There is a grapevine of communication the negroes have that runs from plantation to plantation around here so that they know everything, sometimes before the white people know it.
The word started going around two days after the Gerard slave was burned to death. You could see it in the faces of the negroes, both outside the house and inside.
Usually there were good feelings between me and most of the negroes on the place. If not downright friendly, they always gave me a smile when we passed each other, or tipped a hat or nodded a head and acknowledged my presence.
This day, there was none of that. This day, they lowered their eyes or looked the other way.
I felt left out of the circle of their trust. I felt as if they were avoiding me. Violet, recovered now only so she could present a good face to do her chores and grateful to me for helping her recover, came over to me after breakfast when everyone was finding their place to hide themselves for the day.
Mother Whitehead retired to her space in the corner on the veranda where the clematis and the passion-flower climbed and made a sweet-smelling curtain for her pleasure.
Pleasant went to her reading room to prepare lessons for me. Little William went for a walk with Owen. Margaret, who had come home out of fear and with Richard’s blessing, and Emilie left to gather some flowers to make a bouquet. And Richard rode over to the Williams place, about five miles north of us, because Mrs. Williams was ailing and had asked for his prayers and comfort.
“Harriet, I must talk to you,” Violet whispered.
“About what?”
“It’s a secret. Don’t speak so loud.”
I lowered my voice. “Is it the same secret all the servants know about?”
“You know it, then?”
“No, but I know they have one. I can tell because they are all agitated. And because they won’t look at me, as if looking at me will give it away.”
She was pulling me toward the kitchen, where the morning dishes were being washed and dried, where preparations were already being made for lunch, potatoes being peeled, fruit arranged in a bowl, cake being mixed.
Usually when I walked through the kitchen, Winefred the cook would take a piece of whatever she was cooking and give it to me. And I would take it as if it were a sacrament and put it in my mouth. Because it was sort of a sacrament, a sign of friendship and love between black and white.
This day she was slicing leftover turkey. She turned her back to me.
Connie was scraping batter for cake into a pan. At this juncture she would always hand me the spoon and allow me to pause and lick the bowl.
This time she did not.
We did not hesitate, Violet and I. She pulled me through the kitchen and outside.
The sky was blue on this hot August morning and there was already a hint of September in the air. In the distance the pond glistened and ducks swam innocently. And slaves were gathering in the orchard to pick the beautiful apples that were bending down to them. I breathed deeply. I would spend this day outside. I would ride. Mayhap I’d take Emilie with me. Do her good.
“Did you hear me, Harriet?”
“No, I’m sorry, I was thinking I’d like to ride out today.”
“Look, I think you heard, but you don’t want to admit it, so I’ll say it again. There was a warning from Nat Turner to Owen, who passed it on. ‘Look out and take care of yourselves. Something will happen before long.’”
I snapped back into reality. “Nat Turner said that?”
“Yes. That’s his message.”
I felt dizzy. “Let me go. I must see him.”
“What makes you think he wants to see a little white girl like you? After that burning the other day, I don’t think he wants to see anybody.”
“He wasn’t angry the other day. He waited on us. Made us fresh coffee, brought us inside, away from the smell.”
“He’s part actor. And he knew he had to do it. And not display his anger. That if he displayed it at the wrong time, he would give himself away.”
I did not understand. “Where is he?”
“Down at the orchard. Supervising the apple picking. He has strange men with him. Told Richard they are his friends and they’ll help for the day. One of them is named Hark, another Will. I don’t know if he’ll talk to you.”
“He’ll talk to me.” I broke away from her and ran to the orchard.
“Nat? Nat Turner?” I looked up into the apple tree and sure enough, there he was, near concealed by the branches. He was plucking apples and tossing them down to one of his men.
“Watch yourself, Hark, you almost missed that one,” he said. “Can’t have bruised apples. Bruised slaves, now, that’s something different. But not bruised apples.”
I waited until he came down from the tree, wiping his hands on a towel. “You want to talk with me, little Harriet? Come on over here by the fence. These lieutenants of mine have big ears.”
They said things to scoff at him. He waved them off.
At the fence he offered me an apple, which I took, and then, with perfect white teeth, he bit into his own.
“Is there trouble over the map?” he asked.
“No. But Violet told me this morning about your message.”
“Ah, yes. Did you receive it, then?”
“Was it for me, too?”
“Now what do you think? Haven’t we been friends?”
“But what does it mean? ‘Something will happen before long.’ And ‘Look out and take care of yourselves.’”
“It means just what it says. I do not talk in riddles. What did I tell you I was going to do?”
“Go to all the plantations and make the people listen while you preach.”
“Exactly.”
“Then why the ‘Look out and take care of yourselves’?”
“Some people don’t like to be preached at.”
He was lying. I was sure of it. As sure as I knew that the apple I held in my hands was fresh and just off the tree. But if he was lying, what was the truth? What was he going to do that would make people have to look out for themselves?
“Do you still have the map?” I asked stupidly.
“Of course. You gave it to me. I shall keep it, always.”
“But I told you I would need it back for my studies.” He said nothing.
The map. The map was the key to the whole thing he had planned, I decided. And I had given him the map! Suddenly I felt sick, nauseous. My eyes blurred. The apple trees danced in front of them. I had to get away from this man before he could tell that I was frightened of him. “I must go back to the house,” I said. “I must help Mother Whitehead write some letters.”