Flashman - Flashman and the Angel of the Lord Part 11

"Hasn't he?"

"Oh, sure, I guess so. I ought to know him by now, I s'pose ... how he talks, and moons around, and then - bang! he's raiding Missouri! It'll be the same this time - when the Canadian blacks come in, and the other fellows who've promised." He turned his clever, troubled face to me, hoping to be rea.s.sured. "I just hate waiting ... and I wondered what you thought, d'you see?"

It was no time to cheer him up, so I brooded a bit and said the five most depressing words in the language: "We are in G.o.d's hands." But so he'd never be able to say I'd discouraged him, I added sternly, with a hand on his arm: "Never forget, John, that 'tis not the beginning, but the continuing until it be thoroughly finished, that yieldeth the true glory." And six feet of cemetery, as often as not. Arnold had made me write it out a thousand times for loafing in a pot-house when I should have been chasing 'cross country at Hare and Hounds.44 Kagi said it was a fine sentiment, and he'd remember it.

As we rose to walk back, I chanced to look up at the signpost, and he followed my glance and said it was a pretty place, but quite a piece down the road, and much too far to walk. The name stayed in my mind, for no reason, as such things sometimes do. Gettysburg.

I should have jumped the train the moment the conductor took Joe's ticket, glowered suspiciously, and asked him to account for himself. Better still, I should never have boarded the train at all - and might not have done, if hadn't mislaid my map. I'd bought it in Boston, to keep track of our random jauntings back and forth, and had traced our progress from New England to Ohio most satisfactorily, but after I lost it (in Pittsburgh, I think), why, like a careless a.s.s I was content to roll along in happy ignorance of where we were. At Chambersburg, I knew we were in Pennsylvania, which was fine, and when J.B. said we were going to I Hagerstown, I never thought twice; I'd never heard of the place, and had no notion where it lay.

There were six of us on the train: J.B., his sons Owen and Oliver, Jerry Anderson, myself, and Joe; Kagi had gone off north somewhere, and John junior had been left brooding in Ohio. It was a baking hot journey, with the sun turning the car into an oven, and even playing cards was too much of a f.a.g. J.B. prowled up and down, accosting strangers to hector them, Owen was snoring like the great ox he was, Jerry was trying to get off with a girl across the aisle, and Oliver was boring me to blazes. He was the baby of the Brown family, a stalwart young Adonis of twenty, shy and given to books, but a chance remark had brought him out of his sh.e.l.l to tell me about his wife, Martha, who was up north, and by his account was a cross between Portia and Helen of Troy. I was dozing off when the conductor's harsh question roused me: "Whut's yore name, boy?", and I saw he was regarding Joe with a mistrustful eye. Joe told him.

"Joe Simmons, eh? An' just where are you from, Joe?"

J.B. was on the scene at once, beard bristling. "Some trouble, mister conductor?"

"You know this n.i.g.g.e.r?" says the conductor.

"I know this free coloured man," says J.B. sternly. "He is in my employ."

In his travelling duds, with their frayed sleeves and air of having been slept in, he didn't look like an employer, and the conductor sniffed.

"He is, is he? An' who might you be, mister?"

"My name is Isaac Smith," says J.B. "This is my servant, and these -" he indicated the rest of us "- are my sons, Owen, Oliver, Joshua, and Jeremiah." Well, if he chose to adopt me, I didn't mind. "Mrs Smith is not travelling with us," he added, with fine ponderous sarcasm, "or I'd be kindly proud to present her to you, too."

The conductor blinked uncertainly; J.B. tended to have that effect on folk, and the four of us were sufficiently large and ugly to daunt the stoutest ticket-walloper. "No offence, Mr Smith," says he hastily. "On'y there's been a couple o' runaways from Frederick lately, an' me seein yore boy here ... well, I thought maybe ..."

"That he might be one of them ... taking the train south?" says J.B., mighty droll. The conductor scratched his head, and laughed apologetically, and said come to think of it, that wasn't likely, was it, ha-ha? J.B. said, no, it wasn't, and if the conductor was now satisfied that we weren't slave-stealers going in the wrong direction, perhaps he'd care to go about his business. The fellow cried, sure, certainly, no offence, mister, and went off like a scared rabbit, with J.B. glaring after him. I asked Oliver what the row was about, and he looked grim and said that was Dixie for you, all over.

"Dixie?"

"Sure - we crossed the line into Maryland a while back, didn't you know? If they're looking for runaway slaves, why, they think they can stop and question any black man they like!"

That gave me a start. I'd a.s.sumed, you see, that my charade with J.B. would be played out in the nice, safe, abolitionist North - and here we were, in the slave South, and I'd never known it. Not that there had ever been warrants out for me in Maryland, and we were still a long way from the scene of my exploits of ten years ago, but it was enough to start me sweating, and I took the first chance that came to ask J.B., casual-like, what there was to interest us in Hagerstown. His reply, in a confidential undertone, but with an alarming glint in his eye, didn't quiet my fears a bit.

