Property(17)
The day before, three runaways had broken into the larder at Chatterly. They had canvas sacks, which they filled with whatever they could carry. The cook, spying them from the kitchen window, raised the alarm. Charles happened to be in the yard, speaking to the farrier. He took up his pistol and came running, arriving in time to wound one of the men, though not seriously enough to prevent their escape. They made for the woods, where, in spite of heated pursuit by hounds and horses, they were not to be found. It was as if the forest had swallowed them up.
Late last night, at perhaps the very hour our mill went up in flames (my husband assumed his most ponderous tone to remind me of this coincidence), a stableboy, walking back to the quarter at Chatterly, was assaulted by two of these men brandishing machetes. They beat him, then hacked off both his arms and legs, leaving him to die. “Tell your master we done this because he shot one of our men,” they told him. The unfortunate boy lived only long enough to deliver this message to the overseer.
“What are we to do?” my husband concluded. “Open our larders to every runaway who is tired of working so that those who are faithful will not be murdered? What can they possibly imagine will be the result of such unconscionable savagery?”
I made no response. Indeed the story had shocked me, and I found myself calculating the amount of time it would take a man to walk from my brother-in-law’s plantation to this one.
“Suppose it had been Edmund?” my husband speculated. “That is what has put poor Maybelle under the doctor’s care.”
“What will you do?” I asked.
“Of course, we’ll raise a patrol and apprehend them,” he said. “It’s damned bad timing. Between hauling timber and the mill repairs I’m shorthanded, but I’ve no choice.”
“But if the dogs failed to find them before . . . ?”
He stopped before me, stroking his mustache, his eyes narrowed. He was trying to decide whether to tell me something more. “They found a structure in a tree,” he said. “A house of sorts, with all sorts of comforts, a washstand, a mattress, a tin of tobacco, there was even a deck of cards.”
“Then they have been there for some time.”
“The sheriff has estimated there may be as many as one hundred.”
“Surely that is an exaggerated figure!” I exclaimed.
He left off worrying his mustache and looked at me thoughtfully. “We can only hope you are right,” he said.
IN SPITE OF the elaborate secrecy with which the planters will veil their scheme to avenge this crime at Chatterly, there can be little doubt that the negroes there will know everything about it before they ride out, and that these runaways will be informed. Else why would they have taken such a risk and warned the very people they plan to rob of their intention to rob them? My husband marvels at their savagery; I am more astounded by their boldness. It must be their intention to lure their enemies into their neighborhood, where they have somehow learned to survive, even to flourish, and then to cut them down. The woods abutting Chatterly are on low, swampy ground; the undergrowth is impenetrable, full of snakes, thorn bushes, and all manner of stinging insects. Even with oxen it is difficult to haul out much timber, as Charles never stops pointing out, though it’s much the same here. In such a place a man on horseback must be an easy target for a man who has contrived to live in a tree.
These were my thoughts in the afternoon as I sat in my room at my sewing. They filled me with trepidation, for we are outnumbered here, as everywhere along the river, and when the planters band together on a hunt, their houses and relations are left undefended. But there was also the thin, scarcely voiced hope that my husband might go out and never return. I had set Sarah to ripping an old gown for quilting, and the repetitive whine of the tearing silk punctuated my musings. Her baby made small congested sounds in its crate. I could see its dark hand moving against the slats. She sat with her back to it, methodically tearing the cloth, absorbed in the task, or so it seemed. I wondered how much she knew about my husband’s urgent errand. Did she share my timid wish that it might put her master in danger? I could not ask this question, yet I had a desire to hear her speak. “What did the doctor say about Walter?” I said.
She glanced up at me, then back to her work, her expression as blank as a death mask. “He don’ hear.”
“Did he make any recommendations for treatment?”
“All master say is he don’ hear.”
“Does that one hear?” I asked, gesturing to the baby. For answer, Sarah laid the cloth in her lap, turned toward the creature, and clapped her palms together, making a sharp crack, like a shot. The baby’s hands flew up above the top of the box and it let out a soft cry of surprise. Sarah turned back to her work, her mouth set in an annoying smirk.