A Dream of Daring Page 24

  “We can find out easily enough,” said Tom. Impelled by a sudden idea, he rushed out of the room and returned moments later with a book and an envelope in his hands.

  “This is the plantation journal from last year. And in this envelope we’ll find a letter Polly apparently wrote just before she died but never mailed. I discovered it earlier on her writing table.”

  The sheriff took the documents. He removed the letter from the envelope. “It’s signed by Polly Barnwell and dated just a week before she died.” Then he flipped through the journal, comparing the handwriting in it to that of the letter. “Looks identical to me.”

  He turned to the coroner, who had come to his side and was also examining the documents. Dr. Clark nodded in agreement.

  “You don’t read at all?” the coroner asked Markham.

  “I can read the cotton scale an’ write slave names by their pickin’ weights good as anybody.”

  “That’s about all he can do,” Kate added.

  Cooper turned sharply to Markham. “Why did you tell me you kept those books?”

  Markham’s head sunk into his shoulders.

  Kate shook her head reproachfully at her brother. “Bret may be a liar and a fool, but he’s no writer.”

  Tom faced Markham incredulously. “What would you have done if Ted Cooper had bought the plantation, then discovered that you can’t keep records after all, and that you lied to him?”

  Markham shrugged his shoulders. “Then’s then. Now’s now.”

  Tom knew that the man before him, who couldn’t project the consequences of his actions over mere weeks, was not someone who could have projected the consequences of an invention into the far future.

  The others were silent. Somehow, they also knew this was true.

  Kate stated what they all were thinking: “Sheriff, if you’re looking for a murderer who had a conscience and wrote a letter so somebody else wouldn’t be punished, well, I don’t know about the conscience, but as far as writing the letter, Bret’s not your man.”

  The sheriff nodded. He turned to his deputy and gestured to Markham. The deputy removed the handcuffs.

  “Now I understand where that purse came from,” Kate told the sheriff. “Bret didn’t have any money when I visited him at Christmas. Fact is, he was trying to squeeze some out of me. But when I came back in February after Miss Polly’s death, he had two hundred dollars in a purse. He claimed it was his bonus for a good crop.”

  Kate darted an angry look at her brother, who lowered his head in silent admission of yet another lie. The powerful overseer who made slaves tremble in fear was himself cowered by his older sister’s scolding.

  “Sheriff, I know my brother likes to gamble and drink. That’s why I wouldn’t let him touch the money until his position with the new owner of the Crossroads was secured. I have the purse with the two hundred dollars, if you’d like to see it.”

  “Before we leave, you can show us, ma’am,” said the sheriff without urgency, evidently moving on in his hunt.

  Tom stood nearby, in unblinking shock from the revelations. He walked slowly toward Markham.

  “I can believe you didn’t appreciate my device. But the senator?” His eyes dropped painfully to the floor. He added, as if talking to himself: “The man who treated me like a son?”

  Sporting a rare smile, Markham replied: “He was only playin’ with you, boy.”

  CHAPTER 21

  As Kate excused herself and left the meeting, Bret Markham sank into his chair, relieved by the sheriff’s loss of interest in him. Duran and the coroner also took their seats; with the tension of the moment past, they observed the others, wondering where the trail would now lead.

  “I’m rather proud of the senator.” Nash looked at Tom with an air of insolent satisfaction at beating a rival.

  “It seems old Wiley didn’t let us down after all,” gloated Cooper. “I should’ve known he’d have a plan to deal with an outsider who comes here hell-bent on revamping everything.” He smirked at Tom. “The senator might have wanted you in his family, but it was definitely going to be on his terms.”

  Markham seemed to be enjoying a rare moment of camaraderie with the class that paid his salary but otherwise ignored him. Proving that self-control was not among his talents, he joined the chorus against the man who was his acting manager. “Right proud I was when the senator trusted me with smashin’ that thing. I reckon we woulda got along jus’ fine, me and the senator.”

