House Divided (140 page)

'Phemy showed these unwelcome visitors to rooms upstairs, and Tony wondered why Darrell had come, and why was Pudrick here, and why had he brought those hounds. When they had changed to dry clothes, the explanation came.

“I suppose we surprised you, Uncle Tony,” Darrell remarked. “Matter of fact, I meant to come in June and help you run the place. You seem to have managed without me.”

His tone was a question. Tony said: “Yes, I get along very comfortably. Mr. Fiddler went into the army, but Peg-leg is my driver and I'm my own overseer.”

“Well, I meant to come,” Darrell repeated. “But an amusing matter detained me—till it ceased to be amusing. To escape called for drastic measures, so I went to Nassau on one of our blockaders, stayed there till a fortnight since. On my return I met Mr. Pudrick in Wilmington. One of the niggers you sold him ran away from the man to whom Mr. Pudrick sold him, a month or so ago. That's bad for Mr. Pudrick's business; when he sells a nigger, that nigger's expected to stay sold. He thinks the nigger might be here, and I suggested that we bring some dogs and run him down. Mr. Pudrick got a pair of the nigger's old shoes, so if the rascal's here we can have some sport.”

“What makes you think he might be here?” Tony asked. The slaves he had sold were all from Great Oak or Belle Vue. Chimneys had only briefly been their home. Also, if there were a runaway on the place, Peg-leg or 'Phemy would surely have told him.

Mr. Pudrick said confidently: “Oh, I know niggers, Mr. Currain. They're my business. This scamp wouldn't eat, from the first; so I knew that either he was homesick, or else he had a wench back here. I always put a couple of my own niggers in with a new batch to listen
to their talk. It turned out this one had his eye on a wench, a bright. So when I heard he'd run away—I guarantee every nigger I sell—I I paid back his purchase price and headed this way.”

A bright mulatto wench? Sapphira was the only bright at Chimneys. Tony felt new anger flood his throat. “What's his name?”

“Sam.”

The name was meaningless, but what did a name matter? Why had not 'Phemy or Peg-leg reported the runaway's presence? Had the nigger seen Sapphira? By God, he himself would have some questions to ask 'Phemy; yes, and to ask Sapphira too.

“There's no bright here,” he said harshly. “There are browns and yellows, but no true bright.” He felt Darrell's eye upon him, carefully held his own on Mr. Pudrick. “And if your nigger was here, I'd have heard of it.”

“Well, he may be hiding somewhere,” the slave dealer suggested. “If he is, the sight of the dogs will flush him. We'll take the hounds for a stroll through the quarter tomorrow.”

“You can't trail him in this rain.”

Pudrick chuckled. “Mr. Currain, those hounds of mine could trail a fish downstream to the Yadkin!”

Tony fell into a stormy silence, and his thoughts were raging. Was it possible that Sapphira would take up with a black? Of course it was! To that nigger strain in her anything was possible. Then in sudden hopefulness he remembered that when Darrell and Mr. Pudrick came to buy those slaves, Sapphira had only that day been brought over from the Pettigrew place. Surely this Sam had had no chance to see her before he was herded away in the coffle with the others.

But during his stay here he might have discovered her, even over at the Pettigrew place. There were no patrollers hereabouts. Negroes could wander at night if they chose; and if Sapphira had ever let her hot black blood have its way, every buck nigger in twenty miles would have known it! They were as sharp as dogs in such matters.

When 'Phemy brought supper he glared at her with bloodshot eyes. She seemed not to see, but that was pretense. She saw, no doubt of that. Well, by and by, when these men were gone, he would deal with her; but first he must be rid of Darrell and Mr. Pudrick, and as quickly as possible.

After supper, stretching his feet before the fire, yawning comfortably, Darrell said: “By the way, Uncle Tony, our blockading venture is a great success. Captain Pew gets the lion's share, but there's plenty for all of us. Why don't you run over to Nassau and spend some of the money? You'd find a variety of pleasures there.”

Tony floundered for words. “Have you had no trouble? I saw by the papers that some of the Government's steamers have been lost.”

“Yes, yes, very sad. The
Hebe
and the
Venus
, and the
R. E
.
Lee,
and the
Lady Davis
. She used to be the
Cornubia.
Yes, the government pilots seem to lose vessels faster than Jeff Davis can buy them; but of course, the fewer steamers they operate, the more profits for the rest of us.” He yawned again. “Uncle Tony, you're mighty comfortable here. I think I'll stay and be your overseer.”

