The Mapmaker's Children (8 page)

N
EW
C
HARLESTOWN
, V
IRGINIA
D
ECEMBER
1, 1859

S
iby's cooking lived up to its fame, and Sarah was grateful when she snuck her an extra corn bread wedge. “Case your stomach be giving you trouble in the night,” she said after showing the women to the guest room.

When they were changed for bed and the candle had burned down to a nub, Annie brought forth a tincture in a black bottle from her bag.

“I ordered it from the
Albany Advertiser
.”

“A snake oil potion?” their mother asked.

“No, Mama. Balsam made by Dr. Karl Von Meier of Germany, a famous doctor. It will help us sleep and give us the fortitude.”

A cup and plaster jug sat on the vanity. Annie filled it: half water, half balsam.

“That should be enough to share.”

Their mother ignored her, standing in her nightgown by the frosted window, gazing up at the shrouded sky.

“What if it snows,” she whispered. “They can't hang a man in a snowstorm—can't bury the dead in frozen ground.” Mary's eyes were bloodshot and dark as train soot. She needed sleep, if only an hour or two.

Annie gave Sarah a desperate look. “We must hold strong to our faith,” she said, and Sarah agreed with that.

Their mother collapsed inwardly, defeated. She took the cup and drank.

“It has proven itself,” said Annie. “I gave it to Sarah, and it cured her.”

This was news to Sarah. She clutched at her throat, shocked that her sister would keep this secret from her. “You had me drink that, unknowingly?”

Annie straightened her shoulders and scowled. “The balsam saved you.”

“What if it had poisoned me to death?”

“Then you would've been no better or worse than the first,” Annie replied.

Sarah winced at the mention. There'd been another daughter Sarah, born an unlucky thirteen years before her. She'd died in the first dysentery epidemic, which had also taken their brothers Charles, Peter, and Austin. Sarah had always hated the idea that she was a replacement. Annie had no such morbid past. There had been no Annie Brown before her.

Her sister had meant that she'd have been no better or worse in physical affliction than the first Sarah, but what Sarah's head knew and her heart felt were at odds:
You would've been no better or worse than the first. No better than the first
. And then her mother's words returned and cut fresh like a razor.
Who will love her now?

She turned away from Annie and her mother. Her stomach cramped on the lamb stew, unaccustomed to being so full.

Annie turned the empty cup. “Mama, you weren't supposed to drink it all!”

Mary moved with shaky legs, lay down on the bed, and began to snore.

Sarah put a hand to her mother's cheek. “Her face is warmed through. Blasted, Annie!”

“Don't swear.” Annie took the rigid tone of their father. “She's fine.” She sat on the bed and gave their mother's legs a jostle. The snore caught on itself, then found its cadence again. “It's got a bit of the spirit in it is all.”

“Spirit!”

Annie got up and went to the vanity.

“You've got our mother drunk on balsam the eve of our father's hanging?” Sarah hissed.

Her sister mixed more water and balsam, then drank it down for Sarah to watch. She puckered her lips when she was through. “I thought it'd be more ambrosial.”

“Father would—” Sarah stopped, not knowing how to finish the sentence.

John had preached that drunkenness was the thoroughfare to every kind of evil debauchery in the land. But she'd seen him have a tipple with colleagues on cold North Elba nights. Medicinal use fell outside of the devil's employment. She remembered how the days of her dysentery ran together in hazy, feverish trances, recalled the miasmas of time occurring after meals of Indian pudding and tea, which she now knew were laced with balsam.

“We all need rest.” Annie held the cup out.

Sarah shook her head. Her mother and sister saw this tribulation as inescapable, but she knew better. Her father had entrusted in her
more
knowledge than they or any of the other women in his life, and she would not let him down now.

Annie put the cup away and slipped into bed beside their mother. “Stubborn Sarah…” She yawned, eyes already closed under the balsam spell. “Good night.”

The candle was down to its last minute of wick and wax. Sarah found an extra blanket inside a wooden chest. She wrapped herself in it, smelling a season long past, sunshine and vegetables from the laundry line. She posted herself by the window to watch and wait for something. Even if that something was as improbable as the dawn was certain.

