Stealing Freedom (15 page)

“You pretend you're studying what's there,” Alfred was telling Sarah, “and when I see no one is looking, I'll quick pull them out the basket and slip them onto the table.”

Sarah nodded, her eyes twinkling.

Ann leaned against a table of baked goods, hoping no one would think she was part of the mischief going on at the produce table. She hid half her face with one hand. A moment later, Sarah and Alfred ran to her, laughing and victorious.

“You have to come see,” said Sarah, breathless.

Reluctantly, Ann let them lead her to the table where prize
beets lay like red and green jewels. Each entry had a tag with a name tied to it. Each, that is, except one. And that one, judging by size and roundness and deep red color, should, by all rights, be the winner.

Ann grinned. She knew her “entry” would be disqualified, and no prize money would come her way, but inside she felt as proud as if she'd won. The next thing that happened caught her completely by surprise. Alfred slid his hand onto the back of her neck, leaned over, and kissed her. His soft mouth left the sweet taste of apples on her lips.

Sarah giggled, and before Ann knew whether to feel embarrassed or annoyed or happy, Alfred took her hand and dragged her toward the speaker's podium. “They're going to start one of those talks where half the words are so highfalutin you wonder if he's speaking Latin like the priest,” he said.

The Honorable Andrew Stevenson, a statesman of Virginia, was just being introduced. “Ladies and gentlemen,” Mr. Stevenson began, “the Agricultural Society of Montgomery County, Maryland, has not only nobly accredited the wisdom and patriotism of its founders, but has spread over the whole state a new zeal in favor of agricultural improvement and high farming, and added fourfold to the productions of the greater portion of the cultivated lands of Maryland….”

Sarah tugged on Ann's skirt. “Who's that?” she asked.

“Some statesman from Virginia,” said Ann.

“Not him,
him
, “ said Sarah.

Ann looked to where Sarah was pointing. Her eyes met the steel-blue eyes of a grimy-faced man standing several yards away.

“He's staring at you,” Sarah whispered.

Ann could see that, and when the man saw her look directly at him, he broke into a brown-toothed grin. He ran a dirty hand through his shock of blond hair, turned away to spit a stream of tobacco juice onto the ground, then turned his gaze back to her.

Ann's stomach churned.

“Do you know him?” Sarah asked.

“Of course not,” Ann said crossly. “Let's go home.
Now.
“

“You promised we'd stay all day,” Sarah whined.

“We
have
stayed all day!” Ann informed her. She bade a hasty good-bye to Alfred, and dragged Sarah toward the fairground gates. As they left, Ann kept glancing behind. She was relieved to see that the strange man did not follow them.

That night, lying awake as usual, Ann's thoughts buzzed with the excitement of the day. She wasn't sure what was more at fault in keeping her awake—Master Charles's snoring or her memories of Alfred's gentle kiss—but she longed more than ever for the quiet of her kitchen corner. Fortunately, Miss Sarah had given her an idea.

Soon after Mistress Carol came to bed, Ann began to moan, at first softly, then louder. She kept it up until the mistress sat bolt upright and announced, “Wake up this instant!”

Ann stirred, pretended to awaken, and asked sleepily, “Yes, Mistress Carol? Shall I get you a glass of water?”

“No,” she answered angrily. “Go back to sleep.”

Ann waited until Mistress Carol's breathing slowed in sleep; then she started the moaning again.

This time the mistress got out of bed and shoved Ann with
her foot. “I don't know what you children ate at that fair today, but it is causing the most wretched nightmares. Pick up your blanket and go back to the kitchen.”

Ann happily gathered her bedding and tiptoed down the steps. In the peaceful quiet of the kitchen, she fell asleep.

Later that night, Ann was awakened by the sound of the floorboards creaking. She sighed. Miss Sarah must be suffering from excitement again, she thought. She was not pleased with the prospect of sharing her bed. She didn't even turn over, but waited for Sarah to come to her.

The soft footsteps approached. Suddenly there was a thud beside her. A large hand came down against her mouth. Her breath caught in her throat.

“Don't make a sound or I'll knock you over the head to keep you quiet,” a man's gravelly voice whispered in her ear.