"You smell the battle afar off, Joshua?" He glanced round to make sure he wasn't overheard. "Have patience, my boy. The time is drawing nigh when we'll be done with talk and waiting at the doors of timid men! Yes, sir, we're approaching the scene of the great war from which there'll be no discharge. We're going to spy out the land," says he, with a grin that froze my marrow. "What did Moses say to his Joshua, eh? 'Get you up this way southward, and get you up into the mountain, and see the land what it is, and the people that dwelleth therein, whether they be strong or weak, few or many.' And Joshua and his eleven spies did just that, remember?"

I didn't, in fact; the only thing I recollected about Joshua and spying was two chaps being sent to a harlot's house ... but this was appalling news I was hearing. I asked him what he meant.

"Why, we'll lie up a day or two at Hagerstown," says he, "and then it's just a few miles down the river to where we want to be at."

"Where's that?" says I, trying not to croak.

"Why, Harper's Ferry, to be sure! We'll take a good look at the country along the way, and what's that? Restrain your language, sir! And keep your voice down!" He was glaring disapproval, and darting nervous glances at the nearest pa.s.sengers. "There's no call for excitement," he whispered angrily, "or that kind of foul Navy talk! I won't have it!" Then he patted my knee, like a forgiving uncle. "I know you're eager - I've watched you chafing these past weeks, and I promise you won't have to wait much longer. Once we've seen how the land lies, we're going to find ourselves a nice out of the way place between Hagerstown and the Ferry, and there we'll make our final plans. And when the men have come in, and the arms ..." He sat back, nodding his great bearded head, eyes gleaming, while I fought man-fully to retain my breakfast. To find myself in Maryland had been bad enough, but the news that we weren't a kick in the a.r.s.e from Harper's Ferry was shocking. Oh, I'd seen it on the map, often, but it had always seemed a safe distance away - America's such a big place, you get into the habit of thinking you're miles from anywhere - and I hadn't realised, in Chambersburg, how close we were getting. Now, without warning, we were almost there.

When my guts had stopped fluttering, I reflected that it might have been worse. For a horrid moment, when he'd mentioned the name, I'd thought he was contemplating a sudden wild onslaught, but plainly it was just to be a scout, before we retired to some hole in the ground for another jolly discussion about Greek phalanxes or forts with connecting tunnels. I could tolerate that - not that I had any choice, with Joe at my elbow.

For now that we were south of the line he took to sticking close again, possibly because he believed the great day was approaching. I continued to doubt it, for when we reached Hagerstown J.B. was back in his indecisive mood; he took us trekking about the country for a couple of days, inquiring for properties to buy or rent, and then it was all aboard the train again, and on a bright July day we rolled across the bridge into Harper's Ferry, and I had my first sight of that strange little town where a parcel of ragam.u.f.fins were to change the course of American history.

It's an odd place, lying on flat land at the tip of a peninsula where the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers meet, with heights of some grandeur on either side, so that the town seems to be at the bottom of a gorge. Behind, the peninsula runs up to a third set of heights, the rearmost houses climbing the slope, with steps cut into the hillside. In those days there was a covered road and rail bridge over the Potomac from Maryland to the town, which lay in Virginia,*(* Now West Virginia) and a smaller bridge over the Shenandoah.

It's changed a good deal, having been battered and burned in the war, but in my time, as you came in over the Maryland bridge, there was a great stretch of armoury buildings running for near half a mile along the Potomac bank, quite unexpected in that kind of farming country. I'd imagined a sleepy hamlet, with a store and ferry-boat, and a few bare-foot loafers snoozing and spitting in the sunshine, but here was a bustling little industrial community of three thousand souls, with neat houses and workshops, and my first thought was that you'd need a regiment to take this place - and a brigade to hold it, for a less defensible position I never did see. Those commanding heights would be a besieged garrison's nightmare, and when the bridges went, why, you'd be like a mouse in a bottle.

But it was the sight of J.B. and his boys, wandering about like a party of tramps looking for a place to doss down, that moved me to silent mirth. They gaped at the great spread of armoury workshops and the a.r.s.enal building, gazed up the Shenandoah sh.o.r.e to the rifle works half a mile off, considered the number of workmen moving briskly about the sheds, and the activity about Wager's station hotel by the railroad tracks - and you could see in their eyes the question to J.B.: how the devil do we take this place? True, there wasn't a soldier to be seen, but there were several score of likely labourers, and any number of townsfolk. I could just picture J.B. hammering at the a.r.s.enal door and getting a bucket of water over him for his pains, before the Hads of the village swarmed out to chase us back over the bridge, probably in tar and feathers. As for the notion of carrying off arms and ammunition to the hills while the populace stayed obligingly in bed ... well, I'd always thought the. projected raid was daft, but only now did I realise it was ridiculous.

