Soul Catcher (32 page)

^{"I done it before," she said.}

^{They unlocked the shackles and led her inside. She asked for some soap and water and rags. She undressed the old couple and set about washing them. Cain stood in the bedroom and watched as she went about her business. The pair looked pathetic in their nakedness, shriveled and gaunt, their skin pocked and of a bluish white hue. They looked like plucked and long-dead chickens lying on the bed. Cain thought:
So this is all that it comes down to.
Rosetta, though, didn't seem to mind in the least. She washed them and then got clean clothing from the chiffonier in the corner of the room and dressed them. She worked briskly, as if from experience, but Cain noticed that her movements were also tender and filled with compassion. From the dresser she found the woman's wedding ring, and she placed it on her finger. When she'd finished dressing them, she took a pair of sheets and used them for shrouds.}

^{"I'll need some rope," she said to Cain.}

^{He went out to the barn and returned with rope, which she used to wrap around the shrouds in several places, holding them in place.}

^{"They're ready now," Rosetta said to Cain.}

^{The men carried the two bodies out to the grave and lay them in, first the man and then the woman on top of him.}

^{"Oughtn't we to s-say some words?" Little Strofe asked.}

^{"What words?" his brother said.}

^{"A prayer."}

^{"You've a mind to, ain't nobody stopping you."}

^{"I ain't no preacher."}

^{He turned to Cain. The only thing Cain could think of was a proverb his mother used to read to him from the Bible:
For they eat the bread of wickedness, and drink the wine of violence.}

^{"We're wasting time," replied Strofe. He grabbed a shovel and was about to begin, when Rosetta said, "Wait." She stepped forward and recited the Twenty-third Psalm:}

^{"The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want.}

^{He maketh me to lie down in green pastures . . ."}

^{When she finished, they began burying the two. As Cain threw shovelfuls of dirt on them, he thought of their conversation the previous night. About his promise to the woman. And about the mysteries of love.}

^{Chapter 11.}

^{T
hey continued to ride west, toward the rolling hills that undulated across the western part of Connecticut and into New York State. They passed farmers driving wagons to market or children walking to school with their satchels slung over their shoulders or, in one case, a doctor in a sulky pulled by a fast bay trotter. Cain stopped the man and inquired if he might take a look at his wound, which the doctor did, pronouncing the stitches as professionally rendered as those of a surgeon. Mostly, though, it was the solitary rider or lonely pedestrian they came across on these back country lanes, some seemingly as intent on not running into fellow travelers as they. They would furtively slide by on the road with barely a nod, the brim of their hats pulled low to shade their faces. One morning they passed a well-dressed, middle-aged Negro man wearing a double-breasted paletot and felt bowler, lugging a well-worn portmanteau. When he saw them, he tried to slip into the woods, but it was too late.}

^{"Just hold it there," Strofe called. When they were close, he asked, "Where you going, boy?"}

^{"Nowhere," the man said. "Just up da road a piece."}

^{"How far to the New York border?" Cain asked him.}

^{"Ain't far, suh," he said, in that fawning way Negroes had with white men on horses. He nervously eyed Little Strofe's dogs. "Two day."}

^{He looked at Rosetta, then Henry.}

^{Preacher stared at the man's hat, which was similar to the one he himself wore.}

^{"Where'd you get that hat, nigger?" he asked.}

^{The Negro shrugged.}

^{"I'm askin' you a question, boy?"}

^{"Done bought it."}

^{"Well, you give it here." When the man hesitated Preacher said, "You hear me, boy? I said give it here." The man took his hat off and handed it to Preacher. Preacher removed his own hat and compared the two. He even tried the Negro's hat on for size. It fit him much better than his own.}

^{"I think I'll keep it. Here," he said, tossing his hat to the black man.}

^{"I doan want your hat. I wants my own."}

^{"Hit's a fair trade," Preacher said. "Now you take and git on out a here, you know what's good for you."}

^{The man gave Preacher a surly look but he turned and started walking. As he went he mumbled under his breath, "
Swanga."}

^{"What's that you say, nigger?" Preacher asked.}

^{"Nothin', massa," the man replied without turning back. Once past them, the Negro broke into an awkward run down the road, lugging his portmanteau.}

^{Just after they'd crossed the New York border, they stopped at a general store in a small out-of-the-way village to buy tobacco and whiskey, and for Cain another bottle of laudanum. Besides the store, the place amounted to only a couple of shabby unpainted houses, a small Baptist church made of logs, a blacksmith shop, and a feed and grain operation.}

^{"How far to Dobbs Ferry?" Cain asked the owner, a tall man with a large gold tooth that seemed stuck to his lower lip.}

