Inez laughed. “No, chile, them folks just stood there and laughed at him—right in his face. He had no power here, so he had to leave.”
“So we’re safe now?” Polly asked. “Even if someone from Carolina Colony should find his way here, he could not make us go back?” Amari knew that Polly was worried about Clay as well.
“’Bout as safe as you gonna be,” Inez replied. “You say your name be Polly?” she asked as she looked at Polly closely.
“Yes, ma’am,” Polly replied.
“A young feller come through here just a few days ago, lookin’ for somebody name of Polly. A redheaded white boy. Could he be the one you worryin’ about stealin’ you back to Carolina?”
Polly covered her mouth in surprise. “Is he still here?”
“I thinks not. He might be down in St. Augustine, but I don’t know for shure. He mighta said somethin’ about comin’ back this way. I don’t rightly remember. He be a friend of yours or a foe?”
“A friend, I think,” Polly replied. Her sunburned skin turned a little redder.
Amari turned to Polly and grinned at her. “So what we do next?” Amari asked Inez.
“Y’all need to meet Captain Menendez,” Inez suggested. “He be the one who welcome y’all officially, find you place to stay, and get you registered down in St. Augustine.”
“What does that mean?” Polly asked.
“Well, you gotta meet with the priests—everybody here be Catholic, you know. And you gotta promise to serve the Spanish king. Personally, I don’t see much difference between a Spanish king and a English one. Both of ’em rich. Neither of ’em ever show up here.” She chuckled. “But that be what they makes you do when they takes you down to St. Augustine. Everybody got paperwork, chile, but the difference here is it make you free.”
Amari grinned at that, excited to start the process. “Free,” she whispered.
At that moment Amari looked up as a tall, dark soldier with black and gray curly hair, deep-set dark eyes, and a spotless uniform walked purposefully from the fort toward them. He reminds me of Father, Amari thought with a pang.
The man nodded to Inez, looked over the tired and bedraggled new arrivals, and said in an officious tone, “Welcome to Fort Mose. I am Francisco Menendez, captain of this fort and responsible for all who live here.”
Amari wasn’t sure what to do, so she stood up and bowed. Polly did the same and said, “Thank you, sir.” Tidbit, copying the two girls, bowed as well, but he leaned too far and fell over in a heap.
The captain chuckled, picked up Tidbit, then sat him down carefully. “Feel free to sit, my children,” he said to Amari and Polly with a pleasant smile. “Please introduce yourselves.”
Amari made the introductions, telling him briefly of their adventures on the journey and their desire to stay there as a place of refuge. She was amazed at how easily she was able to convey her thoughts in English.
“You have just learned English since you have been in this country?” he asked.
Embarrassed, Amari was afraid she had said something incorrectly. “Yessir,” she replied quietly.
“Then I must compliment you on a remarkable job—to learn so much so quickly. Are you ready to learn Spanish now as well?”
Relieved, Amari grinned at him and nodded.
“Life here is not easy,” the captain warned.
“Oh, no, sir,” Amari said quickly. “We knows hard work. Even Tidbit—I mean, Timothy—is willin’ to work.”
“I am an escaped slave as well,” the captain told them. “I have been recaptured twice and taken back to slavery. But I escaped each time and finally made my way back here. This place is not heaven, but it is so much better than the hell of slavery.”
“Yes, sir,” Polly whispered.
“How many years left on your indenture?” he asked Polly.
“Fourteen years, sir,” Polly told him.
“That’s madness!” the captain replied. “This Derby fellow must be out of his mind.”
“Yes, sir,” Polly said with sorrow. “We saw him kill a slave and a newborn baby the night before we left.”
“Well, you will be safe here as long as we have the protection of the Spanish. What skills do the three of you have to offer?” he asked.
Amari thought for a moment. “Before we leave, suh, I feel like I worth nothing. But I knows how to cook and hunt and find herbs. And my mother taught me how to make threads from cotton. My father be a skilled weaver in my village and I watch him as much as he let me. If women be ’lowed to weave here, I got lots abilities,” she said proudly.