Darrell under the same roof with Sapphira? No sir! Tony meant to be rid of this whelp even if he had to shoot him. “Peg-leg does the work all right.”

“All the same, I think I'll stay,” Darrell repeated. “There's talk of a new conscription law, you know, to make up for desertions.” He laughed. “They give a soldier a thirty-day furlough now for shooting a deserter; so half the army will shoot the other half and then go home. And the Government's going to stop substitutes. Wilmington's full of gentlemen who hired substitutes while they made their fortunes; but now they've bought passports and they're taking their gold out of the country before the conscript bureau knocks on their door. But I'll stay here and turn planter.”

Tony bit his lip. “The conscript officers are busy here; and Salisbury prison is a mighty uncomfortable place. Ten thousand prisoners of war, there, and not room enough to lodge a thousand. You might not enjoy it.”

Darrell looked at him with lifted brows. “I declare, Uncle Tony, your fears for me are touching. But you've slaves enough to count off twenty to exempt me; and even if the conscript men get me, Judge Preston will turn me loose.” He called for 'Phemy. “Brandy,” he said, when she appeared.

Tony thought brandy might make Darrell sleepy. His own room was on this floor, but Darrell and Mr. Pudrick would presently go upstairs. When they did, he could summon Sapphira, twist the truth
out of her. He was by this time sure that Mr. Pudrick's nigger was here; yes, perhaps hidden away in that room behind the kitchen where Sapphira took refuge when Tony had visitors. He might even be there with Sapphira now. Tony twitched and twisted with the jealous rage in him, and longed for the hour when these others would retire.

But the liquor 'Phemy brought loosed Darrell's tongue. He talked of the easy pleasures of Nassau, and of men grown suddenly rich, and of the stupidity of any man who neglected those golden opportunities. “Why, there's money lying around loose for the trouble of picking it up,” he declared. “I heard of a Baltimore man the other day, a clerk. He put three hundred dollars into merchandise and marked the box to be delivered to Yankee prisoners in Richmond and put it on the flag-of-truce boat. Then he slipped through the lines and met the boat in Richmond and carted off his box and made fifteen thousand dollars' profit on the deal.”

Mr. Pudrick chuckled enviously. “I'm in the wrong line of business, gentlemen; but all I know is slaves.”

Darrell grinned. “With prime niggers worth three or four thousand dollars, you make a living, my friend.”

“That reminds me.” Mr. Pudrick bestirred himself. “I think the rain has stopped. If my man is here, he saw the dogs, and he'll be off to the swamps by this time. Mr. Currain, may I let the hounds take a swing around?”

“Can they do anything in the dark?”

“They see with their noses,” Mr. Pudrick assured him. “Let's have a look at the weather.”

Tony came to his feet. By God, if that nigger was here, the sooner he was caught the better. From the veranda they saw that the west wind had freshened to blow rain clouds away, and stars were out. Tony bade 'Phemy summon Mr. Pudrick's Negro with the hounds; and Peg-leg brought men to carry lanterns.

 

When they were ready, they went afoot, the dogs loudly snuffling at the wet ground. Mr. Pudrick said the man they sought would make for the nearest running water to lose his scent. There was a branch, a tributary to the south fork of the Yadkin, which threaded its way
through the hills northeast of the house and furnished power for the mill below the quarter before it crossed the Martinston road. Darrell remembered this stream, and spoke of it, and Mr. Pudrick agreed that it was a probability. Tony thought that if the fugitive had been hidden in the quarter they might pick up his scent among the cabins there, but Mr. Pudrick said this was unlikely.

“He'd have got some buck nigger to tote him to where he could put his feet in water,” he predicted.

So they went down the driveway to the main road, and along the road to the ford. The Negro, if he were wading, might have gone toward the Yadkin. “They most generally head downstream,” Mr. Pudrick admitted. “But this is a smart nigger. We'll try the other way tonight, and if we don't pick him up we'll go down the branch tomorrow.”

