A Perilous Proposal (38 page)

Thurston nodded. “Probably right after you did. Same thing—they burned a cross in front of my house, fired a few shots, yelled and broke a few windows, then took off.”

“Got any idea who it was?”

“Nope. Nearly frightened my wife to death.”

Four hours later, three men with serious expressions rode side by side down the main street of Oakwood. As they went a few townspeople stopped to stare. A few of them mumbled comments that it was best weren't heard. Some of the women, sensing trouble, hurried away.

The three men stopped in front of the sheriff's office, dismounted,
tied their horses to the hitching rail, and walked inside.

Sheriff Jenkins glanced up from his desk. He did not seem entirely surprised to see them.

“Morning, Daniels . . . Thurston,” he said to Templeton Daniels and Mr. Thurston. “You must be the other Daniels brother I've heard about,” he added, glancing toward Ward.

“Ward Daniels,” he said, extending his hand. Sheriff Jenkins shook it, though without much enthusiasm.

“I take it this isn't a social call,” he said.

“We had a problem at both our places last night that we want to report,” said Templeton.

The sheriff eyed him with a cool expression.

“Our homes were paid a visit by a band of riders,” said Mr. Thurston. He went on to explain what had happened. “There was some damage done. We'd like it looked into.”

“Who were these riders?” asked Jenkins.

“They were cloaked and hooded,” replied Templeton. “We couldn't tell.”

“How do you expect me to do anything if you don't know who they are?”

“You've got to do something, Sam,” said Thurston. “You can't allow this kind of thing to go on.”

“You're not really surprised, are you, boys?” said the sheriff, glancing back and forth between all three. “I must say, Thurston,” he added, “I'm surprised at you getting involved with these two and their colored friends. My son tells me you took a nigger's side in a ruckus over in Greens Crossing. No wonder you got paid a night visit—you riled some folks.”

“You know as well as I do, Sam, that Deke Steeves and his father are troublemakers.”

“At least Dwight Steeves is white.”

“I'm aware of that, Sam. But he's a troublemaker. All I did was keep his boy from killing Henry Patterson's kid.”

Sheriff Jenkins shrugged. “Well, boys,” he said after a pause, turning again toward the Daniels brothers, “I suggest you think about getting them coloreds out from under your roof. That'd go a long way to settle this community down and keep anything like this from happening again.”

“That could almost be construed . . . as a veiled threat, Sheriff,” said Templeton. “Are you saying that as long as we
don't
do what you say, and as long as we have blacks living with us, you're not going to help?”

“Now you heard every word I said, Daniels, and I said nothing like that. All I'm saying is that you came in here asking for my help, and I'm just telling you that folks don't take kindly to treating coloreds like whites. The war may be over, but this is still the South. We got our own way of doing things. That's something you boys might oughta try to understand. Maybe you Northerners don't know better, but Thurston . . . you know how things are here.”

After the incident, and after realizing that the sheriff was going to be no help, Templeton Daniels started carrying a small pistol inside his coat pocket.

O
UT OF THE
D
EPTHS

53

E
verything was quiet and somber for several days. Every time we went outside, the burned cross in the grass reminded us that a change had come. Our danger really sunk in after that. It was good that we blacks were free. But it was becoming more and more dangerous to be colored in the South. I could tell that my papa and Uncle Ward were worried. Mr. Ward especially got real quiet and was acting strange. Ever since the moment I had seen him with that gun, somehow he had seemed different
.

We were all jittery. Katie . . . Josepha . . . Emma . . . each one of us had our own personal fears. The riders in white had frightened us all. Suddenly we were very conscious of our skin color . . . and knew that people hated us because of it. It is an awful feeling to be hated for who you are, not because of anything you have done
.

Even though they hadn't been there, the incident changed Jeremiah and Henry too. They knew that they were at the center of the storm, even more than we three women
.

Jeremiah got real quiet for two or three weeks.
Whenever I saw him he hardly said a word. I could tell something was on his mind. I figured it was about what had happened. But it wasn't. The incident had triggered deeper things inside him than that, things about his past, things I could never have guessed
.

It's a hard thing when men get quiet. You can never tell what they're thinking. It's easy to figure they're angry. Their expressions don't give away as much as a woman's. When they're gloomy and silent, it can almost be frightening
.

That's how Jeremiah got. I thought he was mad at me, though I didn't know why
.

Then a horrible thought occurred to me. What if he was upset with me for only halfway saying yes, but then saying we had to wait? Or what if he had changed his mind about wanting to marry me! What if he was afraid to tell me?

Before long I was sure that's what it was. I couldn't imagine anything else
.

Finally I couldn't stand the silence. I knew that I had to talk to him. We were walking in from one of the fields alone and I just blurted it out
.

“Jeremiah,” I said, “what's the matter? You're so quiet. Are you mad at me?”

He looked at me almost as if I'd slapped him in the face
.

“Why wud you think dat?”

“I don't know . . . you've been so quiet and glum.”

“Yeah, I reckon,” he said with a sigh. “But it ain't you.”

“What is it, then?” I persisted
.

He glanced away
.

I waited. Suddenly I realized that he was trembling. I reached out and put my hand on his shoulder. Slowly he turned to face me. His eyes were wet
.

“Oh, Jeremiah . . . what is it!” I said. I'd never seen him like this!

“I . . . I haven't been honest wiff you,” he said in a broken voice
.

“What . . . how do you mean?” I asked
.

“I haven't tol' you everythin'.”

“About what?”

“I don't reckon I been honest wiff my papa either,” he said. “But . . . but if we's eber gwine git married, you an' me, I mean . . . den we's gotter be so honest wiff each other dat we's got no secrets. An' dat's what's been tearin' me up sumfin dreadful inside—”

His voice broke and he looked away
.

