Days and nights rode into one another. We followed the road slowly by dark and slept by day—the same as I’d often done traveling North on the Underground Railroad, before the war. Sometimes wed find a stream and follow it a while, always making sure we headed south or southwest. That way we could fish a little, let Stargazer graze.
We came across a deserted farmhouse once. We stayed there two nights—slept easier and warmer with a roof and a door. I tried snaring small game. But the land had been picked clean by more than three and a half years of war and foragers. Luring the scrawniest rabbit or squirrel turned out next to impossible. My luck was out, and our spines gnawed at our bellies. We rested most of that second day, then saddled up at dusk to avoid travelers and followed the road.
The sun hadn’t colored the east when we edged into a town, the first we’d ridden through. Even in the dusky light something about it tickled the edge of memory. I don’t think I’d have remembered but for a sign nailed to a lamppost, “Jamestown.” Ma and I had ridden through Jamestown on the train years ago, on our way to Ashland. That was less than a day’s ride to Salem! It was almost five years since Jeremiah and I had stolen through Jamestown on our way North, Christmas night 1859. We’d hidden in a tight cave behind a Quaker family’s farmhouse. The next day we’d ridden in their false-bottom wagon north, toward Petersburg.
Jamestown was where the boy Timothy had done me out of Stargazer, just before we reached the Quaker farm. The memory knotted my stomach, and I was anxious to ride, to get beyond this town. But it would soon be daylight. We needed a place to hide, to rest, needed food and something solid for Stargazer. I remembered the strips of rabbit meat, roasted and wrapped in leaves, sitting in our bags upstairs back at the mill. For the hundredth time my mouth watered, and I groaned.
I wondered if I could find the Quaker farm where Jeremiah and I had hidden. I wondered if they would take us in, or at least let me feed and water Stargazer. The sound of an early morning wagon rumbled toward us. I pulled Stargazer off the road and into the woods until the wagon passed.
“We’d best do something, boy.” Wooster’d slumped forward, asleep for the last hour or so. Back on the road I picked up the pace, hunting for the farm. I remembered it sat back, along a main road, that the barn was built into the slope of a hill. We’d nearly passed it when I recognized the barn. No lights burned.
Down the road we came to more woods. I walked Stargazer down the hill, through the trees, then backtracked along the riverbank, just as Jeremiah and I had done. When we reached the back of the Quaker family’s barn, the ground floor where they’d kept livestock, I pulled open the door, praying it wouldn’t squeak on its hinges. It never did, and I thought how careful these Quaker abolitionists were about everything. I wondered if they still hid the false-bottom wagon on the second floor of their barn, where they could pull it out onto the top of the slope, near the main road. I wondered if the cave was still behind the tanning table, or if it had been blocked up. Maybe we could sleep there.
The barn and its smells, the lowing of the cattle, even the way my feet trod the path all brought a rush of memory. I held Stargazer’s neck so tight he whinnied. “Shh. I’m sorry, boy. I’m sorry. You have to be quiet.” He snorted like he understood.
I made a temporary bed on the hay for Wooster and set to feeding and watering Stargazer. I meant to brush him, to check his hooves, but never even pulled off his saddle before I fell asleep on the hay beside Wooster.
I felt the prod of the pitchfork against my shoe before I heard the boy’s voice. Blinding daylight shone through the cracks in the barn walls, and I covered my eyes with my arm.
“Thee is alive.”
“What?” I tried to wake up.
“Is thee a deserter?” The voice came from a boy, curious, wide-eyed, not more than eight or nine.
“No. No, I’m not.”
“Then why did thee steal our hay?”
“I’m sorry. I should have asked, but there was no light burning. I didn’t want to wake anybody.” It was a half truth, and the boy stood waiting. “I stopped here some years ago. I hoped your family wouldn’t mind if I fed and watered my horse, if—if—my brother and I rested before heading on home.”
“I must tell Father.”
“Sure. Tell him I’ll work for the hay, and if your family could spare a little food, I’ll work for that too. Tell him, please.”
“Father does not allow deserters. He does not want trouble.” The boy stared at me, then turned to run for the house. A name crept on the edge of my memory.
“Wait! Wait—Jedediah?”
The boy stopped in his tracks and turned to stare again, his eyes wider yet. “How does thee know my name?”
I grinned, trying to put him at ease. “Tell your pa that I was here the Christmas of’59, and that his two packages made it to the promised land.”
“But what about me? How does thee know my—”
“You and your brothers and sisters played in the snow that Christmas night. One of your older brothers swooped you up and called your name. You were the littlest. Five years back. I figured it must be you.”
Jedediah puffed his chest and lifted his chin. “I am the littlest no more. Hannah Grace is the littlest now!”
