Fantasy & Science Fiction Mar-Apr 2013 (4 page)

"Well, he…," the slave-catcher glanced at Thomas. "He talked to it. Pardon, his wife did. She asked what it wanted to do."

Taney's shoulders straightened, a subtle movement under the folds of his judge's gown. Thomas caught the leap of interest in his expression, a tightening of the small muscles around the eyes. "And what did this device communicate? It can speak?"

"Yessir, it surely can. It said—" Cochoran's face twisted with the effort of remembering "—it didn't like bein' a slave, so it wouldn't do that to anyone else. Or thereabouts."

Now Judge Hall sat up as well. "This
mechanical device
quoted the Golden Rule?"

"Not…not exactly."

"Exactly enough for this court," Taney said dryly, "albeit in the negative form."

"Your Honor," Turner's attorney spoke up once the bustle of reaction from the audience had died down. "This is beside the point. The defendant, Thomas Covington, unlawfully prevented my client from enjoying the use of his property."

Taney's voice dropped in pitch and his dark, unruly brows drew together. "Are you attesting that the defendant is guilty of failing to take positive action to return property that expressly did not wish to be returned?"

The attorney blanched, but only for a moment. "The automaton is not a volitional agent, your Honor. It is a machine. It can be taught to parrot back phrases and it can follow a limited range of instructions, but it cannot
wish
for anything."

"That remains to be determined. Mr. Turner, in your affidavit you state that the device was eventually recovered. Present it before this court for examination."

Turner got to his feet. "I'm afraid that wouldn't do any good, your Honor. When the automaton refused to function as it ought, I took it back to the manufacturer. They removed the animation element and inserted a new one. It's working properly now, but it doesn't remember what happened to it before."

Oh, Adam.
Thomas wished Hannah were here.

"Animation element?" Taney lifted one eyebrow. "And what might that consist of?"

"It's.…" Turner bent over the table and rifled through a stack of papers, finally extracting one and reading from it. "It's a
discorporated nonmaterial motivational unit.
"

"A what?" someone in the audience exclaimed. Taney glared at the man and the hubbub subsided.

"By this," Taney addressed himself to Turner once more, "do you mean a
soul
?"

"I…I suppose so."

"And whence came this soul?"

"I'm sorry, your Honor, the papers don't say. It must have been the sort of man suited to catching slaves. Maybe even a slave himself." Turner recovered a modicum of composure as he nodded in approval of his own argument.

Thomas felt too numb, too horrified to speak. At his side, John Wales scribbled notes on a piece of foolscap.

Judge Hall cleared his throat. "So you have no information as to whether the provider of this…soul was a free man or slave?"

"Your Honor!" Turner's attorney exclaimed, gesturing for his client to remain silent. "Is this germane to the charges?"

"We are attempting to determine whether the automaton constitutes in itself a device for the unlawful imprisonment of a free man's…soul, or whether, in its capacity as the encasing structure for a slave, it fulfills in its entirety the definition of
property.
"

The discussion went on for another three-quarters of an hour, although Thomas had not the heart to follow it closely. It sickened him to his very marrow to think of Adam, that new and bright spirit, now so casually extinguished. As a Friend, he was committed to the testimony of peace, but he could not deny the anger that stirred at the notion of the souls of men, those reflections of Divinity itself, treated as expendable commodities.

Adam, gone.…

Turner submitted his ownership papers, along with other informational materials from the Lake Geneva Trading Company, as evidence. Taney announced that he and Judge Hall would review the documents and hear closing arguments after the recess. After they retired, John Wales leaned toward Thomas.

"Mr. Covington, are you unwell?"

Thomas came back to himself. "Friend," he said, gently reminding the lawyer that Quakers did not use such titles, "I am distressed to learn of the death of a friend."

"You cannot mean the automaton?"

"Not the metal housing, but the soul within it, yes. John Wales, this was a child of God, even as you or I. Should we not mourn his passing, and for such a senseless cause as the pursuit of men who seek only their own freedom?"

