Douglass’ Women (17 page)

“I can manage.” I touched my hand to his cheek. “I know you have important work to do. I see that now. But we be a family. Rosetta needs us both. She needs her father.”

“It’s because you’ve never been a slave.”

It was softly said, and though I heard it, I questioned I’d heard it. “What? What you say?”

“You’ve never been a slave.”

“You think I don’t be feeling other people’s pain?”

“I didn’t say that, Anna.”

I know he didn’t. But I felt this be what he mean. How could I explain that?
You said it without saying it
. How did I say that without angering him again?

Rosetta began crying. Time for her feeding. With great relief, I left the small parlor. How good it felt to have my baby taking from me what she needed. How good it felt to have something that somebody needed.

Truest love. Love be true
. I be failing myself, failing my daughter if I didn’t try to understand this new man in my house.
Frederick Douglass
.

Where Douglass come from? Did he pull the name from air? Where’d he get it from? My name, Anna Murray, be real. Douglass, not so real. But my vows be true. I made them as real as I could speak. As real as my own breath. My own blood.

I buttoned my gown. Laid my baby in the pine drawer that was her cradle. I went back into the parlor. The food was uneaten and Frederick was by the window, looking at the horizon like the first time I saw him on the ship being built, dry-docked, sailing to nowhere.

“You don’t have to preach. Water here be just like the water in Maryland. I’ll ask for the bones to help.”

“Superstition, Anna.”

I frowned.

“Garrison thinks I could write a book. It might pay.”

“That be fine.”

“A book should sell fine, I think. It’ll help promote the cause. More towns will want me to visit. That’ll suit me well.”

“So you be going again?”

“Yes. Maybe with the baby here, I can ask abolitionists for more support.”

“Pay?”

“Yes, for my speeches. They’ll recognize I have a family. Yes,” he say, as if to himself, “I will ask for more support.”

“So you going?”

“Not for a while yet.”

“When?”

“When they call for me.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Anna, you’re being stubborn. I can’t just stay here because you would have it so. People, the cause, need me. I am doing great good.”

He be so handsome. So mightily handsome. He’ll bring down the walls of the temple, I thought. I only hoped he wouldn’t die doing it like Samson did.

“Then teach me letters.”

“Yes. I’ll teach you, so you can teach Rosetta.”

If you ain’t here
. The words hung in the air.

We worked for hours. My mind twisted around those scratch marks.
Anna
—I knew. Frederick taught me to see—
Rosetta
.

Rosetta

“You like the name?” I asked.

“Yes. Our next child should be called Frederick Junior.”

If you ain’t here
. He was telling me so I know. If he ain’t here. He was telling me a baby boy be better.

My tears made all the letters swim. My head ached. Rosetta cried. She needed feeding again. This time Freddy
came into the bedroom with me, watching me feed her.

Freddy looked hungry, too. He said, “Time to let the letters be.”

ABC’s tomorrow.

We made peace in the bed today.

There be lulls before storms. I couldn’t have lived my whole life next to water and not have known that. Clear skies, sunshine, quiet waters fool. Wind and water be raging down the coast. Deep in their watery grave, bones be clattering. Biggest fish be eating the smallest.

Still—there was a short good time.

Me, Freddy, and the baby, took pleasure in each other. Freddy loved me many times while baby Rosetta slept in her drawer. I tried hard to keep myself open. To be a good and giving wife. If there were fewer words of tenderness, fewer caresses, I told myself it didn’t much matter. My baby be proof of loving. She was the “littlest thing” Freddy had ever given me. A “little thing” that grew hold of my heart and became my world. When Freddy held the baby, he was holding me. Holding our world together. God bless.

One day Garrison came and brought Rosetta a rattle. My hands shook, splattered tea, dropped the pie. That’s how certain I was he’d come to take Freddy away from us.

Mr. Garrison said, “No need for speeches yet, Douglass. It’s a false spring. Ice will return soon.”

“Do you think slaves care that it is winter up here?”

“Patience, man. All things in good time.”

* * *

In good time
. I rejoiced; Freddy grew sad.

He grew restless. He’d been on a big stage and our house be so, so small. Sometimes I thought he’d burst. So much energy and no place to put it. Without abolitionist work, he was adrift. Only so much energy to be used in tending to a wife and an itty-bitty child. Only so much energy needed for chopping wood, hauling tinder, and tossing grain at our one chick. Though I praised him, I couldn’t compare to a stomping, clapping crowd.

Freddy never complained. He saw how much money was needed for candles, cotton, and thread. How much money was needed for flour, ham, black-eyed peas, and rice.

He tried welding. He was good at it. So good, white workers complained.

For two weeks, Freddy straggled home tired. Sore in spirit.

“Coloreds might not be slaves, Anna. But it doesn’t mean we aren’t resented. Prejudice has well-tended roots in the North.”

I didn’t say a colored church be more welcoming. I didn’t say that with his learning, a great Pastor he’d make. Mam always told me “deeds, not words” speak the truth of a loving heart.

I wanted to ease Freddy’s burden. I guess, too, I wanted the big man who thought great things and fought to free the slaves. Tired out, this new, quieter man slept soundly in bed. Less time for us touching. Less time for playing with his baby before the fire. Less time for learning ABC’s.

There was only one bright spot: as days became weeks, my heart grew full; Miz Assing didn’t knock at our door. I hadn’t actually seen her for a good long while. But Freddy
came back full of smiles after visiting Mr. Garrison in town. I figured Miz Assing must’ve been at some of them meetings. I figured Freddy, too, must’ve told her not to come. Not to his house.

I still hadn’t found a way to
think
good about Miz Assing; but I knew the way to
do
good for Freddy.

I carried my baby on my back and went to town.

Love, love be true
.