“That’s good to hear, Jedediah. Will you tell your pa what I said?”
“I will!” And he turned, running full speed for the house.
“Robert?” Wooster mumbled. “Robert, who’s there?”
“A boy, Jedediah.” It felt good to know his name, to know him, sort of, from before. “He’s gone to tell his pa that we’re here. I’m hoping they’ll have food for us, maybe let me work it off.”
“We need to get home. We need to get home to Salem.”
“We will. I swear it.” Wooster looked paler, thinner in the morning light. Two bright red spots stained his cheeks. Dark circles spread under his eyes, darker than the day before, despite his sleep. “How you doing, Wooster?” I tried to keep my voice steady, not to sound as alarmed as I felt.
“I don’t know. Not too good, I think.” Wooster sat up, held his head with his good arm, and looked like he was having trouble focusing.
“We’re not too far from Salem. Hang on till we can get to your family.”
“How do you know we’re not far? Did that boy tell you?”
“No, but I saw a signpost. We’re in Jamestown. Not more than a day’s ride to Salem.”
“A day! A day—I can hang on another day.”
The Quaker family did better by us than I’d imagined. They took us into their barn loft, fed us, bathed and dressed Wooster’s wound, gave him tea for his fever, and let Stargazer eat his fill. Food and sleep work wonders—at least they did for me. But Wooster didn’t rally, and that night the Quaker lady drew me aside.
“Thy brother needs a doctor. There is no more I know to do.”
“I’m taking him to his ma in Salem.”
She frowned. “There are good doctors in Salem, or there were before the war drew so many away. But I don’t know if he can withstand the ride.” She’d said the very thing I worried over.
“I’ve got to try. He’s got it in his head to be there for Christmas Eve.”
“But tomorrow is Christmas Eve! He is not fit to travel so soon.”
“Tomorrow?” I looked at Wooster, then back at her. I’d lost track of the days. I sat down. “I promised him. I promised him I’d get him home for his Moravian lovefeast on Christmas Eve.” I ran my hand through my hair. “It’s the thing he wants most in all the world.”
“And thee does not?”
“What? I mean, ma’am?”
“It is what thy brother wants, but thee, a Moravian also, does not?”
I felt the heat rise up my neck, the way it always did when I was caught in a lie. “Wooster’s my friend. He’s not my real brother, and I don’t know too much about the Moravian religion.”
“Thee was not truthful with us.” It was a statement. Then more kindly, “Why?”
I looked at her. She waited patiently for my explanation, and I wanted to give it. I wanted to pour out the whole long story about Ma having left and Pa being gone, about Cousin Albert’s deceit and death, of Wooster helping me, and Rev. Goforth and Katie Frances saving us, of wondering if they’d been killed, and how Wooster was shot at by deserters. I wanted to tell her how scared and worn I was, how this had all grown too big, and now Wooster’d better not die on me. He just plain better not die!
But how could I say any of that? I was all of eighteen, supposed to be a man, and should have been a Union private. I was in the South helping an escaped rebel prisoner get home, looking for my ma, hoping against hope that Emily cared what became of me. Even if I enlisted now, how could I kill rebels when my mother and my new best friend, and the girl I—the girl I cared about—were all rebels? I nearly laughed. How could you shoot at the idea of war without shooting at real people? And where did that thought come from now? My head went light. I steadied myself against a hay bale.
“Thee must sit.” She steadied me, guided me to stretch out on the hay. Then she sat beside me, still waiting.
“When my friend—another friend—and I stayed here all those years ago, when you and your family helped us North, you didn’t want to see us, so you could honestly say you hadn’t seen any runaways staying in your barn.” She nodded. “It’s like that now. It might be safer if you didn’t know the whole story.”
She weighed that. “Does thee put my family in danger?”
“No, ma’am. No one will ever know we were here. I swear it. And my brother—my friend—will honor that promise. I know he will. We’re grateful, ma’am, for all you’ve done for us.”
“Deserters.” She sighed.
“No, ma’am. We’re not. Wooster has discharge papers, because of losing his leg. And I never joined at all.” I colored, ashamed and relieved all at once, that I could tell that truth.
“Thee art a Friend?”
“I’m Wooster’s friend.” I meant it. “But nobody’d believe I’m not enlisted with one side or the other. They might take me for a deserter or a spy, and neither of those things would be good for you or your family.”
“This war makes fools of everyone, North and South, men and boys, even women. It is a thing I do not understand.”
“Neither do I, ma’am.” I meant that too. I looked back at Wooster. “But I promised him I’d get him home for Christmas Eve—if there was any way to do it. And it would be better for you if we didn’t stay.”
She nodded, smiled sadly, and pressed my arm. “Rest now, and we shall get thy friend ready to ride.”
