In the Brown camp the great family of fugitives dwelt together in
guileless and trusting brotherhood under the patriarchal care of
Captain Brown, who daily praised the Eternal Sire, and one soul of
harmony and love was infused into each individual dweller.
John Brown was a man of deep religious convictions; but mingled with
austerity were perfect gentleness and self-renunciation which inspired
love in every breast. But amid the self-denying calmness of his
deportment, those who looked deeply into his eyes might discern some
cast of that quiet and determined courage which faced his enemies in
later years before the Virginia tribunal where, threatened with an
ignominious death, he made the unmoved reply--“I am about God’s work;
He will take care of me.”
The fugitive slaves who came in fear and trembling were strengthened
and improved by contact with the free, strong spirit of their rescuer
and his associate helpers of proscribed Free Staters.
Weeks must elapse, perhaps, before a force of sufficient strength could
be organized to protect the fugitives on their perilous trip to Canada.
In the interval Captain Brown was pastor, guide and counsellor. The
instruction of youth he considered one of the most sacred departments
of his office, so it happened that in the camp the ex-slave received
his first lessons in the true principles of home-building and the
responsibility of freedom. There he first heard God’s commands in the
words of Holy Writ:
“He hath made of one blood all the nations of the earth.”
“There is no respect of persons with God.”
“Do to another as you would that another should do to you.”
“Remember those in bonds as bound with them.”
In the field the negro learned for the first time in his life the
sweetness of requited toil together with the manliness of self-defence,
for the musket was the companion of the implements of rural toil, as in
the days of Nehemiah the restorers of Jerusalem wrought “every man with
one hand upon the wall and with the other held his spear, having his
sword girded by his side;” and also that it was better to die than to
live a coward and a slave.
Winona was quartered at the Brown domicile. With her story and her
beauty she was an object of uncommon interest to all in the camp. She
became Captain Brown’s special care and the rugged Puritan unbent to
spoil and pet the “pretty squaw,” as he delighted to call her.
And to Winona all the land had changed. The red-golden light that
rested upon it near the evening hour was now as the light of heaven.
The soft breezes that murmured through the trees and touched her cheek
so gently, seemed to whisper, “Peace and rest. Peace and rest once
again. Be not cast down.”
There was the touch of sympathy and comfort in the rugged Captain’s
hand pressed upon her short-cropped curls. It gave her courage and
robbed her heart of its cold desolation. She felt she was no longer
alone; heaven, in her dire need, had sent her this good man, upon whom
she might rely, in whom she could trust. Though much older, Captain
Brown reminded her of her father, and her quiet childhood dependent
upon him for constant companionship had given her a liking for elderly
people, and she treated Captain Brown with a reverential respect that
at once won his confidence and affection.
But there was not a day nor an hour that she did not think of Maxwell.
She craved for news of his safety. When the daily routine of work was
ended, the girl would steal into the woods which skirted the camp and
climb to a seat on the high rocks watching eastward and westward for
some sign of the young Englishman’s return.
Some impulse of the wild things among whom she had lived drove her to
a hole in under the bluff. It was necessary to descend to find it.
Presently she was in a tunnel which led into a cavern. She made herself
a divan of dried moss and flung herself down at full length to think.
Time’s divisions were lost on those days when the girl felt that she
neglected no duty by hiding herself in her nook. She had come upon
the eternal now as she lay in a sweet stupor until forced to arouse
herself. She stared across the space that divided Maxwell from her
with all the strength of her inner consciousness. That light which
falls on the spot where one’s loved one stands, leaving the rest of the
landscape in twilight, now rested about him. With rapture she saw again
the hopeless passion in Warren’s eyes when he left her. Her hands and
feet were cold, her muscles knotted, her face white with the force of
the cry that she projected through space, “Come back to me!”
And this young creature just escaped from cruel bondage gave not a
thought to the difficulties of her position. In the primal life she
had led there had entered not a thought of racial or social barriers.
The woods calmed her, their grays and greens and interlacing density
of stems, and their whisper of a secret that has lasted from the
foundation of the world, replacing her fever with the calmness of hope.
In the midst of her sweet perplexity came another trouble.
Judah’s capabilities were discovered very soon by Captain Brown and his
sons, and he was appointed special aid and scout to the camp. Nothing
could have suited him better. All day he scoured the woods, following
the trail of parties of desperadoes or bringing in the fruits of the
line or rifle to supply the needs in fish or meat. Twice he saved them
from surprise by bands of marauders, and soon his name was heralded
with that of Brown as a brave and fearless man bold to recklessness.
Sometimes Winona accompanied him on his trips when not fraught with
much danger; once he tried to broach the subject nearest his heart,
but a movement on her part--the carriage of the head, a queenly
gesture--served to intimidate him and forced back the words.
The next night he passed in the woods, with his rifle, on a bed of
leaves, studying over the problem of his life. “Why should I hesitate?