My spirits were further raised by our conference in Galt's saloon, where we met Johnny Cook, who was J.B.'s man on the spot. He'd been at the Ferry for a year, teaching school among other things, and G.o.d help the children's education: a pleasant fellow enough, but garrulous as a Welsh parson, and I'd sooner have trusted a secret to Elspeth. Like Kagi, he was fretting about whether the slaves would rise, and wanted to take soundings among 'em. The thought of this babbling a.s.s tooling about asking n.i.g.g.e.rs if they felt like mutiny had J.B. almost biting his tea-cup (yes, tea, in a saloon; he and Oliver were strict temperance). He told Cook, with some vigour, on no account to meddle with the slaves. Cook was crestfallen.

"But how they goin' to know, an' be ready, without we tell 'em? Can't have a nigra uprisin' if the nigras don't know, can we? How we goin' to get them in?" He raised a foolish laugh, and J.B. ground his teeth.

"When we strike, they will know it, and they will come in to us, I tell you, and they shall be legion!" He was wearing his mad Isaiah look, as he always did when contradicted. "The Lord will guide them to us, and they will be like the standing corn for number - so don't you fool with 'em, John Cook, you hear me?"

And that, you should know, was the last that was ever heard about stirring up the slaves - a task which could never have been done in secret anyway; George Broadfoot would have turned his face to the wall at the mere thought.

The next thing was to find a lonely spot on the Maryland side where we could set up shop, pretending to be farmers while we girded our loins, planned, trained, drilled, acc.u.mulated arms and recruits, and generally played out J.B.'s dreams. After putting it about that we were settlers who hoped to bring in cattle from the North, he found the ideal place about four miles from the Ferry, a ramshackle three-storey farmhouse which he rented from someone named Kennedy; it had pasture and outbuildings and lay away from the road, shielded by shrubbery, in pleasant wooded country at the foot of the hills. Just the spot for a few eccentrics to waste time fooling themselves that they were on the brink of great things.

And there we stayed, G.o.d help me, for three solid months - and if you ask me what happened in that interminable time, I can only say that dusty summer drifted endlessly into golden autumn, our clothes got seedier, and our leader talked and talked and brooded and wrote letters North for money, and accomplished ... absolutely nothing. While in the world outside (which I began to doubt still existed), Pam became Prime Minister again, Blondin walked across Niagara on a tightrope, someone invented the steam road-roller, people read A Tale of Two Cities (I know these things 'cos I looked them up in an encyclopedia the other day), and my loving Elspeth, I have reason to suspect, misbehaved in a potting-shed at Windsor Castle with that randy little pig the Prince of Wales, who at that time was just beginning to notice that girls were different from fellows, somehow.

And not far away from the Kennedy Farm a chap called Emmett was composing a catchy little ditty, which was rather ironic, when you consider that we were preparing to set the South ablaze: it was called "Dixie".

You may ask, how did I stand it, and why? Easy: I'd no choice. So far as I knew, the Kuklos were still keeping a leery eye on me, and Joe certainly was. Still, I might have tried to slide out, but for one thing - I never believed it could last. Only when you know you're in for a long haul do you grow desperate; I didn't, because each day I could tell myself that tomorrow, or next week, must see the end, surely; J.B. would realise his folly, and give up, or go loco entirely, or the plot would leak out altogether ... or something would bring the whole farce to a quiet conclusion. One thing I grew increasingly positive about: there would be no raid and no uprising.

I became convinced of this in the first two weeks at the farm, which I spent, at J.B.'s request, in writing plans for the great invasion. I did it in best staff-college style, covering reams of paper with instructions for the initial taking of the vital points in the town (a simple task in itself), and the development of the rebellion - a glorious exercise in impossibility, since it took for granted a force of at least a hundred well-trained men, properly equipped and led (a total which took care not to state in bald terms), and a.s.sumed that hordes of ferocious fugitive n.i.g.g.e.rs would flock to join us; it might encourage them, I suggested, if we sent riders round the country with fiery crosses - and if you think that was stretching credulity, you don't know J.B.

He was delighted. This was what he'd needed all along, he said, a clear laying-out by an expert; there had been nothing like me since Hannibal. He read it over and over, sighing with satisfaction as he turned the pages by the light of the oil-lamps, his great lion head tilted back to scan them through his reading-gla.s.s. The fiery crosses brought an explosion of admiration, and a fist thumped on the table, and I reflected that feeding dreams is like flattery: you can't lay it on too thick. If I'd had a spark of decency I'd have felt sorry for the credulous old clown, humbugging him so, but I didn't - hang it all, it's my livelihood.

Such a masterpiece had to be discussed, of course, ad infinitum, in every minute, futile detail. A copy must be sent to Kagi, who was now at Chambersburg awaiting the shipment of arms from John junior in Ohio, and Cook had to be summoned from the Ferry so that he, too, could be dumfounded by my genius. It was all there, he agreed, plain as print; he'd have to take a look up in the hills to select likely spots for the forts, but he could get tar and turpentine right away for the fiery crosses, you bet. One omission in my plan disappointed him, though: no mention of hostages. What hostages, I asked.

