Stealing Freedom (14 page)

Alfred climbed up on a flat rock in the shade and wrung out his shirt and trousers as best he could while still being in them. Once Ann had cleaned most of the creek mud off her dress, she
joined him. Alfred's playfulness had lifted her spirits, and the heaviness of an hour ago, when she stood in the churchyard deciding to leave everything she'd ever known, seemed far away. Suddenly, instead of feeling terribly sad at the thought of leaving Alfred, she grabbed onto a hopeful idea.

She peered into the woods around them, and listened carefully for sounds of anyone on the Baltimore Road. When she was sure they were alone, she spoke. “If I ever have the chance to leave here, would you come with me?” she asked.

“Is Master Charles up and leaving already?” Alfred shook his head as if he didn't believe it. “But you just moved here.”

“I don't mean move away with the Prices,” Ann said very quietly. “I mean run. Run north to freedom.”

Alfred put his hand over her mouth and hastily looked around. The woods were alive with the sounds of summer insects, and the creek rippled over rocks nearby, but there were no other human sounds. His eyes softened and he brushed her cheek with his fingertips. He put his mouth close to her ear. “I will never leave here without you, Miss Ann Maria,” he whispered. “And please don't you leave here without me.”

She closed her eyes and felt the nearness of his breath. “I won't,” she promised. When Mr. Bigelow came again to tell her how she would escape and when, she would make sure Alfred was included in the plans. They would run together.

That evening, as Ann prepared to fall asleep in her usual place in the corner of the kitchen, she heard Master Charles and Mistress Carol arguing in the next room.

“I don't trust the man,” said Master Charles.

“That's nonsense. He's a lawyer and a law-abiding citizen,” said Mistress Carol.

“Believe me, he hasn't given up yet. I want her where I can see her.”

Ann sucked in her breath. Someone must have reported to Master Charles that she'd been talking to Mr. Bigelow in the churchyard.

“Very well, then.” Mistress Carol stomped into the kitchen and ordered Ann to gather up her blanket. “You're coming with me,” she said, and pushed Ann in front of her toward the door.

All the way up the steps Mistress Carol gave her sharp shoves. When they'd reached the master bedroom, she pointed to the corner of the floor. “There. He wants you where he can see you, so now I'll have no privacy.”

Ann simply looked from the floor to Mistress Carol, not comprehending.

“Are you deaf or just stupid?” Mistress Carol clenched her fists. “Go to bed, you wretched girl. Once again, you're causing me more trouble than you're worth!”

Trembling, Ann moved to the corner of Master Charles and Mistress Carol's bedroom and lay down. She pressed herself against the wall, as far away from their four-poster bed as she could get, and wrapped her blanket around herself. She turned her face away and squeezed her eyes shut as she heard Master Charles undressing and getting into bed. He was already snoring when Mistress Carol padded in and joined him some time later.

Ann stared at the ceiling and listened to the loud rumble and snort of Master Charles's snoring. She didn't think she'd ever be able to get to sleep. And she certainly wouldn't ever be able to get away.

Ann carefully loosened the soil and pulled out a clump of beets. They were plump and blood-red, with long crisp greens on their tops.

“I could win that dollar if they'd let me enter these,” she said aloud to herself.

She put the beets in her basket and loosened another clump. She'd read in the September 11
Montgomery Sentinel
that there would be prizes for the best vegetables: cabbage, squash, potatoes, turnips, carrots, and, she'd read with special interest, beets. Ann had never seen beets as big and round and red as the ones she grew.

“I could sign you up when I sign up for the plowing contest,” Alfred offered when she told him.

Ann sighed. “Mistress Carol says she's not a farmer anymore, and she'll not have me bringing her garden goods to the fair.”

“Then come watch me plow, and we'll have a good time anyway. Master Anderson says if I win the race for him, he'll split the two-dollar prize with me. Then I'll share it with you.”
He smiled so sweetly Ann forgot all about the produce contest for the moment.