Wales swept his hair back from his high forehead. "The business at hand is your acquittal. Grief and politics can come later."

Grief comes when it comes,
Thomas thought, but did not say it aloud.

Court resumed. Turner's lawyer restated his case, pointedly referring to the eyewitness testimony. He implied that the malfunction of the automaton, which necessitated the considerable expense of repairs, was due to damage inflicted on it by the defendant. Wales, in his turn, argued that Cochoran and his assistants had entered the property of Thomas Covington uninvited. Without a proper warrant and proof of ownership of the mechanical device, Thomas had been under no obligation to deliver the automaton. If the automaton had refused to comply with its instructions, then perhaps those instructions were improperly issued. Given the necessity for subsequent repairs, the automaton was certainly defective. In neither case could responsibility be assigned to his client.

As persuasive as these arguments were, Thomas grew increasingly uneasy. The question was not whether Cochoran or Turner or anyone else had the proper authority to claim a piece of stolen equipment, but whether Adam or any human soul should be enslaved.

Thomas caught the eye of his attorney and beckoned him over. "John, thee must allow me to speak. Put me on the stand!"

"Are you mad? You'll be under oath and the plaintiff will question you on cross-examination! You'd be slitting your own throat!" Wales hesitated, perhaps remembering that Thomas would not swear an oath that implied he was at other times untruthful. "I'm sorry, but it's too late. Unless you have some new piece of evidence you haven't told me about."

"Not evidence, no—"

"Counsel for the defense, do you require a recess?" Justice Hall inquired. Taney was scowling in disapproval.

"Thomas, there's a time and a place for everything. Now let me do my job." Wales straightened up. "I'll resume my statement straightaway, your Honor."

Thomas sat helplessly as Wales concluded his speech. He did not expect the jury to confer for long, and they did not. As the courtroom settled to hear the verdict, Thomas felt a sense of dread. He listened as Hall reviewed the salient points in the case, searching for any hint as to how the judges saw Adam's status—machine or man, slave or free? But Hall kept only to the testimony presented, and Taney's expression was unreadable.

In the end, did it matter in whose favor these men decided? Would Adam be less dead in either case?

After Hall concluded, Taney glanced down at his notes and began. "This court was unable, given the facts presented, to determine if the entity referred to as the automaton is entirely a mechanical device or whether it, by the moiety which might be considered a human soul, has a valid claim to consideration as a person. Furthermore, we have been unable to determine whether that person, if any such exists, is to be considered a slave or a free citizen. Therefore, we have attempted to ascertain whether, at the time the Constitution was ratified, federal law would have recognized this entity as a citizen, and we have determined that it would not. A device created for the sole purpose of servitude, regardless of any hypothetical human component, must therefore be regarded under law as property."

The jury found in favor of the plaintiff, the fine being calculated at the cost of the automaton, its repairs, and the loss of its use. Some of the onlookers gasped at the amount, far more than the value of a slave.

After the court adjourned, Turner went up to the jury and attempted to shake their hands; some accepted, but others turned away, clearly uncomfortable.

Only a few of the onlookers left the courtroom, and most of those had been standing at the back. Thomas got to his feet and the murmurs died. Turner, in the midst of thanking one of the jurors, stepped back.

Thomas faced the bench. "Judge, I have not always acted according to my conscience, at times out of fear of losing what little I possess. Now that burden has been removed from me, so I say to thee, to Durham Turner, and to all in this courtroom, that if anyone knows a fugitive—slave or automaton—who needs shelter, send him to me that I might befriend him!"

Taney glowered at Thomas, but Thomas did not flinch. Words poured from his mouth as if he were not their originator, but only the voice of the spirit that moved through him. He sensed the close attention with which his arguments were received.

"My friends, are we not called to regard all mankind as our brethren? Was the soul placed in the automaton once a man? And must he then be our brother, for whom we ought to have the most tender care?"

