17

Josiah came to the master’s door asking for my sister. I ran to get her. Rarely did he come unless it was something mighty special.

“I came to tell you that they need soldiers so badly that a deacon in the church wants me to go to muster, learn war, in place of his son,” Josiah said. “He’ll pay well, enough for me to buy little Ayisha. Plus, if I’m let into the big army I’ll get twenty pounds and one hundred acres of land.”

“No, no, I don’t want you to go,” Bett said. “You could be killed.”

Josiah. Killed. Is that why the deacon didn’t want his son to go? Oh, no. What would life be without Josiah? He made us laugh; the joy he brought Little Bett, all of us, could never be replaced.

“I know it’s dangerous, but with that money I can buy the baby, you, and Aissa.”

“How dangerous is it?” I asked.

“Too dangerous to risk for our freedom,” Bett said. “It is not only his being killed. It is also his killing. Once it’s over, even if he lives he will be dead.”

“What do you know about war?” Josiah asked, his voice raised.

“I know. I saw the killing of the Indians and the white men when I was just a child. But I remember.”

“It would take me forever to raise the money I can get by going to war. My mind is set on it.” He held her in his arms and kissed her long. Then he hugged me and kissed me on the forehead. Little Bett clung to him as if she understood. Then he said good-bye.

A few days later, Josiah returned. His shoulders were bent, and his face was more stern and his smile no longer there. “They refused to let me substitute for the deacon’s son. I was told that there is no place for a black man in the ranks of what is now being called the Continental Army.” He was silent for a moment as we stood in disbelief. Finally he said, with little enthusiasm, “I hear the British are taking us.”

“Then go fight for the British,” I said.

“But what if they lose? I got property here. Not much, but still land that’s mine. And I know this place. Where will I go if they lose? I like the words spoken here about freedom and liberty. Men who believe that will, I feel, stand by their words and do justice by all men, black and white, rich and poor.”

I could tell that Bett felt both relief and outrage. Relief that he had returned and outrage that a man as courageous as her husband was denied the right to make a choice.

Upstairs they were discussing what to do about the war and what to tell the people in the next town meeting. Bett was moving in and out and heard much of what was said. She walked about for days with her back stiff, her head high. She seemed sad and not excited as she had once been about what they were saying. I had to prod and plead with her to talk.

“I thought it was just the mistress and the master, but the others, too, speak things about slaves right in front of me as if I’m not there. Do they not see me at all? Their mighty General Washington will not have Africans in his army for fear the British will think our own men are not willing to fight. And some of them say the British are poking fun at them for having Africans fighting with them.”

“But Josiah says the British are taking blacks. So how can they poke fun?”

“The British probably think they are pretending to be better than what they are. Saying they love liberty and freedom while still holding slaves. Not a one in that room dares to admit that. They say we are stupid, untrustworthy, lazy, unable to fight. You should hear them.”

So that’s why she has been so sad, so stiff-backed. She was suffering under the urge to lower her head to a bleeding heart. Was she losing faith in the master’s lofty words? I wondered. She went on talking.

“There’s only one, who has not been here before—Tapping Reeve, a lawyer who heads a law school in Litchfield, Connecticut—who admits that white men don’t want to fight and the war is being lost. Aissa, there are five hundred thousand of us in this land. He said that. And that we could be the ones who affect the way this thing is going, depending on which side takes us in first. He’s afraid it’s going to be the British.”

I didn’t know much but I said, “If the British will give us our freedom, let’s pray they win.”

“Who do you think owns us? Mostly British! Think of what my husband told us. Who decided that we should be slaves when the people wanted to end it? The king and his governor. And what if the king loses and we’ve cast our lot with him? Where would we go? They say the British have only forty-two thousand soldiers. The Colonials have nine times that many.”

“I don’t believe it. With that many men, how can they be losing?”

“The Colonials will only stay three months in the army and then they go home. It takes more than three months to make a good soldier.” Bett went on talking about what they were planning to do, but I was not listening. I was thinking about what would happen to us after this war. Were the British really giving slaves freedom? How could Africans choose between these two? I wanted to believe that somewhere there was somebody who knew that slavery was wrong and how much we wanted to be free. Maybe it was the British.