"Did I not tell you, Joshua?" says J.B. "When we have taken the Ferry we must lay hold on the princ.i.p.al slave-owners, as security for any of our people who may fall into the hands of the enemy." By "enemy" he meant the U.S.A., if he'd only thought about it.

"I know a prime case," says Cook. "Old Colonel Washington - he's George Washington's great-grandsomethin'-or-other. Has a fine place close to town - an' hasn't he got slaves, though!"

"We must take him without fail," says J.B. "It will mean much to have that great name, the name of our country's founder, as a hostage."

"He's a real fine gentleman, a proper arist-o-crat!" says Cook, pleased to be approved for once. "Say, you should see his house, though - that's the bang-uppest place! The things he has there -why, there's a pistol that Lafayette gave to George Washington, an' Frederick the Great's sword!"

"Are you sure - you've seen them?" J.B. fairly glowed. "Oh, to have those when we raise the flag of freedom over Harper's Ferry! Precious symbols in our country's history - Lafayette's pistol in my belt ... great Frederick's sword in my hand ..."

It kept him happy for a couple of days; if only Harper's Ferry had also contained Franklin's lightning-rod and Jefferson's commode, he'd have been in wonderland for a week.

We were just a party of six when we moved into the farm, but soon we were joined by Oliver's wife, Martha, and J.B.'s daughter, Annie, who were to keep house for us and the recruits who arrived at intervals thereafter. The two girls were bright, cheery la.s.ses in their late 'teens, and I should put your minds at rest at once by stating that I never had carnal designs on either; they weren't my style or pa.s.sable above half - and you don't fool with the womenfolk of John Brown of Ossawatomie, believe me. Martha was a capital cook, and little Annie a sharp sentry; it was J.B.'s great dread that we'd arouse suspicion among the local people - for Americans are the nosiest folk on earth, prying into every newcomer's business, trying to get sight of his furnishings and guess how much money he's got (being neighbourly, they call it), and the arrival of six mysterious stalwarts was enough to set the countryside agog.

Later, when more recruits came in, little Annie had to be on the look-out constantly, crying warning and rebuffing visitors, for it would have been fatal if the gossips had learned there were a score of men in the house. I've seen a dozen of us at dinner having to lift the cloth at a moment's notice and carry it off, dishes, scoff, and all, from the big common-room off the kitchen, up into the sleeping loft. And aII because Mrs Huffmaster, a barefoot slattern with half a dozen snottering brats at her heels, "came a-callin"', peeping round Annie on the porch to get a look inside, and remarking slyly "what a smart lot o' shirts your men-folk has", when we'd carelessly put all our washing out at once, and there were clothes for fifteen or twenty fluttering on the green.

These recruits came by twos and threes at intervals during the summer, but I'll list 'em all together for convenience. At first I worried in case J.B. might a.s.semble a formidable force, but twenty proved to be the full count, far too few for the business he had in mind, and only one or two first-cla.s.s experienced men. Mostly they were Jerry Anderson over again: young, eager, sworn abolitionists full of tripe about liberty and black equality, and all under the spell of J.B., for most of them had been with him in Kansas or up north, and had dispersed after last year's postponement.

The one formidable customer was Aaron Stevens, a big black-avised rascal who at thirty was the oldest; he'd served in Mexico, been sentenced to death for mutiny, broken out of Leavenworth, and fought the slavers in Kansas, where he'd been colonel of a militia troop. He and a fellow called Taylor, a Canadian, stuck together, for they were both spiritualists, and would prose away for hours about the beyond; Stevens was sane enough, but Taylor was next-door to a padded cell - he believed his dreams and would tell you cheerfully that he'd be dead by Christmas. He was, too.

Watson Brown was another of J.B.'s boys, tall and good-looking, with a dandy beard and a gentle manner; he'd left a wife and baby up north and was yearning to get back to them. Al Hazlett and Bill Leeman were wild young blades, forever sneaking out when J.B.'s back was turned to spark the local girls or get up to larks even down in Harper's Ferry, but Leeman was a favourite because he'd shot it out beside the old man when the Ruffians drove them from Ossawatomie. And Charlie Tidd was an ugly young brute with a temper to match.

There were two sets of brothers, the Thompsons and the Coppocs, just raw youngsters, but all I remember of them is that Dauphin Thompson was a fair-haired cherub who blushed like a girl, Bill Thompson was a jolly soul with a great fund of stories, and Ed Coppoc was a- sober youth with nursery manners who called me "sir". And aside from Joe there were three or four blacks, but they joined late in the day, and the only ones of whom I have any image were Emperor Green, an eye-rolling yes-ma.s.sa critter, and a middle-aged Scotch-mulatto with the astonishing name of Dangerous Newby.45 Those, then, were John Brown's "pet lambs", as I remember them -lively youths without much schooling, but fanatics to a man, and as I note them down, pictures of memory rise before me: Leeman, slim of face and figure, lolling with his feet on the table, cigar at a jaunty angle, talking big; Hazlett haw-hawing at Bill Thompson's jokes; the three Brown brothers playing nap, Oliver's fine profile and curly hair in the lamplight, Watson intent on his cards, Owen like a benign bullock; Jerry Anderson snapping checkers across the board, telling young Ed Coppoc he knew nothing about the game; the blacks muttering quietly in a corner, except for Joe, who often as not would be in the kitchen, listening to J.B. prosing away in his chair by the stove - the old man was always there of an evening because, he said, he didn't like to damp the spirits of the young men by his presence in the common-room; Martha peeling potatoes for next day's dinner, pushing the hair out of her eyes with a damp hand; Stevens and Taylor on the porch, discussing the hereafter; little Annie perched on her stool, keeping an eye on the distant road fading into the dusk.