His voice swelled as he exhorted the audience to, "Quench not the spirit, but live in love and unity one with another! The same expression of God's love dwells in all of us, male and female, black and white, slave and free—
and sheathed in metal
! It is as vile a practice, and as contrary to the laws of God, to keep a metal person in bondage as it is to enslave another man, for both are living souls!"

At moments, there was such a profound silence, he might have been in Meeting. Now and again, a member of the audience hung his head or someone else hissed their displeasure.

"Consider, friends, that a black man may escape to a free state and thereby become free. Consider that he may purchase his freedom and that of his family. But what of the automaton? We have heard testimony in this court that the boundaries of the states and their laws regarding slavery are of no account in this case. This automaton was pursued and then seized in Pennsylvania, in what ought to have been a place of sanctuary. Then he was executed without trial. His light was forever extinguished. And for what reason?"

Thomas paused. For the last few minutes, he had been so caught up in his ministry as to become unaware of his listeners. Now he saw them, the reddened faces and those nodding in agreement. Toward the back, a small, mousy woman, whom he had noticed previously, sat as if rapt, a journal book open on her lap. Her cheeks were wet with tears.

"For the reason of following the leadings of the spirit, for answering the demands of conscience! Even without having been instructed, this automaton understood the great teaching from the Gospel of Luke—
As ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.
Friends, we are commanded that if a stranger sojourns with us, we must not vex him, but shall love him as ourselves. How can it be love to enslave a soul and then destroy it for speaking God's truth?"

A fever seized him as he saw Adam no longer as a slave or a tortured soul but as a martyr, even as many of his own faith had met the same fate. He found the insight so moving that, for a moment, he could not find the words. But then, as if a floodgate had opened within him, phrases thundered from his mouth. He scarcely knew what he said, so overcome was he with awe and fire. His limbs trembled, but his voice did not. When he paused to draw breath, the room still echoed with his words.

"A martyr? A holy saint?" sneered Durham Turner. "That piece of worthless machinery? What's next—setting free our cotton gins? I've heard enough of this balderdash!" He strode from the courtroom.

Thomas sagged, the passion that had fueled his words spent. His ministry had lasted for over an hour. He gathered himself and returned to the defendant's table, where John Wales waited. They were joined a moment later by one of the jurors.

"Old man, I came here with my mind set against you. Having heard you, I now believe every word you have said. I have done you an injustice."

"Not me, friend," Thomas replied. "Look rather at thy dealings with the unfortunate and oppressed, and then address thy concern to thy own conscience. Never advocate for the vile custom of slavery, whether of a black man or an automaton."

An elderly man, by his plain dress and hat a fellow Quaker although one Thomas did not know, stopped for a moment, said, "Thee was well favored," and quietly departed.

Last of all was the mousy woman, the one who had been so affected by what Thomas said. She clasped his hand in both of hers, her eyes still reddened with weeping.

"Oh, sir! Your words have wrung my heart! I had not known there was such goodness in men—or such evil! I am…I am writing a book, you see, on the sufferings of the negro slaves. John Jewett of the
National Era
has expressed interest in publishing it in serial form. Now I see I must enlarge my story to include those poor souls who inhabit the automata. I only hope I can be as persuasive as you have been."

Thomas extracted his hand as gently as he could. She was so earnest, still quivering with the intensity of her fervor. Such zeal might incite revolutions, start wars, or bring a nation to its knees.

"Would you…I would like to correspond with you," she said, "to gain more particulars about this automaton in order to better depict the plight of its kind. I mean, of
his
kind."

Perhaps there might be hope for reason and tolerance, for fellowship and the "Spirit that delights to do no evil."

Thomas gave the woman his address and received in exchange a lady's fine calling card. After she left, he took the card out of his pocket and studied it.

She'd come a long way to hear him. He did not doubt she would go even further.