Chapter 15: Sentence

Remy LeBeau gritted his teeth in anger as he saw the bailiff take the arms of the man behind the rail. The little girl beside him reached out to him, tears streaming down her face, and grabbed his hand. "Logan, please!" She tried to cling to his hand, but the army officer grabbed her firmly around her waist and dragged her away. The court watched with held breaths as both girl and man were dragged off in opposite directions. The girl was kicking, struggling, crying in anguish as she was pulled backward. "Logan!" she shrieked. "Logan…Papa…oh, mister, please, please, don't hurt him, mister, please don't hurt him!" Her anguished pleas trailed off as the army officer wrestled her out the side door. Through the window in the wall, he could see the child being forced to undress until only her white shift and her pantaloons were left. Her dress was taken from her roughly, and then she was marched back through the courtroom and out to the town square's pillory. Her petticoat was still lying on the floor behind the rail, and he took a moment to scoop them up as he passed. Everyone in the courthouse was heading out to the town square.

The man, John Logan, was already stripped to the waist. The town's sheriff was tying rope around his wrists in front of him, and now was pulling the rope through the ring at the top of the post. Remy winced. He knew what was going to happen, knew what it was going to feel like. The man was twisting, straining to look behind him, at the child who was being forced to put her head and hands in the indentations in the bottom half of the pillory. The top half was then brought down and locked into place. "Don't worry about me!" the man shouted to the child, who was still crying for her papa. "Try to bear it. I'm sorry, Jubilee!" Then a leather-wrapped wooden bit was shoved between his teeth to bite down on as the sheriff drew the whip back. Remy winced and looked away, looking down at the delicate white petticoat in his hands.

The lash hissed through the air with a vengeful whine, and Logan clamped down on the bit as it connected. His body went rigid with the pain. Dear God, he'd never thought anything could hurt so much. Was this what Jubilee had experienced almost two months ago? No wonder she'd almost died. He tried to focus on anything to counter the pain. He heard her frantic cries behind him, heard her sobs, and his heart ached as he heard her. "Papa! Papa, oh, please, Mister, please stop! Please don't hurt him!" She'd called him 'Papa'. She loved him. Loved him enough to break her customary silence around others, loved him enough to beg for him. He knew if she heard him scream it would cut her heart to ribbons, so he tried to suppress it, but when the fifth lash came burning down right on top of the second one, cutting deeper into the flesh and muscle of his back, the bit slipped from between his teeth and he howled in agony.

He was barely aware of anything by the time the tenth lash fell, barely aware of anything but the burning agony in his back. His mind only dimly registered her scream of terror and horror as she saw his bleeding body being cut down from the whipping post. He tried to rise, so she would know he was all right, but he couldn't manage it, and fell back with a groan.

"Here," said a voice. A hand touched his shoulder, careful not to brush against the bleeding slashes. "Drink dis. It will help. Don' worry 'bout de girl; you not goin' to be much use to her if you dead." A pause, during which Logan stared at the stranger warily. "Don' worry, I'm a frien'. Name's Remy LeBeau." Logan took the silver flask held in front of him by the stranger with the oddly-accented voice, and drank down one gulp.

The stuff burned all the way down his throat, and after so long of not tasting strong whiskey it was something of a shock to his system. He coughed, choked, and spat, and then his head snapped up as he heard the whine of a lash. The crowd around the pillory was too thick for him to see what was happening, but Jubilee's high-pitched scream of agony told him plenty. He got to his feet, wobbling a little, and tried to get to the crowd.

"No," the stranger said. "You in no condition to fight your way t'rough dat crowd. And you can't do her any good, so you better stay right where you are." He grabbed Logan's arm.

Logan twisted around in the stranger's grip, snarling. "You got any idea what they doin' in there?" he hissed. "They're whippin' her, they're hurtin' my little girl…" He flinched at the sound of another scream.

"I know what dey doin', Mister Logan," the stranger said grimly. "I was in de courtroom. I seen what dey done to you bot', and I heard what de sentence was. I been on de receivin' end of de whip more times'n I can count. Believe me, I know." He looked pained as another scream split the air. "Let me tell you somet'ing, Mister Logan. Remy used to be a slave too. A branded one. Grew up on a plantation in Louisiana. My mot'er was a Creole slave; my fat'er was de plantation master. I had to watch him beat my mot'er one day at a whippin' post, and he didn't stop till she hadn' a single inch of untouch skin lef' on her body. She died."

Logan stared appalled. "What happened?"

The man leaned back against the whipping post, taking out an already rolled cigarette and lighting a match against the wooden post. "Remy got bought by a man who take him up to Canada. Dey got no slaves dere, mister; you free soon's you cross de border." He took a long drag on his cigarette. "I seen you an' your girl in de courtroom. If you let me, I'll do de same for her. When she's well enough, I buy her, take her north. Once in Canada we get rid of dat brand, give her papers, she a free woman. She can come back here if dat what she want."

There was a cheer from the crowd, and suddenly the sound of harsh, agonized sobs filled the air. Remy smoked his cigarette furiously. "She pass out. Dey cheer 'cause dey get her awake again. Bastards." He took a long drag. "Dey gonna take time wit' dis whippin'. Merde."

