Glory Over Everything (39 page)

We ate wordlessly and rolled out our pallets. Soon both Pan and Sukey fell into a deep sleep. I lay back as well, but sleep would not come. My mind raced, and the space closed in on me. I worked to regulate my breathing in an effort to fight panic. How had I come to this? And how would I find my way out?

I looked at Pan. Asleep, he looked more helpless than ever. As sickly as he was, I wondered if he could survive this journey. Why hadn't he stayed back? He would have had a better chance that way. I was furious with myself for not refusing him. What if he were to die and this was all for naught? Bitterly, I thought of burying Henry, and of the promise that had brought me to these circumstances.

I glanced at Sukey. When was her baby due? She was the one who knew the route, but her swollen abdomen suggested an imminent birth. What would happen to us then? Surely a newborn would put an end to our flight.

I shut my eyes. Each fear raised another, but what overrode all of them was my most immediate concern. Where was Rankin? Was he already with the patrollers? I knew what would happen if I was found. I would be tried as a Negro for murdering a white man, and my fate would be sealed. I would be hanged.

After hours of torment, it almost felt a relief when a shuffling commotion began above us.

T
HE PATROLLERS' HEAVY
feet woke Pan and Sukey. We three held our breath as the gathered quilting party above us stitched on the lowered quilt while they greeted the intruders. Their friendly greetings were not returned. When the patrollers shushed everyone and stood to listen, the silence grew almost unbearable. Then a child cried and was joined by another. Soon after, the disgruntled patrollers left, though the women stayed on to stitch while their children settled to play at their feet.

Hours later, all was silent, but that evening, after the clock bonged for the tenth hour, we were brought up from the underbelly of the house. We needed a stool to help Sukey out, and while the husband frowned uncertainly at her pregnancy, there seemed no choice but to lead us away.

The tall Quaker man strode forward, sure and direct on a path that he knew well. Both Pan and Sukey stayed strong, and we traveled wordlessly for much of the night. Just before daybreak, the man stopped to leave us in the shelter of dense woods. He spoke low, going over our directions as he handed us a packet of bread and hard cheese. “Stay to the north.” He pointed. “And stay alert,” he needlessly added before bidding us good luck and farewell.

We found our way through the woods, which opened to an orange sky and fields of cotton that stretched endlessly before us. We all gratefully sank to the ground; within minutes, Pan was asleep beside me. Sukey lay down, and though she was restless, to my relief she did not try to communicate. Finally, by midafternoon, after no sign of human life, I could no longer take the wait. Though we had been advised to stay hidden and to travel only at night, I had seen no one about through the day and thus decided it was safe to leave before nightfall. When Sukey realized my plan, she shook her head in disagreement, but after Pan and I stepped out together, Sukey reluctantly followed.

The sun beat down as we moved through the cotton fields, crouching low to bypass the small farms set back on sloping hills. On occasion we heard the bark of a dog; at the sound, we froze and dropped to the ground, only to rise and move again when reassured that no one was about. Pan was silent, but his energy remained high, while Sukey's face glistened from the heat. Once or twice she stumbled, but I kept on, relentlessly moving us forward, mindful only of reaching safety.

Our destination was north, where lay the Great Dismal Swamp. Once there, traveling the outskirts, we would come to a cross-canal that cut east, a waterway we would follow inland for ten miles, where it connected to the main canal. Along that canal, we had directions for a safe house where lived a friend of Doc McDougal.

Even as the sun set, it was insufferably hot. I missed my hat, which, along with the gun, I had regrettably left back at the house. What I clung to was my old jacket—counting on the jewels, if necessary, to buy our way to Norfolk.

We pushed on, resting in small patches of trees long enough to catch our breath, and by nightfall we had reached a dense pocket of green forest. I wavered, uneasy at the spongy feel of the soil.

Uncertain, I looked to Sukey. “Are we in the swamp?” I asked, but she shook her head. Seeing my hesitation, she pushed past me to take the lead, fighting through the vines and briars until she found a stream. There she dropped to her knees to drink, and after Pan and I did the same, Sukey broke off chunks of bread and cheese and we all ate hungrily.