We are of the same condition in life in the eyes of the world.” But
even while the thought was in his mind he knew that what he desired
could never be. Unconsciously he was groping for the solution of the
great question of social equality.
But is there such a thing as social equality? There is such a thing
as the affinity of souls, congenial spirits, and good fellowship; but
social equality does not exist because it is an artificial barrier
which nature is constantly putting at naught by the most incongruous
happenings. Who is my social equal? He whose society affords the
greatest pleasure, whose tastes are congenial, and who is my brother in
the spirit of the scriptural text, be he white or black, bond or free,
rich or poor.
The next morning Judah built a fire in a deep ravine to cook his
breakfast, and then scattered the embers that the smoke should give no
sign.
All the morning he waited near her favorite haunts determined to speak
out the thoughts that filled his mind. He began to fear at last that
she was not coming. A little noise down the path reached his ear. In
a moment he could hear slow foot-falls, and the figure of the girl
parted the bushes, which closed behind her as she passed through them.
She passed quite near him, walking slowly; she was very pale; her
face bore traces of mental suffering. For a moment she stood there,
listless, and Judah watched her with hungry eyes at a loss what to do.
The sun lighted her hair, and in the upturned eyes he saw the shimmer
of tears. “Winona!” He couldn’t help it. The low cry broke from his
lips like a groan; the next instant the girl faced him. She looked with
quick wonder at the dark face with its mute appeal. Then a sudden spasm
caught her throat, and left her body rigid, her hands shut, and her
eyes dry and hard--she knew, instinctively, what he suffered.
“Oh, Judah! Hav’n’t we been through enough without this?”
The girl trembling at the knees sank to a seat on the rocks, and
folding her arms across her knees, laid her forehead against them.
“I’m going away, Winona, as soon as you are safe in Canada,” he went on
after a little pause. “It’ll be pretty hard to leave you, but I want
you to know how I’ve been thinking about you and sorrowing over your
sorrow and hoping that you might get over your liking for Maxwell,
seeing that you’re only a slip of a girl, and think of me as the one
who would die for you and ought naturally to care for your wants--” He
spoke hesitatingly; there was a question in his last words, but the
girl shook her head sadly, her tears falling to the ground. Her sorrow
gave way in a great sob now, and he turned in sharp remorse and stood
quite near her.
“Don’t cry, Winona,” he said. “I’m sorry for you and myself and
Maxwell. It’s this cursed slavery that’s to blame. If your father had
lived all this would never have happened.”
“I am sorry--so very sorry! But you see, Judah, it cannot be; I have no
love to give.”
Judah stood beside her, his heart bursting with suppressed emotion. The
bitter words would break from his lips.
“The white man gets it all--all!”
“Do you forget all that Mr. Maxwell has done for us, Judah, that you
condemn him so bitterly? It is not like you--you who are generally so
generous and true-hearted. He knows not of my love and will never know.
Is he to blame?”
“You are right--you are right! But how is a man to distinguish between
right and wrong? What moral responsibility rests upon him from whom all
good things are taken? Answer me that.”
They were walking now toward the camp; the shadowy trees tossed their
arms in the twilight and the stars came out one by one in the sky. Only
the silent tears of the girl at his side gave answer to his question.
A month had passed since the fugitives had reached the camp. Captain
Brown eagerly awaited the return of Warren with Parson Steward to help
them on the trip to Canada.
The wild flowers swayed above their counterfeits in every gurgling
stream; the scent of wild grapes was in the air; the cliffs and rocks
blossomed with purple and white and pink blooms. The birds sang and the
bees droned in the woods on the morning when, wild and dishevelled,
Parson Steward’s wife and two children found their way into the Brown
camp.
“My heavenly marster!” shrieked the widow in incoherent wailing. “The
Rangers done caught my husband and shot him; they’ve carried the young
Englishman to jail. What will become of me and my poor children?”
No one slept that night when the fate of the two gallant men was
known, and the oaths uttered were not loud but deep.
Captain Brown, like a prophet of old, drew his spare form erect.
Lightning flashed from his mild eyes and sword-thrusts fell from his
tongue.
Then and there a rescue party was planned to take Warren out of the
hands of the Philistines. The only trouble was to spy out the jail
where he was confined; but there seemed little hope of success, for it
appeared that since his trial Warren had disappeared from public view,
and the Pro-Slavery men were very reticent. Ebenezer Maybee volunteered
to secure the desired information.
As was the fashion in those days, the women listened but did not
intrude their opinions upon the men, being engaged in performing the
part of Good Samaritan to the widow and orphans. But long after the
meeting had broken up Winona crept into the woods not to weep, but to
think. She leaned against a tree and her hopeless eyes gazed down the
darkening aisles; she prayed: “Help me to help save him!”
In the morning she sought an interview with Captain Brown.