A Light to My Path Read online

  Everything went blurry as tears filled Kitty’s eyes. “I don’t know what that means. I don’t know how to find myself,” she said. “Can’t you just tell me what to do, Delia?”

  “Go back to the beginning,” she said gently. “How’d you get to this day? If you know where you’re starting from, and if you know where you’re wanting to end up, then maybe you can find the path in between.”

  Kitty knew the beginning—of Grady’s story as well as her own. She knew where they both had started out from. She wiped her tears and gazed toward the woods, remembering a time when her name had been Anna… .

  PART ONE

  I cried out to God for help;

  I cried out to God to hear me.

  When I was in distress, I sought the Lord;

  at night I stretched out untiring hands

  and my soul refused to be comforted… .

  Has his unfailing love vanished forever?

  Has his promise failed for all time?

  Psalm 77:1–2, 8 NIV

  Chapter One

  Great Oak Plantation

  South Carolina 1849

  Anna stood on the cabin’s top step, peering into the distance. It was no use. Even on her tiptoes she could see only the top of the Great Oak Tree. She was too small. And the carriage house blocked her view.

  Behind her the other children squealed and giggled as they played in the muddy yard outside Slave Row. Last night’s rain had pooled in shallow puddles, and her playmates had made a game out of squishing the mud between their fingers and toes and smearing it on their bare, brown skin.

  Anna didn’t want to play in the mud. And she didn’t want to draw pictures in the dirt like she always did, either. She’d had the dream again last night, but it was growing as worn and faded as threadbare calico. If only she could touch the Great Oak Tree again and gaze at the vivid green woods beyond it, maybe she could keep the dream from fading altogether.

  The tree seemed miles and miles away, up near the Big House where she was forbidden to go. Old Nellie had threatened to use the hickory switch on Anna if she went up there again. But Nellie was old and couldn’t see very well. She’d gotten too tired and bent over to work in the rice fields with the other slaves, so now she took care of their children all day.

  The Great Oak Tree’s top branches swayed in the breeze, and they seemed to be waving to Anna. She suddenly decided that she didn’t care if she got switched; she had to go. When Old Nellie carried one of the babies into the cabin, Anna saw her chance. She crept quietly away from the colorless slave yard, staying close to the row of weathered cabins, hoping no one would notice her. She turned up the driveway when she reached the carriage house, walking faster now that she was out of sight. Stones and crushed oyster shells dug into her bare feet; knots of buzzing flies warned her where the horse droppings were.

  She reached the edge of the lawn at last and saw the tree up ahead, its massive trunk and spreading branches a dark silhouette against the blue sky. Pale silver moss entwined with the leaves and swayed gently in the breeze. Anna stepped off the driveway onto the warm, prickly grass and began to run.

  The Great Oak Tree that gave the plantation its name stood on a rise overlooking the Edisto River, a sentry marker for ships that ferried the plantation’s rice crop down to Charleston. Anna ran to it as if for shelter, resting her small palms against the bark. She felt dwarfed alongside it yet somehow very safe. She gazed up into the canopy of branches and leaves above her head, and the memories stirred.

  Once there had been a tall, strong man she’d called Papa, a man she could run to for refuge. His voice was very deep and he sang to her sometimes, humming a tune that had no words. The oak’s dark branches reminded her of his ebony arms, strong and muscular with corded sinews and tendons. Anna looked up at the outstretched limbs and remembered how Papa’s arms had reached out to her, lifting her, carrying her.

  She closed her eyes and listened to the swishing leaves and heard her mother’s soothing whispers, the rustling of her skirts. Mama had been soft and sweet smelling, like the breeze that blew from the nearby flower beds. Whenever Anna had gazed into Mama’s dark eyes she’d seen tenderness and love and a fierce protectiveness that made her feel very safe.

  Then everything had changed.

  One day the place where they lived and ate and slept was no longer surrounded by whitewashed walls but by trees—trees and bushes and tangled vines that were so tall and gnarled and thick they blotted out the sun. Anna remembered the sound of palmetto saplings brushing past her legs, rustling like her mother’s voice: “Shh, Anna … shh… . You can’t make a sound.” Papa hummed his song very softly to her in that place.