All gone now, every one, and I wonder if the Kennedy farm is still there in peaceful Maryland, or if it has crumbled into a ruin of planks and shingles, overgrown in that lonely field, or perhaps there's a new farm altogether, whose tenants wonder what those strange conspirators were like, so long ago.

I have another strong memory of J.B. conducting communal prayers night and morning, the great bearded head with its fine mane of greying hair thrown back, eyes closed while he exhorted G.o.d fit to shake the roof; or reading aloud some blood-and-thunder pa.s.sage from the Old Testament. Often he would give us a brief sermon, usually on a text describing the destruction of the Amalekites or another of those unfortunate tribes who were forever being smitten hip and thigh.

If you'd seen him then, in full cry, you'd have believed all the stories about his fanaticism, yet at other times he could be as jolly as Punch. We occasionally played games on the meadow before the house (with Annie keeping watch), base-ball or Tom Tiddler, and I taught them football as played at Rugby in my time, with a bladder for a ball; they took to it like sailors to rum, charging and hacking in fine style, and J.B. roared and hurrah'd and laughed so much he had to sit down. He would sometimes wrestle with his sons, and beat Watson and Owen easily, but Oliver nothing could shift. I wrestled with J.B. once myself, at his invitation, thinking I'd best go easy on the old fellow, but it was like being wrapped in wire hawsers with a scrubbing brush buried in your neck, and he gra.s.sed me before I knew it.

Sometimes he cooked breakfast, to give Martha a rest, skilleting out the eggs and ham in his shirt-sleeves - that was the time I noticed his toes sticking out of his old boots, and on that same occasion he lost his temper: he'd brewed tea for all of us, Watson wanted coffee, words were exchanged, Watson sa.s.sed him, and J.B. suddenly blazed up and let drive a fist. Watson skipped away, they glared at each other, and then J.B. fairly bawled him to bits about duty and respect for elders and ungrateful children. Watson was on the verge of tears, but still came back at him, shouting: "The trouble is you want your sons to be brave as tigers, but still afraid of you!" J.B. glowered at him a full minute, and then took Watson's head in the crook of his arm and held it against his breast, ruffling his hair and smiling, and d.a.m.ned if Watson didn't start blubbing in earnest.

I reckon he'd summed the old man up pretty well. J.B. was a natural tyrant, and his sons treated him as the Children of Israel served G.o.d, with terrified affection. Watson told me an astonishing story of how he'd punished them in child-hood: he'd announce a number of strokes of his belt, say twelve, but he'd give them only six, and then they had to give him the other six. "'Twas the most awful punishment anyone could give a child," says Watson. "Imagine, havin' to lick your own father! I tell you, Josh, it near broke my heart. Say, didn't it keep us good, though!"

It wouldn't have kept this infant good; I'd have laced the old b.u.g.g.e.r till his a.r.s.e fell off. But then, I never had any proper filial regard, and if you'd ever met my guv'nor you'd understand why.

While I remember, J.B. had a great way with animals; he knew horses and they knew him, and he could quiet a barking hound just by glancing at it. But the strangest thing was when a brace of wrens flew into the common-room where lie was writing, fluttering about his head. When he went upstairs, they flew away, but later, when he was writing again, back they came to pester him. At last he went outside, and they flew ahead, twittering, to their nest in the brush - and there was the ugliest copperhead you ever saw, hissing and buzzing its tail. J.B. blew its head off with one shot and when next he sat down to write, d.a.m.ned if the wrens didn't bowl in, perching on his table, even hopping on to his sleeve, doing everything but shake his hand. "They know it friend when they see one," says he, and for weeks after-wards, when he was writing, the wrens would look in to pa.s.s the time with him.

Another critter whose regard for J.B. piqued my interest as the weeks went by was ... Joe. In all our time at the farm I doubt if he ever strayed ten yards from me, but he played it well, and no one ever suspected he was my watch-dog, ready to bite. He was at pains to conceal his intelligence and schooling, too, taking the silent dignified line, but always showing willing - he was the keenest hand in our football games, scrimmaging with the best of them - and was pretty well liked, especially by J.B. What intrigued me was that Joe seemed equally taken with the old man; I've told you how he'd listen to J.B.'s ga.s.sing in the kitchen of an evening, and in the talks where we all sat round debating half-baked philosophy and how society ought to be put right, or religion and military tactics, and J.B. started laying down the law, I'd catch Joe watching him with a strange, intense look in those awful bloodshot eyes. And when J.B. got on his slavery hobby-horse, as he always did, Joe would sit back with his lids half-closed, and I would wonder what was going on in that shrewd black mind.

