of contract, or understanding, with the guardians of the estate, by which your liberty was secured in case of the death of your mistress?”
“Yes,” said Harry, “there is such a paper. I was to have my freedom on paying a certain sum, which is all paid in to five hundred dollars.”
“I will advance you that money,” said Clayton, unhesitatingly, “if that is all that is necessary. Let me see the paper.”
Harry produced it, and Clayton looked it over. It was a regular contract, drawn in proper form, and with no circumstance wanting to give it validity. Clayton, however, knew enough of the law which regulates the condition in which Harry stood, to know that it was of no more avail in his case than so much blank paper. He did not like to speak of it, but sat reading it over, weighing every word, and dreading the moment when he should be called upon to make some remark concerning it; knowing, as he did, that what he had to say must dash all Harry’s hopes, — the hopes of his whole life. While he was hesitating a servant entered and announced Mr. Jekyl; and that gentleman, with a business-like directness which usually characterized his movements, entered the library immediately after.
“Good-morning, Mr. Clayton,” he said, and then, nodding patronizingly to Harry, he helped himself to a chair and stated his business, without further preamble.
“I have received orders from Mr. Gordon to come and take possession of the estate and chattels of his deceased sister without delay.”
As Clayton sat perfectly silent, it seemed to occur to Mr. Jekyl that a few moral reflections of a general nature would be in etiquette on the present occasion. He therefore added, in the tone of voice which he reserved particularly for that style of remark: —
“We have been called upon to pass through most solemn and afflicting dispensations of Divine Providence lately. Mr. Clayton, these things remind us of the shortness of life, and of the necessity of preparation for death!”
Mr. Jekyl paused, and, as Clayton still sat silent, he went on: —
“There was no will, I presume?”
“No,” said Clayton, “there was not.”
“Ah, so I supposed,” said Mr. Jekyl, who had now recovered his worldly tone. “In that case, of course the whole property reverts to the heir-at-law, just as I had imagined.”
“Perhaps Mr. Jekyl would look at this paper,” said Harry, taking his contract from the hand of Mr. Clayton, and passing it to Mr. Jekyl, who took out his spectacles, placed them deliberately on his sharp nose, and read the paper through.
“Were you under the impression,” said he to Harry, “that this is a legal document?”
“Certainly,” said Harry. “I can bring witnesses to prove Mr. John Gordon’s signature, and Miss Nina’s also.”
“Oh, that’s all evident enough,” said Mr. Jekyl. “I know Mr. John Gordon’s signature. But all the signatures in the world couldn’t make it a valid contract. You see, my boy,” he said, turning to Harry, “a slave, not being a person in the eye of the law, cannot have a contract made with him. The law, which is based on the old Roman code, holds him pro nullis, pro mortuis; which means, Harry, that he’s held as nothing, — as dead, inert substance. That’s his position in law.”
“I believe,” said Harry in a strong and bitter tone, “that is what religious people call a Christian institution!”
“Hey?” said Mr. Jekyl, elevating his eyebrows: “what’s that?”
Harry repeated his remark, and Mr. Jekyl replied in the most literal manner: —
“Of course it is. It is a Divine ordering, and ought to be met in a proper spirit. There’s no use, my boy, in rebellion. Hath not the potter power over the clay, to make one lump to honor and the other to dishonor?”
“Mr. Jekyl, I think it would be expedient to confine the conversation simply to legal matters,” said Clayton.
“Oh, certainly,” said Mr. Jekyl. “And this brings me to say that I have order
s from Mr. Gordon to stay till he comes, and keep order on the place. Also that none of the hands shall, at any time, leave the plantation until he arrives. I brought two or three officers with me, in case there should be any necessity for enforcing order.”
“When will Mr. Gordon be here?” said Clayton.
“To-morrow, I believe,” said Mr. Jekyl. “Young man,” he added, turning to Harry, “you can produce the papers and books, and I can be attending to the accounts.” Clayton rose and left the room, leaving Harry with the imperturbable Mr. Jekyl, who plunged briskly into the business of the accounts, talking to Harry with as much freedom and composure as if he had not just been destroying the hopes of his whole lifetime.