Father
, she thought,
if you must perish, I promise I won't let you down
.

Children were created to carry forward a father's legacy. That's what he'd taught them. It was nature's way: the vine showed the seedling how to grow tall; the hatchlings learned to fly from their mother's breast; the fish swam against the current to spawn. “And God blessed them and God spake unto them, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.' ” Genesis. Her father's favorite book. The end of God's solitary existence. The beginning of Creation. She understood now. Today could not have meaning without the promise of ending. Birth and death, beginning and ending—they were one in the universe's memory.

But who would remember
her
tomorrow?

The taper had burned to nothing and fizzled. Outside, the clouded sky gave way and the winter moon shone open as bone.

She exhaled, leaving a halo of condensation on the windowpane.

Gypsy bayed and hurried between the house and the barn.

The bedroom was inky black and smelled of liniment and bodies, but the world beyond the window was lit and waiting. Sarah pressed her nose to the glass, watching the dog trot through the staked rows of dormant tomato plants. Her coat gleamed like a penny coin. She yelped again at something out of view, then circled back toward the house.

Suddenly, Sarah realized that if her father had escaped and chose not to follow her map, he would still know the way to them here at the Hills' home. How could she stay within when her father could be below, salvation in hand? Sarah's heart beat fast, hope renewed.

She collected the napkin of corn bread and tiptoed out. No pink of candlelight shone from beneath the bedroom doorways. She made her way down the staircase, through the servant's door, into the kitchen. The hearth coals glowed in sleepy smolder. To the left was a narrow passageway: Siby's room and the cooking pantry. Sarah made a beeline for the back door.

Outside, the blanket insulated her body much better than her coat had earlier. The ground frost stung her bare feet, until she found a set of muck boots by the garden trowels. She slipped into them and ventured to where she'd seen Gypsy minutes before. Taking the corn bread from the napkin, she clicked her tongue softly against the roof of her mouth like she did when feeding the guinea hens at home.

Their yard at home was buried beneath frost and snow and layers of winter, but here, in the month of Christmas, the ground was still bearing. A blueberry bush held a smattering of fruits. Every dollar from the UGRR backers had gone toward the purchasing of wood and flint for the raid spears, as ordered by her father. There was not a coin to spare for store-bought artist paints, so Sarah had learned to make long-lasting stains from harvest juices. Beet juice produced a pink paste; orange and carrot peels, a vibrant yellow; blackberries, a purple black to rival the deepest dim; even a blade of grass left its green memory on paper. Nature was more than appearance. It was a bounty of colors, free for all but understood best by those who read colors and shape. A blueberry wave:
waterway to freedom
. Pink hearts:
loving people
. Yellow:
safety
. Black:
danger
is near
. Green:
life is here
. Sarah walked the garden rows. In addition to blueberries, she saw orange squash, red beetroot, green sorrel and kale…

A horse neighed suddenly. Sarah dropped to her knees in the garden shadows.

Freddy and a man walked toward the barn, leading a speckled mare by the reins.

“Much obliged to you, Mr. Fisher,” said Freddy.

Mr. Fisher's face glinted indigo under the night light. “Glad to help, Mr. Hill.”

Siby's pa. Sarah was touched by the way Freddy addressed him, respectfully and with obvious affection. Her father's vision before her: white and black men, walking side by side as equals.

“We thought it best to have two horses pulling the wagon,” Freddy explained. “In case we need to move at a quicker pace. A lot of strangers in town. Amazing how people don't give the time of day to a man doing a good work, but everybody shows up to see him suffer.” Freddy shook his head and whipped the horse's reins across his palm. “Mankind. We're a savage bunch. Sometimes I wonder if Gypsy and Tilda look on us with pity.”

