Chesapeake (107 page)

But he was at his greatest during the evening meal. Sitting at Susan’s right, he discoursed on his vision of a more powerful Union, stretching to all parts of the continent, provisioned by the southern states, supplied with manufactures by the northern, and provided with raw materials by the western. In the midst of his flowery oration he dropped his napkin, placed his two hands on the table and said in a resonant voice, ‘Gentlemen of the South, I am here to learn from you what it is you desire from that Union.’

Old Tiberius appeared to lead the ladies to their coffee, but Webster interrupted, ‘I believe the ladies should stay,’ and he personally superintended the placement of Susan’s chair.

The discussion was far-ranging. He had not come, like Henry Clay, to listen, but rather to catch fleeting images of problems, which he would grasp, rephrase and make a permanent part of his arsenal. No slaveowner proposed any action but that Daniel Webster understood his dilemmas, sympathized with them and gave assurance that he would do his best to alleviate them. When the probing question that Henry Clay had raised—What is to be done about the fugitive slave?—was brought up by Steed, Webster brushed it aside in four forceful words: ‘Return him, of course.’ How, and under what circumstances and with what effect upon federal law-enforcing agencies did not concern him.

He retired early, quitting the room like a spent tornado, his massive head bowed as if overcome by the burdens of office. At the door he turned, smiled at Susan and looked every man in the eye. ‘Gentlemen, and beautiful ladies, tonight your railroad is much closer to Patamoke than it has ever been.’

When he was gone, leaving a conspicuous void, the party started to break up, but Mr. Walgrave signaled imperiously to Paul that Tiberius ought to lead the wives to their coffee. When the doors to the dining room were closed and cigars were lit, Mr. Walgrave from the head of the table said in his whispery voice, ‘Gentlemen, now we get down to business.’

‘What do you have in mind?’ a merchant from Patamoke asked.

‘Senator Webster, gentlemen. That’s what I have in mind.’ And he proceeded to make a speech which astounded everyone in the room except one of the men from Baltimore. Steed observed that this gentleman kept puffing on his cigar and looking disdainfully at the ceiling, and Paul got the impression that he had heard it all before:

One guest pointed out that he had served Massachusetts, not Maryland, that indeed he had been an enemy of the principal laws that might have helped planters. Of such a claim Mr. Walgrave was contemptuous:

He went around the room, one man at a time, and proved that Webster had done his duty, for he queried each man on particular mercantile bills which Webster had sponsored to aid that man’s business. Each had to confess that Daniel Webster had been the guardian of plantation owners as well as factory owners. Then he came to the point:

One of the planters from north of Patamoke asked, ‘How much did you have in mind?’ and without hesitating a second, Mr. Walgrave whispered, ‘Five hundred thousand dollars.’ This evoked gasps, so he added quickly, ‘Gentlemen, as you know, Senator Webster lives expensively. He has farms, relatives. He entertains much in Boston and New York. And when you come to Washington, you’ll wine and dine with him. His expenses are large because his heart is large.’

Temporarily the meeting broke up into small groups, in which discussion was vigorous, and Mr. Walgrave made no attempt to interrupt this necessary process of opinion-formation, as he termed it; he had conducted numerous such meetings in all parts of the nation and had found that he never got really big pledges unless the local businessmen were given ample time for arguing among themselves. And it was big contributions he wanted.

‘Are you asking us for the whole half million?’ a planter asked.

‘Heavens no!’ Walgrave said. ‘Understanding supporters from all over the nation are making their contributions.’

‘Isn’t such a collection forbidden by the Constitution?’ a lawyer from Patamoke asked.

‘It certainly is!’ Mr. Walgrave agreed instantly. He had learned that this was the way to handle this difficult question, which always arose during these fund-gathering sessions.

‘Then why are you asking us …’

‘My dear friend, if you contribute—well, let us say, two thousand dollars tonight and expect Senator Webster to vote yea or nay on some bill that interests you, that would be bribery, subornation of the Senate, and it would certainly be punishable at law. But Senator Webster does not, nor has he ever, engaged in bribery, or the sale of his vote. All I promise you tonight is that if you see fit to support this great man, and keep him in office …’

‘He has nobody running against him.’

