“Godspeed,” Robert said as I turned to the carriage. I nodded, wishing mightily that he were coming with me.
Though it was before dawn when we left for the shipyards, I kept a sharp lookout for Mr. Cardon or one of his men, and when long lines and chaos met us at the docks, I pushed through to pay double the going rate so Henry and I could more quickly board the steamboat.
Once under way, the huge boat, pumping and puffing steam, moved swiftly through the Delaware, and in under three hours we arrived at the canal that cut through thirteen miles of land to meet the Chesapeake. Here we disembarked to climb aboard a lesser boat, where horses, hitched to the small craft, pulled us along a scenic path that I might have appreciated had I not been so anxious to put Philadelphia behind us. As I looked about nervously, Henry, unaware of the threat of Mr. Cardon, gave me a questioning glance more than once.
To my great relief, when we reached the Chesapeake River, another boat was already waiting to take us to Baltimore. On this we traveled for six more hours, but luck was with us, for no sooner had we disembarked in Baltimore than we were able to find passage on yet another steamboat—one that kept night hours and was bound for Norfolk.
I secured a small cabin for the two of us. When we were finally alone and well under way, Henry spoke his mind. “You got to settle down,” he said. “You actin’ like somebody on your tail.”
I was uncertain how much to tell him, for he knew nothing of Mr. Cardon. “I might have been in trouble if I had stayed back in Philadelphia,” I admitted.
“Might do, you tell me ’bout what you got goin’ on, so I knows what you lookin’ for.”
“I was with a woman and she became pregnant,” I began. “Her father found out about my . . . past . . . and threatened to kill me if I didn’t leave Philadelphia.”
“The girl white?” he asked. When I nodded, he blew air through his teeth. “Then it good you gettin’ outta town.”
“I don’t know what I was thinking to get involved with her. I knew better, but I couldn’t help myself.”
“Yup. It like that for me first time I see Pan’s mama. She got hold a me and no talk was gonna get me out. Thing is, now she gone, she still got a hold on me.”
“Caroline died, too,” I said. It was the first time I had said those words, but they still had little meaning.
“She do? When?”
“Day before yesterday.”
“Uh,” he grunted as though I had kicked him.
“She was married,” I added, deciding to confess all.
He rubbed his face before his next question. “And what ’bout the husband? He lookin’ for you, too?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t ask her about him. I didn’t want to know. We didn’t even discuss what could happen if she had a child. She knew nothing about me—nothing about my past.”
“You ’fraid she find out, she walk away?”
I nodded. He had hit the mark.
“Mr. Burton, I got to sleep now. My head’s hurtin’ and I’s done in,” he said before he lay back on his bunk.
Though Henry soon slept, I couldn’t. When I had sat beside Caroline at Stonehill as she slept, I had imagined the two of us living a life together. It was so sweet a dream that now it would not quit me. Why hadn’t I planned it sooner? Would she be alive had I done so? And would the child be alive? I thought back to the black-edged note from Mrs. Cardon. How I wanted to believe that it had been a lie, but I had seen for myself how ill Caroline was. No. She was dead. The word now struck me like a hammer to my chest.
THE NEXT MORNING Henry sat back a distance, as a manservant would, while I stood on deck staring out at the Chesapeake coastline. The weather was mild, and as we drew closer to Norfolk, familiar Virginia scents came in on the soft breeze. Unexpectedly, wave after wave of homesickness struck. Nostalgia for my old home swept over me. I thought again of how close Tall Oaks was to the area of North Carolina where I hoped to find Pan. Perhaps after I found him, when he and Henry were safely on their way back to Philadelphia, I could travel the day or two it would take me to arrive at my childhood home in Virginia. Surely Lavinia had been overcautious in her warnings about Rankin. Wasn’t he already an old man when I fled twenty years ago?
As the boat docked, Henry rushed over to push me aside and vomit into the water. Others attempted to disregard his miserable retching as they filed off, while I gathered our things and Henry tried to recover himself.
On the next part of our journey, we were to board a stage, but Henry was unfit for the road, so I got us settled into a tavern close to the water but on the outskirts of town. There I hoped to give Henry a chance to recover before we set off once more.
On the second day, late in the afternoon and while Henry slept, I walked into town to seek out the post office. Enveloped by the warm spring sun, I felt such a sense of longing for my childhood home that I wanted to weep. Though my home was now in Philadelphia, everything about Virginia felt like mine. Here was May as it should be, thick with honeysuckle scent and lush trees bursting with green. As I neared the post office, I quickened my pace. Robert and I had agreed that if he heard any early news, he would post it to me in Norfolk. Though I knew that was unlikely, I was nonetheless disappointed to find no letter from him.
On my return to the tavern, I found Henry had worsened; his eyes were glazed with fever and his speech was incoherent. I sent for a doctor who suggested only that Henry be given rest. Five days later, his condition had worsened to such a degree that I left him only for meals and to walk out for the mail.
One afternoon, concerned and frustrated, I left for the mail earlier than usual and went the short distance into town to join a small group of farmers and tradesmen who had gathered to await the mail’s arrival. We first heard the shout and the whip, then the steady dull thudding of what I thought were horses’ hooves. But I was wrong. A coffle of slaves came around the corner, driven forward by two men on horseback, one who whipped the air as though driving cattle.
The double row of chained Negroes thumped by at a slow but steady pace. My chest began an aching pound when, in the midst of the dark-skinned prisoners, I saw a face almost as white as my own. He was stumbling in his struggle to keep up with the others, and when a whip caught him on the shoulder, I flinched as though it had landed on me. Outraged, I looked toward the slave driver who had dealt the blow. He was a small man, and his dirty brown hair hung clumped around his face. Though his hat sat low, there was something about the set of his jaw that looked familiar. The closer he came, the more certain I felt I knew him.
Taller than many, I stood above the crowd, and as though he felt my stare, the rider looked up and met my one good eye—or was it my black eye patch at which he stared? When I clearly saw his face, I caught my breath. It couldn’t be! Although our last encounter had taken place some twenty years before, it took only one brief moment to recognize Jake, Rankin’s son. To judge from his openmouthed expression, he recognized me, until a stumble of his horse and a shout from the other driver had him turn back to his duties.
The coffle soon rounded the corner, but I was left with the memory of my last encounter with Jake.
THE AFTERNOON WHEN Marshall had me removed from the big house, Rankin took me down to the quarters where, mute with fear, I was bound to a row of other slaves. We were mercifully left to sit under some trees and out of the direct sun but were watched over by a heavily armed slave trader until evening, when another man took his place. Although he looked as rough as the first man, Jake was younger, and because of that I appealed to him. “Listen,” I said, “there’s been a mistake, and I need your help.”
“There’s been a mistake?” he said. “And what kinda mistake is that?”
“They’re calling me a Negro, but that isn’t the case. Just look at me. Do I look like a Negro?” I pulled open my shirt to expose my white throat and neck.