A Dream of Daring (20 page)
Authors: Gen LaGreca
The candles were
generating too much heat for what was already becoming a hot, humid day. In
shirtsleeves and vest, Tom could feel the sweat forming on his forehead as he
sat in the dining room for breakfast the next morning. The crystal candelabra,
the fine china, the impeccably polished silverware—all from his mother’s best
collection—were part of the setting Jerome had arranged for the service of his
chocolate squares. Like many of Greenbriar’s residents, Tom had become addicted
to the new food, and a few squares downed with a pot of coffee was now his
standard breakfast fare.
Soon the chef entered to
serve these items himself. Though he kept late hours tending to his many tasks
and newfound business and he delegated work to his assistants, he made a point
of serving breakfast himself to Tom, who rose at dawn.
Although Tom allowed him
to wear his kitchen clothes in the big house, Jerome arrived in his finer
threads, adding to the formality of a meal that Tom viewed as a mere cramming
of something into his mouth so that he could get on with his day. Tom observed
the chef’s hat on the slave’s head, stressing the stature of the person who
made his breakfast and of the dish that was perfuming the air with chocolate.
“Mornin’, Mr. Tom.”
The inventor nodded,
watching Jerome pour his coffee with a flourish, then serve the squares with a
bow, as if they were a delicacy and Tom a king. The inventor sighed. He decided
not to spoil Jerome’s moment by having the candles extinguished; he would
endure the heat.
He watched the tapers
send curls of smoke into the air for a few lively seconds before they vanished.
He thought of Cooper’s life now flickering in its final moments, about to fade
into the stillness within hours. The treachery of Cooper, the demise of the
senator, and the loss of his invention had drained all joy from Tom’s face and
mood.
He pushed the squares
away and gulped down his coffee.
“Mr. Tom, are you feelin’
ill?” Jerome’s speech, though not perfect, had improved with six weeks of
Solo’s classes.
“I’m fine.”
Jerome looked concerned.
“You want somethin’ else? Muffins, biscuits, or waffles?”
“No.”
“I have leftovers. Cold ham
or chicken fricassee?”
“I’m not hungry.”
As Jerome refilled Tom’s
coffee cup, a house servant, Charles, entered holding a letter.
“Excuse me, Mr. Tom. This
came for you.”
Tom noticed the improved
speech of another of Solo’s students. Charles also seemed to stand taller than
usual, as if straightening out his grammar did the same for his posture.
Tom took the envelope. It
was from a standard line of stationery sold in the general store and in
widespread use. His name was written on it in block print letters:
Mr.
Edmunton
. Tom glanced at both sides of the envelope, looking for an
indication of the writer’s identity. There was none.
“Who sent this, Charles?”
“I don’t know, sir. ’Twas
on the table by the front door this mornin’. ’Twasn’t there last night when I
put out the lights and gone to my cabin.”
Tom shot a questioning
glance at Jerome, who shook his head, indicating he too knew nothing about the
matter.
The front door was often
left unlocked and the window at the entrance open. Could someone have dropped
the envelope off in the night? Curious, Tom thought, as he opened it. He
removed a letter that was unsigned, written on the same stock stationery, and
with the same block letters, making it impossible to recognize the handwriting.
Holding the letter in one
hand and his coffee cup in the other, he read:
THE
MAN WHO IS TO BE HANGED IS INNOCENT. THE KNIFE THAT STABBED BARNWELL IS A MILE
UP THE TURNOFF TO WATKINS LANDING. LOOK BY THE DEAD OAK IN THE CLEARING AT
MANNING CREEK.
Tom leaped from his
chair. His coffee cup slipped through his fingers and shattered on the floor as
he rushed out of the room.
* * * * *
A slave who was hauling a
wagon of wood to the big house veered sharply off the road to avoid colliding
with a wild figure galloping at blinding speed toward him. The slave was
stunned to see that the crazed man was his master. Tom’s horse whinnied its
distress as it struggled to make the sharp turn onto the main road at full
speed. The dirt stirred by the hooves sprayed Tom’s face and clouded his vision.
Trees and fields along his path whizzed by him in one liquid smear. The horse
tried to oblige Tom’s urgent need for speed, flying along, its tail straight
out, its eyes bulging in high alert.
