Chapter 8
Scott’s Grove
December 1853
The sun rose over the frost on the tobacco fields, but the warmth didn’t penetrate Alden’s room. His family might be able to ignore what happened to Benjamin, but he could not.
With his door cracked open, he could hear Rhody outside, calling for Mammy.
Mammy should be grieving, but instead she’d have to suppress her grief as she buttoned, ironed, and powdered his sister into a proper young lady. For two decades now, Mammy had worked tirelessly for his family, raising the three Payne children and then serving the women, yet they didn’t give her a day off to mourn her loss.
His mother entered his room, dressed in a Sunday gown that shimmered red and gold. In her hands was a wheat-colored carpetbag. She quickly scrutinized his nightclothes. “Why aren’t you dressed?”
He leaned back against the bedpost, raking his fingers through his messy hair. “I’m not going to church.”
“But it’s Christmas.”
He bowed toward her, forearms resting on his knees. “Do you remember the Christmas before I turned ten?”
She shook her head.
“It was so warm that Benjamin and I rose early to swim in the pond. Benjamin was only seven, and yet he’d figured out how to make a diving stage from the racks in the curing barn.”
His mother’s eyes narrowed. “I thought you stole the racks.”
“I couldn’t tell Father that Benjamin did it. By then, I’d figured out that Benjamin would be whipped with the switch if he did something wrong while my punishment was usually to skip a meal.”
She shifted her feet. “That was a long time ago . . .”
His gaze traveled back toward the window to the oak and hickory trees in the forest beyond his father’s field. “I knew we were different, but I didn’t really know why until I was much older. In my early years, I just saw him as a boy like me.”
“He’s not anything like you, Alden,” she said stiffly.
“But he was. Not his skin color, but he was smart—much smarter than me—and so clever. Then he lost everything when he was sent out to the fields.”
She closed the door and sat on the bed beside him, the carpetbag in her lap. “Your compassion is admirable, but you can’t change the way of the South on your own. Nor should you. Your father may be firm, but he also provides food and clothing and shelter for our men and women. He cares for them much better than some of our neighbors do their slaves.”
His stomach churned. “You should have seen Benjamin’s body—”
She waved her gloved hand above the bag. “I don’t want to hear about it.”
“His treatment was much more than firm, Mother. It was cruel.”
“You didn’t know Benjamin in his later years. His rebellion was stirring up all the slaves. Your father had to make an example of him to stop the others from running away.”
He leaned toward her. “Perhaps it will stop others from running now, but it will also make them angry. You should be worried about what they might do.”
She glanced over at the closed door. “After last night, your father doesn’t want you to return to Harvard.”
“I suspected he might not.”
“He says you’re learning all the wrong things.”
“I’m learning to think for myself.”
Fear flashed across her face, replaced swiftly by the resolve in her gaze as she opened the carpetbag, displaying the banknotes inside. “This is enough to pay for your final semester.”
He looked down at the money. “Does he know you’re giving me this?”
She clasped it shut again. “You will leave with Eliza’s driver tomorrow before breakfast. I will explain after you’re gone.”
For a moment, he felt like Isaac, being shipped off in the carriage in the early morning hours, except he believed his mother was doing this for his well-being. And perhaps to protect him from her husband’s wrath.
“No matter what your father says, he is proud that you’re going to be a Harvard graduate.” She stepped back toward the door. “Use your education for good, Alden.”
“I will.” He stood and kissed her cheek. “Thank you.”
A half hour later, he watched the horses pull his family’s carriage away from the house. Then he cleared out the dresser in his room swiftly, unceremoniously dumping his possessions into his steamer trunk. The money for school went into his leather valise.
He wouldn’t wait until his family returned to celebrate the holiday with dinner and gifts. He’d leave now, and perhaps he could take Mammy with him instead of Benjamin.
While the other house slaves prepared for the festivities, Mammy sat by the kitchen hearth in the basement, staring down at a plate of grits and boiled chitterlings. He had always thought Mammy was beautiful, like the African princesses in the adventure stories she used to tell him and Benjamin, but her loss, and the years of her service to the Payne family, had pared away most of her outer beauty. She probably hadn’t lived more than thirty-five years, but she looked to be at least fifty.
He filled two cups with black coffee and handed one to her as he sat beside her on the hearth. Even though her body was frail, he knew she remained strong inside—and beautiful.
“Benjamin was a good boy,” she said, stirring the grits with her fork. “Could have gone off to the university with you.”
“Yes, he could have.”
“Made something big of himself.”
He twisted the cup in his hands. “What my father did was wrong.”
“John Payne never thinks about anyone except himself.”
A loyal son would have corrected her, might even have sent her out to the pillory for her impertinence, but unlike his father, he wanted to protect instead of harm her.
He set his cup on the wooden counter. “I want you to come north with me.”
She shook her head. “Your father won’t emancipate any of his slaves.”
“It won’t matter up in Canada.”
“Even a half-wit slave hunter would suspect something if I crossed over that Mason-Dixon Line with you. Then he’d bring me back, and Master Payne would kill me, like he did Benjamin.” She pressed her spoon into the grits and grease from the chitterlings puddled over it. “I want him to sell me, Alden. I don’t care where I go as long as I don’t have to be here.”
He threw his remaining coffee into the fire. “It’s not fair, Mammy.”
“Please call me Naomi,” she said. “It’s the name my mother gave me.”
All these years, he’d never even known her name. “Thank you for being a mother to me.”
“I wish I could tell you that I did it from the kindness of my heart, but I cared for you the best I could alongside my own son. You’ve grown into a good man, Alden Payne. A strong one. If you come back here after school, I fear it will all be taken away.” She met his gaze with a new boldness. “You need to leave this plantation and never look back. Go someplace where you can use that brilliant mind God gave you and your passion to help other people.”
Isaac peeked around the stairwell, staring at both of them before he focused on Alden. Then he pointed toward his mouth. “My tongue won’t stay lassoed.”
Alden sighed. “Say what you want.”
“I’ll never look back.”
He stared at the boy. “What?”
“If you take me with you, my eyes will stay on the road. I won’t even steal a glance behind us.”
Alden was considering his words when Naomi spoke again, her voice laden with grief. “Take him instead of me. So he won’t suffer the same fate as Benjamin.”
Looking back at her, he reached out, taking her calloused hand into his. “Benjamin was like a brother to me.”
“Oh, Alden.” Tears filled her eyes before she spoke again. “Benjamin wasn’t just like a brother to you. He was your brother.”
Her words stung more than the whip his father had lashed across his face. The scales blinding his eyes dropped, everything falling into place. Benjamin’s skin may have been dark, but he was smart and confident and bold—just like the man who’d fathered him.
“Does my mother know?” Alden asked.
When she nodded her head, his stomach roiled.
“And Benjamin?”
“I told him when he was twelve.”
“Isaac,” he said, turning toward the boy. “Please find Thomas.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Tell him to prepare the carriage.”
He and Isaac would leave Scott’s Grove straightaway. And he would never return.