The arms arrived in August, fifteen cases of Sharps rifles and the revolvers. Owen Brown had been our teamster in the early weeks, driving the, wagon up to Chambersburg to take letters to Kagi, and to pick up sup-plies discreetly in villages along the route; now Joe and I went with him to collect the arms, and while Joe and Owen stowed them in the wagon, Kagi drew me aside, looking grave.

"This plan of yours," says he. "I'll allow it's sound - but you're counting on a hundred men! Joshua, I don't see us raising half that number!"

I asked, what about the free blacks in Canada, who were supposed to be in a great sweat to join us, and he grunted.

"Junior's up there now - you may guess how many he'll raise! Oh, I should have gone myself, instead of wasting my time here, being a postmaster! And no sign of funds coming in, either; you'll be out of food shortly, and the boys daren't look for work down yonder." He shrugged angrily, then brightened again. "Still there's hope yet, for money and men - you know J.B. is coming up here to meet Frederick Dougla.s.s next week?"

Even I had heard of Dougla.s.s, the greatest black man in America, an escaped slave who moved in the highest circles, published his own newspaper, lectured all over, even in Europe, and was the nearest thing to a black messiah since Toussaint I'Ouverture.

"J.B. hopes to persuade him to join the raid," says Kagi. "Oh, if he but could - why, it would change our fortunes at a stroke! Every black in America and Canada would flock to him ... well, enough, anyway! The trouble is, he's always declared against violence, blast it! We must just see what J.B. can do with him."

This was the worst news I'd heard in months. Suppose this infernal n.i.g.g.e.r did throw in with Brown, and brought even fifty with him? The old buzzard would be into Harper's Ferry like a shot - and where would poor Flashy be then? Skipping for the timber, that was where ... with the likes of Joe Simmons looking to put a bullet in my back. But, steady on - Dougla.s.s most likely wouldn't come to scratch, and all would be well. One thing was sure: when J.B. met him at Chambersburg, I was going to be on hand.

Luckily, J.B. was all for it, saying it was right and useful that Dougla.s.s should meet "our strategian", as he called me, and when Joe, inevitably, asked to come along, he agreed right off; it would be good for Dougla.s.s to see such a fine upstanding man of colour in the forefront of the cause, he said.

The meeting took place in great secrecy, because J.B.'s fears of betrayal were mounting by the day, what with neighbours prying and our young men behaving carelessly, showing themselves about the farm and writing indiscreet letters to wives and sweethearts, making no secret of what was afoot. I remember Leeman reading aloud an effusion to his mother, about "our secret a.s.sociation of as gallant fellows as ever pulled trigger", and how we were soon going to "exterminate !slavery", and J.B. overhead him and pitched right in.

"It isn't enough that folk come spying about us, stopping us on the road, demanding to know our business - you have to write this kind of foolishness, too! Think of the burden of secrecy you put on your mother! And the rest of you, writing to girls, and special friends, telling of our location and all our matters! We might as well get it published in the New York Herald and be done with it! Now, drop it, d'you hear?" He scorched them with a look, and stumped off, and Leeman rolled his eyes and told Dauphin Thompson that he'd better mind what he wrote to those saucy little snappers of his; the infant blushed like a beetroot.

So we stole into Chambersburg by night, J.B. and Joe in the wagon, myself on the mule, and lay up in a deserted quarry. The old man was more nervous than I'd ever seen him, probably because he was in such a sweat to enlist Doug-la.s.s - and I nearly caught a bullet as a result. It was around dawn that Joe and I heard someone coming, and when Joe shook J.B. awake, d.a.m.ned if he didn't come to with his Colt in his fist, loosing off a shot that blew splinters from the rock beside my head. It shook the old fool as much as it did me, and he was fairly twitching by the time Kagi hove in view, with Dougla.s.s and a young n.i.g.g.e.r in tow.

Dougla.s.s was one of those mulattos who are more white than black; but for the wiry hair he might have been Spanish or Italian, and I found myself reflecting yet again on the oddity that the smallest visible touch of the tar-brush in a white man makes him "black", but a trace of European in a negro don't make him "white". Dougla.s.s was altogether white in speech and style, but I doubt if he knew it or cared; he had a fine sense of his own dignity, which would have irked me whatever colour he was, but while he talked down his fine straight nose at least he had none of the resentful spite or childish airs that had made George Randolph such a confounded bore."