Tom leaned forward and
drove the animal hard on the main plantation road headed north. After riding
eight miles, he came to the turnoff for Watkins Landing. He headed northwest on
the old Indian trail that led to an abandoned trading post. He jumped over a
downed tree on the unkempt path, then another, and then he splashed through
mud. Soon he heard the rippling waters of Manning Creek. He meandered off the
road through a tangle of vegetation to reach the stream, with branches tearing
his shirt and insects biting his hands.
Just as the letter in his
pocket described, he came to a clearing and spotted the trunk of a dead oak.
The once-living giant had apparently been struck by lightning in a past storm,
leaving only a hollow, decaying trunk. Tom dismounted and combed the area by
foot. He looked through the fallen dead branches of the tree, the ground cover
around it, and the roots exposed and rotting along the bank of the creek. Then
he saw a silver object shining in the dull brush.
Tom picked it up
carefully. It was a carving knife. Embedded on the handle were two flowery
initials, the same ones he had seen on the cutlery and china served at a
funeral reception:
PB
. Caught in the blade were traces of what looked
like dried blood and a torn piece of fabric the color of Wiley Barnwell’s robe
on the night he was killed.
Indigo Springs was four
miles north of the murder scene at the Crossroads. The spot where Tom stood was
nine miles northwest of Indigo Springs. That placed him thirteen miles from the
Crossroads, or twenty-six miles roundtrip. It was
impossible
for Cooper
to have covered that distance, hauling and hiding the invention for part of it,
in the approximately eighty minutes he had on the night of the murder. And it
was
impossible
for Cooper to have come here afterward, because he had
remained in custody since that night.
Tom didn’t need to
analyze the distances; they were clear to him in the one shocking instant when
he had read the letter. Now, holding the knife, he had to face the inescapable
conclusion: Cooper could not have put it there.
Sheriff Robert Duran
stared at the document on his desk. It was a warrant signed by the governor,
and it was his sworn duty to carry it out. His eyes locked on the words
to
be hanged by the neck until dead.
Out the back window, he
saw the setting for the duty he had to perform: the courtyard between his
office and the jail. He saw the simple wood platform that had been pulled out
of the corner for the day’s event. At the top of its steps were two posts and a
crossbar with a noose hanging motionless in the stagnant air.
Out the front window, the
sheriff caught sight of a youngster from the town, a boy about ten years old,
walking along the street with his father. The man went into the shop next door,
and the boy sat on a bench outside to wait for him. The youngster settled
himself comfortably and began to read a book he was carrying.
The sheriff noticed how
quickly the child became immersed in the book. With his face lowered to the
pages and his hair spilling into his eyes, he seemed oblivious to passersby and
street noises. The sheriff marveled at the boy’s apparent preference for
reading rather than shopping with his father. The youth reminded the lawman of
himself at that age because as a boy, Robert Duran was an oddity; he loved book
learning.
He was about the same age
as the boy outside on the day he found his mother crying inconsolably. She was
in their small farmhouse, standing before the empty dresser that belonged to
his father, who had just left them. His mother had married the man in defiance
of her parents’ admonitions, and they, in turn, had disowned her. She and her
husband became yeoman farmers who grew cotton on their small acreage, tilling
the fields themselves. Thanks to his mother’s scrupulous savings and
determination to give her son an education, Robbie was able to buy books and
attend school. The boy tried to console his mother in that desperate moment
when she wondered aloud how they would manage their farm. As he hugged her and wished
desperately that he could make her stop crying, he pledged to leave school to
help with the crop. She could count on him. He was strong and could do the work
of a man, he told her.
Robbie was spared from
his own death sentence—a life of back-breaking drudgery on the family farm—by
the man named in the warrant before him. His mother’s brother, Ted Cooper,
stepped in to help them begin a new life of comfort on his plantation. Under
the protection of his uncle, Robbie completed his basic education and found a
calling in the law.
Outside the sheriff’s
office, the boy’s father left the shop and returned to the young book
enthusiast. The boy stood up and grinned at him. The man patted his son’s head
affectionately, and they walked away. Watching their happy exchange, the
sheriff recalled his own fond moments with the man he came to regard as his
father.
When the man and boy
vanished from his sight, the sheriff turned his glance to another object of
interest: the whisky bottle on his desk next to the death warrant. He closed
his eyes in flat refusal of his need. That would be for later, he told himself.
Right now, there would be no relief.
He got up, straightened
his tie, and pinned to his vest the badge with the blindfolded lady and her
scales.
A small, somber group of
witnesses gathered before the scaffold. Some arrived on horseback and hitched
their animals to posts in the back of the yard. Others arrived in carriages
that they left on the street, then walked the narrow path to the courtyard
hidden from public view.