“Ma’am?”
“Rest, and let me talk with my husband.”
She didn’t have to tell me twice. I figured Wooster and I would set out at first light, keep to the woods and back roads. But I didn’t think on it long. For all I fared better thanks to their food and care, I was tired clean through and slept beside Wooster. I believe I’d have slept through the night and all the next day, but Jedediah woke me again. This time a stream of lantern light probed my eyes. It was pitch dark outside.
“Father says to come. Come, and bring thy friend downstairs. I will help thee with him.”
I tried to rouse Wooster. He moaned but would not be roused. I felt his forehead. The fever nearly blistered my hand. “Oh, no, God. Please, no. Please let him get home for his service—home to his ma.”
“Yes, Father in Heaven, let it be so,” Jedediah echoed my prayer.
It took the two of us to carry Wooster down from the loft. There, in the light of another lantern, stood Jedediah’s ma with a quilt, and Jedediah’s pa, holding up the plank to the false-bottom wagon. Inside the wagon hidey-hole they’d laid a tick mattress. The Quaker man motioned Jedediah and me to lay Wooster inside. He pushed Stargazer’s saddle in behind him.
The lady pushed her quilt into my arms and laid her hand on my cheek. “My husband will drive you both as close to Salem as the night will permit. At first light he will help raise thy friend to the saddle. Thou will be on thine own then. We do not believe he could ride horseback all the way in his condition.”
I tried to speak, to thank them. I realized they were going against everything they’d been so careful to protect for years and years, risking that we could be trusted, risking that we’d not be stopped by patrols or caught or questioned. “Thank you. All of you. Thank you.” The Quaker man nodded and guided my elbow to the wagon. I climbed in. “Thank you!” I said again.
“It is best if traveling packages do not speak.” The Quaker man set the plank in place.
“It is a thing I hope is true,” answered the Quaker woman.
I laughed and cried—all in silence. They were the very words my journey with Jeremiah had started off with in this very wagon five years ago. Good, good people. And that made me think of home and Aunt Sassy saying, “Good and bad people everywhere, Robert.”
“Oh, Lord God,” I prayed, “bless this family.”
The wagon rumbled on and on. It was cold, but we were out of the wind. I wrapped the quilt around Wooster and me. I knew Stargazer was tied to the back of the wagon. I heard him, smelled him, and found that a comfort. I didn’t worry that the Quaker man would try to keep him or steal him.
Wooster slept like the dead. Every once in a while I’d feel his forehead, hoping the fever had crept away. But it continued to grow. I didn’t know if it was because of his arm or something else. I prayed he’d make it home to his ma, that she’d know what to do. I wanted to know Wooster would work in Salem, plying his leather trade. I wanted to wear shoes he’d make one day, visit the children he’d have with that lucky woman Katie Frances talked about. I wanted to see them play round ball in the streets—using a leather ball their father’d made.
There was only dark through the wagon cracks. At last we rumbled and bumped across a tangle of roots, then smoothed to a stop. When the Quaker man lifted the plank I saw we were hidden from the road by a thick stand of trees. Silently, he pulled out the saddle and threw it over Stargazer’s back. I climbed out and tightened the girth.
“There is food in this sack, just in case thee does not find the family thee expects.”
“Not find them?”
“Remember,” he said, “thy friend has not been home for several years. Many families have had to relocate to provide what is needful.” I’d never thought of that, never even considered it. “Help me pull him out.”
“Wooster. Wooster, can you wake up?” I pulled Wooster and shook him at the same time. But it was like shaking a sack of feed.
“Let us steady him in the saddle. I will hold him while thee climbs up behind.”
Once we were settled into the saddle, the Quaker man tied on our bedrolls and the sack of food and stowed Wooster’s crutches. I reached for his hand. “I don’t know how to thank you, sir. For everything you and your family have done for me—twice over now.”
He grasped my hand and nodded. “Thee would do the same.”
“Yes, sir. I would. I will.” I meant that true.
“Take the road straight ahead. At the crossroad is a sign for Salem, near the edge of town. Even riding slowly thee should reach Salem within the hour, before dawn, before too many stir.”
“Thank you. Thank you!” He slapped Stargazer’s rump and we set off.
It was a job to hold Wooster steady. But in the cold he came to a bit. “Where are we?”
“We’re on our way to Salem! And we’ll be there any minute. You’re going to have to tell me how to get to your house.”
“Is it true?” He couldn’t believe it. I held him tight.
“I told you we’d make it. Here it is Christmas Eve, so you haven’t got a minute to spare if you want to get there for your lovefeast!” I tried to laugh.
He nearly cried but shuddered, then slumped, limp. “Get me home.”
I felt the heat from his head against my chin. “I swear it.”