The county fair was something of a controversy at the Price household. Mistress Carol said it was loud, smelly, and dirty, which was true, and because the fairgrounds were so close to their house, the noise and dust came right in their windows. She also complained about the evils of the gambling that went on at the fair—the betting on the races. So when Miss Sarah got it in her mind that she wanted to attend the fair, and put on her meanest pout and performed her loudest tantrum, it created quite a problem. Her uncle had no interest in going and her aunt had no intention of being seen around all that gambling and farm produce. That was when Ann stepped in and offered to take Sarah. She pointed out that since children and slaves were not charged the twelve-and-a-half-cent admission fee, it wouldn't even cost anything. That made everyone happy.

The farmers began arriving from all over Montgomery County with their wagons full of hams, quilts, pies, and preserves, and their best livestock grunting and mooing, squawking and bleating, and—this was the part Mistress Carol disliked the most—dropping manure on the road directly in front of the Prices’ house.

Also arriving were the carriages carrying city folk from Washington City and Georgetown. If they brought something to enter in a contest, it was usually a lady's fancy needlework or homemade perfumed soap. But they came to see what the farmers brought, listen to the speeches and the marching band, watch the races and cheer with the crowds, and, of course, bet on the racers.

The night before the first day of the fair, Ann lay awake listening to Master Charles snore. How Mistress Carol could sleep with all that racket, she couldn't understand. She heard the floorboards creak and looked up. Miss Sarah was standing over her in the blue-gray darkness.

“I can't sleep,” whispered Sarah.

Ann sat up. “The problem is your eyes. They're afraid to close because they don't want to miss anything,” she explained.

Sarah nodded, admitting it was true.

“Tell your eyes the fair won't start until the sun comes up, so as long as it's dark they should stay closed.”

“All right,” said Sarah, and she trotted back to her own room.

Five minutes later she returned.

“My eyes won't listen to me,” she said.

Ann lifted the side of her blanket. “Here.”

Sarah snuggled in beside her. “Will we go as soon as we eat breakfast?” she asked.

“We can go as soon as they open the gates,” said Ann.

Sarah clapped her hands and Ann shushed her. Master Charles snorted, shifted in bed, and then resumed snoring at a slightly lower pitch.

“Can we stay all day?” Sarah whispered.

“Yes, we can stay all day,” Ann assured her.

Sarah sighed and rolled over, kicking Ann in the process. “I think I can go to sleep now,” she said.

“Good.”

Ann expected her to get up, but a few moments later she found herself cramped against the wall, with a sleeping Sarah
hogging most of the blanket. Ann groaned and tried to find a comfortable position. It didn't really matter, she told herself, because the snoring would keep her awake anyway.

She must have dropped off to sleep finally, because it was barely dawn when the moaning woke her up. Sarah's knee pressed into the small of her back reminded Ann that she was sharing her bed, and made it clear where the moaning was coming from. She shook Sarah awake. “You're having a bad dream,” she whispered. Fortunately, Sarah had not awakened her aunt or uncle. “Go back to sleep,” said Ann.

For a while Sarah looked as if she would do just that. Then her eyes sprang open. “Today is the fair!” she shouted.

There was no sleeping for anyone after that.

Ann had never seen so many people, animals, and flies gathered in one place at the same time. Skinny boys in mended britches chased each other through the mud and dung. Ladies from Washington City in crisp dresses carried parasols and walked arm in arm with men in dark suits. Farm women, both white and free black, in worn gingham, their sleeves rolled up, unloaded hams and homemade fabrics from their wagons. Sweaty-faced men in overalls led sheep and turkeys, oxen and cows, the biggest and the best, to their pens to compete for the coveted blue ribbon.

At about ten o'clock a marching band struck up, and though they were sorrowfully out of tune, they gave the whole
place a feeling of Christmas and the best summer Sundays combined.

Miss Sarah wanted to see everything and everyone, so Ann was obliged to be led around from cake table to quilt table, from hog pen to goat pen. Sarah met friends from school, and Ann saw folks from church, and by the time the plowing contest was ready to begin, Ann was very happy to flop down under a shady poplar to watch.

Alfred had only just arrived. He greeted her briefly before taking his place in the field with his team of two horses. He had his own section to plow, and would be judged on speed and the straightness and depth of the furrows he made. Competing against him was Jeoffrey, plowing for his master, Mr. Julius West.

“Come on, Alfred. You can win this!” Ann heard someone shout. She turned and saw Thomas waving his arms.

“Go, Jeoffrey,” several men yelled.

