There was but a momentary pause. We had not, occupied as we had been
with each other, seen the flash which preceded or accompanied the
thunder; but before I could persuade Bessy to sit down by me again, a
blaze, gleaming through every crack and cranny of the hut, dazzled our
eyes, succeeded by a peal, breaking just over head, as if mountains
had fallen, which, echoed and re-echoed round by the forest, exceeded,
in deafening roar, anything I had ever heard, even in the Indian
ocean. Then came the rushing sound of the descending rain, first
pattering heavily on the thatch, and then sounding with one continuous
noise, like that of a waterfall. The frail covering above us could not
withstand the flood, and here and there the water began to drop on the
floor, especially near the walls. The space around the table, indeed,
remained free; but, fearing that our poor brown companion in the
adjoining room might suffer before she was aware--for negroes will
sleep through anything--I ventured to look in.
Jenny had heard no thunder, nor had the lightning passed before her
eyes with any effect. She slept as soundly as if there was no war of
elements, nor any other dangers nigh. But the thatch over that room
had been more solidly constructed, and the rain had not penetrated.
Satisfied on that score, I returned to the other room, and again
seated myself beside Bessy, placing my gun and a pistol on the table,
where I could see that they did not get wet.
I had not returned a moment too soon, for I had no time to utter a
word before the door of the hut was pushed sharply open, and a dark
form presented itself at the aperture.
On the first impulse, I snatched up the gun, and, pointing it at the
doorway, exclaimed, "Stand!" while Bessy cowered down in her chair
with a look of terror, but did not speak or move from her seat.
"Stand!" I exclaimed again, seeing the man take a step forward,
"Stand, or I fire! What do you want?"
"Shelter--food," answered the negro. "Fire, if you like! It matters
little."
As he spoke, I perceived by the dim light that the intruder was the
leader of the sanguinary band who had crushed out so many a happy
hearth, and made so many a household desolate.
"Keep back for a moment," he said, turning to some one without. Then,
confronting me again, he added, "I am starving, and so are those with
me. God's storms are raging through the forest. Will you give me some
food? Will you allow me and mine to take shelter here till the deluge
has passed over? On my life, no harm shall happen to you; if not,
fire, and you will find you have killed the only one who could protect
you."
"Will you swear by the God whom you adore, and who you fancy has
guided you," I asked, "that neither you nor your companions will offer
any violence, and that you will quit the hut the moment the storm is
ended--nay, that you will not move forward from that side of the cabin
while you are here?"
"I swear!" he answered. "But you, too, must promise that you will not
betray me."
I thought for an instant; but the consideration of Bessy's safety
prevailed over every other, and I promised.
"Who is in the other room?" he asked, seeing a light gleaming through
a chink in the door.
"Only one other person," I answered, "who is under my command. You are
quite secure if you keep your oath. If you do not, I have three lives,
at least, at my disposal."
"I have sworn by the Almighty," said the man, in a tone almost of
indignation. Then, turning to the door again, he exclaimed, "Come in!"
Two other negroes instantly appeared from behind him, and as all three
were armed, the odds against me, in case of strife, were somewhat
serious. I had trusted, however, to my own conception of the man's
character, for, although every sort of abuse had been piled upon him
by all ranks and classes in the county town, and though certainly his
deeds, during the last days, had been of the most remorseless and
brutal nature, yet I had come to a conclusion which nothing could
shake, that superstitious fanaticism was at the bottom of all his
actions--good and evil.
Nor had I any cause to change my opinion from his conduct towards me.
He pledged himself by the Being whom he madly believed to be his
prompter and guide in all his wickedness; and I rightly believed he
would keep his word. He himself and both his companions looked gaunt,
exhausted, and famished; and I am convinced that had I refused them
the boon of food and shelter which they required in their desperate
condition, they would not only have taken it, but the lives of all
within the hut.
"There, in that basket, is the only food I have to give you," I said.
"Take it and share it amongst you. We have not been well supplied
ourselves; but you want it more than we do."
One of the men was starting forward to seize the basket; but Nat
Turner put him sternly back, saying,--
"I have promised that you should not go a step forward from that side
of the cabin. By your permission, sir, I will take the food, for we do
want it indeed."
"Leave us some, leave us some," cried a voice behind me; and, turning
round, I beheld old Jenny, who, though she had slept through the
thunder, had woke up, it would seem, at the sound of human voices.
"I was well nigh starved to death to-day by that old Thornton, and I
don't want to die o' hunger to-morrow, nor see you nor Missie Bessy
either, Mas'r Conway."
A grim sort of smile came over Nat Turner's dark countenance as he
threw the pine-knots out of the basket on the floor, and helped his
companions with his own hands to the coarse bread and raw salt fish
which lay beneath. He took a small portion himself also, but less than
he gave them; and, looking first at me, and then at Bessy, he said,--
"You have found, I fancy, that white men can be as hard and cruel as
negroes--but without the same cause."