‘Thank God for that. No, he’s not up for reelection, and if he were, no one in Massachusetts could defeat him.’

‘Then why does he need …’

‘Sir, he serves us all as Senator. He represents the entire nation. His living expenses …’

‘They must be pretty high, to need half a million.’

‘They are,’ Mr. Walgrave snapped, and then he dropped back to his whispery voice. ‘They are because he must work extra hard to protect men of property. Gentlemen, you support Daniel Webster or you throw your fortunes to the wolves.’

Now was the moment to whip these potential contributors into an orderly session. Speeding about the table, he placed before each man a carefully printed slip of paper on which to write the amount of money he was willing to contribute, and Webster had been so impressive, so
comprehending of their problems, that each man but one signed a pledge. Paul Steed gave three thousand dollars.

‘You haven’t signed,’ Mr. Walgrave said to the man who had been staring at the ceiling.

‘No,’ the man responded. ‘I gave three years ago, in Pittsburgh … remember?’

‘No, I do not remember,’ Mr. Walgrave said with a certain asperity.

‘That night you were collecting from the iron and steel men … four hundred thousand that time.’

Mr. Walgrave took note of the man. Under no circumstances would he ever be invited to another social evening with Daniel Webster.

For Eden Cater the 1840s were a time of perplexity. She was a freed woman with a good husband, two fine sons and a compassionate mistress who needed her. Miss Susan, with the aid of various devices built for her by Cudjo Cater, moved rather well about the mansion, and as she grew older, she grew more kind and understanding: ‘I’m English, you know. Our ladies are supposed to acquire a certain grace.’ She spoke often of the Fithian women in London, and of the quaint ways in which they had supervised her childhood: ‘We had nannies, you know, and they always spoke French to us and slipped us novels to read. “So zat you will know how to make love … when ze time comes.”’

She always added, as Eden listened to her monologues, ‘But then, of course, I’m half American, too. And American women who live on islands are supposed to acquire a certain courage.’ On some days she even went out into the garden, where she would sit in her wheelchair and watch as the slaves edged the walks. She was a gentle mistress, and the slaves treated her indulgently: ‘Yes, ma’am. Yeeeessss, ma’am.’ But they kept the garden pretty much as they wanted it, with the looming pyracantha reaching out for any passer-by and the tawny daylilies in place behind the iron rims in which their beds were now enclosed to prevent wandering.

Paul and Susan had added numerous hollies to the pattern, and these ingratiating trees, red in autumn, green in winter, gave the lawn a new touch. Indeed, Paul had perfected a holly which threw enormous clusters of bright red berries and was selling rooted plants to his neighbors under the name of Susan Fithian. Places all up and down the Choptank were burgeoning with Susan Fithians—‘A hearty tree. They’ll stand any adversity.’

Eden was not really needed at the mansion; two younger slaves had been trained to tend Miss Susan, but whenever she left for Patamoke to spend time with her family, she was missed. ‘She’s so understanding,’ Miss Susan told the other girls. ‘Sometimes behaves as if this were her house, not mine.’ Upon reflecting on this phenomenon, she added,
‘That’s understandable. She was born on this island. Started living in the mansion the same year I did.’

Eden was drawn to Patamoke not only because of her family, but also because she sensed that movements were afoot which must soon engulf her and Cudjo. She loved to sit on the bench before their cabin in the evening and exchange ideas with him, for she developed her understandings at the mansion, he at the boatyard.

Their conversation followed strange patterns, for she had learned gentleman’s English at Rosalind’s Revenge, while he had picked his up from the fields and Cline’s shed, intermixed with readings from Plutarch. Their pronunciation varied, too, with Eden speaking a soft, drawling tongue, while Cudjo’s was crisper and more barbarous. Each pronounced the repetitive short words—the, these, they, them, that, then, there—with the hard
d
sound, and they used other interesting variations and contractions, but the important fact was they conversed on a high level of interest and taught their sons to do the same.