The gun was fired, and the horses lunged forward. Alfred took off down his first furrow, his plow splitting the earth like a storm. His bare feet slipped as he marched through the great clods of broken earth.

The crowd cheered, some for Alfred, most for Jeoffrey. Ann saw a man in a top hat slip a handful of paper money to a man with a cigar hanging from his pale lips.
Gambling
, she thought with fascination.

Jeoffrey had pulled out ahead.

“Go, Alfred!” Ann cried. Then, embarrassed, she covered her mouth and glanced around to see if anyone disapproved of a girl shouting. But everyone was cheering and waving,
including the ladies in fine dresses. “You can beat him, Alfred!” she yelled as loud as she could.

But Jeoffrey had a large lead. His horses snorted as his plow cut through the earth straight to the end of the marked-off section of ground. Alfred still had a whole furrow to complete.

“I wanted to win that dollar for you,” Alfred told Ann when the race was over, wiping sweat off the side of his face with a muddy hand. “I'd have bought you some ice cream.”

Ann and Sarah stared at each other, their eyes wide. “Ice cream?” they both asked in unison.

“Didn't you see Mr. Boyle's stand? He'll be making the first batch soon.”

Ann could hardly stand still as she waited for Alfred to wash his hands and face at the pump.

“Soda water! Ice cream! Step right up!” Mr. Boyle stood under a canvas awning with glasses and spoons laid out on an overturned crate. He collected money from ladies in silk dresses and men in top hats. Once he'd loaded his pockets with coins, he pulled out a wooden bucket with a hand crank on top, and set it on the crate. He poured cream and sugar into the bucket, cracked a couple of eggs into the mixture, and stirred it briskly. Then he chipped pieces of ice from a great block that stood melting in a bed of straw nearby. Ann touched the ice with two fingers. How amazing, she thought, that a piece of frozen pond could last from winter all the way into September in the icehouse.

Mr. Boyle mixed the chunks of ice with salt in a compartment around the edges of the bucket. Then the cranking began. Mr. Boyle turned the crank himself for a while, then
offered up the job. “I'll do it!” Alfred took the crank in his strong hands and spun it until a boy from Sarah's school whined that he wanted a turn. When the boy was tired, Sarah insisted on having a try. She strained, her skinny elbows sticking out like chicken feet, but she could hardly move the crank. Mr. Boyle laughed and took over.

When at last the cranking was done, Mr. Boyle opened the bucket. What had been, a little while before, a soupy, sloshy mixture was now icy thick custard. The small crowd oohed and aahed. Those lucky enough to have paid their money eagerly reached for glasses filled with ice cream.

Ann, Sarah, and Alfred watched the delicacy disappear into the mouths of the ladies and men. It smelled sweet as fresh molasses, and it made Ann's mouth water just to watch.

“I wish Uncle Charles had given me a nickel,” said Sarah dreamily.

“I wish I'd won that race,” said Alfred.

By the time the first batch was eaten, Mr. Boyle had attracted quite a crowd, and he immediately began collecting the next round of ice cream money.

Ann sighed. “Let's eat lunch,” she said.

They found a shady spot and opened their basket. They shared their bread and apples with Alfred, who said he wasn't hungry and didn't need anything, but then devoured everything Ann gave him.

“I want another apple,” said Sarah, and opened the basket. But when she reached inside, she pulled her hand back and grimaced. “What are these dirty old beets doing in here? Did you expect me to eat them raw?”

Ann quickly closed the basket. “The apples are all gone,” she said. “We can get more at home later.”

But it was too late. Both Sarah and Alfred were looking at her, waiting for an explanation.

“Did you see the sorry-looking vegetables on those tables?” Ann blurted out. “They've got lumpy old potatoes, and carrots that look like shriveled-up fingers. And the beets—they're so small the judges will have to put on spectacles just to see them!”

Alfred leaned toward her. “Let's go put yours on the table and show them what real beets look like.”

“No.” Ann pulled up a sprig of grass and shredded it with her thumbnail. “I'm not signed up, so I can't enter the contest.”

But Alfred and Sarah were already on their feet, the basket between them.

“I can't enter without Mistress Carol's permission,” Ann objected.

The other two were on their way to the produce tables. Ann sprang to her feet and followed. “It's not allowed…” she called to deaf ears.