Walk Through Darkness (19 page)

O
NE
Dover whistled for William in the pitch-blackness that precedes the rising of the moon. He stumbled forward, crouched low and feeling his way with his hands. When he stepped out of the undergrowth and emerged beside her, she pulled him tight against her. “Shh,” she said. “Don’t let nobody hear you talk.” With that, she set off, quick enough in her step to allow no dissent.

They had precious little time to speak upon their meeting. Dover had done little more than verify through touch and a few words that William was real, then she had ordered him back into hiding until she could figure out what to do. It was too brief a reunion, and it left William with a host of unanswered questions. He waited as instructed, throughout the late afternoon and on into twilight and beyond, replaying those seconds, searching each of her gestures and words for meanings hidden below the surface. Though he was amazed by the sight of her, something in their greeting left him uneasy.

They traveled on the side streets, the alleyways, behind people’s
houses, stepping around the refuse that collected in such regions, the pungent mounds patrolled by rats wakening to their work. It was an intimate progress, this rear glimpse into people’s homes. It became more so once out of that affluent neighborhood and into working class areas. The business at the backside of the city dwellers’ lives was on display. The splash of liquids thrown from a back window, the piercing wail of a child left unattended, the glazed eyes of an old woman, alone on a porch, railing verbally against the rats she loathed. William started at the call of one Irishman to another, the two suddenly emerging from a fenced yard, dashing past them like school children, laughing as they went. Once their path brought them near a legless man. He shouted curses from the padded crate in which he sat, lashing out with his arms as if he could grapple with the world and so vent his anger. The couple circled him at length and moved on.

Their destination was a modest row house, a unit squashed between the larger structures. They approached it from the back alley, slipped in at a rickety wooden gate and fell into shadow, and emerged into the moonlight again as they climbed the stairs. The landing at the top was a narrow balcony of rough-cut lumber. It bowed beneath their weight. William wondered how Dover knew this route so well, but he didn’t voice the question. She motioned him still and addressed herself to the door, a windowless portal whose lintel met William at eye level. She rapped against it with her knuckles. He noticed for the first time how hard she was breathing. Beads of sweat clung to her forehead. Noticing his gaze, she wiped them away with the flat of her hand.

The door cracked open. A man stepped forward, holding a candle close to his face, bathing his features in pools of light and shadow. His complexion was similar to William’s, though his face had a muted quality very different than William’s strong features. He wore wire-rimmed glasses that reflected the candlelight in
gold. His glance first settled on William, quick and defensive, but it softened the moment he noticed Dover.

“Sorry to trouble you,” she said. She leaned in toward the man, meeting his gaze and speaking as much with her eyes as with her mouth. “Have to apologize for coming by at this hour, but we need to talk.”

William learned the other man’s name was Redford Prince. His apartment was small but tidy, with a sparseness that at first disguised the careful selection of the room’s decorations. Red-ford bade them enter and motioned them toward the sofa, an ornate furnishing with pale upholstery, with cabriole legs of a deep mahogany that concluded in claws clenched around the balls upon which the entire structure rested. Redford swept an assortment of books and papers from the coffee table and offered them tea. They both refused, but he stoked the tiny fire in his hearth with a few small sticks and set out saucers for them. He was largely silent through all of this, working with a quick dexterity, his fingers trembling while at rest.

William soon found himself seated on the soft cushion, a cup and saucer balanced on the rough contours of his knees. Dover held the same in one hand, somehow graceful with the porcelain in a way that made William uneasy. She explained the situation that had brought them there. A little of it, at least. But as she knew almost nothing of William’s story it fell to him to tell his tale. He did so most reluctantly. Though he described terrors neither of his listeners could imagine, it was he who was most unnerved. He wasn’t even sure why, but somehow, already, the glow was fading. Things were already different than he had imagined. Telling his tale only made him more aware of this.

Before long they began to talk of the couple’s options, which proved to be painfully limited. They couldn’t make a home for themselves here because William wasn’t beyond the reach of the South. And Dover, despite her apparent freedom, was still the property of a man who could call her back at any time. They
could flee farther north, or to the west, but to where, with whose help, to settle in what unknown territory, with what demons stalking behind them? At length, Redford began to speak of an escape to Canada.

