Charleston (22 page)

In June 1831 a fireman accidentally closed the
Best Friend
's safety valve and the boiler exploded; escaping steam scalded engineer Darrell badly. While Edgar worried about his investment, a second engine,
West Point,
was rushed from New York and repairs begun on the damaged
Best Friend
, rechristened
Phoenix
. The rails of the Charleston & Hamburg line crept toward Summerville and Branchville.

Alex's fear of Gibbes was unfounded. After the encounter in the pine grove he didn't bother her. Their paths never crossed.

Edgar's friends talked passionately of Nullifiers and Unionists, Edgar standing staunchly with the latter. The Nullies, as he scornfully called them, hoped to win a two-thirds majority in the legislature next year, two thirds
being necessary for calling a special convention to write a nullification law.

Support for nullification was by no means solid throughout the state, but Charleston was a stronghold. On July 4 more than a hundred Nullifiers marched to the Circular Congregational Church on Meeting Street to hear a fiery noontime address by Senator Hayne. At the same hour Edgar joined another, smaller march to the Scots Presbyterian Church, where William Drayton spoke. Drayton raised the specter of a divided Union if the Nullifiers prevailed.

In the evening each faction held a banquet, with more oratory. Edgar reeled home full of wine, zeal, and praise for President Jackson. In a letter read at the banquet Jackson equated nullification with secession and vowed to resist it with all the powers of his office. Cassandra said it sounded like war talk.

In mid-July the family took a steamer to Newport, where they rented rooms at a harbor-side hotel for several weeks. Alex missed Maudie and Henry. She hated to be away from familiar people and surroundings. She didn't mind Charleston's summer heat, in fact found it comforting somehow.

Edgar's holiday was spoiled by a letter from Judge Porcher. He enclosed a piece written from Fort Hill and published in the
Pendleton Messenger
; in it Calhoun clearly stated his support of nullification as a conservative and constitutional means of redressing grievances.

Some argue that he came forward because of conscience,
the judge said.
Others claim he revealed his convictions because he has realized he will never gather enough support to be elected president. Whatever the motivation for the “Fort Hill Letter,” Mr. Calhoun is finished forever.

“And South Carolina's prestige and influence reduced thereby,” Edgar complained.

That same month the nation reeled from reports of a bloody slave uprising in Southampton County, Virginia. Under the leadership of a supposedly well-treated slave named Nat Turner, seventy Negroes massacred nearly
sixty whites in a single night. Although the revolt was swiftly put down, panic swept the eastern seaboard and lower South.

On the trip home in September they passed through New Haven, leaving Ham to begin his studies at Yale. They continued by coach to New York, where they boarded a steamer: Cassandra said she had no wish to travel through Virginia, either to risk slaughter in another uprising, or to see the heads of the Nat Turner gang displayed on poles at the roadside.

 

At the Charleston Theater members of the stock company gave Henry play texts, and pointers on understanding and interpreting them. During the winter he and Alex confined their meetings to safe places: the house on South Battery, the friendly kitchen of the Strongs, the theater when it was closed and there were no actors and stage mechanics tripping over one another.

In the Bells' garden one afternoon Alex sat with Maudie, snapping the ends off green beans and pulling the strings. She smiled as she related an amusing remark of Henry's from the day before. Maudie clucked. “You sweet on that boy?”

“Nonsense, what gave you such an idea?”

“Way you talk about him. Henry this, Henry that. Way you smile when you say his name. Nothing so strange about it. Henry's mighty good-looking. Plenty of white men favor colored girls, why not the other way round?”

“It may be all right for white men to cross the line, Maudie, though most do it in secret. It wouldn't be right for a woman.”

“Love don't go where it's told. Never has, never will.”

“I am not
in love
with Henry Strong.” She hit her knee so emphatically that her basin of beans tipped and scattered the contents. “Oh, damn.”

Maudie set her own basin aside and went to her knees to pick the beans from the coarse grass. Alex dropped down next to her. “Henry and I are friends, that's all,” she
said, though her cheeks had acquired color, and she didn't look Maudie in the eye.

 

Alex spent her days reading, sewing, making up little banjo tunes, and fighting off feelings of drifting. She read John Woolman's book twice. His thoughts on the keeping of slaves sharpened her doubts about the system.

A plain brown parcel arrived from Philadelphia: a copy of an antislavery paper called
The Liberator
, published by a Boston printer named Garrison. An accompanying note from Angelina Grimké said,
He does the Lord's work
. Alex found herself in guilty agreement with Garrison's purpose but shocked by his stormy rhetoric. She asked her father for an opinion of it.

“Inflammatory. If slavery must be ended one day, hostility like this won't do it. It only antagonizes the South and entrenches the system more solidly.”

