Free Stealing Freedom by Elisa Carbone Page B

can
sell.
“
    Ann felt suddenly dizzy and sick to her stomach. She wished she hadn't come to listen as she and her mother and sister were sorted out and priced like cattle. “Let's go,” she whispered, and tugged on Catharine's hand.
    “It's all right, Ann,” said Catharine. “We're going to be free soon, and none of that will matter. We'll just be girls.” She stroked Ann's cheek.
    But as they rose to leave, Ann saw her sister's face go slack as Master Charles's words drifted from the window: “All right, then. Twenty-six hundred it is. My wife will have to get used to only one extra pair of hands to help around the house.”
    “Mr. Price, won't you please reconsider—”
    “Mr. Bigelow—” Master Charles sounded angry. “I have made up my mind, and I don't enjoy being argued with. I will not leave my wife without household help. If you don't want the mother and the older girl, then I suggest you leave.”
    “No!” Catharine said, too loudly, “He can't do that!”
    Ann choked on her own breath. It couldn't be. They must have heard wrong.
    Two heads appeared at the window. Master Charles pointed at Catharine. “You,” he said, “go tell your mother and father you're leaving.” Then, to Mr. Bigelow beside him, he said, “I want you to take your property and go. I'll not have them crying and wailing around here all night.”
    Catharine grasped Ann's hand and started to run. Ann stumbled, keeping up with her.
    “Mamma! Papa!” Catharine cried as they neared the cabin. “Don't let them do it!” She fell into Arabella's arms. “They're going to make us go away and leave Ann here.”
    Their father placed one hand on Catharine's head and looked up at Ann. Ann stopped short of the group of three, huddled together. She felt as if she were sinking, dropping away from them.
    “This is not what I asked for,” her father said angrily. “I want to join this family together, not break it apart!” He marched up the hill and met Jacob Bigelow, who was on his way down. Ann watched as they gestured. They seemed to be arguing.
    Catharine came to her. “Papa won't let them do it,” she said. “He'll tell them we won't leave you.”
    But Ann already felt it. The fabric of her family had been ripped again, and she was the piece that was being torn off.
    Her father's shoulders drooped with despair when he returned down the hill. “Oh, baby girl,” was all he could say as he enveloped her in a hug that seemed to want to blot out the rest of the world. She felt his body shake and knew it was toolate to take back anything that had been decided that afternoon. Ann held him tightly and tried to memorize the feel of his arms and chest.
    “Are we leaving, John?” her mother asked quietly. “Am I losing another child?”
    “No!” Ann's father released her and tightened his fists. “We'll get her back as surely as we'll get the boys.”
    Ann felt herself sink further away. She was as lost as her brothers in Alabama. She felt her mother's embrace and vowed to remember the softness of it. She tried to press back tears, but they flowed down her cheeks.
    “Can't you stop them?” Catharine begged of their father.
    Jacob Bigelow answered for him. “Your master took my offer very quickly, Miss Catharine. It was likely he already planned to sell you and your mother before the move to Rockville. If I leave you here with your sister, your fate can only be worse.”
    At that moment Master Charles came down the hill, shouting that he'd heard enough weeping for one day. He stood between Ann and her family, his arms crossed, and ordered them to pack and leave at once. “And I don't want you coming to find us in Rockville, is that clear? I will send her to you at Christmas, but if I see
any
of you”—he looked hard, first at Mr. Bigelow and then at her father—”prowling around my home in Rockville, I will have you promptly arrested.”
    “And what will be the charge?” Mr. Bigelow demanded.
    Master Charles grew red in