Free Liberating Atlantis by Harry Turtledove Page A

away. And he could, if he got any kind of chance. He had his switch and a knife with a blade long enough to gut a man like a hog. Frederick didn’t think he was a coward, either. Life would have been simpler if he were, but no.
    There was plenty to eat. Fewer and fewer field hands came out to work, but the cooks went on making as much as they always had. More than one slave patted his belly and grinned after he finished eating. Frederick was surprised Matthew hadn’t noticed what was going on and done something about it, but the overseer hadn’t. It wasn’t as if he didn’t have other things on his mind.
    And so did Henry Barford. The planter looked like a man bathing in hellfire when he came out onto the front porch. Eyes wild, he pointed at one of the cavalrymen guarding the precious wagons. “Where’s that lieutenant of yours, the God-damned son of a bitch bastard?”
    “Sir, Lieutenant Torrance is sick. He’s mighty sick,” the trooper answered. “He can’t see anybody right now. What’s the matter?”
    “What’s the matter? What’s the God-damned matter ?” Barford howled. “My wife is puking up this horrible black gunk—looks like coffee grounds—and you ask me what’s the matter? Your miserable, stinking lieutenant is what’s the matter, that’s what! Bringing the yellow jack to my plantation! I don’t want to see the lousy bugger. I want to horsewhip him!”
    “Well, sir, if it makes you feel any better, he’s heaving up black stuff, too,” the soldier said. “I don’t think he’s going to pull through.”
    “Too bad,” Barford said, which surprised Frederick till he added, “I wanted to kill him with my own hands. But I reckon the yellow jack’ll have to do. Though why a merciful God would take my sweet Clotilde, too . . .” He turned and lurched back into the big house.
    Sweet? Frederick shook his head. Mistress Clotilde was about as sweet as vinegar. She was the one who’d wanted to give him more lashes than Master Henry. That was just like her, too. Did her husband really believe what he was saying, or was he trying to make the trooper feel worse?
    From inside the house, Barford shouted, “I’ll sue the government for every last eagle it’s got! You wait and see if I don’t!”
    The cavalryman only shrugged. He scratched his nose, as if to say it was no skin off that organ. Unless the planter came out shooting—or unless the soldier got yellow fever—it wasn’t his worry.
    “Come on,” Matthew called to the field hands. “Grab your tools. The work doesn’t go away. The work never goes away. I know we’re shorthanded, but we’ve got to keep at it. Otherwise, the harvest’ll be bad, and then we’ll all go hungry.”
    He wouldn’t. Master Henry would yell at him, but that was all. The field hands really might go hungry in a bad year. Or Barford might have to sell some of them, which would be almost as rough. Frederick snorted quietly. He had other things on his own mind besides what the master might do after a bad harvest.
    “You ain’t said anything to anybody,” Helen said as they walked out to the cotton field with tools on their shoulders. Hopefully, she added, “You gone and changed your mind?”
    “Nope. Not me,” Frederick answered. People said stubborn as a Radcliff . By that standard alone, he might have guessed he shared blood with one of the First Consuls. Even Henry Barford had sometimes seemed more proud than annoyed when calling him a hardheaded smoke. But Frederick also had other things than that on his mind. “Sometimes all the talking in the world doesn’t do a cent’s worth of good. Sometimes you got to show people instead.”
    Helen clicked her tongue between her teeth. “Oh, Fred, what are you gonna do?”
    Burn my bridges , Frederick thought. But that wasn’t what she wanted to hear. All he said was, “What I’ve got to do.”
    Helen shook her head, but she didn’t say anything more, either. Maybe she hoped he would change his mind