Inez interrupted quietly, “You got more than that, chile.”
“What you mean?” Amari asked.
“Now is not the time,” Inez answered cryptically. “Later.”
The captain ignored Inez and said to Amari, “Women can do anything they have skills for in this place. Can you build a loom?”
Amari closed her eyes, thinking back to her father’s sturdy brown hands and how deftly they had constructed his loom, how nimbly his fingers had danced as he wove, and how magically the designs seemed to appear on the fabric. She wished she had spent more time with her parents when she’d had the chance. “Yessir. I remembers well how my father made it.”
He nodded his head with satisfaction. “Good. You can earn good money as a maker of cloth and clothes.”
“Money?” Amari asked with surprise. “I be paid for my work?”
“Of course,” the captain replied. “Only slaves work for no reward.”
Amari looked at Polly and beamed.
To Polly the captain asked, “Now, what can you offer? We all work together here.”
Polly, seemingly unsure of herself at first, glanced at Inez, who gave her a nod of encouragement. “I can cook and clean. And,” she added as an afterthought, “I can read and write.”
Captain Menendez looked up with instant interest. “You are educated?”
Polly looked surprised at the captain’s reaction. “Yes, sir. My parents had their troubles, but they taught me to read and write and count.”
“There is a profound need for education for the children here,” the captain said, his brows furrowed as if he were deep in thought. “Freedom means very little if there is no knowledge to go with it.”
“I’d be glad to teach the children, sir,” Polly offered.
“We’ll start a school!” the captain said with excitement. “Do you think you can do that?” he asked Polly.
“Of course, sir.” Polly glanced at Amari and Tidbit, a broad smile on her face.
“Excellent!” the captain said, clapping his hands together. “We have much thirst for learning. I shall have Jesse, our carpenter, make plans to build a small school.”
“Can you show me how to make Timothy on paper?” Tidbit asked, obviously impressed with Polly’s hidden talent.
“Yes, I can, Timothy,” Polly replied. “And much more.”
“And you, little man,” the captain said, turning to Tidbit, “your job here will be to learn to read and write, but I shall apprentice you to the carpenter, so that you can learn to be a builder as well. Would that suit you?”
“Yassuh,” the boy replied. “I be likin’ that just fine.”
The captain turned to Inez. “Give them the dwelling that had been occupied by Felix and his wife. They have moved down to St. Augustine.” Inez nodded.
The captain began to leave, but then he turned back to the new residents of his domain. “Tomorrow we will begin the formalization process. But for now rest, relax, meet the people here. Inez will take good care of you. You are indeed welcome—even your dog,” he added with a smile. He saluted and walked away.
Amari was thrilled and her face showed it. It was the first time since she had been taken from her homeland that she had met a black man in a position of authority. “Close your mouth, chile,” Inez said with a chuckle. “Round here it ain’t unusual to see a black man in charge. He wear his uniform well and be using his po
wer wisely. He been around for a long time. Even the Spanish soldiers don’t be messin’ with Captain Menendez.”
“I like his uniform,” Tidbit said as the captain disappeared down the road. “Can I be a soldier?”
“Perhaps one day, when you are all growed up,” Amari told him.
“I be fightin’ for my freedom,” the boy said, pretending to hold a musket.
“All your life, little one,” Amari told him. “Take your time.”
“I feel good about this place,” Polly said with contentment. “I’m so tired of traveling, I could sleep for a week.”
“You do that, chile,” Inez told her. “Y’all still got a heap of healin’ to do. You got family now—folks who will help take care of you. Go on and rest if you’ve a mind to.”
Polly scooted close to the fire and held her hands out to its warmth. Amari knew that Polly had much to ponder as she gazed at the flames. She, too, had found a place of safety, at least for now.
Inez stood up and said to Amari, “Walk with me, chile. I wants to show you where the captain done give you to stay. It be on the far side of the cornfields.”
