The black swan (36 page)

Wolfs skin tightened and prickled in fear. He knew better than to wait. He hurried from the house, riding fast on the River Road toward the Saunders plantation, shouting to all he passed, "Insurrection! Took Miz Moran captive! Meet at Mossrose! Bring hounds! Insurrection!"

By the time he reined in at the Saunderses*, panic had spread across the county. Houses were barricaded against their own slaves. Overseers worked furiously, lashing at any suspected sign of insolence or rebellion.

Cal Saunders tried to persuade Patricia to remain. Her face frightened and pinched, she refused.

"Mah Dulcie may be lyin' dead this very moment, Cal. If Jem can fin' her, Ah'm goin' to be right theah in mah home when she needs me."

Patricia mounted the narrow buggy, sitting beside Wolf and his loaded rifle. On the way she had him repeat every detail of the slaves' activity that morning and of Dulcie's disappearance. Finally, she asked, "But have they actually done anythin' threatenin'? Dulcie has always been a favorite of the blacks. She—"

"I think they took Miz Dulcie off somewheres. Keepin' her there. One of the wagon's missin' an' four o' the horses. That good-fo'-nuthin' Fellie an' his woman is gone too. I'm thinkin' they took her off, so's we couldn't do nuthin* to stop 'em."

Patricia's hands clasped at her breast and throat, but she said nothing. The distance to the house seemed interminable. Patricia jumped from the carriage as soon as Wolf reined the horses to a stop.

"Jem, the men are comin'. Cal Saunders and Glenn are just behind me. She threw herself into his arms. "Oh, Jem, if weah goin' to be slaughtered. . . . Jem, Ah love you.'*

"Aw, Patsy love, it'll be all right. No one's goin' to be slaughtered." Carefully he kept his betraying eyes from her sight.

Patricia kissed him, then buried her face in his shoulder again. "We gonna get ouah Dulcie home again, Jem? Will that happen too?"

"We'll get her back," he said grimly.

"Free 'em all if you must. Promise me you will, Jem. Give 'em Mossrose itself if that's what they want to bring her back safe to us.'*

"We'll get Dulcie back. Patsy, and there'll be no con-cedin' to the niggers." Jem felt far stronger and more manly now that Patricia was once more depending on him.

She moved away from him. "No, Jem, you can't do anythin' against them—not until Dulcie is safe. They . . . they could kill her. Nothin' is worth that. She's ouah daughtah, ouah only chil'."

"Hush, Patsy. I said I'd take care of it." He took another rifle from the gim rack, methodically loading it as she watched.

"You aren't gonna do this, Jem Moran.'*

"Hide in the root celler, Patsy. Lock the door and stay there 'til I tell you it's safe to come out." He handed her a gun. "If things go wrong, don't hesitate, Patsy. Pull the trigger."

The fear that had been held in abeyance now overwhelmed her. She pushed the gun away. "No! You talk to them, Jem. You go out theah to the chapel, an' you talk to them! Ask them what they want. Doesn't matter what it is. You give it to them if they bring ouah Dulcie homel You heah me, Jem!? You promise 'em the moon if they give you Dulcie alive and well!"

"Calm yourself. Patsy. There's no reasonin' with a nigger. They don't understand reasonin', I hear the Saunderses comin'. Be my good love and go to the root cellar. You'll be safe there."

Cal and Glenn Saunders's voices could be heard in the front hall as Patricia screamed, near hysteria, at Jem. "It's youah fault! You brought this on us with youah whippin' an' youah brutalizin' of Fellie! He took her 'cause o' what you did to him. Now youah gonna listen to me! We will promise them anythin'!"

"Patricia!"

"She's mah daughtah, an* Ah intend to fight fo* her, even if ifs you Ah have to fight, James Moran!"

Glenn and his father stood in the study doorway, astonished. Glenn nudged his father.

The older man nodded, then turned, looking toward the front door. "Those are the Biggs's hounds. I'd know that lead hound's bugle anyplace."

The Chilcotes, Biggses, and Actons arrived in a group. The Matthewses, Carsons, and Redgraves rode in from the south across Jem's fields. The yard filled with pawing, nervous horses and the sounds of eagerly whimpering hounds. In the background was the melodious singing of the slaves.

Glenn Saunders jumped onto the rail of the veranda, shouting above the noise for attention. He told the men of the situation at Mossrose, of Dulcic's capture, and of the threat to their own plantations.

Inside the house Patricia had worked herself into a frenzy. Everything she had worried about over the years came tumbling out. "You nevah treated youah slaves bad 'til you began this breedin' business. Now look what it's done to us! Ouah Dulcie gone—maybe lyin' dead, 'cause o' you, Jem. Ah won't stan' quiet this time. Ah won't let you do anythin' to prevent her from bein' returned to us. You heah me, Jem!"