As he spoke, he rolled his eyes in his head with a fierce, almost
insane look; and then added abruptly,--
"This cabin was built by an old negro as a place of refuge from the
brutality of one of your white men. We break forth for a moment when
we can bear no longer, destroy, kill, murder, if you like; but has any
one of us inflicted as much misery, done as much harm, as that man in
the course of his long life? If we had done rightly, he would have
been the first sacrifice to the God of vengeance. We should have
chosen our victims equitably; and perhaps it is for this that the
Almighty favour is withdrawn from us; but the time may come when it
will be restored."
"Ah, Nat, Nat," said Jenny, "I did not think you would have done such
terrible things as you have done--you, who always seemed kind and
good, and to be a God-fearing man."
"Woman, I did God's bidding!" answered Nat Turner, with a sharp, angry
look; "and I will do it still, but more wisely."
He then fell into a fit of deep thought, fixing his eyes upon the
floor, and remaining on his feet, though his two companions had seated
themselves on the ground.
Every two or three minutes the lightning continued to flash, and the
thunder to roar, and the rain still poured down in torrents.
"I wish, dearest Bessy," I said, in a low voice, "you would go into
the other room and rest. This man will keep his word with us. There is
no danger."
"I will stay by your side, Richard," she answered in a whisper; "this
is my place."
A long pause ensued; and certainly curious sensations
arose--sensations not very pleasant, when I reflected that before me
were three men whose hands, within the last eight-and-forty hours, had
been steeped in the blood of nearly eighty human beings, most of them
women and children.
At length, Nat Turner broke silence, saying abruptly, and in a gloomy
tone,--
"What was that you told me about the sign I saw in the sun--an eclipse
you called it?"
I gave him the same explanation I had done before, telling him that it
was a mere natural phenomenon, which occurred at periods easy to be
calculated, in consequence of the regular movements of the planets.
"Can I have been mistaken?" he muttered between his teeth. "No, no!"
he added in a louder tone; "the sun shall be turned into darkness, and
the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord! It
was the sign, it was the sign! The vision and the prophecy cannot be
mistaken. I saw him stand on my right side with a rod in his hand, and
he pointed to the sky, and he told me to be up and doing. It shall be
fulfilled even yet. But the wheat must first be winnowed from the
chaff, and the tares rooted out, that it be the work of the
husbandman. What though there be few left, others shall rise up. Hands
more meet hearts more firm, to do the mighty and terrible work of the
Lord."
His two companions fixed their eyes on his face, evidently regarding
him as one inspired; and I watched with no slight anxiety, knowing
well that one can never calculate what turn superstition may take. But
he fell quietly into another reverie, which lasted nearly half an
hour, and his mood seemed to be soothed by his own reflections. I
fancy the truth was, that irritating doubts had suggested themselves
as to the truth of his fancied revelations; but that now, by his own
arguments, he had satisfied his own mind again, and that his heart
felt lighter in consequence.
The storm, though very severe, was brief. Before Nat Turner brought
his meditations to a close, the thunder grew fainter, and followed, at
a long distance, the flash of the lightning. The rain no longer
pattered on the thatch; and the negro, looking up, said, though in
what connection, I could not discover,--
"Was not the moon very red when she rose to-night?"
"She was red enough last night," answered aunt Jenny, "and I dare she
was redder to-night. But I did not look at she, Nat. She was as red as
blood last night 'bout this time."
"Ay, ay!" replied the man in a satisfied tone. Then, after a few
minutes' silence, he added--"It has done raining, I think, and I will
keep my word."
He opened the door of the hut and looked out, and we could see gleams
of the moon's light flitting over the Swamp as she struggled with the
parting clouds. After gazing forth, for a minute or two, he returned,
and approached the side of the table, saying,--
"I want you to give me some gunpowder, Sir Richard Conway. Mine is
almost out."
"Not if it were to save my life, and all that is most dear to me," I
answered. "Not one grain. I have given you food and shelter, but I
will not give you the means to injure others."
"So be it," he replied, quietly. "God, mayhap, will give what you
refuse."
And calmly throwing the damp powder out of the pans of his guns, which
had nothing but flint-locks, he primed the weapons again, and made his
two companions bring their guns to him to undergo the same process. He
then shook the flask at his ear, saying.--
"One more charge a-piece, and before that is out, we must find more.
Now, boys, leave the cabin." They seemed to obey his lightest word;
and when they were gone, he turned to me, saying--"I do not thank you,
for I have as much right here as you have, as much right possibly to
the food. But I will keep my word with you--I will keep my vow and
more. You may sleep in quiet and peace. I shall be near, and no one
shall molest you. Goodnight! We may meet again, when I shall not ask
you for anything, or you refuse me."
And he left the cabin, drawing to the door after him.