  “Tom,” said Rachel, “Papa was only doing what he thought was right.”

  “It was for your own good, Tom,” Charlotte announced.

  The inventor, the only one who had remained standing, now faced the group as if he were the culprit and they were the firing squad.

  “No offense, old boy,” said Nash, proceeding to offend, “but it would be best for everybody if you never found that machine of yours. You can see all the trouble it’s brought us.” He looked at Rachel, who rewarded him with a nod.

  “Nash is right,” she said.

  Tom looked at her blankly, as if she were a stranger.

  “I hope it’s at the bottom of the swamp,” added Cooper, “that confounded device of Yankee gall.”

  “It’s cursed,” said Charlotte.

  Tom looked curiously at the woman whose eyes held a hint of derangement.

  “It’s brought innuendoes and suspicions—lies, all lies!—on our family,” Charlotte continued. “I declare, that machine could do the farmin’ for Satan!”

  Markham smiled maliciously at the dressing-down of his superior. Encouraged, he added to the chorus: “Slaves make crops. Always have, always will.”

  The verbal bullets kept flying for a few minutes. But they seemed to miss their mark. Rather than fatally wounding the young inventor, they emboldened him. He stood tall, his head high with pride in himself and his eyes heavy with contempt for them.

  When they were finished, he spoke. “So none of you are surprised by the senator’s behavior?”

  Waiting for an answer, he pensively looked out the window like a scientist forming a conclusion, then turned back to the group. “None of you are dismayed to learn that your town’s distinguished statesman, a man of great standing among you, was engaged in deception, bribery, thievery, and destruction?”

  No one denied the charges.

  “Face it, Tom, your invention was just a delusion, anyway,” said Cooper. “There was no proof it would work the way you claimed. Why, our dear Wiley was doing you a favor before you made more of a fool of yourself. He was helping you come down to earth by getting rid of the senseless thing.”

  “People don’t commit crimes for things they think are senseless.” Tom shook his head. “New devices that don’t work die by themselves. Nobody would have a motive to steal and destroy something he believes is useless.”

  Tom paced before the others like a bobcat they couldn’t shoot down.

  “Tell me, Cooper, were you also doing me a favor by attempting to steal my tractor that night? Was Nash doing me a favor when he tried too? Were you both going to risk getting caught and going to jail for the theft of something you thought was useless—in order to do me a favor?”

  There was no reply.

  “I’d say you all took the device very seriously.” His eyes traveled from Cooper to Nash to Markham, while his mind also saw a fourth face on a portrait hanging in his parlor. “Yes, indeed, you took it seriously! But not for the reason I thought.” His voice dropped grimly. “I didn’t understand you at first. I thought you wanted to develop the invention and realize the dream of the new age. But now I see what really drives all of you.” His eyes reached Rachel, including her in his statement.

  The sheriff listened patiently, allowing Tom to continue. The lawman watched everyone. He looked interested in letting the interplay proceed among those closest to the invention and the deceased, as if hoping it might lead to a new clue and direction.

  “I had mentioned my invention to the senator on previous o
ccasions, but he didn’t know how far along I was until the day before Miss Polly’s burial when I told him I was going to Philadelphia to unveil it and couldn’t make the funeral. Now I realize why he insisted on delaying my trip. He wanted to get at the invention before I could take it away. That’s why he offered to bring it to the Crossroads. He wanted it in the place where he was going to be that night. And that’s why he pressed me to show the device to Cooper and Nash that afternoon. The more men who knew about it, the harder it would be to pin the theft on him. Sheriff, I think the senator concocted an excuse to bring my device to the Crossroads early that day. He told me he wanted to review the plantation records, but it seems he really wanted to see the overseer and make his deal, as Markham claims.”

  The youthful disillusionment had vanished from Tom’s face. The scientist in him was now in charge, dispassionately firing off conclusions. The puzzle pieces were now fitting together to form a clear picture.