"I can't help but hear you, Patricia, but I wish to God I couldn't. How can you blame me? I love you and Dulcie better than my own life."

"Then you'll free the slaves? Let 'em go if that's what they want?"

"No." He turned from her, ready to leave the room.

"Fellie's got her," Patricia said flatly. "He'll kill her 'cause you took his sons. An eye for an eye."

Jem shook his head, cold fear taking over. "He wouldn't . . . gentlest nigger on the place—" —

"That gentle nigger nearly killed a man fo' those boys o' his. Ouah Dulcie's blood is on youah hands, Jem. Ah won't foahgive you fo' that. Set 'em free and get Fellie's sons back. Spig Hurd was gonna stop at other places before he went on South. You can still get 'em. Do it, Jem. I'm beggin' you!"

But Jem had already walked out into the crowd of men and boys and hounds that cluttered his lawn. They had divided into two groups. Glenn was organizing one group. The tick from Fellie's cabin lay on the ground. Each man took a strip of it, giving their hounds the scent.

Glenn divided the party. He gave them the signal for calling the others for help as well as the signal to indicate that the fugitives had been treed. One group would take the River Road to Savannah, another would ride toward

the piney woods, the third to the coast, and the fourth heading south and inland. "No shootin' unless necessary. We don't want Miss Dulcie harmed by us."

On the other side of the yard Dulcie's other suitor was talking with as much earnest vigor as Glenn. But Leroy Biggs had devised a much more direct and brutal scheme. The men with him marched in a mass, guns loaded, toward the small chapel with the blue door that had been meant to bring good fortune to the plantation. As they neared, the singing stilled, then rose again more thinly, marring the easy harmony.

Leroy kicked at the blue door, sending it back on its hinges. Black faces, now silent, looked at him. He appeared a dark phantom, outlined as he was by the brilliant light. From Jem's ledger Jan Chilcote read the name of the lead man of each cabin.

"Stand by the door when your name is called," Leroy ordered. The chosen formed a line. Leroy selected six of the best, the most popular or the biggest men. "Thafs how many hours you got, one hour for each man's life. Six hours to spread the word an' bxing Fellie an' Miss Dulcie back here. Each hour that passes an' you don't bring 'em back one man dies. He won't die kindly. I'll gut-shoot him."

Keening and chanting rose and swelled, filling the chapel with lamentations and pleading. "We doan know Where's Miz Dulcie! Please, mastah, we'ns doan know! Doan hurt Hosea! 'Polio a good man, doan hurt nobody."

Leroy's face showed no softening. "Six hours. One dies at the end of each until Miss Dulcie is back here safe and sound."

The six men were herded into the yard, in plain view of the chapel. Each was tied to one of the trees lining the driveway. Leroy stood in front of them, his feet planted firmly, his legs spread. His rifle rested on his crossed arms. From his belt hung a pocket watch, which caught the sun and sent signals of the passing minutes to those in the chapel.

As soon as Dulcie reached the outer boundaries of Mossrose, she left the River Road and jolted across the fields in the heavy wagon. "It's just eleven o'clock. I've often slept later than that. With'a little luck, Claudine, we can come in the back way, and no one will ever know I was gone."

But Claiidine wasn't listening. She was looking all around as Dulcie tried to think her way into the house unseen. "Miss Dulcie," she whispered breathlessly.

"Oh, what is it now!?"

"Look 'roun' an* what you see? Where the fiel' niggers? Dey's not a one o' 'em in de fiel's. Oh, Miss Dulcie, Ah'm jes' 'bout as skeered as Ah kin be."

Claudine's small hand on her arm transmitted the fear to Dulcie as she saw the eerie emptiness of the fields. She slowed the horses to a walk. As they neared the back of the quarters, they heard the baying of hounds, the lamenting in the chapel, the sounds of angry, excited male voices. "They know we're gone, Claudine," Dulcie whispered.

"Yes'm. What we gwine do now?"

At the rear of Wolfs cabin Dulcie stopped the horses. "We're goin' to run for the house, go up the back stairs, and come out just like we don't know what's happenin'.'*

"Miss Dulcie! Ain't nobody gwine b'lieve dat!"

"Nobody has to. They won't say a word—'til later, and that's all we need. Not a word about what we did—no matter what!"

Dulcie sped through the servants' entrance. Outside she heard Leroy's voice. "Ten more minutes, you darkies, an' Tollo gets killed first. Any o' you got somethin' to tell me, or y'all jes' goin' to let these niggers die?"

With trembling hands Dulcie changed into a fresh and pretty morning dress. "Look out the window. See what's goin' on."

Claudine moaned. "Oh, Lawd, Miss Dulcie, we done it dis time."