  Now Anna opened her eyes again, summoning the courage to peer into the distance beyond the Great Oak Tree, beyond the last swath of cut grass to where the woods began. She needed to soak up the lush green colors of the forest, memorizing them. But some deep fear kept her from ever venturing into that terrible place.

  The woods she had lived in with Mama and Papa had been just like that distant forest—wet and green and sticky-hot, yet rich in the rainbow of colors she loved. There had been emerald blankets of thick moss coating the sides of the trees. Anna still remembered how fuzzy the moss felt beneath her hand. The trees wore long gray beards of Spanish moss.

  Sometimes Papa carried her on his shoulders through the maze of green, his arms burdened with the quilt that held their bundled belongings. Sometimes Anna walked, following along behind Papa’s creamy homespun shirt, the cloth dark with patches of sweat beneath his arms and down his back. The earth felt wet and soft under her feet, and tiny green frogs zigzagged across the path.

  Papa carefully steered around the king snakes and rattlers that slithered across the trail or lay coiled in patches of dappled sunlight, but he hadn’t been afraid. “They won’t bother you none, if you don’t bother them,” he’d told her.

  The sound of croaking, gulping frogs filled the thick air along with the harsh drones of cicadas and whirrs of insects. Anna swatted at the huge metallic-green dragonflies that swooped around her head. Mosquitoes and gnats and midges swarmed around her in a humming cloud, biting and stinging her arms and legs. Mama had tied a red bandana around Anna’s head, just like the one she always wore, to keep the bugs out of her thick hair.

  Once, as she rode on Papa’s shoulders, they’d passed beneath an arch of tree branches and she’d felt cobwebs on her face. She looked up to see a huge spider, its outstretched legs as broad as her mother’s hand. Anna had cried out in fright, and Papa had quickly dropped his bundle and swung her down from his shoulders, clapping his hand over her mouth to silence her. His movements had been swift and rough but his eyes were gentle and kind as he whispered, “Hush, now. Them spiders ain’t gonna hurt you. They’re big, but they don’t mean you no harm. They’re the Lord’s creatures, too.”

  Papa and Mama walked a long, long time, it seemed, barely pausing to sleep or eat. Whenever Anna had grown hungry, Mama would pull a piece of corn bread or bits of smoked pork from the bag she carried, saying, “Thank you, Jesus, for this food” before they ate it. At dusk they sometimes saw white-tailed deer. Owls hooted in the darkness at night as Anna dozed on Papa’s shoulders or in his arms.

  They passed cypress trees with bell-shaped trunks that reminded Anna of hoopskirts. In places, the path grew so marshy that Papa’s feet sank, and sometimes the path disappeared completely in the swamp. All that remained of it were tiny islands of trees surrounded by brackish water. Papa hopped from one island to the next until they grew too far apart, then waded through the knee-deep water. He put Anna high on his shoulders, and he unsheathed his knife, alert for alligators. He’d shown her one, floating in the water like a fallen log with only its eyes and snout peeking above the surface.

  One day the narrow path ended beside a stretch of dark green grass. Papa had pulled Anna back as she’d started toward it. “You can’t walk on that, Anna,” he whispered. “That ain’t grass, it’s water. It
won’t hold you.”

  Anna didn’t believe him. “Then why is that bird sitting on it? See?” she asked, pointing.

  Papa shook his head. “He ain’t sitting.” He tossed a pebble at the bird, and as it launched itself into the air on graceful white wings, the bird’s long, stick-like legs dangled for a moment. Then they curled beneath its body, hidden again, as they had been hidden beneath the water.

  But as beautiful as the woods were, Anna recalled that journey with fear. Her family had been running from something. Anna didn’t know where they were going or why, but her parents’ faces wore looks of alarm and desperation. Mama would glance over her shoulder at each new sound, and Papa stopped to listen every now and then, wary and alert. “Lord Jesus, help us,” he would murmur. “Shine your light on our path.”

  As the days passed, fear began building inside Anna, too, as she sensed her parents’ tension, absorbing it. Even now, as she stood beneath the plantation’s Great Oak Tree and gazed at the distant forest, that fear twisted inside her.

