Jefferson's Sons (34 page)

 

“What do you mean, no piano?” Miss Virginia's angry voice filled the hall. “Mother! You promised this time!”

Miss Virginia and Miss Martha were sitting in Miss Martha's little parlor. Peter was waiting in the hall, to see if Master Jefferson wanted Eagle. On his good days he sometimes still rode.

Miss Virginia had been whining about a piano for months. Peter was sick to death of hearing about it. He supposed Miss Martha was too.

“Jeff tells me he spent the money elsewhere,” Miss Martha said. “I thought he'd set it aside for the piano, but he says he didn't, and it's gone.” After a pause, she added, “He says we can't afford a new piano.”

“How ridiculous!” Miss Virginia huffed. “I refuse to believe it. He simply doesn't care about my needs. I know our situation is bad, but I must have a decent instrument if I'm to have any hope of keeping up my skills. Think of all the time I've invested in learning to play. The old piano is hopeless. It's inadequate.”

“I agree,” Miss Martha said. “But Jeff seems to feel that any indulgence, however small, is too much for us now. I'll tell him again how important it is.”

In the hall, the door to Master Jefferson's bedroom creaked open. Peter jumped up. “Eagle?” he whispered to Miss Sally.

Miss Sally shook her head. Peter nodded. He went to the stables, and turned Eagle out to grass for the day.

 

In the kitchen Peter told Miss Sally and his mama about Miss Virginia and her piano. Miss Sally shook her head. “That girl is worse than a two-ton mosquito,” she said.

Miss Sally told Peter's mama that Master Jefferson couldn't pass water. His water was getting blocked up in him, and that caused terrible pain. The Charlottesville doctor was bringing them tubes made from rubber gum, which could bend without breaking, to stick inside Master Jefferson and let his water out.

Peter's mama shook her head sympathetically. She seemed about to say something when Peter's little sister Isabella came in. “Miss Martha said to tell you twenty-six for dinner today.”

Mama looked at Miss Sally. “When will it end?”

 

At first the gum tubes helped. Then Master Jefferson got an infection from them. It was terrible to get infections up inside of you.

Night and day, either Miss Sally or Burwell stayed at Master Jefferson's side. They sponged his forehead to bring his fever down, and fed him broth Peter's mama made. He survived.

 

Christmas came. With Master Jefferson sick in bed, no one felt like celebrating. Peter thought of what his daddy had said: As long as Master Jefferson lived, all of them would be just fine. As long as Master Jefferson lived.
Please don't die,
he begged Master Jefferson in his head.
Please don't die
.

 

Miss Virginia borrowed money for a piano from a friend of Master Jefferson's. Her brother Jeff argued hard against it, but she shouted him down. She wrote to Miss Ellen in Boston to find a good piano and have it shipped to them.

“I told her we didn't want to spend more than two hundred and fifty dollars,” Miss Virginia told Miss Martha.

Peter perked his ears. Two hundred and fifty! He never dreamed pianos cost so much. No wonder Mister Jeff didn't want to buy one.

He still wished he knew for certain what Miss Martha had said that day—selling Negroes? Old clothes? He told himself over and over that
Negroes
didn't make sense. If Miss Martha sold the workers, there would be no one to grow crops on the farms. Then there'd be even less money.

Negroes, old clothes. She'd said Negroes. In his heart, Peter knew.

Worry lived on the mountaintop. The cold winter winds blew it back and forth, around the edges of the doorways and down the chimney draughts. Mister Jeff's face stayed creased and his fists clenched tight. Master Jefferson, up again and walking gingerly about the house, never smiled. When folks knocked on the door now, they were more likely to want money that was owed them than to meet the president.

Burwell said there was a heap of debts, from little ones to wine merchants and tailors to big ones like the one left over from Mr. Nicholas. Nobody knew their total, except maybe Master Jefferson. “And I doubt he does,” Burwell said. “He doesn't want to know.”

One winter night Peter went up to the great house with a cup of hot spiced wine his mama made for Master Jefferson. He scratched on the door of Master Jefferson's room and handed the cup to Miss Sally. “He's sleeping,” Miss Sally whispered. “Tell Miss Edith thank you. I'll give it to him when he wakes.”