Terror seized her. Ann could not move to struggle as the man hoisted her over his shoulder like a dead possum. Stealthily, he opened the back kitchen door and carried her down the steps. He need not have told her to keep quiet: panic had frozen her voice. He threw her into a carriage, banging her head on its door in the process, and tossed her blanket in after her.

“Stay hidden under that blanket, do you hear?”

In the moonlight she'd seen who he was. It was the man from the fair.

She heard reins slap against a horse's back and felt the carriage move beneath her. The horse's pace changed quickly from a walk to a trot to a canter, and the rickety carriage bounced and bumped over the rutted road. Under the blanket, her breath came in short, tight bursts.

As the road sped by under the carriage wheels, she felt herself disappearing. There would be no trace, no way to find her—just a sad message sent the next day to all who cared: Ann Maria Weems was kidnapped last night.

The carriage traveled for hours, and in that time Ann managed to calm herself enough to think. If she jumped from the coach, she would either be mangled by the wheels or, if she managed to run, easily caught by her captor. If she simply obeyed his orders, she would be taken to a slave pen somewhere, sold for his stolen profit, and passed on south where no one from Maryland would be able to track her down. She had made the difficult choice between remaining a slave near Alfred and her family or living free far from them. But to be held as a slave far from those she loved—that would be too much to bear. She decided that, even though she might be killed in the attempt, she would wait until the carriage stopped and then try to make her escape.

The sound under the wheels changed, and Ann realized they must have entered a city. They had left the dirt road and the wheels now rattled over cobblestone. She peeked out from under the blanket and saw the eerie light of gas lamps. Though she'd never been there, it seemed the place must be Baltimore. Could this man be stupid enough to bring her to the city where
her own master did his slave trading? If she could only slip away and hide, surely she could find Master Charles before a week had passed.

She touched the lump on her head. She hoped she would not be too dizzy to run. The carriage slowed and turned. Once again the sound under the wheels was of dirt. There were several more turns, and the horse slowed to a walk. Ann tensed, like a lion ready to spring.

The horse stopped. In an instant, Ann threw off the blanket and grasped the handle of the carriage door. But the man had leaped so quickly from his seat, he was already standing over her.

“I told you to stay covered!” He threw the blanket over her head and lifted her in it, his arms tight as a vise around her chest.

Ann's mouth bumped against something bony—his shoulder? She opened her mouth wide and, blanket and all, bit him as hard as she could.

The man yelped and dropped her. She landed on her rump and struggled to get untangled from the blanket. He grabbed her again and, this time with no blanket to cushion him, she bit down on his arm.

A door opened and a slice of yellow light brightened the dark street.

“Help!” Ann cried.

But the blanket came down over her head again.

“Are you mad?” It was another man's hushed voice. “The constable patrols this street every hour all night!”

“The wench bit me!”

Ann found herself being held tightly by two pairs of strong hands.

“Just get her inside.”

She heard a door shut and as it did, her heart sank. She was trapped.

“You've scared her half to death, is what you've done.”

“I got her here, ain't I?” came the voice of her captor.

The blanket was lifted off her head. A hand grasped hers and helped her to her feet. She blinked, uncomprehending. She was standing in the foyer of a narrow row house. One candle flickered on a table nearby. In the dancing light she saw the stubbly face of the tobacco-chewing man from the fair. He was calmly picking his teeth. When she turned to see the other man who'd helped him drag her inside, she let out a yelp and stepped back, her hands covering her mouth. It was Jacob Bigelow

“Welcome to my home,” said Mr. Bigelow.

Ann took in a sharp breath. “You're…I mean…” She pointed to the other man. “He's…”

Mr. Bigelow smoothed her sweaty hair away from her forehead. “There will be time for explanations,” he said. “Are you in one piece?”

She nodded.

Mr. Bigelow handed the man a fat wad of paper money. “You got her here safely. Now be off before the constable comes by to find out why there's a brawl going on in my foyer at three
A.M.
“

The man tipped his hat to Ann and slipped out the door.

“I apologize for his conduct,” said Mr. Bigelow, “but often it's only the roughest sort who are willing to do such risky work.
And I'm sure you understand why we had to do it this way.”

Ann screwed up her face. “I don't think I understand anything,” she said, bewildered.

Mr. Bigelow helped her to a chair in the parlor, carrying the candle with them. She sat stiffly and uncomfortably. It was the first time she'd ever sat in a parlor.