  Their journey had ended in terror. One day Anna had heard a new sound in the distance, a harsh braying that made her skin prickle. Papa had stopped to listen as soon as he’d noticed the faroff barking, and his face turned gray with despair.

  “No …” he groaned. “Oh, please, Lord Jesus … no …”

  Mama clutched his arm. “What? What is it?”

  “Dogs. They’re tracking us with dogs.” Papa scooped Anna into his arms and they began to run.

  The barking drew closer. Along with it came the distant crack of gunfire. Bullets whizzed through the leaves around them like wasps. Papa ran and ran with Mama and Anna, never stopping, gasping for breath. They wove and ducked through the tangled woods and swamps, searching desperately for a place to hide. The dogs were much closer now, splashing through the water behind them. Shouts echoed through the woods, men’s voices commanding them to halt. The men rode on horseback and Anna could hear hooves pounding down the trail, sloshing through the swamp, drawing nearer.

  Papa ran and ran, but it was no use. The dogs had found them, and there was no place to hide in the gloomy swamp. The hounds raced through the woods, converging on them like a single, snarling beast, snapping at Papa’s legs, tearing at Mama’s skirts, forcing them to stop. Papa held Anna high above their reach, trying to kick the dogs away. But three white men suddenly broke through the woods on horseback, their guns aimed.

  “Lord Jesus, help us!” Papa breathed.

  Anna buried her face against Papa’s chest as he lowered her into his arms, hugging her close to himself. She was afraid to look, afraid to cry out or make a sound. Then Mama screamed, and Anna felt her father’s body lurch. He was trying to shield Anna and remain standing as the men clubbed him with their rifles. At last Papa staggered and fell, landing on his knees, still clutching Anna, covering her with his own body as men and dogs attacked. The rest of the dream turned into a nightmare that she couldn’t—or wouldn’t—remember.

  “Anna! Get over here!”

  She came out of her reverie to see Old Nellie beckoning to her from across the yard. “Anna? You hearing me? I said get on over here!” The old woman stood near the carriage house, as far as she dared to come.

  Anna pressed her palms against the dark tree trunk one last time and braved a final, fleeting look at the distant forest. Then she turned and dashed across the grass toward Slave Row. Old Nellie had a hickory switch in her hand, and she caught Anna by the arm as she sped past and thrashed her bare legs all the way back to the cabin.

  That night Anna lay alone in the darkness, clinging to the memories that the Great Oak Tree had awakened. She was no longer certain that the doomed flight through the swamps had been real—or that she’d ever really had a mama and papa. She drifted to sleep, longing for them to come to her again in her dreams, hoping that the dream would end differently this time.

  Chapter Two

  Richmond, Virginia 1853

  “Get up, boy.”

  Grady opened his eyes. Gilbert stood over him, shaking the sleep from him. Was it morning? It seemed too dark, too quiet in the loft above the kitchen for it to be morning. He heard the faint drumbeat of rain on the roof.

  “Get up,” Gilbert repeated. “Massa Fletcher wants you.”

  The urgency in Gilbert’s voice made Grady’s heart pound faster, like the drumming rain. And there was something else that Grady couldn’t quite place—something very wrong. The day had started out all wrong. Massa Fletcher’s manservant never came up to the loft to wake him. Massa Fletcher never sent for Grady.

  “But why? What’s he want?” Grady asked. His movements felt sluggish, his limbs still heavy with sleep as he pulled on his trousers.

  Gilbert opened his mouth as if to speak, then stopped. He quickly looked away but not before Grady saw Gilbert’s chin tremble the way a woman’s does when she’s about to cry. “If you got shoes,” Gilbert said hoarsely, “better put them on.”

  A sick feeling gripped Grady’s stomach as he climbed down the ladder to the kitchen. He smelled ham frying and biscuits baking, but something was wrong here, too. Esther wasn’t bustling around in her usual way, clanging pots and yelling at Luella. Instead, Esther stood beside the fireplace, her hands over her mouth as if she was trying to hold something terrible inside. Tears trailed down her broad face the same way the rain washed down the kitchen window. Esther’s eyes never left Grady’s face as he finished descending the ladder and slowly headed toward the door. He wanted to ask Esther what was the matter, but before he could speak she suddenly reached for him, pulling him into her arms, hugging the breath from him. Her body shook the way it did when Eli told one of his funny stories, but Esther wasn’t laughing.