Instead of taking the stairs to the basement, Peter stepped through the parlor onto the back portico. The new brick steps were still unfinished along one side. Master Jefferson had forgotten them. Peter looked across the broad lawn, peaceful under the moonlit sky, and there, standing beside the north pavilion, was Master Jefferson.

He stood hatless, his back to Peter, his coat open and one hand on his hip. Peter knew Master Jefferson had no business being out on a cold night. He'd get sick and die for sure. “Master Jefferson!” Peter called. “Hey—Master Jefferson!”

Master Jefferson didn't turn around. He'd grown pretty deaf in the past months. Peter ran forward, still calling. He had nearly reached him when the man finally turned—but it wasn't Master Jefferson. It was Eston.

“Oh!” Peter said. “I thought you were Master Jefferson.”

Eston looked down at him and smiled. “No. He's in bed, I hope.”

Eston was tall, over six foot, the tallest man on the mountain besides Master Jefferson. He was thin, and he moved in the same loose way Master Jefferson did. Peter had never realized before how exactly they resembled each other. “You look just like him,” Peter said.

“Mmm,” said Eston. “Stars are pretty tonight, aren't they?”

“Yes.” A gust blew, and Peter shivered.

“Come on,” said Eston. He put his hand on Peter's shoulder. They walked across the lawn, back toward the kitchen. “He's my father,” Eston said. “Master Jefferson.”

“I know,” Peter said. “Everyone knows that.”

Eston smiled. His smile looked like Master Jefferson's too. “I thought it was a secret,” he said.

“Not really,” Peter said.

One spring night, Master Jefferson dreamed of a way to make enough money to save them. Peter listened to him tell Miss Martha about it at breakfast the next morning. Master Jefferson's face shone like a boy's.

He would hold a lottery, with the farm as a prize. No one would pay a high price for his land right now, but surely hundreds, even thousands, of people would pay a small price for a chance of owning it.

“The house too?” Miss Martha asked. “Monticello?”

No, Master Jefferson said, his face falling a little. Not Monticello. Surely not. He could never sell Monticello. But he would be willing to sell his farmland, if only it would bring enough to clear his debts. If enough lottery tickets sold— tens of thousands, perhaps even hundreds of thousands, given the size of the nation—it might be that he could pay all he owed and even have money left over, for Miss Martha to live on after he died. Lotteries were illegal, but that didn't bother Master Jefferson. He wrote Congress immediately to ask them to make an exception.

Miss Virginia's new piano arrived before Congress replied. Miss Virginia hovered anxiously as the carters unpacked it; as soon as they were finished, she sat down to play. Master Jefferson came in to listen. He said, “That's a lovely instrument. If our lottery succeeds the way I hope it will, I may buy one like it for myself.”

Miss Virginia looked puzzled. “But you don't play the piano, Grandpa,” she said.

 

The idea of the lottery seemed to buoy Master Jefferson. His health improved. He started riding again, every day, at first only short walks around the mountaintop road, but gradually longer ones until he sometimes stayed out for an hour. He even trotted a little. Miss Martha fussed, but Miss Sally smiled when Peter brought Eagle to the house. In the saddle Master Jefferson looked spry.

But it didn't last. The rubber gum tubes and the careful nursing and even the lottery weren't enough. On the sixth of June, a bright, clear day, Master Jefferson's hands trembled as he took Eagle's reins from Peter. He looked so feeble Peter hesitated to let go.

Miss Sally, who had come out with Master Jefferson, put her hand on Eagle's shoulder. “Maybe you should rest,” she said, “and ride tomorrow.”

Master Jefferson looked at Miss Sally. “I think I need to ride today,” he said.

He came back early, exhausted. Miss Sally shouted for Peter to take the horse as Burwell carried Master Jefferson into the house. Master Jefferson went to bed and didn't get up again that day.

“Don't bring Eagle anymore,” Miss Sally told Peter the next morning. “He won't ride again.”