“Canada?” William asked. He glanced at Dover, surprised that she did not share his shock. Yes, Canada bordered the States, but, as it was another country, it might as well have been Great Britain or Prussia or even Africa itself. “You expect us to go to Canada? I don’t know nothing bout up there.”

“It’s the nearest truly free soil around. I know it’s a difficult thing to consider, but you’re already an exile from the place of your birth, William. Life there does have advantages, as I’ve already explained to Dover. I’ve a copy of the
Provincial Freeman
around here somewhere. It’s a paper put out by a Negro woman about life in the provinces. She exaggerates the positive, I’m sure, but it’s worth reading.” Redford half-stood and cast his eyes about the room.

William’s eyes darted between Redford and Dover, sharp on each. Everything about the free man’s educated tone aggravated him: the brevity with which he shot down each proposal they made, the way the corner of his lips dipped before he spoke, the manner in which he explained the hard facts behind things as if to a young child. Even the way he held his teacup—the angle of his wrist and pauses in his speech during which he drank—seemed an insult. But what choice did he have but to sit and listen and try to learn enough to get some control back? He lowered his gaze and glared at the teacup.

“Anyway, I’ll find it for you,” Redford concluded. “This does pose problems of its own, not least the financing of such an adventure. We might be able to gain the support of some of the faithful, but you know how these things are—the fewer that know the better.”

“You say we have to head to Canada,” William said, his voice fighting for a composure he didn’t feel, “and maybe you’re right.
You let us on think on it a bit. Meantime I’ll work. I’ll pay our own way.”

The other two shook their heads in unison.

“That wouldn’t be advisable, not unless it was work that I secured for you,” Redford said.

Dover agreed. “It’s best you just stay hid somewhere. No use bringing attention to yourself.”

William lifted the teacup and deposited it untasted on the glass tabletop. Dover’s words were simple and reasonable enough, but he felt a sting at the backside of them. Did he embarrass her? Was he so useless? Must he just hide and rely on the good will of others? The moment of connection he had experienced when they reunited was gone. It had only been a few hours, but the intimacy between them seemed to have faded completely. “Don’t see why I can’t just work. That’s one thing I know how to do. If I could keep my wages it wouldn’t be long fore …”

“Before you were chained and on your way back to massa.” Redford said this with a touch of sarcasm, but, having spoken it, he changed his tone. He adjusted his glasses, looked from William to Dover and back again. “What I’m trying to say is that you’re daily in danger. Perhaps I should explain to you the current laws of our land. You can’t be expected to understand them. William, there are many good men and women in the North. I don’t doubt that there are a few in the South as well, although they stay largely silent. The Christians of the North abhor slavery, and we are doing everything possible to see it overturned. But, the powers in Congress over the last few years have followed a policy of compromise. The Congress, and the President, want nothing so much as to keep this union of states together. As such, they’ve capitulated to the slaveholders, not so much because they share like minds, but because they see the denigration of the Negro as the lesser evil compared to dissolution. Do you understand?”

Dover said, as if translating, “They made a law that says the North gotta send slaves back south.”

“Exactly,” Redford continued, inching forward to resume center stage. “Anyone, anywhere in the United States is required by law to respect the property rights of slave owners, even here in the North. Law says that if you’re a white man walking down the street one day and deputy yells for you to grab hold of the Negro standing beside you because he’s a fugitive then you are required to lay your hands on the man. Before the new fugitive law an escaped slave wasn’t exactly safe in the North, but he could live with some measure of security. He could live a decent life up here, marry and own property and get into business. Some even wrote of their histories and had them published. But the new law has emboldened the slave masters. They come up here and snatch men and women out of the lives they’re creating for themselves and take them back into bondage. We abolitionists have fought this at each juncture, but each year the government bends further back upon itself. They capitulate, capitulate, capitulate. It’s a dire situation. You can’t trust anybody, and yet you’re forced to trust somebody.”

