8
Wreckers’ Cay
September 1839
After the exhausting months of doing everything myself, having Andrew’s help was like a vacation. Apart from having to cook his food, he was no trouble to have around. He cleaned his own quarters, did his own laundry, and when he completed one chore, he looked for another.
He tried not to intrude on our family time, staying in the background. Rising early, he made a special effort to help even with those chores I had assigned myself, and he was particularly adept at tending the vegetable garden. He found joy in weeding, planting, hoeing, or picking insects off plants. He rigged up a scarecrow with some of Martin’s clothes and a hat to keep away plundering birds, like the hawks that swooped down to snatch baby chicks.
When he found free time, he wandered the island, looking for herbs. Our vegetation was different from that of Georgia, but he felt that some of our plants were of value medicinally, and he tied bunches of them to rafters in the playhouse to dry.
My children had all adjusted to Andrew’s presence, and over time I learned to accept his interaction with them. Whereas Martin had indulged in parental scolding, Andrew was more of a friend to them. Martha and Timothy often sat under the mahogany tree with him, chatting about his past life, and even asking him questions about slavery. Little Hannah adored Andrew unconditionally. Her pretty little face would light up at the sight of him. She had been the one who’d missed her father most, and it seemed she now accepted Andrew as his replacement. She had turned three several weeks after his arrival, and I realized her hearing problem was beginning to take its toll. She was still not speaking clearly, and I was coming to understand that the fever of her infancy had slowed her in other ways, delaying her walking and speech—everyday things my other children had achieved much earlier. These delays saddened me, but Andrew sensed her need for patience and attention. Often I found them together in the garden, where he would be showing her how to dig properly and pull up weeds. He never shouted, and always repeated instructions gently when needed. I noticed, too, that he was even beginning to learn a rudimentary kind of sign language with her.
On the day Captain George Lee and Al?e Dillon next came with our supplies, Andrew hid in the playhouse, and we took turns taking him food and water. The men unloaded our supplies and I served them tea.
“How’d ja get that fence up?” the captain inquired. He was studying our new enclosure, and I grew nervous because in doing so, he was approaching the playhouse.
“Timothy and I put it up,” I said, lying. “Can I offer you some more tea?”
Lee was staring at the fence in silence. “A mighty ?ne job,” he ?nally muttered, testing its sturdiness. He looked at me. “We were going to do that for you one of these days, Al?e and m’self.”
“Thank you.” I smiled brightly. “But as you can see, we are managing well.”
He glanced up at the lighthouse tower, its clean glass sparkling, and nodded. He seemed disappointed. Or was that look one of … suspicion?
Hannah ran over to us and tugged at the captain’s sleeve. She pointed with her other hand at the playhouse, chattering excitedly. Alarmed, I picked her up quickly and kissed her cheek to distract her.
“She’s a mite retarded, ain’t she?” he said, looking critically at my little angel. “She don’t make no sense when she talks.”
I bristled, annoyed at his rudeness. “She was just telling you about her new doll,” I replied defensively. “She might be less articulate than most, but she is quite intelligent.”
Captain Lee simply grunted. With nothing more to say, the pair left, leaving me the Key West Enquirer, a letter from my sister, Dorothy, and our supplies. We then hurried to the playhouse to let Andrew know they were gone. Leaving his hot, stuffy room, he headed for the ocean to cool off before supper.
While his old scarring remained, the recent wounds across Andrew’s back had healed nicely. With good food and grueling physical work, he was ?lling out and developing muscle again. He had not as yet told me his story, and I had not probed.
It was his good cheer that made me aware of his excellent baritone. One afternoon, he began to sing while he worked, and as his work on the fence continued, he moved from gospel hymns to old African lullabies, which, I suspected, had been forbidden on the plantation.
When he burst into song, the children would stop and listen. And even though her hearing was impaired, Hannah would lead a cheer. Martin and I had always applauded our encouragement when Martha was at her piano, or when Timothy played his violin, and now Hannah would clap for Andrew, dancing back and forth on her chubby feet, laughing as he sang—as though he was singing just for her.
Soon after Andrew arrived, I sensed his presence one day as I taught the children at the worktable in the cookhouse. While Martha and Timothy were excellent readers, my attempts to teach Hannah her letters were not getting very far.
I turned around and saw that Andrew had stolen in quietly, hat in hand, listening intently while I explained a point of grammar to Martha.
“Yes? What is it Andrew?”
“I was wonderin’ …” he began, ?ngering his hat.
“Yes?”
“I was wonderin’ if you’d consider … teachin’ me. I’d like to learn to read them books,” he said, gesturing to the bookshelves. “And to form my letters … so’s I kin write.”