In the summer of 1832 the Bells packed trunks and portmanteaus for a second escape to the high cliffs and bracing breezes of Aquidneck Island. Henry's birthday fell three days before their departure. He'd mentioned a Shakespearean play whose tragic protagonist was a Moor, a black man. Alex knew he couldn't afford a personal copy. All his wages went home, because he lived there and ate at Hamnet's table. She bought a copy of
Othello
from Marburg's.

She wrapped the gift in gold paper and carried it to the theater one airless afternoon when the sky was yellow and the air ripe with humidity. People moved languidly. Women protected themselves with parasols. Street dogs found shade and lay panting. Her calico dress clung to her and she breathed almost as hard as her father during one of his spells.

Henry answered her knock at the artists' entrance. The theater was shuttered in the hot months, so Henry worked as day watchman, guarding against intruders and killing the inevitable rats.

“Come in, too hot out there.”

“Hotter than hell's ovens,” Alex agreed. High up, a
grime-coated window filtered yellow light to the dark interior. The theater was no cooler than the street, though perhaps not quite so sticky. Alex offered the present. “For your birthday. How old are you now?”

He laughed and lapsed into Gullah. “The sun done baked out your brains. You know.”

“Eighteen?”

“Tomorrow.”

He pulled off the fancy paper, turned the slim leather-bound book so the light from the window caught the spine. His brown face broke into that smile Alex adored. “Oh, Lord. The Moor play.”

“I knew you wanted it.”

“'Cause I could act that part. Thank you, thank you.” He darted forward, kissed her cheek.

It was a chaste kiss, but he'd never been so bold before, in fact seldom touched her now that they were grown. She supposed he felt the same mysterious stirrings that she did—the sense of a new, exciting, but forbidden experience awaiting you if only you dared say yes to it, as Gibbes claimed he had.

Alex wasn't naïve about relations between the sexes. Though such things were never mentioned in the family, she'd watched street animals for years. She and Maudie had discussed the mechanics of the act. Yet she was afraid of it. Except in marriage, it was sinful.

“Little cooler in the auditorium. I opened windows behind the boxes.” He led the way. “Sure will miss you when you're way up there with all those Yankees.”

“I'll miss you too. I always miss you when we're not together.”

“Soul mates.”

She laughed and fanned herself with her handkerchief.

He found a pair of gilt chairs left from some production and placed them close together on the stage. He brought a candle from the prop room, fixed it to a saucer with melted wax, set the lighted taper between them. She sat motionless while he turned pages, growing excited.

“If I had some pomatum, and some charcoal dust, I
could mix up a greasepaint and blacken up so I'd look like the Moor. We could read parts. The scene where he murders his wife in her bed with a pillow.”

“Would you really need the blacking?”

“Makes it more real. Othello, the general, he's dark, it says so. Bad man calls him a big black ram.” Henry gave her a swift, unreadable look. “Desdemona, she's a white lady.”

“Yes, you told me.”

“Othello's tricked so he thinks Desdemona's not faithful and he kills her. It's so sad, he really cares for her.” Without looking at the text he spoke slowly, his voice resonant. “‘Then you must speak of one that loved not wisely, but too well.'”

Her legs and breasts felt hot. “If you want to read a scene, I will.”

They sat two feet apart, the candle flickering between them. It was as though some elemental force gathered in both of them, then leapt between them. Henry dropped the book, took one long stride to her chair. She was already standing. He swept his arms around her.

His eyes seemed to ask permission. She let her eyes close because she didn't know how to grant it, or whether she dared. She hung limp in his arms, waiting.

His sudden embrace crushed her breasts against his shirt. He kissed her. The salty tang of his lips, the strange masculine scent of him, dizzied her, as though she'd drunk too much claret. The kiss grew more fervent. Her hands flew around him to clasp his broad leather belt and pull him closer.

Something shocked them back to reality. They broke the embrace, each stepping away. Their faces reflected a curious confusion of fright and joy. Henry whispered, “Oh, I'm sorry. We can't do this.”

“No, no, we mustn't,” she said, although she wanted him to tear her clothes.

“Anyone found out, they'd hang me.”

“I wouldn't let them.”

He shouted. “Goddammit, you got nothing to say about it, I'm a nigger.”

The cry echoed in the auditorium. He shook himself in
a way that reminded her of a spaniel after a bath. “You better go home.”

Meekly, she said, “I will. I hope your birthday's fine.”

“Thank you.” He picked up the play. “Thank you for this.”

“We'll see each other when summer's over.”

“Guess we will.” He didn't sound confident.

They gazed at one another and Alex felt the dizziness again, the sense of sliding toward an abyss. He was right, it would be catastrophic if they were caught. After Newport she'd pull away from him.

“Alex, don't stand there, get the hell home 'fore somebody sees us.”