If, by any kind of inward clairvoyance, or sudden clearing of his mental vision, Mr. Jekyl could have been made to appreciate the anguish which at that moment overwhelmed the soul of the man with whom he was dealing, we deem it quite possible that he might have been moved to a transient emotion of pity. Even a thorough-paced political economist may sometimes be surprised in this way by the near view of a case of actual irremediable distress; but he would soon have consoled himself, by a species of mental algebra, that the greatest good of the greatest number was nevertheless secure; therefore there was no occasion to be troubled about infinitesimal amounts of suffering. In this way people can reason away every kind of distress but their own; for it is very remarkable that even so slight an ailment as a moderate toothache will put this kind of philosophy entirely to rout.
“It appears to me,” said Mr. Jekyl, looking at Harry, after a while, with more attention than he had yet given him, “that something is the matter with you this morning. Aren’t you well?”
“In body,” said Harry, “I am well.”
“Well, what is the matter, then?” said Mr. Jekyl.
“The matter is,” said Harry, “that I have all my life been toiling for my liberty, and thought I was coming nearer to it every year; and now, at thirty-five years of age, I find myself still a slave, with no hope of getting free!” Mr. Jekyl perceived from the outside that there was something the matter inside of his human brother, — some unknown quantity in the way of suffering, such as his algebra gave no rule for ascertaining. He had a confused notion that this was an affliction, and that when people were in affliction they must be talked to; and he proceeded accordingly to talk.
“My boy, this is a dispensation of Divine Providence!”
“I call it a dispensation of human tyranny!” said Harry.
“It pleased the Lord,” continued Mr. Jekyl, “to foredoom the race of Ham” —
“Mr. Jekyl, that humbug don’t go down with me! I’m no more of the race of Ham than you are! I’m Colonel Gordon’s oldest son — as white as my brother, who you say owns me! Look at my eyes and my hair, and say if any of the rules about Ham pertain to me!”
“Well,” said Mr. Jekyl, “my boy, you mustn’t get excited. Everything must go, you know, by general rules. We must take that course which secures the greatest general amount of good on the whole, and all such rules will work hard in particular cases. Slavery is a great missionary enterprise for civilizing and christianizing the degraded African.”
“Wait till you see Tom Gordon’s management on this plantation,” said Harry, “and you’ll see what sort of a christianizing institution it is! Mr. Jekyl, you know better! You throw such talk as that in the face of your Northern visitors, and you know all the while that Sodom and Gomorrah don’t equal some of these plantations, where nobody isn’t anybody’s husband or wife in particular! You know all these things, and you dare talk to me about a missionary institution! What sort of missionary institutions are the great trading-marts where they sell men and women? What are the means of grace they use there? And the dogs and the negro-hunters! — those are for the greatest good, too! If your soul were in our souls’ stead, you’d see things differently.”
Mr. Jekyl was astonished, and said so. But he found a difficulty in presenting his favorite view of the case, under the circumstances; and we believe those ministers of the gospel, and elders, who entertain similar doctrines would gain some new views by the effort to present them to a live man in Harry’s circumstances. Mr. Jekyl never had a more realizing sense of the difference between the abstract and concrete.
Harry was now thoroughly roused. He had inherited the violent and fiery passions of his father. His usual appearance of studied calmness and his habits of deferential address were superinduced; they resembled the thin crust which coats over a flood of boiling lava, and which a burst of the seething mass beneath can shiver in a moment. He was now wholly desperate and reckless. He saw himself already delivered, bound hand and foot, into the hands of a master from whom he could expect neither mercy nor justice. He was like one who had hung suspended over an abyss by grasping a wild rose; the frail and beautiful thing was broken, and he felt himself going, with only despair beneath him. He rose and stood the other side of the table, his hands trembling with excitement.