  “None of you are surprised at the senator’s behavior—because you’re just like him. All of you wanted my tractor smashed.”

  No one denied it.

  “It appears none of you actually stole the invention or killed the senator, but you’re guilty of crimes just the same.” His targets now fidgeted in their seats. The men looked vexed, and the women looked puzzled. But the sheriff and coroner looked merely curious. “You’re guilty of crimes against yourselves.”

  “Robbie, stop this drivel now!” Cooper looked about to jump out of his chair.

  “You all had your chance to speak. Now I’d like my chance,” said Tom.

  The sheriff motioned to his uncle to sit back. Cooper seemed surprised to see how little sway he now had over the young lawman who once treated him like an oracle. “Mr. Edmunton and his invention are critical to the case. I’ll hear him out.”

  Sparks flew from Tom’s eyes. “You, Cooper, you pride yourself on being a businessman, but you committed a crime against business. You want to make as much money as possible, yet you tried to sabotage an invention that promised to make you more money in less time and at a lower cost than ever before.”

  “You traitor! You know how we farm here,” argued Cooper. “Why do you taunt us? Our system was fixed on us; we didn’t make it.”

  “But you like it the way it is, and you would destroy anything that upset it.”

  Tom recalled the day he tried to improve the seed drill, when his attention was pulled away to deal with the most mundane details of other people’s lives. He recalled too many of his days spent like that.

  “Instead of engaging yourself with the latest discoveries and innovations to reduce your costs and labor and improve your business—instead of that—you throw away your mental energy on arranging how many blankets others have, the frocks they wear, the kind of shoes they get, the food they eat, the beds they sleep in. When you control every detail of others’ lives, you not only shrink their horizons but you also shrink your own. You gloat over the destruction of a farm invention that could enlarge your profits, while you glory in a world where you dispense molasses rations and keep others helpless. You betrayed business for the sake of power. That’s your crime against yourself.”

  The faces around the parlor reddened. In the Louisiana of 1859, no one ever said the kind of things the group was now hearing.

  “Watch it, Yankee,” warned Cooper. “We have laws here—”

  “Yes, yes, you have laws,” Tom said contemptuously. “Like the ones you and Barnwell used to shut down the factory? Like the ones you use to block your fellow citizens from freeing their bondsmen or even schooling them—because the self-reliance of others threatens your power? That’s the other crime you committed, the crime against the law. You took off the blindfold of justice to make the law give you benefits at others’ expense, and those others aren’t just the slaves. They’re also your fellow citizens, like me. When I can’t speak my mind or educate my servants or free them without getting thrown in jail, then aren’t you using me against my will to serve you? Isn’t that also slavery?”

  The man whose badge displayed a blindfolded lady looked disturbed by the notion.

  “Shut your insolent mouth, or I’ll have you prosecuted!” Cooper looked to the sheriff for support, but his nephew offered none.

  The inventor turned to another man, one whose face was drawn tight and who stared at him resentfully.

  “You, Nash, you spread your feathers like a peacock who’s all fluff and no mass. Where’s your passion to do anything? Where’s your skill at doing anything? The only thing you excel at is idleness.”

  Nash shot up in his chair. “What gall!”

  Tom continued pacing as he gestured to Nash. “You live off not only the backs of the slaves but also off anybody else you can cajole. You lived off your father’s efforts. And after his passing, you lived off loans, like the ones you got from me. Then you wanted the senator to gift you with the Crossroads, so you could live off the product of Miss Polly’s work.”

  Nash turned to Duran. “Sheriff, really now!”

  The sheriff didn’t reply. He looked engrossed in Tom’s words.

  “You want someone else to do the work. Yet when you learned of a new invention that had the potential to make you lots of money in farming with much less effort, you wanted to sabotage it. What you really want, Nash, is to be an aristocrat in a dying age. That’s your crime against yourself. In your quest for a life free of effort, you made for yourself a life free of purpose, a life of laziness, incompetence, and debt.”

