Rhoda of the Underground

by Florence Finch Kelly

The box, short and narrow and looking hardly large enough to contain a human being, was hurried into Jim’s room and the cover quickly removed. Within was the huddled figure of a woman, her knees drawn up to her chin, and all her body held in the close confines as tightly as in a vise. She did not move and when they spoke to her there was no answer.

“No, she’s not dead,” said Dr. Ware, his finger on her pulse. They lifted her out and restorative measures soon brought her back to consciousness. But she was ghastly pale and trembling from head to foot.

“You poor thing! You’re safe now,” Rhoda soothed, patting her arm, as she began to sob hysterically. “We are your friends and we’ll take care of you.”

She was young and comely, perhaps one-fourth colored, with neither complexion nor features showing more than a faint trace of her negro heritage. Presently they were able to give her food and water, and a little later she told them her story. As she talked Rhoda sat beside her, clasping her hand and now and then patting her arm in sympathy and encouragement. Her speech was simple, but good, showing intelligence and some training.

“How did Mr. Wilson happen to send you in a box?” asked Dr. Ware.

“It was the only way. They had to get rid of me quick. I’d been sold to a trader from New Orleans and he’d brought me and a lot of others to Louisville to take us on the steamboat. I knew he’d paid a big price for me, and from that and the way he talked me over I knew what he’d bought me for. I made up my mind I’d rather die, or do anything. A chance happened to come, on the street in Louisville, as he was taking us to the boat, and in a crowd I give him the slip.

“I didn’t know what I’d do or where I’d go, but I just hurried along down another street, and then I saw the man who’d been at master’s plantation last year and told us about going to Canada if we wanted to try it.”

“Yes—Mr. Wilson,” Dr. Ware interrupted.

“I knew him right away, though he looked different, and I spoke to him and told him what I wanted. He said to follow him and we walked fast and turned up and down streets, and came to a free woman’s house. But they’d followed us, and in two or three minutes they were at the door. The woman took me into the back room and told me to jump into that box. Then she put the cover down quick and went back and I heard the men go all round the house looking for me and they swore at the woman and told her they’d seen me come in and they’d watch the house and keep on searching it till they got me. Then the man—Mr. Wilson, you said?—spoke up right loud and said he couldn’t wait any longer and would she have his clothes ready if he’d send for the box right away, ’cause he wanted to catch the boat for Cincinnati. I ’spected he meant me, and he did. She put a pillow in the box and some biscuits and a bottle of water, and cut a little hole in the side, so I could breathe.

“I thought I was gwine die in the box,” the woman went on, again showing signs of hysteria, as memory of her experience returned. “It was such a little box I had to be all crunched up and I got awful pains, and sometimes it seemed as if I’d just have to scream right out. And then I’d think what would happen if I did, and I’d be caught and they’d flog me and send me—where they’d bought me for, and then I’d bite hard on the pillow and keep still. And once the box was turned up so I was on my head till I knew I was gwine die in another minute, but they turned it down again and I didn’t.”