So they turned up toward the mill. The Negroes with the lanterns were wall-eyed in the darkness, staring fearfully at the dogs, edging away from the mournful beasts. Mr. Pudrick's man who controlled the hounds held them on leash in couples, and he went afoot, his mule on lead. Now and then, to remind the dogs of their prey, he thrust under their noses a worn old shoe.

Tony watched them, and his pulse was pounding and his lips were dry, and there was a murderous impatience in him. “Suppose you find him?” he asked.

“I'll teach him not to run away again!”

“Kill him?”

“No, no. Sam's worth four thousand dollars in Alabama or Mississippi today. No, but I'll teach him some manners.”

The slow search went on, and Tony began to think it would prove futile. They came up the branch past the saw mill; but a few yards above, the hounds gave tongue. Mr. Pudrick cried out in triumph; and Tony asked: “Have they got him?”

“Yes, got the smell of him. We'll need horses now.”

Tony sent for mounts. While they waited, the hounds clamored to be gone; and there was a zealous haste in Tony too. The horses came, and Tony and Darrell and Mr. Pudrick mounted, and each took a lantern. The Negroes who had brought the horses faded away into darkness and at Mr. Pudrick's command the hounds were loosed, and
the black man who handled them shouted some encouragement. Two of the hounds splashed across to the other bank of the little brook while the others stayed on this side. With the horsemen following, they began to move up the stream through the winding gorge.

The hounds, save for an occasional questing bay, were silent at their work. They tested every inch of the ground, considered every bush and tree, tried not only the ground scent but the air. They moved for a while so slowly that it was easy to keep upon their heels, and Tony sweated with the excitement of this man hunt. He forgot his personal animus against the fugitive in watching the dogs and in watching Mr. Pudrick's Negro, mounted on his old mule, as he directed them. This was for Tony a completely new experience. At Great Oak no slave ever ran away. As long as Negroes were decently treated, they were easily content. A man whose people ran away was subject to almost as much criticism, spoken or unspoken, as one who whipped his slaves. But Tony reminded himself that dealers like Mr. Pudrick were in a category by themselves. They were not masters of their slaves; they were simply owners, commanding from their human property neither affection nor slightest loyalty. A slave who had been sold away from home might run away if he saw his chance; so dealers had to be prepared to hunt them down.

Mr. Pudrick saw Tony's interest, and he explained: “Those dogs know he's gone to water, you see. Watch them look up at every tree to see if he's climbed it. See them stand up and smell the trunk and sniff the air. When he comes out of the water, they'll know it. They'll tell us.”

This prediction proved a good one. A mile or two above their starting place, a smaller tributary stream threaded the laurel to enter the creek they were following. Tony saw one of the hounds wade up that lesser stream, scenting the banks, standing on its hind legs to sniff at the boughs on either side. Almost at once it uttered a long doleful cry that made Tony shiver. The other hounds answered and came that way.

“Got him!” Mr. Pudrick shouted; and he urged the dogs. “On, boys! On, on, on!”

The hounds broke into a loose-jointed lope that seemed slow; but it soon became impossible to keep up with them. They threaded their
way through the undergrowth faster than a horse in the darkness could safely go. Tony forgot caution in his zeal, till a branch he did not see twitched the lantern out of his hand and broke it and left him in darkness. Thereafter he followed Mr. Pudrick and Darrell; and for a while the mournful baying of the hounds drew farther and farther away. The dogs reached the crest of this ridge well ahead of the horses, and their cries were muffled as they went down the slope beyond, to become clearer again when the riders topped the crest. Then the tonguing faded and was almost lost before Tony heard, far away, a sudden fiercer clamor.

“Treed,” said Mr. Pudrick in calm satisfaction. “You can tell by the sound. We'll take our time now, gentlemen. That nigger will wait for us right where he is.”

They were long in coming to him, picking their way through tall pines and then through tangled scrub oak, descending steadily, the baying of the hounds beckoning them on. But the end was sure. The fugitive in his panic had allowed himself to be overtaken in a sparse-grown old field where there were no big trees, and only a few young pines offered brief security. The tree into which he had climbed was hardly tall enough and stout enough to keep him above the reach of the leaping hounds. In the light of the upheld lanterns Tony saw his eyes burning red like those of a wild thing in the night. They were red with a rim of white, and below him the hounds leaped sluggishly, more from duty and from a sense of what was expected of them than from any lust to kill. Between leaps they bayed, or in a bored way scratched themselves.