My Monticello(52)

Desperate times, the man said. Behind him, the orchard people nodded or cleared their throats. A few beat the ends of their tools against the gravel. Up here, we don’t invite trouble.

Listen, Devin started, his body already arced with that restless urgency from earlier that I felt in my limbs too. There were these zealots, down on the road, these crazy fuckers—they shot at us, chased us—

The orchard man cut in. Son, we are decent people.

He looked at Devin, who was sweating, like we all were sweating, and then away.

Man, they were about to kill us, Devin said.

All I could think was, Devin, raise your hands back up—keep them up!

This one, the man said, gesturing at Devin, but looking at Knox, at Carol. At me, even. Calm him down. Is he on something? The man’s voice was so steady that we knew better than to answer. Carol began to make a small sound, like a word caught in her throat.

Goddamn, Devin muttered, but he raised his arms high and stilled his body, until he looked like a statue of someone in perpetual surrender.

No, Knox said. What he said is true. There were men, blocking the road. We don’t know them. They shot at us. We think they’re going to follow us here.

The man looked Knox up and down. We don’t invite trouble, he said.

Help us, Knox said. We need to get away—we’ve got to get back …

Knox’s voice trailed off, and his light eyes drifted, as if he’d lost his aim and meant to find it in the hazy air. Where did he hope to get back to, precisely? Back to First Street, or to the university? Back to Washington State?

Monticello, I said.

My raised arms were trembling from the effort of demonstrating that I meant no harm. Around us, the orchard people coughed and twitched, shifting weight, as if our desperation had agitated their bodies. Help us to get back to Monticello, I said, willing my voice steady and appeasing, like I’d done so many times before. But my throat burned as if I’d been forced to swallow embers.

I could feel the orchard man weighing my request.

We’ve had some interesting visitors, he said, glancing back at the others, many of whom nodded. I’m afraid helping people like you would most certainly be trouble.

Like us, Devin said.

Leave on your own or we’ll be forced to help you leave, the man said.

You should help us, Knox said. You have to—

Carol was still making that noise, a call held in.

The line of orchard people was already retreating, with only a handful of the men—the ones who held long rifles—remaining to watch us. We started for the driveway, our footfalls unsteady but hurried, our chests caved in. We’d put some distance between ourselves and the orchard men when Carol doubled back, dashing toward them, her sandals skimming gravel. We caught her well before she reached them, our hands hooked into her elbows, pulling her back. She shouted past the men, toward the backs of the heads of the orchard people, almost to the first barn.

Lorraine! Carol shouted, sounding shriller with each repetition. Lorraine! Carol knew or thought she knew one of the women. I see you, Lorraine! Please make these people help us!

But Lorraine, whoever she was, did not answer.


XI.

We knew it then, undeniably: There were white men gunning for us along the road to town. Still we were shocked to find a lone Black man, without any weapons, bound and waiting on our own mountain when we returned.

We’d made it back to Monticello by scrambling headlong into the mouth of unfamiliar woods, midway down the orchard’s long paved drive. We’d clambered over ravines, up banks so steep our ankles throbbed. Legions of ticks lay in wait in tall grasses, crawling up our calves, trying to latch to skin before we brushed them off. There was, we knew, a sturdy boardwalk path that would have more comfortably delivered us that few miles back. But the easier path, like the road right below it, risked our being seen even more than the woods did. By the time we got back, we were dripping with sweat, our lungs raw-feeling, our bodies full of a dull, profound hunger.

When we staggered out of the woods near the welcome pavilion, our trio of guards—Lakshmi along with Gary and Ira—ran out to meet us. But they hardly took in our terrible adventure, why we were carless and sick with thirst. Instead they alerted us that there was another stranger at the house. Ira clutched Carol, and Gary brought us plastic bottles refilled with cistern water, his black-and-blue hair dripping as if he’d recently dunked it against the heat. Had we made it to town, to First Street, they asked. We told them we had not.

You should hurry, Lakshmi said. She’d found lipstick somewhere; her lips stood out, a deep rust color. He’s up at the house, she said. You should see for yourselves.

When we came up on the backyard, no one was in sight. No one was working down in the gardens or playing up along the terraced side yard. Not one person was visible along the south terrace or in the reconstructed shelters of Mulberry Row. A blistering wind pushed at my body, and I felt light, like I might be swept up into the billowy architecture of the clouds. They rushed over our heads, throwing peculiar shadows to the ground.

Carol and Ira took off toward their white textile workshop above the garden, but Knox and Devin followed me. The three of us passed swiftly through the greenhouse room and Jefferson’s crowded cabinet. When we reached MaViolet’s bedchamber, Ms. Edith was there, sitting tall in her dedicated chair near the window, hands busy with work at her lap. We blundered in and she released her squinting focus, addressing us as children. Y’all get her medication? Our houses still standing?