Safe

• May Warry, Grade 8
• Short Story
• 2012

She was tall. Tall, skinny, and scrawny. Her shirt was dirty, skirt long and torn. She was a black slave, about to be auctioned.
The sun beat down on the Illinois harbour, the sea sparkling so much it hurt her eyes. People gathered around the wooden block in the market place and looked at her, inspecting her. Over the bustle of the market, the auctioneer yelled to the crowds.
The young woman wondered who her next master would be. Would they be kind, or cruel? Would they have her work on a farm, or in a house?
“Thirty dollars over here!”
“I’ll give you forty!”
She hated this life, was sick of being treated like a possession. She looked over at the sea of white men bargaining for her. One particular gentleman smiled sadly at her when she turned her eyes on him. He looked well-to-do, and kind. She gritted her teeth. “I…will…not…work.”
“Shut up,” someone said.
“I said, ‘I won’t work!’”
The whip came sharp and hard, a sting on her back. She yelped in pain, and her eyes watered. The slave locked eyes with the same man again. He just looked at her, nodded, and interrupted the bargaining.
“I’ll pay you five hundred!” he shouted.
She bit her lip.
The crowd fell silent.
“For five hundred dollars, going, going…” the auctioneer looked desperate and stalled for a bit. “The work she’ll do is worth more than five hundred…”
“I won’t work!”
The auctioneer screamed. “Be quiet! She’s sold to the gentleman over there.”
The chains came off and she was led roughly to the gentleman who had paid so much for her. “What’s your name?” he asked quietly.
She didn’t reply.
He led her gently to his carriage.
“I will not work.”
The man smiled, and opened the door and pointed inside. She stepped in, shocked. She’d never ridden inside a carriage before. Before long, the man was seated opposite her and the carriage rolled out of town.
“I will not work…I will not work…” she said over and over again. Her master didn’t respond. Then they arrived and she saw her new home. Her mouth fell open. What was all this? There were several wooden cabins and lots of people, of all ages, roaming the grounds.
The gentleman opened the door. “Welcome to the safe house.”
She shook her head. “I will not work.”
“You won’t have to.”
She looked at the man in surprise.
“This is a safe house for people like you. I want to stop slavery, one slave at a time. You will live here, get fed, educated, and help change the world.”
Overcome, the girl fell to her knees. “Is this a joke?”
The man smiled. “Of course not.”
She wept. “I will work long and hard to repay you.”