Nothing much was happening in Maryland that spring of 1834. In Virginia they hanged Nat Turner. John Brown, on a wave of prosperity, was making money in his Ohio tannery. William Lloyd Garrison was publishing the Liberator in Boston, and a man named Lovejoy was trying to start an Abolitionist paper out West, trying both Kansas and Ohio. But Maryland had everything under control.
The Coveys had no neighbors. The farm, surrounded on three sides with water, lay beyond a wide tract of straggling pine trees. The trees on Covey’s land had been cut down, and the unpainted buildings were shaken and stained by heavy northwest winds. From her attic window Amelia could see Poplar Island, covered with a thick black forest, and Keat Point, stretching its sandy, desert-like shores out into the foam-crested bay. It was a desolate scene.
The rains were heavy that spring, and Covey stayed in the fields until long after dark, urging the slaves on with words or blows. He left nothing to Hughes, his cousin and overseer.
“Niggers drop off to sleep minute you turn your back,” he groaned. “Have to keep right behind ’em.”
Amelia battled with mud tracked from one end of the house to the other.
Then came summer with its oppressive heat and flashing thunder storms that whipped the waters to roaring fury.
“Family” prayers were dispensed with only on Sunday mornings. Regardless of the weather, Mr. Covey and his wife went to church. It was regrettable that the slaves had no regular services. Big plantations could always boast of at least one slave preacher. Mr. Covey hadn’t reached that status yet. He was on his way. He observed the Sabbath as a day of rest. Nobody had to go to the fields, and nothing much had to be done—except the cooking, of course.
So Amelia could lie in bed this Sunday morning in August. All night the attic had been like a bake-oven. Just before dawn it had cooled a little, and Amelia lay limp. By raising herself on her elbow she could see through a slit in the sloping roof. White sails skimmed across the shining surface of the bay. Amelia sighed. This morning the white ships depressed her. They were going somewhere.
The heat, she thought, closing her eyes, had made things worse than usual. Mr. Covey would certainly kill that Fred—that is, if he wasn’t already dead. Well, why didn’t he do his work? She had thought at first the boy had intelligence, but here of late he’d lost every spark of sense—just slunk around, looking glum and mean, not paying any attention to what was told him. Then yesterday—pretending to be sick!
“Reckon I ’bout broke every bone in his body,” Mr. Covey had grunted with satisfaction.