At home that night master sat in his rocking chair drinking a glass of ale. He felt he had taken a beating. Jack had finally won, he thought. He won because he held the moral high ground. Jack had been right about the Negroes, and he, Whittemore, had been wrong. All of these years he had been wrong. He had been unfair to a whole race of people. He had been unfair to his students to whom he had lied. He drank another glass of ale.
A former sailor and un-ordained minister on a Liverpool-built slave ship, Master Whittemore after years of being obstinately opposed to freedom for slaves now admitted to himself after Jack's and my reading that slavery was wrong. He always had known it was wrong but he had tried to convince himself and, what was worse, others, that it was good. He now knew it truly for the first time. He saw his own blindness, and clearly realized that this slavery ideology he thought he cherished had actually been the cause of his tormenting himself and making himself miserable and ill all these years, and others miserable as well. He vowed to change.
"Through the mouths of babes..." he reflected. The next morning he astounded his students.
"I'm going back to the sea to complete my mission, and am in fact leaving off the teaching of children," he told the hushed class.
It was the first time he had ever genuinely commanded their attention. He told them he dreamed of returning around the stormy cape to India and China, and that he had known for a long time that he must return.
Master said he had one, more short lesson:
"Children. Up until today I have failed you and that's why I will no longer be your teacher. I saw yesterday that what I had been saying to you about slavery was wrong. Jack Stone and Jeremy made me see it. Their recital yesterday was a noble act of courage that we should all hope to emulate. They stood for what they knew was right regardless of the consequences. That's what I'm going to do now - stand for what I know is right. Better to be late than never try to do the right thing. I bid you all good luck! I am off again to the wide open seas to hopefully find something left of purity and natural goodness. Perhaps I'll find a bit in me. Goodbye and go straight home."
YOU ARE READING
Jack: Book One in the Trilogy, the Battle Begins
Teen FictionIn Book 1, Jack conspires with friend Jeremy to undermine their racist, secessionist teacher's efforts to poison his students' minds with his benefits-of-slavery lectures. Will the students buy into it? Not if Jack has any say. The book is dedicated...
