I gived him the clean side of it, that I had found the Rail Man. I left out the part ’bout the Coachman’s wife and her maybe spilling the beans. “You has done a good job, Onion,” he said. “Hiving the bees is the most important part of our strategy. They will come, no doubt, by the thousands, and we must be ready for them. Now, in lieu of cooking and cleaning for our army, I suggest you continue your work. Hive on, my child. Spread the word among your people. You are majestic!”
He weren’t nothing but enthusiastic, and I didn’t have the heart to blurt out to him that the coloreds wasn’t sharing his enthusiasm one bit. The Rail Man hadn’t said a word to me since I gived him that money to spread the word among numbers runners in Baltimore and Washington. The Coachman avoided me. I saw Becky in town one afternoon, and she damn near fell off the wooden sidewalk scrambling to get out my way. I reckon I was bad luck to them. Somehow the word had gotten out on me, and the colored in town runned the other way every time they seen me coming. I had my hands full at home, too, running from Annie, who seen me as needing her religious training and liked to go naked every couple of days while the men were out, plopping into the tub anytime she pleased, causing me to scamper out the room on one pretense or another. At one point she announced it was time for me to wash my hair, which had gotten scandalous nappy and frizzy. I normally kept it tucked under a rag or a bonnet for weeks, but she got an eyeful of it one afternoon and insisted. When I refused, she allowed she’d find a wig for me, and one evening ventured to the Ferry and returned with a book she brought forth from the town library called
“The Onion,” I allowed.
She burst into laughter and let it go. She had a laugh that made a feller’s heart jump, and that for me was dangerous, for I growed to liking her company a bit, so I took to making myself even scarcer. I made it a point to sleep next to the stove at night, away from her and Martha, and always made sure to be the last soul on the first floor to go to sleep at night and the first out the door in the morning.
I kept myself on the go that way, hiving the bees without much success. The colored of Harpers Ferry lived on the far side of the Potomac railroad tracks. I hung around them for days, looking for coloreds to talk to. Course they avoided me like the plague. Word had gotten around to them ’bout the Old Man’s plot by then. I never did figure out how, but the colored wanted no parts of it nor me, and when they seen me, moved off quick. I was especially moved to discouragement one morning when the Old Man sent me on an errand to the lumber mill. I couldn’t find it, and when I rolled up to a colored woman on the road to ask for directions, before I could open my mouth, she said, “Scatter thee, varmint. I ain’t got nothing to do with you and your kind! You gonna get us all murdered!” and off she went.
That moved me to discouragement badly. But it weren’t all bad news. After Kagi arrived, he met up on his own with the Rail Man, and I reckon his cool manner calmed the Rail Man some, for Kagi reported they’d gone over various plans to get the colored to the Ferry from points east and thereabouts, and the Rail Man seemed to have it worked out right and promised to deliver. That pleased the Old Man no end. He announced to the others, “Luckily for us, the Onion has been diligent in her work, hiving.”