“Jeremiah, what is it!”

“I . . . I got a terrible secret,” he struggled to continue, “an' it's killin' me. It's killin' me worse dat I axed you ter marry me wiffout tellin' you. 'Cause you got ter know what kind ob person I am, an' dat maybe I ain't what you think. It's like I lied ter you an' I hate myself fo it. But I can't lie no more.”

“But you can tell me now,” I said. “It's all right that you didn't tell me before.”

He sniffed and wiped at his eyes. He drew in two or three breaths to try to steady himself. But even when he started again, his voice was shaky and soft and broken. Whatever it was, he was right—it was tearing at him inside. I could see that he was in torment
.

“I tol' you about my mama . . .” he began
.

“Yes,” I nodded
.

“But I didn't tell you da whole truf, dat her dying— oh, God!—it . . . wuz my own fault!”

The words filled poor Jeremiah with anguish. They stung him with a pain I can hardly imagine. I could see it in his face. He was trembling to keep from bursting into sobs
.

He closed his eyes and swallowed hard. He could hardly get anything out
.

But now that he had made the admission that had haunted his nightmares and even his waking hours, he couldn't stop. He had let the healing knife go down into the deepest place where the tormenting secret had hidden so long
.

“I wuz such a cantankerous an' selfish boy,” he said. “I wuz full ob anger. My mama wuz as good a lady as dere is. But I wuz so full ob myself I cudn't see past my own nose. She did everythin' fo me. She wuz so strong when dey sol' us an' sent us away so dat Papa cud neber find us. She wuz about as strong an' courageous a woman as dere cud be. But I wuz jes' selfish an' angry. An' when dat day came when Massa Winegaard tol' me ter go ter dat white drifter wiff sum tools, my anger got da better ob me. I got angry at Mama too, an' I gots ter live wiff dat terrible thought. I got selfish an' lazy, an' so Mama went instead. An' dat white no-good drifter, he tried ter rape her an' he hit her an' she fell and got hurt real bad. An' a week later, she wuz dead an' it wuz all on account er me. If I'd jes' dun what I wuz tol' . . . she'd still be alive! It wuz my own fault!”

The last words came out in a forlorn wail of remorse. I could hardly stand the awful sound of it—to see someone I loved in such torment!

Jeremiah stopped and almost shuddered in horror. He was blinking hard but couldn't stop the flow of tears from his eyes. I was in an agony to see him suffer so! I couldn't imagine how terrible the guilt must be
.

“I went crazy wiff rage,” he said. “I shud hab seen den what an evil thing da anger inside me wuz. I shud hab seen it. But I wuz too young an' selfish ter see my heart fo what it wuz. I can't hardly recollect what happened next. When I saw dat white man an' my mama
lying dere an' him wiff his clothes half off, I lost my head. An' I ran at him an' attacked him wiff a fury I didn't eben know wuz in me. An' I hit at him an' den grabbed a rock an' just kept hittin' an' hittin' him. An' when I came ter myself, dere wuz blood everywhere. I knew he was dead an' dat I'd killed him. I knew I'd be hanged if dey foun' out. I looked aroun' an' saw da stream dere, an' I drug him to it an' washed away all da blood an' tried ter git it off my hands, but it wudn't wash off. Den I drug him down past where I thought dey'd fin' him, where dere wuz a little falls where da stream dropped in ter da river. I pushed him over an' watched dat body float away. An' den I went back an' got my mama an' ran fo help. I cud hardly sleep for weeks after dat, knowin' what I'd done. An' a week later, Mama was dead.”

Jeremiah stopped and at last broke down sobbing with the most bitter grief I've ever heard
.

“Oh, Jeremiah!” I said, trying to comfort him. I was holding his hand. He was sweating and trembling
.

“Mayme,” he said, “I killed a man. I got da blood ob a man on my hands an' it won't come off. I's a murderer, Mayme, an' I can't live wiff myself for da torment ob it. You won't neber want ter marry me now, an' I got ter bear da guilt ob my own mama's dyin' wiff it. I got two people dat's dead on account ob me, an' da guilt ob it's more terrible den I kin live wiff. I'd die myself ter take away da voices haunting me at night!”

He was sobbing uncontrollably. All I could do was gently stroke his hand and sit with him. There were no words to comfort him. Only forgiveness could do that. It would be a hard forgiveness for him to find
.

It was a long time before he began to breathe more easily. When he next spoke his voice was barely more than a whisper
.

“Ain't no good comes ob anger, Mayme,” he said. “It's a bad thing. But even den, after all dat, I cudn't see dat it wuz all my anger dat was da cause ob it. So I got angrier an' angrier at my pa, trying ter blame him when it wuz me I shud hab been lookin' at. Da guilt wuz so terrible dat I cudn't look at myself. So I blamed him. Anger's a terrible thing, Mayme. It kin jes' destroy a man inside. What kind ob person am I ter hab lived such a lie all dis time!”

Again Jeremiah quietly wept. Several minutes went by. Gradually the storm passed
.

We continued to talk. Eventually Jeremiah told me most of what happened since that time. He must have talked for more than an hour, telling me things he never had before, about his childhood as a slave, about his father's leaving, about Micah Duff and his years with the army company, then about the Dawson family he'd met. Once he started talking about his past, it was like a dam across a river had burst and he wanted to tell me every single thing that had ever happened to him. I think that's when I first began to think that his story needed to be told too, just like Katie's and mine. That's when I realized that mine and Katie's story wasn't only our own story but that it was a story about a whole lot of people and an important time in the country when a lot of people's lives were changing. Jeremiah was one of those. His story was my story, just like, in a different way, Henry's was too, and Katie's and Josepha's and Emma's, and maybe even Micah Duff's, for all I knew. Anyway, that's how it seemed to me at the time
.