The witnesses included
newspaper reporters, planters, shopkeepers, other townspeople, and relatives of
the victim and the convict. Greenbriar’s coroner and town doctor, Don Clark,
was there to make the final pronouncement on the doomed man after the task was
done. Bret Markham was there from the Crossroads Plantation.
Charlotte Barnwell,
dressed in black, fanned herself limply, looking drained by the heat and
tension of the day. Rachel, standing next to her, wore a dress of muted gray
with a white bodice that formed two scallops over her breasts, her neck and
shoulders bare. A black lace shawl falling around her arms was a remnant of the
mourning attire that she had relaxed in recent weeks.
Nash Nottingham stood
next to Rachel. His admiring glance at her soft breasts suggested that she
looked alluring to him, even at a hanging.
“Where’s Tom?” he
whispered to her.
“Darned if I know. He
never came for us this morning, like he said he would.” Rachel’s voice was
heated with anger. “He never showed up, on this horrible day!”
Nash took her hand
reassuringly. “
I’m
here for you, dear. And for your mama too.”
* * * * *
A dust cloud swirled
around Tom as his horse galloped along the dirt road. The airborne particles
stuck to the sweat on both of their bodies, making a single bronze figure out
of the man and his horse. They had traveled miles in the blistering heat. Could
they go a bit more?
There were multiple tears
in Tom’s shirt, making visible bloody streaks on his skin from his duel with
the bushes at Manning Creek. His face was flushed from the toxic mix of
scorching heat and lack of water. But
his
condition was not the chief
problem.
Just as he took the
turnoff to Greenbriar’s main street, his horse stopped its constant whinnied
pleas and slowed its pace. The overworked animal was breathing rapidly and
sweating uncontrollably, sure signs of heat exhaustion. The animal needed rest
and water, but Tom could only give it the whip. The poor creature could no
longer oblige; it would rather endure the sting than move another step. The
animal suddenly began to tremble, its legs wobbled, and then its belly hit the
ground with a thump. The horse seemed in the throes of fatal heatstroke.
Tom slid off the animal
and began running. He was at the outer edge of town and not yet near the shops
and people. Ahead he could see the town landmark, a clock tower near the jail,
with a great bronze bell that rang to signal every hour. Tom ran furiously
toward it. From his distance and angle, he couldn’t see the time, but he knew
the next hour would be ten o’clock. He raced ahead, wishing desperately that he
would not hear the tower bell, because if he did hear it, the event he was
trying to stop would begin. Then in mere seconds it would be over.
* * * * *
There was silence in the
courtyard when the door to the jail opened. A small group came out and walked
toward the scaffold. Sheriff Robert Duran led the procession. Next came Ted
Cooper, his head down, his hands tied behind him, a guard on each side. A
chaplain in a robe walked behind the doomed man, reading from a Bible and
blessing him.
The sheriff looked as
grim as the prisoner, realizing that somewhere among the witnesses, his mother
would be standing, once again suffering an immense loss—and once again crying.
This time he could do nothing about it, except add to her grief. As he walked,
he resolved not to look at anyone. At the scaffold, he glanced at the clock
tower visible above the yard. Within moments, it would strike ten, the time set
for the . . . event.
He mounted the steps to
the platform. Cooper and one of the guards followed. The other guard moved to
the side of the platform, where he took hold of a lever. The sheriff positioned
Cooper’s feet on the trapdoor.
The noose cast a looming
shadow on the ground. The prisoner stared at his nephew in indignation and
hopelessness. The nephew did not avoid his uncle’s eyes but stared back in
sadness, resolve, and quiet agony.
The guard on the platform
observed the pair. Knowing their relationship, he stepped forward to reach for
the rope and handle the matter for the sheriff. But Duran put a hand on the
guard’s arm to stop him and took the rope himself.
With his uncle’s
unblinking eyes locked on him, eyes that were hardened in scorn at everything
and everyone, the sheriff positioned the noose around the prisoner’s neck and
tightened it.
There was another set of
eyes that never left the sheriff. The prison guard at the base of the platform
waited for Duran’s signal. The guard’s hand gripped the lever that would
release the trapdoor. He held the handle in white-knuckled tightness. The
sheriff thought he could hear the guard’s teeth grinding.
Duran turned to the
prisoner. “Do you have any final words, Mr. Cooper?”
“May Tom Edmunton rot in
hell.”