“These bugs gettin' to me,” Pan whispered. All three of us scratched mercilessly at the chiggers that had embedded themselves under our skin. As the mosquitoes and biting flies bore down, Sukey withdrew the animal bladder filled with thick bear grease.

“Whew! This got some smell to it!” Pan whispered when she dipped the yellow grease out and silently showed him how to rub it on his face and exposed skin. At another time, the smell alone would have prevented me from using it, but when she offered some to me, I, too, used it liberally. When our faces and limbs shone from the thick ointment, Sukey grunted and rose heavily, motioning for us to follow her across the shallow stream.

Again we fought through dense underbrush that tore at our clothing and at our skin until we made our way through to an opening on the other side. There, lit by the night, lay open fields of corn. Sukey pointed into the distance, then firmly grasped my hand. “Swamp,” she scratched into my palm.

“What she say?” Pan asked.

“She said that up ahead is the swamp,” I said, squinting to better see the dark outline of tall trees.

“Are we almost home when we get to the swamp?” Pan asked.

“No,” I said, and that silenced him again.

There were some night hours remaining, ideal for traveling, but relieved to be this close to the swamp, and with the cover that the corn stalks would provide, I sank to the ground and declared that we would take a short rest. I had not slept since leaving the Spencer home, and I felt overcome from exhaustion. Sukey, though, shook her head, and motioned for us to continue on. I disregarded her and scraped together a bed of leaves for a pillow, and when I lay down, Pan followed suit. Finally, Sukey, sighing heavily, did the same. Minutes later, all three of us were sound asleep.

I awoke with the early-morning sun in my face. I leaped up, startling the other two out of a sound sleep. “We slept too long,” Pan noted, while Sukey and I stared at each other, disbelieving the hour. I longed for a drink from the stream, but that would have meant backtracking, so I promised myself we would have water as soon as we reached the swamp. By my estimation, we were under five miles away, a destination that could be reached easily before noon.

I looked out across the lonely cornfield. Seeing no humans about, I decided that we would take the same risk and travel during daylight. Again Sukey objected but followed when I scooped up my jacket and moved out.

W
E HAD BEEN
moving swiftly for a good long while and had almost reached the outskirts of the swamp when a gunshot burst through the still air. Startled crows cawed and flew up as Sukey and I flung ourselves to the ground, parallel to each other, between the rows of corn. Pan, confused, stayed standing until I yanked him down behind me. When a crashing noise came toward us, Sukey rose to her hands and knees, then lifted up her skirt and clamped it in her teeth as she began to crawl forward. I crawled, too, with Pan close behind, until the gun blasted again. We all hit the ground just as a huge black bear crashed by in front of us, trailing blood. Though still a distance away, the sound of men's excited voices grew closer. We dared not move. Unexpectedly, the bear circled back toward the hunters. With whoops of surprise and a rifle report, their shouts receded, and we rose again to our hands and knees.

We scrambled until we reached the safety of the swamp and there had to push through tangles of thick vines and briars before we were in far enough to hunker down. The ground we sat on was damp and spongelike; the forest around us was so dense that it appeared black, but we had reached the great swamp. Gasping for air, we sat staring at one another, disbelieving that we had reached safety.

We had only just caught our breath when we heard shouts, followed by more shots from a rifle. Now came the barking of dogs. As one, we scrambled to our feet to push farther in.

With the sound of dogs sharp in the air, we tore our way through, deep into the tangled overgrowth and darkness, until the sound of men and dogs began to fade. We dared not rest. I hated the way the soft boggy land gave under my feet, but I hated even more stepping into the tea-colored water to weave our way, knee-deep, through the maze of jutting cedar roots that buckled up as twisted barriers. From above, thick, corded vines, netted with Spanish moss, draped down to ensnare us. With each vine I pushed away, I thought of the cottonmouth moccasins, the copperheads, and the rattlesnakes known to inhabit the place.

We struggled on, Pan surprisingly agile in water that was at times waist-deep. Sukey suddenly grunted and pointed ahead to what appeared to be a small green island. Exhausted, we slogged toward it and finally onto the dry piece of land where, in the midst of towering white oak and green pine, there lay a massive overturned oak.