Suppose that Cudjo wanted to say
Why don’t they just wait? He has the time.
It was likely to come out
Howc’m dey doan’ jes’ bide? He hab de time.
It might be truncated, but it was neither illiterate nor humorous.

On one trip home, Eden told her husband, ‘When them great senators an’ whatnots comes to Revenge they talks about railroads for ten minutes an’ slavery for ten hours. Cudjo, they hopelessly confused.’

‘What you think?’

‘All the good white men, like Mr. Steed an’ this Clay an’ Webster, they wants to do the right thing. You can hear that in they voices. But they doan’ know nothin’, Cudjo. Fact is, I think they knows less than you an’ me.’

‘The others?’

‘Most of the big owners—along the Choptank—they plain stupid. They think nothin’ ever gonna change.’ She repeated her ideas to her sons, then returned to Cudjo. ‘At the bottom of the heap you got Lafe Turlock an’ Herman Cline. Slave-trackers. Cudjo, you best watch out for ’em. They gonna try kill us … some day.’

‘Why us? We ain’t done nothin’.’

‘Because we’re free. They hates all black folk, but us free ones they hates the most.’

Cudjo asked how she assessed the Paxmores, and she said, ‘They tryin’, Cudjo, but they all mixed up.’

‘They sure help me.’

‘But they think they can change things by bein’ nice. Miss Elizabeth, Mr. George, they doan’ want to harm nobody. Turlock and Cline, they want to harm ever’body.’

‘But Mr. Bartley an’ Miss Rachel, they somethin’. You remember that night the slave come to our door?’

How well she remembered! It had been a watershed night for the
Caters. This slave had swum across the Choptank, an amazing feat, and had come dripping to their door. Cudjo, aware that he might be sold back into slavery if caught helping a runaway, wanted to turn him away, but Eden laid down the law. ‘I often think what happen, we have to run away that night Miss Susan sign my paper. I can see the dogs … us in the swamp … no friends.’ She had pulled the slave into their cabin and said, ‘Cudjo, ain’t never no slave come to this door an’ failin’ to find help.’

‘This here Bartley,’ Cudjo resumed, ‘maybe he doan’ want to fight, but he ain’t afeert of nothin’. Me an’ the slave is runnin’ north. Lafe Turlock an’ his dogs on our trail. Lafe, he shoot at me. Bartley, he step out from behind a tree. They wrassle. Lafe sic his dogs on Bartley. Rachel, she come out an’ bust the dogs with her oar. Ever’body arrested but me an’ the slave. We gits to Pennsylvania. Bartley, he gits two weeks in jail.’

‘Yes,’ Eden said reflectively, ‘on the little things they strong. But come the big ones, they gonna be like all the rest.’

‘Never old Mrs. Paxmore. She teach me to read. Ever’body warn her, “You teach nigger to read, you in trouble.” But she teach me.’

Eden refused to comment on this special woman, the quiet one who had dared so much. But as for the other whites, they were stumbling in darkness toward a conflict that Eden saw as inevitable—‘’Cause when I listens at the mansion, Cudjo, all I hear is that even the senators, they doan’ know what comin’ down the road.’ But Eden knew.

The final weeks of 1849 were a shambles. The Senate, led by Daniel Webster and Henry Clay, recently returned to it by the legislature of Kentucky, was preparing a vast compromise acceptable to South, North and West which would abolish sectional rivalries, the threat of secession and the possibility of war. Rarely had two great leaders toiled toward a more desirable end.

But the House of Representatives was in disarray. Through fifty-eight agonizing ballots extending over weeks it had been unable to elect a Speaker, its members snarling each at the other like alley dogs. And no solution was in sight. The cause, of course, was slavery, as it would be through the next decade. The House, being less philosophical than the Senate, simply could not reconcile its sectional differences, and the futile debate droned on.