Here is part V. I'm working my way towards the end of the chapter, but there's still more to go. Enjoy!
“Did you say that he redeems slaves?” asked Maria, her curiosity piqued.
“Yes,” the cook answered, “he is a rich man who is very merciful. No one knows why he does it, but he’s just started doing it. If I knew that I could get away without being caught, I’d go myself, but I know that if I escape, they’ll kill me because I’ve run away twice already. They’ve told me that the next time they find me outside the plantation grounds without their permission I’ll be shot on sight.”
The cruelty of such an arrangement amazed Maria. She had expected to escape the barbarism of civil war when she had fled Cuba with her family. Now, she found the same depravity at work in America.
“How far away does he live? How do I get there?” she asked
“Well,” replied the cook, “it wouldn’t be easy. First, you’d have to get off of the grounds without being caught. Then, you’d have to make the trip – which would take the better part of a day on foot – without being caught. You’d have to cross the river into town, and there’s only one way to do that, the bridge on the main road into the east side of town. After that, you’d have to find your way to West End Road, which would lead you towards Providence. Once you had found that road, it’d just a matter of getting to Providence before the catch you.”
She slid back to far wall of the shack and sighed. “But there’s not much hope in that. The minute everyone knew that you were gone, they’d sound an alarm, and master Walters would send every one of his men out after you. There isn’t much hope of getting away, then, because they’d all be on horses and you’d be on foot.”
“That does sound like a challenge,” Maria said thoughtfully. Hope arose within her.
Here was the chance she had been waiting for! She now knew where to go. Her only obstacle was getting away from Walters’ property with enough of a head start that they would not be able to track her down before she reached town. In the back of her mind, she already began formulating her plans for escape.
“Yes, missy,” the cook said, “it is. And one that I don’t particularly feel like taking. I value my life too much to lose it on same crazy escape that may or may not work. I would rather live in this misery than die.”
“But isn’t it worth the risk to try to get freedom?”
“No way. At least here I get food and shelter. I have no family left. My parents and my siblings died in the hurricane that hit the coast last year.”
“Then you have nothing to lose,” Maria argued.
“I could lose my life easily enough,” countered the cook, “and that’s about all I have left right now. At least I’m alive.”
Maria tried to convince the cook that escape was worth trying, but she gave up when it became clear that the other woman, in an odd way, actually loved her life too much to be willing to risk losing it for the sake of being out of slavery. Even if Colonel Williams were to ride up to the plantation that day and tell this slave that he wanted to redeem her, it appeared that she would refuse his help. The realization that this woman would probably die in slavery because she loved comfort more than freedom saddened Maria.
In a few hours, Tyrone came in, roughly grabbed the cook and dragged her back to the house. Maria never saw her again.
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