The enormous root ball rose at least six feet into the air. After Sukey cautiously pulled back the thick overgrowth of moss and vines covering it, she waved us over to show us a cavelike hideaway. We were peering into the dark interior when, from behind, something massive came barreling through the water. As one, we dove into the shelter, letting the heavy vines swing down behind us.

The interior was dark, low, deep, and wide, and as the crashing sounds grew dim, I whispered in relief that it must have been the bear escaping the hunters. When Sukey nodded agreement, she tapped my arm and I gave her my palm. “Rest,” she scratched, and then encircled her abdomen with her hands.

“What she say?” Pan asked, tightly clutching my arm. “She say something 'bout her baby comin'?”

“No, she wants to rest,” I said.

“Good,” he said. “I'm sure glad to hear there's no baby comin' now.”

I was on edge with the nearby hunters and would have pushed on through the swamp, but Sukey lay back with a sigh. Pan did the same. I stayed sitting up, too uneasy to rest. I looked about the dark cave and worried what would come next. We had the patrollers pursuing us, and though it was not likely they would come this deep into the swamp, there was the danger of escaped slaves—men desperate enough to live in this ungodly habitat who did not welcome intruders.

Finally, I lay back to close my eyes, but moments later, I was swatting frantically at a gigantic spider that had crawled onto my face. I sat up, shuddering, squinting in the dark to see where it had gone. Pan and Sukey were resting, but I was overcome with the hopelessness of what lay ahead.

Lost in this overgrown quagmire, we had to find the cross-ditch that would eventually lead us over to the main canal. Assuming we could find it, we had to follow that cross-ditch on foot, traveling the ten miles of rough towpath only at night, since barges would be coming through by day, no doubt some with patrollers eager for the large bounty.

Then there was the danger of the animals. This huge swamp was known to shelter not only bear, of which we had evidence, but also other predatory animals such as wolves, panthers, and bobcats. Alligators lived here as well, but it was the snakes I feared the most.

I had not yet told Sukey that on our crawl for the swamp, I had lost our supply of bread and cheese. What, I wondered, would we do for food? Fortunately, the tea-colored water surrounding us was drinkable, and though we all had an earlier fill of it, I now slipped out for more.

A wide shaft of light traveled down the incredible height of the trees. I might have seen a certain beauty in it had I not been so anxious. I went to the water's edge and knelt on a mass of ferns, there to cup my hands and slurp up the brown water. Then, as I splashed my face, Sukey quietly joined me. She hunched down to drink, but when she leaned over, she gave a startled yelp. I sprang up, thinking she had seen something I had not.

She avoided looking at me as she awkwardly rose to her feet and I went cold when her hands gripped her swollen abdomen. Was it possible that she was ready to give birth?

Pan suddenly emerged from the cave. “Hey, Mr. Burton! You give me a scare,” he said, rushing to my side. “I woke up and thought you went without me!”

His eyes followed Sukey walking heavily back toward the cave. She stopped at a nearby tree and broke off a small branch—about a foot long and one to two inches in diameter—and took it with her as she crawled into the cave.

Why did she want that stick? Did she mean to kill the child? I had heard of Negroes doing things like that. Bile rose in me. What kind of mother would do that? I must leave now! Without her! I sat arguing with myself while Pan squatted beside me, studying my face. “You think she gonna have that baby?” he asked. “Mr. Burton! What we gonna do with a baby?”

I shook my head in response while trying to think clearly. From inside the cave came a sharp cry of pain. “Stay here,” I said to Pan, then went back into the cave. Sukey met me with a loud moan.

“Quiet! You must be quiet!” I stared at her as my eyes adjusted to the dark.

She clapped her hands over her mouth, but when she tried to shift again, a low animal sound escaped from under her hand. She looked at me in apology.

I looked away, but she waved me forward and then tapped at my clenched fist. Though dreading the message, I gave her access. “Baby coming,” she wrote.

I pulled back my hand and rubbed the palm with my thumb as though to erase the message. This was impossible! We couldn't journey out with a newborn. We both knew it.