“Timothy, you stay here and take care of Polly, you hear? I be right back,” Amari called. Tidbit, who was busy chasing a chicken in Inez’s yard, waved good-bye.
“Even the air here smell free,” she said to Inez as they walked.
42. COPPER SUN
INEZ SHOWED AMARI THE BOUNDARIES OF THE little settlement—a river, a marsh, and the hills they had traversed earlier. The entire community would fit in one tiny corner of Mr. Derby’s plantation, Amari observed, as she walked past the small gardens of the people who lived there. Several people waved. To Amari’s amazement, Inez pointed out a blended family whose Spanish mother and Negro father sat in front of a fire with their two children, as well as a family of Seminoles, who lived in the house next to them.
“Everybody here come from someplace else—ain’t nobody been here very long. Don’t nobody know how long they gonna stay. It just be good for right now,” Inez explained. Amari understood.
She thought of Cato, who had dreams of streets of gold. “How this place come to be?” Amari asked.
“Folks been livin’ here for a long time, but Fort Mose got made official by the king earlier this year of our Lord, seventeen hundred and thirty-eight,” Inez explained. “Fort Mose s’posed to be protection for the town of St. Augustine,” Inez said. “The Spanish king ain’t no fool.”
“How this little spot o’ land s’posed to do that?” Amari asked.
“When the soldiers come, it be from the way you come—from north of here. St. Augustine be real important to the Spanish, so we out here as the outpost. I ’spect that’s what Fort Mose is all about,” Inez replied.
As they reached the thatched cottage that would be her new home, Amari thrilled at the sight. Surrounded by a small garden where vegetables were already growing, the dwelling was much larger than the slave shack she had shared with Polly back at Derbyshire Farms. With a window, a back door as well as a front door, and a hearth for cooking, there would be plenty of room for the three of them. It was perfect! But then Amari had a terrible thought.
“You got fightin’ here?” Amari asked with alarm.
“Not much yet, but when there do be fightin’, our men gonna be the first to die,” Inez told her.
“Seem to me it be better to die for freedom than live as a slave,” Amari said with feeling. It was hard for her to absorb the fact that she was truly free.
“Yes, chile, it be hard for a woman to be a slave,” Inez replied slowly. “I know—I lived it too. Massa be messin’ with you in the night.” She kept her eyes away from Amari.
Amari bowed her head and looked at the ground. “For me, it be the son. I was his birthday present.”
Inez touched Amari’s shoulder with understanding. “How long you been on the road, chile?” she asked.
“I think about two month—it be hard to say.”
“You been feelin’ poorly on your journey?” Inez asked.
“We always hungry,” Amari told her. “Never enough to eat. Never enough rest. But, yes, I been feelin’ sickly.”
“You ain’t sick.”
“I ain’t?” Amari asked hopefully. “But I feels real bad ’most every day.”
Inez paused a moment. Then she said gently, “You be with chile, Amari.”
Suddenly, it all made sense—the nausea, the dizziness, the feeling of being heavy and lethargic. “Oh no!” Amari cried. She slumped to the floor of the cottage.
Amari thought with revulsion of the hated nights she had been called to Clay’s room. The smell of the lantern by his bed. The stench of his sweat. She thought she would vomit.
“This cannot be. Not now. Not when freedom be in my hand,” she whispered.
Inez squatted beside her. “You all right, chile?” she implored.
“No, ma’am. I cannot do this. This child make me think about bein’ slave.” Amari wept.
“Babies don’t know nothin’ ’bout no slavery. They just knows ’bout love,” Inez said gently.
“I hate it!” Amari cried, clutching at her stomach. She could not erase the image of Clay’s hateful face from her mind.
“No, chile. You don’t hate it. Already you be lovin’ it. In your mind you already protectin’ it from the bad memories you carry. I sees the struggle on your face.”
“No!” Amari cried out.
“Yes,” Inez whispered into her ear. “Your heart be sayin’ yes.”