"Don't stand there groanin'. Tell me!"

"Dat's a huntin' pahty. Mastah Glenn jes' rode off with the houn's, an' Mastah Leroy, he a-shoutin' at the niggers in de chapel. Lawd, Miss Dulcie, he say 'Polio gwine die!" Claudine began to cry. Dulcie remembered vividly the sleek brown body of the young man in the fields the day after her birthday party. "Mastah Leroy say he gwine shoot 'Polio in five minutes. He cain't do dat! Mastah Jem—"

Dulcie spun Claudine from the window. "They'll hear you! Fix my hair. Hurry! You don't want anything to happen to him, do you?"

"No! No, coon't stan' dat. Ah coon't."

Dulcie ran down the stairs, remembering to slow her steps as she reached the door. Her father stood on the

porch looking bewildered and unhappy. Tollo had been unbound from the tree, his arms tied behind his back. Jan Chilcote and Conroy Biggs dragged him in front of Leroy. They forced him to the ground, where 'Polio remained kneeling at Leroy's feet, in plain view of those in the chapel.

Taking all her courage, Dulcie stepped onto the veranda. "Mornin', Daddy! Why, I declare! What's goin' on?" She smiled broadly, her eyes glowing in innocent wonderment as she scanned the clusters of men, all armed, all attentive to Leroy until Dulcie appeared in their midst. Jem stood rooted, looking as though he'd been struck unconscious. As the others cried or murmured her name, Dulcie greeted each as though it were a Sunday outing, but she made her way without faltering toward Leroy. She stood beside Tollo and looked up into Leroy's face.

"Where have you been?" His voice was low with fury.

"Why, I've been in my bed sleepin', Leroy, 'til y'all woke me up with your racket. What's goin' on? We havin' a party?"

Leroy alone of the men in the yard was having no part of Dulcie's performance. "You can call it a party if you like. But it isn't one for a lady. Get back inside the house where you belong."

Dulcie's eyes sparkled with all the angry things she'd like to say. Instead, she smiled sweetly. "Thought you'd come to see me, Leroy, wantin' my answer to your proposal. Here all you came for was to shoot poor 'Polio, who hasn't done anythin'."

"I don't take to women interferin' with a man's business, Dulcie."

"An' I don't take to bein* ordered. Your answer \s no, Leroy!'*

He laughed at her. "Dulcie honey, I don't need an answer from you now. I already got one." He glanced up and saw Jem headed toward them. "What you need is a man strong enough to break you to harness, an' I'm that man." He grasped her by her arm and took her to her red-faced father. Dulcie struggled. Leroy only laughed. "Here's one worry off your hands, Mr. Moran. She's safe enough, an' never was in any danger. Now all we got to do is stop these blacks from goin' on a bloody rampage. Soon's I shoot a couple o' these bucks— "

"Daddy! You aren't goin' to let him shoot 'Polio! You can't!"

Jem seemed incapable of speech. From the slave chapel 'Simmon and his old black stick of a woman approached Jem. They came slowly, clinging to each other. Behind them the others filed out of the chapel walking in quiet order back to the fields.

"We's ain't rampagin', Mastah Jem," 'Simmon said in his crackling voice. "We's jes' singin' fo' Fellie an' his woman. Dey done made free, an' we's a-singin' dem on dey way. We ain't causin' you no mo' troubles, Mastah Jem."

Jem remained silent. His hand shook as he clutched at Dulcie's arm. His face was red except for the deathly white patches that stood out like half-moons under his eyes.

"Get back to the fields," Leroy ordered, "Mistah Moran will see to you soon enough. You can tell the others your singin' cost you dear. Six men. Tell 'em that."

"Please, mastah. Cain't punish niggers dat ain't been bad," 'Simmon said humbly. " 'Polio, he ain't wan' come wiff us. 'Polio doan like singin' noway, 'lessen his mama say he got to, an' she say he got to."

"Daddy . . ." Dulcie said in a tear-choked voice.

"Put 'Polio and the others in the stables. Tie them up. I'll see to them later," Jem managed to say. The decision seemed to snap him out of his stupor. "Leroy, seems like this uprisin' is of my daughter's makin'. I've got to ask your help. Send these men on their way."

"You don't want me to call the others back, the hounds?"

"No, I want Fellie brought back. Can't have them runnin' and gettin' away with it. We'll have to make an example of Fellie. Got to hang him, I suppose." Jem wiped his brow. "The hounds'U get him. They've got his scent." Without looking at Dulcie, hanging his head to avoid his neighbors' eyes, he walked to the house. He would have to think up some reasonable lie to explain his daughter's disappearance and reappearance and the insurrection at Mossrose, but for now, he hadn't the heart or the arrogance to try.