“Mr. Jekyl,” he said, “it is all over me! Twenty years of faithful service have gone for nothing. Myself and wife, and unborn child, are the slaves of a vile wretch! Hush, now! I will have my say for once! I’ve borne, and borne, and borne, and it shall come out! You men who call yourselves religious and stand up for such tyranny, — you serpents, you generation of vipers, — how can you escape the damnation of hell? You keep the clothes of them who stone Stephen! You encourage theft, and robbery, and adultery, and you know it! You are worse than the villains themselves, who don’t pretend to justify what they do. Now go, tell Tom Gordon — go! I shall fight it out to the last! I’ve nothing to hope, and nothing to lose. Let him look out! They made sport of Samson, — they put out his eyes, — but he pulled down the temple over their heads, after all. Look out!”
There is something awful in an outburst of violent passion. The veins in Harry’s forehead were swollen, his lips were livid, his eyes glittered like lightning; and Mr. Jekyl cowered before him.
“There will come a day,” said Harry, “when all this shall be visited upon you! The measure you have filled to us shall be filled to you double, — mark my words!”
Harry spoke so loudly in his vehemence that Clayton overheard him, and came behind him silently into the room. He was pained, shocked, and astonished; and, obeying the first instinct, he came forward and laid his hand entreatingly on Harry’s shoulder.
“My good fellow, you don’t know what you are saying,” he said.
“Yes, I do,” said Harry, “and my words will be true!”
Another witness had come behind Clayton, Tom Gordon, in his traveling-dress, with pistols at his belt. He had ridden over after Jekyl, and had arrived in time to hear part of Harry’s frantic ravings.
“Stop!” he said, stepping into the middle of the room; “leave that fellow to me! Now, boy,” he said, fixing his dark and evil eye upon Harry, “you didn’t know that your master was hearing you, did you? The last time we met, you told me I wasn’t your master! Now, we’ll see if you’ll say that again! You went whimpering to your mistress, and got her to buy Lisette, so as to keep her out of my way! Now who owns her? — say! Do you see this?” he said, holding up a long, lithe gutta-percha cane. “This is what I whip dogs with, when they don’t know their place! Now, sir, down on your knees, and ask pardon for your impudence, or I’ll thrash you within an inch of your life!”
“I won’t kneel to my younger brother!” said Harry.
With a tremendous oath, Tom struck him; and, as if a rebound from the stroke, Harry struck back a blow so violent as to send him stumbling across the room against the opposite wall; then turned, quick as thought, sprang through the open window, climbed down the veranda, vaulted on to Tom’s horse, which stood tied at the post, and fled as rapidly as lightning to his cottage door, where Lisette stood at the ironing-table. He reached out his hand and said, “Up, quick, Lisette! Tom Gordon’s here!” And before Tom Gordon had fairly recovered from the dizziness into which the blow had
thrown him, the fleet blood-horse was whirling Harry and Lisette past bush and tree, till they arrived at the place where he had twice before met Dred.
Dred was standing there. “Even so,” he said, as the horse stopped, and Harry and Lisette descended; “the vision is fulfilled! Behold, the Lord shall make thee a witness and commander to the people!”
“There’s no time to be lost,” said Harry.
“Well I know that,” said Dred. “Come, follow me!” And before sunset of that evening Harry and Lisette were tenants of the wild fastness in the centre of the swamp.
CHAPTER XXXVIII
THE PURPOSE
IT would be scarcely possible to describe the scene which Harry left in the library. Tom Gordon was for a few moments stunned by the violence of his fall, and Clayton and Mr. Jekyl at first did not know but he had sustained some serious injury; and the latter, in his confusion, came very near attempting his recovery by pouring in his face the contents of the large inkstand. Certainly quite as appropriate a method, under the circumstances, as the exhortations with which he had deluged Harry. But Clayton, with more presence of mind, held his hand and rang for water. In a few moments, however, Tom recovered himself, and started up furiously.
“Where is he?” he shouted, with a volley of oaths, which made Mr. Jekyl pull up his shirt-collar, as became a good elderly gentleman, preparatory to a little admonition.
“My young friend” — he began.
“Blast you! None of your young friends to me! Where is he?”
Complete Works of Harriet Beecher Stowe Page 107