She fled through the dark. At the artists' door she threw herself into the fierce yellow daylight and slumped against the building. They'd come so close. What if he'd taken her?

It must never happen. She could love him forever, but never that way.

Alex told no one of the shattering experience at the theater. In Rhode Island she sat on a windy Atlantic beach with her banjo and began a new song, slow and melancholy.

She wrote it down on music paper, though when she sang it to herself, she changed the lyric to
I love a man who
loves
. Usually she had no trouble finishing a song, but she couldn't take this one beyond the first quatrain.

 

For all his hostility to Calhoun and proponents of nullification, Edgar was a man of his time and place. He was now forty-seven and, following the pattern of generations before him, becoming more reactionary than he had been at twenty-five. He was angered by the mounting attacks on his city and state from Northern politicians, preachers, pamphleteers, and the press. One evening in late August, after a heavy dinner washed down with ale cocktails, he fell into conversation with a burly ginger-haired man on the veranda of Newport's Harbor Vista Hotel. Cassandra and the children had gone off to watch fireworks.

The gentleman, dressed in sober black despite the heat, introduced himself as Reverend Justus Drew of Boston. “Of the Unitarian faith,” he said pleasantly, laying aside his book, Washington Irving's
Conquest of Granada.
Lanterns on sailboats in the harbor gleamed in the dusk. “Your speech would suggest you hail from the South, sir.”

“Charleston. We enjoy vacationing here, away from the heat and summer maladies. My name is Edgar Bell.”

They shook hands.

A stocky young man of about twenty arrived with two young ladies. Drew introduced his son, William, who strongly resembled him. “We're going for ice cream, see you in the morning.” Off they went, the girls giggling, the young man squeezing their waists. Edgar sighed; he felt his age.

“May I ask a question about last summer's slave uprising in Virginia?” Reverend Drew asked.

“Nat Turner? Certainly.”

“How did it affect South Carolina?”

“It terrified and inflamed the whole state. For weeks after my family and I returned from Newport, we heard rumors of impending uprisings in various counties. The legislature funded a special hundred-man cavalry unit to patrol Charleston. The uprising stiffened resolve to resist those who inspired Turner's crimes.”

“I understood his inspiration was Holy Scripture. The Book of Revelation. His disciples called him the Prophet.”

Edgar remembered reports of Turner's fearsome visions—black and white angels locked in a death struggle; fields afire, streams running with blood. “Prophet from hell,” he said. “I'm sure Turner was influenced by the kind of Northerners who claim to know how we Southerners should live our lives. They export their propaganda to incite the ignorant. In Columbia, our capital, citizens are offering a thousand dollars for apprehension of anyone distributing such literature. I'm speaking of work by misguided missionaries like Garrison.”

Drew lowered his massive head, squinted at Edgar. “A friend of mine, sir. Surely writing and speaking the truth can't do mischief.”

“You think not? Gangs of black runaways are living in our Low Country marshes right now. They prey on isolated farms. An overseer was strangled the week I left home. On July 4 some ladies and gentlemen picnicking at the site of Fort Sumter were poisoned by their cook. Two died. Garrison and his kind will bring anarchy and ruin if they persist.”

“Mr. Garrison won't be swayed by your objections, Mr. Bell. He's determined to be heard. So are thousands like him.”

“I'd say they all deserve a good horsewhipping.”

“The kind you administer to your poor niggers?”

“I find that remark offensive, Reverend.”

“It's you slavocrats who are offensive. To the nation, and to the Almighty.” Along the veranda conversations broke off as people overheard the quarrel. “Are you a slave owner?”

“I am, but—”

“Do you keep black concubines? I understand it's common for owners to lie with them to breed more slaves now that the trade is outlawed.”

Edgar rose from his teak chair. “That is even more offensive.” He poked Drew's shoulder. “I respect your calling but I will not suffer insults.”

Drew revealed himself as huge, a head taller than Edgar when he unfolded himself from his chair. “There's a limit to Christian forbearance, Mr. Bell. Don't lay hands on me again.”

“I will if I choose.”

“The devil.” The reverend pushed Edgar hard enough to jam him against the rail. Someone down the veranda stood up, exclaimed, “Gentlemen, if you please.” Edgar knocked Drew's arm aside. His blood-suffused face contorted. He sagged forward against Drew, almost carrying them both to the floor. Red and white star clusters exploded over the harbor.

 

When Cassandra, Alex, and Ham returned an hour later, they found Edgar in bed with a Newport doctor attending. Alex clutched her mother's hand as they stared at Edgar's waxy face.

“He fainted, Mrs. Bell,” the doctor said. “It is a symptom not to be taken lightly. I gather there was a discussion of sectional issues on the porch. Words exchanged.”

“I know nothing of that. Who brought him upstairs?”