Chill was creeping in the air again. Squirrels who poked their noses out early, scurried back to rest. Even birds flew south again. Wind blew white kisses across the waves.

Still I knew where to go.

Salt Hill was where rich white folks lived. In Baltimore and in other cities and towns, too, I imagine, there be Salt Hill places. Streets where folks lived better than most. Where white folks could pay others to do their work.

I walked the half mile, trudged up the hill with a view of the harbor, ships and flapping masts, and knocked on the first kitchen door I came to.

“Laundry,” I said to the colored kitchen maid. “No one does it finer.”

She nodded and left me standing on the steps, in the cold, my baby curled against my breast. I kept my head up; my face smooth. No frowns. No false smile. When the woman of the house came to see me, I spoke quietly:

“I’m Anna Douglass. Honest. Clean. Not afraid of hard work. I wash, iron, sew better than anyone.”

The colored maid whispered in her Mistress’ ear.

I thought: in Baltimore, I would’ve been invited in. Told to wait in the kitchen, then escorted to the parlor. Northerners had shabby manners. But I kept my face ever
still, my eyes cool. The woman studied me; her faded brown hair pulled tight beneath a white cap.

“Fine lace. Can you clean and sew that?”

“Yes, ma’am. Most anything. I worked for a fine lady in Baltimore.”

“Twenty cents a week. On trial. Come back Tuesday.”

I bobbed a curtsy and turned to step down.

“You’re Mr. Douglass’ wife? The escaped slave?”

I nodded.

“And that’s his child?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She cracked a wide grin. “Come back Tuesday. I’ll have a fine load for you then.”

At first, I didn’t understand. What matter who my husband be? My husband won’t be turning his hand to cleaning. I knocked on houses, door-to-door, and those ladies that hesitated, didn’t hesitate to hire me once I said, “Anna Douglass. Wife of Frederick Bailey Douglass.” Some would say, “I heard him speak.” Others would say, “Time for him to lead a quieter life. Abolition has no meaning here. We’ve always been enlightened this far north.”

Mercy me. Foolishness. These women cared more about the one cleaning their clothes, than the cleaning. Cared more, for better or worse, that it would be in Frederick Douglass’ house and be Frederick Douglass’ wife that boiled water, starched, and pressed their clothes. Fine with me as long as I received my due.

And I did. Eight households gave me their wash. Eight basket loads Rosetta played in while her Daddy worked at the shipyards, twisting metal.

At the end of a week, I fixed a fine dinner for
Freddy. Even baked a cake as good as Mam could make.

“What’s this, Anna? Has the North taught you wastefulness?”

He’d come home bone-tired, I could tell. Stinking of fire, soot, and metal.

“Wash up, Freddy. I have a surprise.”

“Not before you tell me the meaning of this. Do you think I work for niceties, Anna? Survival, Anna. I work for our survival.”

I blinked back tears. I took his hand and pulled him into the parlor. There I’d cleared the table and made a desk. I had a candle, a quill, an inkwell, and vellum I’d purchased at the feed and sundries store.

“You big, Freddy. Too big for shipyards. I think I tell you that before. In Baltimore.”

“What does this mean, Anna?”

“Write. Your book. Your story should be written down. I’ll work.”

“Anna, no—”

“All my life, I work. I be proud of what my hands and back can do.”

“You have work, Anna. You have a child to raise.”

“If Mam can raise five kids, I can surely raise one and do a little laundry on the side.”

He squeezed my hand. His hands touched the quill and paper like he was a blind man. He feel every fiber, every wrinkle, every feather.

Then he dipped the quill in black ink:

The Narrative of Frederick Douglass,
An American Slave

He paused, looked at the words, then added more scratches:

Written by Himself
1845

I brought food to him. He worked all night. Such pleasure on his face, I be almost jealous. He here. In our house. Home. My husband. Daddy to my child.

I thought another babe be on the way. Rising inside my oven. Rising because of the warmth inside me. Mam said nursing kept another baby from coming too soon. I wasn’t done nursing Rosetta, but I didn’t mind. I thought how strong Freddy’s seed be. I thought even though I was older than him, my body knew woman’s work.

Six weeks of heaven. Days grew colder, a snowstorm blanketed roads and frosted all the windows. I heard the
Bedford Mary
was lost at sea.

Freddy wrote, said little; but I was content. Mr. Garrison, once he found out about the book, gave us a drudge horse to carry me to and from my white women’s houses. While it helped, it was another mouth to feed. Mr. Garrison didn’t think about that.

He thought about Freddy’s “tract,” he said. “All the time. All the time.” Said he’d pen the introduction. Wendell Phillips might pen another. He was so excited, he couldn’t sit still. Eyes wide, cheeks bright, his lips cracking from all his licking, like he think a slave story be a piece of pie.

Mr. Garrison lifted one of Freddy’s many pages. “Have you read your husband’s words, Mrs. Douglass?”

I shook my head. (I thought Garrison be trying to shame me on purpose.)

He cleared his throat; a picture flies out of his mouth:

“Mr. Gore then, without consultation or
deliberation with anyone, not even giving
Demby an additional call, raised his
musket to his face, taking deadly aim at
his standing victim, and in an instant poor
Demby was no more. His mangled body
sank out of sight, and blood and brains
marked the water where he stood
.

“A thrill of horror flashed through
every soul upon the plantation, excepting
Mr. Gore. He alone seemed cool and
collected.”

So much I didn’t know. These markings were a window. My fingers touched the sanded and dried ink.

Freddy buried his head in his hands.

“Success. This is to be a big success,” Mr. Garrison chortled.

And so it was. So it was.

Freddy be the biggest man. Everybody wanted to hear the man who wrote so fine a book. Telegrams, letters came every day, inviting Freddy to speak. Sometimes money was folded into envelopes.