The sheriff picked up a
white hood on the platform and raised his arms to place it over Cooper’s head.
The prisoner shook his head, emphatically refusing it. Duran stared at Cooper,
the hood in his hands, as if wishing the prisoner would change his mind. Cooper
shook his head again, and the sheriff tossed the hood aside.
The tower bell began
sounding its ten gongs to announce the hour. The sheriff turned to the guard at
the lever and was about to nod.
Suddenly, an urgent cry
filled the courtyard, drowning out the town’s bell, and a body shot through the
crowd like a bullet.
“Stop! Stop! Stop at
once!”
A collective gasp came
from the group as the shouting man raced toward the scaffold. Panting and about
to faint, he faltered. Two men propped him up, and he yelled, pointing at the
accused, “He’s innocent!
Innocent
!”
Disheveled and weak, with
no jacket, his vest torn, his shirt streaked with blood, his pants splattered
with mud, and his face soaked with sweat, he was almost unrecognizable.
The first official to
reach him was Dr. Clark. “It’s Tom!” The coroner exclaimed.
The sheriff stared at Tom
from the scaffold in utter astonishment.
“My God!” Rachel
screamed. Charlotte looked ready to swoon. Nash, their pillar of strength,
curled a comforting hand around each woman, and he too looked shocked.
Trying to catch his
breath and steady his legs, Tom reached down for the knife tucked in his boot
and the letter in his pocket. He gave the items to the coroner, who examined
the weapon and read the note.
To the stunned gathering,
Tom told his story. He described the anonymous letter found that morning in his
home, how it had directed him to a location thirteen miles away from the scene
of the crime, how he had followed the instructions and found what in all
likelihood was the murder weapon, and how impossible it was for Cooper to have
made the round trip from the Crossroads to the knife’s location on the night of
the crime, or thereafter while he was in constant custody.
“Sheriff,” Tom concluded,
his voice rising as if delivering a proclamation, “since the prisoner could not
have delivered that note to my house, nor could he have disposed of the murder
weapon at Manning Creek, someone else has to be involved.”
A man in the group handed
Tom a canteen of water, and he drank greedily.
“Was any person seen on
your property who could have left that note?” the sheriff asked Tom.
“The servants didn’t see
anyone, nor did I. The block printing of the words makes it impossible to
identify the handwriting.”
A tall man who ran the
general store peered over the coroner’s shoulder to inspect the letter. “I sell
that paper and ink in my shop. Everybody buys it. Could’ve come from anyone.”
“Sheriff,” said Dr.
Clark, “this is a carving knife that bears Polly Barnwell’s initials and
evidently came from her plantation. It appears to have the right dimensions to
be the murder weapon, and I can do measurements to confirm that. And, Sheriff,
I also see fabric particles on the knife that I believe can be matched to the
decedent’s clothing.”
With great consternation
Dr. Clark reached up to the platform to hand the items to the sheriff. All eyes
turned to Duran as he examined the knife and read the letter. He paused,
silently weighing the matter as he studied the new evidence, the prisoner, and
the gathering. Then he gave the items back to the coroner. The group studied
their lawman for his response, searching for a break in his marble composure.
“In view of the new
evidence, this matter needs to be investigated further. The warrant will
not
be carried out.”
The sheriff tried to
maintain his even keel, but his relief at the change of events was evident in
the sudden spark of life in his eyes and in the more spirited motions he used
now than he had in his earlier preparations. He promptly removed the noose from
Cooper’s neck and untied his hands.
Cooper’s eyes lost their
doomed stare. His face dropped into his hands in utter relief from his ordeal.
“The guards will take the
prisoner back to his cell,” said the sheriff. “I’ll take the letter and knife
into evidence and get the sworn testimony of Mr. Edmunton and Dr. Clark. And
I’ll notify the court and the governor.”
The coroner gave the
evidence to one of the guards. Another directed Cooper off the scaffold. As the
prisoner was escorted back to the jail, he passed Tom, and the two men glared
at each other.
“You really
were
telling the truth, weren’t you?” Tom asked incredulously. “You really did
arrive at the carriage house
after
the crime, didn’t you?”
“Why is that so hard for
you to understand?” replied Cooper. The deathlike stiffness of his body had
relaxed, but his voice remained hardened with resentment for Tom.
“You really were aiming
to
destroy
my invention, weren’t you?”
Cooper smiled
contemptuously. “You fool! You don’t understand us at all, do you?”