I stood up, startled. In all my years in Louisiana and Key West, I had never met adult slaves interested in becoming literate. But then, had I ever bothered to explore the subject with any of them?
“And I’d like to know how to do my sums,” he persisted. “For the log and the oil and such.”
I considered this. If he could look after the log, it would be one less thing I’d have to do. Still, I hesitated. “I’m not sure. I have much to do as it is. I’d have to design a separate program for you. Let me think about this,” I said.
He nodded, put his hat on his head, and went back out to work.
Later that night, drifting off to sleep, I asked “Martin” what he thought.
“What harm, Emily?” he asked. “After all, the poor devil has been working hard. Why not give him some education?”
The troubling memory of the literate Nat Turner and his rebellion was still fresh in every southern mind. Teaching a slave to read and write was considered not only unsafe, it was unlawful. In Louisiana, the punishment was a year in prison if you were caught. But then, wasn’t I already breaking the law by harboring a runaway slave? Grandpère’s words echoed in my mind I repeated them now to Martin: “Best to keep ’em ignorant. Start teaching a Negro to read and such, and you’ll have a worthless Negro. He’ll be no help to you at all.”
“Emily, forget all that. You’re not paying him, so it’s the least you can do to compensate him. Do it.” I repeated them now to Martin.
I scoffed. In life, Martin had been every bit as skeptical of educating slaves as my grandfather. As I turned over to settle into sleep, it occurred to me that for the ?rst time I was thinking about my husband in the past tense.
After breakfast, the next morning, I told Andrew I would school him. I produced some paper and pencils and spent an hour teaching him his alphabet. He listened intently, repeating everything. I showed him how to form the ?rst few letters and how to spell out his name. I left him with simple homework, which he eagerly accepted, and in the days that followed he worked hard at his letters, quickly mastering the alphabet and forming small words, then larger ones. Soon he began to ask questions about history and geography, and though I had hesitated initially, his eagerness was just so refreshing, I found myself teaching him more than I’d planned. He loved maps most of all and was eager to read the names of places.
“Show me Africa,” he would say. “Show me the different places and how you spell them. Europe … America … Georgia … the Caribbean Islands …”
Then one morning, he said, “Show me the slave routes.”
I froze. “Perhaps,” I said gently, “we should ?nish our lesson for today?”
He agreed. But a few days later, he again pressed me about the slave routes, and the discussion I dreaded became unavoidable.
At ?rst, I tried to keep my answer vague: “I think they originated in European ports. And later, from some of the northern American states.”
“And from there?”
“The traders would go to West Africa and trade manufactured goods there.”
“In exchange for slaves.”
“Well, yes,” I admitted. “For people. A workforce.”
“Then where?” He was looking steadily at me. “To America?”
“Yes. They put them on ships and sailed to America and the Caribbean to sell them, or to trade the African people for … things.”
“What things?”
“Well, I don’t know exactly,” I said irritably, wanting to end this conversation. “Sugar, I suppose, and coffee, tobacco, rice. And cotton, of course. Lots of cotton. Indigo … Rum …”
“Where did rum come from?”
“I’ve always heard that it was invented by slaves working on a sugar plantation in Barbados. They boiled the dregs of the canes and turned that into molasses … and then … distilled it somehow.”
He thought about this. “So, the slaves invented rum … and then the white people used their invention to trade it for more African slaves?”
He was relentless. I sighed. “Really, Andrew, I’m hardly an authority …” I decided to change the subject. “You know, you must tell me your story sometime,” I said, closing our geography book and clearing the worktable. “You’ve never told me how you happened to be on that slave ship with those Africans. Or why you were whipped.”
He looked thoughtful. “I was a freed slave,” he said ?nally. “I was grabbed while walking on a street near the port of Savannah. They clubbed me over the head, chained me, and sold me; when I woke up, I was on a slaver goin’ to Cuba.”
I looked at him in surprise. It was possible. I had heard of instances where a freed slave would be pressed in a grog shop and knocked unconscious, only to wake up shackled on a ship bound for a plantation somewhere in the Caribbean.
“You were free?”
“No. I am free,” he replied, correcting me.
When he rose and headed off to his quarters in the playhouse, I was left feeling oddly stimulated by our discussion. Had he been freed? Most slaves who gained manumission had benevolent owners. The scars on his back told me this was not the case, for clearly, he had been badly used. I found myself wondering idly about his past. Had there been a particular woman in his life? Was he a father? He was certainly good with children. Had he been with many women? But then I forced such questions from my mind. Why on earth should I care to know such things? Andrew was an excellent worker. That was all that should concern me.