  “Here, now!” Gilbert said. “Don’t you do that, Esther. Don’t, now.” He pried her arms open, freeing Grady, then pushed him toward the door. The sick feeling in his belly tightened as he emerged into the cold rain. Then he froze at the sound of his mother’s horrible, anguished cries.

  “No … no!

  ” She was running toward him from the Big House wearing only her nightclothes, her eyes wild with fright. “Please don’t take him. Please don’t take my boy from me. Please!

  ” Eli ran right behind her, grabbing her and stopping her before she could reach Grady. “Mama!” he cried. He started toward her, but a white man Grady had never seen before lunged at him, gripping his arm and wrenching it painfully as he pulled him backward.

  “Hey! Come back here, boy!”

  Grady began to scream. It was what people did when they wanted to wake up from a nightmare—and that’s surely what this was. He screamed and screamed, longing to wake up and see his mama bending over him, to hear Esther’s familiar clamor downstairs in the kitchen. He would begin this day all over again, the way he always did, toting water and fetching wood for the kitchen fire, helping Eli with Massa Fletcher’s horses. In the afternoon, when Missy Caroline finished her lessons in the Big House, they would play together in the backyard beneath the warm Virginia sun.

  But Grady didn’t wake up. This wasn’t a dream. He cried out for help as he twisted and kicked, desperate to free himself from the stranger’s grip. He could hear his mama’s cries above his own.

  “Please don’t send my boy away. I beg you, Massa! Please!

  ” A second white man gripped Grady’s other arm and they dragged him down the brick walkway toward the street. Massa Fletcher stood near the wrought-iron gate, his arms folded across his chest. Rain darkened the shoulders of his overcoat and the brim of his hat as he calmly watched, deaf to Grady’s screams and his mama’s anguished cries.

  “No! Don’t take my boy! He’s all I got! Please, Massa! No!

  ” Grady glimpsed Massa’s cold, dark eyes for a moment and saw neither pity nor regret in them. Then the strangers dragged Grady out of the safety of the yard, propelling him toward a wagon filled with Negroes that was parked by the curb. One of the white men prodded the slaves with the butt of his whip, shouting
at them to make room on the wagon. Then the two men lifted Grady like a sack of feed and tossed him onboard.

  Grady struggled and fought for freedom as the damp bodies of strangers pressed all around him, holding him down. Rain soaked his clothes and ran down his face along with his tears. The wagon jolted and began to move.

  “Mama!” he screamed.

  “Don’t you let them white folks hear you cry!” The hushed voice in Grady’s ear was urgent, demanding. “Don’t you ever give them that power over you.”

  But Grady couldn’t have stopped crying even if he’d wanted 27 to. “Mama! I want my mama!”

  “Don’t you let them know that,” the man insisted. “That’s how they keep us down, how they torment us. Show some pride, boy.” The man gripped one of Grady’s arms, but he continued to kick and squirm, desperate to break free.

  “Hush, now … stop …” a woman’s voice soothed. “Ain’t doing no good to fight. You only hurt yourself if you’re falling off this wagon, and then they’re catching you anyways.” Someone gripped his feet to keep him from kicking. The hands holding him all had shackles and chains attached to their wrists. The cold metal bumped against Grady as the wagon rumbled down the hill into downtown Richmond.

  Grady was still fighting and struggling, sobbing in frustration and fear when the wagon finally drew to a halt. Every inch of his body ached, and his throat burned from screaming. The two white men climbed down from the wagon and began shouting at Grady and the others, prodding them like animals as they herded them into a fortress-like building. Dark faces peered out from behind barred windows. Grady heard the jangling, clanking sound of iron chains with every movement the captives made, scraping across the paving stones as they shuffled into the building, rattling from their wrists as they wiped the rain from their faces. Only young children like Grady had been left unshackled.