Mr. Fisher sighed loud enough for Sarah to hear from her crouch. “I wonder the same. Mr. George be a man of forgiveness, mercy, and tolerance. I know he preaches them things to the white folk in New Charlestown, but do other towns hear them parts of the Gospel? Sho' don't seem like it.” He ran his hand over the horse's haunches. “My pa, long time 'go, told me God gave animals a different kind of vision from us peoples. They ain't got as many colors in their head, so they ain't confused as easily. They sees straight through the rainbow. When I was a young'un, I used to wish I could see for a minute like theys do.” The horse nuzzled his shoulder. “A rainbow be pretty, but if a man try to take hold of it, he learns fast it ain't nothing but mist in hand.” He patted the horse's jowl and pushed it back forward. “Speaking of, I hope this fog rolls off for good tonight, otherwise passengers be late.”

Both men stopped their stroll to look up to the sky. Sarah followed
their gazes. Surrounded by cloud banks, the moon shone through but not a speck of starlight.

“Coming by land or river?” asked Freddy.

“Rumor's they be from Alabama parts, following the Drinkin' Gourd.”

Freddy exhaled heavily, surveying the sky. “They'll be late, to be certain, then.”

Passengers, the Drinkin' Gourd: UGRR code. She was right! The Hills and the Fishers shared her father's secret—hers now, too—and Sarah had seen how secrets bonded people more than blood or love or faith. Her father's Secret Committee of Six were men above all others. Men he'd been willing to leave his family for. Men he was willing to hang for.

“Margie and Siby put together vittles for the Hill women. I'll have her add a little extra for them's that's coming.”

To get Tilda moving again, he clicked his tongue, then continued in a low voice: “Mr. Freddy, we didn't want to be intruding or being of opinion, but I wouldn't count myself no kind of Christian if I didn't tell you.” Mr. Fisher stopped then and lifted his face confidently. “You folks be doing a fine thing here with the Browns. My brother be a freed man out west, and he put to pen the good that Captain Brown be trying to do in the territories. Lots of blood spilt, and he hanged for what? For my peoples and Margie's peoples down in Georgia, so they be free as us. I wouldn't have picked up a weapon to fight in Harpers Ferry, no suh, but no mistaking…” Fog curled its way around the moon, cloaking them in shadow. “The signs be saying change.”

Something cold and clammy slithered across Sarah's bare knee in the dirt. On nervous edge already and fearing a snake, she jumped from her hideaway, into full view.

Gypsy wagged her tail in greeting. Yellow crumbs clung to her shaggy beard.

“Miss Brown?” Freddy came close to see her better.

As if her family hadn't endured enough humiliation, now this. Sarah
reluctantly pulled the blanket tight around herself, throwing the triangular edge over her shoulder like a scarf before squaring her shoulders. “Yes, it is I, Mr. Hill.”

Freddy turned to Mr. Fisher. “May I introduce Miss Sarah Brown, Mr. Fisher.”

Mr. Fisher bowed. “Miss Brown.”

Sarah lifted her head high. “A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Fisher. Please thank your daughter Siby for the most delicious meal I've had in months. As for the moon”—she inhaled deeper than was natural so the gesture could be seen through the sheath of bedding—“Mr. Thoreau insists that a sturdy walk through nature, at any hour or unpredictability, comforts an anxious body and mind.”

She felt stronger by evoking Henry David Thoreau and hoped Freddy was educated enough to know of him; otherwise it was a lost rationale.

“Your Mister Thoreau be wise, indeed,” said Mr. Fisher, taking a step back. He pointed a finger to the sky. “But Cold Moon Man, he be fickle. I best be home while there's still light.”

Freddy cleared his throat—whether of the cold or a laugh, Sarah couldn't tell.

“Good rest to you, Mr. Fisher.” Sarah curtsied.

“Same to you, Miss Brown.” A nod of mutual understanding passed between the two men before he went back the way he'd come.

Gypsy licked remnants of corn crumbs off Sarah's side, making a long sweeping wet spot. She rubbed the dog's ear. The horse nickered, tired and ready for the warm hay.

Freddy nodded toward the barn. “If you're in the walking way—care to help me bed Tilda?”

Sarah flushed under the coverlet. No proper man would've dared ask a woman in her undergarments to walk anywhere. By the same token, no proper woman would've been out alone in the dark in her nightgown to begin with. She turned the situation over like a flapjack. What was the best course of action? She crossed her arms over her chest, pretending to be in deep contemplation as to whether he was worthy of her company.