An Acquaintance with Darkness - Ann Rinaldi [77]
21. And Frightened Miss Muffet Away
EVERYTHING WENT WRONG.
Addie had to wear two petticoats, two skirts, an apron, two blouses, and one vest. She would have worn her shawl, too, but I said it was too warm. I got her downstairs for a quick cup of tea.
"We really goin, little missy?" she must have asked me a dozen times while we sipped our tea. Birds were already chirping outside. I heard the clop-clop-clopping of the milkman's horse down the street. The light was a soft gray now outside the windows. And, of course, it was foggy. For once I welcomed the fog. I counted on it to shield us.
"Yes," I said, "we are really going, Addie. Hurry now, finish your tea and biscuit. Last evening I arranged for a hack to meet us down at the corner."
"One thing I wants afore I go," she said.
"What? What is it?" She wasn't going to balk on me now, was she?
"I wants one o' them flowers." She smiled sheepishly. "I always wanted one o' them flowers. The kind that hangs down like bells at rest. And turns right up at night."
"I suppose I could get you one before we leave, Addie."
So there I was, stumbling around in the fog in Marietta's eerie garden. I cut a yucca flower on a long stem. Addie stood waiting. Beside her on the stone walk was my portmanteau, a basket of food, and another basket with Ulysses the cat. At least he was cooperating. He'd curled right up in the bottom of the basket and gone back to sleep.
I wrapped the flower in wet paper and presented it to Addie. "Come on, now, let's go."
We must have made a strange procession going down the street, me with my bundles and Addie with her flower. I heard church bells chime across the city. Six o'clock. I heard and smelled the horses before they appeared out of the fog, waiting at the head of the carriage.
"Twelfth and O Streets," I told the driver.
"That's a long way, little lady. Across town."
"I know. It's the Relief Society."
"It ain't a good neighborhood. And the way the streets are clogged with the Grand Review today, I'll have to charge extra."
"How much?"
"Twelve dollars."
I sighed and settled my things. The war was over, but people were still price-gouging. "All right," I said. "Just get us there, please." Thank God for Johnny's gold pieces. It seemed like a hundred years since the morning he had given them to me.
To get to the Relief Society we had to travel through the most terrible areas, past shanties and swampy land along the lower stretches of the Washington Canal. People were just getting up, bending over cooking fires outside their shanties. In the fog they seemed like creatures from another time. I knew that these were the freedmen who had tried Elizabeth Keckley's patience so. There were forty thousand of them in Washington now, needing schooling and homes and jobs.
Sometimes Addie gave one of the figures a wave of recognition. And they'd wave back. Then she told the driver where to stop, in front of the old army barracks.
I got out. I helped Addie down from the carriage.
"Best do your business quick and get outta here," the driver was mumbling. "These places are known for breeding disease. 'Specially smallpox."
"I'll be right with you," I told him. "Wait." Would they want Addie here? Suppose they didn't and I had to find someplace else for her. What would I do?
My worries were short-lived. A figure came out of the fog. "Addie? Addie Bassett, is that you? Lord awmighty, we thought you were dead!"
"Well, I ain't. I's alive."
The old, white-haired Negro reverend embraced her. "You look good, Addie," he said.
"I's better. Been livin' wif a doctor. He take care o' me." She chuckled. "I's free. And gonna use my freedom right that Mister Linkum gave me."
Others came forward to greet her. The fog gave an unreal quality to the voices and scenes. I saw a woman in the distance stirring something in a huge pot. Another stacking clothing on a table in some