  “You’re not fit for Rachel!” roared Nash. “Go back to the North where you belong!”

  “And . . . the senator—”

  “Stop, before you disrespect the dead! Have you no shame?” cried Charlotte.

  “Senator Barnwell was your salesman for the dying age.” Tom stood still, his restless pacing subdued, his voice heavy with sadness and bitterness. “Barnwell put the mask of goodness on something bad. He told himself and all of you that the dying age is kindness; it’s caring; it’s looking after those who can’t help themselves.” Tom thought of the intelligent face of a young teacher and the eagerness of a chef with a tall white hat. He thought of how proud and capable they stood. “That’s Barnwell’s crime. He tried to bend and twist morality to justify power.”

  Tom’s eyes grew more intense as a further thought occurred to him.

  “And he tried to control me the same way he controlled the slaves. He tried to push me to lend Cooper money to take the Crossroads off his hands, against my own lending practices. He wanted me to marry his daughter and give up inventing, against my own wishes. An appetite for power doesn’t stop at one prey but hungers for more. Barnwell was closed to the great challenge of nature that the new age presents. He was too busy trying to expand his control of people in the dying age.”

  “Well, I declare! In all of God’s kingdom, you are the most arrogant beast of all!” said Rachel, aghast.

  She seemed to have lost her self-consciousness at having her personal affairs discussed in the group. A perverted intimacy seemed to have developed among those involved in the sheriff’s meetings, like a bickering family unable to break away from conflict.

  “When Senator Barnwell, your great moral leader, learned of an invention that could have created the most moral society ever—one in which nature’s awesome power was tamed and men were set free—what did he do? He tried to destroy it.”

  “Good gracious God!” cried Charlotte.

  “And others here,” Tom looked directly at Rachel, “gave up their dreams for the comforts and conveniences of the dying world. They didn’t mind going along with the corruption, didn’t give it a thought, as long as they got their own inducements. They committed crimes against their own spirit. When someone has to rein in her will and inclinations to conform to what the town wants her to be . . . who’s the real slave?”

  Rachel crossed her arms and whispered venomously, “You monster!”

  “And you, Markham, you want your own nich
e of power. It’s not brainpower you want but the power of the whip. You never cared for schooling because you think intelligence doesn’t matter. You say you were happy to smash an invention that could free up the field hands to compete with you for work. Why? Because you’ve held yourself back; you’ve made yourself unfit to compete. The new age requires brains, not muscle. Your crime is that you never tried to beat your mind into shape—only your field hands.”

  “I’s right itchin’ to beat you into shape, Yankee!” Markham’s lips curled into a snarl.

  Tom pressed on. “In fact, you’re all Markhams. That’s what you’ve become. You’re all bullies. Only Markham makes no pretense at being anything more, while you fancy yourselves as upper class.”

  The three men Tom had insulted shot out of their seats and leaped at him.

  “Swine!”

  “Madman!”

  “Traitor!”

  Nash reached for his throat. Markham raised his fists. Cooper lodged the first blow. Tom threw off their hands and ducked their punches. The women screamed. The sheriff sprang up, and the deputies and coroner rushed into the fray. The lawmen wedged themselves between Tom and his attackers.

  The sheriff was silently grateful for his earlier insistence that guns be left with a deputy outside the meeting so that only the law enforcers were armed. As he and his men pushed and shoved both sides back, Tom was still defiant.

  “Why did you commit crimes against business, against justice, against morality, against your own characters? Because you’re clinging to something whose time is up.”

  “It’s your time that’s up!” yelled Nash.

  “By keeping your slaves down, you’re keeping yourselves down too. Being masters over men doesn’t destroy just your subjects. It destroys you too.”

  “Seditionist!” yelled Nash.

  “That’s treason! Arrest him!” added Cooper.

  “Get back! Get back! Get back!” ordered the sheriff.

  The riled men pushed forward to break the lawmen’s defense. The sheriff and his men peeled the attackers off Tom.