It soon became plain that he was far too level-headed to be swayed by J.B.'s nonsense, or to beat about the bush. He listened soberly while the old man told him that the die was cast, it was Virginia or bust, and what did Dougla.s.s think of that? Dougla.s.s told him, straight, that it was not only wrong, and crazy, but downright wicked: it was an attack on the U.S.A., it would rouse the country against the abolitionists, do untold harm to their cause, and be fatal not only to Brown and his gang but to every slave who was fool enough to run off and join the rebellion. I wanted to cry hear, hear, and wondered why none of Brown's supporters had had the spirit to say it to him long ago.

J.B. said he didn't care two cents if the country was roused; it needed rousing. And Dougla.s.s couldn't conceive what the taking of Harper's Ferry would mean - why, it would be a sign to the slaves that deliverance was at hand, they would burst their chains and rally to his banner in thou-sands, not only in Virginia but throughout all Israel, amen! He was in his best raving style, pacing about the quarry, arms flailing and eyes flashing, while Dougla.s.s waited stern-faced for him to run out of wind. When he did, Dougla.s.s asked me to describe the men and means at our disposal.

Ht was my chance, and I took it, telling the simple truth without opinion, while J.B. stood nodding triumphantly as though to say: "There - you see!" Dougla.s.s sat back against the rock and looked up at him.

"H can't debate the cause with you, John; I'm no match for you in such matters. But from what your comrade tells me of the place, and all you've said, I'm convinced you are going into a perfect steel trap. You'll never get out alive, you'll be surrounded with no hope of escape -"

"If we're surrounded we'll find means to cut our way out!" cries J.B. "But it won't come to that - we'll have the leading men of the district prisoners from the start! With such hostages we can dictate our terms, don't you see?"

Dougla.s.s stared in disbelief. "You can't think it! Why, man, Virginia will blow you and your hostages sky-high rather than let you hold Harper's Ferry an hour!" He turned to me. "Is that not so, Mr Comber? You are a soldier, I believe -"

"He's a sailor!" roars J.B. "Oh, can you not see, Doug-la.s.s, that even if we were destroyed altogether, we should have won the victory? The fire would have been kindled, the flag unfurled, the nation shaken from its slumber ..."

And so on, ranting and pleading by turns, while Dougla.s.s exclaimed in anger or shook his head in despair. They argued back and forth for hours, J.B. insisting on a sudden war-like stroke, Dougla.s.s trying to persuade him that if he must go mouth he should do it gradually, helping slaves to escape to havens in the hills and so building a resistance that couldn't he ignored. They left off only at dusk, agreeing to meet again next day, and when we parted Dougla.s.s stepped aside to shake my hand.

"You are English, are you not? Well, sir, I must tell you that your country is dear to me beyond all others, for it gave me sanctuary from my enemies here. Indeed," says he, looking stuffed, "I owe my name to Scotland, and my liberty to England. 'Dougla.s.s' I borrowed from 'The Lady of the Lake', and English friends purchased my freedom." He sighed, with a wry smile. "Ironic, is it not? America cast off a royal tyranny to found a free republic, yet it was the land of royal tyranny that bought my liberty from the free republic which had stolen it."

"Ah, well," says 1, "always happy to oblige, don't ye know." It sounded a bit lame, so I added: "Cost a bit o' bra.s.s, did it?"

He blinked. "Seven hundred and ten dollars," says he, rather stiff. "And ninety-six cents."

"Bless my soul!" says I. "Well, there it is. Easy come, easy go, what?"

He gave me an odd look, and a brief good-night, and steered clear of me when the meeting resumed next day. He and J.B. were still altogether at odds, and when the old man begged him to join the raid, Dougla.s.s refused point-blank; much as he loved and respected J.B., his conscience wouldn't let him. Aye, thinks I, we've heard that tale before. Still J.B. wouldn't let up, putting his arm round his shoulders and breathing zeal.

"Come with me, Dougla.s.s!" cries he. "I will defend you with my life! I need you, my friend, for when I strike, the bees will start to swarm, and I shall want you to help hive them! Oh, think what it will mean to them if you, of all black men, aye, with the stripes of the lash upon you, are there to greet them sword in hand amidst the smoke of battle!"

That's the way to drum up recruits, thinks 1. Dougla.s.s, sensible chap, wouldn't have it, but he told the young darkie he might go along if he liked, and to our surprise the fellow, Emperor Green, snuffled and muttered: "Ah guess Ah'll go wid de ole man." He looked as though he'd sooner have gone to China, but I suspect that word of J.B.'s plan had spread among the wealthier free blacks, and they were eager to have as many coloureds in the business as possible, so poor old Emperor may just have been doing what he was told.

It was a fine cheery trip back to the farm, I don't think, with J.B. deep in the dumps; he'd been so sure he could persuade Dougla.s.s, and all he'd got was a complete damper and one run-down n.i.g.g.e.r. To make matters worse (or rather better), we soon had word from Kagi that John junior had made nothing of the Canadian blacks, and that various white men on whom J.B. had been relying weren't coming- some wanted a definite date, others wanted to get the harvest in, or didn't fancy Virginia, and one had decided to study law instead. But the worst blow of all to J.B. was when two of his sons, Salmon and Jason, who were up north, wrote that they weren't joining. Salmon was quite brutal about it, saying that he knew the old man, and he would just dally until he was trapped.

