The overseer said all this with a smile on his face. Lucius hated him for that. For a fleeting moment, he wished he still had the knife in his hand. “Here’s a pass to their place. You have to be there by sundown. You know the way,” said the overseer. “Now get out of my sight!”
Lucius collected a few belongings. Then he walked back to the home he had not seen for years. That evening, as he reacquainted himself with familiar faces that had grown several years older, he learned the news: Richard Bennett had died two weeks earlier. His son Langston was running the plantation.
These memories flashed through Lucius’s mind as he followed Tucker Hughes up the stairs. He was determined to catch the younger man.
Bennett had treated Lucius very well as the years passed into decades. He had let Lucius start a family, gave him a prestigious job inside the plantation house, and now rarely traveled anywhere without his favorite servant. Lucius once heard it said that the art of being a slave is to rule one’s master. He knew that nobody ruled Bennett, but he also believed that he had achieved a position of reasonable comfort. He doubted that someone who was not white could have a better life in the South. At the same time, he privately shared Nelly’s hope that his whole race might be free one day. He wanted that for his grandchildren more than himself. He never said such a thing, of course. Not even to Nelly.
The urgency of the moment again intruded on these thoughts. Hughes was about to enter the study.
“Please, Mr. Hughes! Let me!” said Lucius.
Hughes looked up irritably but took a step back. Lucius nodded to him-a thank-you that was not heartfelt-and opened the door. Inside, Bennett looked up. Piles of books and newspapers cluttered the room. Both Lucius and Hughes knew that Bennett was a voracious reader. He read almost every word in every issue of the Charleston Mercury and De Bow’s Review plus several other periodicals. He even used to get Harper’s Weekly, which was published in New York. Yet the local bookshops stopped carrying it when it printed pictures of Lincoln.
“Mr. Hughes is here, sir.”
Hughes entered the room, arms outstretched. “Langston,” he said, with a big grin on his face.
The men exchanged greetings. Hughes eventually took a seat and picked up a book on a table beside him. He flipped to the title page: The War in Nicaragua, written by William Walker and published by S. H. Goetzel amp; Co. in Mobile. On the facing page, a picture of Walker made him look harmless, even effeminate. It was hard to believe this man had led a small army of American adventurers into Nicaragua and had briefly become the little country’s president.
“It’s surprising how photographs are appearing everywhere,” said Hughes.
“It may be a passing fancy,” grunted Bennett. “I’ve never had mine taken.”
“Really? We have to do something about that.” Hughes continued to flip through the pages of the Walker book. “Are we mentioned in here?”
“Fortunately not.”
The light in the room brightened. Hughes looked up to see Lucius adjusting an oil lamp.
“It arrived last fall, around the time of Walker’s death,” said Bennett. “He wrote it to raise money for that final expedition-the one that killed him.”
“I was sorry to hear what had happened,” said Hughes.
“There was a time when you and I believed he held promise. His success might have changed recent events for the better. If some part of Spanish America had been integrated into the Union, we might have averted this whole secession crisis.”
“We did what we could. Yet we were foolish to think the Northern states would ever permit a filibuster like Walker to succeed in one of his conquests-and let Nicaragua, Cuba, or any part of Mexico into the Union as a slaveholding state. I am coming to believe the North actually wants this calamity.”
Hughes set the book back on the table where he had found it. “How exactly did he die? All I heard was that he was executed.”
“The Brits caught him in Honduras plotting a new incursion. They handed him over to the locals, who put him in front of a firing squad.” Bennett lowered his voice. “After they had riddled his body with bullets, the captain walked over to his slumped form, placed the barrel of his musket in Walker’s face, and pulled the trigger. The shot obliterated his features.”
The image made Hughes cringe. “You might have spared me that detail,” he said, shifting around in his chair. He noticed the pleasure Bennett seemed to take from his discomfort.
“Today, of course, I’m much less interested in the events occurring outside our borders than those occurring within them,” said Bennett.
So now it was down to business, thought Hughes. Bennett seemed uncommonly serious this evening.
“Lucius, would you please excuse us? I’ll call if we need anything.”
The slave left and closed the door. Alone in the room with Bennett now, Hughes stood up. He found that pacing made it easier to think.
“Tucker, do you seriously think we can win a war against the North?”
Bennett knew the answer to that question, thought Hughes. They had debated it plenty of times before. It was a rather famous disagreement between the two of them. Why raise it now?
“My opinion on that has not changed, Langston. The South may prevail. We have better leaders, and we will fight a defensive war in protection of our homes and our ways. That gives us a significant advantage.”
“Your ideas on that are thoughtful,” said Bennett, “even though they are wrong.” He paused to let that comment sink in. “Open warfare is exactly the wrong approach. The men now aiming cannons across the water at Fort Sumter are hotheads. They are ready to fire, and they have not given any consideration to whether Virginia will secede, whether they can secure agreements with the border states, or whether they can make treaties with foreign nations. They will act, then think-rather than think, then act.”
Hughes had heard this before too. Their discussion this evening was like attending a play he had already seen several times. He knew how it would end. Yet Bennett seemed to want to go over the same ground another time. When would the old man ever broach the subject of inheritance? He had no heir-not even a relative. Everybody in Charleston thought he would name Hughes as the main beneficiary of his estate. But so far, he had not. Hughes had hoped tonight might be the night. Then again, this hope seized him every time Bennett summoned him for a visit. Time to return to the script, he thought. I have a part to play.
“Perhaps this business with Sumter is a welcome development,” said Hughes. As he strolled around the room, he spotted some correspondence sitting on a table near Bennett. He immediately wanted to read it. “We’ve known for years that preserving our institutions may require war. Better to strike a blow for our freedom and our culture now than to curl up and let Lincoln destroy them over time and on his terms.”
Bennett shook his head. “That fight cannot be won against the Northerners, at least not in the way you imagine. They have men, money, and material on their side. They are manufacturers. They have a navy. We are an agricultural people. We have rice, sugar, and cotton. It is not enough to win a war. We must consider other options. I want to do something for South Carolina, Tucker-one last thing before my days are done. I want to strike one final blow for the whole South.”
This is new, thought Hughes. Bennett had not hinted at a specific plan of action before. “You puzzle me,” said Hughes, stepping leisurely to the table. Bennett’s back was to him. “One moment you sound like a conciliator who wants to avoid war. The next you say you want to do something for the South. I hope that what you intend to do is something besides giving up.”
“I will never surrender,” sputtered Bennett. “There can be no compromise on the slavery question. We cannot live under politicians whose idea of democracy is that when three people get together, the two shall rule the one. Our institutions must survive. It is our right that they do. And therefore, we must aim directly at the heart of Black Republican rule.”