^{Scratching his crotch, the man glanced out the window, as if he'd never been asked the direction to anyplace in his life.}

^{"That's a good question," he replied.}

^{Just as they were mounting up to leave, a party of men on horses came riding in. Dust from the road kicked up around them, and the air wavered in the midday heat creating an almost miragelike image.}

^{There were four men on two bay horses, a swaybacked, broke-winded nag, and a black gelding with four white stockings and white hooves. The latter horse was three-legged lame, its hooves a mess, all broken up. Cain wondered if the man bred the horse or if he had been stupid enough to purchase one with four white hooves. Shuffling on foot behind the four men were a half dozen Negroes. They wore shackles hand and foot, and around their necks heavy iron collars with hooked prongs sticking out to the sides, some with bells attached. They were tied neck to neck by lengths of rope, the lead Negro's rope held by the last of the riders, who tugged them along at a brisk pace. If one fell, they would all fall and get dragged along. Cain had seen such arrangements before and didn't approve of them.}

^{"Well, would you looky there," Preacher said. "Fellow slave catchers."}

^{"Blackbirders," countered Cain, who'd been checking the cinch of his saddle. "Don't tell them anything."}

^{Cain knew their sort. He'd had experience with blackbirders and he liked to steer clear of them. Despicable men of low character, they roamed about preying on any Negroes they could find, freemen or runaways, it didn't matter to them. In the South they kidnapped slaves legitimately traveling on an errand for their masters or freed Negroes with papers, which they'd confiscate and destroy. In the North, they haunted the black sections of large cities, waiting for a drunken Negro to wander into their clutches. They captured women and children, gray-haired old grannies, Negroes who'd been free their entire lives, and they'd put them in irons and march them down to the auction houses in Baltimore or Richmond or Charleston. They never carried warrants, and the law meant nothing at all to them.}

^{"Why not?" asked Preacher.}

^{"Just keep your mouth shut."}

^{They came riding up to the store and stopped, the dust carrying beyond them into the faces of Cain and the others. The Negroes were a haggard-looking bunch, scrawny, poorly fed. Mixed in among them were two women, one of whom had been branded on her face--the mark of a runaway.}

^{"How do," said the leader, a stocky, red-faced man with a powder burn beneath his right eye. His greatcoat was open and on his hip he carried a brace of blunt-barreled Tranter revolvers. He was on one of the bays.}

^{Cain touched a finger to his hat in greeting.}

^{"Where'd you get them niggers?" Preacher asked.}

^{"Here and yonder," said the leader, smiling. He stared at Rosetta, standing beside Cain. "Where y'all headed?"}

^{"Virginny," Preacher piped up.}

^{Cain looked over at him, but Preacher was occupied by the other slaves.}

^{"Why, we're going the same way," said the ruddy-complected leader. "We're bringing these here niggers down to Baltimore, to the block. What say y'all and us throw in together?"}

^{"Thank you," Cain said, untying Hermes from the hitching post. "But we're fine as it is."}

^{"You might want to reconsider," the man said.}

^{"Yeah. Why is that?"}

^{"Those abolitionists are everywhere hereabouts. What was that feller's name, Bell?" he asked, turning to the rider on his left, the one who rode the black gelding.}

^{The man, who had a long dark beard with two streaks of pure white down the middle like the back of a polecat, was concentrating on chewing a fingernail. "What feller would that be?"}

^{"The one we heard tell was looking for some folks took off with one of his runaway niggers."}

^{"How in tarnation would I know?" the other snapped.}

^{"That goddamned abolitionist. The one from out in Kansas."}

^{"You mean Brown?"}

^{"That's it. Brown. We heard he was riding down toward New York City. Asking along the way for any sign of some slave catchers he was after. You wouldn't know anything about that, now would you?" The man grinned, glancing first at Henry, then at Rosetta.}

^{"Don't know anything about that," Cain said.}

^{"But you see my point. We'd be better off throwing in together. Safety in numbers and all that."}

^{"The man makes sense," Preacher said, glancing at Cain.}

^{"No," Cain repeated.}

^{"We're on the same side, mister," the leader advised.}

^{"What side would that be?"}

^{"The side of the law."}

^{"Whose law?"}

^{"The one that says a man's property can't be taken from him by some nigger-loving Yankee."}

^{"And I suppose you have warrants for every one of those Negroes you got there?"}

^{"That would be none of your business."}

^{"Like I said," Cain repeated, "thanks all the same, but we're fine."}

^{"But--" Preacher started.}

^{"I
said
we're fine," Cain said, tossing a harsh look at Preacher.}

^{The man looked from Preacher to Cain, then smiled. He was missing one of his front teeth.}