So there it was, as autumn advanced: no more men, no more money, J.B. in the sullen frets and growling about betrayal, our situation at the farm growing more precarious by the day, and the young men restless and writing ever longer letters home - I couldn't have wished for a better state of affairs, and looked forward to the enterprise being abandoned any day.

It was interesting to watch the nerves starting to fray with the uncertainty. It's always the way: men facing a definite task, however desperate, are manageable, but give 'em a leader who can't make up his mind and they go all to bits. quarrels became more frequent, Bill Thompson ran out of jokes, Leeman and Hazlett no longer got up to larks, and for the first time I heard murmurs that the raid should be given up, that it was madness with no more men coming in, and Harper's Ferry would prove a death-trap. The youngsters, who'd been so full of ginger a month before, were looking uneasy, Watson Brown confided to me that he wanted nothing but to be home with his wife and baby, and even Oliver, the coolest of hands, wore a tired frown on his handsome face - I'd seen dried tears on Martha's cheeks, and knew she'd been trying to talk him out of it.

To add to the gloom, she and Annie went back north in September, but one who wasn't missed was J.B. himself on the occasions when he went up to Chambersburg to confer with Kagi. He was at his wit's end for funds, and bit the heads off Leeman and Tidd just for lighting cigars, crying that if he had half the money that was wasted on smoking, he could have outfitted an army. Leeman threw down his weed in a temper, and Tidd flung out of the house, saying he'd had enough. He came back, though, after three days spent croaking to Cook down at the Ferry. Meanwhile J.B. was off to Chambersburg again, and the general feeling was that he could stay there, and the rest of us could go home.

No such luck. He drove up next day, bringing the famous thousand pikes with him, and tried to make it an occasion for rejoicing, saying here was proof that our friends had not forgotten us, but the mere sight of that great heap of lumber and metal lying in the yard sent everyone's spirits into their boots. He drove us to work fitting the pike heads and stowing them in the loft, and then had Stevens call a drill parade; we'd been getting slack in his absence, he said, and must brisk up directly, for the time was coming when we must prove ourselves in earnest.

"Sure, next summer, maybe," mutters Jerry Anderson, and Bill Thompson cried no, no, we mustn't be in such a rush, 1869 would be soon enough, if we weren't all dead of boredom by then. The n.i.g.g.e.rs haw-hawed at this, but Joe rounded on them, telling them to mind what they were about, and fall in like the captain said. Stevens marched 'em up and down for an hour, while I watched from the veranda (chiefs of staff don't drill, you see), and a more ill-natured parade I never saw. Now's your time, Flash, says I to myself, and when they'd fallen out and eaten supper in sullen silence, I joined Stevens, who was having a brood to himself in the yard.

"Aaron," says I, mighty earnest, "I'd value your opinion. This plan of mine ... I've done it as best I known how, J.B. is all for it, and so, I believe, is Kagi - but you're the only real soldier in this outfit." I looked him in the eye. "Straight, now - what d'ye think of it?"

"Well, it's a real fine plan, I guess," says he, in his slow way. "For a full company of soldiers. For our poor few . . . " He shrugged his big shoulders. "I reckon Harper's Ferry could be a right pretty place to die."

I nodded solemnly. "So think I. Well, my life don't mat-ter." G.o.d, the things I've said. "And I know you don't count yours - like me, you feel it's a small price to pay for the cause. But ..." I paused, a n.o.ble soul troubled "... what of the younger men - and the blacks? Is it right that they should be sacrificed? You see my plight, old fellow - it's my plan that is dooming them ... their deaths will lie to my account ... ah, that's what burdens my spirit!"

This kind of soul-lashing was small talk at Kennedy Farm that summer, and meat and drink to mystic idiots like him. I knew I'd hit pay-dirt when I saw his jaw tighten; he shook his head sternly.

"Everyone counted the cost before he came," says he. "They'll give their lives gladly - after all, there is a better life beyond, and the door is always open. To pa.s.s through is but a small step," continues the great loony, "and if in pa.s.sing it falls to us to do a n.o.ble thing, then who shall mind a moment's affliction, knowing that in death lies victory, not only for us but for the thousands enslaved and oppressed?"

"G.o.d bless you, old fellow!" cries 1, and wrung his hand. "Gad, but you put it well! You've lifted a weight from my mind, I can tell you!" I hesitated. "See here, Aaron, will you do something for me?"

"What's that, Joshua?"

"Talk to the others ... the younger men ... as you've talked to me - you know, about pa.s.sing through, and victory, and ... and so on. They'll heed you, because ... well, you have such faith, you see, and a gift of words! I mean, if I were to say to 'em: 'We're all dead men, but it's worth it' ... well, there you are, you see! I don't put it too well, do I? But you can, old boy! Oh, 'twill raise their hearts why it may make all the difference, and ensure that dear old J.B.'s dream comes true!"