Logan clenched his fist, feeling the tears on his face and not caring. He could hear her voice, hoarse from screaming, begging them not to hit her again, that she was sorry and she would do anything if they would please not hit her again, and her father, was Papa all right? Several heads turned around to look, but not many, and no one told her he was all right. Then she screamed, and Logan knew the whipping had started again. He counted them; there were only two left to go. She screamed for both, and then there was nothing but sobbing. Remy smoked the last of his cigarette as the sheriff departed, leaving the hot, sunny town square for the cool interior of the saloon.

"Water," came a sobbing voice. Jubilee. "Please, somebody, I need water." Someone detached himself from the crowd and went to the well. Logan breathed a sigh of thanks as he took the flask of whiskey again and swallowed another mouthful. The boy came running back with a bucketful of water. Logan saw a little ripple as it was passed from person to person through the crowd, and then suddenly Jubilee gave a short, sharp cry.

"There's yer water!" came a cruel laugh. The bucket was passed along, and the little boy went running again. Logan struggled to his feet, the whiskey having dulled the edge off his pain, and began to fight his way through the crowd. People shoved and pushed him cruelly around, trying to keep him back, but he finally broke through the crowd and came out in the cleared space around the pillory.

He saw immediately what had been done with the water. They had dashed it over her, soaking her hair, face, and hands; and a second bucket, flying toward her, drenched her thin shift. The soaked material clung to her skin, outlining her buttocks and breasts and washing some of the blood from her bleeding back. He could see the livid welts, two still oozing blood. The top half of her shift was stained red with it.

She looked up with eyes dazed by pain, and saw him. "Papa!" she sobbed, and he ignored the crowd as he went to her. The pillory was just short enough to keep her slightly bent, and he knew by the end of the four hours her hips and lower back would be aching. He pushed the soaked, tangled hair back from her face, kissed her cheek tenderly, and pressed her face to his shoulder. She buried her face in it, crying bitterly, and he buried his own face in her hair, which had come loose from its braids and hung in damp, dripping tangles around her face, so the watching crowd wouldn't see him cry. "Papa, I tried to be brave, I really did, but it hurt…My back's on fire, Papa, I hurt so much…"

"It's okay, darlin'," he said softly. "It's okay, go 'head an' cry, yer a sweet, brave, wonderful girl, an' I love ya…" She cried unashamedly into his shoulder, sobbing in misery and pain, and Logan held her and let her cry. The crowd watched in silence, and on the outskirts of the crowd, an auburn-haired Cajun chain-smoked his cigarettes and watched with a few tears in his own eyes.

Logan didn't move the entire four hours. At the end of the first hour, people, sensing nothing dramatic was going to happen, started walking away, going about their own business. The town boys gathered around them, with stones and clods of dirt, but when Logan felt her body shudder from the impact, he gave a terrible snarl and turned on the boys. They scattered, resuming their abuse of the whipped slave girl from a distance verbally. Jubilee was too tired and in too much pain to notice. Logan held her as she sobbed, soothed her and comforted her, gave her water when she asked for it from the bucket someone had left for them out of pity, and didn't move. He never left her, until the four hours were up and the sheriff came to release her. He sniffed. "Filthy little slave," he said scornfully, "crying like a baby."

"She's a kid," Logan snarled. "Let me put you up here and do the same thing to you, and we'll see how much you bawl."

"Stand aside," the sheriff said, and unlocked the pillory. Jubilee slid limply out of it to the ground, moaning faintly as her raw back hit the ground. Logan gritted his teeth and tried to pick her up, but the sheriff snapped at him, "Back off, Mister. We're gonna wash her off first." He grabbed her arm firmly and dragged her across the square to the well, where he brought up a bucketful of water and dashed it over her. Three bucketfuls, and she crouched under the deluge and trembled until he finished, then got up when he seized her arm and dragged her off to the jail. "Take me too!" Logan cried. "Put me in there with her…" but the sheriff ignored him and disappeared into the jail with her. Logan was about to follow them, but Remy grabbed his arm. "Not'ing more you can do for her, mon ami. C'mon, let me take you to de town doctor, get you treated. Den I get you somet'ing to eat, and you tell me 'bout her, non?"

Logan didn't say a word to the doctor, nor did the man say anything to him. He didn't say another word until they were out of the doctor's office, and he determinedly headed for the jail.

Jubilee lay on her side on a bed of straw, sleeping. Her shift was still damp, and she had tear tracks on her face, but she was breathing shallowly and evenly. Logan looked at the sheriff, sitting there with his feet up. "Did she eat anything?"

"Didn't give her nothing. We aren't paid to feed the prisoners."

Logan ground his teeth. "Is it all right if I give her somethin' ta eat later, when she wakes up?"

The sheriff shrugged. "Suit yourself." He leaned his chair back against the wall, pulled his hat over his face, and went to sleep.

Remy tugged on Logan's arm. "Come on. I get you somet'ing to eat at Miss Gina's, den we bring somet'ing back for her. She sleeping now. Let her fin' some comfort in dat for a little while." With a last look behind him, Logan left the jail.