Amari did not want to admit that Inez might be right. “I be so scared,” she whispered to Inez.
“I know, chile, but you ain’t the first. You got women here who will help you, women who done gone through the same thing. Like me,” Inez offered.
“You?” Amari asked through her tears.
“I had a chile, my massa’s chile for shure. She be as pretty as the dawn—blond hair, blue eyes, and skin the color of weak tea.”
“What happen to her?” Amari asked.
“Massa’s wife hated that chile. Had Massa sell her when she was not much older than your Tidbit—sold her down to New Orleans. Massa sold his own flesh and blood.” Inez gave Amari a hug. “I never seen her ever again.”
Amari hugged Inez and swallowed her own tears. “I be so sorry about your baby. You must for shure knows how Tidbit’s mama must be feelin’. I hope your child be safe and happy like Tidbit is.”
“Lord only knows,” Inez said as she looked to the sky.
“I feels so stupid,” Amari told her. “I shoulda figgered it out.”
“You ain’t had no mama to see the signs and take care of you,” Inez told her softly. “And it probably was best that you didn’t figger it out while you was on your journey. You had to focus on survivin’.”
“What I do now?” Amari asked her in alarm.
“Relax, chile. Let nature take its course. You ain’t got but a few months to wait.”
“My chile be born free?” Amari asked.
“Oh, yes, Amari. Your chile be free.”
“Free.” The word felt like cool water on Amari’s lips.
Inez looked around the cottage. “I’m gonna make y’all a broom for your new place. I’ll get Tidbit to help me gather the branches. You stay here and think about your future, chile. It be a good day to spend some silent time. I’ll be back directly.” She turned and left, heading back to her own place.
Amari placed her hands on her belly, full of wonder and confusion. I cannot do this! she thought frantically. She felt like running away from herself, from this new reality. But I’m so tired—I just can’t run anymore. Not from the past. Not from my future. She closed her eyes and leaned against the wall of the cottage. Distorted images of Clay Derby’s face floated into her mind. The most disconcerting image was the look of genuine affection he occasionally showed her. Amari beat her hands on the dirt floor, tears of anger welling in her eyes.
What shall I do? Amari thought helplessly. She w
illed herself to imagine her mother, who would know what to say and how to comfort her. All of her mother’s dreams of growing old and watching her grandchildren play had been brutally dashed into the dust. This child carries the spirit of my mother, Amari realized suddenly, as well as the essence of her father, little Kwasi, the murdered people of her village, and the spirits of all of her ancestors.
Amari opened her eyes and glanced out of the small door of the hut to the bright sky above. It was getting close to sunset. She lovingly visualized Afi, who had been the friend and mother she needed during that horrible journey to this land. Afi, who had told her that her destiny lay somewhere beyond those horrors. Amari had understood none of it at the time, but now, perhaps, it was beginning to make just a little sense.
Wiping away a tear, Amari thought painfully of Teenie. “Long as you remember, chile, nothin’ ain’t really ever gone,” she’d said many times. Amari vowed never to forget. She wished with all her heart that Teenie could have come to this place with them. Teenie had also understood that Amari had been brought to this land for a reason, had sensed Amari’s strength before Amari knew she had any, and had placed her own child in Amari’s care for a chance at freedom.
She inhaled sharply as she thought of Mrs. Derby, of the infant who had been given no chance to live, and of all the other women, both black and white, who continued to suffer as property of others. Amari also said a prayer of thanks for Polly, who was, incredibly, her friend.
Amari refused to think of Clay any longer, for she knew his evil spirit could never touch the love she was already beginning to feel for the child within her. Inez had been right about that as well.
If this child is a boy, Amari thought, I shall name him Freeman. He will stand tall and proud and be forever free. I shall teach him my native language and tell him of the beauties of my homeland. If it is a girl, I shall name her Afi, after the one who loved me and helped me find my destiny. I will tell this child of her ancestors and her grandparents and tell her the stories my father told me. My child shall never be enslaved, Amari vowed fiercely.