For a few weeks Master Jefferson could sit up sometimes. He wrote a few more letters and once in a while had something to eat. Miss Sally, Miss Martha, and Burwell made sure he was never alone.

Congress allowed the lottery, but only if Monticello itself was part of the prize. The great house would go to the lottery winner.

“If it pays the debts, that will be enough,” Miss Martha said. “I know I can always find a home among my children.”

But the lottery failed. So few tickets sold that eventually Mister Jeff canceled the whole thing. Some people and even some state governments sent Master Jefferson money out of charity, but no one, it seemed, wanted Monticello.

Peter couldn't tell if that was a good thing or a bad thing. He'd been scared at the thought of Monticello changing hands, but everyone around him seemed more upset that it wouldn't happen. As long as Master Jefferson is alive, Peter repeated to himself, we'll all be fine. Master Jefferson had been sick so many times before. He had always gotten better. Surely he would this time too.

One morning in the woodshop John Hemings asked Peter to bring him a board. Peter took one out of a group of fine, straight boards leaning against the back wall.

“Not those,” John said. “I'm saving those.”

“What for?”

John took a deep breath. “For when I make his coffin.”

 

Master Jefferson had finally written a will, Miss Sally said. She didn't know what it said, but she knew he'd written it. Miss Sally seemed happy about that, beneath her sorrow.

 

“Daddy,” Peter asked, “if Master Jefferson dies, what are we going to do?”

Daddy looked him in the eye. “When he dies,” he said, “we're going to work hard and stick together as much as we're able. We'll do our best, the same as always.”

 

By the second of July, Master Jefferson no longer ate or drank. He no longer spoke, and opened his eyes only if someone shook him. Peter wasn't allowed near him, of course, but Maddy got the details from his mama.

“He wants to live until the Fourth,” Maddy said.

Maddy explained that July 4, 1826, was fifty years exactly after July 4, 1776, which was the day the constitutional delegates signed the Declaration of Independence that Master Jefferson wrote, and the country America was born.

Some other old man named Mr. Adams, who was president even before Master Jefferson, was dying too. He lived a long way away. Peter had heard of him because he and Master Jefferson used to write letters to each other all the time. “They're both trying to stay alive until the anniversary,” Maddy said. Peter didn't see why.

If not for the worry on the mountaintop, everything would have been so beautiful. Summer was in full bloom. The garden burst with fruit and vegetables. Ripening peaches hung golden from the trees. Grass shimmered green in the fields. When Peter visited Eagle in his pasture, the horse whuffled hello and came eagerly to get whatever treat Peter brought him. Eagle smelled so good in the sun.

Without the worry, it would have been wonderful, but Peter felt like no one other than him even noticed the sunlight or the warmth or the green crops growing. All over the mountain, everyone was holding their breath, waiting for Master Jefferson to die.

 

July second passed. On the afternoon of the third, Master Jefferson woke for a moment. He seemed unhappy, and tried to speak. Burwell shifted his pillows. Master Jefferson nodded, and closed his eyes.

Miss Sally told them that, in the kitchen.

Much later, Peter heard that just before old Mr. Adams died, on the night of July the Fourth, he opened his eyes and said, “Jefferson survives.” But by then it wasn't true. Master Jefferson died at ten o'clock in the morning, July 4, 1826.

 

His will gave Poplar Forest free and clear to Francis Eppes. Monticello, all the property there, and every single debt went to Mister Jeff. That hardly seemed right. Mister Jeff had always worked so hard. But the debts had to go to someone. Someone had to pay.

The will gave Burwell his freedom immediately. It gave Joe Fossett, John Hemings, and John's “two apprentices” their freedom from exactly one year after the day Master Jefferson died, or, in the case of the apprentices, on the day they each turned twenty-one. The apprentices were Maddy and Eston, of course, but Master Jefferson didn't write out their names.

Joe Fossett and John Hemings were given the tools they used. Master Jefferson's will also asked the legislature of Virginia to allow all five freed men to remain in the state, instead of leaving it immediately once freed, as Virginia law now demanded.