“A Unitarian minister. He's left the premises. I advise you to let your husband rest for a day or two. Then you should return him to Carolina speedily, so his own physician can examine him. Despite his robust appearance his heart may be fragile. A person in that state should not become unduly excited.”

They left Newport three days later. Edgar said he felt fine, though his pallor and labored breathing denied it. Alex worried. Fortunately there were no repetitions of the disturbing incident during the winter.

 

Edgar wrapped the white cloth around his coat sleeve, knotted it. White showed up well in the dark. In the midst of a melee Unionist friends could be identified.

The nullification crowd wore blue rosettes in their lapels, blue cockades on their hats. Charleston Nullifiers included town-dwelling planters such as Simms, and
younger gentry, including Gibbes, already expelled from the state college at Columbia for brawling.

It was Monday night, October 8, 1832, the first of two days of voting for state legislators. For weeks the city had been plagued by confrontations, fights, and near riots as the factions campaigned for their candidates. Governor Hamilton and Edgar's friend Petigru, political foes, had acted together to prevent a major bloodletting in King Street after rival meetings let out at Seyle's Hall and the Circus Tavern at the same hour. Bricks thrown in the dark bloodied the governor's head and that of William Drayton. Petigru and others drew the Unionists away east on Hasell Street.

“After I leave, put Titus on watch,” Edgar said to Cassandra.

“Titus is far too old. He couldn't fend off an attack from a puppy.”

“Then lock the doors.”

“I will when Alex returns.”

“What? Where the devil is she?”

“She ran to John Street with a tin of fish chowder. Henry Strong's mother has been ill with influenza. She's recovering. Alex wanted to visit.”

“And you allowed it?”

“Edgar, your daughter is seventeen. Strong willed.”

“Muleheaded. Something's changed her lately. She's quiet, less forthcoming. Is it a boy?”

“I don't know of one.”

“Well, roaming the streets is unsafe. The Nullies are waylaying derelicts and holding them in houses where they'll be given whiskey all night and sent to vote tomorrow. They're terrified of a defeat upstate. They even stoop to voting dead men whose names are copied from headstones.”

“If the streets are dangerous, why are you going out?”

“To prevent more chicanery.”

“Alex will be fine, she's hardy,” Cassandra assured him, though her glance expressed anxiety. “Please don't excite yourself. The doctor—”

“Hang the doctor. If something happens to her, it's on your head.”

He stalked out. On the steps he was caught by a last ray of daylight; Cassandra saw the choler in his face. She blamed herself.

 

Alex said good-bye to Mrs. Strong in her sickroom, and to Henry's sister washing dishes in the kitchen. Henry sat on the chopping block, whittling. Alex glanced at him and went out.

In the shop Hamnet was busy with his latest handiwork, a mahogany clothespress with casters and a beautiful scrolled pediment. “For your relative, Mrs. Simms Bell.”

“They get all their furniture from London,” Alex said. “Uncle Simms told me so.”

Amused, Hamnet said, “Maybe that's the story they peddle in town. I've made their pieces for years. Charge 'em about a third of what an import costs and I still make a profit. But I practically have to swear a blood oath to keep the business a secret. To see how I'm coming with a piece, Mrs. Simms Bell and her stuck-up daughter creep around here like spies. Some folks are passing strange.”

He escorted her outside. A luminous azure sky spread over them, speckled with stars. The air smelled of the ocean. With the coming of autumn it had turned cooler.

“Kind of you to come visit. Mary's a whole lot better.”

“I was so glad to see that, Mr. Strong.”

“Soup will go down just fine, her appetite's back. You best hurry home. There's a lot of trouble in town, the election and all.”

“I saw men idling on Meeting Street, but nothing worse. My father was out on patrol last night. I suppose he will be again.”

“How's he feeling?”

“Not as well as he should.” A distant sound like a gunshot startled them. “I'll tell him you asked.” She shook the carpenter's big hand. As she arranged her ivory shawl, she heard footsteps behind her. Henry appeared, still awkwardly silent.

His nearness produced more of those strange, excited feelings Alex remembered from the theater. The sonorous
peal of St. Michael's bells reached them. Hamnet Strong frowned.

“Too early for curfew warning. Could be a fire.”

“My father saw two last night,” Alex said.

“Henry, I want you to keep Alex company on the way home. Still plenty of time before curfew. Stay a ways behind her, you don't want to be stopped for walking with a white girl.”

“Really, Mr. Strong, I don't need—”

“Best you let him go along, never can tell what you'll run into, night like this.” Reluctantly she thanked Hamnet and left through the gate to John Street.

Deepening shadows seemed all the darker because of the luminous sky. A few steps brought her to Meeting, where she saw St. Michael's white steeple in the distance, painted a lovely dark blue by the evening light. Down by the city market lanterns flashed. All at once she was grateful for Henry's steady step a half block behind.