William stared at his teacup. Thoughts moved behind his eyes, thoughts different than those he spoke. “So you telling me that freedom’s just a lie.”

Redford cleared his throat and adjusted his posture. He reached for his tea. Holding the saucer just before his lips, he said, “No, it’s not that simple. But, truth be known, we’ve married ourselves into a union with criminals. None of us are safe for it. We all live in constant fear. I’ve never been a slave, but I know there’s no difference between you and I save the location of our birth. And even that’s scant protection. Good brothers and sisters that were known to me personally have been kidnapped and taken into bondage. A man can labor all his life in the freedom of the North, but if a scoundrel takes hold of him he cannot utter a word in his own defense. That is why we must solicit the favor of honorable whites. It doesn’t make one comfortable, but it is a necessity. And with Dover’s condition …”

Noticing the downturned expressions on the couple’s faces, he leaned forward and touched Dover on the knee. “But, listen, I will do everything in my power to help you. You have my word on that. Both of you.” He promised to begin working on their behalf in the morning. For the time being, he proposed that William stay with him. He would see about securing a safer place for him to hide and would look into a way of getting them to true safety. It would not be easy, he said, and it would not be cheap, but all things were possible if one were willing to put actions in line with beliefs. That was what gave the champions of liberty strength, and, thank God, it was one weapon that the slavery interests could never truly raise against them.

Dover parted from William with a quick kiss. The sensation of her lips on his lingered long afterwards, not the touch of them, but the memory, the knowledge of their absence. He spent a sleepless night on the floor of Redford’s sitting room, lying straight-backed on a quilt thrown over a woven rug. It was more luxurious bedding than he was used to, but slumber proved difficult. Nothing was as he had imagined it would be. He had found Dover, but instead of resolution he discovered a new host of hurdles thrown up against him. He tried to sort them out, to deal with each issue separately and thus move forward. But he couldn’t approach a single question without an array of laws and politics flying in like a flock of crows, insatiable and raucous. And behind all of these machinations were more troubling doubts. Dover was as he remembered, and yet she was different also. She was as determined as before, but now she had the will to put her plans in motion. It was she who led him through the streets, who brought him to this place of shelter, who knew the city and the ways of the North. He felt like a child beside her, not like a husband, or a man soon to be a father. And what of Redford and his strained familiarity with Dover?

William was still awake when the new day lightened the
room. Redford left him alone with instructions to rest himself, to keep the curtains drawn, to be as quiet as possible and to answer no caller save for Dover herself. He slipped outside briefly and returned with a bucket of water sprinkled with lye soap. William should feel free to wash himself. It wouldn’t make for a proper bath, he knew, but he hoped it would suffice until he had the time to pump and heat enough water.

Alone, William rose, brushed and folded his bedding and set the quilt in a corner. He ate a breakfast of a hard, white cheese, sliced thin and topped with a preserve that Redford had set out for him. He had at first thought little of bathing, but alone with himself he became conscious of his body. His own odor floated heavy around him. The grime from his vigil coated him, leaving him feeling like he hadn’t bathed since he began his journey. He stripped naked and stood in the tiny nook beside the stove, atop dry bits of kindling that stuck to the bottoms of his feet. He was pale beneath his clothes, a honeyed tone several shades lighter than his suntanned face. His skin seemed thinner than it had been before, stretched taut across muscle and bone. It was an awkward bath. He scooped up handfuls of the milky water and rubbed his flesh, trying all the time not to splash outside of the tiny wet circle beneath him. Eventually, he dipped his whole shirt in the bucket and used it as a wash cloth. He gave special attention to his back. He ran his fingers over his ridged scars, tracing the whip marks on his shoulders and upper arms, although unable to reach the layered welts that stretched down his lower back. He knelt and scrubbed his shirt within the bucket, then tossed in his trousers, which he washed carefully for fear that they would disintegrate. The water was no longer white when he finished. He hung the wet clothes over the wood stove and stood in the center of the room as if he planned to wait that way until they dried.