“We had to steal you from your master this way,” he said.

Ann felt a quiver go from her throat to her belly as it dawned on her what had actually happened this night.

“You see—” Mr. Bigelow adjusted his spectacles. “If you'd known that you were escaping, you would not have played the part so convincingly. But as it was, if you'd been taken up by the sheriff, what would you have told him?”

“That I'd been kidnapped!”

“Exactly,” said Mr. Bigelow. “And you would have been returned to your master without harm or suspicion.”

Ann's eyes widened as the plan began to make sense.

“And if anyone has seen you, the rumor mill will serve us well. You were not seen running away. You were being carried away against your will.”

Ann rubbed the bump on her head—what a small price to pay for a clean escape! “Thank you,” she said. She held her hands together toward him in a gesture like prayer. “Thank you so much.”

Mr. Bigelow pressed his fingertips together. “Ah, yes,” he said. “A lawyer by day, a lawless kidnapper by night. It's a wonder I get any sleep at all.”

There was the sound of footsteps in the street. They stopped briefly outside the door, then moved on.

“That's Sergeant Orme on his patrol,” Mr. Bigelow said quietly. “I'd better show you to the guest quarters now.”

He led Ann into the hallway and, with one wiry eyebrow raised, pointed to the ceiling. “There you are,” he said. “The most comfortable lodging in town for kidnapping victims.”

The candlelight flickered and Ann squinted at the place where he'd pointed. All she could see was wide ceiling boards that fit tightly together. Was he playing a joke on her?

Mr. Bigelow hummed as he opened a nearby closet and pulled out a ladder. Then he climbed up and pushed carefully on the ceiling. Ann's mouth dropped open as a piece of the ceiling lifted up and he slid it aside.

“Up you go,” he said, stepping down off the ladder. He gave her the candle.

Ann climbed up until her head entered a stuffy, attic-like room. She lifted the candle and saw a pitcher of water, a dish of corn bread, a straw mat and quilt, and a chamber pot over in the corner. She looked down at Mr. Bigelow. “No one will know I'm here!” she exclaimed.

“My thoughts exactly,” he replied.

Ann scrambled up, then lay on her stomach to peer down before closing up the opening. “May I know his name?” she asked. “The man who brought me here?” He had given her several hours of terror and a rather large bump on her head, but he had, in fact, been her savior. She wanted to remember him.

Mr. Bigelow rested one foot on the bottom rung of the ladder. “The Powder Boy,” he answered. “He takes both gunpowder and fugitives on his sailing vessel. Of course, that's not his real name, but that is how he's known on the Road—and
since you are now a passenger on the Road, that is how you should know him.”

The Powder Boy. She would never forget. She looked quizzically at Mr. Bigelow. “The road?” she asked, shaking her head slightly.

“The Underground Rail Road. You have just begun to ride it, my dear. I am one of the conductors, and this is your first stop. It runs all the way to Canada.”

Canada. She felt the quiver run through her again. She could not turn back now. And Canada was so far away.

They said good night, and Ann slid the ceiling boards back into place. They fit perfectly. The hiding place must have been built, she thought, like a hidden closet behind one of the upstairs bedrooms.

When she blew out the candle, the room went quite dark. Her stomach had been through too much this night for her to eat the corn bread, but she drank thirstily from the pitcher. The air was hot and close. Sweat dripped down her neck as she lay on the mat. Her heart pounded in her ears with a new rhythm—one she'd never heard before. It said, “I'm free, I'm free, I'm free….”

When Ann awoke, she saw light leaking in through a small opening at one end of the narrow room. It wasn't quite as hot as it had been the night before, and when she peeked out of the hole, she saw why. Great storm clouds covered the sky. She ran her finger over the edges of the hole. It had been roughly chiseled from the wall, large enough to let in a little light and air but small enough so as not to be detected from the street below. She was not the first fugitive to be hidden in this secret room.

The hole gave her a bit of a view. Down below was a dirt road, much wider than the streets in Rockville. As she watched, a horse and carriage passed by, then a boy herding a small group of cows, then a chicken squawking as if it had lost its way. Across the road was a two-story frame house with a neat yard, but on either side of the yard, as far as her peephole would let her see, grew tall grass and brambles. And out there, somewhere beyond the brambles, was her family's home. Now that she was so close, she longed more than ever to see them.