Citizens Creek by Lalita Tademy

Harry watched waves of unresisting men, women, and children herded on board the Paragon , as military men steered them up and onto the boat. At first, Cow Tom peered into every face, but saw only averted eyes, resignation, and weariness. The new crop of Negroes varied widely in appearance, from those who could have just stepped off the boat from Africa to those who could easily pass as Seminole full-bloods. They didn’t move singly, but clumped together in groups, babes in arms, children clinging to a mother’s tunic, boys and girls of the same age holding hands as they headed up the plank. Cow Tomturned away to collect himself, but in the end, couldn’t resist, and stared again at the oncoming wave of humanity. They all looked exhausted, and hungry, and several sickly, helping one another forward.
    Three-quarters of the refugees were already boarded, the others waiting on the sandy swath of land beyond the gangplank for their turn. A white man appeared at a distance from inland, running his two-horse wagon team hard. He angled his winded horses directly alongside the ship, set the brake, and jumped down from the riding platform. He was civilian, plump and scruffy. An enormous, unkempt brown curly beard came all the way down to the middle of his chest, hiding much of the crumpled jacket beneath. Long loops of heavy chain and manacles lay in his wagon bed. The man made for the gangplank and tried to board the Paragon , but one of the military men blocked him. The man waved a paper, increasingly agitated.
    “Take me to the man in charge,” he bellowed.
    The soldier talked to him quietly, but the man was having none of it, and he made such a ruckus that the soldier finally sent for the captain, who met him at the foot of the gangplank.
    “Some of these are my Negroes,” the man said, again offering up the papers. “They can’t be allowed to leave Florida.”
    The captain barely glanced at the pages. Cow Tom saw easy dismissal of documentation enough times in his work as translator to posit that the captain of the Paragon most likely couldn’t read.
    “We have a transport contract with the military,” said the captain to the white man. “This is no concern of mine.”
    “I’m here to take my property with me. I demand to board and claim my property.”
    “If there were claims,” the captain said, “they should be handled before now. My agreement holds with the government, and the cargo is arrived. Payment is based on the number of heads I deliver. The only amendments I recognize, sir, are with the government.”
    “There!” the white man said. He aimed a long, crooked fingerat a dark face on the boat. Cow Tom caught only a quick glimpse of gunnysack and a printed head scarf, swirled, before the accused melted back into the others and disappeared from view. He was fairly certain she was a woman, short and dark-skinned. “See her? That one is mine.”
    From the shore, the man continued to scan the clutch of bodies. “And that one!” he declared, pointing at a stocky man just to the other side of Harry.
    Almost as one, the Negroes shrank back from the railings, cloaking their bodies as best they could, lowering their gaze and hiding their faces, easing their backs to the man on the shore, as if they too might soon be singled out.
    “I demand their return. And there must be more. I demand to search the boat.”
    He advanced toward the gangplank, but the captain put himself directly in his path.
    “This is my vessel. This is my cargo.” He whispered to one of his sailors, who began to move the last few Negroes up and onto the boat. “There’s to be no open poaching on my ship today.”
    The white man reddened. “You dare stand in the way of regaining rightful property?”
    “Take it up with the government,” said the captain. “We depart within the half hour.”
    The man turned to the military men still on land. “Let me on this boat.”
    “We have our orders,” one said. The other shrugged a sheepish